Young Inhumans

Inhumans (2003) #1-12

by Sean McKeever (Writer), Matthew Clark (Illustrator), Rob Teranishi (Illustrator)

The next generation of Inhumans star in this atmospheric ensemble drama, collected for the first time in one trade paperback! They're just ordinary exchange students from a far-off land, here to learn about our culture - except their home is a mysterious city on the moon, and they each possess fabulous, exotic abilities and appearances. The product of experiments on humanity by an alien culture millennia ago, the Inhumans are a race governed by the laws of genetics. Here as nowhere else, diversity and individuality are prized beyond compare. The Inhumans have flourished in isolation from humanity within their kingdom of Attilan on the surface of the moon, but what happens when their king decides to send some of his subjects to Earth to learn about humans? Will they be able to integrate into human culture? More important, will they even try?

Collecting: Inhumans 1-12

Genres: Comics, Marvel, Graphic Novels, Superheroes, Comic Book, Fiction, Science Fiction

272 pages, Paperback

First published September 3, 2008

About the author

After writing indie comics (such as the ensemble teen-drama The Waiting Place) for six years, Sean got his big break writing an issue of The Incredible Hulk for Marvel Comics in 2001. Since then, Sean has written hundreds of comics for Marvel, DC Comics and other publishers, including notable runs on Sentinel, Inhumans, Mystique, Marvel Adventures Spider-Man, Gravity, Spider-Man Loves Mary Jane, Birds of Prey and Teen Titans.

Best known for delivering introspective, character-driven work, Sean also wrote several weeks of the Funky Winkerbean syndicated comic strip, much of which has been reprinted in the celebrated collection, Lisa's story: the other shoe.

In 2005, Sean won the Eisner Award for Talent Deserving of Wider Recognition.

Sean continues to write comic books; he also writes for the videogame and animation industries.

Reviews

[Terence · Rating 2 out of 5]

 
This is the story of 5 Inhumans
 
Picked to go to Earth together
 
Go to college in Wisconsin
 
And find out what happens when Inhumans stop being polite

And start getting real The Inhuman Real World

So Young Inhumans is almost literally an Inhuman season of The Real World. The Royal Family chooses five young Inhumans to send to college in Wisconsin as exchange students. Most of them don't really like each other and ugliness ensues. Oh and there is the whole people are ignorant and want their DNA for their own reasons story going on too.

[Dan · Rating 1 out of 5]

My first 1star book of the year. First exposure to Inhumans,and just wasn't feeling it.

[Brandon · Rating 4 out of 5]

This isn't the most original book, and it's not the most 'Inhumans' of all the Inhumans book. You could replace the characters in this book being inhuman with nearly any other alien race and still keep most of the story arcs the same. But as-is, it's fine. Hell, it's fun! The characters (except for Jolen, all my homies hate Jolen, that stupid gaslighting genocidal Poison Ivy wannabe) are likable and complex, and I enjoyed watching the ensemble cast fight and bicker and learn more about humanity. I was afraid Sean McKeever would try to make either the capitalist human society or the genocratic inhuman society be superior but throughout the book both cultures have to learn a lot from each other. The books side-steps some of the deeper political debate that made the Paul Jenkins/Jae Lee "Inhumans" so unique in establishing the Inhuman culture, but seeing deeper into the minds of the younger characters is more telling of how their society works as a whole. This isn't the Inhuman Royal Family fighting wars, this isn't Black Bolt's master scheming, this is a group of confused young adults still trying to find their place in the world and now being shoved somewhere new. It's a fun read full of heart.

[Christian Zamora-Dahmen · Rating 5 out of 5]

I adored this series. My only complaint is that it didn't last longer.
At first it troubled me that the Royal Family wasn't the focus of the story, but then the kids grew on me.
Both art and story were great, with a big focus on character development which is something I really appreciate.
The last issue felt rushed, but the creators did their best to tie loose ends. Kudos to them!

