Uncanny X-Men & Fantastic Four Annual '98

Uncanny X-Men & Fantastic Four Annual '98
Writing: Joe Casey
Art: Paul Pelletier and Leo Fernandez

What Went Down:  A Stark-Fujikawa scientist named Doctor Beynon has just completed his invention, a miniturizer, with his robot assistant Hadley. Taking a break, Beynon decides to go with a colleague to Reed Richards’ press conference.  Beynon holds utter contempt for Richards, but goes regardless.

At the conference, Richards shows off his newest invention, a miniturizer of his own; Richards’ version is superior because, unlike Beynon, he though it might be more convenient to be able to return items to original size afterwards.  Beynon is escorted away from the conference after trying to confront Mr. Fantastic.  Later he is accused of stealing from Richards, even though he had been working on the invention for months. Losing his job, Beynon vows revenge on Reed Richards. 

At the X-Mansion, Cecilia Reyes is bored, and Beast is trying to entertain her with a game of chess.  He invites her to go to the opera with him, although Cecilia wants him to clarify whether it is a date.  Storm watches amusedly.  Elsewhere, Wolverine is forcing Cannonball to come with him to a poker game. 

Beynon breaks into the Stark offices to recover his invention.  He also discovers some other devices that he plans to use to exact his revenge.  At Pier 4, the FF’s new base, we learn that Reed and Sue just happen to be going to the same opera as Beast and Cecilia.  Meanwhile, the Thing is forcing the Human Torch to cancel his date to play poker with him and Wolverine. 

At the Met, Cecilia feels like everyone is staring at her because she hasn’t been out in public since being outed as a mutant.  Beast insists it’s just her imagination.  At the same time, the paparazzi are overwhelming Reed and Sue.  Back stage at the opera, Beynon has stolen the device that FF villain the Psycho Man uses to control the emotions of people.  He plans to use it during the opera.  Hidden in a closet, Beynon can’t tell if the device is working, but outside the actors and audience alike start going insane, jumping to anger and depression.

At the pier, Cannonball turns out to be really good at poker, even though he insists he doesn’t play.  Hadley, programmed into a Psycho Man robot, attacks the heroes.  Mr. Fantastic triggers the emergency flare before being overwhelmed by emotions.  After taking out the robot, Cannonball and the Torch fly off, while the other two run to their vehicles.

Inside the Met, Sue Richards attacks her husband while Cecilia attacks the Beast.  Wolverine and the Thing learn that both their vehicles have been smashed, so they have to get a taxi.  While in the taxi, the Psycho Man robot reactivates and goes after them.  The Psycho Man’s emotion controller shorts out due to all of the people it was controlling, and Beast and Mr. Fantastic confer to assess the situation.

Ben and Logan are attacked by the robot again and defeat it.  When everyone converges on the opera house, Beast and Reed have already captured Beynon.  While arguing about what to do with the Doctor, Beynon manages to get away, stealing the emotion controller as well. Upon returning to Stark-Fujikawa, Beynon is attacked by the actual Psycho Man.  The X-Men and FF soon show up to fight the villain.  Beynon actually tries to attack the heroes with a pipe.  The scientist tries to use his miniturizer on the FF, but it explodes taking Beynon and the Psycho Man with it.  Reed postulates that both of them have been sent to the microverse.

The issue ends with all the heroes returning to Pier 4 to relax.  Johnny and Sam have fallen asleep at the card table, while Ben and Logan continue to play adamantly. 

How It Was:  Uncanny’s annual teams them up with Marvel’s first family, the Fantastic Four.  In case you’re curious, the FF also had another annual in 1998 where they teamed up with an alternate version of themselves.  And this tale is written by future Uncanny scribe Joe Casey, who I believe was writing Cable at the time.  Anyway, you can see what Casey was going for, teaming the FF with their character equivalents on the X-Men: Beast and Reed are the intellectuals; Johnny and Sam are young, inexperienced, and energy-based fliers; Sue and Cecilia are serious and grounded nurturers who both have forcefields; and Thing and Wolverine are cigar chomping tough guys.

