Fallen Angels #1
Psylocke gets a new mission in Fallen Angels #1, by writer Bryan Hill, artist Szymin Kudranski, colorist Frank D’Armata, and letterer Joe Sabino. This isn’t the old Psylocke, though, but Kwannon, the original owner of the Asian body Elizabeth Braddock was put in, and her methods are quite a bit more extreme.
In Tokyo, a girl with a butterfly tattoo on her neck puts a machine on her face and goes on a rampage on a train, killing all in her path before attacking the conductor and crashing the train. On Krakoa, Psylocke is meditating when she is given a warning about a being named Apoth, who could spell doom for the world. She goes to Magneto to ask if she can leave the island, but he refuses due to tragic circumstances (see X-Force #1, there will be no spoilers here), before telling her to talk to Mister Sinister. Sinister agrees to help her get off the island and tells her to take some others with her, people like her who are restless with the peace of Krakoa. She finds Cable and X-23 sparring while everyone else dances and asks them to come to her house. She explains what she needs to do and X-23 volunteers only if Psylocke leaves Cable behind because X-23 believes he deserves the peace of Krakoa. They go to Tokyo and meet up with an old associate of Psylocke’s, Motoko, who claims not to know anything about Apoth but shows them the video of the train wreck. Psylocke notices the girl’s tattoo and realizes that it’s her daughter that was taken from her when she was being trained as an assassin. She attacks Motoko and gets the location of where devices like her daughter had, the delivery system of a machine-based neuro drug called Overclock is located. Her and X-23 go there and find more children on the drug, who drop dead as they approach. One survives, and Apoth uses it as a speaker, telling Psylocke to leave him to his peace before the child dies. They return to Krakoa, and Psylocke offers Sinister Apoth’s technology before she kills him if Sinister helps her and then tells X-23 and Cable to assemble a team she can trust.
Kwannon has only returned to the X-books in the last year, but even in her 90s run with the X-Men, not much was known about her other than she was a telepathic mutant and a ninja. Her origin wasn’t fleshed out before she, returned in Elizabeth Braddock’s original body, contracted the Legacy Virus and died. There is one bit of bad continuity in this book, where it seems like Hill didn’t know about the mind swapping the two went through (unless before dying Kwannon put a fragment of her mind back in her old body which she was able to take control of when Psylocke went back into her old British body during the whole Hunt For Wolverine thing from last year), but other than that, he fleshes Kwannon out nicely. Readers to get to see fragments of her training with an unidentified master and get into her head. She doesn’t like the tranquility of Krakoa very much, and when she’s given her vision of Apoth immediately asks to leave to deal with it. She’s a warrior, and Hill gets that across very well. Giving her a daughter and that daughter’s fate makes the whole thing that much more personal for her.
It was interesting of Hill to choose X-23 and Cable to be the core of Psylocke’s new team. Both of them are people who have been fighting their entire lives, and one would assume they’d be happy in a place where they could have some peace and quiet for once, but they are just as restless as Kwannon. X-23 wants to do something to get out of Logan’s shadow, but she also doesn’t think Cable should be involved because she believes he deserves the peace. Sinister brings Cable back in when X-23 and Kwannon return, almost as insurance. What could Sinister’s purpose of teaming them together be? It’s an interesting question that will hopefully have a good answer.
The art by Szymon Kudranski is terrific. Fresh off a six-issue stint on DC’s Action Comics, Kudranski does equally well in shadow and in light, giving the characters a definition and personality. He actually makes Psylocke look Japanese, which is something a lot of artists over the years have failed at, regardless of who is control of the body. Elsewhere in the book, he uses close-ups of eyes, lips, and faces during the dialogue-heavy seems to accentuate the emotion of the dialogue. His fight scenes are well choreographed and clear. His art is enhanced by Frank D’Armata’s adroit colors, which make all of the scenes in the book pop, especially the one where Psylocke talks to Magneto. Magneto’s new costume is all white, but the room he and Psylocke are in is pitch black, and it’s a wonderful contrast.
Fallen Angels #1 is a great first issue. It focuses on a little-used X-Men character and puts some flesh on her bones. Hill sets up an interesting conflict, one that ties into Hickman’s conceit about humanity using machines to equalize themselves with mutants, and has picked out characters who all have the same warrior spirit, ones who would bristle at the peace of Krakoa. Szymon Kudranski’s art is impressive, and it will be great to see what he can do in more action-heavy issues. While not perfect, this is an excellent beginning for a new book.