This week's picks

Geez, didn't quite realize how hard these three would be to choose until I actually started to think about it. Sometimes I'm not particularly confident in my pre-game picks so the pull list is pretty up-for-grabs. This week I was totally sure of my pre-game, barring possible freak inexplicably bad issues from really talented creators, so I had a good feeling that was where the picks would go. With the exception of one possibility jumping into the fray, I'm torn. The worst part is I know two of my three picks already. Alphabetically, though, they're the last two and I just hate working out of order. Well, let's see what I decide! It's a journey for ALL OF US!

She-Hulk 1

GUYS, this was a really tough pick and I'm writing these words without knowing if I'm going to use them or delete them later. SHE-HULK beats out, just by a hair, SUPERIOR SPIDER-MAN 27, which gets lots of points for tying together all of its plots and constructing a very interesting upcoming arc to lead us back to AMAZING SPIDER-MAN, and WINTER SOLDIER: BITTER MARCH, which established an amazing tone and is just a really well-constructed book. SHE-HULK wins the day, though, as it's hard to come away from a first issue with such a good grasp on who this character is and what to expect from this book. I'm not going to say that things won't change or that the book won't be dynamic or anything like that, that we're just going to get this style of issue every time out; quite the opposite, in fact. SHE-HULK shows itself as an interesting and quirky book with a real sense of its main character and of the world she inhabits. I can't imagine how hard it is, though Soule is helped by his many forebears, to take a character who is constantly giant and green (by choice, mind you) and drop her into a real world and make it still relatable and not crazy. Soule does it, though, with absolutely no problems and with a nice little flair for humor and personality through every single character. This book was almost hurt by the next book on the list if only because I don't want to look stupid when I say that "number ones are rarely this good" twice in one post but, hey, whatever, I think I've proven just how stupid I can look already.

X-Force 1

Number ones are rarely this good. This one doesn't have the kind of shock value of the sheer beauty of something like BLACK WIDOW or NEW AVENGERS but it has such a well-defined sense of itself and such a wonderful sense of the narrative that anyone, whether they're new to X-MEN, new to X-FORCE, new to Marvel, or probably even new to comics, can, I would speculate, pick up what's happening in this book so far. Despite the amount of information that kind of comfortability requires, Spurrier makes sure the book isn't loaded with exposition. It leaves us with exactly the right amount of questions and the right tone for this series as it moves forward. Our team is well-established, their purpose even more so. Spurrier even knocks it out of the park with the decision to cast our initial narrator as Marrow, easily the least visible member of the team in recent years. He took the risk of alienating readers by putting in a relative unknown with a relatively unknown point of view and a rather crazed perspective as our narrator and it pays off well, allowing us to understand her better than we would have if it were, say, Psylocke or Cable's more tempered narration, or no narration at all. Rock-He Kim's art flows well with the book and I look forward to the way that Spurrier and Kim continue to improve as they work more and more together. There is, of course, also a measure of trust in this pick. As I said earlier, the book leaves us with exactly the right amount of questions by the end and the trust comes in as I trust Spurrier to eventually reveal those questions before they fade into "does anyone really care any more?" territory. I think one of the big problems with, say, Marvel's Agents of SHIELD is that they prodded the watchers to ask so many questions (and like, explicitly told them to ask, unlike something like Lost where the characters were just as in the dark, or lost, even, as the audience) and refused answers that it's gotten fairly monotonous and annoying. I don't want to have to ask questions that I know you have the answers to and that you'll only divulge at the right time. That is, I don't if you don't overstay that time. Like a good mystery novel, the satisfaction is in the figuring it out, not in the asking. I trust Spurrier to lead us to that point because he's done it so masterfully across his other works.

X-Men Legacy 24

If you didn't think this book was going to be on this list after the "review" I posted this week that was less review and more open love letter, I can't help you any more. This is the kind of book that will stay with me for years to come and this issue has been on my mind as much as anything else in the last week. I can't stress enough how much I want you all to read it. I've made just about everyone who's come into contact with me in the last few days read it because I need people to talk to about it or even just to know it exists. Every bit as meaningful as the comic itself was to me, so too was Spurrier's little letter to the audience at the issue's conclusion. There's so much to love about this and it's so hard to be sad that the book's over since, you know, kind of the point of this is that we shouldn't be sad that it's over. David himself told us not to be, you guys. As a whole, this series has been one of the best Marvel, or any publisher out there, has put out in quite some time. David is one of the most well-characterized and, despite all of his power and the scale of his problems, relatable characters I've seen. Check this title out and tell me what you think. Am I overblowing it? Maybe. But I suppose that's my right, isn't it?

X-Men Legacy 24, X-Force 1

X-Men Legacy 24
Spurrier (w) and Huat and Yeung (a) and Villarrubia (c)

My plan, right, was to lead Wednesday off with AVENGERS and SECRET AVENGERS, as I tend to put Avengers titles out first if I have them. Scheduling forced my hand, though, and had me lead with X-MEN LEGACY, the end of my favorite book of the year, and X-FORCE, the start of what I hope will be a favorite (I'm writing this before I read that one). I think, given the impact of these two stories (and particularly this one), it's the right call to highlight these books as early as I am, middle of the day on a release day, but it also makes me more wary of spoilers. I've toyed, going back and forth, with having reviews that wholly summarize the book and having reviews that vaguely point at things and reviews that are more log lines with analysis of something I refuse to define. I've more or less settled on fully summarization, leaving out some of the finer details to allow potential readers the chance to find those out for themselves.

There's no room for that here.

This book is not only totally spoiler-laden, it's maybe the most incredible story I've read in comics since Gillen's JOURNEY INTO MYSTERY or the Winter Soldier creation. It's meaningful, it's wonderful, and it, above all else, knows exactly what it is. I refuse to spoil it here and I refuse especially to do so on a Wednesday, when plenty of people won't even have a chance to get to it. All I'll do is advise you to go out, buy this book, buy any copy of X-MEN LEGACY you can find, and absorb it all. Drink it all in. As Spurrier says in the traditional final letter to the audience, the book is "a title, a character, a creative team and above all a vibe so bloodymindedly unlike its fellows." If it's not for you, it's not for you. But it's absolutely been for me and it's absolutely been something to watch. It's an incredible departure from any other superhero comic in the way that YOUNG AVENGERS played with the medium and the art form as a whole or the way HAWKEYE insists on not being about superheroes. It's something worth seeing even if it's not what you're looking for. Please take note of it. I'll end this not-quite-review with more of Spurrier's words:

There will be some, I think, angered by these last few pages, on the grounds that a tale's "importance" can only be weighed according to some grand impact on its Universe. I understand but disagree with that view. Instead I wouldn't have chosen quite such a perversely bittersweet ending if I didn't think it the best way to emphasize a very important point: even when nothing else has changed, when all the explodo and punching seems to have been for nothing, it's the lesson learnt - even the merest echo of it - that renders the journey valuable. Our memories remain.

X-Force 1
Spurrier (w) and R. Kim (a and c)

Cable has assembled Psylocke and formerly-powered Marrow to be a part of his new mutant strike team, a "dirty tricks crew" for mutant nation. The reasoning behind this one is more firm than the reasoning behind the most recent couple of X-Force teams, one brought together by threat and one brought together to prevent disasters Cable foresaw. This one is here to do a little bit of everything, including making sure mutants don't get dealt out of the world-building hand. After an attack in Alexandria (which may be linked to why Hope is suddenly strapped up to machines with Doctor Nemesis claiming that she's "theoretically alive") took over three thousand lives with a mutant square in the center of it, Cable wants to figure out what the mutant's tie was to the explosion, hoping to keep people from getting more mad at mutants, and to recover whatever the weapon was, hoping to arm up the mutants. His "broadly trustworthy" informant has discovered that the cyber-weapon that shut down communications in Alexandria was also used in various other countries at various other strikes to gain data. Now this informant is being held by the Chinese and the team needs to get him out before they can advance to the next stage. Of course, to Psylocke's dismay, the informant is Fantomex. Fantomex reports that the weapon is being carried by a plane always airborne over Antarctica (international air) and it's only susceptible to attack when it's being refueled. He also happens to know the refueling schedule. The team dispatches in EVA to attack the refueling plane, hijacking it to allow the formerly-depowered Marrow to hurl herself at the plane with a Doc Nemesis concocted timefreeze grenade, allowing her 30 seconds of unfettered access. She shatters the engine of the plane before sticking a parachute on the weapon container and launching it and herself out of the wreckage in that 30 seconds (real time a few tenths of a second) before the plane blows. Inside the weapon's container is, as Cable suspected, a new mutant.

