What do you think?
Rate this book
X Omnibus
X Omnibus, Volume 1
The city of Arcadia is the dark side of the American Dream. It's the land of opportunity, if you've got the money to buy it or the muscle to take it. The police are the best trained and equipped in the country, if you can afford their protection. Crime is under control, because crime is in control. For the corrupt and the ruthless, Arcadia is paradise on Earth. But a cold wind is blowing through the streets of Arcadia, a plague wind in black leather and torn cloth, a one-eyed, one-man judge, jury, and executioner who the papers call "The X-Killer." He has set the new rules for Arcadia. Cross the line once, you'll receive a warning. Cross them twice, and "X" will mark the spot . . . where they'll find your body Violent and morally ambiguous, X walks the thin line between heroism and obsession and shows that sometimes the cure may be worse than the disease
352 pages, Paperback
First published May 29, 2008
14 people are currently reading
117 people want to read
About the author
Steven Grant
793 books24 followersSteven Grant is an American comic book writer best known for his 1985–1986 Marvel Comics mini-series The Punisher with artist Mike Zeck and for his creator-owned character Whisper.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steven_...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steven_...
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 15 of 15 reviews
July 15, 2020
Well, if you're going to create the Dark Horse version of the Punisher, you could do worse than bringing in the writer of the original Punisher miniseries, Steven Grant. This is interesting in that it's more more about the criminals than it is about X. Most of the stories begin with the criminals being criminals when eventually X shows up and murders them. X gets very little characterization and zero backstory. Still not a bad way to spend an hour or two.
April 19, 2020
Although originally disappointed that no single volumes currently exist on GoodReads save the two omnibuses, as I’ve learned in life many times over, sometimes its the best thing to not get what you initially wanted. Case in point, X is a series that demands a full on dive into its world. A mere dipped toe or a single collection read would be to miss the point. Given that X is one of the most innovative comics in recent memory all of its nooks and crannies must be investigated across this journey that is the delightful hike through 300 pages of unfairly forgotten comic book excellence.
While clear recollections of Spawn’s tattered cloak, Batman’s dark personality, and even Hooded Justice’s get-up in Watchmen (remember?) X retains his uniqueness in a deluge of cape laden wannabe weenies that have existed since the genre began. Trenchantly saturated in the shadowy realm if his adopted city’s underground, Arcadia, this uncompromising lone ranger defies convention as well as any alliance to fellow capes nor the urb’s legislature. Shunning company of any sort his mission is his and his alone.
This is the first stunning success of this series, the second is a retrospective application of sternly applied vaguery. While most comics comes across as lazy with weak wording and flimsy characterizations, the depth of mystery here is particulalry strong two decades down the road. Demanding your third eye to fill in the lacunae of world building, the unseen intersection sof place and plot forge a true personal attachment that only grows deeper as the series goes on.
Thirdly its steadfast refusal to reveal its secrets proves a powerful mantle o individuality that can rarely be matched in our current comic-scape. Even when compared to his closest thematic cousin, V, only a curious analogue of inversions can be evinced. V’s background story is given yet his face is never seen, X’s face is revealed later but his background is utterly mysterious.
Yet what ultimately sets this comic apart from its puerile peers is its expert distillation of film noir’s most potent aspect of world-building: unflinching amorality. Drenched in the dank alleyways and ostensibly swept away by the ever-festering sewage of Arcadia, the unapologetic amoralism of this city is un-erodable.There is no right here. And there is no wrong either. Only the Will to Power is active and morality is forged by man and man alone and in this comic his name is X.
While clear recollections of Spawn’s tattered cloak, Batman’s dark personality, and even Hooded Justice’s get-up in Watchmen (remember?) X retains his uniqueness in a deluge of cape laden wannabe weenies that have existed since the genre began. Trenchantly saturated in the shadowy realm if his adopted city’s underground, Arcadia, this uncompromising lone ranger defies convention as well as any alliance to fellow capes nor the urb’s legislature. Shunning company of any sort his mission is his and his alone.
