Match 2 of the new tourny

Previously-
Match 1- In a rematch from last year Morrison once again "Murderstomped" Bendis' run.


NOW

Scott Lobdell's Uncanny X-Men run continues from Claremont and Jim Lees runs, with the X-Men seemingly stronger then ever following the return of Prof. Xavier and the unification of the original X-Men's X-Force and the main X-Men team. Lobdell's run would see significant amounts of plots and story arcs playing out at once such as the long running mutant killing Legacy Virus, the Phalanx Covenant, the return of Magneto with his Acolytes in Fatal Attraction and the Age of Apocalypse which began when Prof X's reality warping son accidentally killed him while time traveling.

vs

Joss Whedon's Astonishing X-Men picks up from the end of Morrison's New X-Men as Cyclops(now co-headmaster of the Xavier Institute with Emma Frost) forms a new team in order to better the public image of both mutants and the X-Men by engaging more publicly in super heroics. Whedon's casual style and whitty tone would see the full time return of Kitty Pryde to the X-Men, the creation of SWORD and several lasting characters and the resurrection of Colossus. Fan's often credit this run for having the definitive Emma Frost and Cyclops of the 00's, the most consistent and easy to start with stories, and for possibly being the best run since Claremont.

so.....Which do YOU think is better?

Feel Free right your pros and cons for both titles

you playing dirty pool Koays! We all known Whedon's run is going to win this entire tournament (since you took claremont out of the equation) but I really loved Lobdell, thing is i think im the only one. I really enjoyed the Phanlanx story and the launch of Gen X, i dont hate AOA like everyone else does and the Legacy virus was a cool story imo.

STILL, Wheldon is more then likely the second best run in X men history, his Cyclops is the best ever, his emma was great. There wasn't a story in his run that wasn't awesome, bringing fan favorite Colossus back after Lobdell killed him lol So yea my vote goes to Wheldon cause its just an easy answer. Im sorry Scotty I wanted to vote for you!

@mcklayn: lol the last time i did this, Whedon lost in round one to Claremont's X-Treme X-Men.

Whedons run spawned a whole new generation of X-Men fans while Lobdell drove a whole generation away.....

This is tough :/

@cattlebattle: lol Lobdell has accomplishments where as Whedon can be overlooked. I mean everyone forgets there even was a cure for mutation. Even Whedon after a while.

Lobdells like the best of the 90's...

Lobdell was on the book longer, so, I think his contributions would be more plentiful thus, more of it would be remembered.

It's like having the least smelliest feces.

Joss Whedon's Astonishing X-Men. IMO the only X-men run that can surpass it is Claremont's uncanny X-men

yea but thats claremont, name alone he trumps any X writer lol, heck i more then likely voted for him (i really liked the Xtreme Xmen run I still own every issue lol) Now dont get me wrong I loved Lobdell's stuff, more then likely more then anyone else on the forums and i really felt he did leave a mark good or bad on the franchise. But to say whedon didn't leave us with anything is silly, he brought back colossus and introduced Agent Brand and Danger his stories may not have been landscape changing but since he had alot less time. Also he was terrible at keeping deadlines, every other month title still didnt come out on time lol. Still just taking the runs as a whole and going back and reading he is one of the best reads, he is the title that i suggest or lend to friends of mine who I am trying to get into comics so yea

I see i have to work harder to divide the fandom....hmm

the man who once swore to unite us against the true enemy now tries to divide us, i am starting to see your true side koays!

Lmao maybe...but think about it like this...your slaughtering a bunch of flatscans in the name of mutant kind, then all of a sudden your partner looks up at you and says "This reminds me of that great scene in Chuck Austen's run where Iceman wanted Havok to pee him back to life". Then you've got a bigger problem.

While I thought this would be tougher, I have to go with Lobdell. There are a few snores in his era of stories (not necessarily penned by him, so I am not faulting his run), but what I most distinctly remember from Whedon's run were largely unimaginative villains and delays. Fatal Attractions, The Phalanx Covenant, The Adventures of Cyclops and Phoenix, and the initial run of Generation X put him way over Whedon (who I actually enjoy). And his run was accompanied by Joe Madureira, Chris Bachalo (who I will contend to this day had his best and most clean layouts in the first art of Gen X), and Gene Ha.

Gallery

@koays: lol god please tell me you have a scan for that

@phoenixofthetides said:

While I thought this would be tougher, I have to go with Lobdell. There are a few snores in his era of stories (not necessarily penned by him, so I am not faulting his run), but what I most distinctly remember from Whedon's run were largely unimaginative villains and delays. Fatal Attractions, The Phalanx Covenant, The Adventures of Cyclops and Phoenix, and the initial run of Generation X put him way over Whedon (who I actually enjoy). And his run was accompanied by Joe Madureira, Chris Bachalo (who I will contend to this day had his best and most clean layouts in the first art of Gen X), and Gene Ha.