The biggest issue with this issue is the villain, Bradley Beynon.  He is this deluded, unintimidating, and unsympathetic whiner who has a weird fixation on Reed Richards.  He is so incompetent that he can’t figure out the Psycho Man’s emotion controller, even though it is essentially a box with buttons next to labels with emotion names on them.  I think he’s meant to be comedic, but Beynon is so over-the-top delusional that he’s hard to take.  I do like that Beynon has built a robot assistant, Hadley, with a dry, passive aggressive sense of humor.  Hadley gets some great lines, and I will say that it is interesting Beynon would build a helper who doesn’t mind taking him down a peg.

Casey has a great handle on all the heroes.  Thing and Beast’s comments are funny, which is crucial, and there are some great moments, such as Wolverine and Thing in a cab.  I also like the attention to character detail; Beast’s reaction to Psycho Man’s box is to be sad that he hasn’t cured the Legacy Virus, and the Invisible Woman is haunted by her time as the villain Malice and tells Mr. Fantastic that she was a better leader. 

There is an unintentional continuity hitch with Cannonball saying he’s never played poker, even though he has in X-Men #48.  In fact, that story featured the same order of events, where Cannonball insisted he wouldn’t be any good, then proceeded to clean out everybody.  It’s a small detail, so I can forgive it; you could even read into it that Cannonball is some kind of diabolical poker hustler, since I don’t think Wolverine was present at the last game, and the Thing left before Sam could play. 

Apologies for getting caught up in continuity details…it’s probably not that big of a deal.  As for the story, there are some good fights, even if the villains aren’t very interesting.  There is a weird plot hole where Beynon manages to escape and steal the emotion controller in the middle of eight super heroes discussing his fate.  Still, this is mostly a fun, slightly goofy team-up story that again has no real bearing on the bigger picture of the Marvel Universe.  It’s a mediocre story with some fantastic (reference intended) character moments.

B-

Fantastic Four #416

Fantastic Four #416
Writing: Tom DeFalco
Art: Carlos Pachco

What Went Down: Dr. Doom’s servant begins by explaining to his master the Onslaught storyline up to this point, including the capture of Franklin and the EMP. Doom declares that this situation requires his personal attention.

At Four Freedoms Plaza, a number of heroes are trying to rest in between going out and fighting Sentinels. The Invisible Woman finds some of Franklin’s toys and feels depressed. Ant-Man, who is working for the FF at this point, regains consciousness, but he is too weak from the EMP frying his helmet, and because of it, part of his brain. The Beast also brings up the fact that he was recently rescued over in X-Factor. Mr. Fantastic’s father Nathaniel tells Sue that the FF need to flee or they will die; he knows this because he is a time traveler who has seen the future. Sue refuses without Franklin, and she goes off with her husband to have a talk.

Inside Onslaught, Franklin is using his powers to send projections to warn his family where he is. It is explained that he was tricked into luring Nate Grey into a trap over in Nate’s book X-Man. On the roof of FF Plaza, Hawkeye and Iceman complain about how boring recon is. Inside, Sue and Reed have a conversation about whether they’ve neglected their responsibility to their son by putting him in danger all the time. Mr. Fantastic swears they will figure it out after they defeat Onslaught.

The Thing contemplates how alone he is as he watches the Torch and Lyja talk alone; Ben has a crush on Lyja at this point. Alicia Masters and her father the Puppet Master show up to offer their help against Onslaught. In another room Ant-Man’s daughter Cassie Lang is busy talking with Kristoff Vernard, a twelve-year-old boy who had all of Dr. Doom’s knowledge and memories implanted in him. They discuss a friend of Cassie’s who was being abused, and Cassie says that he finally told a teacher and got help for him and his mother from his abusive father. Kang the Conqueror appears, but Kristoff punches him once and the Conqueror dissolves.

The Thing and Alicia talk, and he explains that recently he’s been utilizing a machine to change back and forth into a normal human. The couple is attacked by the Psycho-Man. Meanwhile Lyja explains that she has been posing as another woman to date Johnny without him knowing, but they are interrupted by Paibok and the Super-Skrull. Fortunately for them, the Inhumans show up to help in defeating the aliens. In another hall, Mr. Fantastic and the Invisible Woman fight Wizard, Mad Thinker, and Devos the Devastator. Namor the Sub-Mariner turns up to help.