This is the first stunning success of this series, the second is a retrospective application of sternly applied vaguery. While most comics comes across as lazy with weak wording and flimsy characterizations, the depth of mystery here is particulalry strong two decades down the road. Demanding your third eye to fill in the lacunae of world building, the unseen intersection sof place and plot forge a true personal attachment that only grows deeper as the series goes on.
Thirdly its steadfast refusal to reveal its secrets proves a powerful mantle o individuality that can rarely be matched in our current comic-scape. Even when compared to his closest thematic cousin, V, only a curious analogue of inversions can be evinced. V’s background story is given yet his face is never seen, X’s face is revealed later but his background is utterly mysterious.
Yet what ultimately sets this comic apart from its puerile peers is its expert distillation of film noir’s most potent aspect of world-building: unflinching amorality. Drenched in the dank alleyways and ostensibly swept away by the ever-festering sewage of Arcadia, the unapologetic amoralism of this city is un-erodable.There is no right here. And there is no wrong either. Only the Will to Power is active and morality is forged by man and man alone and in this comic his name is X.
April 21, 2018
I read the whole thing. Still couldn't tell you why. The dude's name is X. That's it. He doesn't have a superpower that I found in this first volume, just wears a mask that exposes only one eye and a cape and he kills people. A lot of people. They don't have to be good or evil, just don't cross his bad side (I couldn't tell you what his bad side is)
I remember one issue where he was fighting this hit man dude and the building was burning and a little kid was still trapped. X had the option of killing the hit man dude or saving the kid. What do you think he did?
He chose option C. You didn't know that there was an option C? CONGRATULATIONS! Neither did I. he let the hit-man get away (he kills him later) and saved the kid, but not before complaining about it for over three panels, even after bringing the kid somewhere safe. And then get this, the kid asks him where he should stay while letting him know that his family is now gone and that his home is burned down, and X goes: "well that's all up to you, not really my problem kid, just be thankful that you're still breathing."
Gee, thanks X. He wouldn't have even been endangered if you kept you're little killing beef to yourself and didn't bring it the poor, heavily populated part of town but sure man, you do you, he'll find a way, you can't be concerned with that because....you know...rah rah gotta kill some more right?
Ridiculous.
No one is redeemable in this one. The ones that seem like they could be, well they die. It literally never fails, like it's the author's "screw you readers" formula. I walk away from this book still not entirely sure why X is the way that he is, what made him turn that way, is he a hero or just a jerk (actually I DO know the answer to that one) and ultimately feeling like I have the reader's equivalent to a really bad hangover. Don't be me, don't waste your time, find a better book. Be part of a better world, one that doesn't ever think of putting this together and passing it off as even a half decent piece of graphic novel fiction. Know better, do better people. And know better than picking this bad boy up.
I remember one issue where he was fighting this hit man dude and the building was burning and a little kid was still trapped. X had the option of killing the hit man dude or saving the kid. What do you think he did?
He chose option C. You didn't know that there was an option C? CONGRATULATIONS! Neither did I. he let the hit-man get away (he kills him later) and saved the kid, but not before complaining about it for over three panels, even after bringing the kid somewhere safe. And then get this, the kid asks him where he should stay while letting him know that his family is now gone and that his home is burned down, and X goes: "well that's all up to you, not really my problem kid, just be thankful that you're still breathing."
Gee, thanks X. He wouldn't have even been endangered if you kept you're little killing beef to yourself and didn't bring it the poor, heavily populated part of town but sure man, you do you, he'll find a way, you can't be concerned with that because....you know...rah rah gotta kill some more right?
Ridiculous.
No one is redeemable in this one. The ones that seem like they could be, well they die. It literally never fails, like it's the author's "screw you readers" formula. I walk away from this book still not entirely sure why X is the way that he is, what made him turn that way, is he a hero or just a jerk (actually I DO know the answer to that one) and ultimately feeling like I have the reader's equivalent to a really bad hangover. Don't be me, don't waste your time, find a better book. Be part of a better world, one that doesn't ever think of putting this together and passing it off as even a half decent piece of graphic novel fiction. Know better, do better people. And know better than picking this bad boy up.
