Excalibur Vol. 1

Excalibur (1988-1998) #1-5

by Chris Claremont, Alan Davis (dibujo)

Chris Claremont se reinventa a sí mismo y crea un grupo mutante realmente diferente y original, lleno de aventuras interdimensionales y humor. La reedición de la serie mutante más peculiar de la mano de un Chris Claremont distinto y el magnífico Alan Davis a los lápices en lo que puede ser su trabajo más largo en una serie regular.
Contiene Excalibur: The Sword Is Drawn , y Excalibur 1 al 5.

Genres: Comics, Graphic Novels, Marvel, X Men, Superheroes, Fiction, Graphic Novels Comics

176 pages, Hardcover

First published November 2, 2005

About the author

Chris Claremont is a writer of American comic books, best known for his 16-year (1975-1991) stint on Uncanny X-Men, during which the series became one of the comic book industry's most successful properties.

Claremont has written many stories for other publishers including the Star Trek Debt of Honor graphic novel, his creator-owned Sovereign Seven for DC Comics and Aliens vs Predator for Dark Horse Comics. He also wrote a few issues of the series WildC.A.T.s (volume 1, issues #10-13) at Image Comics, which introduced his creator-owned character, Huntsman.

Outside of comics, Claremont co-wrote the Chronicles of the Shadow War trilogy, Shadow Moon (1995), Shadow Dawn (1996), and Shadow Star (1999), with George Lucas. This trilogy continues the story of Elora Danan from the movie Willow. In the 1980s, he also wrote a science fiction trilogy about female starship pilot Nicole Shea, consisting of First Flight (1987), Grounded! (1991), and Sundowner (1994). Claremont was also a contributor to the Wild Cards anthology series.

Reviews

[Baba · Rating 2 out of 5]

Collecting The Sword is Drawn and Excalibur #1 to #5. The American X-Men guru Chris Claremontjoins with the superlative Brit Alan Davies to create a mutant team based in the UK, as a repercussion of the 'death' of the X-Men. Shadowcat, Rachel (Phoenix), Nightcrawler, Meggan and Captain Britain make up the roster. A somewhat rocky start for the series which is enlivened by Davies art, Mojo's Warwolves and the return of the Rachel/Phoenix to Marvel in 1988. The inthended 'European feel' is very American-centric, something that the Marvel Universe has always struggled with. 5 out of 12.

[Sesana · Rating 4 out of 5]

I seriously loved this stuff. The reason why is right there on the cover: Nightcrawler. My favorite character in comics, and one of my favorite fictional characters. If he's written in character, I'll pretty much like anything he's in. And so, not at all objective review here. I like this entire cast of characters, to be honest. In retrospect, it's tough to read Kurt and Kitty's very real grief at the apparent deaths of the X-Men, knowing that they're very much not at all dead and just hadn't told them yet.

[Stephen · Rating 1 out of 5]

1.5 stars. I read this when it first came out as a comic. The only thing I liked about this series was Captain Britain was a pretty cool character. Hated the other heroes and the main villains were just dumb.

[The Antiquary · Rating 5 out of 5]

The original Chris Claremont and Alan Davies Excalibur comics were amongst the best that Marvel has ever issued. A spin-off from the X-Men, except with humour and contemporaneously better art and writing (it almost gave 'wacky' a good name), unfortunately Excalibur soon fell victim to the constant push for $ with the ridiculous turnover of writers and artists at Marvel.

Kitty has never been so charming and geeky, Rachel was given a coherent and decent (if indecently clothed) storyline for the one and only time, Captain Britain was still Captain Britain and a wonderfully flawed hero, Megan endearing and the character you were patiently waiting to grow, and Nightcrawler at his swashbuckling best (the antithesis of the movie version). There's precious little to compare it to, but it does have a similar feel to Buffy sometimes (apparently Kitty was the inspiration for Buffy, and with his British connections I'm sure Joss Whedon must have taken notice of these - in fact I'm wondering now if Captain Hammer was partially inspired by Cap. Britain).

