X-23 #3 - Hellish Awesome

Before I begin, let me point out the obvious again. Yes, I know X-23 #3 came out a few weeks ago. Yes, I know I usually review these books the week they come out. Don't bust my balls. It's not like I want to delay these reviews. There just aren't enough hours in the day and popping caffine pills has turned my heart into the equivalent of Keith Richard's nutsack. Like X-men Legacy #242, I had to wait until I actually had time to review this. Plus, it was a shitty week. I originally intended to review the latest What If comic, but it ended up sucking so bad I couldn't give enough of a shit to review the damn thing. If a book is so bland it's hard to finish, I'm not gonna bother reviewing it. I'd rather stick to something that I know has the potential to be awesome.

The new X-23 series has certainly measured up in that regard. Since it began, Marjorie Liu has injected a steady stream of awesome into the pages that my pot dealer is officially jealous. The story of X-23 has always been compelling. She's not just a Wolverine knock-off. She's someone with a unique past, a unique persona, and unique disposition that puts her in a much better position to be awesome compared to more shitty incarnations (cough-Daken-cough). The first two issues of X-23 has her story intertwining with the ongoing Hellverine story in the Wolverine comics. This has been a bit of a mixed bag because that story hasn't exactly been worth dancing naked in the streets about. Tying X-23 into that story has somewhat limited the first few issues, but Marjorie Liu has made it work superbly.

The last issue put X-23 against a demonically possessed Wolverine who was obsessed with her in the same way Michael Vick is obsessed with dogs. He teased her, taunted her, and tormented her. He eventually got her to trade her soul for the life of her on-again off-again boy toy, Julian Keller. She was willing to save his life in exchange for taking a trip to hell. If Julian doesn't wake up kicking her feet, he's an even bigger douche than he was in X-men Legacy #242. He may not get a chance though. When X-23 wakes up in this issue, she's wearing a prisoner uniform and not the kind used in those sexy porno prisons. She's basically on the wrong side of an episode of Oz, only instead of sodomizing rapists she has to fight wolves. Not sure which is worse.

She tears into the wolves in a way that would make Michael Vick proud. Then it takes a hellish turn with one of the wolves turning into a demonic manifestation of Cyclops. He's also bear ass naked, so that shows Marvel is making a push to appeal to the Tween crowds or the gay crowds. The way this demon Cyclops talks to X-23 is similar to the way pimps talk to their hookers. He says he owns her and she's nothing but a tool. What makes this somewhat less pedophilic is that he's not entirely wrong. X-23 knows she was pretty much made to kill. In many ways, she is a tool and when a naked Cyclops says that to your face that's hard to ignore. Just ask Jean Grey or Emma Frost.

Laura's trip down the first few circles of Hell continue. The demon Cyclops basically tells her she has no soul, which for teenage girls is not much of a stretch. But she runs anyways, trying to get away from the wolves and the creepy gaze of a naked man. She's not unlike Miley Cyrus in that respect. Then along the way she meets someone else. This time it's a little less menacing and doesn't involve naked man (sorry tweens). It's hard to tell what his is, but this walking spirit that looks like a bad hologram from the Star Wars movies reaches out to her and provides X-23 with some much needed guidance.

She seizes this light and it takes her back down a trip to memory lane, which for her is like walking through Jeffery Dahlmer's kitchen. It takes her back to her childhood when she was being turned from an anti-social little girl into an anti-social killing machine. Her creators were trying to train the empathy out of her. To do that, they do something that could only come from the nightmares of grade school children. They threaten to kill a puppy. They give her a choice. Either she has to sit by and watch them horribly torture a cute little puppy or she has to kill it quickly so it doesn't suffer. On a scale of 1 to 10, it ranks about an 8 on the fucked up cruelty scale. Still not as bad as your typical initiation ceremony for a college fraternity, but it's up there.

The incentive works. She becomes a heartless killer and does everything her creators ask of her. She butchers people in a way that would make Ted Bundy queasy. She knows this and it starts to wear on her. In this Marjorie Liu really digs deep into Laura's psyche. Even during the Craig Kyle and Chris Yost minis, there was little time given into how Laura copes with all the terrible things she's done.

How does a teenage girl cope with being a heartless killer? It may not be too far off from your typical overly dramatic teenage girl who ends up on a reality show, but it's one of those extremes that's hard to wrap your head around. Marjorie Liu shows that for all the horrors that went into her creation, X-23 still has a fragile spark of humanity. That alone places her above half the teenage girls I went to high school with.

The personal struggle then turns into an actual struggle when Laura comes face to face with Hellverine. The nude Cyclops is gone (again, sorry tweens). Now Hellverine is tempting her again, trying to make her yet another demon for his army. He speaks his typical demon talk, droning on about how she has no choice and making his the only one that makes any sense. It's basically what you would expect of a demon. He's more full of himself than Simon Cowell and thinks he's pulling all the puppet strings when in reality he's just comic relief.

Of course, Laura's smart enough to understand that the only language demons know is bullshit. Taking them seriously is like trusting a used car salesman that insists the squeaking noise made by the transmission is nothing more than the radio acting up. She calls his bluff, saying she has another choice. Then it gets a little sudden. Without many words or descriptions she makes this choice and everything fades in a white light. It's about as exciting as it sounds.