February 27, 2022
This is going to be a tough one for me: I'm not sure why I like X so much. There's something that feels unique about him, except I can't pinpoint it in the character itself. Much that we know, and much that is implied about his origins, are very similar to other antiheroes.
Of course, there's the lock around the choker (that the reboot flat out says is to hold him back from being too psychotically violent) and the fact that he looks like he's starring in a super kinky porn flick. Most antiheroes don't lean into the kinkiness quite as much.
Or maybe it's that unlike the Punisher or Red Hood, I can't really understand X's motivations: it's clear why Frank Castle and Jason Todd are killing people. They have genuine grievances and while we may revel in their punishing the worse guys - usually involving murdering them - this makes us sympathize with them. On the other hand, supervillains murder and we are intended not to sympathize with them (for the most part, and I'm using Joker type villains here, not Magneto who had understandable reasons for his wrath and took it too far. Villains who kill for money, or fun, not for the protection of their people.).
X's history - and potential current alliances - implies that we might not want to sympathize them as much as we do, and yet he's targeting only corrupt people, gangsters and corrupt police officers and on and on. It's made clear from the beginning, and throughout this volume, that the city he lives in - Arcadia - has been destroyed by the corruption; we are reminded every now and then about the homeless who are sneered at and spat upon by the type of corrupt people X targets. And while he never actively helps hopeless people, he is in a war against the people who look down on them. But they are brought in, threatened, interrogated and X does nothing against that, nor does he actively help them; when a young boy is made homeless because of X's war, X acts cold and distant, even pulling a gun on this hapless character, dragged into a fight he never wanted, comes to X for help.
So perhaps it's the ambiguity. I honestly don't know how I feel about him. Am I cheering him on because there's just enough to code him as on the good side, even if using methods that aren't quite heroically pure? Because I am cheering him on - but there's enough to make me doubt myself, and create a little pit in my stomach. He might turn out to be corrupt as well - and I'd actually be crushed about it. I want to like him.
Then again, I'm invested enough to care about what side he's on, and I'm enjoying the stories unravelling this. I did knock down one star because the story feels like it's taking a little too long to get to it's eventual end: there are one-off issues that break up the larger arcs, and plot and character revelations - and some of those felt slightly unnecessary, like the Ghost story which felt like a reminder that Ghost existed in X's universe.
Still, excellent art, loved the longer story arc - even if I haven't gotten to the endpoint yet - and so I enjoyed this immensely.
Of course, there's the lock around the choker (that the reboot flat out says is to hold him back from being too psychotically violent) and the fact that he looks like he's starring in a super kinky porn flick. Most antiheroes don't lean into the kinkiness quite as much.
Or maybe it's that unlike the Punisher or Red Hood, I can't really understand X's motivations: it's clear why Frank Castle and Jason Todd are killing people. They have genuine grievances and while we may revel in their punishing the worse guys - usually involving murdering them - this makes us sympathize with them. On the other hand, supervillains murder and we are intended not to sympathize with them (for the most part, and I'm using Joker type villains here, not Magneto who had understandable reasons for his wrath and took it too far. Villains who kill for money, or fun, not for the protection of their people.).
X's history - and potential current alliances - implies that we might not want to sympathize them as much as we do, and yet he's targeting only corrupt people, gangsters and corrupt police officers and on and on. It's made clear from the beginning, and throughout this volume, that the city he lives in - Arcadia - has been destroyed by the corruption; we are reminded every now and then about the homeless who are sneered at and spat upon by the type of corrupt people X targets. And while he never actively helps hopeless people, he is in a war against the people who look down on them. But they are brought in, threatened, interrogated and X does nothing against that, nor does he actively help them; when a young boy is made homeless because of X's war, X acts cold and distant, even pulling a gun on this hapless character, dragged into a fight he never wanted, comes to X for help.
