Uncanny X-Periment # 161: Messiah War

Cable # 1-15, X-Force # 14-16, X-Force/Cable: Second Coming one-shot, and Cable: King-Sized Spectacular

Cable and the baby arrive in an alternate future, and proceeds to get dragged into a street level battle against the Turnpike Authority of NYC.  Bishop eventually enters the picture, having stolen time travel technology from Forge and now obsessed with chasing Cable and killing the baby.   Cable holes up with a waitress named Sophie (he had a bit of thing for waitresses) and eventually, Cannonball (the last X-Man) arrives to help him out.  Cannonball helps save Cable and allows him to escape to Westchester.   Bishop kills Cannonball and then proceeds to take charge of a bunch of Turnpike Authority goons.  Cable eventually repairs his time machine, but discovers he can travel into the future.  He and Bishop fight it out, and then Cable jumps into the future, trying to out-run Bishop.  Sophie, inspired and armed by Cable, kills the leaders of the Turnpike Authority.

In the present, Cyclops leaves a time capsule for Cable.  Cable, still being chased through the future by Bishop, creates a series of booby-traps (with help from Irene Merryweather’s descendant).  Cable is able to evade Bishop and heads even further into the future, eventually discovering a refuge called New Liberty.  New Liberty is supposed to be absolutely protected and undetectable from the outside world.  Here, Cable and baby are safe.  Nathan eventually settles down marries a woman named Hope, who helps raise the baby.  Of course, the peace doesn’t last and evil humanoid cockroaches invade New Liberty.  He eventually repels the attack, but he, Hope, and the baby need to escape.  They travel across the county, skipped through time as they do so.  Eventually, they are faced the roach-President, who explains that the rest of the world has been destroyed, trapping Cable and his family in North America.   Cable kills the President, but Hope is killed also.  Finally, Cable and the baby find a safehaven, and Cable decides to name the baby Hope (of course, at this point, she’s like five).

Meanwhile, in the present, Bishop has returned and proceeded to steal several WMDs.  X-Force arrives and intercepts him, and then drags him in to Cyclops.  Cyclops and Emma interrogate him, but get nowhere.  Bishops escapes .  . . and then meets up with Stryfe at a bar called Betty Noirs. 

Cable and Hope hide with a military unit, which is able to eliminate the roaches.  The pair leap into the future, where it’s a wasteland.   Hope is able to find them some rations, causing Cable to wonder if her Mutant powers have manifested.  The two then finally find Cyclops’ time capsule and then leap further into the future, where Cable is horrified to discover that Stryfe has risen to power.

In the present, Beast and Cyclops have found Cable and Bishop in the future and send X-Force to help.  Apocalypse, after being taken to the brink of death by Stryfe and Bishop, summons Archangel.  Cable and Hope meet with X-Force . . . and then a long-buried Deadpool shows up and teams up with them.  They also discover that they are unable to time travel from this era for some reason.

There’s a big fight and then Stryfe manages to capture Hope and Warpath.  Bishop attacks Stryfe and goes to kill Hope once and for all . . . but Stryfe fights back and then the others come in and there’s more fighting.  Meanwhile, Vanisher, X-23, Domino, and Deadpool discover that it’s X’s old NYX pal, Kaden (?!) that’s causing the time lock.  She forced is to kill Kaden.  Stryfe is betrayed by Deadpool and then Wade dies.  Apocalypse then arrives and defeats Stryfe once and for all.  Bishop’s robotic arm is destroyed by Logan.  Bishop is able to lock his sights on Hope again – but Apocalypse steps in.  Bishop escapes, but just barely.  Apocalypse reveals his own plans for Hope, but Archangel demands that she is given back to Cable as payback for reviving him.  Apocalypse agrees and goes back into hibernation, carrying Stryfe back with him. 

