Uncanny X-Men #287

Uncanny X-Men #287
Writing: Jim Lee and Scott Lobdell
Art: John Romita Jr.

What Went Down: Bishop, Malcolm, and Randall track down the last of the evil mutants that Fitzroy brought from the future in #282. They are in the middle of executing the bad guys at a seedy nightclub.

The Gold Team is on its way to stop the future cops. In case you’re curious, Iceman explains that Mikhail Rasputin is at home resting since last issue.

One of the thugs forgets Bishop’s power for a minute and shoots him with a laser, charging him back up. Once the bad guys collect themselves, they focus their gunfire and wind up killing Malcolm and Randall in an explosion. Ah, we hardly knew them.

Bishop swears vengeance when Colossus falls through the ceiling, and the rest of the X-Men show up. Bishop still doesn’t believe they are the real X-Men because they won’t condone violence; he appears to attack them. Then Colossus punches him really hard, and Bishop lands with a pipe sticking through his midsection. The Gold Team realizes that Bishop was really attacking an evil mutant who was targeting Storm. In the mean time, Bishop manages to disappear, despite having a hole through his body.

Bishop flashes back to the future, where Malcolm and Randall are still alive, and they are chasing Fitzroy through some abandoned tunnels. After catching Fitzroy with a neuro-collar, the three stumble upon the remains of the X-Men’s war room, where they watch a distress call from Jean Grey. In it, Jean warns of a betrayal before getting killed by someone off screen.

His curiosity aroused, Bishop goes to a prison called the Pool and meets with a criminal named Lebeau, who is assumed to be the future Gambit. He is also known as the Witness since he is the last person to see the X-Men alive. Bishop tries to get answers from him, but receives nothing except for some vague ramblings. The Witness also alludes to a prior relationship between Bishop and himself.

Fitzroy escapes his cell by absorbing the energy from a rat and lets the rest of the prisoners out. Bishop and his partners go to the basement only to find all of the escapees going into a portal. The three friends decide to follow, and this leads into Uncanny X-Men #282-283.

When Bishop wakes up from his flashback, he is in the X-Men’s medical facility, and he accepts that they really are the X-Men. Professor X asks to be left alone with Bishop, where he presumably learns everything about Bishop’s future. Out in the hall, the Gold Team questions whether or not they should trust Bishop. Professor X calls them all back in and announces that Bishop is the newest X-Man.

How It Was: Quite good, to put it succinctly. The flashback scenes for Bishop go a long way towards defining him as more than just the mutant Punisher, and the deaths of Malcolm and Randall, although completely expected, still lend Bishop a little pathos.

Of course, the best tidbit is the scene in the abandoned war room that starts off the X-traitor subplot. It’s a genuinely surprising and creepy scene with the stuttering video, and who could forget the gravity of the statement, “Professor Xavier was the first to die.” Of course, like most plots, the X-office stretched it out for too many years before resolving it in a completely unsatisfying way. But it was very cool at the time.

John Romita Jr. is up at pencils, and he draws a spectacularly energetic gun battle between all of the time travelers. Unfortunately, the scene does have one awkward hiccup when a bad guy forgets Bishop’s power because the writer needs to remind the reader what he does. Also, it’s a little unclear what causes the explosion that takes out Bishop’s partners, and some of the scenes in the future look more like they take place in space. But these are minor complaints for what is a really, really great issue.

A

Uncanny X-Men #286

Uncanny X-Men #286
Writing: Whilce Portacio, Jim Lee, and Scott Lobdell
Art: Whilce Portacio, Jim Lee, and Art Thibert

What Went Down: Colossus is reunited with his brother Mikhail, and it is revealed that Mikhail is the actual savior from the prophecy. All of the rebels decide that they now have two saviors on their side. Mikhail has the power to stop the portal from destroying both worlds, but he refuses to.

We learn the tragic origin of Mikhail. As a Russian cosmonaut, he was forced to fake his death when the government found out he was a mutant. Mikhail and a group of scientists were sent into the void and crashed. When he awoke, he found that he was recuperating in the palace with the former Avatar, or king, and his daughter Tra-Mai-A-Zath. Mikhail and the king’s daughter were married, but when he returned to the wreckage of his vehicle, Mikhail learned that the king had killed the rest of his crew.

Mikhail then joined the resistance, who are pro-democracy. It turns out that the portal was responsible for the Avatar’s powers, so Mikhail tried to close it with his own mutant abilities. The end result killed everyone on both sides and made him very sad.

Elsewhere, Iceman freezes a bunch of goons who were hassling the local women; he and Sunfire learn the location of the rebel base from one of the women.

On Earth, multiple portals are popping up, and everyone is powerless to stop them. Reed Richards, Hank Pym, and Nick Fury make cameos so that the reader knows this is quite serious.

Colossus and Mikhail argue over what should be done. Mikhail walks away rather than risk everybody’s lives.

Over at the Triumvirate, Archangel is training with some soldiers of the Posse Comitatus, when he accidentally kills them all. It is revealed that Sha-Har-A-Zath, the current avatar, has the ability to control his will through touch. She’s also very bitter that Mikhail killed her parents and sister.

