Generation-X #4: Christmas Special? (1995)

I picked up the next generation-X from the comic store [I own #1-3], and so far I really like this series. It's neat to read what was coming out the year I was born. The highlight for me is the Chris Bachalo art. He is the same artist who is working on Wolverine and the X-men. The writing by Scott Lobdell isn't too bad most of the time, and overall this is a neat series to read if not just for the art.

I keep forgetting to pick up issue -1! It's a bit harder to find.

I'll start with the cover. This issue is the so-called “Holiday Spectacular” and the cover is kinda lame compared to the last 3. It is arrangement of snapshots and previews for events in the comic. Even though it's simple and fun, I still think this cover is a 3.5/5. It doesn’t live up to the other awesome covers that I loved, and it's boring overall.

Page 1/inner cover:

oh my god! The inner cover is an ad for the live-action street fighter movie! :D that's funny.

Anyway, focus...

there's a little elf hanging above the page narrating the story. It names all the mutants, and I’ll talk about them here.

M has a whole bunch of powers from flight to super-strength, a grab-bag pretty much. Similar to Captain Marvel, I think.

Skin has the mutant power of...having a ton of extra skin, gross...Skin was also known as Angelo. Angelo was actually killed in that one issue of x-men that Linkara reviewed from Chuck Austin’s X-men, and that’s where I remember him from.

Sync has the power to “sync” up and mimic other people's superpowers, it seems to be based on an aura.

Finally, Jubilee...who really needs no introduction. For reference, her power is creating firework-like energy bursts. After Curse of the Mutants, jubilee got turned into a vampire [yes, really] and is currently working on her own personal life.

The leaders of the young mutant team are Banshee and Emma Frost.

Back to the plot: The mutants are hidden inside a truck headed towards Maine as a man with a gun approaches. I really like the way the snow effects are done here. The page edges are also decorated with colorful bells, very cool!

Page 2-5: For some reason the page is labeled as “page 4” by an elf holding a sign at the bottom of the page. It's still a cool page marker. Banshee [AKA Sean Cassidy] is greeted by a group of armed policeman as he drives into a roadblock. He says the students from the Massachusetts Xavier School are on a field trip.

Turns out that the sign at the bottom is leading to page 4, not actually page 4. Also, the credits are given here with a cool Christmas time as well as labeling it “Generation X-mas”. Nice touch.

The police are also aiming a gun at a local school. They are ordering a mutant to come out.

Inside you see Eliot, someone who actually looks like a realistic type of mutant hunchback. He just wants the police to leave him alone and learn at the school. The public doesn’t seem too willing to help him though.

Page 6: The story shifts to the Xavier School, and I'd like to add that the narration boxes are a bit weird. I think the narrator is supposed to be an elf or something. Overall they don't really ruin the issue. Also this page has a decorative border...I guess since it's a different place? Anyway, Penance is sitting in a bio-chamber hanging out with butterflies. Penance isn't really a person, it's actually some kind of armor that is being possessed. She uses sharp claws and spikes and has diamond hard skin. She is apparently present at Avengers Academy nowadays.

Page 7-8: Chamber arrives to greet Penance using psychic communication [seems like he wouldn't be able to talk since his face is full of energy stuff]. Chamber's power is that he basically has psionic energy engulfing his chest and face. It also seems to change color with mood, since it is purplish-blue in this panel while it is normally orange. Also in the base is husk and emma, who I know enough about already. It should be known that when the x-men broke apart husk and chamber both joined wolverine at his school, while emma went with cyclops. He was most recently shown in the new X-men Legacy.

Emma mentions that Paige [Husk] is very similar to her when she was young.

Page 9-10: Back to the bell-like page borders! As the police talk about Eliot the monster, a bad guy of some type is hiding in an ice cream truck and plotting something. The truck was in the background for a few scenes. Meanwhile, Banshee knocks a patrolman out with a sonic frequency and watches the scene from the rooftop with Sync. I like how the comic mixes these elves into the panel layout. One moment they're holding a panel and in another they're sleeping off one panel. Banshee has Sync try to copy Elliot’s power to see what his abilities are.

