Uncanny X-Men #337

Uncanny X-Men #337
Writing: Scott Lobdell
Art: Joe Madureira

What Went Down: Wolverine starts off the issue outside in the rain trying to give Professor X a much-needed pep talk. Xavier blames himself for Onslaught and the death of the all the Avengers and Fantastic Four. Wolverine tells Charles that he shares the blame, since Xavier was influenced by Magneto because he was reacting to Wolverine’s loss of adamantium. Wolverine sympathizes with Xavier’s condition, even though Charles insists that their losses are nothing alike.

In Central Park, site of the final battle with Onslaught, Bastion is surveying the crater where Onslaught blew up. Presidential Candidate Graydon Creed is also there, blaming mutants for the tragedy and using it as a springboard for his campaign. Peter Parker, aka Spider-Man, feels disgusted as he is forced to take pictures of Creed while he rants. At the Daily Bugle, J. Jonah Jameson and Robbie Robertson are discussing Creed’s campaign. Robbie thinks that Creed is a lowbrow politician that will say anything to get elected, but Jameson insists that he sells papers and may be the biggest story of the year.

At the X-Mansion, Cyclops shuts off his alarm clock by destroying it with an optic blast. He realizes he overreacted and reflects on how tense life has been for the X-Men. Beast surprises Cyclops in the bathroom causing him to drop his glasses and let loose another blast. Beast brings up the fact that Cyclops never once attacked the imposter Beast while he was being held captive. Scott apologizes, but Beast admits that he had been absorbed in his lab work for the most part. Cyclops gets Beast out of the bathtub, only to have Iceman trick them both into falling back in. Cyclops blasts the mirror and reflects a shot that hits Bobby.

Jean is making breakfast for all of the X-Men. Quicksilver is sitting with her; he is staying with the X-Men while he mopes about the death of his wife Crystal and sister the Scarlet Witch. Psylocke shows up, but tells Jean that Archangel isn’t feeling well. Quicksilver comments on how distant Betsy seems.

Bastion enters the secret base of Operation Zero Tolerance. His assistant Harper gives him an update, but shapeshifts into Bastions form to give it. Bastion slaps him and tells him to get back to work. Wolverine gives Xavier a speech about how important he is to everyone, but Charles insists on staying outside. The rest of the X-Men gather for breakfast. Gambit asks about Joseph, who went out with Rogue because he did not feel comfortable with the other X-Men. Wolverine comes in from the rain and tells everyone that Xavier isn’t coming. The team sits down to enjoy the meal together.

How It Was: It’s one of Lobdell’s famous after-crossover epilogues, and this one is pretty solid. As usual it’s a nice quiet issue where different characters take time to process the events of the crossover while the writers set up some new storylines for later down the road. Given the nature of the end of Onslaught, nobody really knows how to act and everyone is on edge. It’s good to see Wolverine reach out to Xavier (even if it is the goofy looking troll-Wolverine) and draw a number of parallels between the two, and Joe Mad draws a great rainy morning. On top of that, the cover for this issue is easily one of Madureira’s best and most appropriate covers ever.

The scenes with Cyclops, Beast, and Iceman feel pretty forced, but whereas that would normally be a negative in a comic, it actually works well here. The fact is that everyone is so tense, and the heroes are just looking for a way to deal with their issues and just enjoy each other’s company again. Beast especially has just gone through this terrible ordeal, and it’s clear he doesn’t really have anyone to blame or anyway to really deal with it when everyone else is dealing with the loss of the heroes. Maybe it’s just me, but the tone feels just right, with characters like Iceman and Gambit going out of their way to try to be silly and funny. We also get subplot building with Psylocke’s personality, but that doesn’t really go anywhere, and haven’t we done enough with Psylocke’s weird personalities of the week?

As for the subplot building, they are three fold: there’s Graydon Creed’s presidential candidacy, Bastion’s buildup towards Operation Zero Tolerance, and a weird one involving J. Jonah Jameson’s investigation into Creed, and later Bastion. I say weird because it involves a lot of Spider-Man characters appearing in X-Men, but they never actually crossover. In fact, #346 ends up just starring Spider-Man for the whole issue, but we’ll have more on that later.

