X-Men Vol. IV by Brian Wood issues #11-12

OHMYFUCKINGGOD ROGUE DIED IN THE Uncanny Avengers, a title I will be reading in my comics roster for next year. No wonder she was officially removed from Brian Wood's cast. AND I WAS JUST BEGINNING TO ENJOY HER AGAIN. She's my first love. My childhood favorite. And now she's dead, dead, DEAD! This was only brought to my attention because halfway through issue #11 of this series, Rachel said something about wishing that they could get Rogue back, and I thought they only meant she went on a sabbatical, or had other ongoing adventures with other mutants. BUT NO. She died in another title. Well, fuck that. But then again, it's only a matter of time. X-Men constants have been biting the dust lately. There was Jean Grey then Nightwalker, then Professor X and now Rogue and apparently Wolverine had also died recently (I'll be reviewing Wolverine and the X-Men as soon as I finish this). It's fine. I'm fine. Death comes for all of us even for fictional characters. It's okay. DC Comics' Damian Wayne taught me how to be strong, and his resurrection story in Peter J. Tomasi's Batman and Robin was one of daring hope but also a risky venture. If any of these dead X-Men do come back, I'd rather it'd be done respectfully and amazingly. If not, then they better just stay dead then. Dammit, I really don't want to begin this review with such dreadful news. 

But what is there to say about the last two installments for this arc anyway? Well, I have nothing to offer in this post but blatant abuse of Mean Girls quotes GIFs because I can't help but feel like the Sisterhood of Evil is an incarnation of The Plastics. You know what, LET'S JUST SAY IT IS. I'm going somewhere with this, just work with me here. Okay, so we have Lady Deathstrike transferring her consciousness to the heiress of a crime family named Ana Cortes. She then recruited Typoid Mary and Amora the Enchantress. For a while, their triad accomplished some things, mostly by stealing a copy of Arkea (WHO IS TOTES NOT FETCH), an alien infection thingamajit who is also the twin sister of hunky John Sublime (who may or may not have telepathically tango-ed with Rachel Grey, if you know what I mean). Why? Because mean girls can do anything, that's why! Deathstrike said something about power and prestige and world domination but meh. That's too generic of a reason. I feel like her grand motivation should have been like "BECAUSE I CAN AND I WILL, SO FUCK Y'ALL" because that would have been more acceptable, really. I probably would have cared more. Or not. WHATEVER.

So, Lady Deathstrike is Regina George and her army of skanks are Mary and Amora. Mary's the smart one (I think?) so she's Gretchen Wieners. She's Gretchen because I want Amora to be Karen Smith because Amora is a blonde too and I think she's also pretty dumb herself for joining the Sis of Evil anyway. For Odin's sake, she's an Asgardian! She should have standards or some shit.

Have some self-respect and stop being such a blonde, Amora!

ANYWAY, moving on. Once Lady Deathstrike acquired Arkea, Arkea totes possessed the body of her willfully ignorant best friend Reiko. This time, Arkea becomes the new Regina because she's more powerful and persuasive and intimidating when she's really such a GODDAMN CLICHÉ EXCUSE OF A SUPPOSED VILLAIN. Really, Brian Wood. Stop making Arkea happen because it's not going to happen. Arkea did grant Amora some powers again and Typoid Mary got a hold of her multiple personalities, but Lady Deathstrike realized she made a mistake awakening Arkea especially now that Arkea planned to subject her host body Ana Cortes into some freaky experiment. Who really knows. I wasn't paying attention anymore to the entire plot itself because the directions it's going are sporadic AND DID I MENTION MY INTEREST HAS DWINDLED INTO THE SIZE OF A GREEN PEA? Because it did. 

So back to Mean Girls. Arkea wants to recruit two new members for the Sis of E. The contenders are Selene Gallio, a.k.a The Black Queen and Madelyn Pryor. She was Scott Summers' ex-wife and a clone of Jean Grey (it was a weird time in the Claremont era, okay?). You gotta hand it to the Sis of E, though. They're consistently expanding their enterprise even though they're all catty bitches who hate each other and are only tied by alliances that mutually benefit their greedy, pitiful goals. Mean girls are all built the same way like that.