Cable and Hope leap further into the future, but Hope spazzes and reaches of X-23 and Elixir.  This throws off their time jump.  Meanwhile, X-Force heads back home.  Hope drops out of the time jump a few years before Cable, causing her to be on her own for the first time in her life.  The city she lives in is one of the two; this having used Celestial Technology left behind by Stryfe to either save or escape the dying Earth.  The other one is the Unclean City and I assume they don’t have toilet paper.  So while Hope lives out the next few years on the streets, and being helped by a boy named Emil.   A few years later, Cable drops out and, in the aftermath of the battle with Stryfe, his techno-organic virus is out of control.   Bishop finds and fights him, but Cable manages to evade capture.  Bishop tracks Hope down to the Celestial city and tries to hunt her down.  Cable finally meets up with Hope and they get aboard a ship that is bound to leave the Earth once and for all.   Cable convinces them he’s Stryfe, but a little while later, Hope slips that he’s not and the two of them are thrown into the brig.

Bishop, Emil, and Stryfetroopers (those loyal to Stryfe’s message) attack the ship.   Not long afterwards, though, the ships are attacked by the Brood.  Bishop makes them a deal, but it costs him his freedom.   Emil manages to get Hope and Cable into two escape pods and launches them into sleep.  Bishop, bound with an Acanti, follow.

Cable and Hope, after two years in space, return to Earth.  She expresses to Cable that she’s ready to go back to the present.  Not long after this, Bishop (with the Acanti dead) tracks them down again.  He cuts Cable’s throat and goes to shoot Hope – but she uses telekinesis to stop the bullet.  She thoroughly defeats him and Cable steals his temporal components.  Cable and Hope leap back in time . . . only to end up in 1614.  Bishop, somehow tied to the time machine, travels back with them.   They fight again.  They leap again, this time 2493.  They fight again.  They leap to 1776 and fight some more.  2220.  Fight.  2224 and, hey, there’s Sophie and the Turnpike Authority!  She teams up with Cable and Hope, just as Bishop takes over some of the Authority again.  There’s a chase.  Sophie dies and Cable and Hope leap back into the past – 1933 – and proceed to fight Bishop again. They leap again, this time to 1953. Fight.  And then Cable and Hope get to relative safety and start leaping WITHOUT fight Bishop.  2043, 1967, 2019, 1978.  Oop!  There’s Bishop again.  They fight it out, Hope leaps in, and Cable presets the time components and slips it onto Bishop.  Bishop goes shooting into the future, 6700.  The world is dying and nearly dead due to all the destruction Bishop brought upon it.  Dying and with time components broken, he realizes that his actions helped shape Hope’s life just as much as Cable’s, making him her father as much as Nathan.

Hope and Cable finally jump forward just a bit, to 1991.  They raid Cable’s storage locker and then prep to arrive to the present.

Wow.  That took all day to write.

I think what’s interesting about this particular title and it’s crossover with X-Force is that it’s fairly self-contained.  It’s a straight-forward liner title that provides one big story, from beginning to end.  I really wish there were more books like this (and, to an extent, Wolverine Origins). I’m not exactly sure I can I’m satisfied by this particular story, but I do like it.  The journey that Cable, Hope, and Bishop make is rather harrowing and exciting.   The world that is created for them is quite twisted and grim; there were points where I just kept questioning “how bad is this going to get?”  And then it gets worse.

One of my beefs with this remain with Bishop’s characterization.  It’s difficult to watch him become such a villain.  The Bishop mini-series does help somewhat, but not enough to really sell that he’s gone as far as he has.  Making bargains with Stryfe and Brood?   Destroying the whole world, just on the prescedent that “it won’t exist?”  It’s a hard sell and I’m sorry to say, it just doesn’t deliever.  It also bothers me that Bishop gets such a dark fate at the end.  It makes sense, given the context of the story, but geez!

