Writing: Joe Kelly
Art: Carlos Pacheco
What Went Down:
In the attic of the mansion, Storm is shown pruning a plant while Marrow
discusses the finer points of darkness and control. Wolverine explains to her that he wants to
help her, but he won’t take any of her crap.
The two decide to battle it out.
In Jerusalem, Israeli ambassador, and former Xavier love
interest, Gabrielle Haller is composing a letter to Senator Kelly to convince
him to have Charles released. Side note:
she was also the mother of Xavier’s son Legion.
She is about to go to bed when she is visited by Israeli super mutant
Sabra, who is on a quest to find Magneto.
Back at the mansion, Cannonball debates going down into the
basement to try to befriend Marrow.
Storm tells him not to, claiming Marrow is a terrorist and attempted murderer,
and she is undeserving of his compassion.
Cannonball gets angry and leaves. On the roof, Beast and Joseph are
plugging the hole Cannonball made from issue #70, but Cannonball bursts through
again. Below, Cecilia Reyes is feeling
sorry for herself after losing her job in Uncanny #351. Maggott joins her and tries to make her feel
better, but fails.
In the basement, Wolverine holds the upper hand in the
fight. Marrow explains that her people
were made to suffer for being different, but Wolverine explains about the
Morlocks’ strength and dignity. Back in
Jerusalem, Sabra explains to Gabrielle Haller that she is looking for Georg
Odekirk, a forger who was responsible for creating the identity of Erik
Lensherr. She is trying to discover
Magneto’s true identity because…well we never really find out.
Back at the mansion grounds, Joseph observes Maggott and
Cecilia. He thinks back to their first
meeting and remembers that Maggott recognized him as Magneto. In the sky, Cannonball realizes that he has
to stand up to Storm for what he thinks is right.
In Romania, Georg Odekirk is visited by the real Magneto,
who chastises him for betraying Magneto through his poor work. Back at the brawl, Marrow discovers she can
control the growth of her bones and makes her fingers grow into claws. Wolverine takes her down and offers to help
her become a hero. She grasps his hand
to get up, but then stabs him in the throat with a bone shard.
In Romania, Magneto kills Odekirk to preserve his
secrets. Sabra and Haller break in the
door, but they are too late. Magneto is
gone and the forger is dead. Meanwhile,
Wolverine has gone into a berserker rage and is about to kill Marrow when
Cannonball flies in and knocks him out.
Marrow runs away, and Sam chastises Storm for arranging this
confrontation between Wolverine and a child.
Cannonball ignores Storm’s protests.
Marrow runs back to the sewers to visit the recuperating Calisto (see
Uncanny #346). Marrow lies about her
experiences at the school.
We end on a scene featuring two cops discovering the
murdered bum from last issue. From their
description, it looks like an animal tore him apart, and the trail stretches to
the grounds of the Xavier Institute.
How It Was:
Ahhh, Joe Kelly’s characterization.
It’s just magical. The battle
between Marrow and Wolverine, both physically and verbally, is just
magnificent. We have Wolverine as the
guy who’s seen everything telling Marrow how it is because he’s lived it, and
we have Marrow who’s so damaged from being denied basic human rights all her
life and so full of anger. It’s great
how Marrow points out the hypocrisy of Wolverine and Storm, and yet it never
feels out of character for the heroes since Marrow presents herself as such a
wild and unstable individual. And the
end where Kelly reverses your expectations and has Marrow stab Wolverine in the
neck is just great. There is some great
humor and drama as this whole scene plays out.
Cannonball’s scenes aren’t quite as interesting, mostly
because he’s whining through most of them, but I like that Kelly is subtlely
shifting his function on the team. When
he first joined he was cast as a nervous novice out of his depths, which was
completely wrong. Now he’s being put at
odds with Storm, a clashing of the generations, and that’s a lot more
satisfying. The scene where Cannonball
calls Storm out on her crap at the end is one of the best scenes he’s had since
joining the team, even if the journey to that point is kind of slow and boring.
Like last issue, while the interactions with the characters
are solid, the stuff with the villains is just not as enticing. Again, it’s due mostly to the fact that this
thread gets dropped and never seen again.
Instead of Shaw’s weird golden idol, now we’re setting up a Magneto
story that goes nowhere. This is a
really odd one though. There is no real
reason for Sabra to be working with Gabrielle Haller, and while it’s an
interesting choice to reveal the Erik Lensherr identity as a hoax, there is no
reason given for why Sabra wants to find Magneto’s identity so badly. After #73, this all goes away, so it’s not
too important. As for the other Magneto,
it feels pretty off that Joseph would wait to gain life-altering news because
he’s afraid of bothering Maggott. Also,
the fact that Magneto’s real name isn’t Erik is forgotten for a while, but then
oddly brought back by Greg Pak in the awesome Magneto Testament.
Carlos Pacheco draws a pretty awesome fight, and unlike
comics today, he had to work within the Comics Code, so he couldn’t just float by on gratuitous violence. The expressions really make the fight;
Wolverine remains calm until the end while Marrow’s variety of expression tell
the story of her own personal battle as she fights Wolverine. Even with the dead end Magneto plotline, this
is still really great reading.
A
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