Nathaniel Richards is being attacked by the Red Ghost, but he is saved by the Black Panther and members of the Fantastic Force. Reed realizes what is happening—these enemies are really projections from Franklin warped by Onslaught, and he goes off to build a machine that can stop it (just like every other FF story you’ve ever read). She-Hulk appears to help out the Thing against Tyros the Terrible. Reed’s machine needs a power source, so the Thing pulls the power source from the machine that lets him turn back into a human.

Outside the Torch is fighting Annihilus and the Dragon Man, but Doctor Doom shows up to save him. Johnny thinks Doom is another adversary to fight at first. The Invisible Woman is attacked by her Malice persona, but Agatha Harkness appears to rescue her. Reed flips the switch on his machine and all the villains disintegrate. Sue tells Reed that Harkness claims Franklin is still alive, and everybody gets excited. Johnny shows up and tells everyone that Doom is now on their side. The team does the traditional hands in the middle pose, and the series ends on a spread of the FF and all their allies, old and new, ready for action.

How It Was: Groan…yet another double-sized issue. Yet this one doesn’t feel as extraneous since this is supposed to be the formal end to Marvel’s oldest and longest running comic (at the time). Poor Tom DeFalco had obviously been doing a fine job of setting up different subplots for his characters that all had to be hurriedly rushed to completion in time for the end of Onslaught. Cassie Lang’s friend who was being abused by his father is all wrapped up with two panels of exposition, the Torch just forgives Lyja for impersonating another woman because there isn’t any time for a different resolution, and Alicia Masters is wheeled out randomly to bring some closure to the ongoing ordeal of the Thing’s loneliness. This all feels really, really rushed. I will admit though that I do love the part where the Thing tears the power source out of his changing machine, not just because I feel the machine lessens the inherent drama of a great tragic character, but also because it’s just a really great example of Ben Grimm stepping up and being a hero.

As for the plot, well… this has absolutely nothing to do with Onsluaght, and it doesn’t really fit the tone of the other crossover books. Instead DeFalco seems more interested in giving the Fantastic Four a proper sendoff by going through a number of past villains and having a bunch of allies show up for absolutely no reason at all. And really, without Dr. Doom or Galactus as potential adversaries, this book is limited to some pretty weak villains, even before you add in the part about dissolving with one punch. Tyros the Terrible? Devos the Devastator? These really aren’t the strongest characters from Marvel’s back catalog. And the Inhumans show up completely out of nowhere. Some of the appearances are kind of neat, but there are just so many that none of them feel significant in any way. And of course it has to end with Reed flipping the Deus Machina switch to save the day, although this comes off more as an homage to tradition, rather than purposefully stale writing.

The other major problem with the plot only matters if you read Avengers #400, which came out two months prior to this issue. In it Loki uses magic to attack a team of past and present Avengers characters with artificial avatars of villains from throughout the team’s history. Does that sound in any way familiar? Now I’m not accusing DeFalco of blatant plagiarism, after all I’ve read similarly structured stories in Spider-Man and the X-Men, but it still isn’t a really a stupendous issue. Plus all the Avengers and X-Men are completely ignored for the sake of giving the FF a proper sendoff; Iceman and Hawkeye are shown observing the villains approaching, then they are never seen again for the entire double-sized issue.

Pacheco is perfect for drawing this kind of issue with lots and lots of different characters. If you want to see how good he gets at drawing giant epic scale battles, go buy Avengers Forever. Still, his Onslaught looks even more out of place now that he isn’t drawing the “evolved” version of the bad guy, although he’s not really in the issue long enough to care. The art definitely elevates the story above the shallow plot structure and hurried subplot wrap-ups that DeFalco is editorially forced to endure. It’s not an ideal ending for the team, especially in the middle of a larger storyline, but I guess it gets the job done.