The fact is that because Lobdell is once again writing both X-Men titles, we’re going into a period of quality that was about as good as before Mark Waid showed up i.e. not very good. This period lasts for about a year, and unfortunately all of these plot lines sort of fizzle out or abruptly end. There’s also Joseph, the new X-Man who was once Magneto to deal with, so that’s kind of interesting. I just want you to brace yourselves for some comics that are not among Lobdell’s best. Still, this one is pretty good and perfectly captures a shell-shocked family trying to return to life before the trauma. Xavier’s reactions feel quite genuine, and it’s nice to see all of the other X-Men going out of their ways to help each other.

B+

Onslaught: Marvel Universe

Onslaught: Marvel Universe
Writing: Scott Lobdell and Mark Waid
Art: Adam Kubert and Joe Bennet

What Went Down: The Watcher (yes, again with the Watcher) opens the issue after the final battle, speaking about the end of the Age of Wonders. He also claims that his job is done, but we all know that isn’t true. We cut back to Xavier facing off against Onslaught from the end of X-Men #56. Because he has no powers, Xavier isn’t doing too well. The X-Men show up, knock Onslaught away, and rescue Xavier. Onslaught makes a giant hand out of rock to attack the mutants, then blasts them into submission. Fortunately the combined forces of the Avengers, Fantastic Four, Dr. Doom, and the Hulk show up for the rescue.

The fight begins and Joseph is knocked unconscious by some debris. Xavier crawls to him and gets Joseph behind cover. Inside Onslaught, Franklin and Nate Grey discuss possibly escaping. Outside, Iron Man explains that everyone is equipped with psi-scramblers, even though nobody is seen wearing them. Cyclops claims that the X-Men are protected by Cable and Jean, even though Onslaught is supposed to be more powerful than everyone. Onslaught erects a force shield and creates a…wait for it…second sun in the sky whose gravity threatens to destroy the Earth. In practice, all it does is make the battle really windy.

Nate Grey reflects that a five-year-old kid is braver than he is. He reaches out to Cable since they share a connection as the same person from different dimensions. Cable senses them and concocts a plan to use Joseph, Xavier, and himself to magnify each other’s powers to save Franklin and Nate. Doom gives a long monologue about how it’s up to him to save the day while various secondary characters of the Marvel Universe see the second sun and wonder if the world is going to end.

Here’s how the heroes get through Onslaught’s forcefield. Vision merges with Rogue, which isn’t his power—he’s supposed to just turn intangible. Wolverine pierces the field, with his bone claws mind you, and Namor and Giant-Man hold the hole open for Vision/Rogue to fly through and hit Onslaught, which appears ineffective, but destroys the force field nonetheless.

The Hulk asks Jean to shut off Banner so that he can lose control on Onslaught and go all out. She leaves the memory of Betty Ross, but turns Hulk savage. He and Onslaught beat each other while the forces of nature rip the area around the heroes apart. Hulk hits Onslaught so hard that a huge explosion occurs, destroying Onslaught and separating Banner from the Hulk.

The heroes think they’ve won, but Onslaught has just “evolved” into his final energy form. Without a body to fight, the heroes figure that the energy needs a physical vessel to destroy. Thor flies in first, followed by all the other heroes of the Marvel Universe in varying groups. Inside Onslaught, the area the prisoners are in is starting to break down.

Mr. Fantastic stops Wolverine, Crystal, and Quicksilver from going in the energy. He explains that because Onslaught was unaffected by Rogue’s attack, that mutant genetic patterns give him more power because he began life as a mutant. Of course, then he has to make some plot convenient excuse for the Scarlet Witch related to her powers, but there you have it. Quicksilver is saddened, but relieved that his wife will be spared, but she tells him that Richards said nothing about Inhumans, and runs into the void.