Every issue not featuring Alan Davies really was a case of criminal damage, no invective is bad enough to describe the abysmal substitute art. The magic numbers, still reasonably priced at online comic shops, are: Introductory Special Edition, 1-7, 9, 12-17, 23-24, 42-50, 54-56, 61-67.

Oh, and the new Dr Who shamelessly ripped-off at least the war wolves from here.

[Andrew Alvis · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great stories, great art, great character developments...what more could you ask?

[Stephen · Rating 4 out of 5]

The 1980s brought a lot of new comics to the Marvel Comics bookshelves. The X-Men expanded from one monthly title to five+ (Uncanny X-Men, New Mutants, X-Factor, Wolverine, and Excalibur). Definitely the most unusual of these was Chris Claremont's Excalibur.

This was a quirky, often silly, take on the super hero team genre. Alan Davis brought his Captain Britain and Meggan characters to the table and Claremont added the former X-Men (those who survived the Fall of the Mutants) Nightcrawler, Kitty Pryde, and Phoenix. Set in England, the team faces villains from the Marvel UK stable of baddies plus Longshot's old enemy, Mojo.

All of the absurdity and total unpredictability meshes into a very fun and entertaining title. Thankfully, things are not non-stop silly. Plots follow some sort of proper order and, in places, the story intersects the rest of the Marvel Universe.

This series was one of Claremont's final contributions before he took a break from Marvel for several years. I recommend it to all the classic X-Men fans as well as fans of Captain Britain and/or a British sense of humour.

[AC Church · Rating 4 out of 5]

By this point Chris Claremont's opus magnum - Uncanny X-Men - became a flagship of the Marvel enterprise, a center stage for the biggest plot developments; it became more serious, action- and plot-oriented and suspenseful. Claremont's other big team, New Mutants was given to Louise Simonson, and the first few issues of solo Wolverine that he wrote were also hardly light in tone. It seems pretty clear now that he used 'Excalibur' to vent all of his comic and surreal potential. It's reminiscent of early days of Claremont's run on the X-Men, but even more humorous and casual in delivery (very close to Byrne's 'Sensational She-Hulk'). The villains are all goofy as hell, plots develop almost like Monty Python sketches (at one point the team battles an army of pies with the assistance of a rock band called 'Cat's Laughing') and all the characters work like a comedic ensemble. Captain Britain is an alcoholic and egoist who shows emotions only when blonde women are around or his whiskey gets threatened, Kitty Pryde further develops her sarcasm and wit, Phoenix jr shocks England with revealing outfits and Nightcrawler switches between being a complete dunce and a voice of reason.

As the mainline X-Men became more involved in complex plots, there was less and less space for casual character intercations. 'Excalibur' on the contrary is full of heartfelt domestic drama and comedy - there's a lot of that hanging around shopping malls, decorating, cooking, mingling and coexisting stuff that made the X-Men so endearing in the first place.

Alan Davis' art is also fully up to the task of creating a surreal comedy with superhero means. Crazy Gang, Warwolves and Technet (and all of the metamorphoses, shapechanging and illusions that ensue when they are around) are some of the best and strangest drawings in Marvel universe.

[Gav451 · Rating 2 out of 5]

I don't always get on with Chris Claremont and the first three quarters of this book is why. There is too much exposition, too much soap opera and too much reference to whats happening in the x men. It started to grate too early as the author seemed to neglect this team which should be better. The art is great, the magical and surreal elements worked when they needed to but as I read it I felt like it was treated too much like a joke.

Every now and again in the first ¾ there were moments where you thought it might fly. The jealousies of the relationships and the idea of someone changing to please another was interesting and had potential. The alcohol issue could have been a great little sub plot. Not one that was spoken about but one that was shown and that had consequences. The last ¼ shows us what a wasted opportunity it was. At the end of the book it suddenly starts to fly, the stories get impact, the ideas become interesting and the darkness creeps in. I left this book with 2 thoughts

1. What a shame to waste such an opportunity
2. If I never read about an Xkid / mini xman again it will be too soon. They are the low point of this whole collection.

