As House of M draws nearer, Excalibur has been given the job of running a two-part prelude to the crossover.  It's the only sensible choice for the job, given that it's Magneto's home title. 

However, for some reason, that two-part prelude is scheduled to be in issues #13-14 - which are also parts 3 and 4 of "The Devil's Own."  The Magneto and Professor X subplot has been ticking along quite nicely for months now and, to be honest, is far and away the best thing about the book.  However, we've now got to a point where there's nothing more to be done before House of M gets underway.  And so... filler.

Yes, the main storyline is almost completely missing here, save for a brief scene at the end which doesn't advance matters much.  Instead, this is a whole issue of the supporting cast and Angel fighting Viper and the Weaponeers in Zanzibar.  This is not desperately interesting.  The Weaponeers are a bunch of generic thugs who've yet to show any particularly memorable qualities.  Viper can be an interesting character in the right story, but Claremont's currently writing her as an evil middle manager, and there's not much to be done with that.

So... a bunch of characters run around fighting a bunch of other characters, and that's pretty much your issue.  Oh, and it's got fill-in art - presumably because Aaron Lopresti has to get the next two issues out on time or the whole crossover gets screwed up.  Cliff Richards draws the short straw and produces an issue which is competent but entirely unmemorable.

There's only one storyline in this book that interests me, and this isn't it.

Rating: C+

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