I've read the gripes floating around about this book, and I have to say that I don't exactly disagree with any of them. For me however, there is one really big, redeemable factor that is allowing me to see past these flaws. This book has the feel of an old school X-story!
Xenogenesis is one of those "fly off to a foreign country in the middle of the night, not really sure what you are getting yourself into" kind of X-dramas. And you know what? I miss them! All of these big event continuity based stories are wearing me down. So a little break in the form of Xenogenesis is a welcome change.
Xenogenesis refers to an offspring being born that is unlike its parents or a substance found in an organism which is not normally produced or expected to be present in it. In this particular case, the anomaly is a string of mutant births in Africa. But that is not the only point of curiosity. These babies break all of the rules when it comes to the X-gene, because mutants were formerly undetectable until adolescence.
As I find in most Ellis stories, there appear to be some gaps. One example that comes to mind is when Beast is making fun of Scott for calling Africa a country. Well, I went back and re-read the previous text at least 5 times, and nowhere could I find Scott refer to Africa as a country. I was able to easily look beyond this though, after having so much fun with Emma Frost's depiction. I love how Kaare Andrews found six different angles to depict Emma's cleavage during her little chat with Logan. I still get a good chuckle out of it, because it is so believable I can picture it in my head. Andrews was hit and miss with art, but I honestly didn't find it too distracting.
I look forward to following this five issue mini. There are sure to be some sensitive times ahead treading through Africa with Ororo in tow.