Page 11-14: The next page shows that Skin and M have disabled the police SWAT team. Speaking of the police, the officer explains how he doesn’t want anyone to be “contaminated” by the mutant inside the school. What a jerk. Jubilee acts as a scout, hiding in the crowd. Eliot yells back at the police that he isn't being treated fairly. Sync locks unto an aura, but he reports that it is not coming from the school...it's coming from the ice cream truck.

Page 15-18: This villain in really heavy armor bursts out of the truck in a full page shot. He is the “Orphan Maker”.

Apparently, he makes orphans out of mutants because he thinks that parents who abandon their mutant children should be killed. As the armed attacker shoots at Elliot’s parents, banshee unleashes a sonic blast! He stops the bullets, which seem to be made out of the villain’s bones. M then smashes into the attacker with super-strength. M says that according to the records, this guy is a mutant hunter. Skin then jumps on top of the orphan maker, making it hard for him to see.

Page 19-23:

Meanwhile, Jubilee sneaks into the school and tries to force Eliot to calm down with her tiny fireworks.

In a moment ripped straight from Of Mice and Men, it seems that the massive Eliot has already crushed his teacher after holding him. Well technically all the commotion gave him a heart attack...but whatever. Skin's uh, skin ends up jamming the orphan maker's armor and banshee actually lets him GET AWAY. Let it also be noted that Angelo has problems using his powers since it gives him headaches controlling the extra skin.

Oh and guess what! Eliot isn't even a mutant [in the x-men sense], he's just deformed. Looks like I was right on that one.

Page 24:Jubilee chimes in with a promo for Generation neXt, part of the Age of Apocalypse crossover. It replaced this title for four issues. Apparently all the X-titles were replaced like this, and I collected some examples like X-Man and Gambit and the Xternals, ect..

The issue gets a 5/10 for me. The narration and strange borders are more distracting than interesting, and half the characters are only given 2 pages of screen time. Plus the villain gets away and a civilian is dead. Don't forget that the main focus of the issue is barely a mutant (I'll forgive that). Anyway, the idea is that this issue is totally pointless overall. Nothing really went down and besides the art and snow effects. Plus strange page borders and annoying elf narrators. I didn't really find anything good in it compared to the other issues.

I'm going to be reading generation neXt digitally, just to see what's up.

Nova (2013) #10

Nova #10 by Zeb Wells and art by Carlo Barberi + David Lopez
It's strange how many times this book is going to change writers, since we have Zeb doing most of the tie-in issues, and then Gerry Duggan (of deadpool fame) continuing from there and he gets a spotlight in this 100th issue special.

We continue with Sam talking with the New Warriors and fantasizing about being a big-name hero. Ironically, even in New Warriors #1 he wasn't even really in...but that issue came out 3 months later. What I'm saying is that he hasn't fully JOINED with the team even in that team's book (though in comic-time it obviously didn't take up 3 months of time and more like a day or so).

I also really hate the way Sam is drawn by this Artist. He looks really unfinished, short, and cartoony. Even Justice looks really washed out when he's drawn. Having to work on my own series actually helps me judge this art more. Honestly, this style does remind me of how my own series looks. At best, it actually looks a bit inconstant when it does look good.

While Speedball and Justice are now living with Sam, we get to see Carrie again (after a while between the tie-ins) who points out that she saw Sam dressed as Nova. I'm more surprised that she knows what Nova's costume (ie: Richard Rider) looks like. Do the people in the Marvel Universe have a Handbook like we do, or is this kinda stuff all over the internet. I'm now imagining a "Superhero Spotting" subreddit or something.

Anyway, Carrie storms off since Sam probably should have told her before. I'm actually wondering if she's going to appear again, cause I could understand if the writer(s) don't know what to do with her or something. Sam flies off to see The Watcher again, who shows Sam the adventures of Richard and the original New Warriors...who the kid sort of brushes off. It's funny for him to actually see Richard Rider instead of just hear about him as well as see things like Annihilation from a "modern" point of view ("I recognize the green woman, but who the heck are the others"). You even get a neat looking (not not great) flashback page to the Infinity Gauntlet days. The Watcher shows him that Nova wasn't really involved there and Sam realizes he dosen't need to be an Avenger.