The mind controlled Archangel leads the Posse Comitatus into battle against the rebels. A huge fight ensues with Storm, Jean, and Colossus coming to aid the rebels. Archangel attacks Jean, but is stopped by the arrival of Iceman and Sunfire. For some reason, being shot by Sunfire’s heat blasts also cures Warren of his mind control.

Colossus is injured blocking a laser blast for his friends, which causes Mikhail to pull out two swords and fight. Sha-Har-A-Zath reveals that she is also a mutant, attacks Rasputin with some kind of pink laser, and then gets sucked into the void. Mikhail decides to use his powers, but with the assistance of the other X-Men, he is able to prevent the body count of his first attempt.

The X-Men make it back to the other side, with Mikhail in tow. Colossus has to give his brother CPR, but he makes it and learns about their sister. Awww, a happy ending.

How It Was: This is the Whilce Portacio’s last issue on art; he would later go on to help co-found Image comics with Jim Lee, Todd McFarlene, and a number of other influential artists of the time, leaving the X-offices, and Marvel Comics in general, totally screwed.

This is slightly better than the past two issues, as it isn’t all just set up, and events actually occur. While Mikhail Rasputin’s reappearance isn’t a huge deal in the long run, it does make for some great scenes with his brother. The part where Colossus confronts Mikhail and accuses him of abandoning his duty is really well done; it gets the right mix of Peter’s feelings of betrayal and anger as he calls Mikhail a coward not just for refusing to help the alternate dimension people, but also for running away from his life on the farm to become an astronaut.

The fight at the end is also pretty good; however, the supposed main villain of the story Sha-Har-A-Zath gets dispatched in one panel by the void instead of an actual character (and may I never have to write that name again). The whole story ends rather abruptly, and the reader never gets to see the impact of the rebels’ battle other than Jean swearing that they didn’t die. The end also suffers from the X-Men having to use their powers in ways that blatantly defy science; how can Sunfire’s power open a window between dimensions?

While everything comes off as rushed, from the ending to Mikhail’s origin, I still think it was a good idea to end the story and get the X-Men out of that dimension. It just didn’t work; the other dimensional people weren’t very interesting because they weren’t all that different from normal, everyday people. Other than having purple hair and advanced weapons, nothing makes them stand out. The Primate character who keeps following our heroes is a wasted opportunity to introduce the ideas and behaviors that could have defined these people and made the reader care about their all too cliché battle. Also, their dimension needed a name like Polemachus or Asgard; no creator is ever going to write another story about the unnamed dimension of the purple-haired people.

C

Uncanny X-Men #285

Uncanny X-Men #285
Writing: Whilce Portacio, Jim Lee, and John Byrne
Art: Whilce Portacio, Art Thibert, and Al Milgrom

Note: The price goes up twenty-five cents this issue. Stupid inflation.

What Went Down: Colossus, Jean Grey, and the rebel leader Primate fall out of the other side of the portal into some fantasy world. They notice that the rest of the X-Men are nowhere to be seen, and then they are attacked by a group of rebels who think that they killed the Primate. Jean and Colossus are both defeated, but the rebels surrender when they see Peter unarmored and mistake him for some kind of savior.

Meanwhile, Storm is dying in a desert. This is odd because normally the weather doesn’t affect her, but since she is in a different dimension she gets to feel the full effect. A stranger rescues her and takes her back to his house. He feeds Storm and asks how she found herself in a desert alone. When she brings up the portal, the stranger freaks out

Archangel stumbles upon a group of rebels fighting against the forces of the established government, which we later learn is called the Triumvirate. In a daze, Warren kills all of the rebels, and when he wakes up he is proclaimed a hero even though he has no idea what happened. This is an ongoing subplot from X-Factor where Archangel’s wings would control him and cause him to slip into rages because they were created by Apocalypse.

And finally we find Iceman and Sunfire in a bar after having fallen through a hole in the roof. When the bartender and his patrons show justifiable anger at having their property vandalized, the two mutants beat them all up and leave.

Back in the desert, Storm and the stranger are getting ready to ride giant lizards to the location of the portal, so they can stop it from destroying both worlds. Storm is pretty sure the X-Men will fix the problem, as should be the reader by this point.

Colossus and Jean are being lead back to the rebels’ base and trying to fit in with the group as best they can.

Iceman and Sunfire walk away from the bar, which is completely destroyed in background. Sunfire takes the time to backhandedly apologize to Iceman for attacking the X-Men during his first appearance. Since it happened almost thirty years (in real time) before this issue, Iceman isn’t too concerned. The pair hear about a steel warrior and go off to find their teammate.

Archangel meets the leader, known as the Avatar, of the Triumvirate; her name is Sha-Har-A-Zath, and she makes Warren a Lord Protector in her army.

Back at the rebel base, Jean and Primate are discussing the prophecy that Colossus is meant to fulfill. Jean finds him in a room with a harem of women, at which point he starts acting embarrassed and bashful. Storm and the stranger show up at the exact same time, and the stranger reveals himself as Mikhail Rasputin, Peter’s brother who was supposed to have died.

