Also this week...

ASTONISHING X-MEN #26 - In which the X-Men head to the Indonesian spaceship graveyard to chase a bad guy.  This is fairly standard stuff, and to be honest it verges on being a plug-in "heroes hunt villain" plot that could have been done in any book.  But it's early days, and Ellis usually puts more thought into his relaunches than that, so I'll give him the benefit of the doubt for the moment.  Simone Bianchi's art is impressive -  although there are a few rough moments, the oddball page layouts seem to be used more effectively here.  I'm not yet sold on this as an X-Men story, but as an all-purpose Ellis superhero book, it's doing fine so far. B+ 

GEN13 #21 - Another post-apocalyptic WildStorm relaunch.  WildCATS and Authority both took the line of "beleaguered superhero team mount rescue effort", so it's reassuring to see this book take a different line.  Stuck in a teleport buffer while the world goes to hell, Gen13 emerge blissfully oblivious to what's happened, and writer Scott Beatty neatly builds the first issue around us waiting for the penny to drop.  There's some semi-gratuitous darkness with the blinding of a main character, but for the most part the script stays fairly light, and Mike Huddleston contributes some wonderful wrecked cityscapes.  As an intended jumping on point, it could probably have done a better job of explaining all the casual references to I/O and so forth, but really, if you've got a vague understanding of the Gen13 premise, you'll be fine.  I'm not yet convinced about the the post-apocalypse as a direction for the whole line, but this seems promising.  B+

GENEXT #4 - The kids run off to find No-Name, and end up just getting a bit confused.  Odd story, this.  The characters are growing on me, and I like the rapport between Olivier and Rico.  But the plot is a bit of a mess; Claremont still hasn't really done anything to persuade me that the Shockwave Riders are a good idea, and some of the fight sequences are thoroughly confusing.  As a story, I don't think this really works, but I can see some potential in the promise.  C+

LAST DEFENDERS #6 - Um... right.  After cycling through versions of the Defenders for six issues, Joe Casey unveils his new team, basically declaring that they're destined to be the Defenders for some reason or other.  It would make passable sense as the first arc of an ongoing series, but as a free-standing mini it's just a bit odd and arbitrary - especially as the new Defenders include the She-Hulk, who's already got an ongoing title with a completely unrelated status quo.  It's clear that Casey had some plan or other in mind here, but quite honestly, I'm just left a little confused about what he was going for.  I don't get it, I'm afraid.  C

There's more from me at If Destroyed, and apparently the Ninth Art archive is going back online at some point...

Next week, Uncanny X-Men #501 continues the new San Francisco story.  X-Factor #34 is a Secret Invasion tie-in.  X-Factor: Layla Miller is a one-shot catching up on the know-it-all in the future.  X-Men: First Class #15 guest stars Medusa.  And Young X-Men #5 wraps up the first storyline.

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