Writing: Scott
Lobdell
Art: Carlos
Pacheco
What Went Down: Jean Grey wakes up to find herself confronted
by the Heroes Reborn version of Iron Man.
Since Iron Man died during Onslaught, and the X-Men don’t exist in the
Heroes Reborn universe, they both assume that the other person is an enemy and
fight for two pages before Jean disappears.
In the mountains we see a couple backpacking for their honeymoon when
they are passed overhead by the X-Men’s plane—pursued by Bastion’s forces.
Jean wakes up, but she doesn’t have time to share her
experience with Iron Man because a hole has been blown in the plane. Cannonball decides to jump out and cover the
X-Men’s escape.
At a bar in Canton, Ohio, a group of civilians watch on
the news as Henry Peter Gyrich announces that the X-Men are known terrorists,
and the government has enacted Operation Zero Tolerance—a program to arrest all
mutants and stop the potential threat they represent. Most of the patrons cheer, except for an
elderly Japanese couple that remembers the Japanese internment camps in America
during World War II.
In the air above Colorado, Cannonball is attacked by a
new kind of Sentinel. These are Prime
Sentinels, and since they are newer, by comic book logic they are also
deadlier. At the Xavier Institute police
surround the school while Bastion’s forces invade it. Cyclops gets knocked out of the plane by a
blast from the Sentinels, and he is captured.
At a hospital in the Bronx, a group of doctors and nurses
watch the news coverage of Operation Zero Tolerance. When Doctor, and secret mutant, Cecilia Reyes
is asked her opinion, she unenthusiastically replies that it is about time.
Meanwhile Cannonball and Storm are captured, leaving Jean
and Wolverine alone in the plane that is crashing. The plane crashes, but we don’t see if they
survive. At his father’s home, Iceman
watches these events with his dad, and tells him that he needs to help his
friends. Bastion projects a holographic
message to Xavier, showing him that OZT has invaded the mansion and found
Cerebro. Even though the files are
encrypted, it is only a matter of time before files will be opened.
How It Was: Operation Zero Tolerance jumps out the gate
with a huge development for our heroes—all mutants are now outlaws. The X-Men get taken in within one issue,
while their home is invaded, making things seem pretty bleak. It’s hard to express just how well this issue
reads compared to the previous year’s worth of stories; it’s like comparing
Watchman to anything by Rob Liefeld.
There is finally an actual threat, and the X-Men are caught offguard,
and challenged in this story. These may
sound like simple narrative tenants to follow, but it’s been many, many issues
since we’ve seen anything resembling a decent obstacle to the X-Men’s
safety. The outlaw status for all
mutants is an exciting angle, and it’s a shame it’s potential isn’t explored
more.
The fight with the Sentinels is adequately done, although
it’s a shame parts of it are delivered solely through exposition so everything
can be fit in one issue. It’s
unnecessary to be skipping parts of the fight when the first five pages are so
superfluous; we get three pages of Jean meeting Heroes Reborn Iron Man for God
knows what reason, followed by two pages of background characters observing the
fight from the ground. An odd use of
space to say the least, but Pacheco’s art is really great. Normally I really hate the “newsfeed as
exposition” in comics, but it is a small price to pay to get everything set up
in one issue.
What really makes this issue worth the read is the end
with Bastion storming the mansion. Seeing the defeat and helplessness in
Xavier’s face says more than any army of Sentinels ever could, and the fact
that Bastion could possibly use his files plus Cerebro really raises the
stakes.
There are some hints that this story hasn’t been
completely thought out. Henry Gyrich
shows up on the news to deliver all the exposition about the government plan,
but it’s unclear what his role is. He
seems adamant about Zero Tolerance in this book, but later we see him plotting
with Senator Kelly to foil Bastion.
There’s not a lot of room for character, but Jean and
Logan get some nice moments. This issue
does its duty of setting up the event and making it look like an epic. The odds are finally against them and that’s
usually when the X-Men are at their best.
While the cliffhangers elicits the right amount of dread, we’ll have to
wait a bit to it resolved, due to the next month being Flashback month! Still a promising, and maybe misleading,
start.
B+
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