X-Statix Presents: Dead Girl

X-Statix (Collected Editions) #7

by Peter Milligan (Writer), Nick Dragotta (Illustrator), Mike Allred (Illustrator)

It's hard to keep a good girl down... especially when she's Dead! After a brief hiatus caused by their deaths, everyone's favorite mutants are back! And this time, they're bringing a host of... questions with them. Like why do some heroes and villains keep on dying, only to return from the dead? And why do other heroes and villains bite the bullet, only to remain dead? Who decides on this craziness? Is it some karmic wheel in the sky? Or is it just some guy in the marketing department? Well, one such deceased villain, named the Pitiful One, is going to find out. When the Pitiful One decides that he's tired of being dead, he assembles a posse of Marvel's deadest villains to attack the world of the living. And it's up to Doctor Strange to stop him and his evil cohorts, but he needs help from...well, you know. With Kraven the Hunter, Tike Alicar and a few other surprise dead guests.

Collecting: X-Statix Presents: Dead Girl 1-5

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

120 pages, Paperback

First published August 23, 2006

About the author

Librarian note:
There is more than one author in the GoodReads database with this name

Peter Milligan is a British writer, best known for his work on X-Force / X-Statix, the X-Men, & the Vertigo series Human Target. He is also a scriptwriter.

He has been writing comics for some time and he has somewhat of a reputation for writing material that is highly outlandish, bizarre and/or absurd.

His highest profile projects to date include a run on X-Men, and his X-Force revamp that relaunched as X-Statix.

Many of Milligan's best works have been from DC Vertigo. These include: The Extremist (4 issues with artist Ted McKeever) The Minx (8 issues with artist Sean Phillips) Face (Prestige one-shot with artist Duncan Fegredo) The Eaters (Prestige one-shot with artist Dean Ormston) Vertigo Pop London (4 issues with artist Philip Bond) Enigma (8 issues with artist Duncan Fegredo) and Girl (3 issues with artist Duncan Fegredo).

Series:
* Human Target
* Greek Street
* X-Force / X-Statix

Reviews

[Nicolo · Rating 4 out of 5]

In this book, Dr. Strange reveals the secret of the revolving door to death and afterlife to Dead Girl. It's all about the numbers.

If it's a book by the Allreds, consider me sold. Even if it its artist Nick Dragotta doing his best impression of Michael Allred.

[Himanshu Karmacharya · Rating 2 out of 5]

A wrongly titled book that focuses more on Doctor Strange than the titular team and character, while also providing a meta commentary on the loss of meaning of death in comic books. It has its moment, but overall, feels just average.

[Printable Tire · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a fun, no-harm-done look into the Marvel Universe afterlife, an arbitrary chaos if ever there was one. Milligan strikes the correct balance between reverence for the characters while openly mocking the apparent absurd universe from which they spring forth and must deal. Much like real life, eh? Trapped in a world we never made.

It can be a little too silly at times, but silliness is probably necessary or else we'd get all depressed thinking about how the afterlife as expressed here is essentially one long waiting room full of book clubs and characters bored beyond death. It was bittersweet to see members of X-statix again, still dealing with the same bullshit they had to deal with in real life. Dr. Strange is a favorite of mine, so no complaints in including him and his hemorrhoids and canoodling of Dead Girl (Canoodling- there's a word you won't hear me use often).

[C. Varn · Rating 4 out of 5]

Peter Milligan has a fair amount of fun at the expense of Dr. Strange, although it is slightly frustrating to try to read this as an X-Statix book as it meta-commentary in a significantly different way. Allred and Dragotta continue the pop art style that defined Milligan's run on the X-force and X-statix. That said, despite the glimpse of the Marvel afterlife and despite being marketed as a Marvel Knight's title, it is significantly less violent and cynical than the X-statix comic. Ultimately, it is fun but not super-substantive.

[Malapata · Rating 3 out of 5]

Spin-off de la Chica Muerta con el Doctor Extraño que unen sus fuerzas para detener a unos héroes muertos que quieren escapar del infierno, con el bonus de la aparición de algún miembro más de X-Statix. Simpático, se deja leer aunque la resolución no está muy allá.

[Ignacio · Rating 2 out of 5]

Milligan se ríe un rato de las muertes y resurrecciones de los superhéroes en los cómics sin hacer sangre, no sé si por cautela o desconocimiento (lo de juntar a Pájaro Burlón y al Jinete Fantasma sin sacar a colación su historia pasada da que pensar).

[Chris Lemmerman · Rating 2 out of 5]

A disturbance in the Underworld leads Doctor Strange to recruit a team of dead heroes, including Dead Girl and her cohorts from the recently deceased X-Statix.

