Chronological X-Men - Marvel Super Heroes Secret Wars Part 1 Review

Marvel Super Heroes Secret Wars!

The New Mutants #15 – Scaredy Cat!

The New Mutants #16 – Away Game!

The New Mutants #17 – Getaway!

Well this particular story takes place right after the X-Men vanish. Kitty is being held captive by Emma Frost – who has woken up from her coma with no real explanation as to why, and Doug is now at Emma’s Massachusetts Academy and being telepathically controlled by Emma.  Wet get several new characters thanks to Emma’s own team of teenaged mutants The Hellions: Catseye, Empath, Jetstream, Roulette, Tarot and Thunderbird (II) – who is really James Proudstar who has joined Emma’s team to take down the X-Men and Charles Xavier whom he blames for his older brother’s death. Some of the team’s powers act as direct opposition to the New Mutants- Catseye can switch from cat form to human, but she performs her feline form, so she’s their version of Rahne. Jetstream’s abilities are similar to Cannonball’s only Sam is stronger, but Jeatstream has better control over his abilities. Thunderbird is the powerhouse, much like Sunspot is for the New Mutants. Tarot who can create psychic visions based off of her tarot cards is Dani’s counterpart. Empath and Roulette are kind of just extras, and since Emma didn’t know about Amara or Illyana she never recruited counterparts for them. The plot revolves around the New Mutants (which now includes Magik) going after Kitty and Doug to rescue them from Emma Frost once Illyana spies on the Massachusetts Academy while in her astral form and sees what is really going on. There are some interesting things here: Illyana’s ability to use astral projection (so far only a few characters could do this, and with the exception of Magneto they all had telepathic powers,) Dani’s growing ease with using her powers yet they’re taking a toll on her soul – it would be really nice to do some bonding with Illyana and Dani, I always wished the two of them were closer and this would have been the perfect opportunity to do it. I really love Tarot’s powers and I wish she would have had a more visible role over the years. There are a few things though that I wished they cleared up, or explained. Illyana wants to keep her sorceress side hidden from everyone, then maybe she shouldn’t have chosen the codename Magik (the secrets out now though), another odd thing was the fact that Kitty could see Illyana’s astral form, yet Kitty has no psionic powers. How did Emma wake up? Why did she want Doug so badly, when even Charles Xavier didn’t consider him ‘worth’ recruiting? Why did Emma go through all this trouble of taking Doug just to let him go? Why does the team have such a hard time even being in the same room as Magik because they’re afraid of her and what she is and can do, yet the team watched Roberto kill Selene and bury her in her temple? The plot was good, it got us some good new characters and it will provide future material for people to pull from – but there were a lot of unanswered questions that created too many loose ends. One thing I’m really excited for though is to see where they’re going with the whole Demon Bear. It was rather surprising to see him suddenly appear in front of Dani and tell her that he’s coming to claim her soon.

Marvel Super Heroes Secret Wars #1 – War Begins

Marvel Super Heroes Secret Wars #2 – Prisoners of War!

Marvel Super Heroes Secret Wars #3 – Tempest Without, Crisis Within!

Okay let me get one thing out of the way first: this is a huge massive event that was created back in the 80s in order for Kenner Toys to have a publishing event to help promote the sale of their Marvel properties toys. That being said, the cast is HUGE: Captain America, Captain Marvel II (not the original guy, but a new lady taking the name), Hawkeye, Iron Man, She-Hulk, Thro, Wasp, Human Torch, Mr. Fantastic, The Thing, Colossus, Cyclops, Nightcrawler, Professor X, Rogue, Storm, Wolverine, Lockeed, The Hulk, Spider-Man, Magneto, Dr. Doom, Dr. Octopus, Enchantress, Galactus, Kang, Lizard, Molecule Man, Ultron, Absorbing Man, Bulldozer, Piledriver, Thunderball, and Wrecker. That being said we get (so far) three new characters introduced: The Beyonder, Titania and Volcana. All this and I’m only on issue three. It turns out that The Beyonder has been responsible for the recent disappearances on Earth and he has also been the one who was behind the psychic probing of various characters over recent months. There’s a lot going on here which at times makes the series a bit hard to follow, but I don’t know if it would be easier if I was up to date on the books of the non X-characters. I’m going to try to be more objective about this story until I read all of it. I mean the storyline is pretty popular, but at the same time it was created just to sell toys so it’s either going to be awesome or awful.

