Transcending Time-Tested Tropes: X-men Blue #20

The following is my review of X-men Blue #20, which was posted on PopMatters.com.

Time travel stories are kind of like those needlessly loud stereo systems that some people put in their cars. From a purely functional standpoint, there's not much to gain by having the ability to project music at volumes that make most peoples' ears bleed. However, the functionality of such a system is hardly reflective of its value. There are other, less tangible reasons why someone would want those systems in their cars. More than anything else, such elaborate systems create equally elaborate spectacles.

Time travel plots are similar in that they rarely function as a means to simplify or clarify a story. Most of the time, they create additional complications that only get more complicated when time paradoxes enter the picture. Such stories may not be simple, but they can work even in light of those paradoxes, as multiple Back to the Future movies have proven. The X-men also have a better track record than most when it comes to compelling time travel stories, going all the way back to Days of Future Past from the Chris Claremont era. Cullen Bunn and R.B. Silva are making a concerted effort to channel Claremont's skills with Cross Time Capers in X-men Blue.

In some respects, this is a story that had to happen sooner or later. Going all the way back to the early days of All-New X-men, when the original five X-men first ventured into the future, those inescapable complications that come with time travel continue plaguing the young X-men. They can't avoid the fact that their presence in the future and their absence in the past is bound to have serious ramifications. Some of those ramifications play out over the course of their story, particularly in events like X-men: Battle of the Atom.

With Cross Time Capers, though, Bunn puts the time-displaced X-men in a position to confront the consequences of their time-traveling shenanigans. It may have taken longer for them to feel those consequences, but they finally get a sense of perspective throughout the arc. It's only in the concluding conflicts in X-men Blue #20 that they gain a better understanding of how they're affecting the space-time continuum.

If there's any lesson the original five X-men should learn from this, it's that when there's a gaping hole in the timeline, someone or something will come along to exploit it. Biff Tannen did it in Back to the Future. The future Brotherhood of Mutants, led by Charles Xavier Jr. and his omega-level daddy issues, do the same. While they're not quite as ambitious as Biff Tannen, they are every bit as devious. What they do to exploit the time-displaced X-men's absence is neither subtle nor minor. It leaves an impact, one that goes beyond the usual lessons learned by messing with time travel.

Bunn closely follows the traditions of Chris Claremont in that respect in that the sci-fi elements associated with time travel are secondary to the dramatic elements. The story is less about the original five X-men traveling through time to fix the past than it is about them confronting the consequences of their actions. Their continued presence in the future has consequences and these are the kinds of consequences that literally fight back.

It's that element of drama that helps subvert the usual complications and confusion often associated with time travel. Classic stories like Days of Future Past show that this is an effective way to give time travel stories a genuine impact without making every other conversation an existential crisis on time paradoxes. Those conversations still happen in X-men Blue #20, but the assorted techno-babble is kept to a minimum.

Instead, Bunn relies on converging the various elements seeded throughout the journey that unfolds in Cross Time Capers, throwing a many of them as possible in the final battle. It's a battle that Silva effectively turns into a colorful, vibrant spectacle that feels epic in both size and scope. While it unfolds quickly, it hits on all the necessary dramatic elements, from confronting Xavier Jr. to the original five X-men reuniting with their mentor. Each moment carries weight and without incurring more time paradoxes.

That's not to say the time travel elements don't also carry weight in this story. Given the circumstances and context of the original five X-men's time displacement, those aspects of the conflict are unavoidable. The story clearly establishes that their decisions in the future have an impact on the past. It also provides some ominous, albeit not too surprising, foreboding about the decisions they'll have to make at some point.

Like Battle of the Atom before it, Cross Time Capers makes clear that what the original five X-men are doing still has an impact on the overall timeline. The choices they make, the battles they fight, and the impact they have on the past and future all matter. It also puts the team in an awkward position because to some extent, they already know what they'll end up having to do. It's like reading an unwanted spoiler in that they can't unread it.