If by "lunch" you mean "world dominance and fuck-yeah power and death to the X-Men"

Where was I again? Oh right, Arkea wants to experiment on another girl's body. Not surprising. She did violate Karima's body before when this series began. A rapist has a pattern that way, you know. But I think Ana Cortes' consciousness switched back to her old self during this attempted rape, and in a desperate moment she stabbed herself in hopes that they won't be experimenting on her body WHICH DOESN'T MAKE BUTTLOAD OF SENSE because she's made it easier for Arkea to turn her into a vessel for someone else' thought consciousness since she essentially abolished herself. God, Ana, don't be such an Amora. If I were Ana, I would have stabbed Arkea's body instead. I mean, sure, the cunt will just transfer herself to another host body but the satisfaction of killing that pesky bitch with a knife on the boob is ultimately worth it. Why does Caesar Arkea get to stomp around like a giant while the rest of them try not to get squashed under her big feet?

BECAUSE THAT'S NOT WHAT ROME THE SIS OF E IS ALL ABOUT! WE SHOULD TOTALLY JUST STAB CAESAR ARKEA!!!

Arkea got to experiment on poor Ana Cortes. And then Madelyn Pryor showed up with a new body. Or did they use Ana Cortes' body and modified her into a smoking redhead? YOU KNOW WHAT I didn't even care to look back on the previous pages to confirm it. Fuck it. So Maddie is here and Selena is here and the X-(wo)Men crash their initiation party in Japan and it was pretty great because I did like the ass-kicking Gretchen-Mary and Karen-Amora got from Psylocke and Monet respectively. And what of the X-(wo)Men? Well, I still like them as the heroines (not like I was given a choice since the villainesses are so crappy). Still, Storm, Rachel Grey, Monet, Psylocke and Karima are actually jiving well together now even if they still have their differences and probably won't work with each other unless the men are there to be ice-breakers. Srsly, where are the fucking men? There is so much estrogen drama here that if only Wood was a better writer then I never would have minded so much because estrogen drama runs in my veins. But hey, an all-girl mutant supeheroine team. Who doesn't want that? Also, nothing bonds women together than when they are trying to take out another group of women.

And YES, Gretchen Wieners is my favorite Mean Girls character. Fucking deal with it.

Madelyn Pryror with her hot new bod, together with Selene who really is just there for prop purposes because she hardly speaks AND WHO THE FUCK IS SHE ANYWAY?, were propositioned by Storm. The weather goddess offered them a truce, that they walk away for now and the X-(wo)Men will deal with them later since their target priority is Arkea anyway. Maddie has no problem with this. Selene is a pushover nobody so she agrees to do the same and leaves the scene. Arkea was pissed. But Maddie, armed with a fabulous new body without having to search for one herself, doesn't give a fuck that it was Arkea who gave it to her in the first place. Motherfucker doesn't even acknowledge the 'betrayal' on her part and she just waltz out of there like a champ. I enjoyed that. Thank you for embarrassing Arkea like that, Madz.

So sorreh, Arkea, but yeah YOU'RE  A WHORE. 

The X-(wo)Men got to apprehend Arkea with the help of her twin brother John Sublime. Apparently, he was able to destroy all copies of her globally so she won't infect any machine ever again. And then he invents a gun that can kill her. Karima did the honors and off-ed her. 

Yay, she's dead!

But the poor girl was a former law enforcement so becoming the assigned executioner (but she volunteered) was too much for her and even though Arkea had it coming, Karima felt like she needed to be a part of another team and so she decided to join Gabriel Shepard and Saber instead, just to get away from the X-Men drama for a while. Her friends easily accept this, knowing she deserves the break and some space. I'm happy for Karima for doing a brave thing. That couldn't be easy, turning her back on her friends but it was the healthiest option for her. 

There's also a Meanwhile story about Jubilee and the mutant teenagers taking on some Sentinels in the sea. Only thing that mattered there was that gay mutant Bling was able to resolve her issues with her crush who finally apologized for punching her and agrees to go out with her--but only as friends. For now. I don't know. But hey, progress! I really hope the next story arc would be more enjoyable than this shite.

