House Of M was the beginning of Marvel's reliance on event comics to set the tone for their entire line. Spinning out of Avengers Disassembled, this story by writer Brian Michael Bendis and artist Olivier Coipel saw the Astonishing X-Men and New Avengers team up to decide what to do about the Scarlet Witch and the resulting chaos that ensued.
With Scarlet Witch at the forefront of cultural significance thanks to WandaVision, it's time to take a look at the story again. House Of M has always been a divisive story, one with lots to love but also a lot of problems.
10 Aged Well: Other artists could have made House Of M look good but Olivier Coipel's unique style made it great
One of the best parts of House Of M was the art of Olivier Coipel. While his art would get better in the years to come, his work on House Of M showed just how great he could be. He got to redesign multiple Marvel characters, reimagining SHIELD, and Sentinels for the new world and making what little action there was in the book look very good.
His character acting was top-notch, which is important in a Bendis written book, since so many of the writer's narratives focus more on dialogue and reaction than action and adventure. Other artists could have made House Of M look good but Coipel's unique style made it great.
9 Hasn't Aged Well: It was excruciatingly long, with Bendis' decentralized storytelling stretching things out in rather obvious ways
House Of M came during a time when the event book was pretty much out of vogue. Marvel and DC both did summer crossovers at the time, stories that would take place in a mini-series and crossover into other books. Most of the time, these stories would be about six issues max, with the crossover issues usually only one of two issues per book.
House Of M was eight issues long and definitely felt like it when it was coming out monthly. It was excruciatingly long, with Bendis' decentralized storytelling stretching things out in rather obvious ways. Eight issues was definitely pushing the story in this book and it hurt the narrative a lot.
8 Aged Well: An Interesting Setting involving alternate universes
Fans love alternate universe storylines and House Of M gave them one to remember. Scarlet Witch transformed the world completely, creating a world where mutants were the dominant species. Even then, though, she made sure to give her human superhero friends lives that they could enjoy — Captain Marvel got her heart's desire and became one of the biggest superheroes in the world, Spider-Man got Gwen Stacy back, et cetera.
There was a whole slew of interesting changes to the Marvel Universe in House Of M, ones that grabbed readers' attention and didn't let go.
7 Didn't Age Well: The World Building Is Pretty Bad — while House Of M is still in print, most of the tie-ins aren't
One of the problems with the alternate world of House Of M, though, was just how terrible the worldbuilding was in the main series. Bendis was doing his Bendis thing and that meant focusing on the drama of the situation at the expense of everything else. Fans were given glimpses into things but to get a full picture of the world, they were forced to buy the tie-ins to understand the characters and their new lives.
For fans who didn't buy these tie-ins, they were missing a lot of the world-building which the main series didn't do. This has compounded over the years because while House Of M is still in print, most of the tie-ins aren't. A reader who picks it up nowadays will never be able to get a full look at the world of the book without extensive back issue box exploration.
6 Aged Well: it brought a lot of great character changes, ones that made the Marvel Universe more interesting in the years to come
While House Of M changed the characters within its pages, it also had lasting changes for characters after it was over, and not just the obvious ones. Take Captain Marvel, for instance; she's become a huge part of the Marvel Universe and the whole reason for that was that she was inspired by her life in the House Of M universe as the greatest hero on Earth.
At the end of the story, Wolverine was given back all of the memories he lost, which had major repercussions for his future adventures. Iceman "lost" his powers and would have to figure out a way to live without them or so he thought. House Of M brought a lot of great character changes, ones that made the Marvel Universe more interesting in the years to come.
5 Hasn't Aged Well: Bendis disregards years of characterization & development
Bendis has long been a writer who caters his characters to the story he's telling, disregarding years of characterization and development to make them fit with the plot. He does this egregiously in House Of M once the heroes get their memories back, with just about all of them exclaiming that they want to kill Magneto in one form or another.
Having one's mind altered would be a traumatic experience, but for the heroes of Marvel Universe, it's actually pretty common. For something like this to get them to give up their morals completely makes no sense. Spider-Man literally watched Green Goblin kill the woman he loved and didn't want to kill him, for example, so him wanting to kill Magneto without any evidence is very out of character.
4 Aged Well: Scarlet Witch's Power Changes affected how everyone saw her
Scarlet Witch was always a powerful hero but Avengers Disassembled revealed how powerful she could be and House Of M cemented it. Scarlet Witch had done a lot of impressive things over the years but recreating the entire planet was a next-level move for Scarlet Witch and changed how everyone saw her, heroes and readers alike.
Scarlet Witch's power changes would have serious repercussions for years to come, as villains like Doctor Doom and the Apocalypse Twins tried to use them to their advantage and those powers — combined with the Phoenix Force — brought hope back to the mutant race.
3 Hasn't Aged Well: An eight-issue book with barely any action at all is not a good thing
House Of M is boring. Bendis's writing style, especially in his early years at Marvel, was very dialogue-heavy and what little action there was in his comics was usually scant and badly laid out, even though he worked with artists who usually did a great job with action scenes. House Of M was guilty of both of these sins.
Most issues went by without any kind of action and what there was bad and unexciting. The seventh issue promised a big battle, but the scenes of actual combat in the issue were few and far between and basically set dressing with no bearing on anything. An eight-issue book with barely any action at all is not a good thing.
2 Aged Well: "No More Mutants" was a huge moment, one that would have effects on the entire Marvel Universe
Scarlet Witch's fateful utterance of "No More Mutants" changed the fabric of the Marvel Universe for years to come. Before House Of M, it was rare for an event book to have any kind of effect on a company's entire comic line and this story changed all of that. "No More Mutants" was a huge moment, one that would have effects on the entire Marvel Universe.
It shifted the power dynamic drastically; mutants had been growing exponentially in power and numbers for years and this book cut them down, transforming them into an endangered species and opening up spots for non-mutant characters to take their place in books and in the Marvel Universe.
1 Hasn't Aged Well: The years after House Of M would be some of the worst for the X-Men
While the depowering of the mutant race was a huge change, it also did a lot of damage to the X-Men brand. The years after House Of M would be some of the worst for the X-Men. Their status as a sales juggernaut would take a huge hit and the amount of legitimately great X-Men stories from this era fell dramatically.
It would set a bad precedent for the X-Men, marginalizing them and setting the stage for the attempted replacement of the X-Men with the Inhumans, a complete and total failure that damaged the Inhumans beyond repair, infuriating fans. It would take Marvel years before they realized their mistake.