X-Men Gold, Vol. 4: The Negative Zone War

X-Men Gold (Collected Editions)

by Marc Guggenheim (Writer), Ken Lashley (Artist), Lan Medina (Artist)

When alien invaders take one of their own, the X-Men must travel to the Negative Zone to get them back! Will the mutants be able to escape the Negative Zone with the team in-tact?

COLLECTING: X-MEN: GOLD 16-20

Genres: Comics, X Men, Marvel, Graphic Novels, Superheroes, Graphic Novels Comics, Comic Book

136 pages, Paperback

First published March 28, 2018

About the author

Marc Guggenheim grew up on Long Island, New York, and earned his law degree from Boston University. After over four years in practice, he left law to pursue a career in television.

Today, Guggenheim is an Emmy Award–winning writer who writes for multiple mediums including television, film, video games, comic books, and new media. His work includes projects for such popular franchises as Percy Jackson, Star Wars, Call of Duty, Star Trek, and Planet of the Apes.

His next book, In Any Lifetime, coming from Lake Union Publishing on August 1st.

Guggenheim currently lives in Encino, California, with his wife, two daughters, and a handful of pets.

Keep up to date on his latest projects with LegalDispatch, a weekly newsletter where he shares news and notes about writing, comics, and the entertainment industry.

Reviews

[Baba · Rating 2 out of 5]

This series just isn't doing it for me. Even with Ink and Armor joining the Gold team on a rescue mission in the Negative Zone. It feels like painting by numbers, and that the creators are just going through the motions? 5 out of 12, no image, no GIF Two Star read.
2019 read

[Chad · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book is just not very good. It's all about the scaly alien they found with the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants. He was banished here from a planet in the negative zone. His followers open up a portal and come take him back. (Even though no one in the Negative Zone has that kind of tech or Annihilus would be over here in a heartbeat trying to conquer the universe. Remember when Marvel used to have editors?) Anyway, a couple of X-Men get sucked up along with these aliens to the Negative Zone and the X-Men go to get them back. The plot is totally ripped off of the other 8 gazillion times the X-Men were whisked into space by the Shiar or the Starjammers (except I'm interested in those).

The main thing is that this is just boring. Nothing happens of consequence. There's no drama. You can tell Guggenheim has spent the last several years padding out 24 episodes of Arrow each season. That's just what this feels like, a bunch of filler while we wait for sweeps so we can get to the good stuff.

[Paul · Rating 4 out of 5]

I absolutely loved this volume. This would've been a five star read for me if it weren't for two things:

1. Old Man Logan. Get rid of him already!

2. I feel the artwork, while perfectly good with excellent storytelling skills, isn't quite five star-worthy.

[Malum · Rating 2 out of 5]

2.5 stars.
Better than the last volume but Guggenheim really getting lazy.

If a spaceship loses power in space, it would just continue to float in space. According to Guggenheim, however, it would instantly crash on a completely different planet from the one it just came from (and thus would be closest to).

Also, Storm loses her powers...until they need her to wrap this story up and then she has them again for some reason.

I am quickly losing my patience with this book...

[Sud666 · Rating 2 out of 5]

Soooo..the gist? Ugly space alien baby almost gets killed by parents for being ugly. Alien space baby grows up angry and starts space alien Nazi party. Space Alien Nazi party tries a putsch and fails, angry space alien gets sent to Earth. Space Nazis come to look for their angry leader. The X-men and super-old Logan fight them. This is the Negative Zone war. This is also a 2 star comic. If I don't sound elated it's because I am not.

[Chris Lemmerman · Rating 2 out of 5]

[Read as single issues]
The X-Men go to the Negative Zone, and fight a war. Pretty much does what it says on the tin, I think?

I...I've been nice to X-Men Gold, since it's been doing alright so far. It hasn't been massively impressive, but it's been solid. This volume is a drop in quality, unfortunately.

The X-Men are dragged into a war that they have no real reason to fight; they could literally have turned up and saved Nightcrawler and gone home again. Instead they involve themselves in things that they really don't need to be involved in and cause a hell of a mess that they then have to clean up. It's...I don't want to say pointless, because it does build on previous storylines, but it feels anticlimactic in comparison.