There is an argument to made that Bishop had been slowing separating himself from the X-Men for a while.  Since the dissolutionment of the X-Treme X-Men team, he went off and worked in District X as a cop.  After that, there was the time he worked with ONE and then, during the Civil War, joined Iron Man’s side against the X-Men.  Since then, there had been some tension between the two.  So, it is fair to say that Bishop really wasn’t completely on the side of angels by the time that Hope was born.  On the other hand, this was a man that worshipped the X-Men as a child and had even nearly given his life to defend them from the traitor that was Onslaught.  Now, to have the tables turned so massively, just . . . just doesn’t completely sit right.

As for Cable, well, this made for an interesting mission for him.  Cable has been one of those characters that has evolved so perfectly over the years that it makes sense that this is his next step.  What’s interesting about this is that it also forces Cable to step into the role of being a father.  In fact, the best moments of this series are the ones of Nathan learning to be a real father to Hope.  Given his track record with Tyler and, to a certain extent, Sam, it’s definitely more of a success this time around.

I’m not sure if this is the popular opinion, but I’m big fan of Hope.  I love that we see her grow – like really, literally, grow - from being a baby to being a kid to being a preteen to being a teen.  She’s showing as a constant work in progress and the moment that she decides to go back to the present is the defining one of this series.  

Scott’s role in the series is rather peripheral, but it works well.  I liked the crap Hank gives (and continues to give him) about X-Force. 

I liked the inclusion of X-Force and Deadpool into the series with the crossover, but it was a little jarring.  For over ten issues, we’re given a tour of this damned, dark world that just becomes increasingly unfamiliar.  Throwing in familiar faces like – even those like Apocalypse and Stryfe – takes us out of that world.  It’s weird to think that at any moment, Cable had the option of digging up Wade or even stealing some stuff from Apocalypse.  Or hell, releasing Apocalypse under the condition he destroy Bishop.  I imagine Apocalypse could have done something to the world that would reversed the crap Bishop did to it . . . 

All in all, this is decent storyline.   I placed it here simply so because it’s where X-Force goes and the events revolving around Messiah War are pretty tightly written.  So there we go!  Hope and Cable are on their way!

Uncanny X-Periment # 160: Sisterhood

Uncanny X-Men # 506-512

The story kicks off with the Red Queen and the Sisterhood stealing Kwannon’s body.  They take the time/space displaced Pyslocke and put her into the rejuvenated body of Kwannon and hence, under the Red Queen’s control.

The Sisterhood attack the X-Men’s base in Marin and Maddie gets a lock of Jean’s hair to use to . . . uh . . . rejuvenate Jean’s body (right?  Does this make sense?).  Emma also gets a little visit from Jean whilst she is under psychic lock-down.  No real reason given.

Anyways, they over to the school to get Jean’s body from the grave.  Scott, Logan, and some other X-Men follow, but luckily, Domino happened to be in the area and she puts another body in Jean’s grave for Maddie.  Maddie is able to take over and rejuvenate Jean’s body and dies.

Meanwhile, the X-Men battle the Sisterhood in San Francisco.  Eventually, thanks to Dazzler, Psylocke returns to her normal body.  Uh, her original body.  Uh, I mean, the body that’s Japanese and really hot.

Then, the X-Club travels back in time and battle a Steampunk Sentinel and meet Doctor Nemesis’ parents.

Sisterhood sounds like a great idea – having Maddie Pryor as the Red Queen gather some of the vilest femme fatale Muties out there and lead them against the X-Men.  Sure, outside of the Mastermind girls and Chimera, the roster was very human-heavy.  But hey, we can let Lady Deathstrike in.  She has a score or ten to settle.  And Spiral, what the heck, she was in Freedom Force.  Even bringing Psylocke in?  Sure.

But it lost itself.  It was all wrapped to tightly.  It suffered from an over-abundance of dues ex machinas, like Elixir and Domino.  The story just didn’t do anything for me.  I didn’t care about anyone I was reading about.  Moments that should have been elaborated on are cut sadly short, such as Scott’s obvious feelings about Logan having a lock of Jean’s hair.   And the Red Queen, a very legitimate villain that seems to have been waiting in the wings for a while, was dismissed far too easily.