Doom tries to absorb some of Onslaught’s energy to use in a later plot, but Hawkeye and Iron Man stop him and send him into the void with them. Mr. Fantastic and the Invisible Woman are the last non-mutant heroes; they tell Cyclops to attack the energy as soon as they’re in and not to hold back. There is a huge explosion, and Bruce Banner gets sucked into the Void right as it’s happening. Xavier and Joseph are also able to save Nate and Franklin right as the explosion takes place. As the heroes die, Franklin uses his vast, plot convenient powers to create a pocket universe for their spirits to go to, thus creating the Heroes Reborn Universe for the Image relaunch. From the perspective of news reporters outside, the world at large believes that the X-Men betrayed the other heroes and killed them, which causes further hatred towards mutants in future X-Men arcs. Professor X consoles Franklin about the death of his family, and we see a blue ball in the grass that is actually the pocket universe itself. No, really, there is an entire universe in that young boy’s ball.

Professor X asks Nate Grey to take him above the rooftops to survey the damage. Nate is really impressed with the heroes, and wishes he could’ve learned more from them. Going back to Uatu, it turns out he wasn’t just narrating to nobody; he was still talking with Apocalypse. Apocalypse agrees that it is an impressive story, but also realizes with so many heroes dead it is the perfect time to try to conquer the world himself.

How It Was: Well it’s finally over, and unlike the majority of this crossover, significant events actually take place. There’s some big action scenes, a surprising detail to characters and relationships, and it really captures the grand scope of the Marvel Universe’s New York. And while there are definitely a lot of issues with the story structure in general, I have to say that there are enough really good moments to outweigh some of them. Quite simply, this absolutely feels like it affects the entirety of the Marvel Universe, and it really does…for the following year. Waid’s script manages to catch most of the character beats that longtime FF and Avengers fans want to see, from Quicksilver’s anguish over Crystal’s death to the forgiveness of Giant-Man and the Wasp. Seeing the Hulk fight Onslaught is pretty awesome, even though he’s only been a presence in his own title and an issue of Cable. Yes, it gets a little schmaltzy and emotional at times, but the heroes are aware that they are literally sacrificing their lives for the world, so it works. Unlike many gratuitous character deaths for shock value in events, this one feels handled with love and respect as the writers go out of their way to show them as noble and heroic as they can.

So as usual, the handling of the characters is fantastic. Where does it go wrong? Well there are far too many characters in this book to be fighting just one villain. Yes Onslaught is supposed to be this cosmic level bad guy, but whereas characters like Dark Phoenix and Galactus have specific abilities and powers, Onslaught’s powers are just made up as the writers go along. Creating a second sun isn’t impressive, it’s just ridiculous, and while it’s handled as serious at the beginning, it really just gets ignored for the remainder of the issue. Then he creates an impenetrable forcefield. Oh wait, the heroes penetrated it, now he’s turned to energy. There is no real logic whatsoever to what Onslaught does; it’s all for the sake of editorially mandated plot convenience. Certain heroes have to end up in Heroes Reborn and others can’t. Thus we get the absurd rule that mutants can’t fight Onslaught, except for Scarlet Witch, and Namor, who the writers and editors forgot is also a mutant. Also, Cannonball, Archangel, and Psylocke are missing for no particularly good reason, but it’s not like their inclusion would have mattered much.

Which brings us to the real problem with this issue, with this whole series in general. It’s an X-Men story where the X-Men have been completely pushed to the side to spotlight the Avengers and Fantastic Four in order to justify a gimmicky relaunch of four of their titles. The X-Men start off the issue on their own, but quickly get overshadowed by the real heroes. Even Xavier and Joseph, who should theoretically have something really significant to contribute since they were the genesis of the villain, get nothing to do except rescue some prisoners. I do like the angle that humans view the X-Men as traitors at the end of the story, but surely the X-Men could just explain the circumstances to people. I guess they were worried that people would learn Xavier was Onslaught, but there probably was a way around it. And what the heck happened to Onslaught’s mutant armies and Sentinels?

The art captures the story quite nicely, but like everything else with Onslaught, inconsistencies abound. The psi-armor that was made such a huge deal out of for issues on end isn’t even drawn on the heroes, and the X-Men decide they don’t even need it. Trish Tilby is drawn completely wrong, and the everyday people of New York are drawn just going about their lives while the battle is raging. Haven’t Sentinels been attacking New York? Wasn’t there a huge EMP that took out all the power in the city? Why is Foggy Nelson just out buying groceries with Karen Page while the writers at the Bugle are just going to work like usual? Shouldn’t they evacuate? I don’t know, maybe I’m just thinking too hard about this.

