Scanned Thoughts: X-men #18

I’m no stranger to awkward situations. Give me someone else who has answered the door at three in the morning in pair of women’s underwear and explained to a police officer why there’s a goat in the front yard and I’ll have someone who has at least a faint understanding of dealing with awkward situations. The X-men certainly have more than their share, albeit without farm animals and inappropriate uses of women’s underwear. Hell, they live with time displaced versions of themselves and their future children. That shit has to be awkward to the point of therapy. It’s because of that I wonder just how much therapy someone like Rachel Grey has had since arriving from a shitty, dystopian future. She could probably put several families of psychologists through college. But it must work because she has managed to keep her shit together, even after some awkward moments with her time-displaced mother. She’s an active contributor on Storm’s all-female X-men squad, but she hasn’t had too many awkward situations to deal with. Now with a new arc and a new era in X-men #18, she has a chance to be very uncomfortable. At least in her case, wearing women’s underwear won’t add to the awkwardness.

As it just so happens, I’m not the only one who doesn’t care for unexpected visitors. A while back, Rachel Grey lost all her appetite for unexpected visitors not delivering pizza. In the infamous “End of Greys” storyline by Chris Claremont, the Shi’ar dropped in unexpectedly and without any pizza to exterminate Jean Grey’s entire family. It was a dick move of cosmic proportions, akin to burning down the whole Amazon rain forest over a splinter. But it was a defining moment for Rachel Grey and for reasons not entirely clear, that painful moment is revisited in the form of a flashback. The purpose isn’t clear, but it’s by far the most dramatic moment Rachel Grey has had since returning from space. That alone is pretty fucking sad. She’s the daughter of Cyclops and Jean Grey for crying out loud. She should be way more than another pretty redhead that Wolverine has yet to bone.

The flashback doesn’t really relate to anything Rachel and her fellow X-women are doing initially. She’s still basically the beta telepath on a team that already has Monet and Psylocke. She’s not even the cutest because Jubilee is on the team as well. All she does is point out that they’re about to fly into a cloud of giant super-viruses, courtesy of AIM. They weren’t content being watered down in Iron Man 3 so they’re taking it out on the X-women. That’s like trading a punch in the jaw for a kick in the balls.

It makes for a generic battle that’s fun and full of nice quips. Every X-women here has their own voice and they all come off as distinct, something that has been somewhat erratic throughout this series. I still don’t know what the fuck this has to do with an “End of Greys” flashback, but it’s still a team of beautiful X-women taking down a cloud of greenish goop in an entertaining if not unspectacular sort of way. And I’m all for that.

But fighting a cloud of AIM cast-offs is the kind of shit the X-women do on a weekend when there are no good movies out. Another more pressing conflict happens to be unfolding and, semi-fittingly enough, it involves aliens. And since it involves aliens, it’s going to have to involve Agent Abigail Brand and the fine folks at SWORD. It’s been a while since Brand showed up with her uncanny ability to induce boners and make all the assholes within a five mile radius clench. She even reveals herself to be a Game of Thrones fan, thus making her even sexier and more intimidating. My penis is happy to see her again is all I’m saying.

Agent Brand, however, is not happy to have her Game of Thrones time interrupted by an unannounced alien that showed up unconscious at SWORD’s doorstep. The alien issue in this case is Deathbird and she’s not crashing their base because she got too drunk and forgot where her car was parked. This is a Shi’ar woman who likes to throw parties in the middle of inter-stellar wars. She also has a history with Rachel Grey, which helps provide a connection to the “End of Greys” flashback. It’s a weak connection, but like a nipple slip from Jessica Alba, it’s better than nothing.

SWORD contacts the X-women specifically because Rachel has a history with her. She’s actually Rachel’s aunt, but only by marriage thanks to Deathbird’s ability to exploit Vulcan’s fondness for alien pussy. I’m not judging here. I can only say that in Vulcan’s defense, dangerous alien women have a special allure that some men can’t resist.

