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Inhuman: Genesis 12/9/2014 7:29:34 AM
This post originally appeared on thunderalleybcp.com
Inhuman is one of Marvel’s highest priorities at the moment. Its first collected edition, Genesis, is now available.
Marvel is grooming The Inhumans for a “moment.” The characters have been around since the ‘60s and have appeared fairly consistently throughout the years. The focus has usually been on the members of the Inhuman royal family, who often operated like an odd super team. Sisters Medusa and Crystal both have served as members of Marvel hero teams, primarily the Fantastic Four and Avengers.
With Marvel keeping the multi-media angles of its properties in the forefront of its thinking, the focus on the Inhumans makes sense. The film rights to the X-Men and the entire concept of “mutants” are held by Fox. Relations between Marvel and Fox could charitably be labeled as “strained.” They might want to insist otherwise, but the fact is that Marvel needs a replacement for mutants in its insanely lucrative film franchise. Thus, the ascendance of the Inhumans. The Inhumans are slated for their own movie in a few years and currently are factoring into a high profile arc on the Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. television series.
Inhuman is another key component of Marvel’s Inhumans strategy. The series not only brings the concept into the beating heart of the Marvel Universe, it explores how a wide swath of people who were unaware of their Inhuman ancestry cope with the sudden activation of their powers.
Genesis works to establish the new Inhuman status quo. Inhuman follows the events of Infinity, which led to the Inhumans’ city of Attilan returning to Earth from space and an environmental event that activated the latent Inhuman gene in potentially millions of people across the globe. With Attilan established as a new sovereign state, located right in the Hudson River, the political and family drama follows fairly easily.
Ubiquitous writer Charles Soule establishes the parameters early on. The roving cloud of “Terrigen,” the substance that transforms Inhumans and awakens their powers, is creating all sorts of new super-powered beings. Some undergo monstrous transformations. Others retain their looks, but gain powers that can be hard to control. Many are unable to withstand contact with Terrigen and die during the “cocoon” process that exposure creates. Regular humans are not affected by the cloud.
Inhuman posits a sort of “arms race” among the familiar royal family, led by Queen Medusa, and the inhabitants of a couple of other previously hidden Inhuman settlements to locate and retrieve newly activated Inhumans (or “Nuhumans”). The factions clash and a future war looms.
In the newly relocated Attilan, Medusa deals with the politics of establishing a new sovereign entity within the boundaries of the U.S. Medusa creates a sanctuary for Nuhumans. She also simultaneously tries to show strength to the rest of the world while engaging them diplomatically. Soule does a nice job of showing the fragile realpolitik situation Medusa is forced to navigate to protect her people.
Long-time fans might be surprised at how little focus Inhuman gives to familiar characters. Medusa is front and center throughout and her cousin Gorgon plays an important supporting role as the mentor to various Nuhumans. Triton, who’s undergone a metamorphosis that has rendered him less human-looking, also pops up in a small role. But other familiar characters are M.I.A. Karnak [spoiler alert] died before the start of Inhuman. King Black Bolt and his treacherous brother Maximus are missing and appear only on the arc’s final page. Crystal (and her human daughter), the canine Lockjaw, and Medusa and Black Bolt’s son don’t appear at all. Crystal, arguably the highest profile Inhuman over the past several decades, isn’t mentioned even once. The Unspoken, a deposed Inhuman king introduced in an Avengers story a few years ago, appears later in the arc.
Instead, Inhuman puts a lot of emphasis on the Nuhumans. That’s not a bad thing, as the first arc shows the transformation experiences of various new characters. Some, like Inferno, Lineage and Reader, are especially interesting ideas that Soule makes good use of. We also meet Lash, an Inhuman from one of the hidden settlements, who’s attempting to recruit strong Nuhumans (and dispose of weak ones) in an attempt to create a counter force to Medusa and Attilan.
Inhuman does an effective job of setting up the new status quo and of grounding the Inhumans firmly in the center of the Marvel Universe. Familiar faces like Captain America and Thor show up and the Inhumans themselves have turned up in issues of the popular new Ms. Marvel series. The latter is a canny way for Marvel to spread the Inhuman concept beyond the core series.
On the art side, fan favorite ‘90s veteran Joe Madureira handles the first three issues. His distinctive, visually exaggerated style works well for this concept. His character designs and imaginative take on Attilan create a strong visual identity for Inhuman that helps sell the concept. Ryan Stegman was a simpatico choice to succeed Madureira. He has a similar style, but manages to incorporate his own touches so that there’s both consistency and variety in the visual presentation of Inhuman.
Marvel is pursuing an ambitious path with Inhuman. While trying to tell a unique superhuman saga set in the Marvel Universe, Inhuman is also ground zero for an important multi-media initiative. That the creative team does such an effective job with the former makes Marvel’s ambitions for the latter seem attainable. Even if you don’t care about the eventual movie, TV and video game prospects of the characters, Inhuman is an intriguing series that does some interesting things with an old concept. It’s worth checking out.