While I was expecting to hate rereading this issue, I have to say it is more of a mixed bag than pure garbage. Parts of it are very, very stupid, like a little boy creates an entire universe with his imagination and puts it in a blue ball stupid. But there are some undeniably cool parts for the Marvel heroes, even if it does come at the expense of the X-Men. Sure, running into a ball of energy isn’t exactly the most stunning personal sacrifice to be depicted in comics, but this does end up feeling really important. Plus it indirectly leads to the Heroes Return Avengers, which is one of my favorite comic series of all time (Go Buisek and Perez!). It could’ve been a lot worse, I guess, but it kind of, sort of holds up, though not completely.

C+

X-Men #56

X-Men #56
Writing: Mark Waid and Scott Lobdell
Art: Andy Kubert

What Went Down: A giant Sentinel foot descends on a mother and child, but fortunately Joseph and Rogue show up to save the day. Joseph uses his powers to stop the Sentinel, but it adapts and swats him out of the sky. Rogue tries to help, but it is Dr. Doom who saves them both. Doom addresses Joseph as Magneto, and Joseph relates his impressions of Doom to Captain America. Cap reiterates that Joseph is doing a good job as a hero and tells him that really he should be talking with Xavier.

In Onslaught’s citadel, Onslaught’s forces have captured Nate Grey, the X-Man from the Age of Apocalypse. Nate mentions that he has beaten all of Onslaught’s minions, causing the villain to contemplate their worth. Onslaught explains that Nate’s psionic powers make him stronger and that he will use them to usher in an age of mutant sovereignty.

Xavier talks with Joseph about how they both share some blame in the origin of Onslaught. They have a good talk about the man Magneto used to be, and Xavier sends Joseph to the hero strategy meeting. The Professor claims that he will fight Onslaught in his own way.

Inside Nate’s mind, Onslaught sees images of the Age of Apocalypse. He’s quite disappointed with how a world run by mutants turned out, even though it was really a world run by Apocalypse. Onslaught reconsiders his plans for mutant rule.

Inside the strategy meeting, the heroes are getting ready to attack. Jean telepathically communicates with Cyclops that the Professor has gone off to fight Onslaught himself. Cyclops tells Jean to summon the rest of the X-Men in secret to go after him.

After absorbing Nate Grey’s power, Onslaught throws him in with Franklin Richards. Onslaught senses Xavier and goes to meet him below. Xavier tries to reason with Onslaught, imploring him on behalf of any part of Xavier that might still be in the villain. Onslaught smashes Charles’ hoverchair and announces that he has decided to kill everyone since neither race deserves the planet.

How It Was: This is both the penultimate chapter of the Onslaught crossover (Thank God) and Mark Waid’s swan song on the book (Aw Crud). Waid had been voicing concerns about editorial mandates restricting creative freedom for quite some time. Plus, after having to write the stories that meant his leaving Avengers and Captain America, I don’t think he was a very happy camper, and rightfully so. So, like Fabian Nicieza before him, Waid ends his run on X-Men…after only six issues. In fact, he’s only credited with the script on this one.

So how does this one measure up? More of the same; heroes fighting Sentinels, Onslaught alluding to his master plan to save mutants that makes no sense, and heroes standing around and talking about how awful this all is (the destruction mind you, not the story). Unlike most penultimate issues of stories, this one has absolutely no momentum; it doesn’t really feel like it’s building towards anything special, just the main fight with Onslaught that we’ve been waiting three freaking months for. There’s a lot of talk about the psi-armor being finished, but it was already finished issues ago, so this is mostly padding.