[M · Rating 2 out of 5]

I really, really like the Inhumans even though they're B-listers in the Marvel Universe. Even though their story is linked to the Kree and all the cosmic aspects of Marvel that I find a bit tiresome, the Inhuman comics are always intimate and very focused. They are not a sprawling team of superheroes getting retconned left, right and centre every two issues. The 12-issue arcs just tell a story. But this one might have been too simple and YA for my taste. A group of five Inhumans get sent to Earth to try and learn more about us humans and mend diplomatic relations between both species. For some reason, they get sent to university in Wisconsin. And honestly, if you're going to send a different species to a hostile planet, maybe don't send them to a place with a history of very clear class and race divisions? But of course, this is Marvel so it has to happen in the US and anyway we could argue that the States have too much bearing on world conflicts so it'd be the logical choice to learn about.

But I digress. The Inhumans go to college, they experience Greek life, trust funders and the cafeteria life, fall in and out of love, have temper tantrums and fight with each other. The only thing missing is a spring break. It's an inconsequential college movie in comic format. An evil guy (or is he evil?) who wants to steal their genetic material enters the story around issue #8, but by then I guess it was too late for this series, because it was cancelled soon after. The writers do a decent job of tying loose ends by the end of the arc four issues later, but everything feels rushed and unimportant at the same time. Also, absolutely nothing happens with Jolen. Such an underused character.

Skippable, but not terrible.

[Silas · Rating 4 out of 5]

I am familiar with the Inhuman Royal Family through a few stories I have read, but this story focuses on some new, younger Inhuman characters in the early 2000s. This puts it ahead of the glut of Inhuman characters later on, where they are still relatively unknown in the general world. These new characters are sent on an exchange program at a university in Wisconsin. It only involves Inhumans living at a human college, and not the other way around. Since it involves new characters, and takes place far away from any other comic properties, it is relatively self-contained and able to go where it wants to. The characters are treated a lot like mutants, with people thinking they are weird and not treating them well, generally, though there is an interesting part where people also see them and assume they will help because they can. The characters are not all particularly nice, and there are some interesting cultural clashes, and the characters acclimate to living with humans at different rates, which is interesting. Since I don't know whether these characters ever show up elsewhere, it is interesting where this book ends. A couple of the characters have something of an ending, but others have lingering questions. Overall, this was an interesting read that was more about the experience of living in a new culture than about people having powers.

[PJ · Rating 3 out of 5]

Nie bardzo wiem, o czym miała być ta seria. Niektóre zeszyty całkiem spoko, reszta taka se, a nawet nie przeszkadzało mi natężenie teen dramy. Przepaść kulturowa i nieufność między młodymi Inhumans a ludźmi miała być osią całej historii, a była zrealizowana skrajnie chaotycznie. Mam wrażenie, że twórcy chcieli przedstawić szeroki zakres konfliktów, co samo w sobie się chwali, bo początkowo wyglądało to na proste "Inhumans źli bo to nie ludzie" vs "Ludzie to prymitywne zwierzęta". Wyszło jednak jakoś nijako.

Zeszyty w antologii:
Inhumans (Vol. 4) #1
Inhumans (Vol. 4) #2
Inhumans (Vol. 4) #3
Inhumans (Vol. 4) #4
Inhumans (Vol. 4) #5
Inhumans (Vol. 4) #6
Inhumans (Vol. 4) #7
Inhumans (Vol. 4) #8
Inhumans (Vol. 4) #9
Inhumans (Vol. 4) #10
Inhumans (Vol. 4) #11
Inhumans (Vol. 4) #12

[Ekenedilichukwu Ikegwuani · Rating 5 out of 5]

i loved this. i loved the way the characters interacted, the way they grew and developed, the way the story felt intricate and even as it got more intense, never too ridiculous. just absolutely amazing

[Peter Howarth · Rating 3 out of 5]

An easy read, but pleasant. A lot of the standard themes about what makes a human, human. There were a few really entertaining issues, and some story-lines I wish they took further. I'm not disappointed I read it.

