Well, here we are, another week, another set o’ comics. I was surprised to see that Marvel was kind of bogarting the books when it came to the previews this time. Sure, they put the big issue everyone’s been dying to see since they trotted out ‘Clor’ over in an 8-page preview at Newsarama, but no full issue.
Right now? I think it’s because they are getting it over with as fast as possible to get JMS back to his navel-gazing story. At Comic Con, they admitted that the God of Thunder won’t be really integrated with the Marvel Universe until June or so to give Straczynski all the breathing room he wants to put Thor back into place. Just think of him as a really bad parallel parker; he’s going to need time, patience and a lot of repetition.
Anyhow, in the eight pages we see, not only do we get to see Thor lament over the Hurricane Katrina Disaster (which, quick aside - that’s kind of tacky. I don’t want to read a lot into the preview or anything, but please notice how all the heroes showed up en masse for the 9/11 tribute to help or just shed a tear, but Black Panther I think was the only comic to deal with the hurricane trauma and here it is in a horrible state that the Initiative doesn’t seem to be handling. Let’s face it, real world tragedies that can be EASILY FIXED BY THE CAST are a little more than awkward in a comic book. Just tacky. Anyhow… ). And then Iron Man shows up and pretty callously just huckers Thor into the Initiative, seeing him again as less of a friend and more of an asset. Thor, rightfully, gets mad and we start the lighting and the thundaaah.
That’s a lot to go down in eight pages for the pacing of this book and I just have this tickling feeling that the fight is going to go down quick and fast, leaving Iron Man beaten up but completely healed off panel and otherwise perfectly able to continue the path he’s been walking since Civil War. Especially after seeing him escape World War Hulk with a boo-boo or two but able to continue to be the Director of SHIELD and continue to promote and help enforce the Registration Act and continue to be the jerk we’ve come to know and tolerate. No, your negligence with your friends and comrades should lead to some result, actions should equal consequences and if the super-hero community doesn’t turn their back on him soon, if he doesn’t lose his authority kick… hell, if he doesn’t lose SOMETHING other than his INTEGRITY…
Ah, what do I know? Here’s the comics I did read in their entirety.
It’s sort of Trauma’s show, the guy with the power to manifest your worst fear. Maybe I haven’t been paying attention, but it seems like everyone stepped aside a moment to talk about what it is he actually does, which is actually becoming that worst fear physically, with all the attributes thereof. So, someone’s scared of Thor, BOOM, you got your Thor is you stick Trauma in front of the guy. Gyrich, true to form, sees him as a weapon while the mentor pulled in from the Xavier School, Dani Moonstar, sees him as someone to help heal people’s worst psychosis. While he gets to sort this moral conundrum all out, Trauma’s sent on a mission with a super secret team of super secret people with a super secret mutant. That’s right, another one. She is super duper special as she’s a fantastic fighter, doesn’t have to go to briefings, can only be used once per mission and a whole bunch other caveats design to make her mysterious and bad ass to the reader. The super secret team is called on to go get the idiots from last issue with their heart on their heart on their sleeves who thought they could go try and take down the Hulk when we’ve seen pretty much every super-team fall to the Green Goliath. We’re told that unsurprisingly, they were defeated and imprisoned so SST needs to go in covertly and get them ut before the media finds out another young hero team thought they could take on people much stronger than them and might have caused an incident. Team recovered, it looks like Trauma’s going to go the healing path and that the Hulk is officially afraid of nothing anymore.
Good issue, like I said. But, it’s just those little rough edges…
First Issue: Hulk shows up wanting to know if he should theoretically kick Xavier’s keister depending on how he would have theoretically voted in the big ‘Send Hulk Into Space’ Illuminati debate.
Second Issue: Xavier feels Spider-Man levels of guilt for his bad decisions of late, admits he probably would have voted to send Hulk ‘away’ while they found a cure (but yet not into space) and surrenders peacefully. The X-Men, having seen the title of the book, tell Xavier to sit down, shut up and let them slug it out. He tries, bless his little bald heart, but the entirety of the current available mutants seem set on protect him and/or just beating up the Hulk. Things get interesting when Cain Marko (recently losing his Juggernaut-like powers) enters the fray, but hasn’t yet made the right deal with the Crimson Gem of Cyttorak for the right power boost. The Hulk continues to smash many mutants.
This Issue: The smashing continues! Hightlights: M getting punted and told to ‘go be invulnerable in Jersey’! Hepzibah pilots the Blackbird to crash into the Hulk! Logan gets brain damage! This is all just good slug-out fun and it just gets better when Cain, finally realizing that the Gem just wants him to be his old villainous self again, finally commits to evil, gets his armor back and IT’S ON LIKE DONKEY KONG! Contractors salivate as the X-Mansion again is demolished to smithereens and finally, the voice of a child rings true. Unsurprisingly, it’s one of the New X-Men kids who snaps, Cessily Kincaid who battles Hulk to the GIANT GRAVEYARD outside the school and tells him that, look dude, sure you’re life was hard but we watch our pregnant wives and utopian cities that accept us and our great accomplishments die fbefore breakfast. Since all this misery is ‘all Xavier’s fault’, Hulk considers this fair punishment and jumps on home to smash people who aren’t so pathetic. The X-Men regroup, repair and heal.
I love this issue. I loved these issues. There is so much good here, everyone should have a copy.
Hey, not a lot of reviews this week, but they didn’t send me all that much. Maybe we’ll make up for it by picking up some comics and reviewing them on Ye Olde Lunch Breake?
STAY TUNED!
