Also this week...

EXILES #80 - The concluding half of the "Future Imperfect" leg of World Tour.  Frankly, at this point I'm starting to think that the idea is outstaying its welcome.  Then again, this is the first world they've visited which I'm not particularly familiar with, so it's entirely possible that everyone else has felt the same way all along.  But the formula of "show up on world, meet locals, fight Proteus inconclusively" can't go on forever and I could have lived quite happily with skipping directly to the concluding two-parter.  It's alright so far as it goes, but it's time to move on.  B-

HARD TIME #6 - The penultimate issue before cancellation, so the creators suddenly go overboard to tie up all the loose ends.  Of course, this is a book created and co-written by Steve Gerber, so what we get is a bizarre existential gallery where two characters patiently discuss everything we've seen so far and explain it to one another.  I'm tempted to say that it's not very dramatic, but then again it's an interesting shift from what the book's done before, and the circumstances demand drastic measures to provide a resolution next issue.  We're getting the artificiality out of the way this issue (and putting it front and centre, to make a virtue of necessity), which leaves the way clear for next month's finale.  B+

ULTIMATE SPIDER-MAN #94 - Worth mentioning because it's the final chapter of "Deadpool", a storyline that introduces Ultimate Deadpool and guest stars the X-Men.  To be honest, it's more of an X-Men story with Spider-Man as a gratuitous guest star, and doesn't really work as four issues of this series.  Come to think of it, it wouldn't have been especially memorable as four issues of Ultimate X-Men either.  It's a sequel to Brian Vaughan's arc which had a drastically revamped Mojo running a televised mutant-hunt in Genosha.  This really just rehashes the concept, as Deadpool and the Reavers capture the X-Men, bring them to Genosha, fight them, and lose.  A plot that goes straight from A to B without doing anything particularly clever along the way, unfortunately.  Mind you, Mark Bagley does a nice visual for the unmasked Deadpool, which is far creepier than the lumps we normally get.  C+

X-MEN: THE END, BOOK THREE #5 - Nearly there.  You know the drill by now - my idea of the final X-Men story does not involve Phoenix, the Shi'ar or Cassandra Nova, and certainly doesn't marginalise the whole question of human and mutant relations.  Somewhere along the line this series has lost sight of the point of the X-Men.  But it doesn't matter at this stage; the hardcore Claremont fanbase will be happy to see his story build to a climax, and relieved to see that at least this book will end without guest scripters.  And if you're not buying the book already, well, you're hardly going to start now.  C

There's a new Article 10 on Monday at Ninth Art, and more from me shortly at If Destroyed.

Next week, two more miniseries get wrapped up.  X-Men: Deadly Genesis is the genuinely important one, at least in terms of plot impact.  X-Men: The 198 has mainly been D-list characters sitting round the campfire, but you never know.  Uncanny X-Men #473 is Chris Claremont's penultimate issue, and the Stryker storyline continues in New X-Men #26.  Meanwhile, Cable & Deadpool #28 goes its own way as the title characters fight Flag-Smasher instead.

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