[Kurt Lorenz · Rating 4 out of 5]

1-3, Lunar, ☆☆☆
4-6, Culture Shock, ☆☆☆☆
7, Surface, ☆☆☆☆
8, ☆☆☆☆
9-12, No Matter the Cost, ☆☆☆☆

[Mickey · Rating 3 out of 5]

Ah, this is how you make me care about the Inhumans. Make them TEENS and give them ANGST. Pretty good. Would be a 3.5 if Goodreads let me do that.

[Zachary King · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Inhumans go to college! Neat premise with group of young Inhumans discovering earth for the first time. Some of the standalone chapters focused on character were more interesting than the main plot.

[Scribd · Rating 3 out of 5]

The story could be totally pedestrian in another circumstance—five young students are sent on an exchange program to learn about a culture rather different from their own. Only here, these five students are Inhumans: genetically modified beings imbued with unique super powers. Their home is not simply some foreign country, but a technologically advanced society on the Moon. They’ve been sent to Earth on a goodwill mission to help broker peace between the Earth and the Moon.

Authors Sean McKeever and Robert Teranishi could easily have relied upon flashy, super-powered action to drive the story, and there is a good deal of it. But the battles are secondary, if that. What really makes the story stand out is the deep exploration of what it means to be human, seen through the lens of those who are distinctly not. The Inhumans experience racism and classism, love and lust, manipulation and power plays, and even lessons in personal finance. We’re granted a deep understanding of the personalities of the five young men and women trying to fit in on a strange world. It’s a careful blend of Sci-Fi and Fantasy, a coming of age tale, a reality show, and a story of subterfuge and political intrigue all wrapped into one. This comic is a clever way of exploring one of humanity’s oldest and greatest failings—our innate fear of that which we do not understand.

[Melissa Snow · Rating 3 out of 5]

The Inhumans here are mired in too many young-adult tropes that get no fresher by applying them to Kree-enhanced not-human characters. Jolen and Alaris are too one-note to be as compelling as they could be, and overall the series is a disappointment. Spending time in Attilan among the Inhuman society is much more interesting than reading about an Inhuman wanting to be on an American college football team, or following the requisite misunderstood-because-they're-different storyline without anything insightful or special added to it.

[Yuuki Nakashima · Rating 4 out of 5]

It was interesting. It's not like other comics I have read.
Inhumans are aliens from the moon. Because of their unique appearance, special abilities and cultural differences, they have some problems in the states. I think it's not just an issue in a comic. We can have similar problems because of our race, culture, appearance etc... So I tend to empathize with them when I read it.
I wonder if "Young Inhumans" completely finished. Just 12 stories?

[Vitek Novy · Rating 2 out of 5]

As much as I liked the first Inhumans series, this one is not even half as good. OK, having young Inhumans to study in America is an interesting idea, but there's not much of a story going on. I'm giving it two stars, that might be perhaps too generous but the comic did have a few fun moments...

[Kerry · Rating 4 out of 5]

Not as good as the original, but I still really enjoyed the story line and that it was the next generation of inhumans that made the story.

[Brandon · Rating 4 out of 5]

I've really been enjoying the Inhumans. Very fascinating. The story in this one was good, but I wasnt a fan of the abrupt ending.

[Marcela · Rating 4 out of 5]

The ending struck me as random and abrupt, but overall, I really enjoyed getting to know these characters. I'm not sure I've seen them in later Marvel books, but I hope to see more of them somewhere.

[Jen · Rating 2 out of 5]

I guess I like the characters ok... Nahrees is pretty upsetting with her violent, aggressive relationship and the frat boy attitude of 'untold you you wanted it!!!' being portrayed. That is something that bothers me a lot. Also there was a lot of weird non-clothes showing boobs and man chest gratuitously. Not needed or helpful.

[Frans Kempe · Rating 3 out of 5]

5 young Inhumans goes to Earth in an exchange program.