Gallery

Bachalo is still the art that i relate with X men the most, his stuff in Gen X was gorgeous the promo art for it

THIS is what might of gotten me addicted to Xmen at such an young age, and the start of the run that Lobdell actually wrote was great btw its the ones who came after him that ruined it. Im still voting Whedon just wanted and excuse to use this image :D

@koays: It's pretty hard to compare for me; their runs are kind of just two different animals.

While I do think of the '93/'94 period of Lobdell's run to be by far the strongest X-men stories of the 90's, it's really not meant to stand on it's own. Even if you pick up after the mess of X-cutioner's song and stop before the mess of AoA, say The Uncanny X-Men #297 -Up and Around to #318 or 319 --a comparable run in length to Whedon's, and the most solid of the era-- the book still runs through 3 crossovers in that time (Fatal Attractions, Blood Ties, and Phalanx Covenant) AND loses a lot of it's story context if you aren't reading the parallel stories that were happening in X-Men at the time. It was a great couple of years for X-men, for sure, but not entirely on the merits of Lobdell's stories alone.

By stark contrast, Whedon and Cassaday's Astonishing X-Men run was completely self-contained, included in no crossovers, had consistent art throughout, and was just generally accessible to both new and returning readers. None of that stuff makes it strictly better than Lobdell's run, but it does at least leave little basis for comparison.

I suppose it could be argued that Lobdell and Nicieza collectively made a much more substantial contribution to the mythos in just those two years than Whedon did in four (and did so under much more editorial scrutiny and oversight), but because their two books were meant to be read as essentially one book (same cast, same premise, overlapping story arcs, etc), there's just really not a lot of ways to compare them to Whedon and Cassaday's run.

classic vs newwave i say tie

Ties are for the weak!

Going to have to go with whedon, his was the run that got me to start reading x-men and though I have since gone back and read the majority of the teams history the accessible nature of the story, the art consistency, the lack of event tie-ins, and above all else the characterizations keep it on top for me

Agree whole-heartedly with the whedon versions of Scott, Emma, and I would argue Logan as well being the definitive versions

Yea logan was great too, but not just him honestly the whole darn roster Kitty and Colossus were point on, and Beast i loved him at the time.

Whedon's totally the writer that made me really appreciate Cyclops, he made him likable without changing any of the character's classic sensibilities, which I really appreciate. And moreover, he actually showed him being a good leader. Lots of writers get that he's supposed to be a skilled tactician, but Whedon really showed us how.

Honestly though, like @mcklayn said, he really did do every character justice; everyone felt like the definitive version, y'know? and no one seemed like they were there just because. Just pitch-perfect characterization that made you really appreciate every character.

Actually, yeah, I'm gonna have to go with Whedon for my vote too.

@oldnightcrawler: yea i mean i think the thing that he did for the X franchise was Cyclops. Before that he was wishy washy, kind of a guy you knew was suppose to be next up but really over shadowed by Storm and made a joke of by Wolverine alot, Whedon started writing him i think as the tactician and future leader of mutant kind and the ball kind of got picked up and ran with from there.

@oldnightcrawler: Well even though i'm a little late and you cast your vote already....I feel like the spirit of this match up was supposed to be "Great but isolated, short Run vs Impactful, lengthy run" and was supposed to ask whether a good story that's unimportant is better then a ok story that changes the landscape. As far as Nicieza, I feel like in his work with Lobdell he doesn't stand out as much as he compliments. I mean I'm almost afraid to include a Nicieza work on his own because it's so uninspired in my opinion. Though i feel like when their looked at together Lobdell and Nicieza sort of compliment eachother and contribute as much to the overall feel of the titles during that it's comparable to how Whedon's writing and Cassaday art sort of made Astonishing the juggernaut that it is, and wouldn't be if you removed one of them....though only Whedon seems to get the credit, like Lobdell.

@mcklayn-

Lobdell. Whedon was overrated. People often give him to much credit and some even say he was better than Claremont.

The only person who has written more iconic X-Men stories than Lobdell is Chris Claremont. His run may of became confusing there in the end, but you can't really blame him for that. It was the mid 90s where the producers were controlling everything. Still I think Lobdell has written more good issues than Whedon.

@koays said:

@oldnightcrawler: Well even though i'm a little late and you cast your vote already....I feel like the spirit of this match up was supposed to be "Great but isolated, short Run vs Impactful, lengthy run" and was supposed to ask whether a good story that's unimportant is better then a ok story that changes the landscape. As far as Nicieza, I feel like in his work with Lobdell he doesn't stand out as much as he compliments. I mean I'm almost afraid to include a Nicieza work on his own because it's so uninspired in my opinion. Though i feel like when their looked at together Lobdell and Nicieza sort of compliment eachother and contribute as much to the overall feel of the titles during that it's comparable to how Whedon's writing and Cassaday art sort of made Astonishing the juggernaut that it is, and wouldn't be if you removed one of them....though only Whedon seems to get the credit, like Lobdell.

