X-Men #13

X-Men #13
Writing: Fabian Nicieza
Art: Art Thibert

What Went Down: Yes, once again there is an allusion on the cover to Ryking’s name being Hazard, and once again nobody calls him that.

Ryking shares a bunch of childhood memories with Charles and then rants a lot. He alludes that the murder of Charles’ father at the hands of Kurt Marko might have gone farther, but nothing ever comes of this. He shows the professor a bunch of file cabinets and papers, and then he reveals a secret staircase that leads to an underground section of the plant, even though the stairs are drawn going up, not down.

The X-Men arrive and split up. Rogue tries to get Wolverine to open up about his past, but he isn’t having it. Also, Cyclops is wearing a telephone operator’s headset for some reason. Wolverine and Rogue find the stairway leading underground; they say they’re going “down there” except once again the staircase is still drawn to go up.

When Cyclops’ team gets to the bottom floor, they find Rogue and Wolverine already captured by Carter.

Back at the mansion, Cannonball calls for some reason. Jubilee asks if he wants to leave a message, but he doesn’t. This might have something to do with Cable missing before the X-Cutioner’s Song story that goes on in next issue, but I have no idea.

In Istanbul, former X-Factor sidekicks and New Mutants Rusty and Skids are working for the villain Stryfe because they’ve been brainwashed. They offer Stryfe a tapestry that depicts Apocalypse, since both villains play an important part in the crossover.

The X-Men fight Ryking until Cyclops blasts the taser mechanisms on his armor. Apparently Carter needed those to channel his power, so he explodes. Xavier uses his powers to save Carter somehow, and despite the entire factory being leveled, not to mention that the X-Men were on the underground floor, they crawl out of the rubble with no serious injuries.

Wolverine threatens Carter because he wants the villain to talk, but Xavier explains that Carter didn’t really know anything. As the X-Men walk away, a sheet with the words Shiva Scenario, as well as Brian Xavier, Kurt Marko, and Alexander Ryking’s names on it blows past.

How It Was: What a freaking tease! In case you missed my comments on last issue, this ends the saga of Almagordo/Xavier’s father for a very long time. Mike Carey picks up the plot thread in X-Men Legacy #213 in 2008, when this issue was written in 1992! You do the math. So not only does Carter waste Xavier’s time by not revealing any actual information, he wastes our time as well.

It’s an okay fight scene and the art is pretty good, but there are some really sloppy mistakes. Please see the aforementioned underground stairway that always leads up for some reason. Also, Beast’s proportions switch around an awful lot, even from panel to panel on the same page, and for some reason Rogue’s arm isn’t colored on one page. All that being said, it’s still a pretty good effort considering this was probably a rush job. After all, Jim Lee and Whilce Portacio were basically running the X-Men, and when they left for Image, Marvel probably had a cow trying to replace them.

Once again, it’s a pretty mediocre issue that probably would have been better if the plot had gone somewhere. The fact that Carter convinces the audience that he has important secrets and then delivers jack just really grinds my gears.

D

X-Men #12

X-Men #12
Writing: Fabian Nicieza
Art: Art Thibert

What Went Down: This issue opens at the Ryking Hospital…please note that Ryking was the name of the guy Maverick killed in the back up story to issues 9-10. Inside the doctors are trying to subdue a mutant patient named Ryking…please note that Ryking was the name of the guy Maverick killed in the back up story to issues 9-10. This Ryking, however, is the son of the man from that story. Anyway, the doctors shoot him full of drugs and tasers to stop him from seizing and shooting energy everywhere. The episode was caused by a story on CNN about his father being killed.

Over at the mansion, Rogue is having a swim, and Gambit is flirting with her…what a twist. Also the Beast is driving Psylocke to the airport so she can guest star in Excalibur next month with her brother Captain Britain. Cyclops watches Psylocke leave through a window, and then he melodramatically flings a picture of his girlfriend Jean on the ground because he is so tortured over his attraction to Betsy.

Then Scott joins the Professor in the Danger Room where he is busy training Jubilee. Jubilee dislikes the Danger Room because she doesn’t want to be hurt, and she hates fighting ugly villains like the Blob and Sauron.

Wolverine interrupts the session, accusing Xavier of lying to him. Apparently Wolverine believes that Xavier’s investigation into his father’s past somehow connects to his own past, although it is quite unclear how. Later Wolverine realizes that there is no connection and apologizes.

Back at the hospital, Carter Ryking escapes and kills a lot of people; his power involves shooting energy through the taser lines that have somehow fused to his body or something.

Xavier and Logan discuss the file on Xavier’s father; Charles has no idea where it came from, and then coincidentally the CNN story on Ryking’s death appears. Charles and Carter were childhood friends and their fathers worked together.

Charles attends the funeral, and he is reminded of his own father’s funeral when he was younger. In the middle of his flashback, Carter contacts the Professor telepathically, and then he attacks the funeral and kills some cops. Also he found some battle armor somewhere. Carter is convinced that their parents had lots of secrets, and he wants Charles to come with him to find out what they were. Charles agrees in order to prevent more deaths.

Val Cooper calls the X-Men to brief them on what happened. She offers to have X-Factor take care of it, but the X-Men want first crack at Carter…because it’s personal. They find out that they are going to the Almagordo Nuclear Plant—the place where Xavier’s father worked.

How It Was: The dawn of new villain Hazard, except nobody calls him Hazard except on the cover and on his trading card. So really it’s just plain Carter Ryking. He’s only remotely interesting because he says he has secrets about Xavier’s father, but as we’ll learn next issue, he doesn’t really. The creators probably had grand plans for the character that never came to fruition. This means that Carter is basically a one-shot villain who acts vaguely crazy and disturbed, and then disappears.

As for Almagordo, it became one of those pieces of X-Men canon that the writers would allude to over the years, get your hopes up that they were actually going somewhere, and then be promptly forgotten again. Mike Carey finally revealed that the factory was a front for Mr. Sinister’s research into prolonging his life in X-Men Legacy—over fifteen years after the plot line was first introduced! And we still never get an answer to why Maverick had to kill Carter’s father, or what Warhawk had to do with any of this.

Well the villain is a dud, so everyone else has to pick up the slack, but nobody is doing anything new or interesting. Cyclops’ is worried about Psylocke. Gambit is flirting with Rogue. Wolverine is bitching about his past. We’ve seen it all before, so there is nothing to get excited about. There are some okay scenes where Xavier reflects on his paralysis and his childhood, but it’s nothing groundbreaking.

Also, this is Fabian Nicieza’s first issue writing after Jim Lee jumped ship to go co-found Image Comics. So a lot of the repetition might just be Nicieza underlining the subplots he wants to focus on. Art Thibert is filling in on art; eventually regular artist Andy Kubert’ll replace him. He does some great work with the scenes outside the mansion as well as the scenes where Ryking kills people; who can resist a good flaming skeleton scene?

It’s a really slow issue that had potential, but fails to live up to it. If the Xavier stuff had panned out, this comic wouldn’t be such a disappointment.

C