Worst of all?  The art.  Greg Land is terrible.  All of his characters look plastic and silly.  No one seems to fit into the scene.  He grabs random X-Men and shoves them in the background, while at the same time, making the main characters look excessively glamorous.  And at least three-fourths of each issue has at least one person inappropriately smiling per page.   At least.

Ultimately, I’m disappointed.  Story potential lost.  Characters muddled.   Shitty art. 

Oh yeah, the Steampunk issue . . . it was okay.  Nothing fantastic, despite my interest in Steampunk.  It was okay, but nothing to write home about.

Uncanny X-Periment # 159: War of Kings

Secret Invasion: War of Kings, X-Men: Kingbreaker # 1-4, War of Kings # 1-6

The Inhumans, fed up with being confronted by Skrull and Earth forces, head out into space to finally deal with deal with their enemies and embrace their destiny with the Kree.  They wipe out the retreating Skrull forces, then head to Hala, intercepting some Shi’ar ships on their way.  They arrive on Hala and Ronan the Accuser hands over the empire to Black Bolt and they all arrange a marriage of power between Ronan and Crystal.

Meanwhile, Marvel Girl, Korvus and Lilandria finally locate the Starjammers.  They go to rescue the Starjammers just as they themselves break free.  A battle ensues, of course, during which Deathbird is gravely injured and Phoenix Force leaves both Korvus and Rachel.  The Starjammers flee and head to Kree space.  The Inhumans allow them to take refuge on Hala – however, the Imperial Guard strikes Hala during the wedding, injuring Ronan and taking Lilandria back to Shi’ar space.  Open war breaks out between the Kree and Shi’ar.

Vulcan is talked out of killing Lilandria by Gladiator and Admiral Ka’Ardum, as she would serve a martyr for those that still supported her.  Vulcan stays his hand and focuses on both the expansion of the empire and the war.  Soon after, the Starjammers and the Guardians of the Galaxy rescue Lilandria.  Gladiator eventually turns his back on the throne and pledges himself to her.  With Vulcan on the frontlines, Lilandria, the Starjammers, and Gladiator return to the Shi’ar homeworld to reclaim the throne.

However, her arrival is met with a riot between supporters for her and Vulcan.  Akkari and the Death Commandos arrive and the conflict grows.  Darkhawk, one of the last members of a warrior clan that was created to serve the empire and now backs Vulcan, manages to kill Lilandria.  Riots overtake the homeworld.  Gladiator is soon seen as the true source of power on the planet and the Shi’ar declare him emperor.

Meanwhile the Inhumans create the ultimate weapon – a sonic-powered version of the Terragin Mists.  It would give all the Shi’ar powers and make them equals, thus making the war moot.  Vulcan learns of this and intercepts Black Bolt and the weapon.  Black Bolt manages to defeat Vulcan just as Crystal and Lockjaw arrive.  Crystal, angry that the weapon is being used this way instead of helping the evolutionary-impared Kree, comes to Black Bolt’s rescue.  Unfortunately, just as they are teleporting away, Vulcan returns and attacks Black Bolt.   The weapon overloads and the power inside rips a hole in time and space, called the Rift – and it also takes out most of the Shi’ar military.  The Inhumans and Kree declare a very costly victory . . .

This was epic.  Having taken an interest in recent cosmic events, this was one was perhaps the best.  It actually has caused major change in the Marvel Universe, (hopefully) forever altering the political and geographic landscape of the cosmic world. 

Lilandria’s death was very brutal and I’m very disappointed to see a lack of follow-up.  But at the same time, it was nice to have things wrapping up in space.  Vulcan’s dead; Polaris, Havok, and Marvel Girl are headed back home; and the Shi’ar Empire is a mess.  Again. 

It definitely left me wanting more.