The art's great though. Ken Lashley and Diego Bernard share the story, and their sketchy styles mesh well together. I've sung Bernard's praises over on numerous Valiant titles, and this is no exception. It's just a shame that all he gets to draw is desert for one issue, because that must be disappointing as an artist.

I have to also mention that Dartayus, the planet that this story is set on, is also the planet that Mick Rory's novel over in Legends Of Tomorrow is set on, so well done Guggenheim for getting a Marvel/DC crossover in under everyone's noses!

Not great, if we're honest. Not bad, but inconsequential and forced at times. Nice art though.

[Frédéric · Rating 1 out of 5]

The creepy alien from previous issues goes back home, the X-Men on his trail. Yawn.
Nothing important really happens. It's overplayed- Old Man Logan drops a killer punchlines every 2 pages, please, spare me- when it's not totally cheesy- "Did she just call me sweetie?"<-actual line of dialogue (roll eyes).

The characters are bland to a point close to non-existence. One cliffhanger is illogically of no consequence the next issue (Kurt's escape attempt), the last issue serves no purpose whatsoever-and the previous 4 were long already- and the art sucks for 3 issues out of 5 (only  Ken Lashley manages to do something half decent).

I'm seriously starting to be convinced Marc Guggenheim couldn't write a good script to save his life.

[Jesús De la Jara · Rating 3 out of 5]

Kologoth, un extraterrestre que quedó varado en la tierra durante el anterior conflicto, será rescatado por fin por sus secuaces, los cuales planean con él tomar el poder en su planeta. Sin embargo se ven envueltos Kitty y Kurt por lo que el resto del equipo irá a rescatarlos.
Este número me pareció un poco más aburrido sobre todo por la longitud de su trama y la poca importancia que tuvo en al historia en general.
Sólo el final me gustó bastante.

[Robert Kirwan · Rating 3 out of 5]

I enjoyed this arc and would give it 3.5. I usually round up if I’m in a .5 score range but I think the 3 is enough. There wasn’t much substance to it. I mean, negative zone, war, god like creature, X-Men overcoming adversity, it’s all here!!

Again this suffers from the changing artwork!! It would have been a definite 4 stars if Ken Lashley had stayed drawing!! But no, it suffers again with chopping and changing mid run. Something that really irritates me.

Some good cliffhangers leaving you like, oh sh——- but all over a little too quickly with no real emotional consequence.

THAT ENDING THOUGH

[Nicole Westen · Rating 3 out of 5]

I really only have one complaint about this, and it's more a personal matter than anything with the plot or characters themselves. The symbol used for the alternate dimension space nazi's. It's an actual rune called Odal, just turned upside down. This rune was actually used by the nazi's, like a lot of them. But today the runes are used in a lot of pagan traditions, including Asatru in Scandinavia, and those people who take pride in their Nordic heritage. There's been huge push back against white supremacist movements because of their abuse of Nordic runes and imagery (like Thor's hammer), because a lot of people see this kind of stuff and immediately assume someone is a racist. And I get frustrated that this part of my heritage is being abused by racists and white supremacists. I'm proud of my heritage, but it's getting hard to express it with these assholes shitting all over it in public. So, yeah, I know the writers were probably trying to go with a symbol that kinda looked nazi-ish to get the point across that these were space nazi's... but I'm just tired of this stuff, which like the swastika was originally positive, being associated with such awful things.

[Quentin Wallace · Rating 3 out of 5]

As I expected, that origin issue of the alien from the last volume leads into this storyline. The alien escapes into the negative zone and accidentally takes a couple of X-Men with him, leading the other X-Men to pursue him. They find themselves in the middle of an alien civil war and end up battling a deity.

Not a bad arc but felt a little typical. This is still a good series.