Back in the real world, the police are investigating the bodies of more mutants that Bishop and his team have killed. Witnesses have mistaken the XSE officers for the X-Men because of the black Xs on their uniforms, and Trish Tilby is doing a report on possible mutant gang warfare. Bishop again ends an issue with a vow—this time that his past will never come to be.

How It Was: On the plus side, all of the X-Men get their own individual plot lines in this story, so some of the characters finally get some room to breathe and let their personalities show a little. Archangel’s subplot is at the same time the best and the worst. On the one hand it deals with the internal darkness he’s been struggling against since his transformation, and the fact that he might be finally losing control is rather intriguing indeed. On the other hand, his plot deals with the monarchy of this dimension, and I get bored just writing Sha-Har-A-Zath and Posse Comitatus, let alone reading about them.

As for the other character beats, they’re okay. Storm’s plot at least has the mysterious stranger’s identity to keep readers invested, although the reveal that he is Colossus’s brother makes for a hell of a coincidence. Colossus and Jean’s arc has the mystery of the prophecy, but it’s never really resolved completely and comes off a little contrived in the end. Iceman and Sunfire’s journey is completely unnecessary, and the question of why Sunfire is even in this story is still a very pertinent one.

Above all else, the world is just really boring and not fleshed out at all. The only things the reader really learns about the culture are that there is a monarchy, some of the people don’t want a monarchy, and the people say “by the mother and son” a lot. It’s about as interesting as it sounds.

The Bishop plot continues and it seems like there may be serious ramifications for the rest of the X-Men. There aren’t, and the fact that a bunch of civilians think they saw the X-Men gun down other mutants in the middle of a club gets quietly forgotten. Oh well.

C-

Uncanny X-Men #284

Uncanny X-Men #284
Writing: Whilce Portacio and John Byrne
Art: Whilce Portacio

What Went Down: Sunfire, the Japanese fire wielder, receives a new costume. He’s out with a team of Japanese and Russian scientists exploring a mysterious portal on the Sakhalin Islands. The team tells Sunfire to use his powers on it, at which point something in the void attacks Sunfire.

As for the Gold Team, they are still on the Blackbird returning from the previous story arc. Colossus has broken his nose, and everyone wants to know how Jean stuck her mind in Emma Frost’s body. Jean has no idea. Jean and the Professor attempt to scan the White Queen’s mind when Forge interrupts them with an emergency alert from Sunfire’s science team.

Back on the island, Sunfire’s new armor isn’t doing much, as the attackers are immune to his powers. Just as they are about to finish him off, the X-Men appear to save the day. Jean notes that the attackers’ minds are very alien, even though they are all speaking perfect English.

During the fight, Forge launches some missiles from the Blackbird; he claims that they are only concussion missiles and will only give the attackers a bad headache. The invaders fire on the missiles, which explode and appear to do a lot more damage than just a headache. One of the soldier’s costumes is damaged and causes a huge explosion, revealing the leader of the group is a young woman in armor.

The girl, named Primate because it is some sort of military rank, says that they were actually trying to protect the Earth from the void, not invade it. The explosion opens the void and sucks all of the X-Men, Sunfire, and Primate into it. Xavier and Forge notice that the vortex continues to expand, even after the X-Men disappear.

Over in North America somewhere, Bishop and his assistants, Malcolm and Randall, are busy tracking escaped criminals from the future. They find three who have butchered some local women, and the XSE officers proceed to kill the bad guys. After finding the dead women, Bishop vows to save humanity from these villains.

How It Was: Well this is the beginning of a pretty inconsequential, and kind of boring, three issue arc. Basically the X-Men get sent to a fantasy world that they will never see again, and it’s not a very dynamic or original one at that. Still, that doesn’t happen until next issue, so I can’t really judge this issue on those merits.

It’s nice to see Sunfire again, although his new costume is really generic looking and he contributes absolutely nothing to the overall plot. This issue he gets completely beaten and then he acts like a jerk to Colossus, and in the next two issues he acts like a jerk to Iceman, and that is all he does for the whole story. Why is he here? I couldn’t tell you.

Also, the X-Men spend a lot of time going over what happened in the last story. This isn’t a bad idea in principle, since there are a lot of unanswered questions about Bishop, Fitzroy, and Jean’s powers that need to be explored, but nothing new is learned after three pages of discussion. The X-Men just get sidetracked and never bring up this quirk with Jean’s powers again.

As for the unnamed bad guys, they do have a very cool design and look awesome, but they aren’t really that interesting. One of them is called Primate for crying out loud. And the reveal that they were actually trying to protect the people of Earth doesn’t really work since the narration before made it pretty clear that the bad guys killed all of the innocent scientists. The Bishop subplot is okay; it’s nice to see he wasn’t forgotten.

The art is par for Portacio; some great characters and action scenes with most panels lacking any background art. For some reason the island Sunfire and his team are on has a blue ground with blue mountains and green water in the background; it is a very odd choice. Plus, some of Storm’s facial expressions during the issue can only be described as awkward—just check out the bottom of page 17.

D

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