crushing blow

drive-by readings

The Thanos Imperative #4 (Marvel) Dan Abnett/Andy Lanning Miguel Sepulveda Jay David Ramos/Wil Quintana Joe Caramagna Aleksi Briclot (cover)

what we learned: the not-so-secret Six (Nova, Quasar, Gladiator, Silver Surfer, Ronan and Beta Ray Bill),attack the Cancerverse HQ and they get their licks in. however, Lord Mar-Vell (the fake) is more than a match for any of them. and in one of the quickest turnarounds in the Marvel U, Thanos reintegrates himself (awwwwww - stop whining! this is the Universe of Life!), much to Star-Lord's relief, but returns the favor to Drax.
oh shit moment: Lord Mar-Vell leaves a bomb. sneaky punk. oh yeah, and a version of the Vision gets ripped in half again. the Android Anti-Defamation League is picketing the Marvel offices.
what's next: what? a universe without a smart cranky Destroyer? perish the thought! pun intended!


cosmic deadpan trash talk. now there's a Marvel Studios movie.

is she talking about Nova?

oh, you mean Thanos! eeeewwwwwwww.

snaps: X-Men vs Agents of Atlas #2

... where the time-honored tradition of fighting before simple diplomacy is in full effect. (actually that describes around half of superhero comics since 1938!)

1) cat? i thought he was a dog?! or a horse?!

Q: What do you call a bunch of Hank McCoys?
A: The Blue Cat Group?


2) Namor: "that insolent remark will cost you thirty lashes in our next tryst. when is that scheduled, by the way? am not sure we should do it in Utopia."


3) how do you say "get a room!!!" in Atlantean?


4) speaking of feelings, here's some creepy ones along the lines of cyber-telepathy.



5) oh, i see what you did there, Jeff Parker, you clever man you.


6) lookit! it's Cyclops without his visor or any eyewear!! isn't he handsome?? (this would qualify for a No-Prize, except that its in the astral plane or some plot device which anything is possible)


7) see, there's always a way to stop Wolverine (short of a Muramasa blade).

drive-by readings TPB: Rise & Fall of the Shi'ar Empire

Uncanny X-Men: Rise and Fall of the Shi'ar Empire (Marvel) Ed Brubaker Billy Tan Clayton Henry Danny Miki Allen Martinez Mark Morales Frank D'Armata Wil Quintana Joe Caramagna Chris Eliopoulos John Watson (other covers)

picking up from where he left off in Deadly Genesis, Ed Brubaker lays in the foundations for the ascension of the third Summers brother Vulcan as a powerhouse villain to be reckoned with, culminating in last summer's War of Kings.

with ol' Charlie Xavier messing up by not telling everything to Scott and Alex, he tries to make up for it by putting an ad hoc team together and try to stop Gabriel/Vulcan from annihilating the Shi'ar Empire - surprisingly, Scott doesn't put up much resistance, considering that team includes Alex and his alternate timeline daughter, Rachel. Xavier's lineup of choice also has Warpath (link to "second" X-team), Nightcrawler (perfect swashbuckler), Darwin (link to the real "second" X-team), and Lorna Dane/Polaris, whom they rescued just for this mission. Xavier's a real sneaky bastard, ain't he?

Vulcan prepares for any pursuit from Earth, so as soon as he gets the chance (by hijacking a Shi'ar military ship) he disables all Shi'ar stargates needed to jump back to the Shi'ar homeworld Chandilar. Xavier, himself commandeering an old Shi'ar ship (see, i told you he's sneaky), is stunned when he finds out (actually, he's also pleased, considering he trained Vulcan). now, where's Richard Dean Anderson/McGyver to cobble up a stargate when you need him? no McGyver, but a small Shi'ar space station (think 7/11) provides the stranded mutants supplies - and a challenge, as it turns out its manned by Skrulls (altogether now: "Secret Invasion!"). saving the two remaining Shi'ar in it, they proceed through Shi'ar space. unknown to Xavier, the two Shi'ar recognize his bald plate anywhere (he's like the Bin Laden of Shi'ar worlds) and wait for the chance to deliver his criminal mind to the bosses.

