Its a new year and I’ve been felled by the flu or a cold or something. But that actually helped since I was hopped up on over the counter drugs, flat on my back, and getting through my stack of comics over the holidays. What was good? What was bad?
Well for starters Brian Michael Bendis continues to warp the Marvel Universe in his own twisted image. We have yet another crossover event on the horizon. The ads have been running for a few months now, proclaiming The Siege: An Event Seven Years in the Making. STOP already and let all of the editors and writers have their characters back.
I’m sick of crossover events, they aren’t special anymore they’re just annoying. They destroy any sense of character chronology and prevent books from moving in an independent direction because their characters are off participating all the time. Hopefully, the new corporate overlords at Disney will teach the Marvel brass about timing and marketing. They don’t put all the Disney classics on Blu-Ray all at one time, they space it out. Giving the consumer time to appreciate and digest.
Thor 605
Now this is getting good. Six months ago, Loki convinces Balder to relocate the Asgardians from Oklahoma to Latveria. Come to find out that Dr. Doom has been kidnapping and vivisecting his new guests. Doom has found and tapped into the Odinforce, that which keeps the Norse gods alive and godlike. Thor is alerted to these crimes and he leads a band of infuriated Asgardians warriors that storms Castle Doom. Unfortunately, this is all part of Dr. Doom and Loki’s plan.
Batgirl 5
Bravo, for taking some interesting characters and actually using them. Writer Bryan Q. Miller has set up Stephanie Brown as the new Batgirl, but has woven the back stories of Dick Grayson (Batman) and Barbara Gordon’s (Oracle) prior relationship into an entertaining read. Sure there’s plenty of action but its not just some WWE tag team match which is what Justice Society of America seems to have devolved into.
Psylocke 1 & 2
Betsy Braddock has always been one of the more interesting X-Men. She starts out as the sister of Captain Britain and does the hero thing on the side as a fairly good telepath. She gets blinded while acting as a stand in for her brother. She is then kidnapped by Mojo and given bionic eyes. Then joins the X-Men. They come up against the extra-dimensional gateway know as the Siege Perilous, she saves everybody by forcing them through it. Only entering it results in some cosmic judgment and return to Earth with amnesia.
So Betsy washes up naked on the shores of Japan, only to be “rescued” by the clan of ninja assassins known as The Hand. Matsu’o Tsurayaba the clan head, has Betsy brainwashed, genetically altered, and mystically transferred her consciousness into the body of his brain dead lover Kwannon.
So now the one time British model and sometime superhero, gets turned into a bad ass ninja. Eventually Betsy breaks free of Matsu’o control and rejoins the X-Men. Things are good for a while, then the previously dead Kwannon returns in Betsy’s old body. Then we had Psylocke who is Betsy’s mind in Kwannon’s body and Revanche who is Kwannon’s mind in Betsy’s body performing feats of daring do. At that point they’re kind of like identical cousins with same powers and skills. But then Kwannon got sick, died, and was buried.
That was until last year when Madeline Pryor returned to the pages of the Uncanny X-Men as the Red Queen. Madeline kidnapped Psylocke and brainwashed her into joining her Sisterhood. In addition, Madeline exhumed and reanimated Kwannon for a battle against the X-Men. During the battle the shock of seeing Kwannon killed by Dazzler, brought Betsy back to her senses. Then the X-Men defeated the Red Queen and her Sisterhood. Afterward, Betsy decided to return Kwannon (still in Betsy’s original body) to Japan for reburial. And that’s where the action picks up in the Psylocke miniseries, which has a very Kill Bill flavor to it.
Dark Avengers 12
This is part of Bendis’ lead up to The Siege. Last month, Norman Osborn ran afoul of Owen Reece a.k.a. The Molecule Man and his weird little band of cosmic friends: The Beyonder, Enchantress, Mephisto, and Zarathos. Molecule Man rearranges Norman’s brain so he’s cracked a bit. But then The Sentry swoops in and saves the day by beating the Molecule Man. WTF!
Point of order here, the Molecule Man is the second most powerful being in the Marvel Universe. Its never explained why, he’s hanging out with The Beyonder who is the most powerful being in the Marvel Universe. But somehow the perpetual headcase know as The Sentry “discovers” he too can manipulate molecules and takes down Reece. Then story is all wrapped up with a bow, no explanation as to why The Beyonder, Enchantress, Mephisto, and Zarathos were there to begin with. At least we see Loki at the end stripping away the last vestiges of Norman’s sanity.
Which gets to the heart of the matter– why did Bendis elevate Norman Osborn to such prominence in the first place? Other than killing Gwen Stacey,what has the Green Goblin ever done? Compared to the other members of the Cabal, he’s the lightweight. Dr. Doom and Loki have stronger resumés and have been villains in the truly cosmic sense, Norman Osborn was a guy in a mask.
Uncanny X-Men 519
Well Matt Fraction has just proved how silly Bendis’ creation, The Void is. The Void was one half of The Sentry, the part that made him “unstable”. So Emma Frost is able to remove the Void from The Sentry, but she had to stay in her diamond form to trap it in her mind. Then the Void jumped in to Scott (Cyclops).
At this point Professor Xavier, Psylocke, and Emma are discussing their options on removing it from a comatose Scott. But hey no problem, Scott dated the world’s most powerful telepath, Jean Grey. He slept with the Pheonix Force when it was manifesting itself as Jean. And now he’s dating Emma Frost a strong telepath in her own right.
While not being a telepath Scott knows a lot of tricks. So he constructs a mental lock box and literally thinks The Void into it. Problem solved with a psychic prison. Four years of ridiculous story lines in the New Avengers and Dark Avengers about how powerful The Void is and Scott Summers defeats it in the span of three pages.
So come back here next month and I’ll review what happens in The Siege, the return of Steve Rogers, and probably DC’s Blackest Night.
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