That’s not to say Rachel is on good terms with her Aunt. It’s hard to be on good terms with someone who had a hand in the slaughter of her whole family. But she’s remarkably casual about agreeing to help out, going along with her fellow X-women to SWORD’s sub-orbital base, Peak. They even meet Cecilia Reyes there so she can give Deathbird a free assessment and not even charge a co-pay. This is somewhat confusing and not just because I had to wrestle with my insurance company just to see a doctor for a case of strep throat. They’re treating this alien like she’s just some cute college girl who got too crazy at a frat party and passed out in front of an emergency room. This is a woman who would probably arm-wrestle Gladiator for saying her ass looks fat. I just can’t wrap my head around it.

It becomes even more confusing when Rachel Grey agrees to help read Deathbird’s mind to figure out how the hell she ended up at SWORD in the first place. As the earlier flashback showed, this is someone who had a hand in the complete eradication of her entire family bloodline. Yet that seems to bother her less than having to wear a dirty pair of sox. It’s completely devoid of drama in a situation where there should at least be some. She could have at least tattooed a few dicks on Deathbird’s face to show she’s at least somewhat upset with the shit she’s done.

Instead, she just shrugs that shit off and teams up with Monet and Psylocke to read Deathbird’s mind. It makes for some colorful and interesting memories. It shows that Deathbird is a functional rageaholic, pitching fights and getting into plenty of trouble that a typical 12-step program won’t help with. It’s flashy, but lacking on details. I’m all for a story about a hot alien woman getting into trouble. It’s the basis of some of my favorite pornos. But even those need a little detail to spark my intrigue.

Rachel and her fellow telepaths are just as confused. They know Deathbird has gotten herself into a few too many bar fights. They just don’t know the circumstances and assume it had nothing to do with someone pinching her ass. Before they can even get a few helpful hints, SWORD is hit with more alien visitors in the form of a massive swarm of alien bugs. It’s almost like a metaphor for beautiful women that show up at a doorstep. They usually are there because some really fucked up shit is chasing them. I contend that a swarm of alien bugs isn’t quite as daunting as an ex-cop father with anger management issues, but it’s close. These little pests are called Sidrian Hunters. Since SWORD and the X-men are almost as used to killer aliens as they are killer robots, they don’t start shitting themselves. They just know this is going to be more frustrating than they thought. It still would help to have at least some drama, but I guess that’s asking for too much.

Things go to shit pretty quickly, but Agent Brand and the X-women still play it as cool as Tom Brady in the fourth quarter of a close game. The lights go out and the Sidrian Hunters infiltrate the base. It’s another flashy and fairly satisfying dose of action. It’s not all that different from the big green cloud of AIM goop from earlier, but at least these bugs have more personality. It’s still just as fun watching Storm hit them with lightning while Agent Brand unleashes her Game of Throne style violence. It doesn’t have to have a lot of drama to be satisfying, but it’s about as memorable as Rob Schneider’s acting career.

That doesn’t keep the battle from intensifying. The Sidrian Hunters are still able to get in pretty deep, making their way through SWORD’s defenses and a pissed off Agent Brand. It has much more detail than the earlier battle, making it a more enjoyable spectacle. These are not Sentinels or Skrulls. They didn’t even bring anal probes or attack Independence Day style. They came directly to SWORD, right on the heels of Deathbird. That means they’re not there to land on the White House lawn and demand that they be allowed to impregnate Sigorney Weaver. They’re there because of Deathbird. It’s a logical connection, but one that is also lacking details. I know I sound like one of my old English teachers, but I don’t grade on a fucking curve or force anyone to read boring ass books from the Victorian era that nobody cares about.

What finally gives this battle some weight is a revelation at the end from Cecilia Reyes. She doesn’t begin to speculate why these Sidrian Hunters are after Deathbird, but she does reveal that Deathbird is pregnant. That definitely adds a new dimension to this otherwise generic battle against a bunch of killer space bugs. It’s still lacking in details with respect to why anyone in the X-men should give a shit, but at this point I don’t think that should surprise anybody. That theme has already been well-established. That doesn’t mean I’m not intrigued. Anytime a beautiful alien women shows up pregnant, there’s usually an interesting story about it and sometimes it can be as sexy as it is disturbing. What? I can’t be the only guy who finds alien women sexy.

