Alpha Flight #7 – Cheap plug, good issue. If you’re gonna have an Alpha Flight miniseries with this much action going on then you have to have Wolverine make an appearance. Cheers to the return of Sasquatch, and Aurora just gets better and better every single issue. I am still unclear if next issue is the last issue is the last issue or not because it says limited series but I had heard a rumor that the series had been upgraded to Ongoing. Loving the Unity/Alpha Strike storyline, and can’t wait to see how it ends!
Angel & Faith #5 – Any issue Harmony is a home run and, then you add Clem to the mix and it’s a grand slam! The whole thing was so cute and made for a nice break in the tension from last issue. Reminds me of Angel the Series seasons 2 and 3 with the campy interlude episodes they used to do. I really hope we see more of Harmony and her celebrity zaniness. Looking forward to the next arc in the series now.
Annihilators: Earthfall #4 – Oh My God! Is it finally over!? Ever since Annihilation and House of M (or at least its spin-offs), the Marvel cosmic landscape has been on a roller coaster of storylines and crossovers and at the conclusion of Annihilators: Earth it seems to finally been at a conclusion. Just to make sure we’re all on the same page Anniliation lead into Annihilation: Conquest, which then brought the space heroes into the War of Kings. Meanwhile on Earth we had the House of M which caused Son of M and Deadly Genesis which then led to Silent War and Emperor Vulcan respectively, Emperor Vulcan then went to the Rise and Fall of the Shi’ar Empire and then all the various storylines intersected in War of Kings. Following the War of Kings we had the Realm of Kings and then the Thanos Imperative followed by Annihilators and the Annihilators: Earthfall. Well at the end of Earthfall we don’t see a splash to the next cosmic crossover, we saw an ad for Point One, which is already out and is leading us to all the next big storylines (coughcoughPhoenixcoughcough). As far as the storyline itself, it was fun. I love the characters on the team and it’s always great watching the Avengers be stupid and pigheaded as they fight everyone else before the talk to them. Looking forward to Phoenix 2012 and all future things cosmic!
Astonishing X-men #45 – Snore! This storyline is ridiculous. Obviously when the writers were overhauling all the titles for ReGenesis they all decided to worry about Astonishing later on. As far as cross-timeline stories go, it’s pretty weak, and I don’t even really see the point of it. Maybe I am just missing something and it will all make sense next issue.
Avengers Solo #3 – Eh…still bored. I mean there’s plenty of excitement and action but there just doesn’t seem to be any real point to this series. It seem like a standard damsel in distress scenario but that is a little weird if you consider that he’s dating Spider-Woman at the moment. On the other hand, the Avengers Academy back up story is awesome. And it just make my theory about reforming the Avengers West Coast team even stronger with Alkhema showing up at the end, an old AWC enemy from early in the series.
FF #13 – Right off the bat, I like that the Fantastic Four was removed from cast list at the beginning. It shows that this series really won’t be focusing on them very much which I like. This series has at least kept things exciting and innovative for the most part. I like the Celestials and Doom interacting, it’s always a good time to see Doom way over play his hand since it always leads to him getting screwed. I really hope all this Celestial stuff in all the Marvel books (especially over in X-men with the Dreamer) is leading somewhere because if it’s not then I’m going to be sorely disappointed.
Secret Avengers #20 – NICE! Not a title-saving issue but definitely a huge improvement from what they’ve been giving us. It was a little dicey following this time traveling trek as we weaved through timeframes but I muddled through! I love the new element they introduced, which is often glossed over: changing time not so something doesn’t happen but so that the same event has a different outcome. She still had to allow herself to get into that fight and do the time jump or everything would have been different. It took a few read through but I like what the writers were going for with this! There are rumors abound about new cast members coming soon so here’s hoping that the new blood in the mix brings this sagging, lagging book back from the dead.
Uncanny X-Force #19 – A bit of a slow feel to the issue. More like an epilogue to the Dark Angel Saga then a prologue to whatever is happening next with X-Force. I’m still a bit upset about how things ended with Warren but I am sure he will get his memory back at some point. Some exciting Jean Grey School developments though! Kitty and Beast find out about X-Force, Apocalypse Jr. joins the student body! All good things but probably won’t affect this book very much. Nightcrawler’s reaction to Kitty “I don’t know you! I am not your friend” was a bit harsh. He should have been warned to be more gracious to people in this timeline. And is The World now a robot and a member of the team?? Kinda strange but I’ll give it a chance. I think good stuff is on the rise for X-Force but this particular issue could have been a little more engaging.
Uncanny X-men #3 – Hm…not the best ending but it got the job done. The first two issues of this series were amazing, so maybe it was just not AS good as these first two. Either way, Sinister was defeated. Emma’s arm? Still not attached so I can’t wait to see how they deal with that next issue. Most important of all though is more Celestial wackiness ensued (again I hope that all this Celestial stuff is going somewhere, if not during the Phoenix storyline then in the following one). And of course what did we gain from this? The slightest glimmer of admiration from the on looking crowds…maybe Cyclops’ way has some merit to it.
Vengeance #6 – Well, I waited all the way until the very end…and I still have no idea what just happened. If I am not mistaken there was a Extinction Level Event that occurred with a bunch of no name heroes and villains (plus Beak and Angel) and somehow it didn’t have any effect on the world at large. Still it was fun to read and maybe when I go back and read the whole series at once, I will understand what it was that I missed.
X-men: Legacy #260 – Talk about your actions biting you in the ass! Just so we are all clear, Rogue left because all of Cyclops’ demotion of her gave her a new purpose. That’ll learn ya One-Eye! And they tied up a bunch of dangling plot lines: Korvus is gone, Rogue and Magneto finally do it, and Ariel is back! Ok that last one wasn’t exactly a dangling plot but it’s still pretty cool. Next issue should be a treat, watching Gambit and Frenzy integrate into the school as teachers won’t go nearly as smoothly as they are hoping I am sure.
