Writing: Scott Lobdell and Ben Raab
Art: Carlos Pacheco
What Went Down: The Kingpin announces that the heroes have come a long way to die. Wolverine wants to attack, but Jean holds him back. Kingpin reveals that he has Cannonball hooked up to a machine that will inject him in the heart with the experimental cure, potentially killing him. In the docking bay, Sebastian Shaw kills two guards and enters Fujikawa.
Back in the upper levels, Jean wraps Sam in a telekinetic bubble to prevent the needles from going in. Kingpin releases Cannonball after threatening the X-Men. Kingpin then recaps his defeat by Daredevil, brings up Shang-Chi’s father again, and mentions that he is not interested in immortality. He knows the price people will pay for a drop of the fluid.
Back in America, in the base of Operation: Zero Tolerance, Jubilee is contemplating her fate as Bastion continues to try to convince her that he has defeated the X-Men. Bastion tells her that all she can do is pray.
Cyclops telepathically conferences with the X-Men; they conclude that the Kingpin will destroy the serum before giving it up. Shaw and an army of ninjas show up to escalate the situation. Just when the final battle is about to begin, Storm decides that they can’t have a battle without taking casualties, so she destroys all of the Elixir Vitae with her powers. Immediately after this, she regrets her decision. The X-Men leave and Shang-Chi announces that the X-Men will cure Legacy on their own terms.
On the plane home, Cannonball contemplates an aphorism Shang-Chi told him. The X-Men explain it to him, and he acts mystified. Storm feels sorry for herself for destroying a potential cure, but the forces of Operation Zero Tolerance attacking their plane interrupt her.
How It Was: After the endings of the Storm/Candra story and the Phalanx Space story in Uncanny, were you expecting an ending here that was climactic and satisfying? Because if you were, then you are pretty bad at identifying patterns. This issue features a lot of the same from the last two issues: more mentions of Shang Chi’s father, more speculation over the healing properties of the Elixir Vitae, and more discussion of the Legacy Virus. It’s a very slow build, but you think it’ll be worth it for the end battle, but then it never comes.
This wouldn’t be so bad if Lobdell, or maybe Raab, had properly set up the need for Storm to take matters into her own hands. Unfortunately the threat just isn’t there. Wolverine and Shang-Chi handled the ninjas by themselves in the first issue, the Kingpin’s traps are easily avoided with the X-Men’s powers, and the Kingpin himself isn’t a threat to any of them. He may work as a menacing Spider-Man or Daredevil villain, but all his threats come off as empty to heroes who can control the weather or shoot force blasts that can level mountains. Storm’s actions come off as completely unnecessary, all the more so when she chastises herself for doing it a panel later. It’s an unearned moment that is supposed to be powerful, but isn’t; it just doesn’t work. Plus, couldn’t the Kingpin just make more? Why would he have his only source of the formula in the same room with a handful of incredibly powerful mutants?
Once again Shang-Chi has literally nothing to do for the entire issue; it makes you wonder why the heck he was even in this story. No amount of meaningfully analytic thought bubbles can hide the fact that this guest star has no purpose. This feels a lot like it might have been an abandoned story idea for Shang-Chi by himself. Without the X-Men, the Kingpin would’ve been a suitable threat and the choice would’ve had more weight to it. Also it drives me crazy that Cannonball can’t understand a simple proverb from Shang-Chi and needs it explained; just because a character is young and from the South, it doesn’t mean they have to be dense! The most successful Rogue stories have been ones that treat her as intelligent, and the same goes with Cannonball.
This story had some promise, but it squandered it all by not wanting to commit or further any storylines. The art is nice, but unfortunately most of it is of people standing around and threatening each other. There just isn’t enough of a threat to the heroes for this story to be compelling whatsoever.
D
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