[Lisa Feld · Rating 4 out of 5]

I love this comic so hard--the gorgeous illustrations, the human drama... These early issues always feel to me like Marvel: the Real World--What happens when five superheroes share a small living space and stop being polite? Squabbles over the bathroom, Brian's drinking, the beginnings of Nightcrawler's crush on Meggan. Plus the joys of Alan Davis's gorgeous art, with its fluid motion, such attention to detail that you can tell the differences of eye tilt or nose shape when one character is dressed in another's costume, or has swapped bodies and is using their old body language in someone else's frame. Not to mention the glorious eighties aesthetic, with the unapologetic big hair and all women wearing shoulder pads.

We also get the beginnings of a bunch of plot threads that are going to influence the next 50 issues of the comic, and it's fascinating to see the problems with Widget and Courtney Ross develop. I am a happy, happy girl rereading this old favorite.

[John Carter McKnight · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very few 80s comics really stand up to a modern reread, but the Claremont/Davis Excalibur is a stellar exception. Charming, fun, silly, moving, clever - it was great stuff from the starting gun.

I'd forgotten how great the Kitty/Rachel friendship was - and how 80s fabulous Rae's outfits were. The Kurt/Megan/Brian triangle is charming, moving and genuine.

And, warwolves!

[Katherine · Rating 4 out of 5]

Not as good as I remember it being when I read it issue-by-issue an age long ago when mastodons roamed the earth, but I will always love Kitty Pryde and Kurt Wagner, no matter how awkward the writing is. 3.5 stars rounded up to four due to said fondness of Shadowcat and Nightcrawler and a fit of nostalgia.

[Travis · Rating 4 out of 5]

Some left over X-men, living in England team up with Captain Britain and his super powered girl friend to form one of the most unlikely of super hero teams.
It's fun and light hearted with a good mix of both sides history. Lots of fun from a time when so many team books were way to serious.

[Jamie B · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excalibur was my gateway into comics. Great team, great villains, fun whimsical stories and Davis' artwork was magic. Start from issue 1 of this series and work your way up until the end of Claremont's run and you will not be disappointed.

[Devero · Rating 4 out of 5]

Forse non il miglior Claremont di sempre, ma ci va vicino in questo ciclo d'esordio del supergruppo anglosassone Excalibur. I disegni di Alan Davies poi meritano sempre. A distanza di oltre vent'anni queste storie si sono mantenute fresche.

[Alex Sarll]

It's the late eighties, and as happens every other Tuesday, the X-Men are presumed dead. Two of the survivors, Kitty Pryde and Nightcrawler, are in the UK, where they end up working with Captain Britain (his sort-of-sister Psylocke also among the lost) and his shapeshifting girlfriend Meggan to rescue alternate reality offshoot Rachel Summers. In the course of which they'll get brain-scrambled, turned to wax, semi-digested and otherwise fucked up, but while in our world that would likely leave you wanting never to see the other people concerned, and gently rocking in a corner, this is a superhero comic, so they decide to stay together as a team instead. It's written by Chris Claremont, who for better and worse pretty much defined the X-Men, and has all the good and bad you'd expect from that; the character dynamics are strong and soapy (fnarr fnarr), but the dialogue and captions are prone to over-explication, and the grasp of anywhere that isn't the US is...well, it's enthusiastic, and it means well. Captain Britain's initial reluctance to get involved is very recognisable, verging on metafictional commentary: "Save them now to watch them sacrifice themselves later. We're supposed to be heroes – but we never really make things better. We have no lasting effect – on people or the world." And when London is described as "the haunted capital of this haunted land", sure, it's playing to American stereotypes of Britain, but it works. Likewise the scene in Hob's End station, or the deathtrap modelled on one of Terry Gilliam's giant Python feet. Captain Britain's lighthouse, on the other hand, is on "the west coast of England", a truly weird description of anywhere – and even such places as it might describe make very little sense as an HQ. And some of the slang used by British extras... Still, Alan Davis is on art, and at least makes it look good, even if that is sometimes for a very eighties definition of 'good' (Captain Britain's bouffant when he's in his civilian identity as Brian Braddock is quite something). I'd probably have enjoyed it more if the main villains of the piece weren't Mojo and Arcade, two characters with similar stagey schticks and annoyance value, and only a brief and fairly pointless Juggernaut battle to separate them. But there was a chilling echo of the future when the malign Jester of the Crazy Gang cluelessly insists "That's because you aren't a big brain and extreme genius. I understand perfectly." Sounds like his evil henchman career has really stepped up a notch these past four years, doesn't it?

