Ultimate X-Men (2024) #1-5

 Ultimate X-Men #1-5

Originally released in 2024

Written by Peach Momoko

Art by Peach Momoko

While I'm still getting caught up on X-Men, and I haven't read the Ultimate X-Men comics from the early 2000s, the new Ultimate X-Men is a very different take on the property, inspired by anime and manga, so it seems like the sort of thing that could be experienced without any prior context.  It doesn't even focus on a traditional X-Men team, or a mainstream X-Men member for that matter, with the point-of-view character being Hisako Ichiki, otherwise known as Armor in the main continuity, who is making the shift from middle school to high school while dealing with some serious trauma.

She hasn't been to school for some time after the tragic loss of her friend, who was bullied to the point where he took his own life.  She's been left feeling guilty that she could have done more, and she's haunted both by visions of her friend and some kind of shadow man.

While there's an overarching story, the issues are fairly self-contained and disconnected from the X-Men mythos (the word mutant isn't even mentioned until issue 4), along with the rest of the Ultimate universe.  It definitely has a horror bent to it, with the imagery surrounding the shadow man being unsettling and him seeming determined to torment Hisako, and it feels like the series takes inspiration from anime/manga with Armor's ability looking like a Stand from JoJo's Bizarre Adventure, or an Oversoul from Shaman King.

Issue two introduces Mei, or Maystorm, who was inspired by Storm's actions in Ultimate Black Panther (she turns out to have similar abilities), and the two quickly become friends.  This leads to Mei becoming a target of the shadow man as well, and though she's not aware of it, the shadow man turns out to be her neighbour, an overweight shut-in.

I think the shadow man is based on the Shadow King, an X-Men villain who I've only heard of due to a mobile game, but his human form is introduced removing a helmet that enhances his abilities, giving him some resemblance to Professor Xavier with Cerebro.

We briefly get a look into Mei's home life from a few months ago; her father is a real piece of work, barely speaking to his family, physically abusing his own daughter, and the only time he speaks is when he kicks her out of the house once she first uses her powers.

Another character who becomes part of the main cast is Nico Minoru, who's associated with the Runaways and normally doesn't have a connection to the X-Men. Here, she's a psychic, would-be occultist, and a classmate of Hisako and Mei.

When attacked by the shadow man and tormented by images of her dead friend, Hisako activates her powers publicly, with the images taken at the scene going viral. While Nico examines a charm that Hisako got, a force within the charm attacks the girls, and Nico's magnifying glass from her grandmother grows (to her surprise, as that hasn't happened before) to resemble the Staff Of One from the main universe comics, allowing them to force the shadow creature to retreat.

As it turns out, the powers that Hisako and Mei use are connected to the shadow man, whose influence gives powers to others, apparently. (It could be a coincidence, but Hisako gains her powers after getting a charm that contains a shadow creature, and Mei gained her powers after being bitten by her neighbour's cat)

These first five issues went by at a fairly quick rate. It's interesting to see how much of a different take this is on the X-Men, with both parts of the name seeming inaccurate. (None of them are men, and they have no connection to the letter X despite Mei saying that it's because she does poorly on tests) Despite the lack of a connection to the broader Ultimate universe, I enjoyed this more than Ultimate Black Panther because it feels like it does something different with its premise rather than feeling like it could be an issue of the mainline version.