Marvel Super Heroes Secret Wars #4 – Situation: Hopeless!

Marvel Super Heroes Secret Wars #5 – The Battle of Four Armies!

Marvel Super Heroes Secret Wars #6 – A Little Death…

As the first half of this story closes out we get two apparent deaths – Doom kills Kang for questioning his orders and in the process of trying to bring Lizard back into the villain’s fold it appears that the Wasp was killed trying to save him. We get the introduction of new characters in the form of Spider-Woman II aka Julia Carpenter – but it’s just a cameo, and we meet Zsaji – a healer who fixes Johnny’s broken arm, heals up Spider-Man and saves Colossus. I did find it a little odd that Johnny and Peter have apparently fallen in love with her after she healed them. It’s not odd, but it would make more sense if Spider-Man was also affected by this weird love obsession – especially if it is caused by Zsaji’s healing abilities. Speaking of odd, Piotr’s love for Kitty comes off a little like he’s obsessed with her. It definitely amps up the creepy factor that was always there because of their age differences. We also get the resurrection of Klaw (who had been killed by Dazzler) – honestly I don’t mind this one at all. I know that over the years quite a few of the X-Men have had to kill people but still. I mean out of all the ‘active’ mutants pretty much the only ones who hasn’t killed someone are Sam and Rahne. I do find it a little odd that Charles is so upset that he manipulated Spider-Man’s mind only because over the years he has done that to quite a few people. His guilt over it starts to ring a little hollow when he keeps doing it. So the story has really picked up: why does the Thing keep changing from human to ‘thing,’ is Wasp really dead, is Kang really dead, who is in the shadows watching everyone, is Galactus really about to eat the planet?

The New Mutants #15 – Scaredy Cat!: A

The New Mutants #16 – Away Game!: A

The New Mutants #17 – Getaway!: A

Marvel Super Heroes Secret Wars #1 – War Begins: C

Marvel Super Heroes Secret Wars #2 – Prisoners of War!: B

Marvel Super Heroes Secret Wars #3 – Tempest Without, Crisis Within!: B

Marvel Super Heroes Secret Wars #4 – Situation: Hopeless!: A

Marvel Super Heroes Secret Wars #5 – The Battle of Four Armies!: B

Marvel Super Heroes Secret Wars #6 – A Little Death…: A

Chronological X-Men - Days of Future Past Part 4 Review

Days of Future Past.

Dazzler #6 – The Hulk May Be Hazardous To Your Health

Dazzler #7 – Fort Apache, The Hulk!

Okay this next storyline for Dazzler has a lot going against it for me: the Hulk, country music, the woe is me I’m a starving artist thing, and Nurse Collins – who is still acting like she’s time traveled from 1940 and thinks Alison is a bad seed and how she has to save Paul (the man that she secretly loves) from Alison. All that said the issue is kind of passable, I don’t think I’ll ever read these issues again, but I don’t feel bad that I’ve spent the time to read them. Sure there are some weird things like the fact that the cover of issue 7 is very similar to issue 3 and there’s the whole ‘Hall of Science’ thing – this is a college, shouldn’t at the very least it just be ‘the science building? – and the previously mentioned cliché and far too campy storyline that Nurse Collins is sporting; but at the same time the disco singer is performing country music and fighting The Hulk. I know I complained in previous issues that Dazzler is feeling more like a Marvel Team-Up spinoff instead of an additional X-book, but this is one time where they could have afforded to throw in some Avengers, or Spider-Man or X-Men simply given the fact that Alison and Hulk are on such drastically different power levels that it’s not even funny. We get more of the whole Alison/Paul plot which I can take or leave, and we see Alison experience some anti-mutant bashing of her own which I know this is going to sound weird is nice. I don’t like that she’s so far been exempt of the anti-mutant hysteria and everyone who knows that Alison is a mutant just loves her and accepts her. We meet ‘The Enforcers’ (Montana, Ox and Fancy Dan) who are working for some shadowed figure that believes Alison’s agent Harry S. Osgood a murder who in his own right deserves to die. On top of that Alison’s also being followed around by the Techmaster – in his first appearance. Technically he’s a Dazzler character because outside of his appearances in her book he’s only ever popped up one time and that was in an issues of an Avengers book over 20 years later. The one thing that really stuck out for me in these two issues was the story pacing – there was actually a build up and a seamless progression to the storyline instead of rapid mid-page gear shifting that has been going on for a few issues now in Uncanny X-Men.