This is where X-men #20 stumbles a bit into the inevitable complications of time travel stories. Even with the drama, there are some details that don't get fleshed. There are moments that have the potential to become very emotional and impactful, but some of that potential is lost for the sake of keeping the story going. Certain elements from the early parts of the story don't really play a role in the final battle, but they aren't rendered meaningless by the final conclusion.

In terms of the most critical elements, X-men Blue #20 handles those very well. There's reason and purpose behind every decision. The motivations and emotions of each character is clear. The events of previous issues influence the outcome of the final battle. Even with the complications of time travel and the erratic pacing of that final battle, the end result is a concise, cohesive story that satisfies as much as any time travel story can without getting too caught up in paradoxes.

That's not just an accomplishment that honors the standards set by Chris Claremont. It's a testament to the unique challenges of time travel stories. They have so many moving parts and so many potential complications that may or may not result in someone like Biff Tannen messing up the timeline. Being able to tell that story and not lose track of all the frustrating time travel tropes that derail so many stories is quite a feat. While Cross Time Capers may not be in the same league as Back to the Future, it certainly makes the case that those stories are still worth telling.

Final Score: 8 out of 10

Doubling (And Tripling) Down On Time Travel: X-men Blue #16

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

There's a certain point in a narrative where a certain subplot either needs to be abandoned or shoved back into the spotlight. It's like that point in a poker game where pushing all the chips to the center of the table is the only sound tactic left. It's a major risk and one that potentially undermines the entire foundation of a story, but the payoff is significant. For the time-displaced X-men in X-men Blue, the time is right for that kind of gamble.

There's no getting around it. Since arriving from the past in the pages of All-New X-men, the mission of the original five X-men seems to change every other week. One week, they're trying to stop Cyclops from ushering in a full-blown mutant genocide. The next, they're joining Cyclops to become mutant revolutionaries. The week after that, they're working with Magneto, the same guy who tried to kill them on their first mission. While it's not uncommon for teenagers to have erratic priorities, time travel seems to exacerbate the situation for the time-displaced X-men.

Beyond these varying missions and allegiances, though, there remains one common, unresolved thread. These time-displaced X-men are, for reasons not yet explained, cannot go back to the future. The events of X-men: Battle of the Atom establish that there is something keeping these time traveling teenagers stuck in the future. The nature of that mechanism is vague and rarely hinted it. For the most part, it's like Spider-Man's marriage in that it's overtly ignored for the most part.

In X-men Blue #16, Cullen Bunn and Thony Silas finally revisit this issue in a way that requires them to push those proverbial chips to the center of the table. It all happens quickly and under the backdrop of some typical teenage melodrama that always seems to find its way into the pages of X-men Blue. The mixture and transitions aren't always seamless, but few things involving teenage melodrama are.

That melodrama is only a small part of a much more serious conflict that has roots that extent back to X-men: Battle of the Atom and beyond. Anyone who has seen Back To The Future more than once understands the erratic and chaotic nature of time travel. Mess with the timeline too much and eventually, it'll get impatient. Whatever patience kept the original five X-men intact in the future seems to have run out, albeit quite suddenly.

There's little build-up or foundation to the sudden fracturing of time. It just starts happening, forcing the time-displaced X-men to react on the spot. Part of that reaction involves them engaging in more time travel. On the surface, that seems like fighting fire with napalm. In this rare instance, though, it makes sense and it addresses an important issue that has remained vague since X-men: Battle of the Atom.

Even those who haven't seen Back To The Future understand on some levels that time travel, especially one that involves changing the past, tends to incur an unpredictable impact on the present. For the most part, the impact of the original five X-men being in the future hasn't been that significant. The final few issues of Dennis Hopeless' run on All-New X-men even imply that their presence may not affect the timeline at all, which undermines the entire premise of a time travel story to begin with.