Very interesting first issue and one that makes completely clear that these characters will all very much have their own distinct personalities and uses. I talked a little bit in my pre-game this week about the upside to having a team that's a little smaller than the recent X-FORCE teams (and really than most teams in general) and, after reading this issue, I have to emphasize again how neat it is. Four people on the team (plus unofficial member Doctor Nemesis) means we get ample time to check in with each character and get a feel for everyone, even in just the first issue. Marrow, the biggest question mark of the roster, handles narration duty and it gives us a look into an adrenaline junkie's mind, one that we can also see through her action and her dialogue. The narration colors her as something more than just a deranged thrill-seeker, which her dialogue may not have done so well. Cable, of course, is the terse general, always plotting and always leading. Psylocke is the most complicated and perhaps the least fleshed out here, though not because Spurrier does a bad job with her. She's probably the most prevalent character in the wider universe from this team right now so there's less need to really get too far into her character but it still sticks the landing (OLYMPICS) by showing her as the uber-powerful and lethal telepath with a complex history and a vow to stop killing. Fantomex gets perhaps the biggest makeover with Spurrier really relishing the dive into his over-the-top personality and his French aspects. Fantomex sometimes confounds writers thanks to his strange origins. He chose to be French when he was raised as part of the Weapon Plus program and it's something that writers don't tend to bring out too much (even Remender didn't focus on it besides a word here or there and Wolverine's insistence that his nickname be "Le Pew," a nickname which Wolvy would be pleased to know carries over here). Spurrier sees it as a key character point and I can't help but agree. The man chose to be French, of course he's going to embrace it. It also gives him the unerring air of smugness and irritation so points to that as well. Really fun first issue, looking forward to this one as it continues and as we start to go deeper into the story and the people.

X-Men Legacy 23, Uncanny X-Force 17

X-Men Legacy 23
Spurrier (w) and Huat and Yeung (a) and Villarrubia (c)

David's world worm is in full effect as he finds himself trapped in his own mind while the sum of his powers begin to envelop everyone around him, calling forth all mutants to join him, which they do, convinced by David's powers that it's for the best. The only one who isn't called into David is Blindfold, who tries to stop the other mutants from being taken but who also recognizes that she won't be able to. She enters David's mind as her physical body keeps fighting the world worm outside and the two of them talk. It's a surprisingly soft talk with everything that's happening outside and it has a lot to do with his regret that he won't be able to spend more time with Ruth. It's then, though, that the smallest of loopholes occurs to him (particularly notable since he also spends a fair amount of time lamenting that the beautiful people in this world always get loopholes and manage to worm their way out of death but he just worms his way into it. Get it? Worms. Guys, I'm working on LAYERS here): one of the powers he's gestalt-ed into him is the powers of the Chronodon, who can make time stand still. He uses these powers not to stop anything that's about to happen but to give himself and Ruth just a little more time. And then they make love in that time.

This series and this story have been incredible all the way through, highlighted by a very distinct narrator and protagonist but certainly helped by a well-developed and maintained supporting cast. In the end, though, this was always meant to be a love story between David and Ruth and finally, after 23 issues, they get their moment. Albeit, it's a short lived one as they had to literally stop time to have it and their return to time will return their physical forms to fighting with one needing to kill the other to ensure their better future, but it's still a moment. It's a lovely moment at that and it's backed by an issue that gives us exactly what we've come to expect from this book; it's a solid mix of action, high stakes, and character drama with the typical comic book world-ending possibility and, as David knew it would, it all comes down to punching. Really great visual issue too. Striking images and jarring colors (lots of yellow and grey) really help to highlight everything that's happening and give it sort of an epic feel. So excited for the last issue but also so incredibly depressed by the idea of it.

Uncanny X-Force 17
Humphries (w) and Tolibao, Soy, Tadeo, Young, and Paris (a) and Curiel (c)

The conclusion of UNCANNY X-FORCE, CABLE AND X-FORCE, and the VENDETTA crossover itself kicks off with Hope plunging the psimitar into Bishop's gut. Bishop, though, convinces her to take the psimitar out without actually killing him by again pointing out that he's totally sorry but more so that she shouldn't throw her life away by killing and that she shouldn't throw her life away on him. Not to say he wouldn't deserve it, he admits, but that it's still not worth it (it doesn't hurt that he's not a threat any more). With this, the rest of the X-Force teams locate and attack Stryfe, splitting into two groups, one to attack Stryfe and one to locate their missing teammates. The attack on Stryfe is well-managed by Psylocke but ultimately fails to the omega-level mutant. Stryfe captures everyone in a telekinetic hold except for Spiral, who had left earlier, and Cable, who was still removed from the fight. Spiral, though, hadn't actually left officially but had, instead, gone to pick up Cable and they return to stab Stryfe with the psimitar, which does not kill him but does force him to flee. However, before he goes, he forces Hope to take his powers, knowing she can't contain them and will likely kill them all with the psychic reverb. With Stryfe gone, everyone is free to worry about Hope exploding but, before she can, Bishop rushes forth and talks to her, understanding what she's going through as someone whose powers also rely on absorption and release. Bishop manages to get her to contain the power and then blast it upwards, impacting no one. With everyone safe, the two teams reconvene and hang out a bit, effectively ending the books with Psylocke and Cable walking into the sunset together.

It's not a bad little ending but most of it hinges on Bishop and Hope, which is certainly a worthwhile story and one that's executed as well as anything in these two series has been. However, it also means that the rest of the players in this book kind of get pushed to the side a little and actually end up feeling a little unnecessary. The story was never about them and their rescue of the hostages only ended up serving as a distraction for Cable to get to Stryfe. Kind of a weird way to end the two series, which is kind of what I've been saying since the get-go. I've also been saying that this crossover has hit every beat in a sort of predictable fashion and, with the quality of the issue aside, this issue is no different. Still, like I said, the story of Cable, Hope, and Bishop was one certainly worth telling and I think it's told pretty well here. I don't think either of these series got to end on a particularly strong note with this crossover, sadly, but it's certainly an acceptable note and it paves the way rather nicely for Si Spurrier's X-FORCE next month (woo!).

X-Men Legacy 22, Uncanny X-Force 16

X-Men Legacy 22
Spurrier (w) and Pham (a) and Rosenberg (c)

The evil mind-Xavier has launched a missile containing all sorts of nuclear firepower at Washington, knowing that the very act, once it shows on the radar, will cause a chain reaction around the world currently filled with hate that the gold Xavier has permeated. David, though, unknowingly has called for his allies. From Wolverine's team to Cyclops' team to Abigail Brand and Sydren to Pete Wisdom to anyone he's teamed up with and they all show, helping to take apart the nuke before it can cause too much trouble (as David points out, taking apart a nuke was the first thing the X-Men did). The gold Xavier is less a gold Xavier at current and more a giant rock monster thing with crazy seemingly disintegration ray powers so it'll take all the X-Men and David's considerable might to bring him down. There are casualties in the fight that David, as a leader, has to be able to move past, including the apparent deaths of Abigail Brand, Chamber, and Karasu Tengu. David pushes through and gets the X-Men to push through and work together, to put aside the hate they have stored up in them and the hate that Xavier is trying to force to the surface. David destroys the body and pulls the power into the astral plane. It's at this moment that Blindfold wakes up, with the power taken by her brother restored (now that Luca's body is destroyed), and projects herself to the fight while her actual body hurries its way there. David squares off against the gold Xavier, who begins to weaken and transform away from the Xavier image and into something small and sickly, goblin-like, in his mind. David prepares to either cage the personality or destroy it but the personality denies him, asking David how a person with a sickness of the mind cures it. The answer is, of course, that he doesn't: he finds ways to live with it. With that, he dives into David's legion and David, unprepared to take it on, emerges back into the real world and becomes the world worm they knew he would become.