SORTA RECOMMENDED: 6/10

EDIT: I have officially dropped this title. I just can't read any more of this. There are simply no characters I emotionally latch to or stories that I'm emotionally invested it. So forget it! I will just devote my time on The Uncanny X-Men and Wolverine and the X-Men instead.

X-Men Vol. IV by Brian Wood issues #9-10

I don't think Brian Wood's stories for X-Men: Vol IV are necessarily bad or bland, but they do lack that 'enticement factor' which is present in other X-titles. As well done as the visual work has been so far, and as straightforward and comprehensible his plots have been at this point, this title is just not something I look forward to reading, let alone compose an in-depth review of. The crossover issues about Battle of the Atom have been interesting enough, but it also cost Kitty Pryde's  appearance here in his next stories, and, of course, the absence of my childhood favorite is noted as well which leads to some inevitable soul-searching on my part. 

Look, this is a serious question: WHY CAN'T I JUST HAVE MY ROGUE BACK? It's like she's irrelevant now. I miss the nineties because most of my experience in its comics roster for X-Men featured her, even if not heavily. Those small doses of her appearances and participation in the stories were always treasured by me, and I really thought Brian Wood was going to keep her around because I was actually glad to see a Rogue who enjoys siphoning other mutants' powers not for any kind of malicious intent but for good, honest fun, like that time in issue #4 with Psylocke which is coincidentally the best issue Wood has written so far. Why can't Wood just write something like that again?

To replace Rogue, he instead had another brawny lady (Monet) who is originally part of the Incredible Hulk canon. I thought her petty rivalry with Jubilee was amusing enough, but I don't know this character at all and nor am I interested in getting to know her either. I JUST WANT ROGUE BACK. Well, enough pointless whining then, and let's talk about issues #9-10 which are the continuing adventures of Lady Deathstrike, Typoid Mary and Enchantress, otherwise known collectively as the Sisterhood of Evil. It has to be said that the villainesses of this story apparently have their act together and are actually working as a team with different desires yet mutually beneficial goals that enable them to function together to defeat the X-(wo)Men. The same thing cannot be said for the latter. Storm and Rachel Grey have finally stopped fighting over who is to become the leader. Instead, Rachel had a 'moment' with John Sublime. I have never seen this physically manifest in the panels in the previous issues but I'm assuming it was also telepathic, considering Rachel's powers and Sublime being a thought consciousness type of alien. Their could-have-been romance was unfortunately squashed because Sublime is focused on stopping his vengeful twin sister Arkea who by now has a a different target--the X-(wo)Men. God, Arkea, could you be more cliché? I have no idea what she plans to do with tracking down Madelyn Pryor (so she's alive? Did not know this) nor am I that interested to find out.

Arkea is running the show now after she was freed by Lady Deathstrike. She took over her assistant Reiko's body and is now giving commands to the other members of the Sisterhood. She restored Amora the Enchantress powers after they were stripped by Thor, and helped Mary merge her split personality once and for all. I forgot if she ever did anything for Lady Deathstrike--maybe permanently instill her consciousness in Ana Cortes' meat suit for good--whatever. I'm not even sure Arkea still wanted Karima or if any of these villainesses still want to target her. I suppose Karima belongs to the X-(wo)Men so most probably they also want to kill her. This was why Storm was adamant to destroy any other replicates of Arkea around the globe. Oh yeah, did I fail to mention there are replicates of her? She did crash-land from a meteor after all and that meteor has remnants of her and said remnants were close to the ocean where several dormant Sentinels got brought back to life, being controlled by Arkea. Jubilee with some of the teenage students (has Wolverine approved this spontaneous field trip?) try to stop these Sentinels and that's how issue #10 ends with Pixie and Bling attacking head-on, never mind that there are no adults. Also, Quentin Quire failed to stop Arkea and that's just embarrassing. The Phoenix Force is watching, Q. Are you worthy of it?

