Wednesday, March 22, 2006

Uncanny X-Periment # 16: "The Brood Saga"

The Uncanny X-Men # 162-166

Ambushed by Deathbird and the Brood, the X-Men and Lilandria are captured. Implanted with Brood eggs, the X-Men escape (thanks to Wolverine, who purged his egg) and must face hard decisions as to what to do with what could be their on-coming deaths.

Now we're talking. After an up-and-down era following the "Dark Phoenix Saga," we finally see the X-Men hit a stride once more.

The threat of the Brood is menacing and Claremont ties it into the Mutant factor very nicely, maintaining the story as being grounded to the X-Men's core concepts. Everyone's take on their fate is unique and allows for some great development. Nightcrawler prays, Storm takes off in despair, Carol Danvers (a guest with the X-Men) leaves in a rage, Colossus and Kitty grow closer (in a way that surprised me), and Wolverine is faced with the horrible choice as to whether or not to kill those that he has grown so close to.

In the meantime, Xavier and Corsair struggle with the possible loss of the X-Men. Xavier, for one, finds it hard to move on . . . until he learns that there are new mutants out there, needing him.

Great stuff.

Dave Cockrum and Paul Smith both add their own flavors to the story and succeed to create great visuals. We've got some amazing two-pages spreads and the transformations scenes are both horrifying and interesting at the same time.

It gets a little silly at the end, with the soul of an Acanti and all that, but it works in the context of the story. It's a surprisingly spiritual story wrapped within a sci-fi tale, told in a very personal way.

Oh! And we get to meet Lockheed too!

~W~

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