The last time I talked about X-MEN LEGACY it was to name it 2013's best Marvel title. This issue does absolutely nothing to disavow me of that notion, even though last week saw the conclusion and therefore the wrap-up of the amazing YOUNG AVENGERS. This book is just truly something else. There's a feeling with the last year or two of Marvel books that they're all echoing something different out there. I think that has a lot to do with books like HAWKEYE, which really broke the mold of a superhero comic, and the rise of Image comics. Superhero books can be different and they can maybe be a little niche and you can take the superhero world, with all of its tropes and eccentricities and over-the-top action and death and resurrection and superpowers and supervillains, and you can, if you want, stick it in a real-ish world and tell really great, really character-centric stories. It's not necessarily a new idea when it's framed that way but it certainly feels new and the books that are doing it well are doing it with such excellence that they're about the best books I've ever seen. Even books that feel a little more traditional, like DAREDEVIL, are bringing such a level of personality and depth that they're changing the face of superhero comics. X-MEN LEGACY is a book about the mutant son of Charles Xavier who happens to be the most powerful mutant in existence. David himself says that his father thought of him as a mutant with "godlike powers and childlike control." Despite this and despite the amazing stories that Spurrier can be and has told with the character, it's remained remarkably personal and remarkably moving. This issue moves David into a spot (where he's been moving for a while, actually) where the main villain has been the sickness in himself and, instead of the typical superhero solution of "punch down the bad guys," you can't find a cure for every sickness. It's an amazing book. Khoi Pham's art is incredible here and, though his style is a departure from Tan Eng Huat (the other major series artist), gives the book a very distinct feel. Huat's art has really grown on me as the series has progressed and, honestly, it's at the point where I love Pham's art in this book but I can see it just as well as if Huat drew it. That's thanks in no small part, too, to Rachelle Rosenberg's colors, which unify the title and makes it look unlike any other out there. Amazing, amazing book. If we ever get a full omnibus style release for this title, I'd urge everyone to get it. Urge, you guys.

Uncanny X-Force 16
Humphries (w) and Tolibao and Soy (a) and Curiel (c)

Hope and Bishop have been taken by Stryfe and both Cable's X-Force and the Uncanny X-Force are interested in finding them. However, the reasons for their mutual interest don't exactly match up and the two teams begin to fight one another through LA. Cable's team shows up to support their leader as he gets knocked out by Storm and Psylocke and they play a bit of keep away as Cable's team works to get him back. Meanwhile, Bishop tries to convince Hope that he's really changed but nothing he can say, as he well understands, can make up for the horrors he's inflicted on Hope. Stryfe shows up to taunt at them for a bit and because he's sworn revenge on Bishop, who betrayed him and left him stranded in the future the last time they saw each other. He offers Hope a chance at her wildest dreams (to be revealed next issue). Back in LA, the dust settles to find Cable awake again. Cable instructs Dr. Nemesis to give Spiral a nightmare, which he does with one of his drug concoctions. In the midst of Spiral's Mojo-based nightmare, Cable convinces her to teleport him to Stryfe's location, which she somewhat unwittingly does. They arrive to find Stryfe waiting for them.

What I typically like about four-issue crossovers is that there's usually a lot to explain and not a lot of room to do it in, so you tend to get only the exposition that you truly need and the action has to move at a certain pace to convey the entire story of two separate entities (in this case, CABLE AND X-FORCE and UNCANNY X-FORCE) over only four issues. For the most part, VENDETTA is proving to be no different. The fights move pretty quickly, the inciting incident and rising action all move well, and you can feel the story both winding up and preparing to wind down at any point. On the weaker ones, you can usually map out the beats after the first issue. I wouldn't say this is entirely one of the weaker ones; the story there, particularly the story about Hope and Bishop, is intriguing enough to keep the audience guessing and to keep the crossover moving well. I will say, I almost would have preferred it if this issue wasn't a big fight issue. Not only would a quick team-up without the typical big fight be something of a surprise in a crossover of this style, it would make a little more sense. To both Sam Humphries' and Dennis Hopeless' credit, they've created a reason for the fight that's more than just "this is the second beat of a four-issue crossover." Still, these are two teams comprised of people who are friends and unquestionably heroes (well, except for the reformed villains you tend to ruin into) and you'd like to see that, just once, mean something. Still not a bad issue. There's some clunky fight-dialogue sprinkled throughout but the arguments for both side are good enough that you can get past it. Also not complaining that the resolution of this crossover will set us into the February launch of Si Spurrier's (see above review) X-FORCE.

X-Men Legacy 20, Cable and X-Force 16

X-Men Legacy 20
Spurrier (w) and Huat and Yeung w/ Tadeo (a) and Villarrubia (c)

The Shadow Phoenix is in David's mind attacking all of the powers that live there as David tries to find a way to defeat it. He thinks back to the things that linked the survivors of the Shadow Phoenix he saw when he was combing around Aarkus' head for clues. His first assumption is that sheer power defeated it, so he tries to rally his strongest and most intimidating powers, though he does so to no avail. They're scared of the Shadow Phoenix, who is picking them apart one by one. His next thought is strength in numbers, so his next move is to attempt to lead the remaining powers in his head. When this continues not to work, it sets in on him. Strength in numbers doesn't matter, it's the ability to work together that saved the Shadow Phoenix's other foes. Knowing this, David opens himself up to bond with his powers, teaming with them instead of simply grabbing and controlling them when he needs. David realizes that his mantra of "I rule me" has never been more true; every human, as he says, is a legion in need of a leader, wishing to be guided and not ruled. As a result, the Shadow Phoenix starts to weaken and even starts to spit back out the powers its swallowed, which David realizes is pretty weird; a predator who doesn't chew its food but keeps it intact. It dawns on David as he expels the Shadow Phoenix and wakes up: the Shadow Phoenix wasn't real, it was all a con. As he emerges from his own mind and awakens again, he begins to accuse Aarkus, who quickly cuts him off and explains it was only for his own good. He needed to learn how to use his powers like this, to become one with them. They needed him scared, not smug. Aarkus, in fact, appreciated that David stepped in to correct his previous views about mutants and wanted to return the favor by opening David's mind to what he could really be. On top of that, they need him whole to face down the golden Xavier. Even this series' first person to turn on David, Karasu Tengu, has realized that her life is, in fact, better for David's interference in it and so she played the role of the Shadow Phoenix. Now David must go and fight, with all of his powers intact.

Really, really lovely book. There are few examples of the sort of "hero realizes his potential" part of the hero's journey that are as well executed as this. All of the pieces start coming together as we see flashes from David of his own memories of this series where, for as successful as he's been, he's used and abused people. He's accomplished most of his own goals but his mistakes and even the problematic perception of him have all come because he's refused to let people in on his plan, preferring to do things himself and let people see too late that maybe he was doing a good thing after all. This issue makes clear that David simply hasn't seen things that way up to now and, even if he realized he wasn't really in any danger from the Shadow Phoenix, it's impossible to argue that he didn't just become far more powerful by leading his powers instead of just controlling them so there's a lesson here for him regardless of how the lesson came to him. The art is gorgeous and fits so well with this book and I continue to read these issues and wonder how I didn't love the art from the start. This issue very much feels like Spurrier's way to wrap it up here as he begins his transition over to his new X-FORCE book (still excited about that, you guys); we've now seen David embrace his powers and his future as well as mending relationships with Aarkus, SWORD, and Karasu. The issue ends with the knowledge that Blindfold was kind of in on this plan from the start but that she refused to be a part of it because she didn't want to see David in so much pain and because she realized that it was the beginning of the end. Brand then promptly wiped Blindfold's memory of it and sent her home. Some has stuck around, though, as she mutters in her sleep that they're going to start the end. So, as Abigail Brand says, go start it, cowboy.

Cable and X-Force 16
Hopeless (w) and Sandoval (a) and Rosenberg (c)

The sudden appearance of another entity in Forge's head has complicated things for the team as a whole. The Sentinel Colossus and Domino were tasked with taking down is not as inert as they were expecting it. Though they eventually manage to shut it down, the initial chase and the ensuing explosion cause an avalanche very near to them. Cable, on the other hand, has found that his new pre-cog powers are working pretty well but that his old powers aren't running properly any more, leaving he and Hope in the middle of a firefight with Reavers without any guns. Hope, though, had accidentally borrowed some of his TK powers when she had to attack him with the psimitar and so has enough to keep them mostly protected, though how far that will go remains to be seen as higher ranking Reavers return with a device that morphs the fallen Reavers into one giant predator. Finally, back at the base, Nemesis has entered Forge's consciousness to try to figure out what's going on inside. While in there, he runs into Forge and the two begin to explore while Forge explains that this entity is known as the Adversary (very clever name) and is a creature of pure chaos who likes to mess with humans (who Nemesis likens to Q from Star Trek: the Next Generation for all you nerds out there, says the guy with a comic blog). As they explore and find no real way to stop the Adversary, Forge realizes that the mind they're in isn't Forge's any more, it's the Adversary's.