Marvel Team-Up #109 – Critical Mass!

Spider-Man and Paladin are in a heated battle with the new villain Thermo when Dazzler runs into them while she’s on her way home from a recent performance. She jumps into the fight when Thermo is about to kill Spider-Man and distracts him long enough so the three of them can escape. Alison and Paladin take the critically injured Spider-Man back to Alison’s apartment to recover while everyone tries to figure out their next move. Thermo runs into some cultists who quickly turn into his lackeys when they are promised similar powers to his. After another rather large battle Thermo eventually falls and everyone else goes on their own separate ways. This was actually interesting, I want to know more about Paladin (so much like Spider-Woman this might be something I look into after I’m all caught up on the X-books) and I’m honestly surprised by how much I enjoy the interaction between Alison and Peter; I wish that they would team up a lot more than they do.

Marvel Super-Heroes #10 – Sabertooth Stalks The Subway

Marvel Super-Heroes #11 – Cry Vengeance

This next stop isn’t so much a retcon as it is fleshing out of history. Ms. Marvel originally had her own comic book series, but it was canceled on the 23^rd issue, and these next two stories were supposed to be issues 24 and 25. The Sabertooth issue was obviously closer to being finished because this one actually had a cover done for it. I would have skipped this one but it does tie in to Department H going back on their word to leave Logan alone by recruiting Sabertooth and extraditing him to Canada to begin his training to return Weapon X to them. Carol has to deal with his escape when her friends almost get killed when the transport crashes in to the café they are in, and Carol begins to be haunted by visions of her own death thanks to her 7^th sense. The second issue takes place directly before Avengers Annual #10- Mystique and Destiny are trying to keep Ms. Marvel and Rogue separated because of all of the potential futures that Destiny has seen will lead to Rogue’s death. The teenage Rogue doesn’t take this well and looks at it like she’s being excluded and she goes off to fight Ms. Marvel on her own. They do add some additional information when they talk about Rogue joining the X-Men after needing their help and how Carol eventually transitions into Binary – but those are stories soon to be told….

Avengers Annual #11 – By Friends – Betrayed!

Speaking of stories soon to be told… here we have the first appearance of Rogue. Spider-Woman finds a woman floating  in the river and takes her to the hospital to be examined. A little funny nod there’s a young girl named Maddie Pryor running around the hospital. Jessica brings in Charles Xavier to mindscan the woman after finding out that she is Carol Danvers a former Avenger. Carol’s memories have been removed and Charles begins to work on helping her regain who she is. Jessica goes the Avengers for help only to find out that Rogue has been there and absorbed Captain America and Thor’s powers as well and is using them to break out the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants who have been in prison for some time now. Rogue and Mystique do manage to free the Brotherhood but when Rogue’s powers start to decrease they are forced to flee which leaves Blob, Avalanche, Destiny and Pyro back in prison after the lost battle with the Avengers and Spider-Woman. Jessica takes the Avengers back to the X-Men’s mansion to come face to face with Carol. There’s a few things that they talk about that I really had no clue what was going on because I don’t follow The Avengers but the gist of it seems to be that Carol met a man from Limbo (oh I can’t wait until we get to some Limbo stuff in the main X-books) who used his powers to make her believe that she was in love with them – he gook her with him and basically got her pregnant with… himself and she returned to earth to give birth to him only it didn’t happen, or it did and then the Avengers sent him back to Limbo or something. Like I said I didn’t really follow what was going on. I know this is an Avengers book, but I would rather have had the book focus more on Rogue and Carol as opposed to Jessica and the Avengers fight the Brotherhood. Since this was essentially Rogue and Carol’s story it feels like they spent more time on other characters than they did the two of them.

The Uncanny X-Men Annual #5 – Oh, La La… Badoon!