The first half of the issue gets a 4/10 from me, I didn't really like it, but it's not that terrible.

Cyber Death Sessions 16-17: The Game Begins, and the Game Ends [Finale]

Before the final battle, Akio studied with the elves and completed his ninja training to be able to use Chi the same way Catherine could. Catherine used chi to generally boost her physical power, replicate her "energetic legs" [kinetic amplification] from the original timeline [labeled B-1, we are currently in B-2]. Catherine's ultimate technique involved her generating balls of concentrated chakra and kicking them like soccer balls. A lot of these ideas were inspired by Naruto, adding to the melting pot that this game became.

Using elven elemental magic, Akio is able to gather the elements of Light and Shadow around himself. His major moves included making armor out of solid light and cloaking himself in shadow [something he had no time to do in this game]. He had entered on a giant time-pirate-ship that he rode on along with Richard's sharpshooting brother Victor Bolton. Victor and Frey had a yelling contest with eachother, since the man had murdered his brother. Though Karl's terrible internet connection really ruined the moment, along with Silver/Fray being a complete jerk in brushing off his words (rather fittingly).

One of the very obvious members of Akio's battle group took off to start the battle. The Ice Drake that Akio recruited from across time flew into the air, getting gasps from the peanut gallery. Karl's first major mistake came when he moved Victor up the middle of the board where he had no range on anybody. Kazuya, still a servant of Asterisk, failed to pierce the Dragon's scales with his sniper rifle.

Responding to this, the Robot Asterisk [from the present] opens fire with his eye-lasers and along with the returning insane dragon sorcerous named Meila [A Character kara originally made for a DCC game that is now being carried into other games] took the dragon to the ground.

May, from the Nova's Journal RP, was summoned into the game by Fray as the last Black Knight. It was a really nice cameo appearance, along with another cameo coming later. May realized that there was another piece cloaking on Akio's side, someone who had very strong cloaking powers. She used her charms to distract the Mutant Wolf for the time being. In the later turns, Wolf would kill two major demons and a minor angel all on his own.

Fray teleports next to the downed dragon and then uses time displacement to move the dragon on top of Victor and Catherine, who were forced into one square on the right side of the board. They manage to mostly avoid the giant dragon falling on top of them, and continue fighting.

Meila and the Future Asterisk [who uses his power to transform into a copy of meila] unleash hell (multiple fireballs) unto this one square, melting the Ice Dragon and burning victor and Catherine almost to death.

The hidden piece uncovers herself as the angel Kuraiel [long story, but she was also from the NJ RP and is an angel of lightning]. She planned that everything would happen this way, and teleported Akio into position to launch his final attack at Asterisk [based on Excalibur from Fate-Zero].
It was cool to see Silver try and guess where she was the whole game using a mix of probability and precognition. If the story was reconstructed, it would be a really cool scene to see...him using his knowledge of time and probabilities to try and narrow her location.

However, the timeline broke apart when Catherine realized she had power over Space [Jaques had injected her with his genetic formula in this timeline, giving her power over Space and teleportation. This was based on Homestuck as well, since we now had a Time and Space player, and Dustin's title was Duke of Space.] She decided to teleport behind the evil god, instead of running away, and made a solid hit on him with a kunai until he teleported out of the way, causing Akio to miss.

Meila fired a fireball at the already dying Catherine and turned her to ash in front of Akio, the insane witch then allowed Wolf to eat her arm and eventually was consumed by the wolf.
Meanwhile, Victor shoots Kazuya in the head with his pistol as he works his way up the battlefield. Kazuya survives this, now immortal, but decides to give up and dive off the edge of the board into space.

With Catherine's death and Asterisk using quantum displacement to put himself into every timeline in the universe using his powers, the timeline starts to break apart. A rip in space pulls in the robot asterisk, dooming him to nothingness.

