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X-Factor Visionaries #3
X-Factor Visionaries: Peter David, Vol. 3
Today X-Factor's beat is Mutant Town, but years before, it was Washington DC Madrox, Strong Guy, Quicksilver and the rest face crises of diplomacy, deception and death while protecting humans from mutants and vice versa A battle with the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants in the shadow of Genosha Musical murder, the Mojoverse and more Featuring one of Wolverine's worst rivals, Cyber Collects X-Factor #79-83 & Annual #7.
136 pages, Paperback
First published October 24, 2007
1 person is currently reading
75 people want to read
About the author
Peter David
3,566 books1,363 followersaka David Peters
Peter Allen David, often abbreviated PAD, was an American writer of comic books, novels, television, films, and video games. His notable comic book work includes an award-winning 12-year run on The Incredible Hulk, as well as runs on Aquaman, Young Justice, SpyBoy, Supergirl, Fallen Angel, Spider-Man, Spider-Man 2099, Captain Marvel, and X-Factor.
His Star Trek work included comic books and novels such as the New Frontier book series. His other novels included film adaptations, media tie-ins, and original works, such as the Apropos of Nothing and Knight Life series. His television work includes series such as Babylon 5, Young Justice, Ben 10: Alien Force and Nickelodeon's Space Cases, which he co-created with Bill Mumy.
David often jokingly described his occupation as "Writer of Stuff", and he was noted for his prolific writing, characterized by its mingling of real-world issues with humor and references to popular culture, as well as elements of metafiction and self-reference.
David earned multiple awards for his work, including a 1992 Eisner Award, a 1993 Wizard Fan Award, a 1996 Haxtur Award, a 2007 Julie Award and a 2011 GLAAD Media Award.
Peter Allen David, often abbreviated PAD, was an American writer of comic books, novels, television, films, and video games. His notable comic book work includes an award-winning 12-year run on The Incredible Hulk, as well as runs on Aquaman, Young Justice, SpyBoy, Supergirl, Fallen Angel, Spider-Man, Spider-Man 2099, Captain Marvel, and X-Factor.
His Star Trek work included comic books and novels such as the New Frontier book series. His other novels included film adaptations, media tie-ins, and original works, such as the Apropos of Nothing and Knight Life series. His television work includes series such as Babylon 5, Young Justice, Ben 10: Alien Force and Nickelodeon's Space Cases, which he co-created with Bill Mumy.
David often jokingly described his occupation as "Writer of Stuff", and he was noted for his prolific writing, characterized by its mingling of real-world issues with humor and references to popular culture, as well as elements of metafiction and self-reference.
David earned multiple awards for his work, including a 1992 Eisner Award, a 1993 Wizard Fan Award, a 1996 Haxtur Award, a 2007 Julie Award and a 2011 GLAAD Media Award.
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Displaying 1 - 16 of 16 reviews
August 19, 2023
More stereotype breaking art as Peter David and Stroman bring a hospitalised Polaris, a possibly dangerous Rhapsody, as well as the X-Patriots, Cyber(!), Shrew and even the New Brotherhood! The creative continue to mix and match old and new, dark and light, humour and pain as they carve their own legacy into the X-universe, book by book! 8 out of 12, Four Stars.
2017, 2015 and 2010 read
2017, 2015 and 2010 read
September 7, 2018
X-Factor was one of dozens of X-books back in the day when an X in the title equaled $’s. The difference for me from most of the other books was Peter David had a handle on the characters and he had a sense of humor – not as finely tuned as his second run on this title, but sufficient.
What also differentiated X-Factor from the other X-groups is that they were working for The Man …every night and day.
X-Factor at the time included:
Havok (Alex Summers) – team leader and almost as exciting as his brother, Cyclops
Polaris – Green-haired mistress of magnetism.
Strong Guy – Owner of one of the stupider super hero names, and as a running gag, David gets plenty of mileage out it.
Rahne – Endearingly, adorable werewolf chick with a brogue. Watch out for her feral side.
Jamie Madrox (Multiple Man) – he’s funny, he can duplicate himself, one of my favorite X-Men of all time.
Quicksilver – fastest guy in the Marvel universe, but not fast enough to outrun the fact that he’s a dyspeptic douche.
Val Cooper was the government liaison who had her paper work cut out for her.
I’ve had job nightmares as well, but there of the going-to-work-naked variety.
To round out the first issue of up close and personal stories (in the ‘90’s it was either this or some sort of reason to put the female characters into a bikini), Strong Guy helps out a kid who’s being bullied in the school yard.
The rest of this volume revolves around a mutant with musical talents…
…protecting one of Hell’s Belles from an attack…
…a throw down with the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants…
…and the beginning of a story arc with the Genosha mutates and the Legacy Virus…
…and some of the worst pop cultural references ever printed.
