Thread by @ClaremontRun

UXM 137 showcases one of Tom Orzechowski’s greatest (and most necessary) talents as a letterer: enhancing the sense of a scene’s spatial geometry and movement, thus bridging the distance between the competing interests of script and imagery. #xmen 1/10

The first thing to note is the degree of difficulty. The issue is scripted by (arguably) the wordiest writer in Marvel history and pencilled by (arguably) one of the finest illustrators in that same history. Orz is caught between them, laying reams of text over drawings. 2/10

We should also note that Tom’s career began largely as an inker; thus he’s an artist with a background in visual composition – someone with an intimate understanding of how to create and enhance the sense of space on a comics page. 3/10

The most basic task is to create balloons that obstruct the artwork as little as is humanly possible, but as Orz demonstrates, there are ways to use the shape, size, and placement of those balloons to actually reinforce key goals of that same artwork, even while covering it. 4/10

For example, as members of the team descend left-right along a slope, the shape and size of Orzechowski’s text balloons form a slope themselves, subtly imitating the geography and forcing the reader’s eye to adopt the same trajectory as the walking X-Men. 5/10

When Storm thrusts her hand in the sky in a dramatic gesture, the balloons are wedged apart, creating a sense of her movement and the power behind it. When Uatu shows up on a screen, the balloons squish against the edges, creating a sense of bursting in and surprise. 6/10

When Nightcrawler is running through an aerial trapeze obstacle course, Orzechowski positions the bubbles in a loose scattering of different sizes and shapes, filling the background as if they themselves are part of the trapeze apparatus Kurt plays upon. 7/10

In the issue’s famous 2-page splash, Orz uses a series of small bubbles arranged in a slight arc across the top of the team, thus mimicking both a coalescing collective (like the X-Men in the foreground) and an ampitheatre-like audience (like the Shi’ar in the background). 8/10

As the X-Men are teleported to their battleground on the moon, Byrne contrasts the scale of the background with that of the team and Orz follows suit with a very small text bubble featuring tiny writing amidst a wash of negative space. 9/10

In all of these instances, a true legend of comics lettering finds ways to overcome a hilariously high degree of difficulty, moving beyond mere unobtrusiveness and into something that, despite all odds, is actually complimentary to many aspects of the visuals. 10/10