Ultimate X #4 - Bullshit Has A New BFF

Strap on your rubber boots because we're about to take a swim through an ocean of bullshit mixed with elephant jizz. That's right. I'm about to review an Ultimate book. I know what some of you may be thinking. I've gone on record as stating that I hate the Ultimate books with the fire of a trillion supernovas. It's gotten to the point where I wish I never got into these comics in the first place. If I could go back in time, I would strangle my younger self while telling him to put his life savings into Apple and Netflix stock to prevent myself from ever giving half a damn about these books in the first place. I wasted 10 years of my life that I'll never get back on this shit. Ultimatum ruined it and Ultimate X is the skanky cousin who got gang-banged by a bunch of meth-head hobos that was spawned from it. The writing has been terrible, the story has been shit, and most insulting of all the characters that were maimed in Ultimatum are now being replaced by pathetic replacements.

If that weren't enough, this fucking series was delayed more than Guns n' Roses's last album. The last issue came out in June 2010. Well it's March 2011 and only NOW issue four is coming out. This is because artist Art Adams sees fit to draw as slowly as possible for quality that's no better than a ten-year-old tracing the boobs on a Victoria's Secret model. Seriously, the man's art is praised as if it was drawn with the entrails of Jesus and menstrual blood from the Virgin Mary. The only thing worth praising here is how anybody has the patience to wait for this guy when in the time that this series has been delayed books like Uncanny X-Force, Generation Jean Rip-off, and X-23 have all released more than four issues and done a much better job of it. Oh, and they fucking sold better as well! Uncanny X-Force was the #1 selling book when it came out. Ultimate X doesn't even outsell the later issues of Ultimate X-men. Yet they still won't call this shit a failure? What the fuck are they smoking at Marvel and where can I get some?

So again, why am I reviewing this? It's a slow week for comics and I had a string of very bad days. I need some time to vent. Plus, everyone is lining up to praise this piece of shit just because it finally came out and Art Adams is drawing it. That's like praising George W. Bush for only fucking up two countries instead of three. There should be an opposing viewpoint for those who are still fuming at how Ultimatum destroyed what was once such a wonderful series. It means I actually have to read this book and resist the urge to rip my eyes out and throw them in the nearest bonfire, but that's how much I care about this blog and those that read it. So here goes nothing and if you have a weak stomach, please for the love of Galactus, Zeus, Odin and everything holy go to the closest German fetish porn site. That will be far less disturbing than the crap I'm about to review.

Ultimate X #4 is based on Liz Allen, who used to be a mainstay in Ultimate Spider-Man. Then before Ultimatum ruined everything, she found out that she was a mutant (the Ultimate version of Firestar to be precise) and that Blob was her father. How a girl can be as thin as her and related to Blob defies even the lousy physics that comics puts forth, but she's had her share of issues. After Ultimatum she basically disappeared and this comic tells her story and tells it in a way that sucks the scrotum right off a rhino. It turns out Ultimatum didn't hurt her a damn bit. She moved to fucking Orange County with her mother and started living life all the pompous douche-bags on the Jersey Shore. Not only that, she found out she has a brother. Apparently Liz Allen's mother couldn't keep her legs closed and let Blob knock her up a second time. And the kid she shat out of her twat takes after her father a lot more in that he's a fat stereotype slob.

There are these annoying red text boxes all over the pages. They're supposed to be Liz Allen's mother narrating, but it might as well be Jeph Loeb himself trying to explain his shitty rationalization for making garbage like this. Mini-Blob's name is Theodore Allen and he gets himself into trouble with the principal (who looks like the Grinch fucked Wolverine). For some reason, throwing a fucking cheeseburger is all it takes to get suspended for a week. I've been to high school and I know for a fact that's bullshit. Throwing food may get you detention, but a week-long suspension? What was on that burger, C4?

If that weren't bad enough, the narration from Liz Allen's mother is progressively more disturbing. She actually describes how she got drunk and snorkled Blob's chud. She described it like an Earthquake. In a series that already has full blown incest with the Maximoff twins, this is enough to make you want to surgically remove your stomach. What good is it to describe how a cute girl fucked a fat ugly slob? There's fetish porn for shit like that and at least those have the decency to not depict fucking Earthquakes!