Now this is something I have a problem with. I get the whole spiritual nature of this struggle, but to have it resolved in a flash...it's like Dorthy clicking her heels in the Wizard of Oz. It's a less than exciting way to resolve an issue. This is Wolverine and X-23! Two character that spill more blood than a hemophiliac getting treatment from an acupuncturist with Parkinson's! For it to end in just a flash is pretty weak and doesn't leave quite the impact it should. For the struggles Laura went through on her little spirit quest, it's not a very compelling resolution.

When the light fades, she's back where she started. She wakes up in the infirmary with Storm and a fully healed Hellion. Everything seems to have been resolved. Nothing is out of place except for some nasty blood stains, but that's the kind of shit that comes out with a mix of bleach and windex. Nobody remembers anything and they're right back to where they started. It's about as exciting as it sounds.

It does pick up again though. Cyclops, Emma, Storm, and Gambit go back to discussing her fate. Emma and Cyclops still believe that Laura needs structure. She can't just run around like Wolverine does because he's been doing that for decades and he's still an asshole. Storm believes she should be free to explore. Surprisingly, Gambit offers the best insight. The mere fact they're debating her fate implies she's another thing that needs to be fixed and that alone makes for a fucked up premise. The only way she'll make any progress on anything is to get away from the people who are trying to decide for her. Normally, Gambit's only good for card puns and flirting with Rogue so it's nice for Marjorie Liu to make him somewhat intelligible for once.

Laura follows Gambit's advice without even hearing it. She pays one last visit to Hellion, but doesn't even say goodbye before she leaves. She also gets one last goodbye from Storm, who decides not to stop her despite wanting to support her. It's a touching moment, one where Laura really sets herself apart from being in the X-men to being on her own. So she ends up leaving, basically following Wolverine's old habits of running off and trying to resolve her own screwed up problems. Like father like half-cloned daughter.

However, she doesn't get far before her next threat shows up. She doesn't know it, but someone every bit as worse as Hellverine catch's her interest. What could be worse you ask? How about Sinister? And not just the pasty faced ugly-ass Sinister that's been a historic prick...it's the Sinister with boobs! Miss Sinister! Could you imagine anything more horrifying and arousing?

Three issues in and the first arc is done! Marjorie Liu wisely doesn't commit too much of this new series to the Hellverine arc, even if it still feels like more than it needed to be. She probes into the psyche and personality of X-23, giving her depth and adding to her already stellar awesome. Her trip through Hell brought out a powerful side to Laura, showing that unlike Wolverine she's still a teenage girl struggling to find her place. She's on a different path now. She's got her own priorities and missions. In many ways this first arc has helped set the stage for what X-23's struggles are going to be like in this series and Marjorie Liu has made them more appealing than free wing night at a topless bar in Vegas!

Now this issue wasn't without some shortcomings. The resolution to X-23's trip through Hell was a bit contrived. The first two issues were flawless because they spared no details. Marjorie Liu took care of the little things and the big things. That's what made it so compelling and complete. With this issue, however, the resolution feels rushed and unrefined. I'm glad this series is trying to set itself apart from the other Wolverine series, but another page adding layers to her struggle in escaping Hellverine would have been nice. It would have come off as less contrived. The book makes up for it in the end, but it does bring a rushed resolution to something that could have been so mind-blowing. It's like only smoking half a joint. You don't get the full high.

X-23 #3 is still an awesome book and one that deserves to be in the upper class of X-men ongoings. It's right up there with Uncanny X-Force and the new Wolverine series in terms of quality. The art is fantastic, the story is compelling, and the characters are well-rounded. There's every possible ingredient for awesome. Marjorie Liu has cooked up something special here. So for this issue I give it a solid 4.5 out of 5. One arc is in the books and there's no reason why ten more can't follow! Nuff said.

X-men Legacy #242 - Untimely Awesome

Before I say anything, let me point out the obvious. I know I'm late posting this review for X-men Legacy #242. I know it came out over a week ago and I've been keeping my review to myself since then. Don't hunt me down and go Tony Soprano on my legs. I only have so much time in a given week and X-men Legacy was the odd comic out. I didn't come to that decision lightly. I meditated, pondered, took a few shots of acid, meditated some more, chatted with Ben Franklin and a pink Unicorn named Farley, took some more LSD, ate lunch with Sammy Davis Junior, got into an argument with a talking lizard, took one more shot of LSD, woke up naked in downtown Phoenix, paid the indecency fine, and then made my decision. The X-men Legacy review would have to wait.

Please don't get the wrong idea. Just because it was the odd comic out doesn't mean it was of lesser awesome compared to Brightest Day and Generation Hope. A Mike Carey comic book always has the potential to be awesome, no matter when you emerge from a drug-induced stupor wearing limited (if any) clothes. His last arc, Collision, was mixed at times. It started slower than one of George W. Bush's old speeches and was just as hard to follow at times without using the world 'evil' every six seconds. Then it got better. Towards the end it got a lot better. It was like being at a bar and hitting on some butt ugly chick, but after a few rounds of Jack Daniels she looks like a young pre-Federline Britney Spears. It took Mike Carey's collection of X-men away from Utopia and into India, home of call centers and less-than-solid bowl movements. It gave underdeveloped characters like Indra a chance to shine while still throwing in a few explosions from inter-dimensional pirates. It seemed like an odd story to tell after an event like Second Coming, but it was enjoyable none-the-less.

