Marvel Marvel Announcement: "Avengers vs. X-men"

I normally don't make two major blog posts in one day for the same reason I don't mix cocaine and vodka. There's only so much my system can take. But Marvel seems intent on putting my crack dealer out of business. Less than a day after posting an announcement that they would discuss the return of the Phoenix Force to the X-books, Marvel made a much bigger announcement. And it can be summed up in three words: X-men vs. Avengers.

Marvel Announces X-men vs. Avengers for 2012

Say it again just so it sinks in. X-men vs. Avengers. It sounds so awesome that you could get high off the fumes and sell it to middle school kids for their lunch money. Yet it comes as one of the worst kept secrets since Ricky Martin's sexuality. Marvel has already been hinting at this. At the New York Comic Con, they were waving their proverbial dicks in the air saying that there would be some big 2012 event that would make Marvel fans ejaculate multiple times in their underwear. This after Fear Itself started with a bang and ended with a whimper. Yet this something that has actual circumstances surrounding it. It has already been confirmed that the Phoenix Force is a part of it, as dictated in the overpriced Point One. It has also been confirmed that Hope Summers and Wanda Maximoff, the cause of and solution to M-Day, will be at the center of it all. Basically, the X-men and the Avengers have to fight over two reality warping women with serious PMS. It's the kind of threat that could tear the universe several trillion new assholes.

Now I'm going to ignore the Phoenix teasers because I already ranted about them earlier and I'm not hung over yet. The simple premise of X-men vs. Avengers just sounds so awesome that I could mix it with cranberry juice and get my ex-girlfriend drunk off it. Moreover, this shit isn't being pulled out of the random ass of a Marvel writer. This was built up back during Second Coming, Generation Hope, and Children's Crusade (which has been more delayed than the return of Arrested Development). It's the climax after so much foreplay that you're not sure you can get it up again. Yet low and behold, this announcement acts like viagra mixed with ecstasy and now every fanboy has a boner that could require medical attention by the time this event hits in April 2012.

So am I excited? Well let me put it this way. When I saw this announcement the first thoughts through my head were "Well shave my nuts, jam a stick up my ass, and call me Johnny Knoxville! This is awesome! Now where the fuck is my weed?" It's THAT big. Marvel has fallen behind DC in wake of the new 52 relaunch. This has the potential to bitch slap DC back into the number two spot until they get desperate again and do another relaunch. The stakes are high and Marvel has a lot to lose and a lot to gain from this story. And like a hobo at a craps table, I'm all in! Nuff said!

New Phoenix Teaser for Marvel "It's Coming"

I know it's been a while since I've offered my colorful drunken input to recent Marvel news. In my defense the most exciting news Marvel has had since Fear Itself all relates to shit that won't happen until the summer of 2012. And I'm sorry, but I just can't think that far ahead. I can barely think back to last night when I woke up in some strange old woman's basement with a pair of dentures in my hand and what I hope was just a wig in the other. But since the New York Comic Con back in October, Marvel has been dropping hints like Herman Cain drops sexual harassment charges about what's going to happen in 2012. They even dedicated an entire, overpriced 48-page one-shot called Point One to act as what is essentially and overblown trailer to a Michael Bay movie. Among the many random and underdeveloped stories in that issue was yet another teaser for the Phoenix Force. Under normal circumstances, I would be jumping out of my skin and humping my couch in excitement over this news. But like one too many hits of crack, the high just isn't what it used to be.

Robot6: "It's Coming" Phoenix Teaser on Wednesday, December 7th

For those of you who haven't kept up, Marvel has been touting the Phoenix Force in their comics more than Brittney Spears touts her snatch. It goes all the way back to Phoenix Endsong in 2005, a time when you could still get a home loan for being able to walk and chew gum and when everyone still laughed at the notion of electing a black president. That story officially or unofficially, depending on who you ask, made the Phoenix Force active again. Since then, the Phoenix Force has showed up in countless references from Messiah Complex to Astonishing X-men to several issues of Generation Hope. This thing is officially the herpes of the X-books in that it keeps coming back and in a very annoying way.