Kuraiel tracks where Asterisk went to for the rest of Akio's team to track him down, while meanwhile Fray sends himself into the past with May and Kuraiel. Fray destroys the computer in the 1700's B timeline, creating the official third scratch [B-3]. This causes Kuraiel and May to dissapear as they were now never summoned, and they return to the NJ universe. We did establish that May and Timeaus from the RP got married between the games, and Kuraiel appeared there in the demon world.

This also caused Akio's Alternate team to disappear, but before they did they managed to kill asterisk in the past and win the game. The winners gathered at the end of time again, Fray now accepted as member of the White team, basically acting as a triple agent.

Catherine and Akio reunite again, since now this is B-3 Catherine who won the game and is no longer dead. Akio becomes the King of Kings, and Catherine as his wife becomes Goddess of Space. Fray [Catherine's half-brother, and now akio's brother in law] becomes God of Time.

Wolf wishes for his genes to live and thrive, causing an explosion in the mutant race, and Richard wishes for his family to be safe forever, effectively making them immortal demigods.

After this, karl proposed we do a Christmas Special using Savage Worlds that involves his fanfiction character named The Masked Avenger, a man from a dark alternate timeline. What would happen if Akio lost? Find out as we journey into the next chapter of this story in late December! It is planned to be a one-shot or limited series.

I'm happy that this series is finally over, but it still had awesome moments and I'm looking forward to continue exploring this universe. The new story takes place in a rebooted timeline in the year 2014 (Around 15 years after the end of Cyber Death, in the city now called Orilla)
called [VB] where the new gods have to exert control when dark shadows start to loom behind them.

Magneto (2014) #1

Magneto (2014) #1 by Cullen Bunn and Art by Gabriel Hernandez Walta

First off, The Paolo Rivera cover isn’t my favorite, but it’s still beautifully done especially considering the symbolism of the barbed wire forming magneto’s helmet. A 4/5.

I’ve never really been too much of a fan of Magneto, especially as a solo character, but for some reason I always try to pick up his various solo series out of curiosity. I read the Magneto: Not a Hero miniseries from 2011 and thought it was alright. Now, coming out of the recent events of Uncanny X-men (vol.3) we see a much weaker magneto altered by the events of AvX now operating on his own (very violently) against anti-mutant groups. At the current time, Magneto is much less powerful. I really enjoy this sort of Magneto more, the one who has to use strategy and clever tricks to escape (similar to the prison scene in the X-2 movie). This isn’t the Magneto who can haplessly fly around and shoot magnet energy beams like in the 90’s.

Anyway, Magneto is now living between hotels and is following a lead on various mutant murders. A man who has been jailed after surrendering. The entire comic revolves around the idea of killing someone without even thinking about it, and that’s a really deep theme that is often not considered by these sort of villains. One really interesting shot is how we see magneto entering the jail with all the metal objects being highlighted, so you can see how exactly how he’s about to screw everyone up before it happens. When he reaches the man’s cell, he finds out that it was actually a cyborg-omega-sentinel or whatever. He smashes it and decides to find the source of the problem himself.

Cullen Bunn said he was trying to go with a dark sort of noir feel to this series and it’s really refreshing. We see a darker reflection of this man known by many names, a man who feels guilt for what he’s done, but is still relentlessly committed to doing what he set out to do. The narration and dialogue is spot-on and the art is very well handled as well! The series is highly violent and dark, but not so overblown that it becomes a problem. You do kind of need to have read Uncanny X-men to get what happened before, but moving forward the series is paving its own path.

I honestly have no problem saying that this series is one of the stand out hits of the year (like Daredevil was before). I’m rating this issue as a 10/10, I really enjoyed it.

Edit: Wanted to add that I started reading Mighty Avengers (the Infinity run) and think it's alright. The art on the book is pretty good, but I want to wait until around after issue #3 or so after it leaves Infinity tie-in status to actually review it. So far, the issues are fairly good, easily within the 6-7.5 range (issue 2 was a bit worse than the first).

