All-New X-Men 28, Uncanny X-Men Special 1

<Quick note at the top here: I know I've already said I'm going down to speed rounds as the main review style for now as things in my life get a bit busier but then, as always happens, I've ended up summarizing and breaking down every part of the book almost immediately. So here's the new attempt - I'm going to really speed up my summaries and hope that my analysis section, while obviously longer, will be shortened by how ridiculous it looks next to such a short summary paragraph>

All-New X-Men 28
Bendis (w) and S. Immonen (p) and Von Grawbadger (i) and Gracia (c) and Petit (l)

The future's Brotherhood is still attacking the ANXM with a battle plan this time that revolves around their last defeat, thanks to time travel. Members of their group are maybe not 100% on board with this but they're all being puppet'd by Xavier. Jean Grey uses her newfound power to hold people in place to hold Xavier, launching the immense psychic attack on the school, while X-23 dives at him.

I think the things that could be interesting about this series are dictated by whether or not you think the concept holds up. If you're totally onboard with the time-traveling X-Men stuck in the future and gaining new powers through shaky explanations and new alliances through shaky justifications, then I can see there being interest in a story that similarly bends the timeline and aligns people who maybe wouldn't align themselves and that's explained away by Raze saying that the mutant timeline is already so screwed up that it probably doesn't matter how often they go back in time to mess with things. I think I've said this before, even going so far as to using this same analogy before (possibly because I'm uncreative and possibly because once you've spent any amount of time grading high schoolers' papers you start to see this major flaw almost immediately), but it's like reading an essay where you don't buy the thesis or, worse still, where there is no clear thesis. Everything you write afterwards will fail to hold up because it's all just information and evidence that won't prove anything because there's nothing there to prove. Setting aside those issues, the book moves well enough and the colors and art help to accentuate the tension of the issue (though it wouldn't be so bad to break away from the reds and blacks for a little bit soon).

Total Score: 3/5


Uncanny X-Men Special 1
S. Ryan (w) and Ackins (p) and N. Lee, Poggi, and Pallot (i) and Redmond (c) and Cowles (l)

Scott's team stumbles across old pictures of Magik and are shocked to see how happy and young she looked. Then they're whisked away on flight training with Scott, where they're shot out of the sky and Scott is captured by Death's Head leaving the kids to try to figure out, along with the called-in Magik and Emma Frost, how to track a mercenary they can't even identify. Irma and Benjamin are sent to infiltrate SWORD as new recruits to figure out who the merc is and Benjamin runs afoul in his search of Iron Man, who identifies Death's Head and offers to help.

There are maybe a few incongruous plot points here, things that don't totally make sense or that don't link particularly well, but overall the book (part one of three, it claims) reads fairly well. Cyclops is taken to a man actually looking for Havok which leads to some interesting questions and decisions, Iron Man's involvement with a group he doesn't yet know is actually Scott's X-Men is a possibly fun touch, and the promise of Nova having something to do with this (per the cover) is a similarly interesting touch. Can't help noticing that the Death's Head in this issue looks rather like the original Death's Head and Tony's had dealings with Death's Head II in recent days but that's just nitpicky. Still a fairly fun book with a team that has some amount of potential, however it's meant to be used.

Total Score: 4/5