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This is it for Volume II of the Comic Book Catch Up. This will focus solely on what I consider the A-list X-Titles. They are the 4 titles that comprise of the Endangered Species storyline as well as Astonishing X-Men. I won’t hesitate any longer. Let’s see how the core titles read over these past few months.
Catching Up – X-Titles Part 2 – Endangered Species
-Astonishing X-Men #’s 21-22- Cassady and Whedon continue with their (never-ending) arc. The X-Men are on the Breakworld and Agent Brand is being annoying. Basically #21 just showed Colossus and Kitty fighting, then Danger attacking Cyclops and Emma, with Emma asking Danger to kill her. The cliffhanger in #21 gave way to #22 which reveals Danger’s programming prevents her from killing. The X-Men now use Danger on their side to stop the Breakworld weapon from firing at Earth. The big cliffhanger in #22 is Cyclops floating in space, dying. To be honest, I haven’t enjoyed this series since the opening arc. It’s run through whatever momentum it had with its terrible delays and the fact I am getting it much later doesn’t help. These guys are out of steam on this title and the arrival of a new team will no doubt help.
-Uncanny X-Men #’s 486-489- #486 is the thrilling conclusion of the epic space storyline. The big stuff happening here was Corsair being killed by Vulcan, Professor X getting his powers back, Lilandra sending the X-Men, with Hepzibah, back to Earth to save Charles and Havok, Polaris and Rachel staying behind with the Starjammers. This was an awesome 12-parter with, what I thought, was a great conclusion. Brubaker can really do no wrong right now. 487 kicks off a five-parter called the Extremists. This issue has Caliban getting attacked by the Morlocks and Masque and going to the X-Mansion for help. Storm is summoned since she is the leader of the Morlocks and we learn from Masque that the Morlocks will look for Magneto in an attempt to have mutants take over the world. 488 shows the Warlock, Hepzibah, Storm and Caliban looking for the Morlocks. They happen upon someone’s old room with writing on the wall, predictions for the future. Masque unleashes his first salvo on the world, exposing a subway train to gas and messing up their faces with his mutant power. Xavier is also getting fed up with ONE and goes out to look for Magneto on his own. Finally, 489 brings the awesome with Masque releasing a statement to the world and calling out Magneto. Xavier realizes the situation is dire and it gets worse when Masque kills some ONE agents. The X-Men team find the dead agents and a Sentinel comes down on them. They find Skids in the rubble and its revealed she’s working for SHIELD! Great twist there. These were 4 awesome issues and I love Brubaker’s work. From the gritty Criminal, to the intrigue of Captain America to the big team book X-Men, he is just amazing. The art changes a lot between Billy Tan (486) and Salvador Larroca since their styles are so different but both are beautiful.
-X-Men #’s 199-202– Issue 199 is the less than thrilling conclusion of Red Data, where an old soul taking weapon is wreaking havoc on Cable’s Providence. Cable summons Rogue, still infected with a virus, to come. She absorbs all 8 billion minds and souls on this weapon, defeating it. She’s a little crazy after that to say the least. They did come away victorious, though that wouldn’t last long. The double-sized #200 had shocks galore when the X-Men are attacked by the new Marauders with the Omega Sentinal being taken over by Mirage, and Mystique shooting Rogue, revealing herself as their leader. The X-Men were soundly defeated and Emma was temporarily paralyzed. She sends Cannonball away with a list of victims the Marauders have. Their next victim was to be Blindfold of the New X-Men but she seemingly kills herself before the Marauders could attack and kill her. The New X-Men are also defeated by a second team of Maruaders led by Exodus. He is searching for a book of some sort that cannot be found. He heads back to tell Mr. Sinister it could not be found, but he has Cerebro to look for Xavier. Cannonball and Iceman battle Sunfire and Cannonball learns the shocking truth, the goal wasn’t to kill the X-Men but to leave them blinded, to kill their pre-cogs and telepaths. Issues 200-202 were very good with a very real threat against the X-Men, and some good storytelling. I enjoyed Ramos’ art on here much more than on Wolverine. I don’t know if it was less cartoony or if it has just grown on me, or if he’s improved, but the art was very good.
-New X-Men #’s 38-41- This is the Magick story line and to be honest the four-issue arc wasn’t as spectacular as previous arcs have been. The New X-Men are ambushed by Belasco at the mansion since he knows Illyana has been near them (but only in story form courtesy of Blindfold). They fight a lot, he kills David (later healed by Elixir) and X-23, but he ends up bringing her back to life. Rockslide is changed to the rock of the Limbo world. Magick steals Pixie’s soul to create a new soulsword. ONE recruits Amanda Sefton to help them and she brings Hellion and the other one who wasn’t in the mansion at the time to Limbo. They end up all teaming up, with Magick, to defeat Belasco and Magick is now the ruler of Limbo. She vows to get her soul back. The art was decent but I felt the story dragged at times. How many times can we see Belasco kill the New X-Men before it gets repetitive? They could’ve brought Magick into Belasco’s castle an issue earlier and probably trimmed an issue from the storyline. I love New X-Men but thought this was a bit disappointing.
-X-Factor #’s 19-22- The first two issues dealt with X-Factor battling X-Cell (a rogue group of depowered mutants who gain their powers back via Quicksilver). They have a drawn out fight but things go badly for X-Cell when their powers start turning on them and they start dying. Rictor battles Quicksilver and using his powers manages to shake the terrigan mist out of him, but Rictor’s power is now gone. The second two issues deal with a man named Huber meeting with X-Factor with a great idea, mutants should be on the endangered species list! He seems to hear other voices around him and it drives him a bit insane. Monet and Siryn investigate two children who are part of an anti-mutant cult and the grandparents want them back. Siryn and Monet end up knocked out and when they wake up they are in the middle of nowhere. Layla and the new runaway they picked up find a positive pregnancy test but don’t know who it belongs to. Siryn and Monet have both slept with Madrox and it could be one of theirs. The runaway turns on Layla, hits her in the head with a rock and dumps her into the water. There is so much stuff going on, so many different layers, that it is tough to go through everything that has happened. X-Factor was awesome this time around and it deserves to be in the top tier X-titles.
-X-Men Endangered Species- This review will include the one-shot and the 9 chapters that are included as back-ups throughout Uncanny X-Men, X-Men, New X-Men and X-Factor. Basically, Beast is worried that the mutant population borders on extinction (an endangered species if you will). He reaches out to some of the most villainous people for help (including Dr. Doom and Mr. Sinister) and they refuse to help him. He goes off alone and investigates an old mutant concentration camp where help comes from the least likliest of places, from Dark Beast. Beast makes a deal with the devil and agrees to work with Dark Beast. They head to an old facility called Dark Womb but the data they were looking for was swiped and erased and they suspect Mr. Sinister. Beast and Dark Beast work on cadavers of mutants and the X-Gene is gone in some of the dead as well! Beast has an option, get some mutant growth hormone to test with, and they plan on getting it from Bishop. Excellent little mini they have running so far. It’ll read like crap in the trades ( 4 pages, then new art and approach) but it’s nice as back-ups.
-The Bottom Line- What can I say? I wasn’t disappointed by any of these titles. Oddly enough the X-Titles are going through a bit of a down-turn lately. They haven’t been as popular as they used to and for a while there was such a saturation of titles it kept it hard to keep up. Marvel has lowered that considerably and with only a few “core” books, it is a whole lot more accessible. Add in that all four core titles are producing their best stories in years and the X-titles could experience a resurgance similar to the ones the Avengers had a few years back.
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Questions? Comments? Shoot me an email.
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