Cyber Suicide Sessions 15: Elf Archers, Missiles, and Laser Beams

After the shocking secret of Merlin's Death was revealed to King Akio and he returned to the forest to scold Fray, Asterisk of the Present decided to make his move. The robot worked with his future self to create a space/time warp and bring forth a small army of cultists armed with guns against Akio and his Knights. He even made preparations to send a long range missile with him into the past!

Seeing this from the forest, Akio asked help of the Elf King along with neighboring villages. After negotiations they provided the honorable man with a large helping of archers and militia to help deal with the gun-toting gangsters. The archers had a much longer range and were able to easily narrow Asterisk's forces.

Meanwhile, Catherine approached and was somehow prevented from moving by Asterisk (his future self taking advantage of the fact that she could be possessed) as the robot almost kicks her to death before letting her go.

Akio used the magical forest to his advantage and appeared through a Fey Gate on another flank of the field to surprise the remaining forces as he moved to retake the castle. Fray had disappeared from this point, sending himself into the future.

As Asterisk prepared to fire a missile at Akio's troops, Richard Bolten (who had lost his power at this point, but he was still a very skilled bowman) fought his way to the roof to confront the robot. He riddles the monster with arrows, striking him in the head and the eyes...critically wounding him and disabling his new eye lasers.  However, this wasn't enough to stop him from launching the missile at Akio's troops who were now in town. The King dived into a building and used the power of Avalon (the healing scabbard) to recover from the blast and head after the fearsome villain...marching up the castle.

Unfortunately, the battle between Richard and his foe was cut short by Fray who appeared at that moment right next to Richard. This was where he planned to appear in the future, and now Richard was doomed. The archer tried to dodge the skilled knife user, and was doing a very good job of it. However, Fray realized that his power could slow the man down, so that is what he did.
Fray slowed the Archer, and the proceeded to stab into him after he was already injured by the Robot.

When Akio arrived, Richard was dead in a pool of Blood and Fray and his new cohort teleported to safety. After burying Richard, The King was greeted with another surprise. Fray blew up the time machine inside of the Fey Forest (asterisk had promised to light it aflame) and created a portal to the End of Time.

Akio sent Catherine and Wolf through the portal and went his own way. On the other side of the portal was a massive board, ready for the battle that would decide the Fate of the Universe.

Next Time, The Game Begins, and The Game Ends

New Warriors Vol.5 #1

New Warriors (vol.5) #1 by Chris Yost and Marcus To

I’m a big fan of Chris Yost and this was the one of the other Marvel Now titles I wanted to check out. It’s ending in january, but it does follow some really interesting characters (including picking up Kaine from his Scarlet Spider series and the new Nova and co.). So I wanted to at least read the first issue before it ends in January and see if it’s worth reading. For reference, the last New Warriors series was published in 2008. This allows follows up on a plot thread in Nova where he was visited by Speedball and Vance to be part of the new team. This also continues on the plot threads in Yost’s Scarlet Spider.

We open on Bova, the cow woman of the evolutionaries, being killed on the first page. She’s a bit of a classic marvel character so I’m a bit surprised that she was killed suddenly. The team starts the issue battling against the villains known as Salem’s Seven in New Salem, but realize that it was all a misunderstanding and later hang out in their house. I find it interesting that Nova is called Kid Nova probably to make an even further divide between Sam and Richard Rider. Most people don’t like Sam, and I can see why, but I was willing to deal with him for the time being. I’m still a bit behind on the Nova series, but I’m hoping to read more soon. Vance is shown that New Salem is home to several supernatural beings or children of devils that are protected by the Seven. Vance is also reminded by the leader of the Seven that his team is still blemished by the events of Civil War when they were responsible for blowing up Stamford. Then a group of agents who seem to be the same as the killers above cause an explosion to interrupt the two.