A good deal of interesting stuff here as, in typical CABLE AND X-FORCE fashion, things go extremely wrong extremely quickly. There's a lot to contend with and it's almost entirely interesting as Cable's old powers are no longer working, Hope's powers are somewhat amplified by the TK that came pouring out of Cable's mind not long ago, Domino and Colossus have ruined their date night by causing an avalanche when they had to bring down a Sentinel, favorite odd-couple Nemesis and Forge are reunited as they wander through someone's mind, and Boom Boom is stuck at home contending with a god-like being of pure chaos who, in his first moments around her, converted their base into a simulacrum of a night club. As I said, there's a lot happening. The writing continues to be really character-driven, giving us really great moments from...well, from everyone, really. There's not a character in this issue who doesn't have a good few lines. The art fits the tone really well, a somewhat more cartoony feel than what we've seen from this book previously with Gerardo Sandoval  picking up the pencils on this one. There are cute little moments in lettering too as Hope throws a car at some of the Reavers and the sound effect reads "KAR-KRASH," just pages after an avalanche starting made the sound "AVALANCHE." Sometimes little fun games like that can get really distracting and pull you out, but I had to double-check kar-krash before really getting it and I didn't even see "AVALANCHE" on the first read-through. Lots of fun stuff with plenty of plot to keep us motivated for next issue.

Uncanny X-Men 13, X-Men Legacy 18, Cable and X-Force 15

Uncanny X-Men 13
Bendis (w) and Bachalo, Townsend, Vey, Irwin, Mendoza, and Olazaba (a) and Gracia (c)

Battle of the Atom pushes forward (this is part 8 of 10) with more fights as present-day Scott's team arrives on the scene in time to learn that the first team of future X-Men to come back to the present is made up of frauds and that the second team of future X-Men is the real deal but then they get eaten by Krakoa, controlled by Xavier. Meanwhile, Magik fights alongside Colossus as they try to push into the school while the fraud X-Men team try to send the past X-Men back to the past. They have some trouble with the time cube, though it seems the cube works (they test it with Wolverine and Mystique's son Raze, who jumps back to the past briefly and returns to the present to test it). Beast speculates that the original X-Men have jumped back and forth in time so much that they now kind of exist outside of their own timeline so they can't be forcibly sent back? Look, that's what they said, okay? The issue ends as Scott and his team, having defeated the Krakoa, burst into Hank's lab.

This series, as you can tell from the summary and the fact I have to specify which of the five or six X-Men teams present I'm talking about, is extremely convoluted. Complicated isn't necessarily bad. Convoluted is. Infinity is complicated (apparently I'm planning to link everything back to Infinity this week), with plenty of moving parts and new characters and untold power and consequences. This is convoluted. In addition, this series is clearly just making up rules at this point. The O.G. X-Men exist outside of their own timeline because they've created such a paradox? The problem with time travel (or one of them) as a literary device is that there are no real defined rules because it's a thing that doesn't and really can't exist. Therefore, everyone who gets a turn to play with it has the chance to make up his or her own rules. As a reader, though, I still have to compare the rules of time travel within a given medium; I'm not comparing the time travel in Dr. Who to the time travel in the Marvel Universe but I sure will compare the time travel in Marvel to other time travel in Marvel and there are way more complicated, paradox-inducing time travel stories in the Marvel Universe already. There was already one this year with Age of Ultron and that turned out, obviously, pretty poorly but it still didn't create a paradox that acted like this. The response, of course, is that there are no defined rules of time travel because time travel isn't real, which is infuriating because I'm not looking for rules of real time travel, I'm looking for rules that make sense when measured against the other rules this universe has set forth. Frustrating. Also, this book is built, it seems, only on revealing new X-Men teams and on fight sequences, as just about every issue in this event has ended in either a new X-Men team or a fight sequence. I guess welcome to comics? AND ANOTHER THING (I really didn't want this to go on this long but here we are), I'm getting pretty tired of future people constantly hinting at ridiculous future events that will either never be referenced again or will be erased from the timeline. You don't need to mention the Baxter Building/Stark Tower wars because it's almost certainly not applicable here and you're just getting people to say "well hey, what's that?" without any chance of offering an answer. It feels like the basest form of fanservice, throwing in things that fans never asked for but will no doubt recognize and thaty ou have no intention of showing. It happens constantly in any book that has to do with time travel and by god it is irritating. Okay, next book.

X-Men Legacy 18
Spurrier (w) and Pham w/ Leisten (a) and Rosenberg (c)

Luca has revealed himself, after jumping from body to body watching David all over the world as he prepares to intercede when David loses control of his powers. Luca wants the end of mutantkind and knows, with the abilities he's stolen from Blindfold, that David might be the root of that. He can't accurately see David's future but he recognizes that the best way to ensure Blindfold's failure in stopping David is simply to follow him around everywhere, hopping from body to body. Finally he jumps in as it seems David is set to explode but he quickly realizes that David has been aware that he's been followed. David had released one of his personalities, the Delusionaut, to the site of his battle with Cyclops earlier that day and it had created a scene that drew the X-Men there, which also drew the press and everything else, meaning that David would get a highly publicized fight with Cyclops, publicized enough to make it seem real if he looked like he was losing control. It drew Luca out and now David has caught Luca in his web. The fight with Cyclops was never about hating Cyclops (David recognizes that he couldn't hate Cyclops more than Cyclops hates himself), to Cyclops' surprise; it was about drawing Luca out. However, Cyclops' team had cheated in the battle and poisoned David's mind with a psychic poison that Emma and the Cuckoo's had designed in the case of a foe stronger than they could fight. It takes longer to kick in but now it has and David crumples to the ground, his mental jail in shambles and, worst of all, the Xavier in his head escaping, potentially teaming with Luca for the next step.

Plenty happening here. I swear, I keep coming into each of these reviews planning only to write a little bit but I get complicated book after complicated book. Whether it's Infinity, where every step is important and we're dealing with longer books anyway, or it's Battle of the Atom and I have to spend half of the review explaining which X-Men team I'm talking about, or it's Hawkeye and no real action happens in the classic sense so I feel like I have to describe every inaction because it all seems equally important to the plot, or it's X-Men Legacy where crazy complex things are happening and I have to explain them, I end up here, with a really long summary and the worry that I've ruined the book by boiling it down to text. Bleh. Oh well, this is another solid issue, and one made particularly good by the end of the fight with Cyclops. I liked the fight itself, with David using his powers to wipe the floor with the X-Men and with what seemed legitimate rage but it would be a lie to say it didn't feel a little out of place. David has a very complex relationship with his father so attacking Scott to avenge that father felt more than a little Hamlet-like, though admittedly with less whining. Instead, it was all another part of his plans. I don't really get why I don't see this coming, Spurrier has pulled this off several times now, with the Pete Wisdom adventure and the Church of the Happy Host, and Darwin's Martyr's. Each time I go "no, something must be up," but then I forget that I thought that and buy into the story as it's written before being pulled back again as David cries "something was up!" Really great book that can fool you over and over and not annoy you but, in fact, delight you. Good stuff. Really long review. I swear I'll cut this next one down if it kills me.

Cable and X-Force 15
Hopeless (w) and Sandoval (a) and Rosenberg (c)

Things are returning to "normal" for Cable and his X-Force as the team is working again to prevent threats to mutants before they happen. They're split on three fronts for this issue, with Cable and Hope taking out bomb-wielding Reavers in Australia, Domino and Colossus stopping thieves from accidentally activating a Sentinel at a Trask safehouse in Colorado, and Forge, Dr. Nemesis, and Boom Boom at mission command in Montana. Forge is hacking on a tight schedule between the other two missions while Dr. Nemesis and Boom Boom test out a new device that should be able to enter Cable's mindscape to see the visions he's getting so he no longer has to be bothered relaying them to the team, they can just see them. The plans, which are all going pretty well, go belly-up when Forge is attacked by an enemy who seemed to be biding his time in Forge's own mind, leaving Cable and Hope at the detonation of a bomb, Domino and Colossus at the hands of a fully operational Sentinel, and Dr. Nemesis and Boom Boom squaring off against a Native American demon thing that was inhabiting Forge.