The plot is virtually non-existent. There are some scenes of the captive Nate Grey, captured in his own series, who was needed for Onslaught’s master plan…for some reason? Really we already knew that Onslaught had targeted Nate Grey from the first chapter of this story, so it is mind boggling why the writers waited until now for him to show up because it certainly isn’t a big surprise before the end of the story. Also having Onslaught change motivations at the last minute seems rather silly; he’s been ranting the whole series about how he’s helping mutantkind, even though it’s completely unclear how he’s doing that, and then at the last second he sees the Age of Apocalypse and decides to destroy the planet. No, I’m sorry there is just no logic or sense to back up that plan at all. And Doom shows up out of nowhere, which is kind of neat, but he doesn’t really contribute anything to the overall story; he’s only here to get sucked into the Heroes Reborn world next issue.

So what does work? Well, the dialogue from Waid is spectacular; these are seriously some superb interactions between characters. Whether it’s Joseph and Cap bonding over the sheer absurdity that is Doom’s personality, to Xavier’s thoughtful deconstruction of his friend Magneto, all of the characters ring true in their exchanges. The art is pretty fantastic, even if this is the zillionth Onslaught issue Marvel has put out involving fighting Sentinels. While the characterizations are great, I can’t really understand a lot of the behaviors different characters choose. Xavier’s decision doesn’t make much sense, unless they’re going for an Xavier that feels so guilty that he can’t live with the repercussions of Onslaught, which actually would be an interesting take on the character. And I can’t understand why Cyclops doesn’t just tell all of the heroes that they need to go rescue Xavier. Surely they have a better chance of surviving with more people, and don’t they need that fancy psi-armor? Apparently not as we learn in the conclusion.

While there is some good writing to be found, this story is still poorly organized at this point, which is just about the end. It’s not just that there are too many characters; it’s the fact that nothing compelling has happened in any of the issues to impact the story. Everyone is writing character side stories, which is fine, except that nobody has bothered to write the main story. Thankfully, next month things get back to normal, because while there were some nice moments, this just isn’t that great. Although I will say that this is above average for an issue of Onslaught.

B-

Wolverine #105

Wolverine #105
Writing: Larry Hama
Art: Val Semeiks

What Went Down: Wolverine starts the issue with a splash page (no pun intended) of him being hosed down. Well, he’s not entering a wet t-shirt contest. He’s actually getting ready to run into a burning building to rescue a little boy. When Wolverine jumps off the ladder to save him, the boy runs back into the fire to save his teddy bear. The roof starts to collapse, so Wolverine and the boy can’t make it out the way he entered. To calm the boy named Sean, Wolverine puts his mask on him to convince him that he’s a super hero and can’t die.

Elektra’s sensei Stick just happens to show up. Since he is blind, he has no problems leading Wolverine through the smoke. The escape involves having Wolverine leap through a huge wall of flames. After healing from some horrible burns, Wolverine runs back into the building to try to save Stick. He is thanked with a crack on the head.

Stick fights Wolverine on the roof of the burning building. Wolverine reveals that he knows who Stick is and that Stick should be dead. Stick then goes through a whole explanation about how Wolverine hasn’t been the same since he lost the adamantium and how he needs to pull himself together. As the roof collapses, Stick points to an area in the smoke and tells Wolverine that he’ll survive if he jumps there. The Human Torch appears at the end telling Wolverine to meet them at Four Freedoms Plaza for the final battle with Onslaught.

How It Was: Once again we have another Onslaught issue that is not about Onslaught. And to tell you the truth, that’s fine at this point since nobody is allowed to progress the story anyways. Instead we have our hero saving some civilians caught up in the destruction. Ignoring that the firemen’s trucks shouldn’t be working after the EMP, this issue has a perfectly fine set up. It’s nice to see Wolverine interact with the small child, and there is a kind of cute part where the victims he saves can’t remember his name. All fine and very competent. On the other hand, it does feel a little generic, as in you could take out Wolverine and put any other Marvel hero in this story and it would still work.

Stick’s appearance comes out of nowhere, especially due to the fact that he’s supposed to be dead. I understand Elektra, his disciple, is supposed to be helping Logan through his recent changes, but Stick’s own help feels redundant. What makes it worse is that Stick is kind of a jerk to Wolverine after he goes back to help the old man, and all the advice he gives to Wolverine is stuff that we already know he needs to do at this point. All I can say is that I really don’t care about Stick at all and he feels so out of place here. Wolverine is out doing what he should be doing, there’s no real need to do the chastising mentor bit right now. At least Wolverine’s speech patterns are back to normal.