Meanwhile, in Mexico, Kaine is still traveling with Hummingbird (and since I didn’t read the full SS series I was a bit lost until I read the wiki page. They beat up some muggers, showing off their powers in really neat ways. Kaine actually uses his stingers and the classic “mark of kaine” (where he can burn someone by touching them). The new duo then relax on the beach and contemplate where they want to go with their lives. Hummingbird, being an empath, knows that Kaine is unhappy. He says he gave up being a hero after so many violent things happened to the people he cared about, and that he isn’t as responsible as Peter Parker is. They suddenly see atlanteans covered in blood in the waters, and a atlantean woman asks for their help.

We are then introduced to Sun Girl, a tech based hero who flies and uses light beams. She was created by Yost for Superior Spiderman Team-Up. I should also note that Mockingbird was also created in Scarlet Spider by Yost...seems like he has a habit of making cool new characters. Somebody’s gotta try though, it gets boring seeing the same heroes over and over. She finds a group of morlocks in the new york tunnels being hunted by the same energy blasting agents as above.

We see Sam at the end of the issue being captured by these Evolutionaries to end the issue off.

I thought that this issue was alright. It is a bit held back by telling 4 different stories that all have a slight connection, but I don’t think it hurts the story too much. Overall, I’m looking forward to figuring out what is going on with the Evolutionaries and how the team comes together. I also really like the cover and logo for the series even if it is a bit basic, it’s very colorful and shows the whole team. My only major complaint is that Nova should have gotten more time in the issue rather than just being stuck at the end. Still, for me it’s a solid 7.3/10. The cover is more of a 3.6/5 for me. I also really enjoyed the active style of this new artist and look forward to more of his work.

Loki: Agent of Asgard #1

Loki: Agent of Asgard #1 by Al Ewing and art by Lee Garbett

To give this review some context, this was one of the marvel NOW series I was really looking forward to that I didn’t get a chance to pick up. I decided to pick up a digital copy and see how it goes. I’m probably going to end up reading issue #2 even if I don’t like the first, because I am actually interested to see what’s going to happen with this new Teen Loki character. The title is a play on the old marvel spy titles (ie: Nick Fury, Agent of Sheild) so it seems cool to have this whole “magical spy” kind of feel, an interesting blend of genres.

We saw him receive a new sword in the Point One issue. And what’s the first thing we see him do with it on page one? Impale thor through the chest! Loki has decided to take assignments from the All Mother, a group of the three ruling women of Asgard (Gaea, Freyja, and Idunn). Loki actually makes a cool point about magic as he explains it, saying that it “takes a lie and makes it the truth.” very fitting of a trickster. We see him explain this as he magically runs up a building using his enchanted boots that he stole from some elves. On top of that, he also procured himself a vanishing coat to make himself invisible. In doing so he mocks other secret agents and their primitive gadgets. Man, I’m starting to feel the same way about Loki as I did about Doctor Who. In the new season, The Doctor has all these gadgets he never used before, like an invisibility watch and temporal explosives and ect.

Why does loki even need gadgets and stuff to get up a building anyway? I saw him use teleportation magic in Young Avengers, so why can’t he just do that?! Showoff! He just wants to run up a building to look cool and then turn invisible. We discover that he is running up Avengers Tower, but thor quickly detects him via his smell (I wonder what loki smells like?) and throws his hammer to knock the trickster off the wall. Hawkeye shoots a grappling arrow down to save him, and we are given an awesome flashback cover to Avengers #1 to show what his relationship is like with the team. They even make reference [in comic and in the recap] and justify how loki was called the God of Evil back then, he was doing much worse than minor mischief, which is a cool touch. Anyway, when Thor arrives, Loki brings up that his mission has to do with the clone thor from civil war (aka Ragnarok), to which Tony says “uhh...let’s not bring that up again.”

