I think I'm addicted to it Marvel SnapAnd the that's good. The game is fun, easy to pick up, has some nice little touches with the card animations, and lets me show off my comics knowledge to friends who aren't as deep as me - but I almost didn't give this game a chance. I'm not usually into mobile games and would like to avoid anything that's easy to spend money on - and yet I'm still married - but the inspiration came from a strange place this time. After receiving a copy of Trading Cards The Uncanny X-Men: The Complete Series And by flipping through, a rush of nostalgia hit me. Suddenly I was a kid again, flipping through tomes of my favorite heroes and villains and reading all about them. I needed more to continue this rush - so Marvel Snap It was my best bet - but the book is what definitely reignited the fire.
The '90s may have been a chaotic decade for the comic book industry in general, but those earlier years were a boom in popularity for the X-Men with their stylish collectible anime, games, and trading cards. Marvel's Transformers never looked so good before artist Jim Lee got them, and now he's doing a full 105-card deck (99 benchmarks, 5 holograms, and 1 checklist). Some of Lee's original character drawings have also been added here, which are great and will be seen by many readers for the first time. The book also comes with three new bonus cards in the back, but I got sick of opening them... for now, at least.
Presentation here is top notch. The dust jacket has a great picture of Magneto on the front and two pictures of the cards on the back as examples, but take it off, and the back of the jacket is a full poster featuring a large portion of the menu which is, simply put, awesome. The actual backend contains a stunning image of Wolverine, who has been noted for appearing in multiple cards because he was the most popular character at the time.
I like that the book is smaller in abstract style because it feels appropriate to the topic and makes it easier to flip through the pages. There are two introductory write-ups here, from Ed Piskor (X-Men Grand Design) and editor Bob Budiansky, as well as feedback from the many contributors who helped make these cards a reality.
These insights into card production and the choices made at the time are as informative as they are entertaining. I had so much fun with the guy talking about how Gambit smokes on the back of his card that fans would never see in comics today, or how they must be vague with some character descriptions that, at the time, had barely been in the books for a few months. There's a fun element to reading the information here and seeing how much these characters have changed, seeing who stayed popular in the fandom and who didn't, along with many notes on what they could have done differently with that knowledge.
This book feels like the publishers wanted to handle this collection's revisit with care--or as much as they could, at least. Each card has its own page, centered on a white background in the same way one would view this artwork if it were on a museum wall. The back of the card is on the next page, complete with bios, X-tra facts, and a fun graph that displays character stats rather than just listing them in a boring way. It seems that the writing that is likely to be located in X-Men Universe. My favorite part might be the profile pictures on these pages. Usually quite different from the action scene or ominous post on the front of the card, these unofficial shots of the subject seem like a behind-the-scenes peek. It may sound silly, but my favorite example is Blob wearing a backwards baseball cap on his shot. These really feel unique.
This collection is full of style, talented work and some great choices. One of the fun things about it Marvel Snap It upgrades the appearance of the collected cards, with the first change being called a frame break - where a character goes beyond the limits of the card. Lee's group was already doing just that, choosing to have characters like Beast and Nightcrawler ignore boundaries to make them stand out and get noticed. Some things are great enough to last.
According to Ed Piskor in the book's introduction, Lee knew how to show the X-Men at their best, and he could make even the dumbest characters look impressive. it's the truth. Maybe nobody cares about Widget, Gatecrasher, or Maverick, but if those images were someone's first impression of them, they'd think differently. Personally, my favorite cards are simple: Cable, White Queen, Bishop, Mastermind, and Omega Red. Strange assortment, but each photo has something that I find captivating.
Among the team cards, the Holograms (of which Gambit is the best), the nine-card Danger Room portrait, Trading Cards The Uncanny X-Men The book is a feast for the eyes and a treasure for most Marvel Comics fans. It's not just a kick of nostalgia, or a way to own the collection without buying cards for the second time in my life, but it's more of a ride. Something like a bundled experience that offers more than the original product. It's hard not to be biased as someone who still has a few of these, however, and the book is now bubbly Marvel Snap, where I continue my collection. This will have a spot on my shelf for quite some time, where it belongs.
Disclosure: The critic received a copy of the book from the publisher.
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