A lot of interesting new concepts emerged in this comic, but they were only slightly fleshed out. It’s like throwing ice cream, chocolate fudge, and whiskey into a blender, but not turning it on. It’s basically partial cock-blocking because only to the extent that it delays rather than hinders a chance at awesome. The tone, characterizations, and setting all work fairly nicely, albeit not in a particularly spectacular manner. Those who got real sick of the Shi’ar after The Trial of Jean Grey will probably start dry heaving, but those who missed Abigail Brand’s crass yet bonerific personality will rejoice. The lack of drama and follow-through are the two major shortcomings in this issue, but all the minor details and overall setting are spot on. I give X-men #18 a 6 out of 10. I’m all for beautiful women fighting an invasion of killer aliens. I’m even for plugging Game of Thrones. I’m even for beautiful alien women getting knocked up. But for the love of Odin, could Rachel Grey get at least somewhat pissed at the assholes that killed her family? Nuff said!

Scanned Thoughts: X-men #17

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Uncharted and Off-Track: X-men #16

The following is my review of X-men #16, which was posted on PopMatters.com.

Even in the era of GPS and Google Maps, it’s easy to get lost. Even if the destination is clear and there have been successful trips before, there’s always a chance of getting off-track and those chances are worse than anyone cares to admit. It usually isn’t the first wrong turn that gets things going in the wrong direction. It’s the fifth, sixth, and tenth turns that changes the situation from merely being off-course to being in another time zone. For the situation surrounding the all-female X-men, it’s hard to know what time zone they’re in, but their watches are clearly not synchronized.

When this new, female-centric X-men series began, the destination for the story was fairly clear. And for the most part, it reached that destination safely on numerous occasions. This series wasn’t just about an all-female team of X-men. It created a unique team dynamic that gave the story a unique context. However, that dynamic has faltered in recent issues and X-men #16 is a culmination of one too many wrong turns and a few too many missed turns. If this story were on a road trip, it would be in the wrong state by now.

Initially, this story was built around one fairly simple conflict. The biological father of Shogo, Jubilee’s adopted son, has returned to claim him. It was a conflict that fit nicely into the overall narrative of the series because it began with Jubilee rescuing Shogo. That conflict might provide a simple foundation, but everything built on top of it lacks structure and refinement, like a gingerbread house that doesn’t have enough frosting. There’s a clear attempt to turn this conflict into something that explores other side-plots going on throughout the all-female team, such as the presence of Storm’s future daughter, Kymera, and the training of younger mutants like Hellion into a more capable team of X-men. While these are plots worth exploring, they end up detracting from the main conflict. At times, it feels like they’re in the wrong X-men comics.

Some of these plots, like Kymera, are appropriate to explore in some respect. There’s just only so much that can be explored while the main focus is supposed to be on rescuing Jubilee and protecting Shogo. Kymera’s foresight into the future should give her and Storm so many things to discuss. Who is her father? Who lives and who dies? Do Cyclops and Wolverine ever mend the Schism? Will Deadpool ever shut up? None of this comes up. Everything is centered around the conflict with Shogo and Jubilee. While this keeps the story focused, it essentially hijacks this unresolved story. It would be like someone having the power to see into the future, but the only thing they use it for is to check the weather for the next football game.

It also doesn’t help that Shogo’s father, who calls himself The Future, doesn’t come off as a character worth hijacking these other plots. He operates under the principle of shoot-random-people-and-wing-it-from-there. He’s supposed to be this extremely dangerous crime lord with access to weapons and personnel that would impress even the Kingpin, but he decides to go about retrieving his son in the most inefficient and messy way possible. There doesn’t appear to be any underlying motivation to his actions or his desire to get Shogo. He gives the impression that he just doesn’t like anyone taking things that belong to him, be it his Sunday newspaper or infant son that he did nothing to protect. He doesn’t even show the slightest affection for his son. He just wants him back because Shogo is his, not because he wants to know the joys of fatherhood.

This further limits the emotional impact of the conflict. The Future is painfully generic as a character and a threat. In addition, the all-female X-men don’t even go about attacking him in a very efficient way. They think they’ve done enough preparation, but when they encounter an exotic defense system that involves turning the vegetation against them. It’s nowhere near as epic as the walking trees in Lord of the Rings and only serves to slow the narrative down even further.