So perhaps it's the ambiguity. I honestly don't know how I feel about him. Am I cheering him on because there's just enough to code him as on the good side, even if using methods that aren't quite heroically pure? Because I am cheering him on - but there's enough to make me doubt myself, and create a little pit in my stomach. He might turn out to be corrupt as well - and I'd actually be crushed about it. I want to like him.
Then again, I'm invested enough to care about what side he's on, and I'm enjoying the stories unravelling this. I did knock down one star because the story feels like it's taking a little too long to get to it's eventual end: there are one-off issues that break up the larger arcs, and plot and character revelations - and some of those felt slightly unnecessary, like the Ghost story which felt like a reminder that Ghost existed in X's universe.
Still, excellent art, loved the longer story arc - even if I haven't gotten to the endpoint yet - and so I enjoyed this immensely.
November 15, 2018
3.5 Stars
I liked this volume as I think it has the strongest creative team of the Dark Horse Heroes line with Steven Grant and Doug Mahnke. However, it drags a bit. I understand there's supposed to be some mystery about the character, but by this point we should know a little more.
We know he's got some type of healing powers and he seems to be enhanced as far as strength and speed go. He's knocking off crime bosses and crooked cops and politicians in an attempt to clean up Arcadia. But that's pretty much this entire book in a nutshell. Very little character development. It's really very similar to the Dark Horse Ghost series with the mystery surrounding the title character and the violent retribution, and that one dragged in parts too. The stories are really too much alike, especially considering the characters cross over on a few occasions.
I'm curious to see where things go in the next Omnibus because this isn't really a bad series, it just needs to move along and we need more than just random violence.
I liked this volume as I think it has the strongest creative team of the Dark Horse Heroes line with Steven Grant and Doug Mahnke. However, it drags a bit. I understand there's supposed to be some mystery about the character, but by this point we should know a little more.
We know he's got some type of healing powers and he seems to be enhanced as far as strength and speed go. He's knocking off crime bosses and crooked cops and politicians in an attempt to clean up Arcadia. But that's pretty much this entire book in a nutshell. Very little character development. It's really very similar to the Dark Horse Ghost series with the mystery surrounding the title character and the violent retribution, and that one dragged in parts too. The stories are really too much alike, especially considering the characters cross over on a few occasions.
I'm curious to see where things go in the next Omnibus because this isn't really a bad series, it just needs to move along and we need more than just random violence.
January 17, 2021
This is a story in which the masked superhero is not really a hero, but rather a mysterious personage who lords it over a particular part of the city of Arcadia, and lays down his law in which, if you cross him in any way, he will mark you or just outright assassinate you. He is not a hero, though he seems less evil than the gangsters--he doesn't go out of his way to kill innocent bystanders. X lives in a Dark Horse hero universe and has some crossover with other characters, such as Ghost in one issue or some mutants, but the stories in general don't seem to cross over much.
Maybe it was just me, but I had a hard time keeping the characters distinct in my mind. There are various gangsters and corrupt politicians and corrupt policemen, but most of them didn't seem to have very distinct personalities, and I quickly forgot who was who, which made reading the book a bit of a chore.
X himself also basically has very little personality and very little backstory in this volume. He is just kind of a violent vigilante with guns and who seems to be super strong and apparently wears a bulletproof outfit, and I guess he had a run-in with some guy who quotes scripture and stuck a knife in his face at some point in the past. That's about all we really learn about him (that and he is difficult to keep sedated as his body apparently adapts to tranqs or something). X's costume looks kind of cool, and it was actually due to my memories as a kid seeing X in ads in the back of comics that I picked this up. I always wondered who X was and wanted to read a bit of his stories. Now I have, and I still don't really know who he is 350 pages later. Also his costume doesn't look as cool to me now--unfortunately it kind of looks like he is wearing a big bulky diaper, and his red cape feels really derivative of Spawn (not sure who had it first).
I think the most distinctive aspect of the stories was how amoral they were, since X isn't really a hero. But that wasn't enough to hook me and make me want to read more.
Maybe it was just me, but I had a hard time keeping the characters distinct in my mind. There are various gangsters and corrupt politicians and corrupt policemen, but most of them didn't seem to have very distinct personalities, and I quickly forgot who was who, which made reading the book a bit of a chore.