Also, and this is so important, I hate Arkea. I really do. Not only is her role in this story keeping it from becoming interesting, and adding the fact that she's so rigidly characterized by Wood, her only real definitive quality is that she's the cliché that cliché pooped and made sentient. I don't care about her endgame. She wanted revenge on her brother. When she couldn't accomplish that, she set her sights on the X-(wo)Men instead. Seriously, go back to space and stop making Arkea happen, Arkea. IT'S NOT GOING TO HAPPEN!

The same thing goes for you, Mr. Wood!

I'm going to lower my rating for these two issues, mostly because I now expect something more complex to be developed from this. After all, I'm growing steadily weary, if not bored, of the way Wood is handling his story and his characters. No one here is having their spotlight or any kind of indication that it's their time to shine. Everyone has been consistently mediocre as both heroines and villainesses. At this point, I probably should start reading the third volume for Bendis' The Uncanny X-Men. At least Arkea isn't there. Srsly, fuck that bitch.

KINDDA SORTA RECOMMENDED: 6/10

X-Men Vol. IV by Brian Wood issues #7-8

I won't be reviewing issues #5-6 anymore which were the crossover issues for Battle of the Atom because I'm not really in the mood to re-visit what happened there because I can't honestly remember anything about those issues and I don't feel compelled to find out again. I remember enjoying that story arc very much, though, and that Shogo, Jubilee's adopted son, will grow up to become another superhero which is relevant, I suppose. So let's jump to the second volume for X-Men Vol IV featuring a brand new though not so new as well, villainess named Lady Deathstrike whom some of you may already know. She had a cinematic counterpart in the second X-Men film of the original franchise (played by Kelly Hu) so that hopefully jogs your memory. For those who read the comics, they know that she's Yuriko Oyama, and probably Wolverine's arch-nemesis of the sort. She's got the adamantium steel in her as well as other genetic enhancements and has worked her way as a mercenary for hire. On her last encounter with the X-Men, her body was destroyed, and now her consciousness was somewhat transferred into the unsuspecting body of one Ana Cortes, who also turned out to be the heiress to a crime family-empire so not too shabby, Yuriko-san, not too shabby at all. With a new body and some face paint, Lady Deathstrike set her eyes on a new prize; acquiring both the previous villainess Arkea and former Omega Sentinel Karima. To accomplish this, she employs the help of Typhoid Mary and Echantress.

For this particular story arc, we have artists Terry Dodson and Barry Kitson working on the visuals and I definitely enjoy the color and composition of their panels. Bendis' focal narrative on Lady Deathstrike was interesting enough. It's great to see that everything about this title remains female-centric, including the bad guys (girls?). I don't really think it's pandering especially to someone like me who barely take notice of gender in my comics unless it's either excellently front-runned or abysmally upsetting. For Brian Wood's run, the jury is still out, although I'm immensely enjoying myself for this current story arc. It was great to see Karima again, now fully conscious and eager to get her life back after it was infected by Arkea, the alien parasite who came to Earth to murder her twin brother John Sublime in revenge because she's a cliché that way. Lady Deathstrike, however, had other plans, and that involved using Arkea for her own means, ignoring the loud protests of John Sublime himself. Lady Deathstrike may prove to be trying to tame forces that are beyond her ken, but I'm eager to see what kind of clusterfuck will that lead to, and how the X-women will fix the mess. I think it's worth mentioning that Kitty Pryde has officially left after the events in Battle of the Atom. She now has to train the OCF who just traveled from the past in Bendis' other title All-New X-Men. She will be missed.

There's a side story here regarding the mutant students where Jubilee was involved in. A female student Bling/ Roxy just asked out a fellow female student was totally insensitive about it and punched Bling in the face. Jesus fuck, that wasn't very nice of her. Being a mutant is hard enough. Try being gay at that too. Anyway, Bling kisses Jubilee which was quite nice. It was all very Degrassi High or something which I can live with as I read this because a nice commercial break from all the deadly action so readers can check out the daily lives of teenage mutants is...necessary? I don't know. I wasn't upset by it. I thought it was pretty cute.