The next story brings us the return of Arkon and his homeworld as the X-Men and Sue Storm team up to save the Fantastic Four and Arkon from the evil Brother Royal and his Baddon warriors who have not only taken over Arkon’s world, but have now apparently been killing Shi-ar scouts and preparing to move on to Earth next. Ororo has been suffereing bouts of nightmares thanks to Sashia who has been using them to reach out to her friend in an attempt to show her that her people need help. All in all the story was good, I liked this visit to Arkon’s world a lot more than the first annual that featured him. This is what an annual should be; it’s a little bonus reward for everyone who has stuck through the book the entire year. Big events or revelations (like Amanda or introducing her mother and Kurt’s foster mother Margali, or the introduction of Rogue) or a chapter of a major over all story arch that forces you to read it. It should be a fun little outing that has little to nothing to do with the current plots of it’s main book.

Dazzler #6 – The Hulk May Be Hazardous To Your Health: B

Dazzler #7 – Fort Apache, The Hulk!: B

Marvel Team-Up #109 – Critical Mass!: A

Marvel Super-Heroes #10 – Sabertooth Stalks The Subway: B

Marvel Super-Heroes #11 – Cry Vengeance: B

Avengers Annual #11 – By Friends – Betrayed!: C

The Uncanny X-Men Annual #5 – Oh, La La… Badoon!: A

Chronological X-Men - The Phoenix Saga Part 2 Review

The Phoenix Saga!

Marvel Team-Up #53 Nightmare in New Mexico

Marvel Tales #262 Nightmare in New Mexico

This story takes place right after the events of Marvel Team-Up Annual #1, the X-Men and Spiderman are on their way back to New York after dealing with their recent battle only to have find out that The Hulk is fighting Woodgod in The Dead Zone. Charles and Phoenix are too weak to take part in the battle so they head back to the Xavier Institute leaving Banshee to help deliver Spiderman to the battle. It is a little odd that Banshee just drops Spiderman off and then leaves, but I guess that’s good considering it means I don’t have to follow the Hulk plot. Meanwhile the X-Men are shot down by the mysterious Sunstroke of the Desert Dwellers. It’s an all out smash up battle between the X-Men (sans Banshee who is traveling back to them as this is happening, Charles who is still too weak from recent events and Jean who only lasts a few moments before tapping into the power of Phoenix drains her) and at first Sunstroke but he is later joined by Cactus and Butte. Banshee shows up and basically saves the day before Gila the final member of the Desert Dwellers shows up. When all is said and done the X-Men continue to head for home while the Desert Dwellers wait for their master to summon them again.

Iron Fist #15 Enter, The X-Men

Hey it’s a party at a recently dead but not dead girl’s house! The X-Men are now back in town, only recently have landed which is obvious I guess because of the fact that Logan is still wearing Fang’s costume – although this makes no sense when you think about how in Marvel Team-Up he’s back to his regular costume. The X-Men want to celebrate having lived through the recent events out in the middle of the Shi-ar Empire’s homeworld. Of course there’s some misunderstandings when Iron Fist shows up at his friend Misty’s apartment at roughly the same time as Wolverine and each of them think the other is after their respective friends. Soon Kurt and Piotr show up and join the battle. Next to enter the fight is Storm, for quite possibly the most ridiculous reason of all… a plate of potato/egg salad falls on her face. Things are finally worked out and Iron Fist joins Jean’s party just in time to save her from being evicted from her apartment due to all the recent damage. It’s a fun little issue but honestly considering this was the last issue of Iron Fist it was a let down- so many dangling plots and unresolved issues- I can imagine how hard it would have been to swallow for someone who was actually a fan of the book and it’s characters.

The Incredible Hulk and Wolverine #1 At the Sign of the Lion

This is just a standard reprint here of Wolverine’s first appearance. There’s nothing new to cover which is good because I did say that I probably wouldn’t ever re-read this particular story. The new feature is okay for what it is. Logan is itching for some action – I guess the freedom he experienced while battling D’Ken and the Imperial Guard got to him now that he has to show restraint now that he’s back on Earth. It doesn’t take Logan long to find some action because as soon as Hercules shows up at the same bar the two of them get into a huge bar brawl. It was kind of fun to see how ticked off Logan got when Hercules kept taunting him about his height. Eventually the two of them decide that they’re wasting their time and start drinking again. I actually liked this issue, it wasn’t strong enough for it to have been stretched out into a full length storyline, but for what it was it was really good.