X himself also basically has very little personality and very little backstory in this volume. He is just kind of a violent vigilante with guns and who seems to be super strong and apparently wears a bulletproof outfit, and I guess he had a run-in with some guy who quotes scripture and stuck a knife in his face at some point in the past. That's about all we really learn about him (that and he is difficult to keep sedated as his body apparently adapts to tranqs or something). X's costume looks kind of cool, and it was actually due to my memories as a kid seeing X in ads in the back of comics that I picked this up. I always wondered who X was and wanted to read a bit of his stories. Now I have, and I still don't really know who he is 350 pages later. Also his costume doesn't look as cool to me now--unfortunately it kind of looks like he is wearing a big bulky diaper, and his red cape feels really derivative of Spawn (not sure who had it first).
I think the most distinctive aspect of the stories was how amoral they were, since X isn't really a hero. But that wasn't enough to hook me and make me want to read more.
August 17, 2024
Fantastic collection. I love the character X. I love to see all of the evil criminals and dishonest politicians get theirs. X reminds me of Paul Kersey who was played by Charles Bronson. He doesn’t put up with any crap. I love all of the violence and the blood. Very realistic. I can’t wait to read the next volume. Highly Recommended.
August 19, 2021
Ultraviolence...Dark Horse comics style.
Dark horse comics offering. Suitable for adults, should have a warning on the cover. Good color artwork. A huge run of material. Plenty of guest stars like ghost. Absurd amounts of violence, like Batman plus the Punisher.
Dark horse comics offering. Suitable for adults, should have a warning on the cover. Good color artwork. A huge run of material. Plenty of guest stars like ghost. Absurd amounts of violence, like Batman plus the Punisher.
November 10, 2024
Very very good.
I have become hooked on this character. I have been reading all his comics and been having a lot of fun reading them. This book was great. I loved every page of the omnibus. On to Volume 2 I go!
I have become hooked on this character. I have been reading all his comics and been having a lot of fun reading them. This book was great. I loved every page of the omnibus. On to Volume 2 I go!
September 16, 2025
I seem to recall liking this series from long ago, but reading it now there's just too many random mobsters and politicians that I can't keep track of them. It definitely has a hardcore tough guy vive but not all that else.
January 3, 2022
Puffff. Heavy, disturbing, dense of non sense.
A psico character half the punisher half batman. Non my cup of tea. Free violence and blood.
A psico character half the punisher half batman. Non my cup of tea. Free violence and blood.
August 13, 2022
A pretty interesting take on a “Batman” like character that uses lethal force. A quasi-political thriller in some ways, and in others a very prototypical anti-hero story.
September 8, 2024
This was a fun read. I enjoy all things Punisher-esque and this definitely qualifies. Hope some loose ends are tied up in the second volume.
December 8, 2014
I like Steven Grant's work, but was disappointed with this effort. I think a lot of that came with the hodge-podge feel of the order of contents. There seemed to be several different sources (regular series, one-shots, specials) that these stories came from and they may have been ordered chronologically by publication date. It was hard to keep a consistent thread from one chapter to the next.
There's a lot of mystery surrounding the character of X. What is motivating his enforcement of his brand of law in Arcadia? Why does X refuse to kill some and go out of his way to take out others? There seems to be more to this than just battling gangsters, corrupt politicians, bad cops and the odd costumed vigilante that rolls into Arcadia looking for a fight. At least I hope there is. Otherwise the second volume will be a waste.
There's a lot of mystery surrounding the character of X. What is motivating his enforcement of his brand of law in Arcadia? Why does X refuse to kill some and go out of his way to take out others? There seems to be more to this than just battling gangsters, corrupt politicians, bad cops and the odd costumed vigilante that rolls into Arcadia looking for a fight. At least I hope there is. Otherwise the second volume will be a waste.
June 7, 2012
I liked the Ghost series better. More complex character and actual plot development. This just seemed to be the same story told over and over with different side characters being killed.
Displaying 1 - 15 of 15 reviews