Review - Ultimate X-Men:Volume 4: Hellfire & Brimstone

Scott Summers and Jean Grey are finally a couple, but it seems that fate is hellbent on interfering with their happiness. Still bitter from Jean’s rejection of him, Wolverine instigates a fight with Cyclops that lands both of them on a mission to the Savage Land in an attempt to force them to make amends. Then, Jean begins experiencing excruciatingly painful visions and seizures. Professor Xavier considers them to be a result of her growing mutant abilities, but a powerful multinational cult believes Jean to be the avatar of the powerful Phoenix God.

Ultimate X-Men Volume 4: Hellfire & Brimstone collects Ultimate X-Men #21-25, written by Mark Millar and illustrated by Adam Kubert and Kaare Andrews.

At first blush, Hellfire & Brimstone appears to be Millar and Kubert’s attempt to modernize the iconic Dark Phoenix Saga. It introduces Kitty Pryde into the Ultimate Universe and has her enrolling in Xavier’s school, which is contingent on her never joining the X-Men on any missions as per mother’s request. Furthermore, we see Jean Grey struggling with her growing powers. This manifests in a series of seizures that result in her having hallucinations about the divine Phoenix Force. Millar and Kubert also reinvent the Hellfire Club as the secret investors of Xavier’s school. They are an international organization, largely comprised of billionaires, whose hidden agenda is to resurrect the Phoenix. There are a lot of interesting elements there, specifically the re-imagining of the Phoenix as a mystical force rather than a cosmic one. Millar and Kubert also ground the storyline by making the Phoenix out to be some kind of symptom of a psychic mental illness. For me, the space elements that are occasionally brought into the X-Men have always seemed at odds with the otherwise grounded world that they exist in. As such, I like the attempt to make the Phoenix less cosmic and more divine or psychological in nature. With that said, Millar and Kubert don’t seem invested in actually retelling the Dark Phoenix Saga in any meaningful way. In fact, it’s but one of several storylines going on in this collection.

There are a lot of plots and subplots in this arc, all of which serve to further diminish the impact of and distract from what could have been an interesting contemporary take on the X-Men’s most famous storyline. First, we have Kitty’s introduction. It’s cute and brief, but isn’t quite as interesting as her 616 counterpart’s where she had to rescue the X-Men after they were kidnapped by the White Queen. In this version, we merely see her tour the school and she enrolls without a problem shortly thereafter. There’s no tension or conflict whatsoever. We also have a subplot involving Wolverine and Cyclops going on a mission to the Savage Land to investigate the disappearance of a platoon of marines. This takes up two issues and is a tremendously disappointing diversion from the main plot. It’s basically just two issues of them arguing and being pouty, interrupted only briefly by an action sequence involving them fighting some zombies (yeah, zombies). The Brotherhood also gets tossed into the mix. In a set-up to the arc that follows this one, Beast effectively gets catfished by the Blob and unwittingly reveals that Magneto is alive and well. Of all the subplots, it’s the most random and unnecessary. Then, we’ve got Iceman’s parents suing Professor Xavier for the injuries he sustained while on their world tour. Ultimately, all of these narratives distract from what should have been the main storyline. Instead of having the focus on Jean Grey, the Phoenix, and the Hellfire Club, readers have their attention drawn to all these other places that aren’t contributing in any meaningful way to the primary narrative. As such, the whole arc feels anticlimactic and doesn’t build towards an exciting conclusion like it should. Where the original Dark Phoenix Saga was an epic that spanned several issues, this take has the bulk of its events crammed into one issue.

There’s really no getting around the fact that Ultimate X-Men Volume 4: Hellfire & Brimstone was a mess. It let down the storyline it was inspired by due to its failure to match its grand scale. The creative team is juggling with far too many narratives, creating a frenetic and unfocused arc that will undoubtedly leave most readers cold. In some ways, Kubert’s art matched the haphazard writing. While issue 25 is beautifully illustrated with a lot of effort put into details, the issues that precede it are incredibly inconsistent. Kubert frequently omits lips and the bodies seem hastily drawn. With that said, the one saving grace of this collection is Kaare Andrews. He provides guest pencils on issues 23 and 24. His art is dynamic, colourful, and surprisingly quite cute. It adds a freshness and youthfulness that this series sometimes lacks. Still, it’s not quite enough to rescue the arc.

RATING: C-