Uncanny X-Men #342
March 1997

Home | Indexes | Uncanny X-Men | Back | Next


 
 

STORY: "--Did I Miss Something?!" (23 pages)  The X-Men are taken to the Shi'ar galaxy and discover a space station where everyone aboard has been killed.  Oh, except Deathbird.  Everyone but her, then.

What you need to know:
The X-Men all get different costumes for the duration of this storyline. Great news for the manufacturers of action figures.  That's about as exciting as this issue gets.  See why I love this storyline so much?

Comments:
One of the rules of the Dogme 95 manifesto for filmmakers is no gratuitous action.  This is a great example of what they're talking about.  Why are the X-Men dumped on an uncontrollable spaceship?  Why does it insist on driving headlong through a sodding asteroid field?  Why, in short, couldn't Gladiator give them a decent craft that would do as it was told?  Because then there wouldn't be any action, so once again Gladiator gets to act like a cretin and give them some piece of crap spaceship that allows for more action. It doesn't work.

As if that wasn't bad enough, we have a computer telling us unambiguously that there aren't any life signs aboard the space station.  Strangely, nobody seems to wonder why it didn't pick up Deathbird, who turns up a few pages later.  You can't help thinking Lobdell wasn't thinking this stuff through very carefully.

And that's it, really.  More set-up, not much of interest.


FEATURE CHARACTERS
The Beast, Bishop, Gambit, Joseph
and Rogue
Cyclops, Phoenix III
(both last in Silver Surfer vol 3 #123), Storm (last in X-Men '97) and Cannonball II (all next in Uncanny X-Men '97)
Wolverine
(last in Wolverine vol 2 #112; next in X-Men vol 2 #62-66, then in Wolverine vol 2 #115-118, then in issue #350)

SUPPORTING CHARACTERS
Trish Tilby
Deathbird
(last in X-Men Unlimited #5)

VILLAINS
The Phalanx
(behind the scenes; last in Cable #16)

back | next


Copyright 2003 Paul O'Brien.  This web site is a work of critical comment and review. All characters and publications referred to, and artwork reproduced, are ™ and © their respective owners.
 

UNCANNY X-MEN #342
Marvel Comics
March 1997
$1.95 US / $2.75 CAN

Both covers by Joe Madureira and Tim Townsend (signed)

"--Did I Miss Something?!"
Writer: Scott Lobdell
Penciller: Joe Madureira
Inker: Tim Townsend
Letterers: Comicraft
Colourists: Steve Buccellato and Team Bucce
Editor: Bob Harras