But, Jeff, at least it wasn’t Freddie Prinze Jr.
There’s something to be said for that, random Goodreader.
I read these as single issues a long time ago and it was good to see a few drive-by panels of one of the great Mort-of-the-months ever – Number One Fan:
Yep, those are blades for hands which prevents him from opening doors, using a phone, scratching his nose…
Maybe I’m giving David too much credit or reading into this more than I should but it comes off as some sort of subversive commentary on the multiple-plot heavy X-books. Whatever, it’s amusing.
Bottom line: This isn’t prime David or prime X-Factor, but it’s still worth a read. A major complaint: David’s writing is consistently being undercut by crappy art.
Some of these pages are like Marvel’s Rorschach test: you can interpret it however you choose, based on your current mental state.
Hey hipster kids! Let’s do the Mutant Rap!!!
July 14, 2017
A bit of a dip in quality in this third volume of PAD's first X-Factor run, largely because of the proliferation of fill-in artists who aren't a patch on regular artist Larry Stroman. Still, the stories are still tackling some quite weighty political issues in an intelligent manner and, more importantly, are still chock-full of David's wonderful, groanworthy puns!
Next up: X-Cutioner's Song... oh, dear...
Next up: X-Cutioner's Song... oh, dear...
August 15, 2018
Peter David's writing is still strong in characterization here, but the fill-in artists don't maintain anything of the quality consistency of David/Stroman (similar things had plagued the Claremont/Davis line of Excalibur just a few years before), and the Washington DC team with Polaris, Madrox, Strong Guy, Quicksilver and the rest face crises of Cyber and then X-Patriots does move this back into more conventional comics territory with less sitc0m banter and more comic plots, but the running jokes and intrusion of the excellent short panels with Val Cooper fighting paperwork, Strongman's styled in Calvin and Hobbes, Rahne's Rahne's (Wayne) World fantasies are all immensely charming. David seems to be doing well at establishing a new voice and tone for X-factor, but also seems to be stalling for any consistent plot development. The mixture of tone also is odd, Havok and Val have several fights and David seems to want to make more serious commentary, but also needs to keep the witty banter going. It isn't convincing. Definitely dated--the colors are nice, but feel of the era--but fun.
July 26, 2024
From a writing standpoint, I think this volume is a step up from the previous to volumes. There are moments when David drops the levity, and allows the story to be 1990s Comic Book Serious. The main story in this volme, involving Cyber and the Helle's Belles (really?), is a four star story, and the material at the beginning involving Val Cooper's valiant (David, look what your writing has done to me) battle against paperwork, and a story about Strong Guy's relationship with Calvin from Calvin & Hobbes, is five star wonderful. The collection ends with an arc about the original Brotherhood Of Evil Mutants, and the Genoshan fallout from other X-books. It didn't hold my attention, but I would probably give it two or three stars.
What keeps me from giving this collection, overall, four stars is the inconsistent art. I'm not a fan of Larry Stroman's art, but I do enjoy when a book has a certain style, and once Stroman was off the title, the visual component of the book hopscotched from trying to be realistic, to cartoony, to Very 90s Extreme Art Thank You. While the characters are aways recognizable, I was taken out of the story each time a new artist was brought on board.
I recommend this for people who enjoy 90s superhero comics.
***Update for 2024 Readthrough***
My appreciation for the previous two volumes of the Peter David Visionaries series has grown to the point where I actually saw this as a bit of a step down. David's dad jokes seemed to trip over themselves in this volume more than they did in the others.
It's still a solid X-book, and apart from the deliberately awkward hero and villain names, I think this is on the upper end of 90s X-titles.
What keeps me from giving this collection, overall, four stars is the inconsistent art. I'm not a fan of Larry Stroman's art, but I do enjoy when a book has a certain style, and once Stroman was off the title, the visual component of the book hopscotched from trying to be realistic, to cartoony, to Very 90s Extreme Art Thank You. While the characters are aways recognizable, I was taken out of the story each time a new artist was brought on board.
I recommend this for people who enjoy 90s superhero comics.
***Update for 2024 Readthrough***
My appreciation for the previous two volumes of the Peter David Visionaries series has grown to the point where I actually saw this as a bit of a step down. David's dad jokes seemed to trip over themselves in this volume more than they did in the others.
It's still a solid X-book, and apart from the deliberately awkward hero and villain names, I think this is on the upper end of 90s X-titles.