X-men Legacy #242 begins a new arc. In many ways this should have been the first arc following Second Coming because it deals directly with the aftermath of Bastion's attack. The X-men have an island that's been more beaten up than one of Ike Turner's old lady friends. The city of San Francisco is also a mess. When killer robots from the future come attacking, they tend to leave a mess. The city is rebuilding and so are the X-men. So it only makes sense that these two stories would intersect.

It starts off with one of the characters Bastion screwed over most. Hellion lost his hands during the battle. Now he's more disgruntled than Dallas Cowboys fans. He's trying to adjust to life without hands. Given he has telekinesis, that's not as bad as it is for some people. He can still work a remote control, play video games, type on the computer, and there's probably some way telekinesis can help him masterbate as well. However, he's still a prick about it. When Dr. Roa tries to help him, he thanks her by destroying her lab.

So yeah, Hellion is a prick. He epitomizes everyone still pissed off after Bastion's attack. That's when Rogue comes in. Remember, this is a Mike Carey X-books. If Rogue isn't involved, either someone's abducted Mike Carey or someone's blackmailing him.

While Rogue is catching up with Jubilee, Jean Gre-I mean Hope Summers (need I explain again?) passes by a friendly game of mutant baseball. It's like regular baseball, except the steroids are replaced with mutant powers. Yankee and Giants fans should be see nothing new. This also presumably establishes this story before the whole Five Lights story because none of Jea-I mean Hope's followers are near her. The time lines in these books are always more fucked up than a season of Lost, but since Second Coming hasn't completely lost it's impact it still feels relevant.

Hellion and Hope (there, got it in three this time!) end up joining a meeting called by Cyclops. He's posed a new project for the X-men. In addition to rebuilding Utopia, they should also help rebuild San Francisco. Seeing as how the whole killer robot from the future attack happened while they had set up shop, it's the absolute least they could do outside sending a thank-you card and a fruit basket to everyone in the city. Some pretty big names are expected to participate, including Magneto. Now he's not too keen on charity. If the X-men were the Simpsons, he would be Mr. Burns. He goes along with it anyways, showing he's been quite pussified since joining the X-men.

Hope also joins in, which gets some protest from Cyclops. She is the mutant messiah and nobody wants her being crushed by mobs of drug induced hippies or outraged homosexuals from Castro street. But she convinces them to let her go. Colossus summed it up best. She's from an apocalyptic future. It would be nice to see the world heal itself for a change. It would spare Hope the paralyzing fear that one day she would go back to eating rats for dinner.

It's amazing how mundane it seems, but the story is still there. They arrive in San Francisco and they start building. What would have taken weeks takes hours. Magneto basically schools all the construction workers in putting back together a damaged building. He does what only an army of illegal Mexicans could possibly accomplish, which in Arizona would probably get him arrested. But in San Francisco, he's as welcome as the Grateful Dead.

Now at this point some may complain that the story is too dull. I would ask those people pour sulfuric acid into their brains and take up cooking classes with Jeffery Dahlmer. After an event like Second Coming and with subsequent events like the Five Lights, everything is so big and eventful. There's explosions, epic battles, and all that shit. There's never a lot of attention given to the little things. Like how does a team like the X-men or a city like San Francisco rebuild after an event like Second Coming? It may not seem like much, but it's those little things that help make a story even more awesome. I read on the back of a bumper sticker in downtown Philadelphia once that big things are best held together by sealing the smallest cracks. It was right outside a strip club so it must be true!

This leads to another interesting moment with Hellion and by interesting I mean he becomes even more of a prick. Hope Summers, despite being the mutant messiah, helps out in a very small way. She takes a shovel and some boards. She takes the whole Jesus connotations and goes the carpenter route. This doesn't jive with Hellion. He basically calls her out, saying that she's supposed to be this super powerful savior. Yet she's not ding anything like healing his hands. He's asking for a miracle and she can't give it to him. It's quite a contrast between someone who may have limitless power and someone whose power is just limited enough to bitch about. It leaves Hellion to storming off while Hope gets to work, not even bothering to turn water into wine to cheer him up.

The next part should get those complaining about the lack of action to shut up. Karima, who is basically half-sentinel with boobs intact, accidentally shoots off a round that dings Colossus. Now anything that dings Colossus is cause for concern. It's another instance of Mike Carey taking a character who hasn't had much time in the spotlight and giving them a chance to be awesome. Anyone who can ding up Colossus would certainly qualify. After what he did with Indra in the last arc, Karima is starting to show her potential in this arc.

While Karima is starting to consider an upgrade from the beta version, the work continues. Hellion stops acting like a prick and starts putting his telekinesis to good use. All the while a little girl starts bugging Hope about how everyone else is flaunting powers while she's using a shovel. It's like she walked into an Ipod convention with a Walkman. Hope has a good sense or humor about it and gets her to help. She talks all cute and stuff, like the little Japanese girls in anime cartoons before the tentacle rape. It's all so nice and casual until something other than a demolition crew starts making a scene.

It turns out it's from Hellion. He's going a little overboard with the telekinesis, adding to his douche-bag factor which at this point is near an all time high. Hope and the girl try to calm him down a bit. Then Karmia comes flying in and goes Windows Vista on his ass. She's no longer in control. She's crashing harder than the Wikileaks hosting server and she starts picking up where Bastion left off.

