Also this week...

UNCANNY X-MEN #501 - Um.  Anti-mutant Hellfire Cultists take to the streets of San Francisco to beat up the newcomers, and meanwhile, the X-Men move into their new base.  (Again.)  I wanted to like this more than I actually did.  There are plenty of decent ideas: I like the fresh start, I like San Francisco, I'm happy to see Empath dusted off.  The crib is still a nice touch, even if Cable got there first.  But this isn't clicking for me.  Partly, it's Greg Land's plastic, air-brushed art, which is problematic at the best of times but just plain embarrassing when the script actually calls for him to draw a dominatrix.  In concept, the Red Queen is nothing we haven't seen before from endless Claremont stories; but Land's pornalike tracing really brings out how stupid the whole thing is, in a way that's tough to ignore.  Moreover, though, the whole issue is shot through with that "Isn't this cool?  Isn't it?  Isn't it?  No, isn't it?  No, but really, isn't it?  Isn't it, though?  Isn't it?" vibe that used to get on my nerves when Mark Millar was writing Ultimate X-Men.  It's just trying too hard and needs to chill out a bit, and it feels so excitably keen to be loved that I feel terribly guilty for not loving it.  Y'know, just tell the damn story and let me figure out for myself that it's cool, hmm?  B-

X-MEN: FIRST CLASS #15 - X-Men Team-Up continues with the Silver Age version of Medusa, back in the days when she was an amnesiac member of the Frightful Four.  We're going way, way back here, and this is getting into dreadfully indulgent nostalgia territory.  There really doesn't seem to be much point to it, other than to put the X-Men next to a version of Medusa who hasn't been seen in decades, and say, "Look, remember 1967?"  I'm starting to tire of these formula guest star stories - have you guessed?  Rather more remarkably, the "Angel quitting" storyline is hastily tied up when he just shows up on the final page, with his return explained in a one-page epilogue drawn by Colleen Coover.  It's a baffling way of ending the book's first multi-issue arc, and frankly, this book is in danger of losing its way.  C

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

Next week, ooh, tons.  Angel: Revelations #4 continues Angel's revised origin story.  More Napoleonic fighting in New Exiles #10.  The Banshee arc wraps up in Ultimate X-Men #97.  "Old Man Logan" continues in Wolverine #68.  Siryn guest stars in Wolverine: First Class #6.  X-Force #6 completes the first arc of mass slaughter.  And Professor X confronts Cyclops in X-Men: Legacy #215.

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