Now don't get the wrong idea. I love Phoenix. I love Jean Grey. What I don't love is having both regularly teased as coming back into the fold only to have it turn out to be a complete fucking farce. Marvel has already gone out of it's way to essentially plagerize Jean's imagery in the creation of Hope Summers, the girl who actually flared the Phoenix back at the end of Second Coming. Every public statement they seem to make regarding Jean Grey essentially reinforces the notion that she's dead. Now could that be a tease? I used to think so, but given how much time and resources they put into making Hope Summers a replacement character and watering down Emma Frost to the point where she might as well be Jean Grey after extensive plastic surgery I honestly can't see it happening. I've brought it up in many reviews where Jean is cited. Marvel wants her imagery, but they don't want to bring her back. They want to have their cake and eat it too. That's like wanting to get piss faced drunk without getting a hangover. I'm sorry, but even in the skewwed physics of the comic book universe that just isn't possible.

Now I would love to be wrong this time. I would get down on my knees and lick Marvel's boots clean of dog shit if this time the story actually involved Phoenix and Jean Grey in a coherent way. But I'm not brushing my teeth just yet in anticipation. I'm a cynical, jaded fanboy in this department and I'm maintainin a strict "I'll believe it when I see it" approach. I'm not quite as extreme as those who deny global warming, but at the moment I'm within spitting distance of that crowd with regards to Marvel's handling of the Phoenix Force and Jean Grey. Again, I want to be proven wrong here. Come on, Marvel! You know you wanna! But until that happens, expect me to keep relating the Phoenix with herpes and Jean Grey with fond memories. Nuff said!

X-men Legacy #259 - Penultimate Mystery Awesome

The end of an era is always vulnerable to a certain level of fucked upedness. When someone spends a long time on something, they tend to embody it to the point that stepping down becomes a bit of a spectacle. Just ask Brett Favre. Okay, bad example and too many dick joke connotations. What I'm trying to get at with my drunken ramblings is that Mike Carey has pretty much defined X-men Legacy. His long tenure has been so thoroughly awesome that it's hard to imagine this series thriving without him. It's going to have to very soon because there's only one two-issue arc left in his legendary run. This arc is part epilogue and part prologue because it tackles the events immediately proceeding Schism. It's a pretty important part of the ongoing X-men mythos, but like the unfortunate cars in every Michael Bay movie the story is bound to be lost in the spectacle of Mike Carey's departure.

I've made my opinions on Mike Carey's run pretty clear since I started reviewing comics in between binge drinking and writing X-men Supreme. He's been one of the most consistent X-men writers in decades. He has Chris Claremont's longevity without Matt Fraction's personality quirks. Like Tom Brady in the pocket, he goes about his business with a cool and collected style. Granted, I'm sure Mike Carey wishes he could include the part where he knocks up Brazilian supermodels, but that's besides the point. X-men Legacy #258 marked the end of his last big arc. It brought Havok, Rachel, and Polaris back to Earth after a nearly four-year hiatus. And it was Mike Carey at his best. Now with X-men Legacy #259, he begins his last arc and it doesn't involve nearly as much sci-fi shoot 'em ups. It's a bittersweet notion that he's finally getting ready to say goodbye to the series that he made so awesome, but no one will blame him if he doesn't care to restrict his brilliance to X-men comics.

The final arc of Mike Carey's run is like his previous arc in the sense that it takes place before much of the Regensis comics. For a while now it seems as though X-men Legacy has been like the state of Mississippi. It's so behind the times that it still thinks Jesus road dinosaurs in his battle against Judas's homosexual inter-racial army of abortion doctors. But with the return of Havok, Rachel, and Polaris the series is finally catching up. Now it was already touched on during the X-men Regenesis one-shot what Rogue, Gambit, Magneto, Frenzy and the rest of the Legacy crew decided. This just fleshes it out a bit more.

It starts with Rogue as Mike Carey's books so often do. She hasn't left Utopia yet. She and Gambit take a break from humping to Mardi Gras music to reflect on all the shit that's happened under Cyclops's leadership. She touches on everything from the Messiah Trilogy to Necrosha to Dark Reign. It isn't just for the sake of a random Family Guy style flashback either. She recalls these events because they show how Cyclops has led the X-men effectively enough for them to...you know, survive. And just walking away from that isn't easy and it really shouldn't be. But Gambit being the overly pragmatic scoundrel that he is at heart reminds her that like the NFL, the X-men are a very what-have-you-done-for-me-lately type team and Cyclops has screwed the pooch a bit too hard this time. Insert whatever Bestiality joke you want from that.

