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Average Customer Rating:

The recycling bin of the AoA

Customer Rating:

I have not yet read volumes 2-4, so this is really a review of just this volume. Overall, I was underwhelmed. There are good moments and moments of promise, but ultimately this is a set of stories of varying quality cobbled together for a complete collection. The Tales from the Age of Apocalypse (Sinister Bloodlines and By the Light) are the high points. They center on Cyclops and Blink, respectively, and tell well thought, engaging stories about how these two fit into the world. The stories are bigger than the individual characters, but those characters provide the main takeaways. Then there are the two X-Men Chronicles. The first is pretty good, telling a story about Magneto assembling the X-Men and their first battle. It is interesting and lays out the characters. Still, things happen suddenly or not at all; Jean Grey faces off against a formidable foe and all you see is her saying "this one is mine" and several pages later returning to the group. This is typical. The second Chronicles tells a story of a love triangle in the X-Men. It's a good premise, and there is a good villain, but it suffers from being over-the-top 80's stylistically and again, too much is crammed in there. It happens very quickly. The series devolves further when we get to the X-Man stuff. The first one is a very short story about X-Man's origin. It insufficiently explains Sinister's motives and what he is actually doing; maybe that becomes clear after you have read the rest of the AoA, but I haven't. The worst part here is the art - it's not bad, but Sinister looks like a Jockeys model with a huge package and a thin sexual predator goatee. Every time he's drawn, it's hard to look at. The second X-Man comic is actually much better, but the Sugarman is a bad villain. I found myself not enjoying it. The most frustrating entry in here is the four Blink comics. Great character and great premise - a girl finds herself in a far away place and falls in love in the midst of a colossal conflict. It's a formula for success. But this piece is so full of non-sequiturs. The more obvious ones are things like in one pane the guards say the cell prevents her teleportation ability, and in the next she teleports out of the cell. Or a series of frames in which she is either tied up or untied in every other frame. At one point she says "I have three bolts left" while on her back is a quiver just bristling with bolts, and she hasn't used any lately anyway. These are easily explained and overlooked, but typify the storytelling here. Some pages I spent a long time just trying to figure out which order to read things, because the narration is disjointed. A major betrayal, meant to be a key in the plot, is never explained as to why it's a big deal. I can hypothesize, but I ultimately don't know why the characters care. Other than the Tales from the AoA and Blink, these stories are not really worth telling. And including Blink, are poorly told anyway. If volume 2 is more of the same, I will have no interest in finishing the cycle. Reasons to buy: If you are a completionist, an X-Men junkie, or just want to fill in a few small corners of the story for yourself Reasons not to buy: If you aren't already invested in the AoA or are only looking for the highlights from the X-Men

Age of Apocalypse is my favorite graphic novel ever

Customer Rating:

the age of apocalypse x men series is one of the coolest things i've ever seen in comics, it's my favorite. it doesn't try to be PC or happy, it's really dark and the x-men are cooler. i have another review more about the story on book 2 page cause as others have said marvel didn't group this series together perfectly, you are supposed to start with book 2 and then 3 then 4. book 1 is a collection of backstories best for being read after the rest. so it's true chronologically book one is first, but dramatically and storywise you should read book one last cause the stories in book one, although good, are kind of sporadic and meaningless to the rest of the series. (x men chronicles are the best and most important parts of book one) trust me, as someone who collected all these and read them in order when they came out, you should read it 2, 3, 4, then 1. and also, you should definitely check these out if you haven't, if you like anything about comic books you should!!

Believe the hype!!

Customer Rating:

The book is amazing! It has really good writing and awesome new looks on characters. It is set in the AoA obviously. This is a world where Xavier is no longer around, and everything goes to hell. Mutants are named superior to humans by Apocalypse. There is much talk about this book being "out of order", and that it should not be the first story. I have not read the other books yet. So I don't know how out of order it is. But I read it first anyway, I was not going to let a book called Vol 1 be saved for the final read sorry. In order, out of order whatever it does not take away from this book and its collection of stories. You'll love it a must buy. When Marvel puts out stuff like this, it is what gives it the slight edge over DC. BUY BUY!!

Age of Apocalypse-The Prequel

Customer Rating:

I have to disagree with the people who think this was an ill advised attempt to rip off the comic reading consumer. Because of their advice I skipped Volume 1 and went directly to Volume 2, and spent a long time trying to figure out what was going on in this counter universe. I now see that if taken as a prequel (because it really doesn't feature Apocalypse) it offers all the background you need to understand what is to follow. It would have made for a more enjoyable read. OK, I do agree that the Blink mini-series was ill placed, but I feel the Marvel team felt they needed to bulk up the book to make it worth the money.

Good series

Customer Rating:

This came out when i went to college and stopped collecting comic books for monetary reasons. I was always a huge X-Fan, and am glad I picked up the whole series. The first book is pretty cool as a retelling of X-Men #1, with Magneto in place of Professor X and Apocalypse filling in for Magneto as the Big Bad. Read back to back the whole series seems a bit disjointed, but you'll have that with a cross title series. If you are an X-Men lover, and are in for a long story, this is a good series to have.