But it isn’t just the slow pace of the story that makes it feel lost and disorganized. Many conversations and actions are just too predictable. Jubilee’s argument with The Future could have been cut and pasted from an old Superfriends cartoon. The Future plays into every villainous stereotype, making no effort whatsoever to create any sense of depth. All Jubilee can do is give a typical Braveheart style speech, minus the painted face and mooning. It doesn’t create any strong emotions. It doesn’t create any tension either. It’s might as well be an excuse to get the X-men out of the Jean Grey Institute and fight something besides killer robots and resurrected enemies.

That’s not to say the conflict is without merit. While the plot might be slow and the dialog might be forgettable, the story never loses sight of the main theme of the story. The focus is still on the X-men fighting to retain custody of Shogo. It’s a conflict that offered plenty of reasons for excitement in the beginning. But as this story drags, the excitement wanes. That doesn’t make the conflict any less meaningful. Jubilee has undergone numerous conflicts in adopting Shogo as her son. Many of those conflicts have made for some of the most compelling stories in this series, but this one is just poorly developed and poorly organized.

The details might be lacking, but nobody gets mischaracterized and nobody does anything that completely undermines their established personality. X-men #16 certainly feels like an X-men comic, albeit a very disorganized and underwhelming X-men comics, but it doesn’t feel like the same X-men comic that had been built around this powerful, all-female cast. Like hippie protesters, it tries to do too much and only ends up next to nothing.

Final Score: 4 out of 10

Scanned Thoughts: X-men #14

The best of intentions have a way of pissing off some unexpected people. I’m sure that Barack Obama thought he would be making a positive mark on history when he decided he was going to run for President. I doubt he had any idea how many crazy racists religious nuts would come out from the shadows and attack him like he just took a shit on George Washington’s grave. And those are just the people who listen to Glenn Beck. Who could possibly be pissed off by a young woman choosing to adopt an infant child after her parents were presumed dead? Hell, this is the kind of shit that makes pro-lifer’s horny. That’s exactly what Jubilee did with Shogo, yet in being so responsible and loving she pissed off someone really nasty, namely Shogo’s biological father. Apparently, this is a guy who probably wasn’t going to pay child support or alimony. He’s the kind of guy who goes on a murder spree to break out of prison just to get to a kid he didn’t seem to give a damn about until after Jubilee adopted him. But this guy is no Jerry Springer reject. He’s powerful enough to attack the Jean Grey Institute and wound two students. I can see some fathers doing that if they think their daughter or son is alone in a room with Chris Brown, but this guy has no excuses. That’s what makes him so dangerous and that’s why X-men #14 should be a lesson to anyone who thinks their good intentions won’t piss someone off. Even adopting an orphan baby is going to make a few nasty enemies. That’s just how fucked up the world is sometimes.

One of those nasty new enemies was brazen enough to shoot Teon from afar in the previous issue. Naturally, the staff at the Jean Grey Institute takes that shit pretty seriously. Rachel and Monet get on the case, searching New York City during fucking rush hour no less for the shooter. How they managed to find him in a city of millions and track him to a specific subway without triggering shit storm parade down Time Square is not explained. But Rachel Grey is the daughter of Cyclops and Jean Grey. She is a capable telepath. She’s able to navigate the crowds while probably making everyone think they’re a couple of teenage girls chasing after a boy they sent nude pictures of themselves to by mistake. It shows her skill, but doesn’t make for a very exciting chase.

They eventually do catch up with him in a subway. Again, it’s not nearly as tense as it could be and not just because Rachel is making sure the rush hour traffic doesn’t start shitting themselves. The shooter himself doesn’t look all that devious. He looks like Liam Neesan fucked Miley Cyrus. He threatens to kill the innocent people Rachel is psychically deceiving. Then he threatens to blow his own brains out before they can get any information out of him. He keeps talking about how the future is unstoppable. Someone should tell him that only taxes and bad hangovers are unstoppable. Monet is able to stop him before he pulls the trigger, but I’m still confused about this guy and not just because he looks like this priest I knew who got caught streaking through Sorority House. If this was meant to be tense, it failed and now I have that disturbing image of that old priest in my head.