In an effort to unscrew the pooch or at least help the pooch cope with the trauma, Cyclops gets a long overdue visit from his brother. It's the kind of reunion that has been years in the making. Havok now knows what happened while he and Polaris were of humping in deep space. We don't get to see his reaction to shit like moving to the West Coast, forging Utopia, and the Mutant Messiah. But that would probably just consist of one page of him picking his jaw up off the floor. The events of Schism are far more pressing. He doesn't belittle his brother as brothers are so inclined to do. He tries to encourage Cyclops to find some middle ground with Wolverine. In his mind there's no need for a schism. It just goes to show he's been gone a long time.

Now I may be getting ahead of myself here, but I might as well bring it up. This is the closest this comic even gets to showing Rachel, Havok, and Polaris's reaction to all the shit that's gone down since they've been gone. No one mentions Hope Summers. No one brings up Norman Osborn or Professor Xavier's absence. It's a deeply underwhelming and disappointing development because some of this shit really shouldn't be ignored. I think someone needs to stand up and point out that the mutant messiah looks way too much like Jean Grey and if she's flaring the Phoenix Force, then that should be brought up too. Not to mention, Cyclops's father kind of died during Havok, Polaris, and Rachel's space excursion. So did Lilandra. None of that is brought up. It's a really fucked up omission and one there were plenty of chances to address. If that pisses you off too much, then you might as well stop reading this issue because it'll only piss you off more and I have enough people suing me at the moment.

Cyclops and Havok's chat only reinforces that everyone is taking sides. Some aren't as certain as others. Rogue is one of them. While she's wrestling with her decision, she pays Magneto a visit and thankfully it's not a booty call. He actually offers an insightful explanation as to why he's choosing to stay on Cyclops's team and it's not unreasonable. He sees Wolverine as too reckless. He believes Cyclops is a better leader and he's willing to follow him. But that's not enough for Rogue. She's struggling to see things from his point of view so in an effort to show that his balls are still barely contained by his old and wrinkly scrotum, he offers Rogue to drain him and not like your typical love interest either. She takes him up on his offer. However, it doesn't offer her the insight she was hoping for. In fact, it exposes a lingering crisis that followed them back from deep space.

Rogue explains to Cyclops and a number of X-men regulars that a psychic presence followed them through the wormhole they traveled through on their way back. Emma Frost actually confirms that another mutant signature made it through and that's cause for concern. You know, besides the massive space station of war-loving aliens. So Cyclops orders a scan of everyone in order to isolate the presence. But like every economic outlook since 2008, the results are negative. Then Dr. Nemesis shows that in addition to being an asshole, he also has an eye for the unusual. He takes a look at Korvus's sword, also known as the Phoenix Sword. As if the name alone wasn't cause for concern. Granted, the Phoenix Force left that sword during the War of Kings arc, but it's still enough to make Emma Frost soak her panties and not in a good way.

Cyclops and Emma confer with their science team. They explain that the Phoenix Sword was altered during their trip through the wormhole. Fragments of a mutant mind managed to latch onto it. Some speculate that it could be Jean Grey's mind, but let's face it. This is Marvel we're talking about here. They won't even begin to sew the seeds of Jean Grey possibly returning. Plus, Emma Frost would be much more of a bitch than usual if she knew that was the case. Instead, they conclude that the sword is like an anchor of sorts for a presence and it's too much of a pussy to let go. Or something to that effect.

So after enlisting help from Blindfold, the X-men put together a plan to seek out and confront this presence. Emma uses her second best asset after her tits to aid Blindfold in finding out more of this presence. It's all somewhat ambiguous, but not in the classic Matrix sort of way. The presence reads like something from Dante's Inferno or anyone that's ever passed out drunk in the middle of the day on Miami beach without sunscreen. There's a lot of burning. Apparently, this presence was about to die, but decided that death probably sucked ass and turned around. Except it got stuck halfway. It's more than a little fucked up, but given how death works in the Marvel universe I wouldn't be surprised if the Grim Reaper worked for the DMV.

