End Pages - the best thing about Ed Piskor's "X-Men: Grand Design"

I've been reading issues of Ed Piskor's "X-Men: Grand Design" recently. It is a nice project with noble aspirations - it tries to condense and make sense of five decades of X-Men history. Think about that - years of stories redesigned into one big thing with a throughline. Sounds intriguing, right? Marvel counts on that. They know people like and buy something that is actually readable - although, judging from their recent output, they tend to ignore that. Anyway - the concept is great. But that is about it.

***

The best thing about Ed Piskor's "X-Men: Grand Design" are the end pages where author lists all the sources he used in order to construct the story. That is really interesting part of the project. Because the story Piskor had contructed and the way it is told is rather ordinary and at times feels really contrived and forced. Essentially it is nothing more than a glorified rethread, a little bit more elaborate and inventive recap. It is middle of the road, nothing special, just barely good narrative that tries to make the least conflicted, universally accepted version of the story. Because of that it feels like a wasted opportunity.  

In some way "Grand Design" reminds me of John Byrne's Star Trek Photonovels - but unlike Piskor - Byrne is not doing rethreads, he forges new stories from the old parts.

The list is different thing. Because is not the thing - it is merely an inciting device, a catalyst for something else. It works on a different level.

Unlike the comic itself - the list of sources makes the case for imaginary collage. Something like "make your own story" "for imagination only". And that is something worth exploring. Because it is better than the book itself. It gives space to think and overthink and get bored - unconstrained by someone else's point of view. That is where the weirdness may come and thrive.  

I've included the lists for the first two issue. Probably will add the rest afterwards.

***

Aside from that - there is something wrong with "Grand Design". Deep inside - something really-really rotten lurks. Technically Ed Piskor is merely streamlining the events into more coherent and plausible timeline. And there is nothing wrong with trying to make sense of something that is substantially lacking it. But it is not the case when such thing is appropriate. Or even reasonable.

X-Men weren't conceived wholly. It is not a puzzle where every piece fits into the big picture. There was never a big picture. It was always whatever works in the particular moment. It is all bits and pieces here and there. There several distinct incarnations and in-between every single element of the concept was transformed, changed, replaced or retconned. X-Men franchise is essentially a Theseus ship which is still technically what it was meant to be but it is substantially different in every way.

It is dissonant and chaotic to the foundation. That is part of the charm of superhero comics - they don't make much sense in the long run - there are lots and lots of contradictions and contrivences. Trying to streamline it all into one well-rounded piece of narrative is utterly pointless. It is making of a Frankenstein monster, trying to fit pieces that don't fit together into one puzzle by thrusting and stitching all over.

There is also another problem. Besides streamlining of the story, "Grand Design" serves as a gentle cover-up of every stupid decision and retcon that ever happened throughout X-Men history. And there were many. In fact, whole lotta stupid things happened along the way. These stupid decisions reflect the times they were made in. They document the state of things and the solutions that were thought as appropriate. They are important to remember in order to avoid repeating them.

It's not like "Grand Design" erases them all-together - but it will likely serve as a go-to book on X-Men and because of that it will distort perception of actual albeit utterly nonsensical sequence of events. "Grand Design" is more than just a rethread or elaborate recap. It is a redaction of sorts - convenient version of the narrative. And that is wrong.

It is really sad that instead of trying to tell new and engaging stories Marvel is trying to fix something that already came and went.