There’s still plenty of legitimate tension back at the Jean Grey Institute. Two students are still wounded and some of the other students, many of whom don’t have X-men training that help them deal with the constant threat of being shot, are worried. Psylocke, while monitoring the holding cell for their new guest, has to reassure a young mutant that they’re not going to let anyone hurt him. I remember my mother telling me the same thing every time I went to the dentist. It didn’t take me long to figure out that it was bullshit.

With the prospect of some crazy douche shooting students still hanging over everyone’s head, Storm hopes to get a little proactive and asks her time-displaced daughter, Kymera, for information. Now this is actually the first time Storm and Kymera have gotten a chance to talk. They’ve never brought up the fucked up circumstances under which she came from the future who her father is, information I’m sure both Storm and Wolverine would want to know. But Storm is only focused on what she knows about the shooter, not exactly a good way of breaking the ice with a future daughter. Given how many time-displaced X-men there are, I would think there’s at least an online support group. Maybe Storm should have gotten advice from Rachel, but she would probably have told her the same thing. Trying to get a little foresight from the future is a dick move and Kymera doesn’t provide it. That’s also a dick move so I guess this is a good case of like mother/like daughter.

Having not gotten any advice from Kymera, the rest of the X-women opt to go directly to the source. That means a very hostile intimidation that involves Psylocke, Monet, and Rachel Grey. That’s like being locked in a cage with the Rock, Mike Tyson, and John Cena after they’ve been fed a bucket of crystal meth. They’re both debating whether or not they should treat this in a way consistent with the provisions of the Geneva Convention or adopt the North Korean approach. Since two of their students were shot, they make it pretty clear that they’re ready to channel their inner Kim Jong Un. Then Storm shows up and stops them from doing anything that might get them on Amnesty International’s shit list. She tells them they’re going to have a meeting. But I think that’s code for, “Get the fuck out of this room before your rip the guy’s liver out through his scrotum.” And while the X-women get the message, the prisoner continues to show that he gives far fewer fucks than anyone in his position should.

When the X-women meet in the Danger Room, Storm does something unexpected of anyone who was once worshipped as a goddess. She humbles herself. She acknowledges that she has basically been leading a team without actually asking anyone whether or not they want to be part of a team. It is part of why Rachel has been criticizing her at every turn. Granted, I find some of that criticism more contrived than a speech by Glenn Beck. But it wasn’t completely without merit and Storm makes it clear that they are now going to operate as a team. She even says they’ll vote on a leader, but I think she also implied that one of the voters can reign an unholy hell of lightning down on their asses whenever she feels like it.

Now for the past few issues, a lot of this conflict felt really contrived. This is the first time it actually feels legitimate. It’s still very shaky and underdeveloped. I get the sense that this is just a way for Rachel Grey to stay relevant since nobody seems to want her to interact with the O5, the Uncanny roster, or any other team that might be in need of a powerful psychic from an apocalyptic future. I may be wrong or doing too much blow, but the whole internal struggles with the all-female team feel more manufactured than lousy boob job. And having spent my share of time in Las Vegas, I know lousy boob jobs.

There are still plenty of issues to discuss before they vote. They haven’t even had a chance to pander to lobbyists or anything. They don’t get that chance because their prisoner finds a way to fuck their day up even more by causing some random explosion within his cell. It’s at this point I realize how fucking stupid it is to take a guy who already shot two students and try to imprison him in the same school he already showed he could outwit. That’s like putting Charlie Sheen in charge of a Mexican pharmacy. It’s a dumb move of George W. Bush proportions.

The action that follows isn’t very detailed. There’s just a lot of fire and shit with the X-women trying to navigate it. For all they know, their students are being cooked like baby back ribs. We have no way of knowing because it unfolds so chaotically. That’s probably the point. That doesn’t make it any less confusing. The shooter keeps taunting them while still having the personality of an old iPod that turned evil. It’s not as interesting as it sounds.