Back at Liz's house, she talks with her mom about what a massive douche Teddy is. Even if she's right, her mother slaps her across the face because it's her late slob baby daddy who has been providing for them. That or she has to justify the massive damage done to her snatch for her. For a girl that actually lives a decent life and is a mutant, you would think she would have some sympathy for her own flesh and blood. She's an even bigger douche in this than Teddy and he's the Blob replacement in this series that is full of bullshit replacements.

We then catch up with the rest of the bullshit replacements that Ultimate X has squeezed out through it's proverbial poop tube. Jimmy Hudson (Wolverine rip-off) and Derek Morgan (the bastard son of Daredevil and Batman, two comics Jeph Loeb used to write coincidentally) are staying in a motel with Karen Grant (who is Jean Grey after Art Adams turned her into an emo bitch who looks fucking 14 when she's actually 20). The two rip-offs just piss and moan about not knowing what they're doing. All Karen does is say they're being stupid and careless while reminding them that the X-men are dead. Really? They still haven't gotten that message across? Then what the fuck is the point of a scene like this? To just show how royally fucked they are? Great writing! I've seen better filler in a bacon cheeseburger that the cook spat on.

So forget that useless scene and go back to the school. The next day Teddy's friend, Evan, who looks like a stereotypical mock-up of every school shooter in history mixed with Toad from X-men Evolution brings a gun to school. Then for reasons that aren't even that clear he starts shooting. No I'm not exaggerating. It's really not fucking clear in the slightest. Everybody was making fun of Teddy. Nobody said shit to this Evan kid. Yet he feels inclined to bring a gun to school? Where the fuck was his story? That seems like a pretty important part to overlook, a kid messed up enough to shoot up his school. It feels like yet more Ultimatum style shock value. Well after seeing shit like Blob eating Wasp, the shock card is pretty much played out. If Loeb or the editors can't get that, then they're beyond help.

Just as with Columbine and Virginia Tech, the shooting becomes a media frenzy. And what are the kids at the school doing? Are they running for their lives and taking cover like the survivors of previous shootings are? No! They're standing around Evan taking fucking pictures with their phones! Seriously, THAT'S what Loeb thinks people are inclined to do! So let me get this straight...these kids just stick around long enough for the news crews to arrive? And all they can do besides shit themselves is take fucking pictures with their phone?! Anyone who has seen a shooting of any kind will be able to call bullshit.

So Evan is basically feeling all hot and famous now. As if sociopaths are just cheerful as Charlie Sheen at the Playboy Mansion. Teddy, resisting his father's cannibalistic urges, tries to coax his friend into getting off the crazy train. In a perfectly reasonable response, Evan shoots his friend. Well given this is a replacement Blob we're dealing with here, the shot does jack shit. Blob ripoff says it tickles. Yeah, Loeb's dialog isn't going to give Shakespeare a run for his many anytime soon.

Well shit hits the fan because apparently mutants are more terrifying than gun-toting teenage psychopaths. NOW those dumb-ass kids who were snapping pictures with their phones start running. Really? A fat kid who can take a bullet is more terrifying than a gun? Are there even enough WTF's on the entire internet to rationalize that shit?

So in another completely random shift, Liz Allen decides to defend the brother she stated earlier that she couldn't stand to be around. She activates her power to come to his aid. Again, where the fuck is this coming from? She knows her brother isn't going to get hurt. He's a fucking Blob ripoff now! So why come to his rescue? He doesn't fucking need it! Seriously, what is she gaining from a stunt like this? It amounts to absolute dick.

Then there's an explosion. No, that's not a porno metaphor. That's what happens. Somehow Liz's fire conjuring creates an explosion. I shit you not. It's like Loeb is pathologically intent on making shit explode. There's no explanation as to how this happened. Liz touches the gun in one panel and in the next, there's an explosion. Since when does a fucking handgun have the ability to explode like that? And since when does Liz's fire powers involve making shit explode? How much of this is just being pulled out of the asses of the people making this garbage? In a series where Ultimatum was allowed to happen, this is par for the course yet still just as sickening.

In another bullshit fuck-up of reality, the rest of the non X-men show up. Again, how the fuck did they get there so quickly when they have no X-jet and admitted earlier to taking greyhound buses all over the country? It's like someone issued a memo to the Ultimate writers and said any effort at filling in plot holes will result in anal rape by a 12-inch dildo. Moreover, their pitch sucks. Aside from Jean ripping off a line from Terminator (again, Loeb's dialog is about artistic as a puddle of vomit) they offer Liz basically nothing. There's no X-men. There's no safe haven. Yet somehow they can keep them safe? What the fuck kind of an offer is that and why would anyone take it seriously?!