Vulcan, meanwhile, has grabbed the attention of the Shi'ar high command, with his stargate-destroying habits, and has come face to face with the Imperial Guard. he gives them a run for their money, but goes down for the count. meanwhile, the Shi'ar dispatch a new character, Korvus, who wields the Blade of the Phoenix (don't ask - just play SoulCalibur IV) and can track down the host of the Phoenix Force (currently Rachel). as you all know, the Shi'ar hate the Phoenix Force with a passion equal to their love of feathered helmets. Korvus slips into Xavier's ship, takes everybody down, except Rachel who bonds with the sliver of the Phoenix Force in his blade (don't take that figuratively, dirty minds! - maybe later). too late, the two sneaky Shi'ar take Xavier hostage and get away using Korvus' own ship ... with the inimitable Darwin in tow. Darwin, for those who don't keep up with Marvel's merry mutants, has the power of surviving - he can adapt himself to anything and you can't use the same tactic on him the second time. so the only way to defeat him is to kill him the first time around. wow, another near-omnipotent individual in the Marvel U. i'm at a loss how they haven't destroyed themselves by now.

Korvus, a contrived character whose sole reason for existence is to have a male romantic Romeo for Rachel - kidding! - helps them use their powers to use to bypass those pesky stargates, and find the - yes, of course, they'll be in this one - Starjammers, who are preparing for war. apparently, a coup de'tat has occurred in that time, as Chancellor Araki makes his move, takes Lilandra captive, and unleashes the biggest reversal of all Shi'ar-related X-Men stories - the resurrection of once-Emperor D'Ken! why?? because they KEN!!!

but wait, wasn't he Vulcan's target in the first place? hell, yeah - if you were forcibly ripped from his mom's womb and force-grown to become an adolescent slave, you'd certainly have issues. captured by the Imperial Guard, he's set up to meet Lilandra's sister Deathbird, imprisoned and hidden for years, as part of Araki's scheme to bring all the Shi'ar GOP party together again. Vulcan's hatred for D'Ken is tempered by the still-smolderingly sexy Deathbird, who understandably, has been without uhm, a male companion for a long time (hello, Bishop, how goes the baby-hunting?). Vulcan agrees to team up with the right-wing crowd up until his wedding to Deathbird, with the casual tossing of a captured Xavier into the M'Kraan Crystal as a digestif ...

... that's when all hell breaks loose as Lilandra's forces (including a former general - think Maximus in Gladiator, only much older) and the Starjammers crash the party. in the segue between the last two issues, two major characters bite the dust - and by only one hand (you can tell whose)! Lilandra would have made it the third, but as it turns out, this was a temporary reprieve. she sends a recovered Xavier (thanks to the crystal), Darwin, Warpath, Nightcrawler and a wrong-place-wrong-time Hepzibah back to Earth, especially to the latter's consternation (temporarily, as she would soon get over her grief by knocking boots with Warpath), before continuing the fight against the other half of her divided empire.

as fate would have it, Alex would become the new leader of the Starjammers, along with Lorna and Rachel and Korvus, joining holdovers Ch'od and Raza. current readers would know where this would all lead to.

with such an ambitious-sounding title, a 12-issue run should hold up, and Brubaker masterfully makes it so. this was artist Billy Tan's coming-out party, although he reminds me more of David Finch and a raw Michael Silvestri (there's that Top Cow influence and training) and there are times the characters have disproportionate limbs. i love Clayton Henry's three-issue contributions (the Vulcan parts). in light of the much-hailed Messiah CompleX (comprising a much wider X-cast), this one holds it own, and will be a joy to re-read for years to come (completists should have Deadly Genesis and Emperor Vulcan, and possibly War of Kings).

drive-by readings: War of Kings #6

War of Kings #6 (Marvel) "War of Kings" Dan Abnett Andy Lanning Paul Pelletier Rick Magyar Andrey Hennessy Wil Quintana Brandon Peterson (cover) Mike Choi/Sonia Oback (variant cover)

wow. i keep looking for happy endings and they never happen. silly me. Black Bolt and Vulcan's mano-a-mano results in both of them dead - probably (this is the Marvel Universe after all). one thing we can be sure of, is that Gladiator will be the new Shi'ar boss. here's hoping he doesn't start another war after what happened to Lilandra; he should go after the Raptors (likely the next cosmic crossover, eh DnA?). what's next for the cast of characters? fingers crossed, no one gets canceled (Guardians of the Galaxy and Nova). Alex and Lorna should go back home to Earth though, and be with family again. one thing good out of this, is we get rid of the annoying Vulcan for awhile (why does he talk like an American douchebag? somebody probably edited out "like" from the dialogue).

i think the collected trade would really be worth getting, as i feel this was a stronger crossover, story and art-wise than its Annihilation predecessors.

what are we, twelve?