This time the X-women get an assist. Kymera actually decides to make herself useful in the past and attacks the shooter while saving Shogo. In the process, however, the shooter reveals that he’s not just an awesome shot with a shitty vocabulary. He’s also a walking bomb with a timer built right into his forehead. That sounds fucked up when I say it out loud, but when I think about it for more than five seconds it’s actually pretty brilliant. It explains why the guy didn’t put up much of a fight when the X-women captured him. He wanted to be in their domain when he exploded. That sounded incredibly dirty, but it gets the job done. It’s not entirely clear that they came out unscathed. It’s only clear that the Jean Grey Institute is going to need yet another round of heavy repairs. Other than proving that insurance companies must hate them, he also proves that whoever is after Shogo is pretty fucking cunning and pretty fucking devious.

Their fate is left uncertain. It’s a pretty safe bet they’ll be shell shocked and feeling like a couple of Twinkies that just got deep fried at a County Fair. Some might even be wounded. Or they might just walk away unscathed since X-men seem to survive explosions every other day. We don’t know because we don’t get a fucking clue. We just get a quick glimpse of the mastermind who is probably jerking off as to how well he’s outwitting the X-women. We still don’t know much about him other than he’s more obsessed with the future than Doc Brown and way more competent. The lack of details here makes it pretty hard to get too worked up, but it shows that they’re going to have to fight hard if they want to keep Shogo.

The story could have ended there on just a confusing and mediocre note. But once again, we get this side-story that takes away from the story that’s actually somewhat interesting to see some of the young X-men partake in a Danger Room scenario that probably takes place at least twice a week. Young D-listers like Hellion, Anole, and Rockslide meet up with Psylocke to basically reenact every Dynasty Warriors game ever made. At least Dynasty Warriors allowed users to press buttons. Nothing much happens here. They just screw around, showing their inexperience and making guys like me wonder what the fuck this has to do with Shogo’s father. I don’t mind comics that try to tell extra side-stories. I would just rather they have a fucking point.

This issue may have had the most tense moments in an all-female story that didn’t turn into a lesbian porn or a Julia Roberts movie. They’re all very overmatched by this enemy, but the nature of that enemy is confusing. He’s packing more heat than Rambo on crystal meth. We get that. But as he frustrates the X-women in this issue, it’s not as clear what he’s after. Is he still after Shogo? Or is pissing off X-women the only thing that gives him a boner? Confusing it may be, his impact is not obscured in the slightest. He’s forcing the X-women to either stop their bitching and become a team or let this asshole continue to make them look like headless chickens in a staring contest. They’ve clearly done something to piss this guy off and he’s very good at being pissed off, but we just don’t get a reason to be pissed off with him. Instead, we get Kymera finally doing something, which isn’t much, but it’s still an upgrade. And we get another meaningless story tacked on at the end that’s more forgettable than Adam Sandler’s last three movies. This series still has a lot going for it, but it needs more to be awesome. Even beautiful women can only do so much to compensate for its shortcomings. I give X-men #14 a 5 out of 10. Let’s have less shitty Danger Room sub-plots and more ovary-busting mash-ups with Storm and Rachel. That’s the kind of shit that will fascinate and titillate, a winning combination if ever there was one. Nuff said!

Scanned Thoughts: X-men #13

In all my experience with comic books, alcohol, and life in general, I've learned time and again that the best intentions are the easiest to fuck up. Think about the guy who invented ski masks. I'm sure he was just a nice guy who wanted to find a better way for people to keep their heads warm in the winter. Did he honestly believe that thieves and muggers wouldn't use it to commit crimes and become the bad guys in every cop movie ever made? I doubt it, but that wasn't his intention. The X-men, and every superhero team for that matter, usually has noble intentions. Even the anti-heroes aren't complete assholes with their intentions. But I wouldn't put Jubilee in the category of an anti-hero. She's too lovable and fun. But earlier in the latest adjectiveless X-men series, she willingly adopted an infant baby who Arkea used to try and wipe out all life on the planet. It's an act that should make her a hero among the pro-life crowd. Sure, she's a vampire and a fun-loving teenager, two things that I'm sure piss off that same crowd. But there's no denying her noble intentions. They haven't screwed her over yet, but that's what's supposed to happen in X-men #13. I almost dread seeing how something so noble can become so shitty. But like major accident involving a Hummer and a truck full of dildos, I can't look away.
Also like accidents involving Hummers, this comic sets the tone by introducing the kind of asshole who would willingly crash into a truck full of cancer medicine. He has no name and he looks like he belongs on a sex offender's list. But he's not just some random guy. He's a random guy who happens to be one of those prisoners that's so dangerous that he has to be transferred from undisclosed locations by armed soldiers and drugged. They must have shitty drug dealers because this same random guy shows that he can beat the shit out of trained soldiers and make it look easy. So he's also the dangerous kind of random guy who probably drives multiple Hummers. But what makes him relevant to this story is that he's Shogo's father. And for reasons I can only assume have to do with not paying child support, he wants to get his kid back.