Hope and the girl are understandably confused. Karmia is just as surprised as they are. She tells them to run, but Hope being raised by Cable doesn't understand that word. She might as well be talking to her in Swahili. Since she doesn't run, Karmia ends up doing what Bastion could only fantasize about doing. She shoots Hope. It's a powerful way to end an issue that wasn't too heavy on action. However, since we know Hope is alive and well in titles like Generation Hope it's more than a given that she survives. So yeah, it seems unnecessary and cheap. But it still has an impact, just not as much as it could have.

There's a lot to love about X-men Legacy #242. There's been a lot to love about Mike Carey's entire run on the title. A guy doesn't write a series for years at a time without it being awesome on some levels. Just ask Chuck Austin. Mike Carey goes for a more subtle approach compared to Matt Fraction or Kieron Gillen. Rather than rely on explosions and reality endangering threats, he goes for the personal touch. It's what defines his style and it's what makes it awesome. This issue gave the spotlight to Hellion, Hope, and Karmia while still touching on the X-men as a whole. It's that extra touch that the last arc lacked. He focused on the smaller things, showing how the X-men rebuild their home and the world around them. It's one of those stories that should have been told much sooner, but is still awesome when it finally does get told.

The sheer fact this story should have been told earlier does cost it some impact though. If this took place directly after Second Coming rather than throwing in an arc like Collision, it would have worked much better. It would have picked up the pieces and sealed up the loose ends in a much more salient way. Because it's been nearly six months since Second Coming came to an end, the breadth of this story is hard to appreciate. The end where Karima shoots Hope is also somewhat cliched. We already know what's happening with her in other titles. We know she's going to survive. If it were another character it might have more relevance. It just seems unnecessary here and more bland than Mike Carey needs it to be.

The issue itself is awesome. It's the context of the issue that keeps it from maximizing it's potential. As such, I cannot give X-men Legacy #242 a perfect score like I so desperately want. I can still give it a 4.5 though. Had it come out a few months earlier, it would have certainly been given the top seal of approval. But the delay can't be ignored. Mike Carey can still make up for it entirely by continuing the quality in the next issue. He's still one of the best X-scribes there is and issues like this show it. If only some decent planning could be implemented then I would have far fewer reasons to nit-pick. For now, it's merely awesome in it's own right and that's still pretty damn awesome! Nuff said.

X-men Supreme Volume 2: War Powers PREVIEW

It's almost upon here! Volume 2 of the X-men Supreme fanfiction series is almost ready! I've been hard at work on Volume 2 since I finished Volume 1. Now I'm ready to give it a name. As of now, X-men Supreme Volume 2 will go by the title "War Powers." If you've read Volume 1: Mutant Revolution you should understand some of the subtext to that title. What happened in Volume 1 will most certainly influence Volume 2, but in this new installment of the X-men Supreme fanfiction series I hope to do more than just continue the story. I want to add in entirely new concepts that will make X-men Supreme truly unique.

The first issue of X-men Supreme Volume 2: War Powers will bring in some new players. One of them is someone I've hinted at before. The first part of this series will be a three-part arc that will set the stage for some exciting new developments. It'll lead to some new characters, some new plots, and hopefully better stories. You can view an extended preview below:

‘Dang, what is it that makes every human being want to dish out so-called advice to anybody having relationship issues? Is that genetically engrained or something? Maybe Ah should cover mah ears from now on whenever someone offers to talk.’

Sighing bitterly to herself, Rogue couldn’t help but feel the frustration getting to her. She was making a bigger deal of this than she should have. It wasn’t like Scott was becoming distant or anything with her. He was still doing everything he could to be a good boyfriend. Every time she thought about him and Jean she couldn’t help but feel uneasy. Maybe that feeling would go away with time, but she just wasn’t sure.

Rogue was ready to crawl into her room and lock the door for a few hours so she could unwind. Some nice alone time should do her well before she got back to her duties. But before she could get to her room, her cell phone started ringing. Groaning to herself, she grabbed it from her pocket and answered it. Hopefully it wasn’t Logan calling her in for a surprise Danger Room session.

“Yeah, what is it?” she groaned.

“Hello Rogue. It’s good to hear your voice again.”

Rogue froze in mid-stride. She would recognize that voice anywhere.

“Mama?!” she exclaimed, “Where the hell…how did you get mah number?!”

“You’re my daughter. It’s my job to know. I’m sure you’re probably still bitter about the last time we talked, but I’m going to ask you to set that aside for now. Something’s come up and I need to speak with you in person…alone.”

“Yeah right!” scoffed Rogue, “Give meh one good reason I should trust anything you say!”

“Because it’s about your brother. He’s in trouble.”

Rogue’s demeanor immediately shifted. Feelings of anger were replaced with feelings of concern. As much as she resented her mother for deceiving her, she knew there were some lines she wouldn’t cross. Her brother was one of them.

“Mah brother…why? What’s going on?”

“Meet me at hanger seven at Westchester private airport in an hour and I’ll tell you. Come alone. I don’t want the X-men involved in this.”

Before Rogue could ask another question, the line went dead. She tried to see if she could redial, but the number was listed as unknown on her phone. She should have known her mother would be too smart for that.

For a moment Rogue stood conflicted. A part of her wanted to run straight to Xavier and tell him about this. But it wasn’t that simple. This was a complicated family affair that was sure to get more complicated. Every reasonable part of her brain was telling her not to pull a Wolverine and go it alone. However, her gut told her Mystique was being sincere. It may be a feeling that came back to haunt her, but she was going to go through with it. She was just going to have to be extra cautious.

