Osborn Meets His Match?

With all the episodes and add-ons in the  “Dark Reign”  series Marvel has released over the years, you’d expect a dud after a while. That being said, “Dark X-Men” is easily one of the weakest, thanks to team that is hard to connect with at first and a story that lacks the same pizazz as the others. While it’s obvious to readers that many of these characters aren’t heroes, the “Dark” X-Men are perhaps more conflicted than any of the other Norman Osborn-powered groups.

Sadly, there’s not the same type of communication between this group, as it is obvious right off the bat that they can’t stand each other. While that same element powers the “Dark” Avengers, that team can manage to keep it together for longer than a few minutes.

Simply put, these guys, in spite of what they’ve done by themselves, feel like screw ups.

As a result, it’s hard to let your bad side loose while reading this, despite the fact that it’s a well-told tale.

Already leading his own version of the Avengers, it feels weird that Osborn would be so on top of things with his own version of the X-Men too. Nevertheless, with members of the “Dark” Avengers appearing in this comic as well, it only enhanced Osborn’s wrath and shows the reader how out of his mind he actually is. Later on, his confrontation with X-Man only cements this further and gives the audience a “villain against a bunch of villains” formula that works well, just not as well as you’d hope.

Osborn’s antics, while enjoyable, aren’t enough to make this book something special.

In the end, this is too poorly assembled a team.

For one, while no one would ever question Mystique’s motives, the involvement of Omega Man and Mimic complicate things immensely. These dudes are in no way, shape or form, bad guys. Conflicted, unable to control their powers and petrified of Osborn, they make this team a far cry away from the real X-Men. Luckily, “Dark” Beast is such an evil character that writer Paul Cornell is able to have some much-needed fun here until the ball on the plot starts rolling. Once it does and X-Man is introduced, things pick up quickly, but before that, “Dark X-Men” is a rolling stone that gathers little moss.

Ironically, the visuals of Leonard Kirk have a similar feel to them, as they lack the detail and energy early on needed to make the story truly intriguing. However, once the team travels into Osborn’s mind, things pick up, resulting in some beautiful full-page and splash page illustrations. Encompassed with color and a great sense of style, this trade proves that Kirk has real potential.

Like Cornell, they just need some better material to work with.

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About Patrick Hickey Jr. 13801 Articles
Patrick Hickey Jr. is a full-time Assistant Professor of Communication & Performing Arts and Director of the Journalism program at Kingsborough Community College and is the chairman of the City University of New York Journalism Council. He is the Founder and Editor-In-Chief of ReviewFix.com. He's also a former News Editor at NBC Local Integrated Media and National Video Games Writer at Examiner.com where his work was mentioned in National Ad campaigns by Disney, Nintendo and EA Sports. Hickey was also the Editor-In-Chief of two College Newspapers before he received his BA in Journalism from Brooklyn College. Hickey's work has been published in The New York Daily News, The New York Times, Complex, The Hockey Writers, Yahoo!, Broadway World, Examiner, NYSportScene Magazine, ProHockeyNews.com, GothamBaseball.com, The Syracuse Post-Standard, Scout.com and the official sites of the Brooklyn Aces and New York Islanders. His first book, The Minds Behind the Games: Interviews With Cult And Classic Video Game Developers was released in April 2018 and is chock full of interviews with legendary developers. His second book in the series, The Minds Behind Adventures Games, was released in December 2019. His third book, The Minds Behind Sports Games, was released in September 2020. His fourth book, The Minds Behind Shooter Games, was released in March 2021. The Minds Behind Sega Genesis Games and The Minds Behind PlayStation Games were released in 2022 and The Minds Behind PlayStation 2 was published in January 2023. Hickey is also a contracted comic book writer, currently penning his original series, "Condrey," as well as "The Job," "Brooklyn Bleeds" "Dem Gulls" and "KROOM" for Legacy Comix, where he serves as founder, owner and Editor-in-Chief. Hickey Jr. is also a voice actor, having starred in the 2018 indie hit and 2019 Switch, PS4 and Xbox One release, The Padre (also serving as English language Story Editor), from Shotgun With Glitters. The sequel, The Padre: One Shell Straight to Hell was released in February 2021- Hickey also served as a Story Editor and Lead Voiceover performer. He has also done narration and trailers for several other titles including The Kaiju Offensive, Relentless Rex and Roniu’s Tale. Hickey is also the lead voiceover performer on Mega Cat Studios’ upcoming title WrestleQuest, responsible for nearly 90 characters in the game, as well as Skybound's Renfield: Bring Your Own Blood, where he voices both Dracula and Renfield, as well as several other characters. He also stars in Ziggurat Interactive’s World Championship Boxing Manager 2, where he performs the VO of nearly every male character in the game. He also worked on the Atari VCS’s BPM Boy.

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