This random guy is choosing a shitty time to attack the Jean Grey Institute. They just got done beating Arkea and the Sisterhood of Mutants. That makes them considerably more tough than a bunch of soldiers. On top of that, they're all badass women. So they can kill most random guys and look damn sexy while doing it.

Monet is no exception. She recently joined the team and showed that she can kick a fair amount of ass. Yet being the obsessive perfectionist usually reserved for an honor student at a Korean Prep School, she keeps on training and she uses Rockslide as a punching bag. That's right, she considers rocks punching bags. She has to use something tough because the Sisterhood of Mutants are still out there. Arkea may be dead, but Selene and the Goblin Queen are still out there. That means she needs to be prepared to hit hard and break shit. I want to feel sorry for Rockslide, but getting beat up by a beautiful woman isn't the worst thing in the world. Hell, it's one of the ways I hope to die.

There's no question that the X-women are going to be well-trained for any asshole that thinks they can bust into the Jean Grey Institute and take Jubilee's adopted kid. However, the Arkea battle also revealed a bit of a schism in the leadership of the X-women. It's nowhere near as hostile as the schism with Wolverine and Cyclops, but it is a concern.

The divide comes from Rachel and Storm. In order to beat Arkea, they had to let Selene and the Goblin Queen go. Rachel had a problem with that and it's not unreasonable. Sure, they beat Arkea. But that's like killing Hitler, but letting Mussolini go. It was a tough decision and it has the team questioning Storm's leadership. And Storm doesn't like that. She's not hardheaded and stubborn like Cyclops, willing to just suck it up and move forward. Then again, she doesn't have Cyclops's Galactus-sized balls. Psylocke encourages her to take charge and stop being so reserved about her leadership style. It's not bad advice. And if Storm is lucky, maybe she can also make Maria Hill want to bone her.

But it's not all bitterness and division with the X-women. With Arkea gone, Jubilee is basically out of danger and free to rebuild her life as a teen vampire mother of an infant. I sure hope Stephanie Meyer isn't reading this because that might give her some ideas. In previous issues, she already went through the process of officially adopting Shogo. Beast is even nice enough to take a break from being a massive furry douche who fucks up the timeline and gives him a checkup. Shogo is declared perfectly healthy. Jubilee still isn't sure about her role with the X-men at this point. But she's getting free health care, a free room, and all the food Doop can cook. Most single mothers would agree that's a pretty sweet deal.

If only Rachel Grey could share Jubilee's upbeat mood. I honestly wish Rachel Grey could share something because she has basically been an afterthought since she came back from space with Havok and Polaris. She didn't really do dick in Avengers vs. X-men. She has had only a few awkward moments with the O5 X-men. And for some fucked up reason, there was this romantic sub-plot between her and John Sublime that was so subtle that it might as well have been a ninja. For someone of her history and heritage, that's just fucking wrong. But I digress.

Rachel is still a recluse, basically hanging out in the darkest hole of the Jean Grey Institute that isn't related to Beast's ass. She doesn't do much other than add a little closure to the Arkea story, showing how John Sublime left. And this time, there was no romantic subplot. John Sublime just left on a bitter note, becoming an asshole again and Rachel Grey gave him the proverbial finger. If only she could do that more often. The X-men can never have enough badass redheads.

The X-women all have their share of issues. They're all still recovering from the Arkea battle. However, they have no fucking clue that someone is coming for Shogo. And given how Arkea only partially succeeded in attacking the Jean Grey Institute, what are the odds that this new asshole will do any better?