Since the X-men aren't big in letting someone suffer in disjointed agony, Rogue offers to take the next illogical step. Since she detected the presence when she absorbed Magneto in a very non-sexual way, it stands to reason that she can gather more pieces if she absorbs everyone else who was on Gul Damar. Again, in a non-sexual way. Along the way Rogue even chats with Frenzy, who seems to have made up her mind. Despite being an epic hardass, she's going with Wolverine. She just doesn't care to be in a war zone anymore and she's too repulsed at the thought of Cyclops and Emma swapping body fluids. It gives Rogue something else to think about other than some disembodied presence.

After absorbing the pieces, she touches the Phoenix Sword last. Like anyone who has ever mixed Cialis with vodka, it has an unexpected side-effect. The last piece opened up a gateway with the sword that Rogue describes as completing a circuit. It opens a door to a world. It confirms that the Phoenix Sword has more uses other than just having a name that makes Emma shake in her overpriced shoes. It's actually a gateway, one that didn't quite make it from the other end of the wormhole on Gul Damar. And Rogue, being the ballsy woman she is, decides to take a look around despite the natural inclination to want to avoid a fiery gateway.

As soon as she enters, she's confronted by a a disembodied fiery spirit. Could it be? Is this fiery woman the missing pieces of Jean Grey? Has Marvel actually stopped fucking with fans on that subject? Of course not. That would make way too much sense. It turns out that figure is Ariel. Who is Ariel? She's just some D-list character that was killed off during Second Coming. It was horribly glossed over, even for a lesser known character. But it's indeed her and Rogue assures her that they'll get her out. Then she can start kicking the asses of everyone who pretty much brushed off her death while they mourned Nightcrawler.

So once again, another dead character not named Jean Grey is back yet she still utilizes Jean Grey's imagery. I want to be overly outraged about this, but I find myself just rolling my eyes and saying "Really Marvel? Seriously? You're butt-fucking THAT worn out corpse again?" But I digress. For an issue that has been mostly talk, it's a nice shot of action. Given that the last arc involved alien armies and a space station falling into a fucking sun, a smaller-scale conflict is somewhat welcome. It allows some of these mysteries regarding the Phoenix Sword and their little trip from Shi'ar country to develop. Even so, the imagery at the end makes you wonder if Marvel artists are banging whoever is running the makers of Xerox copiers.

While this issue had plenty of dramatic elements, it seemed to overlook some in favor of creating new ones. One of the biggest appeals this issue had going in was seeing the reactions from Havok, Rachel, and Polaris regarding all the changes since they've been gone. Well didn't get much reaction. The conversation with Havok and Cyclops was nice and all, but at no point was it ever shown how fucked up they may or may not have been after hearing what has happened to the X-men. We never even got to see their reactions to Hope Summers. Given how often Rachel complains about her mommy, that sounds like it would be a pretty big issue to overlook. Now Mike Carey could address it in the next issue, but it still feels like a missed opportunity.

I still enjoy Mike Carey's style and I'm trying to savor it for his last arc. This issue highlighted his ability to focus on certain character-based plots and further explore how others reacted to the events of Schism. The plot with Ariel was a nice bonus, but it still distracted from other looming plots that were essentially cast to the wayside. So while logistically speaking this comic is pretty solid, the sheer breadth of missed opportunities really brings it down. That's why I give X-men Legacy #259 a 3 out of 5. Mike Carey has one issue left to end his run on a high note. I hope he takes advantage of it the same way Charlie Sheen takes advantage of hookers who don't want to pay for their own drugs anymore. His run has been legendary on a great many levels, but there's one more left to overcome. Nuff said!