Like the events of X-men: Battle of the Atom, the temporal details remain vague. However, X-men Blue #16 ditches much of those subtleties and makes one thing very clear. The original five X-men's presence is indeed having an impact on the timeline. They aren't just a bunch of clones or alternate versions of themselves from a dystopian future, of which the Marvel universe already has plenty. They are from the same timeline and what they do does effect the present. That reaction may have been delayed, but it's happening.

It's an important facet that Bunn and Silas belabor, which helps establish the premise and the stakes of the Cross Time Capers arc that begins in X-men Blue #16. It's an overdue dose of clarity for an issue that many recent stories involving the time-displaced X-men go out of their way to ignore. It's both refreshing and profound in that sense that it gives the story genuine stakes, but still doesn't forget that those involved are teenagers. That means that no matter how serious the story may be, there's going to be some entertaining awkwardness along the way.

There is some of that in X-men Blue #16, but not nearly enough. Much of the melodrama involves ongoing emotional entanglements between Cyclops and Jean Grey. While those kinds of entanglements are a major part of X-men drama, regardless of timeline, they seem somewhat forced. It's as though these two always have to have the same kind of drama thrown in, as though that's the only drama they know. Being teenagers, that's less believable than anyone shooting lasers from their eyes.

Even if the melodrama is forced and the pace is quick, the sheer intensity of X-men Blue #16 make it a solid beginning to what promises to be a chaotic arc involving time travel. Given how X-men Blue is coming off an event that involved Mojo, that's saying something. Bunn's concise storytelling and Silas' colorful lay a solid foundation that has the potential to incur more significant implications than anything the time-displaced X-men have experienced to date. Like Marty McFly though, they will likely have to learn about those implications the hard way.

Final Score 6 out of 10

Ultimate X #2 - Painful Nostalgia

A couple months ago I gave my review for the debut issue of Ultimate X, the comic by Jeph Loeb that was supposed to reinvigorate the Ultimate line by telling bold new stories about what is happening to the mutants after Ultimatum. The premise is good, but in a nutshell the execution smells worse than mule shit, elephant shit, horse shit, dog shit, cat shit, and pretty much every other form of shit on this planet combined. Scientists would have to formulate a whole new strain of shit to match how much Ultimate X sucks. It's not only an affront to people who used to like the Ultimate universe. It's akin to sending a hitman to the readers still in the hospital after Ultimatum and so they can anally rape them to add to the humiliation for ever having followed this series.

So if I hated Ultimate X so much, why did I read issue 2? Plain and simple, it was the only comic outside the pitiful X-men Forever series that offered a chance at a decent Jean Grey story. The preview art from months ago hinted that this supposed new character, Karen Grant, was actually Jean Grey in disguise. Loeb tried to make it out to be some big mystery, as if her secret was the only thing keeping the holy grail from being found. Problem is, from the first few pages a brain damaged retard could have figured out that Karen was Jean. If that was the entire premise of the issue then this comic wouldn't qualify as being worthy of toilet paper. Luckily, there was more to it. Unluckily, it was every bit as pitiful as the first issue.

Now I'm a sucker for Jean Grey stories. She's one of my favorite characters and I've always had an affinity for Ultimate Jean Grey. She was a lot edgier and outgoing than her 616 counterpart. It was ironic how she was one of the few Ultimatum survivors when in 616, the writers seem to look for ways to kill her. I sincerely wanted to see a fresh story of her that wouldn't make me sick to my stomach the way X-men Forever did (which sadly is the only other ongoing series where Jean is still alive). It started off promising, but it went down faster than the stock market.