Uncanny X-Periment # 158: Dark Reign

Uncanny X-Men # 504-505, Secret Invasion: Dark Reign, Uncanny X-Men Annual: Emma Frost, Uncanny X-Men # 506-507, Dark Avengers # 1, Wolverine: Origins # 33-40

Norman Osborne is running the show now.  As Emma begins to understand that Scott is keeping secrets, she goes off and joins the Cabal alongside the like of Namor, Doom, Osborne, Hood, and Loki.  It’s pretty cool to see them all together and certainly makes me wishes they had just gone off and fought the Illuminati.  Oh well.

While they’re in the city, she and Namor head off and snag Shaw for crimes Shaw helped commit to Atlantis back in the day.  Shaw is then taken prisoner by Emma Frost and is held in the X-Men’s basement/brig.  Meanwhile, word breaks that Cooperstown was wiped out due to a Mutant being born there.  Former Mutants show up at the compound looking for refuge.

Colossus, to help clear his head, goes off and joins a Russian mob and eventually finds some former mutants who had been brought to America illegally as slave labor and hookers.  Colossus takes them back to the compound, and then he and Emma stomp the mob.

Meanwhile, Maddie is gathering together a Sisterhood which includes Spiral and a being-repaired Lady Deathstrike. 

As this occurs, Beast and Archangel begin to assemble the X-Club, including Doctor Nemesis, Box, and Doctor Yurkio Takiguchi.  They fight Godzilla-lit.

Back in New York City, Osborne assembles his Avengers – Sentry, Ares, Spider-Man (Venom), Marvel Boy, Ms. Marvel (Moonstone), Hawkeye (Bullseye), Wolverine (Daken), and himself, the Iron Patriot.  Nick Fury goes to Logan in a bar about this.  In exchange for information about Daken, Fury promises information about the Weapon X Project.  Logan agrees.

Fury reveals that Logan’s mother was part of the Hudson family – a name that’s been haunting him for years (honestly, it’s insanely complicated – head over to UncannyXmen.net for a better and fuller review).  One of the Hudsons fathered three sons: the Weapon X Professor; Victor Hudson; and James Hudson, the Alpha Flight guy.  The Hudsons have been the pawns of Romulus for generations.  Weapon X was eventually built to control Wolverine and make him better.  Stronger.  And when Wolverine joined the X-Men, Romulus focused his attention on Daken.

Daken is looking to get a hold of the Muramasa Blade and use it become the next Weapon X.  Using his place as an Avenger, he draws Cyclops and the X-Men to New York.  Frost confronts Osborne about calling Daken off, but he claims to not know what he’s up to.  Daken fights the X-Men and (eventually) Wolverine and beats ‘em.  The swords breaks and Daken takes part of it.  Cyclops gives the sword back to Wolverine, damning his mission.

Fury tracks down the Tinkerer, who uses the sword to lace Daken’s claws ala Wolverine.  Wolverine goes after Daken, but is confronted by Victor Hudson.  They fight for a while and Wolverine tracks Hudson to a train.  This train leads him to Daken, who reveals that Romulus is on the train.  Wolverine tells Daken that he let Romulus go to save him.  Daken stabs Logan and leaves.

Wolverine tracks the train and Victor Hudson and he is eventually led to a prison in Russia, where he finds the recovered Carbonadium Synthesizer – and Omega Red.  They fight for a while before Omega Red gets taken down and Wolverine leaves.  Injured, Wild Child shows up to finish him off.   Wild Child tells Wolverine that the past few events have been a competition of sorts to find Romulus’ successor.  All that’s left are the two of them, Daken, Cyber, and Omega Red.  Wolverine, of course, gets the advantage of Wild Child and kills him.  Two days later, he gets a package from Black Widow: the Muramasa Blade.  He uses this to kill Omega Red and then finds himself face-to-face with Romulus himself.  They fight, Wolverine eventually loses, and Romulus leaves him to continue to be tested.

We’ll start with Wolverine Origins portion first.  I liked that Way has found a way to bring in the X-Men and the current state of the Marvel Universe that progresses the story.  While I’m not completely fond of the overall Origins story, I found this to be a nice step forward and it’s great to have some momentum going.  Romulus was a major disappointment overall and I’m actually wondering if he was supposed to be from the beginning.

