Paradise X, Vol. 1 by Jim Krueger

Paradise X, Vol. 1 Reviews

• 
  Matt Oleskiewicz

  It’s a book late in a series of other books That I’ve never read nor heard of and I had no idea what was going on the entire time. Like, I got the story, but, I had no idea what was going on. A lot of dialogue and a lot of jumping around to confusing characters. Meh, comic book read.
• 
  Sandra Rosa

  actually have this in individual issues...
• 
  Gianfranco Mancini

  L'incontro-scontro tra le due May Parker e la reazione di Peter mi hanno fatto troppo ridere. Togliete Spider Man a Slott ed affidatelo a Krueger, vi prego!
• 
  logankstewart

  I first read Earth X a few years ago. I was largely unimpressed and decided not to read the sequels: Universe X and Paradise X. The whole series spans five large trade paper backs and I didn’t want to invest in the story. For some reason I decided to pick up Earth X again and give it a shot, and this time I was quickly engrossed… or at least interested.
  
  Earth X places the Marvel universe in the unspecified future. Captain America is an old man fighting a war against a large metaphor. Reed Richards, devastated over the deaths of his wife and the Human Torch, lives in seclusion in the remains of Dr. Doom’s mostly abandoned fortress. Wolverine is a fat, lazy slob who refuses to get off the couch. Peter Parker is much the same. In this future, familiar super-heroes are supplanted by a new breed of humanity: everyone has super powers.
  
  In the midst of this, the Watcher pulls the cyborg X-51 to the moon and names him the new Watcher. The world is ending and the Watcher wants X-51 to tell him everything that’s happening, as the Watcher has been blinded. There’s also a time machine and about a million side-plots. And dinosaurs.
  
  The bulk of Earth X is told in a somewhat passive voice through conversation between X-51 and the Watcher. The Reader sees different events happening on earth, but immersion is mostly omitted, ironically forcing the Reader to take part as a watcher. Inserted throughout the trade paperback is various info-dumps that basically serve to fill in the Reader on more information about what exactly is going on. These info-dumps are yawn-inducing at best, largely unimportant and extremely uninteresting. They’re kind of like deleted scenes on a DVD.
  
  This time around I still felt that Earth X was a bit heavy handed and too philosophical for its own good, but the story was somewhat entertaining. When I finished the introductory issue I happily picked up the first volume of Universe X to see where the story was heading. Not where I thought, which was a good thing, but the story turned more ridiculous as the pages depleted. By the conclusion of Universe X Volume 2 I was ready to quit again, but I hung in there, hoping the concluding volumes would be okay.
  
  Halfway through Volume One of Paradise X I gave up the ghost and quit. The groans were too loud for me to continue. I developed a tic and a severe allergy to the Marvel Universe. I was no longer at all interested. I flipped through the rest of Volume I and did the same for Volume II, skimming over the artwork and totally ignoring the text. There were a few cool-looking scenes, and if I could somehow read the comic without the words I might continue, but I could not, and I just didn���t have it in me to start again.
  
  Maybe I’m just the wrong audience for this kind of mega-comic. I’ve been a lifelong comic book reader, a lifelong fan of Marvel (albeit niched to really only just Spider-Man and the X-Men for most of my growing years), and I’ve even been known to enjoy an occasional philosophical tangent for no other reason than to wander down different avenues of thought. But the Earth X saga failed (twice) to live up to expectation. The writing was terrible and the plot was such a mess that meaning was lost in untranslated psychobabble. Joss Whedon wrote the introduction for Earth X, praising the series as innovative and entertaining. I disagree with Mr. Whedon here. It may have been innovative when it was written, but I cannot imagine it ever being entertaining.
  
  All in all I really cannot recommend the five-volume saga of Earth X. There were plenty of people who enjoyed it, but count me out on this one. Sorry.
• 
  Joseph

  I enjoyed the premise of Earth X, taking the Marvel universe and twisting it into a truly epic story, wherein all the superheroes who were for so long the focus of all comic book stories became little more than pawns in a much larger game. It had surprising revelations, interesting artwork, and a unique story.
  
  Universe X attempted to continue that story, but the artwork wasn't as good, and the plot seemed to become convoluted just for the sake of being convoluted.
  
  Paradise X? The artwork, aside from Alex Ross' excellent covers, is terrible. The story, although it might seem impossible, is worse. But what really gets me about this book is just how slapdash it seems to be. It really seems as though everyone involved is just making things up as they go. Captions are misplaced. Character designs seem to change from page to page. Plotlines appear out of nowhere. Serious moments are interrupted by lame jokes.
  
  And most importantly, it just keeps going on and on and on ... Where was an editor to stop everybody and say, "Where the heck is this going?" The writers just keep adding things for no apparent reason, pulling in obscure characters who seem to serve no other purpose than proving that the people making this comic know more about Marvel comics history than anyone ought to.
  
  Do you know what you find in the dictionary next to the word "Pointless"? The definition of the word "Pointless", which is what this book is.
• 
  Stephen

  This one is a little more dense than the other X books, and a little less clear. I think the only way to read this is to read it in the trade paperback format. if you had to wait a month for every installment you'd lose track of what was going on.
• 
  Timothy Boyd

  Is Earth X a possible future or an alternate reality? No matter which of these possibilities holds true it all comes out as fantastic story for Marvel's superheros. Exceptional art and an excellent plot by Alex Ross make these a superb read. Very recommended
• 
  Stacy

  When the plot got too complex I got bored with it. The art is still amazing, its just the story that is a little too over-developed.
• 
  Andre

  The story continues, keeps us interested and reading past the hour we should have stopped.
• 
  Ken Reed

  Meh.
• 
  Will Cooper

  Woof. This is so high concept. Death is destroyed and now Mar Vell and the new Angel All-Stars have to create Paradise for all the dead people, but they only get it if they know they're dead instead of alive.
  
  Kinda spoiler? Not important enough to be:
  Kingpin, Jigsaw, and GoblinVillain (too lazy to care about looking up his name) decide they hate the Punisher so much that instead of getting their own paradise, they just want to kill the Punisher. Well, why not get your paradise, which is literally whatever you want to have happen, and each kill Punisher in your paradise?!!??!?! Rick Jones has a paradise where he beats Ultron (and I suspect everyone else), so why not kill Punisher in yours? No sense.
  
  Also, if you want to know who "Daredevil" is, give up. He's no one.
  
  I had to read Wikipedia to see if it got any better or made more sense and IT DID NOT. It just got more convoluted. Please skip this. Life is too short, unless you are Daredevil who can't die, so you have plenty of time.