It’s not bad, it just feels like Hama is stalling until he can get back to his own storylines. The appearance by the Human Torch at the end serves only as a reminder of how little is going on at this point as all the heroes are pretty much just gathering for the final issue.

C-

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-

Avengers #402

Avengers #402
Writing: Mark Waid
Art: Mike Deodato and Tom Palmer

What Went Down: The Avengers start out by rescuing a subway full of people trapped underground. Didn’t something similar already happen in Uncanny? Don’t worry about it! Once they get above ground, Captain America seems overwhelmed by the chaos around them, as buildings crumble and fires rage. The Avengers spend some time rescuing civilians and getting them to safety. They come across the Black Widow, technically the leader of the Avengers at this point, being mobbed by desperate people. Cap orders them away, and the Widow goes off to help more people.

Iron Man and Giant Man show up and tell the Avengers that they’ve completed the psionic armor. Unfortunately they’ve brought it with them, right as they are attacked by Post and Holocaust. The two villains are trying to steal the armor, and they have cloaking fields that render them invisible. While they fight the Avengers, the surrounding civilians begin to feel hopeless as the heroes are beaten. As the fight rages, Wasp asks Captain America what they should do; he replies that they can’t beat them. The Wasp is shocked to hear that Cap is giving up, but what Cap meant was that they couldn’t beat the villains head-on and needed to trick them. So Captain America throws his shield, triggers Post’s cloak, and tricks Holocaust into shooting him. While Holocaust is shocked by his actions, the Avengers beat the crap out of him. The crowd cheers, inspired by the Avengers’ victory. Onslaught appears on a giant screen to taunt the heroes. They destroy the screen and charge off, while saying “Avengers Assemble” of course.

How It Was: This is actually the last issue of the Avengers’ initial run. After the Onslaught storyline, the Avengers get shuffled off to the Heroes Reborn universe and the numbering starts over at issue one. So Mark Waid had the task of providing a closing to the Marvel Universe’s greatest heroes while making it fit within the Onslaught crossover. Oh, and he couldn’t resolve anything in the Onslaught storyline either. What we get is an issue of the Avengers doing what they do best, saving lives and inspiring people, followed by a fight with two C-list X-Men villains, which probably isn’t the conclusion Stan Lee would have envisioned 401 issues prior.

The story is okay, nothing spectacular. Mark Waid doesn’t even get a chance to wrap up any of the dangling sub plots his tenure as writer had set up (Kurt Buisek would handle them years later), and he also has the unpleasant duty of writing the issue that essentially makes his job obsolete. Black Widow gets brushed aside during the course of the story because she can’t go to Heroes Reborn; she’s needed in Daredevil and around the Marvel Universe. Vision is still lying on a bed off panel and Hawkeye is nowhere to be found, so they don’t get to be in the finale either. Come to think of it, while this Avengers roster consists solely of veterans, these are not the best versions of these characters. We have teenage Tony Stark/Iron Man, a Wasp who is an actual insect person, the poorly named Giant Man, and redesigns of classic costumes for characters like the Scarlet Witch and Thor that show how hard the Avengers Bullpen was trying to rip off the look of the X-Men.

So they’re rescuing civilians, which is fine except that the same thing is happening in every other Marvel book, and then they have to fight two villains that they have nothing to do with. The art is phenomenal and it really makes the issue. The battle is brutal as heroes are ambushed and thrown around. The mislead of the disheartened Captain America is a little contrived, but it’s not like Waid can really build drama any other way, since the plot isn’t allowed to proceed until Onslaught: Marvel Universe.

This is just a really odd issue to end the Avengers on. Waid definitely does his best, and at least the characters aren’t overshadowed in their own book as the X-Men have been in theirs’. Considering how bad the next year was for Avengers fans, this probably didn’t seem so bad, but it still feels like Earth’s Mightiest Heroes deserved better.