I do find it odd that Wolverine has yet to take part in all this drama. Lady Deathstrike is his foe. Do we keep him busy while all of this is happening since, after all, this title is about the ladies taking over cases and challenges as they find a way to be a unit? How is that accomplished exactly? Not the ladies fighting as a unit because I know they are more than competent to do that. But the one about Wolverine being out of the loop here as Lady Deathstrike wreaks havoc. Well, Wolverine is assigned to handle the delinquents of their school in the other title Wolverine and the X-Men. What's the matter then? Is Quentin Quire enough in keeping Wolverine far too busy for him to notice? 

RECOMMENDED: 7/10

X-Men Vol. IV by Brian Wood issues #3-4

There was nothing really special about the third issue of of this series, which is the conclusion of the first story arc Primer. The so-called villain of the story was Arkea, the alien Subtle's twin sister whom he overpowered and pushed during utero or something (because he's a dickhead, I'm assuming). Due to that homicidal negligence, Arkea piggybacked using an orphan human boy to track down her brother in Earth, and then she proceeded to possess machines (particularly Omega Sentinel Karima) because she's so original, and then she tried to kill the X-Men because they were in her way of vengeance. What a fucking cliche. The only real dramatic thing that got to me was that Karima was able to regain control of her body and offered to sacrifice herself to save them all. And that Storm actually considered that an option, much to Rachel Grey's chagrin. I like Karima back in Claremont's Excalibur Vol. III so I do hope she will be revived. For now, they neutralized Arkea, kept the baby Shogo safe, and still salvaged Karima's body. All in the day's work.

The fourth issue, however, was a very substantial installment that truly took its time focusing on characterizations and relationships. Divided between a rescue mission for the ladies, and Jubilee's lunch date with big-brother mentor Wolverine as they brought Shogo along, this was a wonderful well-written piece that explored how the daily grind must be like for people like the X-Men who take what they can get from a world that never stops trying to bring them down. The flow of the narrative and the transition among scenes were deftly accomplished, and Coipel's illustrations are growing on me especially those that featured Jubilee's panels with Wolverine as they have a great time just catching up and taking care of the baby; which were then heavily contrasted by the more action-oriented scenes featuring Rogue, Kitty and Betsy. Rogue, particularly, is enjoying her siphoning of Psylocke's powers. I have never seen her have such crazy fun like this, and it was a nice change because Anna Marie had always been so cautious and a little resentful of her siphoning abilities especially when certain assholes would force her to absorb powers (and memories) she would rather not. So seeing Rogue goofing around but still saving people put a smile on my face for at least a solid hour after reading about it. She'll always be my childhood favorite after all.

And as I enjoy Kitty, Betsy and Rogue just being awesome superheroine-gal pals together, the same cannot be applied to Storm and Rachel Grey who are definitely butting heads. Rachel was not happy that Storm was taking the reigns in their team, particularly when she believed that Ororo doesn't deserve the leadership role to begin with. After all, Storm did not even hesitate when she considered having Karma killed if that's what it took to stop Arkea. This doesn't sit well with everyone but Rachel was the only one who was willing to speak up about it, and it was great for her to question Storm, and I love this new dimension to Storm where we see her also becoming more brutal and less trusting of the world much like Scott now as the leader of the new mutant revolutions. Both are world-weary veterans who have been through so much to still believe in the best of things. That being said, Rachel did get through Storm and she eventually does accept that she shouldn't just boss them around and must be willing to work with them as a team player. Just like Rogue, Storm is a favorite, so I believe in her.

Meanwhile, Wolverine tries to buy Jubilee's childhood home behind her back as a surprise gift and it was all kinds of sweet and nice especially after he promised to look out after Shogo as well. Now, I'm not really that confident about Jubilee's newfound role as an adoptive mother, mostly because of my own issues about motherhood in general. I trust that she will do her best and that she does have other people who can help her raise the kid, but I'm pretty nervous and dreadful of the potential screw-ups along the way (which is why I WILL NEVER become a mother). In a way, I admire Jubilee for taking on the responsibility, but I'm also worried about her and the child's safety which will never be guaranteed, not as long as he's with the X-Men. But hey, if any group of people can make it and make the most of a bad situation, it's the X-Men. It takes a while but they always adjust. So I sure hope things won't get too worse soon. 