Marvel Team-Up #65 Introducing, Captain Britain

Marvel Team-Up #66 Murder World

This is an odd one here because while this is Captain Britain’s first appearance in the ‘American’ Marvel Comics publishing he’s been around in the UK Marvel Comics for a while now. And again while this is his first appearance in the American it’s still not his first appearance in an X-title so I have no idea where or how to categorize this. The same could be said about the ‘Siege Perilous’ which is tied to Captain Britain and later is part of a major X-Men event. It was interesting to see a young and inexperienced version of Brian and I wish that they kept him in this mindset for longer than they did, but there isn’t anything I can do about that. The whole story revolves around Arcade and his assistants Miss Locke and Mr. Chambers being hired to take out Brian Braddock who is believed to be one of fifty people who might be Captain Britain. We see an abridged version of how Brian came into his powers and we actually get the first real appearance of Arcade, Miss Locke and Mr. Chambers on any side of the pond, and since this is the first time we see Arcade this is by default the first time that we see Murderworld which is sort of Arcade’s playground. I liked the issues and I was glad that it was a two-parter. Normally I don’t like crossovers because this early in the game it’s with books that aren’t X-titles so I have no idea what’s going on in the mythology of the other half of the team up but considering this was the first time we see Captain Britain and Arcade it didn’t matter that I didn’t know what was going on in Peter Parker’s life because the whole aspect of the team up involved shaking up the events of their individual lives and starting a new chapter so I didn’t feel like I had been weighed down by some unseen mythology.

(The Uncanny)X-Men #109 Home are the Heroes!

Classic X-Men #16 Dearest Friend

Well it had to happen sooner or later but the X-Men have FINALLY arrived back to the Xavier Institute. The X-Men are all dealing with the recent events in their own way: Scott is brooding, Jean is telling her parents all about what happened on the space station and how she became Phoenix (I’m assuming that she also is telling them that she’s a mutant too, but since there is no dialogue for this particular scene it’s hard to tell, it could be argued that she’s not telling them about that, just that she died and became Phoenix since it is later retconned that Jean’s parents knew she was a mutant when she was a little girl and Charles came to seal off her telepathic abilities.) Kurt, Moira, Sean and Piotr go on a picnic which is soon crashed by Weapon Alpha (later known as Vindicator and Guardian) who has come to reclaim Wolverine/Weapon X. It was a little odd that Logan says that James Hudson was there when Logan left (what later becomes known as ) Weapon X considering that James didn’t appear at all in Giant-Size X-Men #1. The additional pages show more of James before and after he targets Logan, including a scene between himself and Heather (still not her first official X-Men appearance though) and Lilandra exploring the mansion and learning how to use the shower. The back up story shows us a little of Sean in his teen years when he was growing up with his cousin Tom. We see them battle over Maeve Rourke (which get this.. this is actually her first appearance period, she shows up again later in the 90s and once more in X-Men: First Class, but this was published before either of them happen;) while she’s not a ‘major’ character there are important events that surround her; the first being the more fleshed out feud between Sean and Tom.

(The Uncanny)X-Men #110 The X-Sanction

This is just a filler issue so it’s hard to judge it because only one major event (that we’re supposed to know about right now) happens: Jean rejoins the X-Men. The bulk of the issue is devoted to Mitchell Tanner (Warhawk) breaking into the mansion in order to test the X-Men’s abilities and monitor them for his as yet unknown, unseen boss. We get to see Colosso 2.0, mostly as an excuse to get all the X-Men in the Danger Room long enough for Warhawk to trap them in there. We do get to see something now for the first time that later becomes a recurring staple in the X-Men’s lives when they need some time to unwind; we see the first ever X-Men baseball game. Half the time in the future this is used as a fun little outlet and other times it’s used to just get everybody together long enough for something bad to happen. I really don’t know what to say about this issue, it’s kind of forgettable but that doesn’t necessarily mean that it’s a bad issue. The whole thing just stinks of ‘filler’ and things that will later be explained. This is just a hard issue for me to rate.

Marvel Team-Up #53 Nightmare in New Mexico: C

Marvel Tales #262 Nightmare in New Mexico: C

Iron Fist #15 Enter, The X-Men: B

The Incredible Hulk and Wolverine #1 At the Sign of the Lion: A

Marvel Team-Up #65 Introducing, Captain Britain: A

Marvel Team-Up #66 Murder World: A

(The Uncanny)X-Men #109 Home are the Heroes!: B

Classic X-Men #16 Dearest Friend: B

(The Uncanny)X-Men #110 The X-Sanction: C

Chronological X-Men - Part 18 Review

The road trip ends… for now.

