So yesterday I sat down and read in a binge the entirety of Second Coming. Continuing where Cable ended, Second Coming begins with the pair’s return to the present, only to be imeediately met with gunfire and a cross-country chase. So off the bat my expectations were met as all the X teams mobilized to get this girl home.
Bastion as a villain worked nicely, since his whole purpose was to wipe out all mutants, and as a result stop Hope at all costs, but the two have never actually met. The story itself never let up the dire circumstances of keeping Hope safe, stating that only 181 mutants were left and several of those number fall before the battle is over.
Naturally, as in most crossover stories like this, people die and relationships change. For starters, Cyclops order for X-Force to finally use lethal force and to keep their existence secret finally comes to a head as the mutant community is divided on the decision. Nightcrawler especially opposes this shortly before his death, one that firmly stated the gloves were off.
Cable and Hope finally separate for the final time as Cable sacrifices himself to save X-Force and bring them home from their successful plan to sabotage Bastion’s plan to bring advanced Nimrod Sentinels from the future to wipe out the mutants. I really appreciated that the Avengers and Fantastic Four show up for this one to assist, giving the X-Men more relation to the Marvel universe that they typically get (except for maybe Wolverine).
But naturally what everyone wanted to know finally gets answered: What exactly is Hope’s power? Well that sort of gets answered in we actually see her use her abilities, but it is never clear what the full extent of her abilities are. For starters, she can mimic mutant powers (which was kind of funny to see Bastion and his lackeys get shredded with as a result), use telepathy to some extent, activate mutant powers in others, and so on. Literally I feel this character is going to replace Jean Grey as the swiss army knife of the X-men team in that she is left open to do just about anything.
I was disappointed in how easily the villains fell in this story though. All the main enemies were killed with almost no difficulty (Ok there was some difficulty but not as much as expected). Typically one person would get wounded or killed then he would just get stabbed or shot and that was that. Even Bastion, the big bad, arrived only to have Hope rip him apart with her bare hands (again, literally).
But overall, Second Coming fulfilled my expectations. People died, especially main characters. Seeing Bastion’s plan come together after years of reading felt satisfying, along with watching Hope develop as a character. Cable and Nightcrawler definitely got the send off they deserved, and the others just got blown away like cannon fodder, intensifying the storyline. It was good to see the X-Men develop as they went to Hell and back (literally again, they actually went to Hell at one point) and satisfying till the end.
Sunday, March 27, 2011
Sunday, March 20, 2011
Get Ready
With next week being the review of Second Coming (insert anxious gasp here), I felt that it would be appropriate to review the series Cable.
Cable is one of the X-men titles that spawned off the Messiah Complex arc (the first in the trilogy of arcs that Second Coming concludes). The series follows Cable (obviously) as he carries the baby mutant Hope further into the future to raise her away from all the bad things happening to the mutants in the present. Sadly, the renegade Bishop (a mutant cop from the future who was put in a concentration camp after Hope killed a million people in six minutes (did I forget to mention Hope can be good or evil?) in one version of her future) and is constantly trying to kill her.
For starters, it is good to finally see Cable down for the count more times than not considering he is considered one of the more powerful X-Men characters. I felt that his constant sacrifice to protect Hope really fleshed out his character after it has become so watered down over the past years. I’m pleased, yet feel guilty for saying so, that I was often unsure if Cable would survive some of the arcs, which goes to say something about the writing.
My favorite aspect of the series though was obviously watching the character Hope grow up over the 25 issues from a baby to an adult. Each time they jumped further into the future, the series would often skip a few years until by the end, Cable and Hope are both much older the when the series started, and Hope has learned quite a bit about how to survive (her first act of war was when she was a toddler and she stabbed the cockroach President of the United States in the face).
My biggest issue with the series is that each time it skips forward, the audience is introduced to a new post apocalyptic setting resulting from either Bishop, Stryfe, or war that makes each time they time travel worse and worse. As a result, we never really become attached to any specific setting and often we are lost to what is happening around Cable and Hope. This causes the series to be a more character driven piece, but we lose some of the tension as a result of lack of setting.