“Damn it all the hell! As if Ah don’t have enough problems,” she groaned, “Guess relationship issues will have to wait.”

So there you have it! X-men Supreme Volume 2: War Powers is set to launch! As always I encourage everyone to provide feedback on this and every installment of the X-men Supreme fanfiction series. Please contact me if ever you have any comments or questions. I'm always ready to listen. Until that initial launch, take care and I wish everyone the best! Excelsior!

Jack

Generation Hope #2 - A Work of Awesome

Every so often comic companies try to be fancy and reinvent the wheel. They refuse to call it what it is, a cheap gimmick. They'll throw around fancy words like 'jumping on point' or 'exciting' or 'never-before-seen.' It's the same shit dishonest car salesmen use and the same tactics Michael Bay can't resist. If that were really all it took to make something awesome, then Transforms 2: Revenge of the Fallen would have won no fewer than 10 Oscars and the Clone Saga in Spider-Man would have been hailed as the greatest piece of literature since Shakespeare.

For once, a new title has come along that doesn't try to forcibly re-wire the brains of readers. Generation Hope, for better or for worse, is familiar territory for X-fans. It's the exact same drug, but from a different dealer and the high is of a similar potency. Generation Hope essentially acts as an Uncanny X-men 2.0. It literally stems from an arc of Uncanny, following Jean Gre-I mean Hope Summers (sorry, most X-fans know by now how hard it is telling those two apart) as she finds her place in the X-men. The task has fallen onto her to locate a new generation of mutants that have emerged in wake of Second Coming. She managed to form her own little team/cult with a bunch of mutants, sort of in the tradition of Generation X or the Original Five. Writer Kieron Gillen doesn't break new ground nor does he try to. He takes a familiar style and works with it and while he's no Chris Claremont, he did a respectable job setting up this series with the first issue.

The second issue is where the whole novelty factor can no longer be used as a crutch. Some readers are willing to overlook certain shortcomings because the book has that nice shiney #1 on it. It's like aluminum foil to stoners. It'll amuse them for a moment, but they'll lose interest and go for the Doritos unless there's something awesome to be seen in that foil. The first issue of Generation Hope had Jean-I mean Hope seeking the last of the five lights in a disturbed Japanese artist named Kenji. It may have been slightly less damaging if he had just been a Final Fantasy fan, but this kid set himself apart as the equivalent of a young Wolverine. He's arrogant, rebellious, and acts foolishly around pretty redheads. In the ends of the first issue when Je-Hope (I'll get it sooner this time, I promise) confronts Kenji, he doesn't cooperate nearly as much as the other four. He essentially rips off Akira and gives Tokyo the Godzilla treatment.

The story picks up with Hope (there now, happy?) confronts Kenji in the ruins. She tries to give her the Catholic Nun treatment, calling him out on this fucked up sense of art he has that would make Van Goah question his sanity. Kenji tries to play the sympathy card, describing how he's in a butt-load of pain. Seeing as how he's talking to a girl who grew up in an apocalyptic future and was raised by Cable, he'll get about as much sympathy as suspected terrorist by the TSA.

Hope figures out she's not going to get through to this kid. She has a better chance at convincing Pat Robertson to become an atheist. She also figures out this whole Akira style apocalypse isn't exactly as graphic as it seems. It's essentially a trailer at a Harry Potter movie. Kenji has Hope in his grasp and is using his powers to basically make her part of his artwork and for once that's not a plot to a bad softcore porno on Cinemax.

Hope is still trapped, but the rest of the lights along with Cyclops and Wolverine are still free to attack. Keep in mind this takes place before Uncanny X-men #530 so I'm not going to let it affect my review of this book. They emerge to find out there have been some casualties, but barely enough to fill your standard Friday the 13th movie. It could be a lot worse should Kenji choose to reenact Akira on a larger scale. So Cyclops takes on the leadership role in Hope's absence. It's a role he's always played well and given how fucked up he was in the latest issue of Uncanny (still comes off as a dumb ass for that scene with Emma Frost's whole shopping excuse) this is a refreshing batch of characterization on Gillen's part.

It's also an interesting moment in that it further reminds the reader that the new lights like Laurie and Gabriel are still young. They are essentially newly recruited X-men who haven't been trained and are still looking around all starey eyed as if they just got voted onto American Idol despite having less-than-developed performing skills. They come off as a little goofy playing the part of X-men, but that actually works nicely here. Since there have been so few new mutants in wake of M-Day, it's a classic moment involving mutants learning to use their powers to kick ass.

Goofy they may be, the lights do go to work. Cyclops has Rogue absorb Laurie's and Wolverine's abilities so she has some extra firepower. They're tasked with finding Hope and pulling her away from Kenji. This isn't without protest. These lights are loyal to Hope, not Cyclops. They're essentially catering to Paula Abdule while ignoring Simon Cowell. They begin their attack, but then Kenji launches his as well. So they don't even have a chance to look awesome. It shows them just how ridiculously overpowered Japanese teenage boys who happen to be deranged artists can be. Even Magneto himself at this point would consider that excessive.