The Incredible Hulk # 172 And Canst Thou Slay… The Juggernaut?

I’m going to be honest folks; I’m really biased here. It’s common knowledge that I hate The Hulk with a passion so it’s hard to be objective here, especially when I know I’ll have a few more issues of his title to read over the course of several storylines yet to come. Just like always I can’t comment on any of the cast of characters because I don’t know enough about them to know who is important and who I can just ignore. Basically the story is Hulk gets captured and the government uses a ray to try to banish him to another dimension and in the process this brings Juggernaut back to Earth and quite a few pages are devoted to catching everyone up on what Cain Marko’s been up to over the years. The issue ends with the X-Men (Charles, Scott and Jean) trying to find out what happened to Warren. I wish I could give this a better rating system because an alphabet grade doesn’t really work for me this time. I’d rank this one some where between ‘meh’ and ‘ehh.’

Captain America #172 Believe It or Not: The Banshee

Captain America #173 The Sins of the Secret Empire

Captain America #174 Its Always Darkest….

Captain America #175 Before the Dawn!

The next pit stop brings us a whole lot of things going on. We learn that while mutants are being hunted down and captured by a mysterious force it turns out that Falcon and Captain America are actually the most wanted men on the block. Banshee shows up for an issue and runs into Cap and Falcon, after a misunderstanding they end up fighting but when Cyclops shows up Banshee takes off. The remaining X-Men and Cap and Falcon team up to go after The Secret Empir who had not only managed to frame Captain America for murder but also kidnap several mutants (Iceman, Havok, Lorna, Beast, Unus, Mastermind, the Blob, Angel and Mesmero and is using them to power a machine that they will end up using to force the United States into either surrendering their power to The Secret Empire or just destroy them outright. We learn that Hank, Bobby, Alex and Lorna were all captured as well which really just serves as an explanation as to why none of them appeared in any of the X-Men’s off book adventures recently. One thing that I couldn’t help but laugh at was the fact that the leader of The secret Empire who calls himself Number One looks an awful lot like Cobra Commander, in reality he’s a ‘high ranking government official’ while his true identity wasn’t revealed it had been later stated that it was intended that his alter ego would end up being Richard Nixon. This whole thing is a big thing in and of itself because of the fact that after Captain learns the true identity of Number One and witnesses his suicide Cap decides to leave the superhero business behind 3for now.

Marvel Team-Up #23 The Night of the Frozen

Bobby and Johnny Storm both get framed for a robbery by the villain Equinox who has both ice and fire based powers. Naturally there is some confusion where Bobby thinks Johnny did the break in and Johnny things Bobby is responsible for it. They end up fighting each other before they figure out who really did it and then team up to go after him. I don’t know what to think of this one, I mean it was a fun little read and I’ve always liked the way Johnny and Bobby play off of each other but I’m not entirely sure that I wanted to read this story. However I think the reason for that is simply a case of bad timing because if I think about it, I would honestly read this story again, and there have been quite a few issues that I’ve reviewed since I started this journey that I will never pick up and read again even if my life depended on it. It was still a pretty good story. I think that I might have read this one a bit out of order because it feels like the X-Men are off looking for the missing mutants and if that's the case this would have had to have happened a lot sooner than the Captain America issues, but at the same time it feels like it could also have taken place after because Hank isn't anywhere to be seen and it's around this time that he joins the Avengers, and that happens after the whole Secret Empire thing.

The Incredible Hulk #180 And the Wind Howls… Wendigo!

The Incredible Hulk #181 And Now… the Wolverine!