I don't really know what the point of this series was? It's a little bit of a meta commentary on the nature of death in comics (because we haven't had that before) and a bit of shitting on Doctor Strange and Wong whenever it gets a chance. Not really sure that justifies five issues of this, but whatever.

I think it's mostly because the title's misleading - this isn't an X-Statix book so much as a Strange one. It takes one issue for Dead Girl to show up, and the rest of the team (which isn't even everyone) only show up about halfway through. The rest of the time is spent with other characters like Strange, the terrible villain The Pitiful One and a strangely evil Ancient One (a plotline that gets resolved with the use of piles, believe it or not).

The artwork's mostly Mike Allred, with aid from Nick Dragotta, but Dragotta does a great job of imitating Allred so it's hard to tell who's doing what, which is much better than the last time Dragotta showed up during the main X-Statix book.

An amusing diversion, but not really a necessary addition to the X-Statix canon like, at all.

[Rick Ray · Rating 2 out of 5]

Though a lot of the essence behind what makes the X-Statix series so special is still felt here, the overall plot behind the Dead Girl miniseries felt very lacking. In a last hurrah for Milligan & Allred (though they would return to the X-Statix just a few years later via a sequel series), Dead Girl finds herself contending against a host of resurrected heroes and villains under the command of the Pitiful One. Characters like Kraven, Mysterio and the Anarchist go on a murderous rampage, prompting the response of Doctor Strange, who works with Dead Girl to assemble a random group of their own dead allies - Ant-Man, Orphan and the Phantom Rider. The main gag here is about the meaningless concept of death in comics, but it kind of doesn't hit quite as hard as the social commentary of the original series. Though Allred and Dragotta are in peak form here, the comic itself is rather a bland supplement to a great series.

[TK · Rating 4 out of 5]

Silly in all the right ways. I love X-Statix soooo much!

[Mystique X · Rating 4 out of 5]

El after-party más loco del universo de bolsillo loco que hicieron Milligan y el matriomonio Allred.

[Fazun · Rating 2 out of 5]

2.5/5

[Don · Rating 3 out of 5]

I didn't get as much of a kick out of this as I did Milligan's original X-Force/X-Statix run. Dead Girl didn't stick to its premise, which was to take shots at the trope of comics characters dying and come back. Milligan took shots at every trope as it came up--Dr. Strange's quirks, his servant's, the supervillain getting repeatedly beaten, etc.--and even threw in some self-referential X-Statix stuff.

It's good for a single read but in the end, it felt like I Can't Believe It's Not the Justice League by Giffen and DeMatteis, a phoned-in return to the good ol' days.

[Matt Shaqfan · Rating 5 out of 5]

This probably flew under too many people's radars, which is a shame because it's hilarious, a little dorky, and the art is awesome comic-pop.

I'm not sure what Dr Strange is really like, but in this he's kind of a kook, and has apparently been having problems with hemorrhoids. I even laughed out loud a couple times, which is a hard thing to do when dealing with super hero comics, I think. Between Milligan's writing, Dragotta's pencils (with Mike Allred inking), and Marvel's cast of dead characters all at their disposal, it's pretty much a perfect mix of what I look for in comics. So if you're me, you'll definitely like this one. Does that help?

[La Revistería Comics · Rating 4 out of 5]

Está medio loca, está muy fuerte, ¡y está completamente muerta! Las tanáticas aventuras de Chica Muerta en solitario (*) en un único y destrenillante tomo, en el que los muertos hacen lo que sea para volver a respirar un ratito.


*técnicamente, en la mayor parte de la aventura está acompañada por un abombado Dr. Strange, pero por algo la miniserie tiene le nombre de ella sola en el título, ¿no?

[Fugo Feedback · Rating 4 out of 5]

Este tomo me lo compré como autorregalo para festejar algo que al final no se dio, pero me dio varias alegrías igual. Lástima que al haberlo leído antes que la serie que lo precede me espoileé un par de cosas. Ahora que estoy leyendo toda la serie cronológicamente, seguro cuando llegue al final me lo relea y escriba su correspondiente reseña.

[Shannon Appelcline · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a much more apt ending for the comic than the final arc of the original series. It's a funny, wacky tale that also does a great job of letting some of the X-Forcers be heroes one last time [7+/10].

[Patrick Artazu · Rating 5 out of 5]

I really liked all the X-Force/X-Statix Milligan/Allred stuff, but this shit just takes it to the NEXT LEVEL

[Jeff · Rating 3 out of 5]

I think I've grown out of comic books.

[Dony Grayman · Rating 3 out of 5]

Sexto tomo de la edición española de Forum/Panini de X-Statix.

[Ondra Král · Rating 4 out of 5]

3,5*

[Variaciones Enrojo]

Edición española de Dead Girl, spin-off de X-Statix.