The X-Men stuff . . . hmm . . . well, I liked the X-Club even though they’re pretty snotty.  I liked that Emma and Scott both have secrets and it’s creating tension between them.  I like that stuff.  But I’m not excited by any of the subplots.  The lack of focus and clarity on the characters harms the issues.  I’m not pleased with the way Cyclops just told Colossus to “hit something and get better.”  The scene where Nightcrawler and Colossus were going to sit down and talk was something I was anticipating – and then Cyclops walks in with Emma and they act like snobby assholes towards him.  Like I said, I’m not impressed.

The Uncanny Return

Those few that follow this blog should be interested in this bit of news -- the actual Uncanny X-Periment will be returning very shortly!

Basically, after the January 2008 release of "Messiah Complex," the X-Periment slowly began to come to a halt.  A lot of this had to do with needing to keep to up with current books.  As you can imagine, getting stories into chronological order as they're being released is very difficult.  Plus, family and financial demands had slowed my ability to get anything done.

So that being said, I feel I'm in a place where I can start up-dating again.   I still have some back-issue catching up to do, but my goal is to be done at AvsX by the end of the year.   I know this seems awfully silly, but I'm the sole provider for a family of four and I need to make sure that my money is going to my family first.   December 2013 seems like a solid goal for this.

Now, I want to lay down some ground rules.  First and foremost, some clarification.   In the beginning, the Uncanny X-Periment's goal was to focus only on the core X-Men titles -- Uncanny X-Men, Astonishing X-Men, X-Men (Legacy/New), and X-Treme X-Men (Volume One).  We would go and focus on the spin-off titles only when it's a critical story and/or would lead into or affect the core X-Men narrative.  A good example of this is the ramp-up to "Operation: Zero Tolerance."  Because of Jubilee getting kidnapped by Bastian and playing a semi-large role in the crossover, it was important to include issues of Generation X. 

Things have certainly changed in the past few years, as using the name "X-Men" to just about any X-related title seems to be the current trend.   I'm not saying this is a bad thing at all; it's just that we need to kinda determine which ones I'm  going to stick with and which I'm not.

To that end, here's what will be focused on, pre-AvsX:

- Wolverine and the X-Men
- Uncanny X-Men

Uncanny X-Force, X-Men Legacy, Astonishing X-Men, and, uh, other X-Men will receive some of the spotlight.   But these titles will mostly be regulated to the aforementioned, "spin-off" status that the actual spin-offs occupied before.  Don't worry -- key stories such as "The Dark Angel Saga" and "Age of X" will still be covered.  Just not every story will be covered.  This is mainly due to financial reasons, but also because I don't want to go insane from having to figure out how these all fit into the overall chronological narrative.

So, post-AvsX and NOW! titles will (tenatively) include:

- Wolverine and the X-Men
- Uncanny X-Men
- All-New X-Men
- Uncanny Avengers

Astonishing X-Men, X-Men Legacy,  X-Treme X-Men (Volume 2), Cable and X-Force, and Uncanny X-Force will not be included, unless we come across a critical event or storyline.  I will probably pick up some of the trades or back issues as time progresses, but we'll see.  This is another reason why I'm sticking with just getting to AvsX this year.  X-Men X-Men (the all girl team) hasn't come yet, but I haven't made up my mind about it.

My logic behind just picking those four title is pretty clear: Wolverine and the X-Men, Uncanny X-Men, and All-New X-Men focuses on the central X-Men team(s) and continues the core narrative of the X-Men's universe.   Uncanny Avengers is a pretty cool experiment unto itself - I like the idea of Xavier's dream in practice.  It feels like the "big story" title, which the biggest and hottest Marvel stories will be told.  It should be interesting.

With all this being  said, it's important to note that there will be, eventually, I hope, non-X-Periment X-Men posts made here.  Possibly.  If I have the time.

Suggestions, arguments, disagreements, complaints, thoughts, theories, criticisms, please feel free to share!