Read
March 1, 2015One of those definitive runs about which one hears mutterings, but I suspect you had to be there. Compared to the po-faced drama of the other X-books at the time, I'm sure Peter David's flip humour and sassy pop culture references were a tonic - but reading it now too often feels like watching a nineties US sitcom (and having seen some a year or so back, it turned out even Frasier hasn't aged too well). Madrox has hair like one of NKOTB, two characters make the same joke within the space of three issues (and it wasn't even a good joke), and - with the exception of the musical notes that start strangling people - most of the meta stuff is a lot less clever than it seems to think. Meanwhile, some of the artists are pushing into the bad nineties, all muscles and claws and guest appearances by cocking Cyber.
September 17, 2016
Very good. Peter David is very talented. Need to finish this up and get over to his Hulk run!
April 11, 2023
the thing about peter david's initial x-factor run is that it shines when characters are allowed to sort of play off each other or have a moment
but when bad guys or plot come in, it becomes a slog, leaving this run, including this volume to be as much of a mixed bag as it's art. high highs, low lows. so you know, typical 90s x-book
but when bad guys or plot come in, it becomes a slog, leaving this run, including this volume to be as much of a mixed bag as it's art. high highs, low lows. so you know, typical 90s x-book
December 10, 2020
Artwork: From good -to okay -downright ugly.Story: Good. Peter David's writing was good and moved the story along. The artwork well that is a discussion for another day. It was like let's throw any artist to draw and see who likes it and boy did it get ugly. The cover was even ugly.
May 27, 2025
RIP Peter David.
May 14, 2014
This review originally appeared on my blog, Shared Universe Reviews.
The third volume of X-Factor Visionaries: Peter David brings the focus back on the main members of the X-Factor team. It’s a big frustrating because I feel this is where the story should have picked up after the first volume. The crossover with The Incredible Hulk was a pretty major distraction even if it was a good story in itself. I enjoyed the third volume more than the second one but my enjoyment of it is hindered by the same problems I had with the previous volumes of this series.
The art inconsistencies didn’t really bother me this time around. That’s because the guest artists’ style matched up pretty closely to Larry Stroman’s art even if they did not quite reach he same level of abstraction in their line work. I don’t have much more to say about the art in these issues and that itself probably says a lot. They’re early nineties comics and it’s important to mention that because the inking and colouring have a pretty big impact on the final look of the comic. These issues look like nineties comics. The only exception would the Annual issue which is drawn by Darick Robertson and Joe Madureira. That issue looks sleeker and cleaner and it’s quite breath of fresh air but the annual they make up can best be summarized as a throwaway gag issue. It doesn’t advance the story or the characterization and the only thing it contributes to is a few laughs. Peter David has made significantly better jokes in the regular issues of X-Factor.
Thankfully the story moves along a big more in the rest of the volume. The X-Factor team deals with three mutant related issues. In one, a mutant is accused of murder and they investigate the allegations. In another story, they’re asked to protect a former member of a muscle for hire crew which offered protection to a drug cartel. The third story deals with mutant expatriates from Genosha who are travelling the seas searching for sanctuary but finding only rejection. Mutants are the Jews of the Marvel Universe it seems. All three of those stories could and for a few pages did, form the basis for interesting stories about homo sapiens and homo superior equality but they all fall short. One of the reasons of the stories do not work is that the members of X-factor always end up fighting numerous other mutants or super villains. The resolution to all these stories is a one or more superhero fights. It’s a disappointing story.
The other reason why the stories don’t seem to work is that they try to bring forward topics that would generally seem more serious in tone. Peter David is trying to pull away from the good guys fights bad guys story and steer the book into a more satisfying direction. He’s trying to offer the reader something different that also happens to have depth of story. As I mentioned, the first problem is the unnecessary requirement for superhero fisticuffs and it’s not even a particularly rewarding version of that. The second reason is that the tone of the book is in constant fluctuation form humorous to serious and thoughtful. David is unable to balance the humour and the more serious elements into a cohesive comic. This happens to be the volume which has the best humour in it. He’s done ag ood job on that fron band the best thing about the fight scenes is the banter. It’s problematic though when Havok and Val are having a serious discussion as to how to handle the mutant expatriate (or x-patriate) situation, they’Re also finding time to crack jokes.
It’s inconsistent but it has a lot of potential and it makes for a frustrating read because you keep thinking the story is going to lead to something good and worthy of thought and discussion but it often leads to bad jokes, cackling evil bad guys. The villains in this story are uninteresting and much like the stories in the Annual issue, they feel like throwaway characters that matter because of their role as villains as opposed to their importance as characters in a story. Three volumes in and it still feels like Peter David is trying to find his footing and it’s getting to be too late since he ultimately only wrote one more volume’s worth of X-Factor comics.
The third volume of X-Factor Visionaries: Peter David brings the focus back on the main members of the X-Factor team. It’s a big frustrating because I feel this is where the story should have picked up after the first volume. The crossover with The Incredible Hulk was a pretty major distraction even if it was a good story in itself. I enjoyed the third volume more than the second one but my enjoyment of it is hindered by the same problems I had with the previous volumes of this series.