It's another good issue for Cable and X-Force and one that starts to get back at the root of what this book had set out to be. Obviously there were complications here and there as we had to deal with the Uncanny Avengers and some of the ramifications of the team's actions for several issues in there, as well as whether or not Hope belonged with the team, but now we seem squarely back on task of preventing threats to mutants and dealing with internal problems on the team. I'm pretty happy about it; I like the Uncanny Avengers and I thought the series was still telling some pretty good stories but we're reading this book in large part because of the team so to have the team take kind of a backseat to the story seems counterproductive. Here, in just one issue split out among seven team members, we get a good feel for every character as if to re-establish them before diving into this new story. What's particularly great about the way it's handled is that it definitely feels, after the fact, like it's re-establishing the characters, but during the issue you don't get that sense. Sometimes books will take the easy way out and will try to re-establish characters in very much the "tell don't show" method, where someone will come out and say "you're always so bitter, you have to let go of [events in your past]" which very much tells us what's happening instead of showing it over time. Some books, of course, don't have the luxury of time to tell a story but this one makes sure it shows but doesn't tell. Good stuff. Also some choice Dr. Nemesis lines so you know I'm on board. God, I thought this review was going to be shorter.

X-Factor 262, X-Men Legacy 16

X-Factor 262
David (w) and N. Edwards and Leisten (a) and Milla (c)

The final issue of X-Factor kicks off focused on Layla as she discovers that, at perhaps the worst possible time, she's pregnant. Old X-Factor enemy Tryp shows up to threaten her a bit and to tell her of something new coming, another version of him, more or less, who she would perhaps call the "good" version, coming to replace the bad. Before dying, though, he does call the police on her for "trespassing" in the house she's staying at, which is a Madrox family farm. Though she's Jamie's wife, no one really officially knows that and Jamie himself is a goat-headed demon being hidden in the barn. Layla tries to bring him food and he breaks free, launching himself at her. He pins her down and she screams that she's pregnant, which is enough to send him fleeing back to the barn. As Layla begins to return to the house, the police arrive. Meanwhile, Jamiegoat seems to pray to something and something seems to answer. As the police begin to take action against Layla, we see Siryn, now the Morrigan, talking with Jamie. The police brought weapons to handle Layla, knowing her powers and knowing she has something in the barn. Siryn joins in the fight against the strange special agent the cops have brought and Jamie, no longer a goathead, jumps in to prove his identity and that they belong in the house, finally sending the police away. Later, Siryn briefs the couple on the rest of the team's whereabouts and asks if they want her to bring them all back together. They think it over briefly but decline, saying they have a family and a farm to get back to.

It's a sweet little ending for X-Factor and one that ties up what remaining threads may have been out there. Great to get Jamie back to his normal self, even if he is in a nondescript white tank and jeans instead of his trademark green duster and if he's not exactly brimming with personality in this issue. Still good to get everything wrapped up and a nice little close for the series. Some intrigue with the strange police special agent with a specially prepared weapon. Also a nice wrap-up note from Peter David at the end of the issue to assure that he wasn't wrapping the series because of his recent stroke or anything of that nature; instead, they wrapped because it was a good time to wrap and they had a story that could do it nicely. He also promised something new coming up that was hinted at in 260 (the issue with Polaris and Quicksilver wherein Polaris was offered a job of a sort). Sad to see the series go but perhaps it was time.

X-Men Legacy 16
Spurrier (w) and Davidson (a) and Rosenberg (c)

David is ready to dispense some filial justice but he actually has to track his father's killer first. No easy feat as Cyclops has dedicated himself to not being found in recent days (not well, they keep running into traps, the dummies). Watching all sorts of international news programs, David begins to track Cyclops' movements and is able within a few hours to figure out Cyclops' location. He bursts in, riding down on thunderbolts and lightning (very, very frightening) with Blindfold and begins to set to work taking out Cyclops' team one-by-one. There are several nice moments in here, including him putting the new mutants on Cyke's team down first (gently and thinking to himself about the ugly legacy his father built of sending children into battles like this) before attacking the big guns on the team. He dispatches them nicely (his feelings about the members also come out, including his calling Magneto a grandfather and Emma Frost a trollop) before turning to Cyclops. Cyclops tries very minimally to talk him down but knows he won't likely listen anyway. David, for his part, says that they won't use powers, just a man vs. man fight, to be continued next issue.

I'm always a little surprised when this book sends an arc for multiple issues and I really shouldn't be at this point. Through 16 issues we've probably had, at this point, more to-be-continueds than not. Still, the feel of this book doesn't always lend itself to cliffhangers so it always catches me a bit off-guard. Maybe it's just that I'm eager to see every story to its conclusion so I am left a little disappointed when I don't immediately see the end. That's probably a good sign, though. Just means that I want to read more of this series. Good issue overall, really great stuff as he dismantles, one-by-one, one of the pre-eminent X-Men teams around. Granted, they're not at full power but the idea is still the same and his confidence-based powers are still on full display here. Solid work. Still a pretty great book. As this series has gone on, too, the art has grown on me again and again. Davidson's has typically been solid but I had to grow a little on Tan Eng Huat's stuff. I have, though, overwhelmingly, and I've really liked what's come recently. What a great book.

X-Men Legacy 15, X-Factor 261

X-Men Legacy 15
Spurrier (w) and Huat and Yeung (a) and Villarrubia (c)

Pete Wisdom set up a meeting for David with his rather estranged mother Gabrielle Haller and it instantly starts on a pretty hostile note as David brings Gabrielle to Muir Island, the place where David was at his craziest and abandoned to Moira MacTaggert's experiments. There's an emotional core to the issue that's really solid as David tries to get to the center of his abandonment issues and why Moira MacTaggert was a bigger role in his life than his own mother. There are some really great resolves here for David and his own issues (including Gabrielle going into David's mind and identifying the demon that's been in there as specifically not Charles Xavier, which is rather a weight off of David). It's good that these resolves come, of course, because Gabrielle is promptly shot after David's issues are lessened. He immediately, in a remarkably cool moment in his brain, harnesses new powers and destroys the attackers (an attack organized by the newly unseated President Abdi) before teleporting himself to the Jean Grey School where he can sit in front of the statue of his father (unbothered after he telepathically suggests to everyone around that he's not there) with Blindfold. The two talk for a bit and it leads to David's revelation that he ought to maybe dispatch some "filial justice" in honor of his father, dead at the hands of Cyclops.

Exciting times for the book and, really, what this whole thing boils down to as ever, is that I really love this book you guys. It's just...it's the best book and I don't get why you're not reading it. If you are reading it, ignore that because you totally know how awesome it is already and I don't need to tell you (I will anyway). There's a great emotional core to this book, as I mentioned above, and it really strikes home for David and for the readers that care about David. There's a lot of resolution to hope for and certainly not enough that could ever be given (David was given up by his mother to Charles and Moira when he developed his powers, where he inevitably went a bit crazy and was ultimately sedated and tested on relentlessly, so yeah, there's a bit to come back from) but David gets enough to satisfy and to make more of a weight for Gabrielle's death. I talked in a Fearless Defenders review in the last couple months about "fridging" a character, creating them just to kill them off for an emotional resonance, but this isn't exactly that. Gabrielle is an established character in the Marvel Universe and her death, even though she's been off the pages for a while, still has a real impact to it. She's big in that world (head of the Israeli Embassy) and she's big in the mutant community. Most importantly right now, she was somehow big to David, even if he didn't grow up with her around. So it's not exactly fridging, it's bigger than that and the weight it holds can't be ignored. Some more great stuff with David in his own mind and hey you guys, I really love this book.

X-Factor 261
David (w) and N. Edwards and Leisten (a) and Milla (c)

We're on the penultimate issue of this iteration of X-Factor (it's very likely it will be rebooted shortly after it ends but no official word yet) which means we're still trying to figure out what's become of the team since the events of the Hell on Earth arc. Today's team members: Darwin and Monet. Darwin, sick of being a lackey for Hela, is trying to hunt the Norse goddess down and work some things out with her when he runs into Monet. He questions how she came back from the dead (it happens) and isn't totally satisfied with her response. Like Guido before her, Monet has come back not feeling much of anything and hoping to fix that but can't find the team and has no real outlet so she's shooting in the dark. She and Darwin talk for a bit and he reveals that he's in love with her, that he always has been, leading the two of them into a brief entanglement that ends when Hela appears the next morning and Darwin shoos her off, deciding he's happy the way he is. Awwwwww.