[C. Varn · Rating 2 out of 5]

Marc Guggenhiem seems lost with what to do Negative Zone and the intrusion of the Negative Zone easily into the Earth 616 seems to contradict the cosmic narrative of Marvel as Annihilus would have destroyed everything by now if it was that easy. Kologoth, the alien who is in the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants is a kind of mutant inverse superman who is biding time until it can return home to leave a liberation army, but, of course, he is unleashing a godlike being to the destroy his home planet. Mutants gain and lose power in the plot--particularly Storm--in ways that seem entirely convenient to the plot. Guggenhiem makes Old Man Logan an awkward fit to the group, so much so that he probably should be dropped from the team as Guggenheim seems to not know what to do with. More Kitty Pryde and Colossus romance develops which seems fairly standard at this point and does develop the character, more Rachel Summers being rendered useless which seems fairly standard at this point, and pointless cliffhangers that don't have consequences. Things tie up far too easily--it should have either been a shorter arc or a far, far longer one. The art is inconsistent, but Ken Lashley's artwork is good when he is drawing.

[Robert · Rating 4 out of 5]

I really enjoyed this volume for my part. Kologoth’s story was a compelling one, even if the religious cult angle felt like it came out of nowhere. I think the part I enjoy most is watching Kitty grow into her leadership role, I really view her as one of the great X-leaders now up there with Scott and Ororo.

[David · Rating 4 out of 5]

This series is getting better as it goes along.

[Renata · Rating 2 out of 5]

This was fine. I'm generally kind of whatever about the X-Men's space adventures.

¯\_(ツ)_/¯

[Michael Hicks · Rating 2 out of 5]

The X-Men Gold crew get caught up in an alien war in the Negative Zone. Not really a whole lot else going on here, making this volume pretty “meh.”

[Emmett Spain · Rating 3 out of 5]

The Negative Zone War? More like the Negative Zone Battle. The story is pretty basic, but there’s some good character work for Kitty & Peter’s relationship that keeps this one worth reading, even if things do resolve awfully quickly and conveniently. A fine little jaunt but nothing more.

[Shannon Appelcline · Rating 3 out of 5]

In some ways, this is Guggenheim's best story for his entirely mediocre run of X-Men Gold. He takes the only major new mythos element that he's introduced, the creepy-new-guy demon, and expands that into a whole storyline about demon's attempt to take over his world. Since Secret Wars, the core X-Men comics have been notably missing in novelty, and this really pays out.

Unfortunately, "The Negative Zone War" continues to be weighed down by the flaws that have been endemic to Gold (and to a lesser-extent, Blue) since the Wars. Horrible injuries are played up, but then turn out to be of little consequence for two different characters. And, the characterization of several X-Men is problematic: Ororo kills without thought or remorse; Kitty forgets she can walk on air and cries out for someone to catch her; Rachel and Old Man Logan are totally generic; and Kitty falls for Pyotr's modern-day nice-guy stalkerism.

Still, an OK volume on average.

[Adam Fisher · Rating 4 out of 5]

This Volume takes Gold Team (Kitty Pryde, Colossus, Storm, Nightcrawler, Logan and Prestige) off-world for most of the time. Starting with a story of Kologoth (almost like a cross between a Brood and a Saibaman) and his exile from Dartayus, a planet in the Negative Zone. Arriving on Earth, he grows in power and size, also learning English and observing the X-Men from afar. When he feels like he can take control, he calls out to the regime he left on Dartayus to rescue him.
The ship arrives on Earth (catching Kitty and Piotr resting in a hotel after a romantic night together) and the X-Men take them on, Prestige getting injured. At battle's end, Kologoth escapes with Kitty and Nightcrawler as hostages. Adding Armor and Ink to their team, they head off to the Negative Zone, intent on rescue.
On Dartayus, Gold Team meets with the current government and makes a deal to take their friends and leave, but an escaping blind teleport from Nightcrawler has him missing and injured. Turns out that all the time stalling was to allow Scythian, a dark god, time to awaken. The X-Men agree to help save them from destruction, and use a tow cable phased through his body to pull him off world and into the Negative Zone vortex. Unfortunately, this gets them towed to a desert world, where they are lost for a bit.
Getting back home, the next event gets set up when Kitty asks is Piotr is still offering. When he asks "offering what?", she asks him to marry her. :)

While this Volume was good, I sort of felt like the whole Kologoth thing was engineered so they would have something to do, very filler-like. Still great art, and nice flow though. Recommend.

[Sarospice · Rating 3 out of 5]

All three stars are for Kologoth, the most interesting character in this book. He's gay he's an alien and he's fighting a war in the negative Zone. What's not to love? The answer is the rest of the X-Men. I understand now why everyone hates Old Man Logan. Also tired of the on-again-off-again relationship between Shadowcat and Colossus.