X-Men Forever is rounding true to form, reading like a fanboy's wet dream - a fanboy stuck in a '90s time warp and never grew up. we get ideas that were probably bandied about during a 'can you top this' bullshit session between pimpled dorks. Wolverine reduced to a skeleton? check. Wolverine doing the telepathic nasty with Jean? check. Sabretooth is actually Logan's dad? check. every major character acting out of character? check. Storm blinding Sabretooth with lightning? check. hey, what if Logan gave Kitty one of his claws to scratch Storm's eyes out? why, that's a cool idea! let's put it in.

there's a sequence that gets my goat - and i will honor any considerably decent explanations. a rogue Storm turns on her pals, and they try to capture her for "killing Wolverine" as posited by a captive Sabretooth and a loopy Jean Grey. she ducks out and locks them in the Danger Room.

for someone who can punch holes in starships, Cyclops holds back his righteous anger (he actually fired the first shot at Storm moments ago) and does nothing more than slam his fists at the door. ok, maybe he doesn't want to put that on his expense account, but the Professor has a first rate Sh'iar insurance policy that magically rebuilds the mansion every single time its leveled by their enemies. it could also be explained by what Kurt says: Storm activated a 'dampening field' so he can't teleport out and go after Ororo. i assume that means a device that negates their powers. they have such a device?? they could have caused M-Day without Wanda ...

so even with that dampening field, Kitty actually phases through the door. because that's what Kitty does.

ehh?

i'm too dumb for this. i await your explanations.

maybe it was a good idea for Claremont to walk away at that time. if this was the storyline that became canon as we know it, i'm not sure how the X-fans would have turned out.

"The Cruelest Cut" would be that, at the end of this series, this is all a hallucination by a pot-smoking Charles Xavier.

drive-by readings: War of Kings #5

War of Kings #5 (Marvel) "In Rage and Blood and Fire" Dan Abnett Andy Lanning Paul Pelletier Rick Magyar Wil Quintana Joe Caramagna Brandon Peterson (cover) Adi Granov (variant cover)

with the assassination of Lilandra (you mean it, Marvel? you really mean it?), the endgame is afoot, making the expected collision course between Vulcan and Black Bolt inevitable. the rage burns out of control on the Sh'iar side, none moreso than in Lilandra's longtime loyalist, Gladiator, who's out ripping arms and putting down those he believes betrayed the Royal Throne (how ya doin', Chancellor Araki). the Inhumans in the meantime, are divided in their own house, as Black Bolt hatches a counterplan involving terrigen mists, sound, and himself: in short, he's goin' a-suicide bombing. i've been praising War of Kings for being a well-coordinated crossover, with its simple, tight sequences and exceptional cliffhangers; case in point - Vulcan easily brushes aside the Kree Sentries and bursts into the heart of the Inhuman bomb, and just nods at Black Bolt: "you. let's go." this is i think, the apex of Vulcan's characterization, thanks to DnA, and ultimately thanks to Ed Brubaker, who co-created the 3rd Summers brother in X-Men: Deadly Genesis, and who also has a hand in this month's other much-hyped book (think red, white and blue).

drive-by readings: X-Men Forever #1

X-Men Forever #1 (Marvel) "Love - and Loss!" Chris Claremont Tom Grummett Cory Hamscher Wil Quintana Tom Orzechowski

loosely labelled as the "Screw You, Jim Lee, Screw You, Bob Harras" Project, X-Men Forever looks like more of Marvel's continued appreciation of Chris Claremont's contributions by giving him more sandboxes to play with, as long as those sandboxes do not interfere with the current incarnation of the team he built from the ground up (cough, cough John Byrne, cough, Dave Cockrum cough cough).

picking up from the events of X-Men #1-3 (with #1 being the best-selling book of all time), the X-Men find themselves tracking down the tastefully-named Fabian Cortez, who in 99% of the time would be a fey loser, except this time he managed to kill Magneto. or so they think. they get ambushed, and they get their asses handed to them. huh, that never happens. especially not by someone named Fabian Cortez.