I've mostly been happy with the wrapping up of individual arcs as the book winds down and I think Peter David's taken great care to make sure his characters, the ones he's been writing for years and years pretty much untouched now are in good shape as their book concludes. It's especially nice for X-Factor fans because there's a good chance we won't see much from these characters in the immediate future, particularly if they don't end up on the newest iteration of the team. Sure, some will probably find their way into X-Men books here and there but by and large these characters are ones that are likely to drift into the background of the universe. Truly sad, sure, but kind of expected. The fact we had them in this book for as long as we did is nice (except Rahne, who I still don't care for). But BOY, he better resolve the Madrox thing in the final issue or I'm going to be so angry. I love Madrox. He better not be a goat-headed demon for the rest of his life. I'll be so mad, you guys.

Comics this week

For anyone who happened to stop by the blog yesterday at some point (hopefully no other times) and found it down, my apologies. Something was going on with my Google account that was shutting down most everything connected to it. Really hoping we don't have any more of those any time soon. Anyways, onwards we march.

Captain Marvel 14
The likely climactic conclusion of The Enemy Within storyline as Carol confronts Yon-Rogg and the Avengers back her up. I honestly can say I don't know what's coming in this story but it, so far, has shown me again that events are best left in small and capable hands only involving a couple of titles and with a very limited run. This has essentially just been an arc that's run through two books for four issues, not a full-scale event in the way Marvel makes them these days. Still hoping Infinity pans out; I'm not sitting here waiting for Infinity to be bad because it benefits me to have something to write about beside my usual "pretty interesting!" tag. I'd much rather be boring and have great stuff to read than be more controversial and have crappy books. Oh yeah, but this Captain Marvel is the book we're talking about right now and I bet it's going to be a good one.

Daredevil 29
This book almost didn't make the cut because, as much as I love this book, it always makes the cut and this seemed like one of the few times where I genuinely wasn't as interested in the story as I have been every other time. It seemed like a prime opportunity to get another book in, like X-Men or Venom or Hulk. However, after I'd written my other four entries and was picking out my fifth book, I looked back and decided that I'm not going to leave a book out for being too good all the time. Instead, we should celebrate how lucky we are to have a really great Daredevil book that examines his character without throwing him through the worst of the worst at all times. We have an undoubtedly fantastic issue coming to us as Daredevil examines his own character through the eyes of former bully Hackett, a man he hated before he was gunned down in front of him by someone with ties to the Sons of the Serpent. Should be a nice entry to the series, like every other one. This book is just good reading all the way through.

FF 10
This book continues to be fun and fresh and the plot is going to an interesting place right now as the FF jump into the timestream to try to find the Fantastic Four. The Julius Caesar alien was a pretty neat guy back in his F4 introduction and hopefully will continue to be so here as he guides the FF on to their next adventure. This book has been surprisingly fun as its continued and it's worth reading every new issue as the team finds out more about itself and as Fraction shows us more and more about the workings of these kids and these adults. Solid book, should be another neat, new issue. And don't forget, somewhere out there, Doctor Doom is still holding Alex Power's parents and using him as a spy on the FF.

Ultimates 28
The Ultimates Disassembled storyline continues as it reaches all kinds of crazy new heights. Following the apparent death of Antonio Stark, the villains of this book seem to only need one more Infinity Gem to really reshape the universe in its entirety to their whim. Cap and Hawkeye are captured, Ben Grimm appears also to have died, Sue is separated, and Fury's strike-force team is preparing but is probably a bit untrained and certainly not on the level of the Ultimates, who were already handily defeated by these guys. They have a Hulk with Infinity Gems. Formidable.

X-Men Legacy 14
Hopefully here we'll find out a little bit more of what Legion is up to in this arc as he's now taken control, without any sort of permission, of several British/United Kingdom superheroes and appears to have decided that he has to do what he has to do, even if the people he needs don't cooperate. It's not exactly what the X-Men and others worried about with Legion but it's certainly along those same lines as his tremendous power makes him a worry for everyone else in the superhero community and in the world at large. As someone who has loved David throughout this run, I'm very interested to see what's going on in his mind; we didn't get that last time as we focused the lens through Pete Wisdom. I'm not sure we'll get it this issue but boy, I'd like to know a little more about what's happening.

X-Men Legacy 12, X-Factor 258

X-Men Legacy 12
Spurrier (w) and Davidson and Leisten (a) and Peter (c)

David is still set on taking the pill as the issue starts, a move that thrills Red Skull. For his peaceful anti-mutant organization Darwin's Martyrs, this is perfect; the son of the most famous mutant of all hoping to rid himself of his powers. They start the cameras rolling as David explains who he is and why he's doing what he's doing. Right as he's about to pop the pill in, Blindfold and her quickly assembled team show up, stopping David from taking the pill. A fight breaks out on camera as the team recognizes Red Skull and attacks. Unfortunately, this is all still according to Skull's plan. When the camera pans to see what's happening, it simply looks as if mutants killed Marcus Glove, the figurehead of the organization (who, of course, was just a Red Skull creation). Now it looks like these dangerous mutants broke in and killed a peaceful man who had a peaceful solution to ending mutant threats. People watching the report are furious, rallying together against what seems to be a common enemy. On the plus side, this actually has all played into David's hands, who was never actually there to take the pill. He brings out one time Legacy star Santi Sardina, the boy whose mutant power is to take credit for things, and it confuses the watching populace, who all believe Santi is a hero but may have just killed Glove but who is also taking credit for leading Darwin's Martyrs but who is also a mutant and...well, it's all very confusing. David, of course, knew it would be and nothing kills a rally like utter confusion at its core. The mutants team on Red Skull, secure knowing that they won't be crucified for the events of today. Just as Skull goes down, the gold entity in David's head takes his minute of control of David's body. He calls himself Legion and makes his way for Skull, hoping to inhabit the body that holds Xavier's brain and claim the brain for his own. The mini X-team holds him for part of the minute as Blindfold tries to help David from inside his own brain (where she can hear all of his loudspeakered thoughts). Right as Legion is about to take hold of the body, Karasu-Tengu shows up with her psychic raven and attacks Legion, stopping him long enough for the minute to end and for David to regain control of the body and trap Legion in a cell. David reveals that Darwin's Martyrs was just another threat to mutants that needed eradicating and that there was never a chance he'd give up his powers. If he really is meant to do something awful to the world, he'll handle it with his own abilities because he rules himself.

I really like this book. I'm not sure I've said that enough here. Even this issue, which took the twist of last issue, which had twisted the entire superhero genre on its own, kind of reversed that twist and still didn't leave me unsatisfied or depressed. Of course, I knew David couldn't really lose his powers but the idea was so brilliant that he was willing to, even after everything converged to convince him to fight back. Still, I guess the way I figured his powers would stay was that the team would show up and they'd all fight and the day would be saved. That sort of happens but not in the straightforward way it could have, and that many lesser books would have done. That's cliche and old but this was new and exciting and worked so perfectly within everything else Spurrier's done with the series. Just a brilliant set of twists and turns and it's hard not to cite David among my favorite characters in the Marvel Universe at the moment.

X-Factor 258
David (w) and Edwards, Carnero, and Leisten (a) and Milla (c)

X-Factor is winding down and, while for Layla and Madrox last issue that meant asking more questions, for Rahne this issue it means closing doors. She jumps into John Maddox's church (he's a priest who was a duplicate of Madrox but chose not to be reabsorbed when the time came) and kills two gunmen who were tearing up the church aiming to kill Maddox for his suggestion to the wife of one of the gunman that she leave him. The gunmen have killed members of the congregation already by the time Rahne launches through the window but she puts them down quickly, killing one and possibly fatally wounding the other. She leaves just as quickly as she came, leaving Maddox confused and alarmed. She comes back later to talk with Maddox, who recognized something was wrong with her when she came in. She tells the whole story about Tier's death and another story about where she ended up after the events. She was sent to the Arctic, though she fever-dreamed that it was Niffleheim, the land of the dead, and that Tier and his father were both there and that she was finally able to join them. Unfortunately for her, she's actually just talking to a polar bear. Guido appears and saves her from it then apologizes, sort of, for things that happened. He knows he can't make it up to her but he sends her to Maddox's church just in the nick of time. As Rahne is about to leave, having told her story, Maddox offers her a position in the church, learning to become a deacon. She accepts and Maddox recognizes that it's the start of a new life for her, meaning probably we're don with her through the end. One would think, but I've been burned before.