This is somewhat played at near the end when they return home and begin jumping back through all the places they’ve visited over the series. It’s funny to see Hope’s reaction as she meets parental figures she never knew, attempts to drive despite never seeing a car before, and also as she learns to swear, much to Cable’s disapproval.
I really did feel like they ignored the whole mutant messiah or antichrist aspect for Hope over the series, baring it down to Bishop hunting her because he’s from the future she was evil, and Cable protecting her since he’s from the good one. We do see a little bit of Hope’s dark side emerge from time to time as she ruthlessly survives the wastelands and when she finally stands up to Bishop and brutally defeats him, but this never really shows her potential for evil which her whole character was created for.
Cable is one of the X-men titles that spawned off the Messiah Complex arc (the first in the trilogy of arcs that Second Coming concludes). The series follows Cable (obviously) as he carries the baby mutant Hope further into the future to raise her away from all the bad things happening to the mutants in the present. Sadly, the renegade Bishop (a mutant cop from the future who was put in a concentration camp after Hope killed a million people in six minutes (did I forget to mention Hope can be good or evil?) in one version of her future) and is constantly trying to kill her.
For starters, it is good to finally see Cable down for the count more times than not considering he is considered one of the more powerful X-Men characters. I felt that his constant sacrifice to protect Hope really fleshed out his character after it has become so watered down over the past years. I’m pleased, yet feel guilty for saying so, that I was often unsure if Cable would survive some of the arcs, which goes to say something about the writing.
My favorite aspect of the series though was obviously watching the character Hope grow up over the 25 issues from a baby to an adult. Each time they jumped further into the future, the series would often skip a few years until by the end, Cable and Hope are both much older the when the series started, and Hope has learned quite a bit about how to survive (her first act of war was when she was a toddler and she stabbed the cockroach President of the United States in the face).
My biggest issue with the series is that each time it skips forward, the audience is introduced to a new post apocalyptic setting resulting from either Bishop, Stryfe, or war that makes each time they time travel worse and worse. As a result, we never really become attached to any specific setting and often we are lost to what is happening around Cable and Hope. This causes the series to be a more character driven piece, but we lose some of the tension as a result of lack of setting.
This is somewhat played at near the end when they return home and begin jumping back through all the places they’ve visited over the series. It’s funny to see Hope’s reaction as she meets parental figures she never knew, attempts to drive despite never seeing a car before, and also as she learns to swear, much to Cable’s disapproval.
I really did feel like they ignored the whole mutant messiah or antichrist aspect for Hope over the series, baring it down to Bishop hunting her because he’s from the future she was evil, and Cable protecting her since he’s from the good one. We do see a little bit of Hope’s dark side emerge from time to time as she ruthlessly survives the wastelands and when she finally stands up to Bishop and brutally defeats him, but this never really shows her potential for evil which her whole character was created for.
Sunday, March 6, 2011
Dark Times Has Nothing on This
With the series coming to a close (again), this week’s choice is Star Wars Legacy. Set over 130 years after the first Star Wars movie, the series mainly focuses on Luke Skywalker’s great-grandson and the Sith who have taken over the Empire and the galaxy.
Cade Skywalker is a unique protagonist not only in the fact that he is a Skywalker that refuses to acknowledge his Jedi heritage, but that he utilizes both the light and dark side for his purposes. I enjoyed seeing a hero who would sudden have his eyes turn gold as he went to the dark side, then watching him lash out at friend and foe alike, which is understandable seeing as the Jedi are all but gone, and the Empire is soon to follow as of the beginning of the story. But Cade is not the only anti-hero character, as others succumb to their anger, and use it to destroy their enemies in a most unorthodox fashion. I admit at the end of the series, when Darth Krayt comes back to life stronger than ever and sends a call out to all the Sith, only one of the good guys was unable to hear the call.
Probably the greatest downfall of Legacy is that there are multiple stories occurring at once. There’s Cade and his crew’s story, his Imperial Moff mother and her secret identity as a spy, his sister who is ignorant of her relation to Cade and her desire to kill him, the Sith and Krayt’s desire to fully turn Cade, the resistance under Admiral Stazi, and the Empire under the Fel Leadership as it tries to hold out and retake the throne. Sound like a lot? I agree.