[Tomás Sendarrubias García · Rating 1 out of 5]

Pues va a ser que la cosa no mejora, que va a peor.

En los números anteriores habíamos visto una nueva alineación de la Hermandad de Mutantes Diabólicos, liderada por Mésmero, y de la que formaba parte una especie de criatura verde reptiliana que más o menos nos habían dejado ver que era un extraterrestre llamado Koloroth (o algo así) que venía de un planeta de la Zona Negativa, y durante el ataque del Ejecutor a la Escuela, se había liberado. Koloroth había permanecido escondido, y es ahora, Guerra en la Zona Negativa, cuando sus aliados van a atacar la Escuela (y de nuevo la van a arrasar) para liberar a Koloroth. En su acción de rescate, Prestigio va a quedar en coma, y Kitty y Rondador van a ser llevados por accidente al planeta de donde procede Koloroth, de modo que el Viejo Logan, Coloso, Tormenta, Tinta y Armadura se dirigirán allí para rescatarlos.

Y una de las cosas que me da rabia de esta etapa es que tengo la sensación de que están fusilando descaradamente tramas anteriores de otros escritores y etapas. En la época del anterior Equipo Oro (cuando esto eran la Patrulla-X de Whilce Portaccio, allá por los primeros 90, hubo una saga en la que se recuperaba a Mikhail Rasputin en la que la Patrulla-X era arrastrada a otra dimensión y se encontraban luchando cada uno a un lado de una guerra civil. Y esto era ya una reversión de una historia de Factor-X de pocos años antes. Pues aquí ocurre lo mismo, más o menos, y peor llevado. El caso es que van a terminar teniendo que enfrentarse a una especie de dios de ese planeta, Scythian en una especie de Space Opera venida a menos que no tiene ni pies ni cabeza más allá de ver a los X-Men enfrentándose a otra raza de extraterrestres, tan poco desarrollados que en fin, es absurdo.

[Scott Lee · Rating 3 out of 5]

I'm not sure if this would have read any better as single issues or not. It comes and goes so fast--the whole arc, off planet, fight a "war," get back--and with no lasting repercussions to anything that I'm a bit lost as to how to respond.

The plot was okay. I've read things like this in X-Men before and been fairly happy with them. But somehow this one just didn't ever catch me. We're given a flashback to some material from issue 12 at the beginning of the volume to refresh our memories of volumes big-baddy, but it just wasn't enough to get me to care. Even the X-Men don't really seem to care, remaining self-interested through out the volume.

Why does it still get a three? Well, honestly it felt like it was what was happening while this both smaller and bigger character thing happened. Said event, which gets its official kickoff moment on the splash page at the end of the volume is the only thing that happens through here that actually seems to matter. It is built up to in nice little character moments throughout the book and saves it from its superficial hero story. I think it's probably the one part of the book that really mattered to the writer as well. Just sayin'.

The art looked pretty good. So far this has felt like a volume-by-volume kinda book with few long term plot threads.

[Adam Stone · Rating 3 out of 5]

The X-Men go to space (or in this case, the Negative Zone), they land on a planet where there's a conflict they don't fully understand. Luckily, English is the language of the land. They try and stay apolitical but an evil dictator that they have history with from Earth puts them at odds with a god.

I've definitely read this precise story three or four times before. This one is told pretty well, though. And the somewhat unconventional team of Kitty Pryde, Colossus, Storm, Old Man Logan, Armor, Ink, Cecilia Reyes, and Prestige (formerly Phoenix formerly Marvel Girl formerly Rachel Grey, formerly Rachel Summers, formerly a hound of Ahab), keeps the story a little in question as Ink is used sparingly enough that I didn't quite remember the current extent of his powers, nor whether he might actually be an expendable cast member, compared to the rest of the team.

While this certainly wouldn't be my first recommendation to anyone, it's superior to most of the X-books coming out in this era. I'm not sure if it will have any lasting effects on the canon, or whether the villains will be used again, it's a perfectly serviceable story worth a quick read. Particularly if you enjoy the X-Men's cosmic adventures.