@mcklayn-

OMG thats gold, i love it

Lobdell. Whedon's first arc is the only one worth reading IMO. I may give it a re-read just because all of my fanboy friends idolize it, but I remember being really underwhelmed after the perfectly crafted--if not totally derivative--first arc ended.

the first arc was the danger one correct? Cause taht was the one i liked least i think, the break world arc which i think was the last one he did was by far my favorite and i tend not to like space stories but yea

Why do you think everything was a mess, between X-cutioner's song AoA. ?

I meant I thought X-cutioner's song was a mess, and AoA was a mess, but everything between them was pretty sweet.

I'll go with Lobdell... This guy is far from perfect, but the 90s it seems had more sanctions than in our own time which says a lot. And he still managed to have some now classic stories under his pen... I dunno, I feel like Whedon is really damn overrated. Yes he got the dialogs and characterizations right, but his plots hadn't introduced anything groundbreaking. Colossus resurrection was incredibly lame. Guy was cremated, but hey some uberprogressive worlds have "the tech" right? Not like those earthling primates (who somehow always the ones to make the most "universal" decisions somehow, yet)... Talking about these worlds, Breakworld - to me, they were lame and nothing else I'm willing to add here. Not an interesting concept to get the whole run revolve around it basically. Oh, the mutant cure. Another abstraction given shape. It's like curing humanity, what the f@ck does it mean? Again, bad ideas. Danger, to whom so many subsequent writers had some pretty intense appreciation - I just don't get it. I love me some female AI concepts, but she is in no way any better than say Karima, EVA or Prosh, why was she given this kind of hype in beyond me. All hype around this run is beyond me I guess. It was a not bad read, I guess the successful name attached to it makes the difference.

I'm not going to knock your appreciation for Lobdell, I grew up with his run, and I still think it's good.

But I will say that Whedon's attachment to Astonishing was not a selling point for me; by the time I read it, I knew nothing about the guy and I'd already read most other X-men runs, and his still stood out. If anything, it was that run that made me interested in him, and it's still my favorite thing he's done.

yea i had no idea who he was when i read the title, and i really liked the title. Again i echo Nightcrawler I loved Lobdell as well, but i really like whedon too.

Also I want to say, Man I hate Danger too lmao glad to see im not the only one

really? I dunno, I always liked her, but for anyone who doesn't, you guys should check out All-New X-Factor. She was hilarious in that, and it's just a great run anyway. It even made me like Polaris. Still kinda bummed it got cancelled.

@oldnightcrawler: she was humerus in that run, i read the whole thing and i for sure was sad it got canceled, i wouldnt mind seeing Georgia some where in the near future either

I just really loved the whole cast. Even Polaris, who I usually find dull as dishwater, just really worked here.

Since it's cancellation I've thought it would be a cool team to revisit in some way. Though I did get interested in Snow, I kinda like the idea of Sunspot buying the team as part of what he's up to now.

Lobdell's run was solid. Probably the only thing he did that was good. But it can't compare to Whedon's. Along with Claremont and Morrison he's one of the holy trinity when it comes to X-runs.

@oldnightcrawler: yea iirc (and i may not) they never broke up the team. So tech they still together working for the time being except for the fact Quicksilver is part of the Unity Squad and it shows Gambit on the cover soon so idk

Morrison was garbage, just sayin lol

@mcklayn: @immolation: Both of you are non believers. Begone.

All knowing, powerful, omnipresence maybe. Non Believers no lol

@mcklayn: Non Believer begone. I shall not base myself to your level.

Hey, it's not like I forgot PoS that was Eve of Destruction. Though it does feel like being an editorial decision more than his own.

PS. Morrison? Trinity? No

@theincrediblesuperhulk8642: See Im not the only one who knows the truth, who have seen the light and lived through the propaganda, Morrison is the snake in the High evolved Garden of Xavier! Cast him from your soul and you too will be washed over with Greater Humanity!

My vote goes to Lobdell's Uncanny X-Men. He told better stories and had better villians. Whedon run is very overated.

Lobdell.

Lobdell. His run was pretty great, though some of his crossovers were a little messy. But he did great character development for everyone he wrote. If you look at the characters from where he started in 1991 to where he ended his first run in 1996, they all grew as characters and received great development. He was the first person to make Jean Grey likable for me. The only main character that he used that didn't receive any great development was Storm, but Claremont had already done so much with her, that there wasn't much left for her at that time.

Just mention the name of a certain red-head from an alternate future and they rise like a Phoenix.

so instead of necro posting we dubbing it Phoenixposting? maybe Phosting <.< no no

@mcklayn: well we are raising a thread from the dead with it. :P