X-men Supreme Reflections: Bobby Drake PREVIEW

It's getting to be that time of year again and I'm not just talking about the holidays. The X-men Supreme fanfiction series is entering a critical area. I'm making a big push to finish up Supreme Reflections Volume 2 so I can start on X-men Supreme Volume 3 by the end of the year. So far I've covered four of Marvel's famous Original Five X-men. There's only one left, the ever lovable Bobby Drake. Like Angel before him, he underwent some serious drama throughout X-men Supreme Volume 2: War Powers. His relationship with Polaris has been a major driving force throughout this fanfiction series. Now that it's over, he can take time to reflect. That's what I hope to do with the final entry of X-men Supreme Reflections Volume 2. I've prepared an extended preview of what you can expect from the X-men's lovable Iceman.

I shouldn’t be droning like this. I’ve never let myself get this down before. I’ve always found a way to pick myself up and make a joke out of my problems. So what happened? Why is it so much harder this time?

It’s not like I haven’t been through hardship. I was practically born into it in South Boston. I’m talking about a rough neighborhood with touch, ridged, blue-collar people whose sense of humor was as limited as their income bracket. My parents sure fit the mold. My dad busted his ass on the docks for 60 hours a week while my mom had been bussing tables at restaurants since she was 17. It was not a fun environment. Our house had more leaks in it than an incontinent dog and the only entertainment my folks would splurge on was a small TV with basic cable. It’s the last place you would expect a career class clown to emerge.

I guess it’s just how I learned to cope. When you’ve got so little growing up, you have to find a way to compensate. A sense of humor ended up working for me. I remember how when I was young, my parents would always come home tired and exhausted. They looked so miserable and being the only one not toiling away for paychecks, I took it upon myself to make them smile. I would walk into the living room with a cooking pot on my head, swim trunks on my arms, and a towel as a cape and claim I flew in from the planet Chocolaton-Five and was looking to gather all the chocolate ice cream in the galaxy. They got a real kick out of it. I wasn’t always the funniest kid, but I did get them to smile. From there, the whole jokester persona stuck.

It didn’t always go over well. I remember this time I went a little overboard with my act once. I grabbed my dad’s tools, put on my mom’s apron, and pretended to be a firefighter. It was cute at first until I tripped, bumped into the kitchen table, and knocked some of our less-than-fancy dishes onto the floor so they broke into a million pieces. To say I got yelled at would not do justice to the permanent hearing damage I probably inferred. I know now I went a little too far with that joke. It may even count as a sign of things to come with Lorna.

Bobby cringed at the many indicators that should have been obvious with Lorna. He pulled the pillow off his face and let it fall to his side. With his arms and legs now lazily draping off the couch, he let out an embittered sigh. The sorrow was becoming too much and frustration was setting in. This wasn’t right. It couldn’t be.

“Pull yourself together, Drake! The hell is wrong with you?” Bobby groaned to himself.

He wasn’t supposed to be like this. He refused to let it get him down. His missteps with Lorna couldn’t be the same as the mishaps of his past. The real Bobby Drake knew how to rise above those and move forward.

While my focus is on completing Supreme Reflections, I'm also getting ready to make a major announcement for a very special event for the X-men Supreme fanfiction series. Every so often, Marvel Comics will take time from continuing their epic stories to do one-shots that help add depth and history to their universe. Well the X-men Supreme fanfiction series is no different. I don't plan on following the events of this series in a completely linear fashion. I want to explore the entire history that I've set up in this unique brand of X-men. Now that I have two volumes of fanfiction under my belt, I'm ready to explore that history. I hope others are willing to explore it as well! So stay tuned for some big announcements. If you have any questions or comments in the meantime, feel free to contact me at any time. Until then, take care and best wishes! Excelsior!

Jack

Uncanny X-men #2 - Sinister Stylish Awesome

Style is like a vagina. We all admire it on some level, but nobody will ever figure it out. I believe there's a little metrosexual in all of us. It may not be as flamboyant as Lady Gaga's wardrobe, but it's there whether we want to admit it or not. On some levels we're all just stoners stumbling around a 7-11 at two in the morning staring in amazement at how shiney the tin foil they wrap old hot dogs in can be. Style applies to comics as well and I'm not just talking about the horribly impractical attire that most superheroes wear, especially those that can barely contain the breasts of the overly proportioned female characters. Sometimes style is more subtle and that subtlety is what gives a comic a truly unique feel.

