Let me be the first to say this about the Earth X series- Alex Ross' art wouldn't fit this series well. The biggest knock against Earth X has been that John Paul Leon (no, not the guy who knocked up Madonna) is pencilling. It's true that anyone short of Ross doing this book would come under scrutiny, but I'd say that Leon's art here fits the concept, at least in this issue, better than Ross'. The story of X-51, better known as Machine Man, venturing to the moon and learning the complete history of humanity is told by Krueger disturbingly easily. Krueger and Ross has expanded on the Celestials, beings brought into the spotlight in the Heroes Return series. You see, these Celestials basically created human-kind, and the Marvel Universe of heroes are the genetic deviants and eventually all of humanity will become 'deviants.' Mankind is about to go about that change, and Machine Man has been chosen to catalog this event by the Watcher, who can no longer handle his duties.
Let's get back to the art aspect of Earth X. Alex Ross has become quite good at sequential storytelling since his first comics work, but Earth X no.0 is barely sequential but for the first 12 or so pages. Leon maintains a fluid feeling between panels, like a highlight reel from a days worth of NFL action. Also, don't think that this book is supposed to be pretty. It's not, and Leon's art captures that perfectly.
Krueger and Ross have taken the basic Marvel Universe and not really expanded it, but explained it in such a way that it explains every character in the MU. The dialogue between the Watcher and X-51 is as if a teacher is speaking to a student. The novel Ishmael comes to mind, where Ishmael, a gorilla, is telling a human about how humanity is destroying the Earth through pollution, and killing off endangered species and such. The only difference is that here, the Celestials are the reigning species and humanity is the endangered one.Don't pick up this book if you're expecting a great revelation, or even the beginning of the Earth X storyline. No. 0 is pure background, so check out the Earth X Sketchbook if you want the characters. What you will get, however, is an in depth and interesting background on how the Marvel Universe got started, and a slightly different spin on its major events, especially on the kingdom of Asgard.
A quick note-- Did anyone else notice that Earth X had no ads? When's the last time a Marvel book that was a 'normal' issue didn't have ads? Thats all right, they make up for it with a four dollar cover price.Rating- 9.0 out of 10. Pop Culture Parallel- "New Skin"; Incubus- S.C.I.E.N.C.E- "It's all been seen with the exception for what could be, when will we be new skin?" "Dead skin will atrophy itself to start again." R.I.Y.L- Kingdom Come, What If?, The Nail
"There is no good. There is no evil. There is only change. " -The Watcher