C-

X-Men #48

X-Men #48
Writing: Scott Lobdell
Art: Luke Ross

What Went Down: The X-Men are taking part in a friendly game of poker at Warren Worthington’s private loft, including a guest appearance from Ben Grimm of the Fantastic Four. Beast is frustrated that Cannonball keeps revealing his cards. The Thing takes off to go save the universe, so Sam takes his spot in the game. Gambit and Storm have a conversation to recap the recent injury to Psylocke in Uncanny #328 and the fate of Sabretooth.

Meanwhile Bishop is describing a flashback/nightmare from the Age of Apocalypse to Cyclops and Jean Grey; in it a shadowy person that appears to be Havok is chasing him. Cyclops tells him that he and Jean have had similar experiences after raising his son Nathan in the future, but Bishop is frustrated by his disorientation. The waitress, Pam, comes to take their order—this is the woman Bishop thought was familiar from way back in Uncanny #299, an issue from almost two and a half years before this one.

It turns out that Bishop is being monitored by the Dark Beast, although the X-office doesn’t want to use that name. After the Age of Apocalypse, Dark Beast was transported twenty years into the X-Men’s past, where he has been experimenting on the Morlocks. In this issue he is meeting with his fellow AoA refugee, the Sugar Man. Both villains have a deal where they share intel, and Sugar Man feels out of the loop. After a standoff at gunpoint from both parties, they agree to calm down.

At the Xavier Institute, Xavier is watching over the mortally injured Psylocke. She wakes up and notes how tired Xavier looks. She assures him that she knew the risks involved and that it is not his fault. Back at the card game, it turns out that Cannonball is a bit of a ringer as he’s won a vast amount of chips. It’s down to Sam and Gambit, so Storm excuses herself to go to the kitchen. Bobby follows to ask Storm to tutor him in his powers since both of their powers involve harnessing the elements. She agrees, but to my knowledge nothing ever comes of this.

In Dark Beast’s lair, McCoy discusses how Bishop is a time anomaly that shouldn’t exist, and that he was the same person as his counterpart in AoA. Dark Beast also mentions that this information might be valuable to Sinister, which scares them both.

During the last hand, Gambit taunts Cannonball with some sleight of hand tricks; this triggers some great realization about the Legacy Virus for Beast, but nothing ever comes of this either. Inside the lair, Dark Beast shows off a creepy brain matter being that filters thought into data. He and Sugar Man decide that they need to kill Bishop so Sinister cannot use him to find out about the Age of Apocalypse. In the card game, Cannonball lays down a full house. Gambit has a royal flush, but he blows up the fifth card, along with the table, even though he has the winning hand. The message seems to be that Gambit doesn’t like to be predictable or wants people to underestimate him or something.

How It Was: This is another story that comes straight out of left field. It feels like Lobdell is treading water until a replacement writer can be found for X-Men, so instead of starting any new threads, he’s sticking to character moments and resolving old plot threads that never went anywhere. And when I say old, I mean practically ancient, totally forgotten threads. We’re reintroduced to Pam, the mysteriously familiar waitress from Uncanny #299. It’s nice that Lobdell is finally resolving this point, but I can’t help but feel that everyone has forgotten about the one panel where Bishop recognizes her from almost three years before.

As for the X-Men, a lot of their arcs are going around in circles. After asking Jean for help with his powers last issue, now Bobby is coming to Storm, which is fine except that once again nothing ever comes of this. Bishop is still haunted by the AoA, and Scott and Jean are still trying to empathize with him, but this doesn’t really work since the couple was never seen going through any of this. At least Lobdell seems to be going someplace with this by setting up Bishop as a potential obstacle for the machinations of the Dark Beast, although once again it is never quite revealed why he is so afraid of Mr. Sinister.

The poker game is an entertaining aside, and it’s a surprise to see Cannonball purposely mess with Beast, but mostly it’s an excuse for exposition about Sabretooth’s escape and the Legacy Virus. Plus, I don’t really understand what the point is of bringing in The Thing for a whopping three pages. The end is kind of perplexing, as I can’t really tell what exactly Lobdell is trying to say about Gambit, other than maybe he likes to be seen as volatile.

This is yet another lukewarm issue of X-Men. I don’t hate it; I’m kind of ambivalent to it all. Sure it’s refreshing to see Cannonball written as confident, but there are so many false starts in this issue that never come to anything that it is hard to care.

C