Writing: Scott Lobdell
Art: Joe Madureira
What Went Down: Through narration boxes, the Beast explains that the X-Men have been in space for about a week, and Deathbird has been in a coma within one of the ship’s med-stations. Deathbird wakes up while Beast and Bishop are discussing her survival. Bishop accuses her of somehow being responsible for her ship’s massacre, which earns him a slap from the villain. Gambit and Joseph show up after their search for more survivors. Deathbird steals Bishop’s gun and shoots Joseph and Gambit… only they were actually members of the Phalanx disguised as the X-Men. Bishop helps finish them off, and Deathbird explains that humans have a specific smell that Shi’ar can detect.
Below in the ship, Gambit and Joseph have been taken captive by the new and improved black Phalanx, in case you couldn’t tell from the cover. Rogue attacks the group, but she is slowly overwhelmed. Just as she is about to be absorbed by the Phalanx, she proclaims her love for Gambit. Gambit is behind her, rescues her, and blows up the remaining Phalanx. While Rogue was being assimilated, she caught a glimpse of Chandilar, homeworld of the Shi’ar; she also learned the Phalanx’s plot, which includes taking over Earth.
Speaking of Earth, Bastion is continuing his preparations for Operation: Zero Tolerance. We see that he has recently captured Jubilee in Generation X #25 and plans on interrogating/torturing her.
Meanwhile, the X-Men plan to get on Chandilar by tricking the Phalanx into attacking their ship and blowing it up while they float to a mining planet in an escape pod among the debris. Deathbird is quite rude to Bishop, threatening his life as he secures her in the pod. After the Phalanx blow up the ship, Joseph navigates the pod through the metal that Beast welded to the alien vehicle. The mining planet turns out to be one of Deathbird’s old bases. Many of the X-Men voice their suspicions about Deathbird’s loyalties as they all get on a transporter to save Chandilar and the Shi’ar.
How It Was: This is a definite step back up storywise, although not quite to the heights of #341. The story does have some great moments; the revelation of the Phalanx as X-Men imposters works rather well, despite the fact that it is ruined on the cover. And I have to say that I genuinely like the Deathbird/Bishop relationship, even if it is only in its beginning stages here. It’s a nice idea to have Bishop find a kindred spirit in a hardened warrior with a harsher code of ethics than the X-Men are used to, just as he was when he started on the team. Rogue’s fight with the Phalanx is also particularly brutal; it’s impressive to see her tearing off limbs and fighting all out, even if her proclamation of love feels a little forced.
Where the issue fails is that in spite of their shiny black makeover, the Phalanx are still as dull as they were the last time they appeared in this title. And after the very first sequence, they abandon any of the shapeshifting subterfuge for the dull assimilation and compensation of powers. Having the villains able to negate mutant powers seems unnecessary since they already outnumber the heroes by quite a bit. It also never made sense how the aliens had the ability to stop powers, but not absorb them.
Joe Mad is drawing some very impressive spaceships, stellar bodies, and space debris. The art is really the highlight, despite the stupid costume designs. Even with the art, this is still just a slow middle chapter with not much for the characters to do. While very cool looking, the villains just aren’t compelling at all, and the threat just doesn’t seem big enough.
C
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