Loki explains that he is trying to make sure that Iron Man removed the DNA from his database, and escapes by using the hulk as a distraction. He runs down and deletes the old files of his older self from the database, continuing the theme of him trying to have a clean slate. He then runs behind Thor once the god catches up and stabs him through the back like on the first page (for some reason Thor has trouble using his hammer). The sword has the ability to reveal truth, and apparently Thor was unknowingly corrupted in his own God of Thunder series (which I really should read also). “To suffer at this blade is to suffer from all the truths you hide.” sounds very epic. Anyway, Loki extracts the corruptive magic, but gets chained up and thrown in jail anyway. Thor jokes with him and they make up since thor only attacked him due to being possessed...he also knows that Loki will escape, but recognizes that he can in fact do good things.

We learn that Loki made a deal with the All Mother in order to earn forgiveness from his crimes. However, they unleash the corruptive magic (The art doesn't really make it clear if the magic turns into loki or if it is in fact possessing the younger loki, but whatever) and out comes the original image of Loki, evil grin and all!

I thought this issue was alright, and pretty decent setup for a series. The writing is very cheeky and funny, with cultural references and snappy humor along with some interesting introspection into loki’s character and the world around him. I enjoyed it a bit, and there weren’t many flaws. The art was fairly well done, and the writing was solid, so for me it is a 7.5/10. I actually don’t like the cover, it’s pretty bland and does little else besides show off the costume and the sword, which is fine, but it could do a lot more to stand out (this even includes the variant cover). It’s a 1.5/5 for me. I admit the logo pops out quite nicely though and I want to read the next issue mostly to clear up the confusions of this issue.

All New X-Men #15

All New X-men #15 by Brian Bendis and David Lafuente

I like the cover for this book first of all, as it mimics a romance book and hints at what will happen in the book. Jean Grey and The beast? What a strange pairing. A 3.5/5 from me.

The issue begins with a funny non-verbal exchange between Jean and Rachel Grey (Rachel is basically jean’s daughter from an alternate universe) and they move away from each other.

Here’s something I don’t understand, who the heck does Kitty Pryde like? In GotG she’s dating Peter Quill long distance, but in X-men she is kissing Bobby Drake (which freaks past bobby out) along with being like really tight with wolverine (though I don’t think that’s a love kinda relationship). I double checked the wiki and found out that she dumps bobby later on and THEN starts dating Star Lord. I find the conversation funny because Bobby is confused over Kitty loving his future self and not him, but the past version doesn't like her and blah blah…

Jean continues to show advanced control over her powers that she didn’t normally in 616 during her training with Beast while bobby and scott head out on the town (in wolverine’s jeep, again). In the last issues, they had to take his motorcycle too...can’t they just get their own car or something? I’d love to see them in a classic 60’s car for one thing. Is wolverine the only one who owns a vehicle in the school?

Meanwhile, Jean accidentally reaches into Hank’s mind and figures out that he liked her in the past (which I’m not even exactly sure was true if you look back at the original run, in fact a few panels pointed out that he was very sexist...unless he was putting on a front. Plus he even had a girlfriend at that point or was at least looking at other women. Though it seems like bendis never cares about continuity anyway and sometimes it works...and sometimes it doesn't.). Anyway, she visits the past hank to go have a chat. He is furious that she read his mind and screams that he belongs with Scott. However, the past jean points out that SHE is not the one in love with him, her future self is. They have a rather charming kiss that brings a refreshing twist to the series. The cover actually delivered this time! (Besides the fact that cyclops isn't watching them and yelling...) This jean doesn't want to be the same as her present self, and neither does Hank (knowing all the mutations he will go through). By the end of the issue, we see jean consider throwing away the marriage certificate. Next time we go into the battle of the atom event!

Overall, this issue was really plucky and fun with some fun teen moments. This really feels like Bendis writing ultimate spider-man if that makes sense. Plus it has one of the newer artists for Ultimate Spider-man. It is more of a fun stand alone issue that continues to build on past Jean’s character. This is a 9/10 for me. I really enjoyed the art and story since it wasn’t hyper tense (where the writing might have mattered more) or ruined by the writing in any way. It almost reminds me a bit of Scott Pilgrim a bit, in the sense that it is a personal light and cartoonish story. I want to clarify that his style does not fit the series as a whole, but for a stand-alone (I would almost call it filler) story it works very well.