However, the team soon learns that this attack isn't exactly from Kenji. The team gets another reminder that Hope's powers don't just involve activating new mutants. They involve tapping the mutant abilities around her. She hasn't done that since the end of Second Coming when she made Bastion her prison bitch. For a while it seemed like that power was forgotten, but Hope puts it to use again albeit in an overly destructive way. But seriously, would you expect anything less? It does make their job easier. It allows the lights to get Hope free of Kenji's grasp and with only slightly catastrophic property damage.

Hope is free, but unconscious and out of the fight. Kenji is still going strong though. The fact he no longer has a pretty teenage girl in his grasp has upset him (as losing possession of an unconscious pretty girl tends to do) and he lashes out. He seems intent on making more of this artwork of his. Now it's still not entirely clear what Kenji's angle is here. His his method of artwork simply recreating the old Rampage games without the giant lizards? Yeah, he's crazy and overpowered. A lot of comic characters are, but there still hasn't been much method behind the madness. He's essentially playing crazy rifts on a guitar with no lyrics to his music.

This is where the lights show some of their X-men potential. Gabriel already saved Hope and Laurie already contributed her powers. Now Idie gets her turn, using ice to put out some of the fires Kenji is starting and using fire to dab a little white wash on Kenji's artwork. It's the first time he shows that he can be injured. He's not as unstoppable as Akira even if he is ripping the whole damn movie off. Cyclops, Wolverine, and Rogue use this as an opportunity to go after him while ordering the lights to stay with Hope. Again, they're newbies. This isn't the kind of fight they need to be rushed into in the same way pornstars don't get into bigger productions before getting their appropriate boob-jobs/penis extensions.

Cyclops, Wolverine, and Rogue meet up with Kenji in a park where he puts himself out in a pond. They launch their attack and Rogue tries to absorb him. She immediately regrets this, getting a brief taste of Kenji's madness. It's here where she sheds at least some light on what's making Kenji tick. She says his body and his mind are like Israel and Palestine. They aren't getting along. So it isn't his fault. Like Matt Damon in Good Will Hunting, it's not his fault and Robin Williams isn't present to hold him while he cries like a baby.

Now this still doesn't explain much. I get that Gillen is trying to offer some insight here, but I'm still scratching my head. So his mind isn't his mind and his body is his mind? That sounds like guru talk from that shitty Michael Meyers movie, The Love Guru. How does that explain his powers? Just what the fuck are his powers and what the fuck is spewing all these batshit comments about needing a canvas for his art? It's an attempt at insight. It just isn't very successful.

The fight doesn't unfold with many details. After only exchanging a few blows, Kenji changes shape again. He goes into some cocoon-like stage and takes on a new form. This one isn't necessarily another Akira ripoff as much as it is an old monster from the Power Rangers TV shows. It's big, it's ugly, it's strong, but it's still pretty damn awesome. I think it counts as Kenji throwing a temper tantrum over being set on fire earlier. Not sure if it's justified, but it is understandable.

This new form begins a fresh round of rampaging and the X-men are pretty much left scratching their heads. Cyclops at this point is getting frustrated. He's already throwing around the Old Yeller method in that he's open to putting Kenji down before he destroys all of Tokyo. It's an extreme tactic, but considering the destruction of a city is looming he can't be blamed for resorting to that. It worked for Bastion, didn't it?

In addition, Hope Summers is still out cold. The rest of the lights seem to sense the danger Kenji's putting himself in, further hinting at a deeper connection between these new mutants. It's not the kind of connection that would prompt a Disney style sing-along, but it does show that they're not going to be able to stay on the sidelines. They're still newbies to the mutant world and they can't sit this one out. They need Hope to pull this one out of the fire or their X-men career will be about as short lived as Brett Favre's acting career.

The issue ends feeling as though it went on longer than it really did. That's not a bad thing though. Given the price of comics these days, it's nice to feel like you're wallet isn't being raped when you pick up a new issue. A lot happens in this comic. There's action, mystery, drama, and an overall continuation of the plot. Kieron Gillen didn't fall into similar traps with the last issue in that he eased up on the Akira rip-offs. Kenji did do a few things to set himself apart this time and the story with Hope and lights continues to unfold in an intriguing way. It really does feel like a classic story of new mutants trying to become X-men the hard way. Generation X fans, New Mutant fans, or just old school X-men fans will find a lot to like here.Two issues in and the story is already exciting, much more so now that it's actually setting itself apart while still feeling connected to the other X-books without it feeling so messy.

There were still some shortcomings though. Kieron Gillen tries to add more details about Kenji and how his powers work. Yet nothing is really answered. Rogue's insight really doesn't address much and Hope's brief interface only revealed that Kenji is in a lot of pain. That's about it. We still have no idea what's motivating Kenji or what's driving him. We don't even know the full nature of his powers. So we're left wondering WTF? It's like Gillen is being mysterious without really addressing the mystery. He may reveal more in the next issue, but the lack of coherent details really prevent this issue from being special.

Generation Hope is a series on the rise. It has so many classic and novel elements that there's no reason why it shouldn't be right up there with the likes of Uncanny X-men or X-men Legacy. It's still a work-in-progress though. Two issues in and it's rising faster than a thirteen-year-old boy's dick during a Skinemax marathon. For Generation Hope #2, I give it a strong 4 out of 5. It's on it's way to being special. It just has to take a few more steps to get there. Nuff said!