[Michael · Rating 2 out of 5]

I don't think it's much of a revelation to admit that I've never been a big X-Men fan or even much of Chris Claremont fan. I bought this book, however, due to a nostalgia factor. Believe it or not, my very first exposure to Alan Moore's work was in the 7-issue X-Men Archives: Captain Britain mini-series that Marvel put out in the mid-90's (long before I knew anything of the copyright conflicts associated with those stories). I was quite enamored with the scope and possibilities of Otherworld and the charming whimsy of his rogues. Thus, I decided to try Marvel's Excalibur series. It was a bit too Euro-X-Men for my tastes (being the days of Scott Lobdell & Ken Lashley on the title), but I went back and picked up some early Claremont/Davis issues, and some middle-of-the-series Alan Davis solo issues. I enjoyed Davis' work best, but Claremont wasn't awful.

I forgot how X-intensive the earliest chapters were, however, when I bought this trade. It's not bad, mind you. But it launches out of an X-Men event (everyone assumed dead, Rachel on the run from Mojo) that I have not read and know nothing about. It's not exactly an ideal launching point for an unfamiliar reader. Claremont's scripting is typically excessive, although I must give him credit because at his best, he does do a good job of setting a scene and putting the reader in the right frame of mind. At his worst, he resorts to cliche, repetitious catch-phrases and bogs the story down in molasses. Excalibur is some of his better work though.

As a reader who got into Excalibur due to Captain Britain's involvement, the early chapters are somewhat annoying. Brian is a drunk, indecisive in his commitment to Meggan, and a blundering, unthinking hero. And his Otherworld origins are only touched upon in this book. Meanwhile, Nightcrawler, who I've always found arrogant and insufferable, takes center stage. The all-powerful Phoenix is continually thwarted or limited in convenient manners. The villains are nicely kooky, though, which did offer some enjoyment. It's a nice change from the modern need for every issue to be a terribly over-dramatic dance with death.

[Chris Browning · Rating 4 out of 5]

Not really a graphic novel, because it doesn’t resolve several of the more intriguing plot points, but a nice reminder of the world of Excalibur. I loved this comic as a kid because it was unlike any other Marvel comics around it - it was joyously happy to embrace the daft and weird from the off. The worst thing that can be said about it now is that it’s sort of removed from the context of what was going on in Marvel around it, so it doesn’t stick out quite as much and instead some of the silliness seems a bit desperate. But among the nonsense there’s some great plotting and ideas, and Davis and Claremont really are a wonderful partnership with the former enjoying whatever the latter throws at him. I’m particularly impressed by the character bits - the soapier elements are a bit of a slog, but I remember immediately why I loved Kurt Wagner so much as a kid. He’s a microcosm of why this kind of comic storytelling can be so successful: he has an innate nobility and joy at his powers that balances out the usual mutant angst. That Claremont chooses two of the more fun loving mutants to form the basis of his new group is very telling and why some of the weirdness to come - especially Mojo - is so great

[Kelly Furniss · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'm reading this collection with a Marvel group. These are my first ever Excalibur.
Editions;The Sword is Drawn-#0 (not listed on Goodreads) and Excalibur #1 (copy as above).
Chris Claremont & Brit Alan Davies collaborate to create a unique mutant team based in the UK which I enjoyed as it made a change to experience London in comics & Scotland too, the name drops of places added some authenticity to the story so you could imagine the setting.
I haven't read much of the X-Men but Excalibur are set up as a repercussion of the 'death' of the X-Men. Shadowcat, Rachel (Phoenix), Nightcrawler, Meggan and Captain Britain are the team.
I was given some advice to not try understand the story too much or characters and 'go with the flow' and I did and as I relaxed I enjoyed the story. A lot was going on, many characters and the art is great.
A good start to the series and I'm looking forward to the adventure and discussing it with the group.

