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It's a new year, and in an ideal
world, we'd be starting with something that asks as a pointer
for the new and different world ahead. Instead, here's
Exiles #21, in which the team is still fighting nasty
monsters who've overrun the world. Ah well.
Then again, it's an improvement
on the previous issue, in which the focus was almost entirely
on the Vi-Locks, and the cast were left as fairly generic
heroes. Never good news at the best of times, especially
when one of the book's strengths is in its characters.
This time round, there's plenty of space for the cast to
further their subplots, which makes me a much happier reader.
The main story focuses on the
Exiles and the local version of the Avengers trying to recover
the body of Cypher in order to create an antidote for the
virus. This being part two of the storyline, you'd
normally expect them to fail at this stage only to come back
with a better plan and achieve the goal later on. That's
not what happens, which throws open the plot quite nicely.
But on the other hand, I'm still
not that interested in this particular world. We've seen
worlds overrun by creatures many times before in Exiles
and they need to be distinctive. The gimmick here is
supposed to be that the villains are all the normal Marvel
heroes and villains who've been co-opted into the Vi-Locks.
But since they don't retain any of their original
personalities, it's a bit wasted. There's a bunch of
robots parading around who look like pre-existing characters,
but nothing really comes of it. They might as well just
be a horde of nobodies, for all the effect it has on the plot.
The Avengers are a slightly more
interesting collection, since even though most of them get
virtually nothing to say, you can at least amuse yourself by
speculating on how Mary Jane ended up as Spider-Woman and such
forth. And Jim Calafiore draws them wonderfully, even
though his Vi-Locks are a bit shaky this issue. Maybe
it's just the colouring. There's only so much pus yellow
I can take on one page.
Overall, it's better than the
previous issue, but there's still an unavoidable sense that
nothing new is happening.
Rating: B
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