Enter Mr. Sinister. He's one of the X-men's most notorious villain. He'll strike fear in his enemies while making them stare in the same way they stare at a midget fucking a donkey. It's so horrendous that you just can't look away. While Sinister has always had a very macabre style, his recent return to the pages of Uncanny have poured a little napalm on that fire. It started in Uncanny X-men #544 where he was literally pooped out of some bio chamber. Then he put on the kind of suit that you only see in Mad Men, but he rocked it in a way not seen since pimps reintroduced the feathered hat. This style made his first act of badassery in Uncanny X-men #1 where he commandeered a sleeping Celestial all the more potent. He presented a daunting first challenge for Cyclops and his new Extinction Team. And like a boss, he created a carnival of horrors that was as awesome as it was theatric.

Uncanny X-men #2 doesn't let up on those theatrics. If anything it kicks it up a notch. Cyclops leads his team right into the twisted new domain that Sinister has carved out within San Francisco. It's as weird as it gets, but the sad thing is it could still probably pass for a tourist attraction. Hell, Nancy Polosi may even take bribes to profit from it. That makes crushing this army of tacky Sinister clones all the more vital. The last thing the X-men need is another reason for San Francisco to sick their army of hippies, gays, and stoners at them.

If Sinister fucking with them with his army of lookalikes and hipster style dress sense wasn't bad enough, Cyclops gets a call during the middle of the battle from Abigale Brand from SWORD. Apparently, the Celestials don't like it when some psychopath hijacks one of their own and uses them to make their personal Disneyland minus the mouse and the subtle antisemitism. So the Dreaming Celestial's buddies, who are space gods capable of ripping the universe several trillion new assholes, are on their way to do a little judging in ways that only republicans can masturbate to.

Now Sinister could just continue to sick his army of Sinisters on the X-men until the Celestials force a global pants-shitting contest, but that just wouldn't be Sinister. At some randomly chosen point in the battle, he calls off the attack and invites the X-men to join him in his newly constructed palace. Now if anyone else did this, I probably would start pissing and moaning about how it's so abrupt and contrived. But this is Sinister. He fucks with people in a way that even Dr. House would find excessive. So he invites them in and the X-men take him up on his offer, despite the fact that Emma Frost lost a fucking arm.

That's something that's worth repeating. In the last issue Emma Frost lost a fucking arm. Now she's able to manage because she's in her diamond form. Apparently, that makes bleeding to death a non-issue. But Cyclops and the others actually make it a point to remind her that she doesn't have an arm and probably is a liability in this fight. But she's Emma Frost. So long as her tits are intact, she can participate in any battle. That's besides the point, but I just think it's nice that Gillen didn't ignore it because it would have been easy for most other writers to do just that.

So the X-men venture into Sinister's domain. Along the way Danger starts making sense of this shit because to this point it has been a little random, although you can't expect much else from Sinister. She describes how all these dupes are basically from the same set of DNA. But they're just expressing themselves in different ways. It sounds like some shit my old art teacher did when he came to work drunk, but it does offer some insight into what Sinister is doing here. All these dupes are actually his DNA and not just your typical clone. They're basically his own kingdom and they all share his flashy style.

Once they're inside, Sinister offers a deeper explanation while coming off even creepier in the process. We actually get a little insight into what makes this raving madman who is crazy enough to clone himself and dress like Dean Martin. Gillen actually cites his past in Victorian England. He talks about how he thought he saw heaven in the White, racist, ethnocentric world of douch-baggery known as 19th century England. I know. That's as fucked up as it sounds. So he makes the same conclusion that the KKK made. Why not impose this entire singular vision on the whole fucking world? But unlike racist rednecks that wave flags with chewing tobacco stains, Sinister is actually capable of it. Remember, he has a fucking Celestial at his disposal and he's used it to make an army of his perfect little clones.

Needless to say, the X-men don't take kindly to a guy so narcissistic that he thinks the world should be made up of his own clones. But keep in mind Sinister invited them into his domain. They suspected it was a trap and guess what? They were right? He used a little creative telepathy to take over their minds and paralyze them. Only Emma could escape because she's immune to telepathy in her diamond form. Now Colossus/Juggernaut has his helmet on so for a moment he was immune too. But Sinister just had Cyclops blow his helmet off. See? Problem solved.