Here's the premise. Jean changed her name, changed her appearance, got a job at a mall, used her telepathy to change everyone's perceptions to make them think she had been there for three years when it had only been three months, and tried to live a normal life. Only she wasn't the same Jean Grey from the pages of Ultimate. She was a new Emo Jean Grey, one who dressed goth and was painfully reserved, a complete departure from what made her Ultimate counterpart appealing. To add to the clusterfuck, the narration was done by her boyfriend Dave, who is basically a mall cop. While Dave tries to come off as some open character with a touch of depth, he ends up coming off as some creepy stalker for Jean/Karen. He talks about early on how he kept asking her out 10 times before she said yes and how she seldom opened up. He comes off less a caring boyfriend and more a stalker. He's some character, one best left for dead. And wouldn't you know it? He got killed near the end by Sabretooth. Normally, I would hate to throw any further death into the Ultimate series after Ultimatum, but this guy needed it. He was too lame to keep alive.

In addition, remember how the first Ultimate X issue basically plagiarized the entire Superman Origins story for Jimmy Hudson? This issue took it a step further. It plagerized a story that came out LESS THAN A YEAR AGO. To make matters worse it came from the same damn series. Here's what happened. Mystique shows up and confronts Jean, telling her she should join her and Sabretooth. A fight ensues and Mystique and Sabretooth are beaten back. Want to know what happened in Ultimatum X-men Requiem that came out in August 2009? The same damn thing! Mystique and Sabretooth show up and try to recruit her. Part of the reason for Ultimatum was to add originality to the Ultimate universe again. But they use the same plot points from less than a year ago! What's that say about this series? They seem to be putting the same effort into it as Homer Simpson does in trying to lose weight.

Even worse? The art didn't offer any redeeming value like the first issue. Art Adams is supposedly an artistic genius in this area and he drew Jean Grey/Karen Grant like she was 13 fucking years old. In the comics it is well established that Ultimate Jean is 20. If this comic were actually decent then that may be forgivable, but the Ultimate series has earned no such leeway. I'm usually willing to cut Art Adams some slack, but now he deserves every bit the same scorn as Jeph Loeb.

It ends predictably enough. Jean meets up with Jimmy and that's about it. There's nothing new or fresh to be taken from this issue. As someone who has always had a special appreciation for Jean Grey, it usually takes a lot to get me to hate a comic with her as the main focus. Chris Claremont succeed with X-men Forever and I never thought that bombastic butchering of her character could be topped. Jeph Loeb, it seems, has matched Claremont blow for blow. It's a fucking Greek tragedy of godlike proportions.

Ultimate X #2 is another solemn reminder of how hard the series I once loved so much has fallen. Every book reeks of the stench left by Ultimatum. Even the most solid series like Ultimate Spider-Man can't get beyond the painful aftermath that basically killed an entire line. It doesn't matter of Hemmingway himself came back from the dead and wrote these books. Without the characters that made Ultimate great, the whole line is nothing more than cannon fodder laced with superhuman shit.

Earlier this week I posed a question to Tom Brevoort, Marvel's Vice President Executive Editor. I asked:

What would you say to all the fans of Ultimate who were seriously turned off by seeing so many beloved Marvel characters be horribly killed in Ultimatum?

His response is here:

Sorry about that. But most of those characters are still alive and active in the main Marvel Universe, so you can always follow them there. But if you just don't care for it, and aren't getting the same pleasure out of following the Ultimate books, then it's all right to stop buying them.

You hear that? It's basically saying "Sorry, you'll have to settle for 616 where those characters are still alive." Excuse me, but wasn't the whole point of Ultimate to create a fresh alternative from 616? Now that they killed off all the characters they're sending readers back to 616 where they weren't pleased with to begin with? Maybe I'm slow, but that logic would give Spock from Star Trek an brain stroke. He and Marvel seem to be okay with permanently handicapping a series. They're okay with taking away appeal and just churning out rehashes of plots so unoriginal it could be scientifically categorized as symptoms of insanity. Either they don't give a damn about the Ultimate universe anymore or they've just plain given up.

Ultimate X #2 gets a pitiful 0 out of 5. There's no redeeming value, not even from the art. Ultimate Marvel is becoming more pitiful with each passing month. It makes about as much sense to buy this comic as it does to stick your head in a microwave while sodomizing yourself with a salad fork. The sooner this entire line gets canceled, the better.