[Johnny Andrews · Rating 4 out of 5]

Really enjoyed this, it has a bit of everything with the added subtle humour that just makes it ever so British. Originally was going to be an X-spin off set in England this is so much more.
After the supposed deaths of the X-Men, Shadowcat, Nightcrawler and Phoenix are healing at Muir Island.
Captain Britain an obvious choice being the trademark British hero for Marvel but also Psylocke's who perished with the X-men's brother which all allows for some grief and torment. Cap's girlfriend Meggan tries to help.
They join together to thwart the bad guys and form a new team-Excalibur.
Then we have tales of them learning to become a team, take on the likes of Juggernaut and Arcade whilst moving in to Captain Britain and Meggan's lighthouse home and learning about each other and themselves.

[Jessica Robinson · Rating 5 out of 5]

This entire volume is some of the most fun you can have with superhero comic books. Start off with Chris Claremont at his serialized, soap-opera best, enhance that with Alan Davies drawing some of the most expressive artwork in the business, add in a heavy dose of Doctor Who-esque British weirdness, and you've got Excalibur, the Great Britain-based branch of the X-Men. I was interested in going back to this series because of my love for Nightcrawler but all the characters stand out and as always with the X-Men, their many personal and relationship problems are half the fun. So good!

[Tom Malinowski · Rating 5 out of 5]

Who'd have thought there'd be a 4th mutant title?! Well back in the 80s anything was possible. Due to the unfortunate events of the X-Men dying during Fall of the Mutants (not to worry, they're not dead), Brian, Meggan, Kitty, and Kurt are in mourning in England. When Rachel reappears after fleeing from Mojoverse, they all team up and realize Xavier's dreams is still worth fighting for. They fight warwolves, the Crazy Gang who are under Arcade's orders, so that means Murderworld.

[Matthew Gurteen · Rating 3 out of 5]

Shadowcat was about the only thing that made this book redeemable for me. The whole thing just felt like a second-rate Avengers or X-men. It couldn't decide whether it wanted to be a comedy with quirky villains and self-conscious of its outrageousness or deeply serious in its tone and storylines about affairs and alcoholism. If you are a fan of classic comics or love one of the main characters in the book, then I would give it a go; otherwise, it is difficult to enjoy.

[Daniel · Rating 5 out of 5]

It's been a while since I read Excalibur. I'd forgotten how much fun this series was. It's very different from other X-titles. There is a certain whimsy to it. There is a serious undercurrent as well. It makes me want reread the Deathshead II. I think this volume is worth checking out. With a new team and the people have to get learn to live with each other. I hope you too, will come to enjoy it was well.

[Ed · Rating 5 out of 5]

Claremont & Davis's Excalibur is top tier super hero comics. All characters are strongly written and Claremont perfectly nails the balance of soap opera with classic heroics. It's also genuinely funny and the villains (War Wolves, Arcade, Crazy Gang, etc) are fantastic. It's also distinctly British in both its voice and it's art.

[Mr Alexander · Rating 5 out of 5]

I love Excalibur. At it's peak the Alan Davis's art and Chris Claremont's writing are pretty much peerless. And this collection of the first few issues is pretty close to that peak. Sure, the quality falls off a cliff far too soon. But for this volume and at least the next two, this is pretty close to comics perfection for me.

[Miguel · Rating 4 out of 5]

Serie muy divertida con un comienzo discreto pero que con el pasar de los números se va asentando. La formación es muy interesante y los dramas internos que cada uno arrastra le da profundidad a las historias. Veremos a dónde nos lleva todo el tema del multiverso.

[Lee · Rating 3 out of 5]

Sweet introduction with lovely art from Davis (love the markery/watercolory feel to the colors too).

[Garrett Ballendine · Rating 5 out of 5]

Absolute fantastic art.

[Kenneth · Rating 5 out of 5]

Claremont and Davis, Kitty and Rachel, Sensual Nightcrawler and Himbo Captain Brittain. What more can you want!

[Allison · Rating 5 out of 5]

(read in single issues).

This series is wild and so much fun.