Claremont uses this chance to put his unused stories right out there, which was the intent all along. the Scott-Jean-Logan love triangle is right there on the forefront, and it looks like Logan will be dead next issue, which could be a convenient excuse for his real body to disappear and be reborn as a Hand assassin (wait, Millar did that already). by the way, why is Gambit called "Remy Picard"? was that the intent all along? to be named after the character played by the actor who was going to play Professor X?

i'm not sure who the audience for this book is. those who lived the Claremont/Lee years have moved on by now, so why would they want to do a What If alternate branch at this point? new readers following the current (convoluted) X-storylines may not remember this period, and would be more confused without a Wikipedia.

a certain bald man is not going to be happy

and i don't mean Max Brenner. Or Brian Michael Bendis.



should i even hope that this is permanent? or would Lilandra be alive and well in Operation Galactic Storm 2 - Kree Versus Shi'ar Versus Skrulls Versus Technarch Versus Celestials: Here We Go Again in 2011?

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War of Kings #4

never doubt a raccoon

or the writing duo known as DnA.

another stellar issue. this is why we read comicbooks.

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War of Kings #3

drive-by readings 023409

Guardians of the Galaxy #10 (Marvel) "Blastaared" Dan Abnett Andy Lanning Brad Walker Victor Olazaba Livesay Wil Quintana Joe Caramagna Clint Langley (cover)

i love team books. and i love team books that feature fractured teams that come together a lot more! Rocket Raccoon successfully leads the Guardians in a snatch-and-grab of erstwhile leader Starlord right from Blastaar and his hordes. i'm salivating at the part where Warlock, Gamora, Drax, Heather and Nova rejoin them in time for War of Kings. DnA hasn't let us down so far, and i expect greater things down the road.

first blood

with the Inhuman king Black Bolt returning home after being replaced by/tortured by/rescued from the Skrulls, there's no other time but payback time. its kinda how abused boys could eventually become serial killers when they grow up. you can't hold back that kind of thing.

"i don't wanna ... talk about it."

breaking out a cache of banned weapons, Blackagar pulls up his race's roots and heads off into space (i assume at some point, that massive liftoff from the moon will be noticed by the guvmint scientist types on earth?) to pursue (and terminate with extreme prejudice, natch) the remaining Skrulls, which is just the short-term goal. in pursuit of this goal, they encounter three Sh'iar (ex-pals of our merry mutants) warships who do not take kindly to this chase across their territory. Blackagar, already the most powerful weapon in the universe and connected to an asskicking amplifier musicians would kill for, has only one response.

"fuck you, Simon Cowell ... i can sing!"

so now you understand why during the opening salvo of World War Hulk, Black Bolt couldn't rip the Hulk to shredded green wheat - that was the Skrull-Black Bolt and it was faking his powers. the real deal can obliterate starships at the minimum, as experienced by the Sh'iar military and the fugitive Skrulls.

Cowell, Abdul and the rest of the AI judges get blown away

short term goal accomplished. now for the long-term: the Inhumans have been weapons created by the Kree (those trigger-happy humanoid aliens), but were left ignored and unused. now the weapons have come back to take over the whole Kree race. easily getting past their defenses, the Inhumans confront Ronan Keating, who was planning to put back Boyzone for a new tour. sorry, i meant Ronan the Accuser, who's currently the caretaker of his race because no one wants to.

Medusa actually insults Ronan with both the American and British variations of the finger

Ronan just actually wants to accuse; that's his day job. no more administration shit. hell, yeah, let's give it to the Inhumans.

and thus Blackagar consolidates his position in the universe.

end of story?


nope, you're forgetting the three Sh'iar warships obliterated during the course of these goals.

when Ed Brubaker crystallized the "third Summers brother" three years ago, we didn't think the character would become the "most annoying Summers brother ever" (and that includes Shatterstar, nyuknyuknyuk). Vulcan, currently in charge of the Sh'iar in his demented quest for revenge and is really the biggest asshole in the galaxy now that the Skrulls, Annihilus and the Ultron/Phalanx are gone, is quite bored with being emperor just presiding on colloseum games. he needs a challenge, and he's found one.

kudos to DnA for cranking out terrific space opera within the Marvel Universe, which had gone stale prior to 2006's Annihilation.


ok, let's say after this War of Kings, the Inhumans/Kree come out on top (and that's assuming even the Guardians of the Galaxy or Nova won't be able to get everybody to smoke the peace pipe), will war against Earth be next? hmmm ...

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Secret Invasion: War of Kings one-shot