Apparently there was a 4-issue X-Factor mini-series in the early 2000s, written by some Entertainment Weekly writer, mostly just involving regular X-Men characters. That's why this post-House of M run is volume 3.
During Grant Morrison's stint writing New X-Men, it was established there was an entire mutant neighborhood, borough, something in New York. Bishop acted as sort of a cop there in District X, I think that was where X-23 got introduced in NYX. In 2004, Peter David and Pablo Raimondi established Jamie Madrox set up a detective agency there with Strong Guy and Wolfsbane. In late 2005, David got an ongoing series to play with the premise, complete with a ready made mystery for them to investigate: What happened to all the mutants?
He expanded the cast, adding Siryn and Monet, the latter in particular serving as team asshole to spark conflict, plus Rictor as a mutant who lost his abilities and struggled with that. Then David brought in Layla Miller, who actually knows what happened to all the mutants, but is trying to keep X-Factor from finding out, while giving the appearance of helping by 'knowing stuff.' David did his level best to run that bit into the ground, but it at least felt appropriate for a kid to annoy the hell out of adults.
Ryan Sook was the initial artist, but a monthly schedule is not something he can keep. He was already sharing artist credit by issue 2, and before long the book was being drawn mostly by Dennis Calero and Renato Arlem. Those two had a photorealist style that matched certain aspects, like the emphasis on people talking and doing detective work. They weren't so great at fight scenes or drawing more unusual stuff like the cast member who is a werewolf.
The first issue of X-Factor came out the month prior to this blog's creation, and I reviewed it and the second issue the first week of the blog's existence. It was the one X-book that held on through the first two years of the blog. The first year was the strongest, with X-Factor trying to learn what we already knew, but dealing with the company Singularity not only trying to stop X-Factor from learning the truth, but keep them from undoing the Scarlet Witch's actions. They should have been more concerned with stopping Cable from protecting Hope, obviously. Madrox struggled to actually pick a course of action, Rictor struggled with his change in circumstances, Siryn struggled to accept her father actually died in Brubaker's X-Men: Deadly Genesis, Quicksilver showed up acting messianic/insane.
The second year started out well. Pablo Raimondi came on as the mostly-regular artist. David had established that Madrox sent duplicates around the world to learn and experience new things, and decided Jamie decided if he brought them back, it would make him whole and maybe make things a little clearer. That got waylaid by a story involving some guy called the Isolationist, who Raimondi sometimes drew to resemble John Cena. It at least led to a change in Rictor's status, and David played with the notion that with so few mutants left in the entire world, the mutant neighborhood was falling apart.
Then Messiah CompleX happened. While David had been able to integrate the two-issue Civil War tie-in into what he was already doing, it was a little harder with 4 issues of "everyone hunts the mutant baby." The fallout didn't do the book any favors, either. Layla was lost in the future, Wolfsbane left to join Cyclops' Stabbity Kill Team (the Clayton Crain-drawn X-Force book), Jamie became grim and angry. David tried to roll with it, integrate the feeling of disintegration and uncertainty into the book, but it didn't work so great. He did a storyline with Arcade and I hardly cared. Never a good sign.
The final straw was when I picked up an issue with the triple whammy of being a Secret Invasion tie-in, a She-Hulk (which David was also writing) crossover, and Larry Stroman as the new artist and in dire need of a stronger inker. That was enough and I pulled the ripcord. Same time I finally gave up on Ultimate Spider-Man, actually.
Volume 3 ran 113 issues all told (not counting annuals and special one-shots, one of the latter we'll look at next week), David writing it the whole way, albeit with a long string of different artists. By the end the team was getting involved in wars over control of Hell of all things, and Pip the Troll was part of the cast. Yeah, I don't know if that means I should have given it another chance, or that I did the right thing staying clear.
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