C+

Cable #35

Cable #35
Writing: Jeph Loeb
Art: Ian Churchill

What Went Down: The opening page is an info dump setting up this point in the Onslaught storyline—brought to us by Uatu the Watcher. Down below Cable and the Invisible Woman are fighting against the psychic storm that is raging with her forcefield, which is being reinforced by his powers. Unfortunately, as Cable puts more effort into reinforcing the forcefield, he is losing control of the techno-organic virus that infects half his body. Sue offers her husband’s help, and Apocalypse shows up to tell them that Onslaught must be stopped. Of course this is a super hero comic, so Cable and Apocalypse have to fight each other for two pages before realizing that they have a common goal.

Apocalypse suggests attacking Onslaught on the Astral Plane because Onslaught draws power from it, so he therefore must be more vulnerable there (??). Cable agrees to the team up, but tells the Invisible Woman to stay behind in case they fail to rescue Franklin. As they travel the Astral Plane, Apocalypse expresses admiration for Onslaught’s accomplishments, disgusting Cable. Apocalypse offers to cure Cable of the T.O. virus that he infected him with when Cable was a child, but Cable refuses, saying it’s made him stronger.

In his citadel, Onslaught admires the destruction with Franklin Richards attached to his back. Onslaught discovers Apocalypse and Cable, which surprises Apocalypse, and summons projections of the Hulk, Post, and Magneto to attack the duo. Cable faces the Hulk projection, and thinks back to when he fought the real Hulk all the way back in the last issue of Cable. While Cable is distracted, Apocalypse makes his way to Franklin and apologizes for having to kill the boy. Cable tells the Invisible Woman to make her move and it turns out that she has been hiding the whole time waiting for Apocalypse to betray them. As Cable and Sue fight Apocalypse, Onslaught teleports them away. Apocalypse yells at the heroes, accusing them of being narrow minded and having cost them the battle. Apocalypse teleports away, and Cable comforts Susan as she thinks about how helpless her son is alone.

Apocalypse returns to Uatu’s side; Uatu proclaims his respect for the heroes’ principles while Apocalypse sees it only as weakness. Back at the Citadel, Franklin is inspired by the bravery of Cable and his mother, and now he has hope.

How It Was: After two issues of Uncanny to set it up, Apocalypse shows up to affect Onslaught’s conquest. Then he goes away, leaving an anti-climactic dullness in the reader’s brain. This is supposed to be the return of one of the X-Men’s greatest villains, one who hasn’t been seen for about three or so years in the main universe, and the Age of Apocalypse showed how great he could truly be. So it’s not the triumphant return that fans were expecting, but Loeb does still get quite a bit right

The interaction between Apocalypse and Cable is very solid. Loeb nails the mutual hatred and respect that each of these characters has for the other. The offer of a cure for the T.O. virus is the perfect example of a back-handed mind game that the villain would play on Cable. Their interactions are probably the highlight of the issue. The central conflict of the issue, whether it is better to kill Franklin and rob Onslaught of his power, is excellent because the way Loeb handles it, Apocalypse is technically right in his viciousness and Cable and Sue have endangered millions of lives because of their own selfishness and lack of foresight. Absolutely fantastic.

However things devolve very quickly once Onslaught enters the picture. First, it’s hard to tell whether the fight takes place on the Astral Plane or the physical plane; I think it is the physical since the word balloons change shape in the Astral Plane. Then they end up fighting uninteresting copies of existing villains, and it is really disappointing to see the Hulk back in this series so soon, especially a more shallow and boring version of the character. Also, inconsistencies continue to pop up as Ian Churchill draws the wrong version of Onslaught for this point in the crossover—it should be the evolved version from Uncanny #336. Plus, if Onslaught can make his enemies disappear at will, why doesn’t he just do it at the beginning?

There is a lot to praise about this book, but it is too bad that it begins the same way as it ends…with absolutely no new plot progression at all. In the end Franklin is still captive, Sue is still distraught, and Apocalypse leaves to go back to spectating with the Watcher. You can skip this issue and not miss anything important whatsoever. On top of that, the confrontation with Onslaught makes no sense, and he uses powers that never appear in any of the other issues of this crossover. It is a nice treat for Cable fans to see the protagonist forced to interact with his arch villain, but outside of that, this is for super collectors only.

B-