Now this would be very cunning if the X-men hadn't walked right into it. But they did. It's the only real head-scratching moment of the comic. While I'm sure there's some plan at work here, it still feels forced. Like it was just a way to get everyone in a place so Gillen could have Sinister do some flashbacks. I'm glad he's taking the time to flesh out Sinister more, but it would definitely help it if happened in a more organic way.

Emma and Danger, who maintain control of their own minds, try to oppose Sinister while he continues to fuck with Cyclops and the rest of his team. But remember Emma only has one arm. That and Sinister pretty much blows Danger the fuck apart with a fucking cannon. Yeah, it's a very basic way to take her out of the picture, but she's a fucking machine that doesn't have diamond kin and big boobs to protect her. Even Emma understands that she's outmatched. Even when Sinister brings up Jean Grey, she's no match for him. He's so unthreatened by her that he takes this time to explain his little philosophy of genetics. He credits his long study of Cyclops's lineage as having paved the way for the research that made his army of non mini-mes possible. He even goes so far as to say that everything is determined by genetics and free will is just an illusion. It's not every day that comics get existential, but with Sinister it's actually more than appropriate.

This philosophical musing distracts from the fact that he allowed Hope Summers to mimic Emma's diamond powers and escape with Illyana's powers. She's pretty resourceful for a Jean Grey ripoff so she deserves credit in that respect. She earns herself even more credit when she uses her escape to position herself a ways away and fire a sniper bullet that hits Sinister right in the head. That's right. A teenage girl that looks like Jean Grey shoots Sinister in the head. X-men fans, if this isn't enough for you then not even the fucking Phoenix Force can satisfy you.

But shooting one Sinister in the head is like shooting one raindrop in a hurricane. It amounts to jack shit because every Sinister clone is just as viable as Victorian Era Sinister. Even though the shot frees the X-men from their paralysis, they're still the one legged man in the ass kicking contest. They have no shot because Sinister is everywhere and he makes it clear that if they're not part of this perfect yet twisted world of his, they're fucked. It's a somewhat abrupt way to end the comic, but it gets the message across.

I said it at the beginning of this review and I'll say it again. Sinister has style. He's always been an over-the-top, unconventional style villain. This issue takes that concept, sticks a ton of C4 up it's ass, and blows it the fuck up over an entire mural. Sinister has always been a crazy son-of-a-bitch, but Kieron Gillen actually took time to flesh out the method behind the madness. He even got a little philosophical at times. Granted, it got a little wordy in some parts, but it's reassuring to see someone make a concerted effort to add more twist to a guy that's more twisted than a Tim Burton movie. Sinister really steals the show here. The X-men are basically props. Hell, you could have called this issue Sinister and his Uncanny X-Bitches and it would have been more than appropriate.

In many ways this issue took a different path than the second issue of Wolverine and the X-men. It tried to mix the action with a deeper exploration of the characters. Gillen didn't try to overwhelm the reader with epic struggles. He used a solid mix of flash and flare to tell a more complex tale, but it doesn't feel quite as complex. It's very different from Wolverine and the X-men because that series is a lot more basic. The premise of that book is clear, but the premise of Uncanny X-men is still developing. At times it requires the reader to be a bit more active in their approach to the book, but it's not fucking brain surgery. It's just a genuinely deep comic that actually makes you think. Since I've killed so many brain cells over the years, I've come to appreciate shit like that.

Aside from the wordiness in the middle, there's really not much else to say about this issue. It's awesome on so many levels. It succeeds in taking what was set up in the first issue and building something greater on top of it. It didn't build as far as it could have. Most of this issue was spent expanding the scale of Sinister's plot. For some, it may feel like the story drags, but it's still as solid a read you'll get with an X-book. That's why I give Uncanny X-men #2 a 4.5 out of 5. This first arc is poised to blow the minds of every X-fan in a way that would land any partially attractive woman a role in Donald Trump's next reality show. It's not quite there yet, but it's close! And like my ex-girlfriend with her favorite shower head, I'm ready for the climax! Nuff said.