The Incredible Hulk #182 Between Hammer and Anvil

Speaking of things I’ll never read again even if my life depended on it this story has to be one of them. I’ll be honest here, I only read this because it’s the first appearance of Wolverine and almost all of the X-Men related stories that I’ll be reading from this point on will heavily feature him so it’s pretty hard to ignore. Maybe I would have enjoyed this story more if I had any idea what the hell was going on half of the time but there isn’t anything that I can do about that. Well there is, but I’m choosing not to. The debut of Wolverine was kind of lackluster but considering he just shows up and fights Hulk and then goes back into Weapon X’s custody there isn’t that much that can be said about it- the story is supposed to be just a violent battle and that’s what it delivers so I guess ultimately it lives up to that promise, but still…. I guess for me the worst part of this is that Logan only appears in the last page of the first issue and the first page of the last issue so it makes me feel like I had to sit through two extra stories that I didn’t have to read just so the middle issue would make sense to me. Not that it made it any better because while I liked the whole plot with the Weendigo, Georges and Marie I had absolutely no investment in what happened to them at all so it didn’t end up being as important as I’m sure it was meant to be.

The Incredible Hulk # 172 And Canst Thou Slay… The Juggernaut?: D

Captain America #172 Believe It or Not: The Banshee: B

Captain America #173 The Sins of the Secret Empire: B

Captain America #174 Its Always Darkest….: A

Captain America #175 Before the Dawn!: A

Marvel Team-Up #23 The Night of the Frozen: C

The Incredible Hulk #180 And the Wind Howls… Wendigo!: D

The Incredible Hulk #181 And Now… the Wolverine!: C

The Incredible Hulk #182 Between Hammer and Anvil: D

Chronological X-Men - Part 17 Review

It’s like squatting at an apartment, only not at an apartment but in other Marvel Comics while the X-Men look for a place to call their very own. A Mutant Road Trip if you will.

Amazing Adventures #11 The Beast

Amazing Adventures #12 Iron Man: D.O.A.

Amazing Adventures #13 Evil is All in Your Mind

Amazing Adventures #14 The Vampire Machine

Umm.. okay, where to start with this one… I was actually kind of let down by the over all story. It’s one of those fixed points in the X-Men history that is so relevant that it can’t ever be ignored but at the same time I don’t think that it really lived up to all the hype it had in my head. It doesn’t help either that some things just don’t track: we’re led to believe that the X-Men are in hiding due to anti-mutant hysteria and that Charles has forbidden everyone aside from Hank from leaving the Xavier Institute yet in the few scenes we do have with the X-Men in this story we never actually see Lorna or Alex- it’s almost as if they don’t exist at all. It’s also unclear as to exactly how much time has passed between this and the end of the X-Men title (as well as the future Hidden Years book, but that becomes an issue with larger reasons in future books that I’ll talk about shortly) but it appears that a rather significant portion of time has passed because Hank is no longer with Vera, instead he is in love with his assistant Linda Donaldson. Anyway for the actual plot Hank is trying to single out and cure genetic mutation but through a series of events he has to take his own ‘cure’ and it ends up jumpstarting his mutation and turn him into the furry Beast that’s been around for years. There are a lot of characters that we touch base with through the course of this story: the X-Men, Iron Man, Mastermind, The Blob, Unus, Quasimodo, a strange woman always in the shadows who is looking for Hank, Patsy Walker, Buzz Baxter, Linda, and the ranks of ‘the Secret Empire’ who play a rather large role in the over all X-Men plot for the next year-ish. IN the end though, it just didn’t live up to the hype I had built up in my brain- it’s kind of sad actually, I really wanted this to be a lot better than it actually was.

Amazing Adventures #15 Murder in Mid-Air!

Amazing Adventures #16 … And the Juggernaut will get you… if you don’t watch out!

Amazing Adventures #17 Birth of the Beast!

The Incredible Hulk #161 Beyond the Border Lurks Death!

The next chapter in this story is a little better but it’s more disjointed. We find out that the shadowed woman has been Vera, Hank’s ex-girlfriend so it appears that the two of them either parted on good terms or it has been an even larger period of time that has passed since the end of the X-Men book and the last few adventures. She’s been looking for Hank to take him to Canada to stop some massive threat that can end the world. It makes you wonder if she had figured out if Hank is a mutant, but it turns out she just wants his help for his brain, the threat that can end the world actually ends up being Calvin Rankin, the Mimic who is quickly loosing control of his powers and is afraid that he will cause the death of everyone he comes in contact with. The Hulk comes into play for two reasons here: Amazing Adventures was canceled before this story could finish so it had to wrap up somewhere, and they explained the Hulk’s weakening powers as a result of Mimic inadvertently draining them. In the end it appears that Calvin dies of radiation poisoning from prolonged draining of the Hulk’s gamma radiation. Back in Amazing Adventures we see a sort of Halloween tale where Hank fights Juggernaut- which I think they could have skipped that story entirely because it would have allowed them to wrap up this plot without having to outsource it’s conclusion to yet another book. The final issue of Amazing Adventures ends up being a reprint of the Origin of the Beast that ran as one of the many back up features in the X-Men books. It’s basically just a reprint of: A Beast is Born, This Boy- This Bombshell, The Lure of the Beast- Nappers!, The Crimes of the Conquistador! And Welcome to the Club, Beast! There really isn’t anything to say about this so we’re going to move on now.