Well he does get their attention in the most graphic way possible. During a seemingly innocent game of mutant baseball, Primal is shot. There's no sound of a gunshot. There's no warning. And none of the omega level telepaths pick it up. Primal just hits the ground wounded. Either the shooter is really fucking good or they're on the kinds of drugs that Barry Bonds would kill for. While I have a soft spot for Primal and I consider this a dick move, it does send the necessary message.

Naturally, Primal gets rushed to the infirmary and the Jean Grey Institute goes into lock down, which seems to happen at least twice a week. Makes me wonder if they ever even bother with fire drills. But Beast and the institute staff are able to save him. They even find out that the shot wasn't meant to kill Primal at all. It was just supposed to wound him. Like I said, it sent the right message. I guess sending a horse head just wasn't enough.

But Primal isn't the only target. Late at night with the Jean Grey Institute still presumably on lockdown, Roxy comes out for a little stroll. I don't know why a teenage girl is out walking the halls late at night. I gave up trying to understand teenage girls in high school when I found out that one had a picture of Mark Whalberg lodged in her vagina. But Roxy is just out walking until she gets a quick drink. Then she collapses faster than an ex-Mormon doing their first bong hit. It's not as bloody as what happened to Primal, but it sends another powerful message. It's really not clear what that message is or how this shit is happening, but it clearly shows that this is one resourceful motherfucker.

The only one who gets a clear message in the end is Jubilee. She comes in her room, rocking out to her iPod like any teenage mother would, minus the regret and self-esteem issues. Then she gets a scary message on her phone from Shogo's father. This time the message is pretty fucking clear. He wants Shogo back or he'll kill everyone in the Jean Grey Institute. And after what he has shown with Primal and Roxy, he's already proven he's capable of doing just that. The nature of this guy's power isn't clear. It's a bit overly subtle, sort of like some of the other details in recent issues of X-(Wo)men. But it's not terribly ambiguous this time. Nobody needs to use their imagination to know what the threat is. To me, that means I don't have to be sober to enjoy it and that's a big win for me.

It would have been fine to end the comic here, even if it was short. But for reasons that I can only attribute to excessive cocaine use, recent issues of X-men have been truncated to make room for these other side-stories that don't do jack shit for the main plot. In the previous issues, it involved a battle against a bunch of rusted Sentinels. It was essentially like watching a fight between Optimus Prime and a Roomba. It wasn't all that compelling. All it did was give a few C and D-list characters some face time.

Well that must have not been enough because now we're getting another side-plot with a bunch of D-listers that include Hellion, Rockslide, Broo, and Anole. They haven't contributed shit to this story and they give the impression that one of their classmates getting shot is no big deal. That shows they have shitty school pride and they're shitty friends as well. So instead of fighting a Sentinel, they choose to do the second most generic thing that X-men do and that's play around in the Danger room. It's as exciting as it sounds.

They just load some random program they found. It happened to be a program that involves fighting a medieval army, most likely ripped from a Sid Meier game. They try to fight the incoming army. The action is predicable and standard. Then Psylocke shows up. She might not actually be there. She might be part of the simulation or a failsafe. It really doesn't matter because it generates about as much intrigue as cat shitting in the desert. So once again, more material that could be used to make the awesome main plot even more awesome is pissed away.

I honestly don't understand the format of this book. This series was billed as a book about at team of female X-men kicking ass and not constantly bitching about men. Isn't that appealing enough? Were the feminazis out there really that hostile? Like the previous issue, this issue had two stories. One was awesome and compelling while the other was unnecessary and shitty. Do we really need to see some of the dipshit students at the Jean Grey Institute fool around in the Danger Room? If someone at Marvel wants to tell a story about these C-list characters, then make another New Mutants or Young X-men series. Don't have it cut into an issue that had such an awesome setup. I want to see what happens with Shogo's deadbeat dad, damn it. But instead, I see some dumb ass teenagers looking for ways to get in trouble. If I want that, I'll go to a frat party. X-men #13 gets a 7 out of 10. I would love to give it a much higher score, but I don't like great stories being cut off almost as much as I don't like having my beer cut off. I can go out and buy more beer. But I can't buy the next part of the story for a fucking month. Nuff said!