X-Force #55

X-Force #55
Writing: Jeph Loeb
Art: Adam Pollina

What Went Down: We open on Shatterstar holding Meltdown, formerly Boom Boom, right above one of the SHIELD Hellicarrier’s engines. She throws a time-bomb in and counts it down. On the bridge, Dum-Dum Dugan is in charge; G.W. Bridge is currently running SHIELD because I believe Nick Fury died over in the Hulk series. Anyway, alarms start going off and Dugan starts yelling at people. A shadowy figure tells Dugan that he’ll take care of it and that mutants fall under his jurisdiction. Contessa Valentina shows up to tell Dugan not to freak out.

In other parts of the Hellicarrier, different squads of X-Force members break in. Cable is teamed with Caliban, who is tasked with locating a particular mutant. Cable brings up some recent X-Force events while they walk. Domino and Siryn discover a load of invisible lasers, but Dom is able to use her luck powers to avoid them while shooting out all the weapons emplacements.

Meltdown and Shatterstar are attacked by some SHIELD troops, but Meltdown discovers they’re all LMDs, so they can use lethal force on the robots. After defeating them, Tabitha searches the ship’s databases and discovers that Sabretooth is still alive, but his location is classified. She blows up the computer because she is still angry about Sabretooth’s betrayal of her sympathies.

Back on the bridge, Dum-Dum yells at his people some more. As X-Force makes their way through the ship, they tear out a variety of systems. Caliban leads Cable to a big round door, saying they’re objective is behind it. Cable contacts the rest of the team to meet them there, and they proceed to combine they’re powers to open the door. Inside, they find Cyclops strapped to a machine. Also, SHIELD has surrounded X-Force while they were opening the door.

G.W. Bridge appears to tell X-Force that Cyclops is a prisoner of the U.S. government. The team pretends to surrender, but Cable uses his powers to free Cyclops of his headpiece allowing him to take out all the SHIELD soldiers with his optic blasts. Bridge is the only one left standing, so Cable punches him out. The team escapes, and Jean Grey picks them all up in a jet. She shares a kiss with Cyclops afterwards.

In an epilogue, Warpath is enjoying a relaxing beach vacation with Risque after disappearing during a battle in a previous issue. The cliffhanger is that he doesn’t know if he wants to leave Risque to rejoin the team.

How It Was: Well, this feels like an unnecessary detour. Granted, it’s not taking up an X-Men issue, but it’s still hard to see why any of this was necessary. We never get to find out why the Friends of Humanity turn Cyclops over to SHIELD or what Kelly’s huge secret was. I also can’t picture X-Force fans being thrilled about having all the book’s plot lines derailed for a meaningless crossover with Uncanny X-Men.

Still, parts of this story still work as a kind of big, dumb heist caper. It’s nice to see the members of X-Force working together to infiltrate the ship so effectively, and there’s some decent action and interactions. Since I’m primarily an X-Men fan, it’s nice to see Meltdown following up on Sabretooth since that’s one of the few character arcs I’m familiar with. Almost everyone clearly has one or two subplots they’re going through, which is nice, but I get the distinct feeling that none of them are furthered with this issue. Also, I don’t like how Domino’s power becomes a plot device to easily overcome any obstacle.

The main problems come from the fact that the whole issue is dedicated to solely rescuing Cyclops and the incompetent portrayal of SHIELD. Yes there is some alluding to factional infighting within the organization, but SHIELD still comes off as being run by a bunch of idiots, which is usually the case when they’re in any book other than they’re own. All Dum-Dum Dugan does is yell for the whole issue, and as far as being worthless goes, the same goes for G.W. Bridge. It’s exciting to see that Bastion might get involved, but then he disappears after the beginning of the book and nothing comes of his telling off Dugan at all.

This is not really where the story in Uncanny #333 needed to go. It feels like a needless distraction for X-Force, and it’s hard to get excited about SHIELD in the 90s without Nick Fury. This feels like a competent team book, but it turns out to be nothing special, which is a shame since this was a golden opportunity to gain more readers. You can almost feel how hard this series wants to be X-Men with the logo at the top of the cover, or at the very least recapture its initial popularity.

C+

Uncanny X-Men #328

Uncanny X-Men #328
Writing: Scott Lobdell
Art: Joe Madureira

What Went Down: Professor X has decided that Sabretooth is a lost cause, so he and the X-Men are getting ready to turn Creed over to Valerie Cooper of X-Factor. Xavier is happy that he tried, even though we never saw it on panel. Jean shows Bishop and Cyclops that Sabretooth was faking his rehabilitation by demonstrating that the serene forest scene that he had been spending time in looked like a creepy haunted wood with dead carcasses through Sabretooth’s mental perspective. Bishop thinks they should kill Creed, but Cyclops argues that they can’t kill everyone who disagrees with their beliefs. Bishop brings up the repressed memories of the Age of Apocalypse that he has been seeing and expresses frustration that Xavier is too busy to help him. Scott and Jean reflect on their own experiences with time compression from The Adventures of Cyclops and Phoenix.

Sabretooth continues to argue with Xavier, trying to get Charles to admit he is jealous of Creed’s freedom. Val Cooper interrupts to check in. Jean and Cyclops try to comfort Xavier about his guilt for failing, but Xavier brushes them off.

Boomer from X-Force shows up in Sabretooth’s cell. She is angry that Sabretooth was faking his injuries because she felt a connection with him when she was helping to rehabilitate him. Psylocke watches silently, while conveying support that Tabitha is standing up for herself. Sabretooth manages to anger Boomer, causing her to blow up his restraints. Once free, Creed is about to kill the girl, but Psylocke intervenes and a big fight begins. Psylocke tries to end the fight with her psychic knife, but it turns out that the injury to his brain that Wolverine gave him now makes Creed immune to telepathy. So Sabretooth ends up gutting Psylocke. The other X-Men respond, but it is too late; Sabretooth has escaped.

How It Was: So despite saving the Gen X kids during the Phalanx saga, and being a hero in Age of Apocalypse, and the head wound that seemingly made him gentler, Lobdell decides to write Sabretooth back into being a villain. There’s nothing wrong with this except for the fact that it’s such an anti-climax after a plot line that has lasted for almost three years. Xavier’s change of heart feels very sudden, and although there are legitimate reasons for turning Creed over, it’s hard not to feel like Xavier is just giving up since we never actually saw him try to help the villain. I guess you could write it off as foreshadowing of some kind for Onslaught.

It’s also surprising to see that X-Force is still living at the mansion, but this goes on for many more months. I like the interaction between Boomer and Sabretooth, although the point he gets her to overreact on seems to be Cannonball learning about her past as a villain, which he is already aware of. Psylocke gets some nice moments to shine, since she hasn’t had anything to do in about half a year.

Sorry to say, but the art really lets this issue down, as it is definitely not Joe Mad’s best work. Sabretooth is drawn with ridiculous proportions this issue; I’m talking like Strong Guy from X-Factor proportions. He looks like he has an absurd amount of muscles this issue. Also, the main dramatic crux of the issue, Psylocke getting mortally wounded, doesn’t have the impact it could’ve since Psylocke is essentially drawn with her eyes closed. This isn’t really the artist’s fault so much as the Comics Code Authority of the time, but it still reduces the effectiveness of what should be a fairly shocking event; the artist just isn’t allowed to properly show what happened to her.

This is actually an okay set up to a couple of stories that are not so great. While I admire Lobdell for trying to put some of the focus back on Psylocke, the results of the upcoming story end up complicating her even more while delivering a mediocre story. Still I guess this issue does have some unexpected moments, at least if you can manage to ignore the cover.

B-