But this is tedious but necessary. For most of the series it is annoying that the characters I want to read about don’t appear for months at a time, but these other stories flesh out the setting and slowly weave together as the story concludes. And I have to say, it made it stronger as a result.
On a personal note, my biggest disappointment was the delivery of Darth Krayt. He first appeared as a Jedi survivor of purge that occurred in the movies who rejoined the Tusken Raiders and was eventually defeated and lost an arm by Kenobi when he attempted to attack Luke’s home. Krayt then met the Yuuzhan Vong, who replaced his missing limb with organic material that slowly consumes his body and requires him to need Cade to heal him. Thus, despite a strong first appearance as a Sith Lord and main antagonist in the series, Krayt soon becomes whiney and weak over his constant complaining over the Vong implants. Luckily this changes after he returns from the dead, making his appearance in the conclusion series, Legacy – War, extremely epic.
Overall, I liked seeing a Star Wars series where the lines between good and evil are blurred. While everyone knows what side they’re on (except maybe for the Skywalker family), their methods are always in question. Only a few characters seem completely in control of their emotions, and those are often the ones unable to fight.
While there has been a long series of upstanding Jedi characters in the Skywalker family (Ben, Leia, Jaina, Anakin (Solo), Kol, Nat, Mara, Sai, ect.) and many who have fallen (Jacen, Vader, Luke, ect.), this is the first time I’ve seen someone walk the line of good and evil since Quinlan Vos.
Cade Skywalker is a unique protagonist not only in the fact that he is a Skywalker that refuses to acknowledge his Jedi heritage, but that he utilizes both the light and dark side for his purposes. I enjoyed seeing a hero who would sudden have his eyes turn gold as he went to the dark side, then watching him lash out at friend and foe alike, which is understandable seeing as the Jedi are all but gone, and the Empire is soon to follow as of the beginning of the story. But Cade is not the only anti-hero character, as others succumb to their anger, and use it to destroy their enemies in a most unorthodox fashion. I admit at the end of the series, when Darth Krayt comes back to life stronger than ever and sends a call out to all the Sith, only one of the good guys was unable to hear the call.
Probably the greatest downfall of Legacy is that there are multiple stories occurring at once. There’s Cade and his crew’s story, his Imperial Moff mother and her secret identity as a spy, his sister who is ignorant of her relation to Cade and her desire to kill him, the Sith and Krayt’s desire to fully turn Cade, the resistance under Admiral Stazi, and the Empire under the Fel Leadership as it tries to hold out and retake the throne. Sound like a lot? I agree.
But this is tedious but necessary. For most of the series it is annoying that the characters I want to read about don’t appear for months at a time, but these other stories flesh out the setting and slowly weave together as the story concludes. And I have to say, it made it stronger as a result.
On a personal note, my biggest disappointment was the delivery of Darth Krayt. He first appeared as a Jedi survivor of purge that occurred in the movies who rejoined the Tusken Raiders and was eventually defeated and lost an arm by Kenobi when he attempted to attack Luke’s home. Krayt then met the Yuuzhan Vong, who replaced his missing limb with organic material that slowly consumes his body and requires him to need Cade to heal him. Thus, despite a strong first appearance as a Sith Lord and main antagonist in the series, Krayt soon becomes whiney and weak over his constant complaining over the Vong implants. Luckily this changes after he returns from the dead, making his appearance in the conclusion series, Legacy – War, extremely epic.
Overall, I liked seeing a Star Wars series where the lines between good and evil are blurred. While everyone knows what side they’re on (except maybe for the Skywalker family), their methods are always in question. Only a few characters seem completely in control of their emotions, and those are often the ones unable to fight.
While there has been a long series of upstanding Jedi characters in the Skywalker family (Ben, Leia, Jaina, Anakin (Solo), Kol, Nat, Mara, Sai, ect.) and many who have fallen (Jacen, Vader, Luke, ect.), this is the first time I’ve seen someone walk the line of good and evil since Quinlan Vos.
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