Well, issues #5-6 are the Battle of the Atom crossovers so Shogo's future was pretty much revealed there. I won't be reviewing those two anymore since I've finished them already and my thoughts about them are in the overall review of the collected series itself.

RECOMMENDED: 7/10

X-Men Vol. IV by Brian Wood issues #1-2

I've been wondering where all the other ladies at--especially the fan-favorite ones--and this title series answers that question. Written by Brian Wood and illustrated by Olivier Coipel, it stars an all-female cast fronted by Storm, Rachel Grey, Kitty Pryde, Psylocke, Rogue and Jubilee. I know it seemed odd that they didn't just re-brand this title into something other than the generic "X-Men" one. I've been aware for a while that there is an ongoing MARVEL NOW! title about all the X-heroines but I couldn't for the life of me figure out which one was it until I googled it properly. So why not renamed this title into 'X-Women' or something like that? From what I know, 'X-Men' is one of oldest titles of the Marvelverse and, in technical terms, this will be the fourth roster released from it since the sixties. Hence, the original title for this particular relaunch should be "X-Men Vol. IV" and that is why I'm labeling my titles with that tag from now on.

And no, I really don't know why they didn't just re-brand this and maybe it doesn't matter. After all, two issues in and I was enjoying myself. I was happy to see Rogue because she's been my childhood favorite from the beginning and I haven't had many opportunities to read about her being awesome since I started my X-Men comics diet. On the other hand, I've been so in love with Kitty Pryde since The Astonishing X-Men and her pivotal role in the Days of Future Past collection, so seeing her working with the other gals was so cool. Storm and her Mohawk are here too which was grea although I wish she'd be able to contribute more to the next stories of this series than just stand there, looking glorious and queen-like (which she really does a great job at, mind you). Rachel Grey and Psylocke, who are awesome psychics, are meshing pretty well together too (though I miss the nineties Psylocke look, to be honest). But the real heroine of this story arc Primer is Jubilation Lee, one of Wolverine's teenage protégé and supposedly the kid that children will relate to in the cartoons, X-Men: The Animated Series. 

I don't really have strong feelings of either fondness or dislike over Jubilee, and her character did go through a lot of weird shit--the weirdest one had to be when she became a vampire...or something. It's as weird as it gets. So this story arc was about her rescuing a baby from an orphanage that was bombed. She traveled back to the States to seek refuge from the Jean Grey School of Higher Learning but was being stalked by a man the entire time. When she managed to reconvene with her friends, some peculiar disaster happened en-route, mostly due to the kid who somehow possesses powers. Thanks to teamwork, Kitty, Storm and Rogue were able to wrap things up and get Jubilee and the baby to safety while Rachel and Betsy confront the man who had been stalking Jubilee. It was no other than Subtle, one of the X-Men's alien villains in the old days. He started talking about his twin sister and how she is out for revenge because he cast her out during fetal stage or something like that. Said vengeful twin had piggybacked with the baby and now she found a better body to possess and its no other than Karima, Omega Sentinel whom I was well-acquainted with since she played some vital role in Chris Claremont's Excalibur Vol. III.

Apparently, Subtle's twin sister named Arkea can hack machines and use them (god, so original) and she attacked Beast and Rogue in the laboratory while wearing Karima. Kitty would have killed her easily; all she needed to do was to phase through Karima, but Kitty was concerned that their friend may still be in there somewhere so she restrained herself. Unfortunately, Arkea got away, but Subtle promised to help them stop her. Jubilee, meanwhile, named the baby Shogo and is now fully responsible of him. She was more than excited to be a single mother. And that's what happened in the first two issues. The third installment is going to be the conclusion of this arc. I like how everything is going so far so I'm reserving any harsher judgments. It's not that amazing but neither is it completely terrible. I'm giving it a solid 7 for now.

RECOMMENDED: 7/10