Amazing X-men #2 Preview - Hellish Holiday Wishes

It's that time of year again. I can finally start getting drunk off eggnog and not have it be weird. Not that I need an excuse to get drunk, but the holidays give me a few extra reasons and I can never have too many. I know today is the day Americans everywhere have a big meal to celebrate the time before Europeans screwed over the Native Americans to prepare themselves for several weeks of intense shopping. I'm sure the overpaid investment bankers on Wall Street are jizzing their pants in participation. But I don't like to wait for my gifts and I imagine few people beyond the age of 5 do.

So to celebrate this day of overly commercialized gift-giving and gluttony, I've got a preview to share. Amazing X-men #1 exceeded my expectations in ways I haven't experienced since my first trip to Amsterdam. It didn't just bring Nightcrawler back into the X-men comics. It put him in the center of a heavenly crusade mixed with Pirates of the Caribbean. It really is as awesome as it sounds. But before Johnny Depp could get involved, the staff at the Jean Grey Institute, including the freshly recruited Firestar, got transported into the middle of the battle courtesy of the bamfs. Now thanks to to ComicVine.com's willingness to work on holidays, we have a preview for Amazing X-men #2.

ComicVine: Amazing X-men #2 Preview

AMAZING X-MEN #2

(W) Jason Aaron (A/CA) Ed McGuinness

• The X-Men, on the search for Nightcrawler, find themselves separated!
• Wolverine and Northstar are mysteriously in... heaven?!
• But where does that leave the rest of the team?

So the X-men's holiday starts off with a trip to Hell itself. I imagine it's still not as bad as being stuck in traffic on the way to Best Buy at five in the morning. It's nice that they actually take a moment to contemplate how fucked up the concept of being in Hell actually is. The Marvel universe is downright schizophrenic when it comes to gods and devils. Thor and the Asgardians walks around as actual gods and nobody gives more than a couple wet shits. And there must be no Richard Dawkins in the Marvel universe because Heaven and Hell apparently exist, in which case he's probably shitting himself on a daily basis. But if this is what the X-men have to go through to get Nightcrawler back, so be it.

The battle between Heaven and Hell is epic on paper alone and a welcome change of pace. For too long now, the X-men have been fighting each other more than actual villains. Sure, the occasional Sentinel drops by. But whenever there's action, it mostly involves the X-men fighting each other or other heroes. Fighting the forces of Hell is exactly the kind of shit they need to remind themselves that heroes don't always have to be pissing on each others' shoes. Sure, it may completely destroy the very foundation of their faith and all notions of Western theology, but I say that's worth it for an epic battle that brings Nightcrawler back.