For once, the bad guys actually make a better pitch. Pietro shows up, who by the way looks like a ferret fucked a gypsy. He basically just offers a better life. No details. No specifics. Nothing. He just says he knows Teddy's father and that's about it. He argues with Jean for a moment, but again there's nothing of substance. They don't say anything about what they're doing or why the fuck they're doing it. They just say they're gathering mutants. That's it. It's not a mystery as much as it is pissing into the wind. Ultimatum rendered all mutants assholes and there's nothing they can do to change it. So why the fuck would they bother?

In the end Liz goes with the non X-men and Blob ripoff goes with Pietro. That's right, the son of the greatest mass murderer of all time is more trustworthy than a sibling that just stood up for your fat ass. Then he has the titanic sized balls to say his gun-toting friend was kind of right? What the fuck kind of logic is this kid using and what the fuck kind of storytelling leads to an outcome like this? It's the same bullshit that made Ultimatum such a horrible piece of garbage that shouldn't be held near an open flame. So Liz goes one way and we get another replacement character joining the other side. In a book that's already full of replacements, what kind of bullshit justifies a shit storm like Ultimatum when all that happens in return is a bunch of replacement characters? That remains the biggest problem with this book. Whereas Generation Jean ripoff only has one replacement character, this whole fucking series is built around them. Unless you don't mind shoving your face in hypocritical bullshit, this book should disgust you more than Japanese fetish porn.

There is absolutely nothing redeeming about this book. The dialog is shit and in some cases plagiarized. The art is horrible. Everybody in this book looks like they have fucking Marfan's Syndrome. I don't know what Art Adams did during the delays, but his character depictions in this book are so lousy you could have paid an autistic homeless guy in watered down vodka and he would have drawn better shit than this. It's not enough that this book is uglier than Courtney Love's pussy, but the story and characters in it are so completely fucked that it would take a nuclear powered microscope to find any trace of depth. Shit just happens. People talk and react as illogically as you can conceive. That's the basic summery of this collection of mule shit.

Jeph Loeb and Art Adams are a great team on Hulk, but in this book they might as well be nitro and glycerine. There is absolutely nothing appealing here. Unless you're brain damaged or high off your tits on a mix of DMT and Peyote, this book is dangerous to be around. It shouldn't be held around an open flame and it shouldn't be placed within 15 light years of another Ultimate comic. If anyone ever cared about Ultimate before Ultimatum, this book will act like sulfuric acid being injected into your urethra. Seriously, Marvel let Jeph Loeb butchered Ultimate X-men for this shit?! Just so we can get a bunch of shitty replacement characters and poorly conceived plots that hold together about as well as the former Soviet Union? Are you fucking kidding me?!

There isn't a score low enough to give this book. I can only give it a 0 out of 5. I'd give it negative numbers if I could, but I'd rather not completely fuck up my rating system for the sake of describing just how bad this book is. If all the shitty stories surrounding Ultimatum didn't bother you, then this shit won't bother you either. It won't blow you away. It'll make you envy the the deaf, the blind, and the comatose. I never thought I would be so disgusted by an Ultimate book. There was a time when Ultimate was my favorite series. There were rarely any books I even thought were just so-so. Then Ultimatum came along and fucked it up so bad that I want to burn every Ultimate book I ever bought and demand that someone at Marvel conceive of a way for me to get that last 10 years of my fucking life back. I would surrender a kidney and a left lung to completely forget about the Ultimate universe and Marvel comics in general. Even that would be less painful than seeing shit like this on the racks next to books that are actually worth reading.

I still follow Ultimate because I have a sub-atomic bit of hope that at some point, Marvel will decide that horribly maiming the characters that Disney paid so much to get the rights to wasn't a good idea. Ultimate is not beyond saving, but books like Ultimate X make it require an act of God, a deal with Mephisto, a gesture from Galactus, and a war with Odin to become acceptable again. If you or a loved one values your health and passion for all things decent, you'll keep them away from Ultimate X and Ultimate comics in general. This comic is so fucked that even Keith Richards won't snort it. Fuck Ultimate! Fuck Ultimate X! Fuck Ultimatum! Nuff said.