Brightest Day #15 - Inching Back To Awesome

So here it is. The new issue of Brightest Day is out after Geoff Johns's long streak of awesome ended with the last issue. It's like having a favorite restaurant all your life and having a single meal where the cook spit on the steak and rubbed his balls in your potatoes. That bad taste is still in your mouth and there may even be a few ball hairs stuck between your teeth, but you still love the restaurant and the food so you go back to give it another shot. Geoff Johns is one of those rare comic writers who has earned a few mulligans. He's written so many awesome stories that we can't reasonably expect everyone to be mind-blowingly awesome. That would be like expecting your girlfriend to keep giving you the best blow job you've ever had night in and night out. Such expectations just aren't reasonable.

What made Brightest Day #14 such a disappointment was that it abandoned what made the book so awesome from the beginning. It took many different plots and balanced them in a way that fit into a larger story. Not every issue was going to cover every plot, but that was okay because the plots that were covered were awesome enough that it was hard to give three quarters of a shit. Brightest Day #14 basically linked up with none of the other plots. It focused entirely on Deadman's ongoing struggles with the White Lantern. That wouldn't be too bad if it hadn't all been a big tease. The biggest injection of awesome came from Batman and the promise that he may be the guardian of the White Lantern that Boston Brand had been searching for. That didn't seem to be the case. Boston gave the ring to Batman, the ring rejected him, and it went back to Boston. That's about it. Boston did get to make out with Dove and that's okay for a fucking Disney movie, but not Brightest Day. There wasn't even a hint as to what other stories would come with the next issue or how this was going to affect the other DC characters who were being affected by the White Lantern. There were a lot of reasons to pull chunks of hair out with a metal lathe and that issue earned the lowest score yet for the Brightest Day series.

Enter Brightest Day #15. This book is like the maid who has to clean up a hotel room after Motley Crue went on a crack binge and staged an orgy featuring no fewer than 20 groupies, 8 midget prostitutes, and 5 transsexual strippers. It does not make too smooth a transition and that may be for the better. Like America's history with African slaves and Justin Bieber's twitter feed, it's one of those things best left unmentioned in civil conversation. This issue focuses on a plot that culminated a few issues ago. J'onn J'ozz, the Martian Manhunter was channeling his inner Scooby Doo, uncovering a mystery involving the last green martian. This last martian was about as friendly as Dick Cheney on a hunting trip. She attacked and tried to screw over J'onn (and it might have been literal at some points, but it's hard to tell since I haven't watched much Martian porn lately). In some ways she succeeded (minus the money shot) and got J'onn to use his White Lantern powers that had flared up earlier to revitalize Mars. It all seemed so cheerful and happy, but then it was revealed that the last green martian tricked J'onn. He's essentially living in a fantasy world now on the scale of the Matrix, only in his reality Keeanu Reeve's bad acting isn't there to fuck it up.

If you hadn't kept up with the events that led up to this issue (or are too damn lazy to look up spoilers online), you wouldn't really know that the Martian Manhunter was in a dream world. Everything looks all cheery and happy. J'onn is on Mars, his people are alive and well, he's revered for having saved them all, and years of prosperity have since transpired. That should be a big enough hint, that this happens in the future. When his fellow Justice League members appear that include Superman, Aquaman, Wonder Woman, Flash, and Green Lantern it they all look like they're spokesmen for one of those annoying Medicare commercials by the AARP. While I'm sure Geoff Johns is enjoying his royalty check on fine wine and the best GILFS a lobbying group can provide, J'onn and his buddies smile and hold hands at how happy life is. It almost makes you wonder why Disney didn't by DC instead of Marvel.

The good times continue, further reinforcing the notion that this can only be a dream. J'onn chats with his Justice League buddies, thanking them for dropping by. They take a moment to reflect on how peachy J'onn's life is on Mars. He's got his planet back, his people back, and he's literally the savior of an entire race. For those like Superman who don't have that luxury, they should be downright jealous. But J'onn still managed to show plenty of humility. Considering you can't get a politician to show humility these days, it's amazing a Martian does a better job. They also take a moment to remind each other that Father Time is starting to creep up on them like a pedophile at the little league world series. It leaves J'onn looking like he's ready to retire and do the Martian equivalent of sleeping until noon and falling asleep in front of the Golf Channel.

Beyond the Justice League, J'onn also has his family back. At this point even I have to admit this dream world is pushing the whole Disney style sap. He's hanging out with his wife, they're cuddling in a way comic couples aren't supposed to cuddle (according to Joe Quesada with regards to his stance on the Spider-Man/Mary Jane marriage). He's got all the Oreoes and love a guy could ever want. You know it can't last. It's gotta go wrong at some point.

Then at last there's a glitch in the Matrix. While feeding his dog (which looks like a totally regular Earth dog and not some bizarre Martian dog mind you), the little mutt actually bites him. Now I don't know where the dog came from or if it was some gift from Superman or something, but it's the first time that J'onn's perfect little world starts to crack. You just know at some point he's going to get a jolt of reality on the scale of 10 billion hangovers.

It all starts going down hill, as if that dog bite was a voodoo curse. On the very next panel, Batman is shown to be dead. There's no big time fight. Somehow some way an unseen foe took out the Dark Knight when countless plots of exploding whoopee cushions form the Joker could not. It's pretty underhanded, but given this is undoubtedly a dream world it does feel a bit more salient. And in the same tradition of a Dan Brown novel and shitty Ron Howard movies, Batman tries to give J'onn a message before he dies. He never gets a chance to finish and lie naked on a pentagram. If only everyone were so lucky to die in such an elaborate way.