Ka-Zar #2 From the Sky, Winged Wrath

Ka-Zar #3 In the Den of the Dazzler

Marvel Tales #30 Te Cage an Angel!

Here we see the start of the story that gave us the plot of X-Men: The Hidden Years #13-15. We see how Dazzler (Angel’s uncle Burt, not the Dazzler we come to know and love later) had Warren Worthington JR killed, we see him capture Angel and learn that he is Warren Worthington III- there really isn’t anything much to say about that. We see the FBI agent who has been working with the X-Men for some time now try to talk Angel fof of a ledge and keep him from killing Dazzler’s men and we see more of Warren’s relationship with Candy. The story is pretty good, if not rushed, which is sort of to be expected considering it ran as a back up feature over the course of three books, so it’s barely large enough for one full comic book to begin with. I think my problem with this story is the fact that I read the retcon first, so I already knew that Burt didn’t die when Warren dropped him to save Candy from falling to her death, but at the same time we don’t actually see Warren tell Candy that he’s Angel, let alone take the time out to explain everything X-Men and Charles Xavier related to her. It’s a safe bet to assume that it happens off panel, but still with how bold Candy acts in the Hidden Years, you would at the very least think that Warren ‘outing’ himself as a mutant would have been shown.

Avengers #110 … And Now Magneto!

Avengers #111 With Two Beside Them!

This next story also sort of suffers from the retcon of The Hidden Years because this particular story then becomes very much displaced. We still haven’t seen Lorna or Alex, so this must take place around the same time they appeared in The Hulk, but that’s iffy too because in Amazing Adventures it is stated that Charles has forbidden the X-Men except for Hank from leaving the Institute. Now this story obviously takes place after The Hidden Years because Hank is now the blue furred Beast, but that doesn’t make sense because the X-Men are shocked that Magneto is alive but by that point they all should know he survived what happened to him in the Savage Land because they have dealt with him several times since then. We do learn one important thing here and that is that someone has systematically been targeting and abducting mutants for a while now and in the midst of the confusion between Magneto fighting the X-Men and then posing as Angel someone has made off with the real Angel. Another thing I found a little strange is during the whole Savage Land story in the X-Men Ka-Zar snapped the Piper’s neck in order to get him to stop, so it leads us to believe that he’s dead only now he’s up and around working for Magneto yet again. It’s just a little too weird. It would have been a good read but I’ve read maybe a total of 5 Avenger comic books in my entire life so I’m not familiar with that universe at all so I honestly didn’t care about Black Panther’s people wanting him to return home, Pietro and Wanda’s falling out over her falling in love with a robot (the Vision) or Hawkeye leaving the team to be with Black Widow only to find out she’s been shacking up with Daredevil and her eventually joining the Avengers to help replenish their ranks while giving her some time and space to pick between Hawkeye and Daredevil.

Amazing Adventures #11 The Beast: C

Amazing Adventures #12 Iron Man: D.O.A.: B

Amazing Adventures #13 Evil is All in Your Mind: B

Amazing Adventures #14 The Vampire Machine: B

Amazing Adventures #15 Murder in Mid-Air!: B

Amazing Adventures #16 … And the Juggernaut will get you… if you don’t watch out!: D

Amazing Adventures #17 Birth of the Beast!: C

The Incredible Hulk #161 Beyond the Border Lurks Death!: B

Ka-Zar #2 From the Sky, Winged Wrath: A

Ka-Zar #3 In the Den of the Dazzler: A

Marvel Tales #30 Te Cage an Angel!: A

Avengers #110 … And Now Magneto!: C

Avengers #111 With Two Beside Them!: C