The art inconsistencies didn’t really bother me this time around. That’s because the guest artists’ style matched up pretty closely to Larry Stroman’s art even if they did not quite reach he same level of abstraction in their line work. I don’t have much more to say about the art in these issues and that itself probably says a lot. They’re early nineties comics and it’s important to mention that because the inking and colouring have a pretty big impact on the final look of the comic. These issues look like nineties comics. The only exception would the Annual issue which is drawn by Darick Robertson and Joe Madureira. That issue looks sleeker and cleaner and it’s quite breath of fresh air but the annual they make up can best be summarized as a throwaway gag issue. It doesn’t advance the story or the characterization and the only thing it contributes to is a few laughs. Peter David has made significantly better jokes in the regular issues of X-Factor.
Thankfully the story moves along a big more in the rest of the volume. The X-Factor team deals with three mutant related issues. In one, a mutant is accused of murder and they investigate the allegations. In another story, they’re asked to protect a former member of a muscle for hire crew which offered protection to a drug cartel. The third story deals with mutant expatriates from Genosha who are travelling the seas searching for sanctuary but finding only rejection. Mutants are the Jews of the Marvel Universe it seems. All three of those stories could and for a few pages did, form the basis for interesting stories about homo sapiens and homo superior equality but they all fall short. One of the reasons of the stories do not work is that the members of X-factor always end up fighting numerous other mutants or super villains. The resolution to all these stories is a one or more superhero fights. It’s a disappointing story.
The other reason why the stories don’t seem to work is that they try to bring forward topics that would generally seem more serious in tone. Peter David is trying to pull away from the good guys fights bad guys story and steer the book into a more satisfying direction. He’s trying to offer the reader something different that also happens to have depth of story. As I mentioned, the first problem is the unnecessary requirement for superhero fisticuffs and it’s not even a particularly rewarding version of that. The second reason is that the tone of the book is in constant fluctuation form humorous to serious and thoughtful. David is unable to balance the humour and the more serious elements into a cohesive comic. This happens to be the volume which has the best humour in it. He’s done ag ood job on that fron band the best thing about the fight scenes is the banter. It’s problematic though when Havok and Val are having a serious discussion as to how to handle the mutant expatriate (or x-patriate) situation, they’Re also finding time to crack jokes.
It’s inconsistent but it has a lot of potential and it makes for a frustrating read because you keep thinking the story is going to lead to something good and worthy of thought and discussion but it often leads to bad jokes, cackling evil bad guys. The villains in this story are uninteresting and much like the stories in the Annual issue, they feel like throwaway characters that matter because of their role as villains as opposed to their importance as characters in a story. Three volumes in and it still feels like Peter David is trying to find his footing and it’s getting to be too late since he ultimately only wrote one more volume’s worth of X-Factor comics.
February 12, 2013
Much better than I expected! It has Strong Guy on the front and so I thought, "Oh, no!" Then it has and Strong Guy and Cyber on the back and I could not believe it.
There's a real sense of whimsy in some of the side stories. Where it tries to do more conventional stuff -- the hero falls in love with villain story and the fight with the classic Brotherhood team -- it falls flattest.
I definitely remember this configuration of the team but not Quicksilver's strong personality.
I also remember when this weird sketchy incompleteness was common. The art looks tossed off even though I'm sure it wasn't. On the whole, I'm not sure I'm a fan, but I can't tell if there's a thematic purpose to it.
There's a real sense of whimsy in some of the side stories. Where it tries to do more conventional stuff -- the hero falls in love with villain story and the fight with the classic Brotherhood team -- it falls flattest.
I definitely remember this configuration of the team but not Quicksilver's strong personality.
I also remember when this weird sketchy incompleteness was common. The art looks tossed off even though I'm sure it wasn't. On the whole, I'm not sure I'm a fan, but I can't tell if there's a thematic purpose to it.
July 14, 2015
The only thing I really like about these old X-Factors is still Multiple Man, and he's not in them nearly enough for my tastes. I like the portrait of Pietro here as well, but, mostly this all feels too much like a cliche version of a hero comic book. I'll stick with the more recent writings of Peter David.
October 26, 2009
Very inconsistent. Some issues are very good, highlighting Peter David's highly entertaining characters. Others are just very blah. There does seem to be some correlation between the issues Larry Stroman illustrated, and the ones there was a guest illustrator for.
April 17, 2014
My least favourite volume of Peter David's original run, it was the shift in artistic style that caused me to drop the title as a kid (back in the day). And while I definitely dig Cyber and his bad ass warrior women, I would only recommend picking this up like I did - for $5. C+
April 11, 2011
Good storylines and great characters.
Displaying 1 - 16 of 16 reviews