I'm not a big fan of Rahne so I wasn't particularly thrilled by this issue. Also, there are a lot of weird bits to this one. On the one hand, there's a couple of gunmen shooting up a church and then that storyline is done. Obviously it will still weigh on the town and on Maddox when he's not dealing with X-Factor related things, but it was weird for such a devastating attack to be thrown aside so quickly. There is also a bit of recap here as we recount what happened in the lords of hell arc and bits of Rahne's past. Still, David had to wrap up the character if his intent is to wrap up the series by ending each character's respective arc and this is about as good a place to leave her as any, with a person she's comfortable with and in a church. It'll do, I suppose. It'll do.

This week's picks

There are five or six books I'm trying to narrow down to three for this week's picks and it seems like, at any moment, any three books could take the spots. It can be frustrating trying to whittle that many books down to three, but the upside, of course, is that I got to read a bunch of really good comics this week. Never going to be upset about that.

Daredevil 26

Daredevil has long been billed "the man without fear" and he almost always lives up to that title. Even if he's losing a fight, he tends to appear unafraid, just angry or depressed. His lack of fear often pushes him to keep fighting. However, here, in Daredevil 26, he is flat out terrified of what's going to happen next. After being soundly defeated by Ikari last issue and told that he'll be killed at some point, Daredevil is seeing threats everywhere. The really great thing, though, is that he's not necessarily wrong. Yes the people he's accusing could be completely innocent and appear to be after he attacks them, but each time something additional happens to show that he wasn't wrong. The issue culminates in a nice Matt/Foggy scene and in the reveal that Bullseye is behind everything. Daredevil gets back on track and finds Bullseye, taking out Lady Bullseye in the process. It's a great examination of everything Matt tries to be and what it takes to make him break. Great issue for comic fans and extra great for Daredevil fans.

X-Men Legacy 11

Like seeing Matt's resolve weaken under all his pressure and strengthen again after Foggy's pep talk, we get a chance to watch David tested over and over, by his own father's brain, by his own feelings about himself, and by the Red Skull. Instead of Matt, whose strength makes him aim to take down the villains he's facing, David's strength means giving up against Red Skull and sacrificing himself to save the world from the future he causes. The writing continues to be tight and David continues to be a perfectly broken protagonist. One of the great things about this issue is that it turns the expectations about comics on its head. As David keeps getting opportunities to turn tail or to discover that the facility he wants to use is, in fact, evil, his resolve continues not to break and he continues to want the chance to take his powers out. In every other comic that Marvel puts out, the hero MIGHT have made it this far, but then would have fought Red Skull and tried to think of another way or something. In this case, everything that piles up makes David say "I don't care, someone will deal with you eventually, the pill works, I want it." It's really brilliant and such a twist if simply because it's what he had wanted all along and he stuck to it. It's a twist without a twist. Fantastic.

Young Avengers 5

I like everything that happened in this issue. There's a lot of really fun stuff and anything that could be construed as cheesy is pointed out to be cheesy right away, before the reader can do it himself. What really boosts this book over other books this week like Avengers or Fantastic Four or Journey into Mystery or Superior Spider-Man is the Loki discussion that it generates. Loki finally reveals himself to the audience to be the original Loki posing as the much more lovable and kind of trustworthy kid Loki but there's a twist; kid Loki is still there as Loki's conscience of sorts (he points out that he's not real, of course, but he's still in there). For anyone who loved Gillen's run on Journey into Mystery (if you didn't, maybe go read all of it this instant), there's tons to be excited about going forward. There are lots of directions to go with this series and with these kids and with Loki. The book jumped right in and clearly intends to keep at this level even as the first arc winds down. This is a near perfect book for anyone. I would recommend this title to any comic reader and to a whole lot of non-comic readers.


Best Cover

Again, a lot of good ones out there. Superior Spider-Man had a weirdly haunting cover, Daredevil's cover is more beautiful Samnee art and Young Avengers is a really neat concept well executed by McKelvie. However, this run of X-Men Legacy covers have kind of blown me away one after another and manages to continue to do so here. It's a great image of David sliding on a bunch of pills, a bit out of control, as the pills form up to make the Red Skull. It highlights everything that needs to be highlighted that will come in the story and that the character is going through without giving the whole book away. Also, the art is solid on it and the very basic color scheme makes the image stand out even more.

Uncanny X-Men 6, X-Men Legacy 11, Ultimate Wolverine 4

Uncanny X-Men 6
Bendis (w) and Irving (a and c)

Scott's team of X-Men are in Limbo right now (capital "L" means that they're in the place, not the state of being. Unless the place is a state of being. Look, just...it's a place in the Marvel Universe and we're all going to have to get over that) and Dormammu is enjoying trying to torture Illyana and claiming sole ownership of Limbo. The team, almost entirely consisting at this point of new mutants with untested powers and of teachers with broken powers, is nervous to engage Dormammu and his minions but are also unable to escape. The Cuckoos enter everyone's minds to give them courage to fight, which they proceed to do. Meanwhile, Maria Hill is trying to figure out who masterminded the attack on Cyclops in San Diego and what Cyclops' mutant revolution is planning on doing, exactly. To do this, she has enlisted another mutant to head up mutant affairs at SHIELD (I don't know if that's a real department, it's just what I'm trying to say): Dazzler.

There are some decent ideas in this book. Obviously training new mutants to use their powers and teaching them about what it is to be a mutant are cornerstones of X-Men books and those cornerstones are made more complicated by the fact that this is the first wave of new mutants since decimation. On top of that, learning that mutant powers can "break," as opposed to being simply magicked away or "cured," is an interesting thought if it's approached the right way. Speaking of approaching things the right way, there is really a feeling that Bendis can't get out of his own way on this. I've already spoken at great length in this blog and to anyone who will listen about how I don't like Bendis' writing style of late, which relies very heavily on snappy back-and-forth (he had a Tumblr post this week about how The Newsroom is not The West Wing in the same way that Bunheads isn't Gilmore Girls; both West Wing and Gilmore Girls are clearly pretty high up in his pantheon of shows and it DEFINITELY reflects in his writing style but, like I've said, that can work in TV and movies but works best if used very infrequently in comics). Putting aside the fact that I personally think it's obnoxious and gets pretty boring to read when done too often, I do think it slows up the actual good ideas he might have about the characters or about the world. It's a pity because I think there is still a Bendis out there I could not spend my time criticizing but, unfortunately for me, it's not present right now.

X-Men Legacy 11
Spurrier (w) and Davidson, Huat, and Yeung (a) and Rosenberg (c)

This book continues to be a joy to read. The secrets of the "red rage" and the Xavier (or at least one of them) in David's head are revealed as he continues through his tour of the I.B.S.S. facility to see if the "cure" pill is the real deal or some scam meant to kill mutants or steal their powers to be used by the stealer. As the issue pushes forward, David finds out a number of things about the facility, including the fact that the pill leaves mutants in a somewhat vegetative state, able to still feel happiness but not much else and never to really develop a personality again. Despite that, he still demands the pill, knowing that putting him in a vegetative state is better than him eventually losing control of his powers and destroying the world. As he reaches the last room, full of people who were the victims of mutant violence (all these victims have been unintentionally hurt as bystanders), he is surprised to find that they're not actually real. Well, they were. They are all dead, reanimated by an Xavier linked to David's brain. They're guarding any secrets perfectly from David because they're almost entirely shells. The red rage attached to that Xavier appears and berates David for trying to give up his powers and making himself a failed legacy to his father (X-MAN LEGACY), all of which David falters under and apologizes for. However, as the red rage disappears, he pulls himself together and understands that his father is dead and whatever sick being is corrupting David's mind to show him this has no control over him. He still demands the pill. In the end, the mastermind reveals himself as none other than the Red Skull, pulling off the Marcus Glove mask and starts soliloquizing, expecting David to lash out at him or something along those lines. Instead, David tells him that he's not going to be any part of the plan, the pill really does seem to work and that's all that matters because he still wants the pill.

The end of this issue was pretty amazing. On top of the reveal of the Xavier and the red rage in David being controlled by the Red Skull and the Red Skull running this little facility, David makes a real character stand and manages to do something that I'm not sure I've ever seen done in comics: not fight. Sure, fight scenes are great and comics are great at them, but there is a real expectation, especially when the mask comes off, that David is going to attack Skull or flee or decide not to take the pill because Skull is evil so this procedure is clearly evil or so on. Instead, David stands up to him and very candidly tells him that he doesn't care that it's Red Skull running the operation, he doesn't care that the Skull has his father's brain, he doesn't care about anything that could spawn from that. All he cares about is that the pill works and he's going to use it. It's a really brilliant twist in that it's not a twist from anything David's said over the last two issues but it breaks from everything comics are known for doing. Meanwhile, Blindfold is rallying the troops at home (by troops, I mean three other mutants who want to beat up David but are also willing to try to save him) to rescue David from taking the pill. That's more like comics but it's set opposite David insistence on taking the pill in such a way that it will still create new drama and a new story to build on. Really expertly done, great series, another great issue.