[Michael Church · Rating 2 out of 5]

This was really a mixed bag. It was nice to see the story for Kologoth come to a close, and it was pretty interesting. The whole thing felt incredibly rushed, though. There was a literal deus ex machina that happened to create an issue, then a similar solution to the problem, which created another problem, which was also somewhat handily resolved.

I thought my main issue was the art, since it seemed to jump around from one spot to the next. However, it actually seems like that was more of an issue with Guggenheim’s writing. The art team changed with every issue and was surprisingly consistent. There were still some jarring transitions, and some things (like Kitty’s power dampener and Storm’s spear) seemed to come and go at random. It still was the same overly shiny style that I don’t really like.

Honestly, if I was reading these issue by issue as they came out, I would’ve dropped this title by now. As it is, I’ve got all the trades, and I’m sticking with it through Disassembled and Age of X-Man to set up for HoX and PoX.

[Jen · Rating 4 out of 5]

Looking at reviews, I might be the only one who liked this much better than volumes 1-3 (of either Gold or Blue, actually). I like the team, felt the dynamic was finally in sync and they were each holding their own. My only problem with the team is that I have never heard/read of Ink/Eric before, but I guess I could tell going on that his mutant power is that whatever he tattoos he gets, he gets powers that are related? Hm. Sounds cool in theory, and actually looks cool on paper but I would like to know more about it.

The story was good, even off-planet as it was. Much of the beginning is actually issue 12 over again, in case anyone has forgotten. I wasn't sure if that was necessary; who really picks up a volume of even single issues when they're numbered #16-20 without having read most if not all of the #1-15?

[C · Rating 2 out of 5]

Continuing the great x-read of 2017/18...

I seem to be in a streak of subpar x-books again here.

So this one comes from a long line of X-Men-go-into-space-for-a-few-issues storylines. (Well, it is the negative zone, whatever that is... but there are spaceships and planets and alien civilizations and...) And I would say that it is firmly in the absolutely average range of them. Not a whole lot happens. There is big "drama" and several near-deaths that are absolutely telegraphed as being big nothings.

It's just a boring book overall. It feels like a writer going through the motions.

[Jeff Lanter · Rating 3 out of 5]

Its fair to say that I was hoping for a bit of a bounce back after the last crossover story and I would say that this was slightly better even if a bit unremarkable. It was nice to get back to a more regular X-Men story and continue on with characters introduced in previous volumes. The plot was a bit predictable in the end but there was one twist along the way which surprised me. The art was once again fine but nothing too spectacular which I guess describes the rhythm the book has fallen into. If it stays this good, I'm happy to keep reading but if it gets much worse, it would be hard to justify continuing on with so many competing series out there.

[Willow · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book just continues to be so obsessed with making Kitty a damsel in distress hopelessly in love with Big Strong Protector Man Peter. And I'm so tired of it. She's supposed to be in charge of the team, but instead is constantly being saved and questioning her own choices and looking desperately to Peter and Logan for approval.

It's exhausting and lazy and just awful. I love Kitty so much. It should be impossible to make me hate a book with her leading the X-Men! And yet, impressively, Guggenheim has done a fantastic job of total character assassination nonsense. And there's still 3 more volumes of this crap... Ugh

[Mitchell Friedman · Rating 4 out of 5]

Never can seem to tell. I look at a new Marvel Book. The cover. The title. Who's in it. The summary. What I thought of the previous books in the series. Sometimes what I thought of the later books. And I just can't tell. Not if it'll be great. Not if it'll be terrible. Take this book. It should have been terrible. It was an alien. And a trip to "space". And fighting a god. And it really shouldn't matter much for continuity. And they got enough of the characters right enough to be a good book. Sure, one of those was Kitty. And another Old Man Logan. But still, I didn't see it coming.

[Adan · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was okay. It picked up the thread of that Negative Zone guy from the new Brotherhood that Lydia Nance cooked up and had some of the X-Men travel to the Negative Zone on a rescue mission. Not sure why Old Man Logan was in charge here (as opposed to Storm, for example), but I was pretty excited to have Ink and Armor part of the rescue team. I don’t think I’ve seen Ink since that Young X-Men series from like a decade back. The art was handled by three different artists, making for a very disjointed look.