It doesn't stop with Batman either. Pretty much the entire Justice League starts falling like the unnamed guards in a James Bond movie. Wonder Woman, Aquaman, the Flash, and Green Lantern all die gruesome deaths. It's not Ultimatum style gruesome, but it's quite a shift from all the rainbows and unicorns from earlier. It's a jarring shift, but one that gives the book a unique feel. One minute you're reading such a happy story and the next there's a mass murderer on the loose. It's like Dexter meets the Disney Channel.

Only Superman remains and before he shows up in a twisted heap of Kryptonian gore, J'onn assembles the Martian Manhunters. The time for holding hands and singing Bryan Adams songs is over. J'onn wants to find this killer and give him the old alien rectal probing treatment, the drunken hillbilly version. They don't find the killer, but they do find Superman. He's trapped in a Martian prison with a Krytonite mask. It would be an unceremonious way to die. Even Lex Luthor would call such a method tacky as hell.

J'onn tries to save Superman by giving him a quick solar sauna (minus the happy ending). Along the way his daughter, Kym, shows some typical teenage whining that seems to cross species. J'onn is making such a big deal about helping his Earth friends that he seems to give less consideration to his Martian brethren. He's becoming Jake Sully in Avatar minus the five-legged horses. Like James Cameron and his producers, J'onn won't hear it. He manages to heal Superman and he's understandably pissed.

It's a given he only becomes more pissed when he demands to see the others only to find they've been butchered like extras on a Michael Bay set. They're basically left to bury their friends and find out who's behind this and how they hell they pulled off what generations of super-powered nutjobs couldn't. It rubs J'onn in all the wrong ways. He remembers how he had to bury every last member of his race before and the thought of doing it again is enough to make him want to cut off his hands and dive head first into a volcano.

It's this paralyzing fear that pushes J'onn over the edge. It's that trigger that turns that sweet, lovable child who likes to rip the wings off flies for fun into a deranged Jeffery Dahlmer level psychopath. Even Martians have their limit and J'onn reached his. So he does the only logical thing a madman would do in his position. He tries to kill Superman. I want to say it sounds contrived, but in a dream world where J'onn is slowly losing it this makes perfect sense. How's that for irony?

It's during this act of Joker style madness that J'onn gets his first dose of the red pill to take him out of the Matrix. Superman urges him to wake up. Doing so is like ripping off 10,000 band-aids while rubbing iodine into your eyes. He flies all over Mars to see everything going up in flames again. All those people he saved are becoming Resident Evil style zombies minus the retarded movements. He makes his way home to find his wife looking remarkably calm. J'onn then proceeds to give her the Ike Turner treatment, literally ripping away the deception from her flesh to reveal the truth that someone has been fucking with him in the worse possible way.

It's a violent dose of reality for the Martian Manhunter, but it leaves him looking more badass than he's ever looked. He finds himself back on Mars (now dead as George W. Bushes credibility), choking the sadistic bitch to death. Now normally I'm not at all for violence against women, including hot alien chicks. But when it comes to mind fucking a guy so he has to relive the death of his whole fucking planet again, that whole chivalry crap goes in the nearest trash compactor.

We don't get to see all the horrible things J'onn does to this alien psycho-bitch and it's probably for the best. Anybody with a dirty enough mind can figure it out. Instead, this issue does what the last issue failed to do and actually touches on another plot in Brightest Day that has fallen to the wayside. This takes place at the Justice League of America's headquarters where Congo and Starman are enjoying a friendly game of chess. Before they can start playing the role of snooty British intellectuals, Firestorm shows up. Last we checked he was dealing with the return of the Black freakin' Lanterns and the prospect of causing another big bang. So he's clearly in need of some assistance and sets the story up for the next issue. And this time, it's done in a way that doesn't suck.

So Brightest Day #15 ends with a far different taste than it's predecessor. It's not the same feeling of imported Swiss chocolate that the other issues brought to the table, but it's still enough to get you drooling like Pavlov's dogs. It doesn't completely turn the tables though. Brightest Day #15 still made a few of the same mistakes the last issue made. It dedicated almost the entire issue to one storyline and didn't really tie it in or even hit at tying it in with other storylines. So it's not a complete departure from what didn't work. Geoff Johns is trying to roll that proverbial bolder back up the hill and crushes his back in the process.

Never-the-less, there is some quality awesome here. Unlike the Batman story in the last issue, this one doesn't end where it began. Even though much of it was spent in a dream world, J'onn woke up and confronted the enemy he had been chasing. He broke free of her control, which granted is progress. In addition the whole shift from such a happy beginning to such a gruesome end gave the story a unique feel. It went from one extreme to the other so fast and still made sense. That's not an easy thing to do. That's like trying to jerk off and take a piss at the same time. Only those truly skilled in the craft can pull it off.

Now I want to get back to giving Brightest Day comics perfect scores. It seemed a given for so long and I miss being able to sing the praises of a book that delivers everything it promises. However, I simply can't make that leap in the same way I can't wipe my memory clean of the previous issue. So for Brightest Day #15 I give it a final score of 3.5 out of 5. This issue is not entirely back to where Brightest Day was in terms of quality. It's definitely back on the right track though. Nuff said!