Ultimate Wolverine 4
Bunn (w) and Messina and Erskine (a) and Tartaglia (c)

The Ultimate Wolverine limited series concludes as Quicksilver and Wolverine brawl over what to be done with the Mothervine sample running through Jimmy's veins. Quicksilver wants to weaponize it to bring the mutant race back to its power and Jimmy refuses to let innocent people be hurt by whatever it is Quicksilver wants to do. Quicksilver, though, has the upper hand in this fight because he just needs blood and Jimmy doesn't want to kill him. However, Jimmy gets in enough hits to stall Pietro and is eventually saved by the reappearance of his birthmother, who knocks them both down. Jimmy, she reveals, will heal so she's not too worried, but she's willing to let Pietro suffer a bit. For Jimmy, that healing is going back to Utopia and forgetting about Mothervine for a bit while also embracing his heritage as Wolverine. For Pietro, suffering means whatever's about to happen next in Ultimates Disassembled, the Ultimates storyline set to start in Ultimates 25. Ultimates.

It's a neat and tidy story with a little bit of character building for both the Wolverines of this universe, giving us the father aspect of Logan that knew the best way to protect and raise Jimmy to live and be a good man was to give him to his old war buddy James Hudson and giving us a good amount of information on Jimmy, who has starred in plenty of Ultimate X-Men books but hasn't had a ton of time to really be explored in that series. The Ultimate Quicksilver is also a somewhat fascinating person; he's not so removed from his 616 parallel that his whole personality is different, but he has more of the villainous streak that makes Pietro such an interesting character across both universes. Obviously he's been a hero in each place, but he has done his fair sure of treacherous acts and is often viewed with suspicion or contempt from his peers. Adding to that feeling in the Ultimate Universe isn't a bad way to push forward. It'll be nice to see him re-emerge in the Ultimates in a few issues.

All-New X-Men 11, X-Men Legacy 10, Ultimate X-Men 26

Sorry for the delay in getting reviews out today. Free Comic Book Day (which, it occurs to me, I maybe should have advertised more on this site but we're all past that now, aren't we?) took up a considerable portion of my day.

All-New X-Men 11
Bendis (w) and Immonen and von Grawbadger (a) and Gracia (c)

I've been trying to narrow down some of my problems with this title and I think I'm making some progress. It doesn't make me like the book any more, it just helps me to try to figure out and point to a couple of real problems that I have instead of just shouting at this book. I've expressed my problems already with the time travel mess, but let's cover that again real quickly. It feels a little like, between this book and Age of Ultron, Bendis has just gotten his hands on some sci-fi and is trying to introduce groundbreaking ideas about time travel that aren't so much groundbreaking as they are well-trodden. Let's move away from that as quickly as we got into it though, moving instead to characters. I feel like no character seems to care what they're doing from one moment to the next so no character has a real arc to go through. It's why Wolverine started off threatening to execute young Scott and now just gets in people's faces. It's why Kitty Pryde thought that Beast was stupid for bringing the kids here, then offered to be their teacher, and is mad at Beast again now for bringing the kids here. It's why Beast brought the kids here and inexplicably now won't send them back. I get that the kids have said they want to stay here. I understand that. I even can understand an argument saying that Kitty has made the best of their decision to stay here and has offered to teach them to help them out if they're going to be staying here anyway. But I don't buy, for one second, that these guys couldn't have sent the kids back right off the bat. It goes beyond suspension of disbelief to genuinely impacting feelings on the story. When the whole story is hinged around the decision that children made to let the children stay, it's hard to ignore the fact that the adults 100% should have sent those kids back and were totally capable of it. Add to that the fact that EVERY ADULT seems to think that's true but never does anything about it, again, despite being capable of it.
The other problem right now is the same problem that I tend to have with Bendis, as stories get carried on far past the point of being interesting and just linger. I think that the same thing is happening in this book and, worse than that, between this book and Uncanny X-Men. So we're getting a lot of the same story across both books right now and it's just...it's not interesting. Maybe that's on me. Maybe I counted myself out too early and now I'm nitpicking. I don't know. I feel like certain parties are phoning it in on this book and I can't say I'm not one of them right now.

X-Men Legacy 10
Spurrier (w) and Davidson (a) and Rosenberg (a)

I like seeing different corners of the Marvel Universe, people and civilians we haven't seen before and getting an greater understanding of how the world outside of the superhero community works. In this case, we look at a scientific institute that is also a charity and whose founder is against mutants, but in a very specific and different way. Though he's lost several limbs and been paralyzed in mutant attacks before, he doesn't hate mutants in general. Instead of the normal anti-mutant spiel we normally get from villains, he's totally reasonable, even if he deserves not to be. David is expecting a little more out of him, in fact, because it's his institute that provided the pills a few issues ago to the Church of the Happy Host. The founder, Marcus Glove, truly seems to regret that fringe groups like that one got their hands on his mutant cure and are using it to promote extremism. Glove is perfectly frank about its uses and about what he believes and it's not unreasonable. He understands that mutants might be the next evolutionary step but he wholeheartedly believes that mutants are set to destroy the planet at some point. He's not necessarily wrong. Obviously it's hard to argue definitively that they will (though David rather agrees with him right now...more on that in a moment), but the signs seem to point that way. His pill blocks the brain from using its mutation. Nothing too painful, a little bit experimental and, Glove isn't shy to admit, clinical brain damage so it's certainly risky. But Glove comes off as a legitimately good guy who truly believes in what he's doing and has no reason not to. He's not forcing it on anyone, it's just an option. And David wants it. David made a deal with the Xavier in his head to see into his future and see if he really is destined to doom the mutant race. Spoilers: he is. There are very limited futures in which he doesn't doom the race and this pill seems to be one of them. The deal he made with the Xavier though is that Xavier gets control of his body for one minute at an undisclosed point later on. Exciting.
So yes, there are things building in X-Men Legacy and this is the first multi-issue arc that we've faced (even if it's just these two issues) since the first long arc. Blindfold kind of knows about it too though, as she's been using Cerebro to follow David without his knowledge. Will she stop him from shutting down his powers? Will she let him do it? Is she going to be more angry by the fact that he's trying to de-mutant himself or more angry that he's reading her brother's book? All sorts of questions and all sorts of places to go.

Ultimate X-Men 26
Wood (w) and Asrar and Vlasco (a) and Bellaire (c)

The Natural Resources arc continues to ramp up as General Ross comes to Utopia to inform Kitty that the US government has overruled President Cap's declaration of freedom for the mutants. General Ross doesn't want to attack the compound unprovoked and wants to go and see the place for himself and look Kitty in the eye as he tells her. He does so and it shakes him up, seeing someone who's the same age and kind of looks a bit like his niece. More than that, though, he's shaken up as an anti-mutant soldier decides that Kitty is a threat to attack Ross and fires on her. The bullet ricochets off of Ross, who tries to save Kitty, and she phases through it and through the ground. But now the terms are out there and Kitty knows what the government and army are expecting her to do. As a result, she welcomes back the more militant branch of mutants into her camp. That group, by the way, is getting more and more interesting as it seems like Psylocke is pulling all of the strings and not letting anyone know what her real purpose is. On top of that Jean is getting a little more supportive of Utopia and realizes that Tian's success hinges on the success of Utopia. She continues to go out to the woods to make calls back to Tian but Rogue has seen her calling home now. Lots of drama still out on the horizon.
The issue is simultaneously important for the future and interesting to read now. We're seeing more and more of Psylocke as she plays her own games to some mysterious end. It seems everything is going her way, as she has her hands on Mach Two and Jimmy, among others. The Tian plot is interesting and I like the idea that Jean kind of understands, despite her possible feelings about Utopia, that the two mutant civilizations are linked. Now we'll get to see how Utopia defends itself. Kitty is still insistent on a peaceful engagement but understands it might not be so easy. She's hoping they can simply defend themselves and not attack so that they can still prove mutants aren't a threat to everyday life while simultaneously not being walked all over. There are a lot of great and real questions in this series that are worth talking about and are good things to wonder about in a world that has mutants. Another good series.