X-FORCE #101 - April 2000

Learning to Fly

Credits:  Joseph Harris (writer), Steven Harris (penciler), Rick Kethcum (inker), Matt Hicks (colors), Chris Eliopoulos (letters)

Summary:  Cannonball crashes into San Francisco Bay as all mutants lose their powers across the globe.  After he’s taken to the hospital, a depressed Meltdown wanders the city.  She soon meets a boy named Kevin, who lost his newfound ability to fly when all mutant powers were cancelled.  He tries to gain his peers’ acceptance by doing another flying stunt the next day.  Meltdown is barely able to rescue him.  Later, Meltdown spends time with the recuperating Cannonball, contemplating what it means to be “normal.”

Continuity Notes:  It’s another story following Uncanny X-Men #379, even though there aren’t any footnotes pointing the reader in that direction.

Review:  Last issue was the big anniversary issue, and John Francis Moore’s final story, while next issue is the start of the Warren Ellis revamp.  What to do with the issue in-between?  Give Moore one more issue to tie up loose ends from his run?  Reunite Fabian Nicieza and Rob Liefeld for one final story featuring the original members of the team?  Another New Mutants tribute story, perhaps?  Nope.  The proper answer is “Kill time with a tie-in to the main X-Men books.”  The “All Mutants Lose Their Powers” arc (Did it ever have a real name?) seemed oddly un-ambitious given the nature of the story, but in retrospect I can understand why Marvel didn’t want to make it into a larger event.  Writers can do the type of story seen in this issue, and…that’s pretty much it.  The cast reflects on losing their powers, then they have to move on with their lives.  How many comics truly need to address this, especially when everyone knows it’s only temporary?  

Joe Harris does a nice enough job exploring some of the obvious ideas, allowing Meltdown to narrate the story and reflect on what being a mutant has ultimately cost her.  The new kid, Kevin (or “Freakshow” to the kids at school) is the archetypal lonely weirdo who thinks being able to fly is his ticket to popularity, which turns the focus to the other side of the equation, just how good it could feel for someone like that to be special.  Thankfully, Harris doesn’t go the predictable route and have Kevin get lynched at the end (in fact, the kids seem genuinely excited to see someone fly); Kevin instead embarrasses himself when he refuses to accept that his gift is now gone.  It’s a sad ending, but Harris doesn't make the scene overly dramatic.  No teen suicides, fortunately.  The main drag on the issue is the art, which couldn’t possibly be more ill-suited for a quiet character story.  Steven Harris simply cannot draw believable, consistent human faces.  These are ugly, ugly people.  Harris seems to be inspired by Adam Pollina’s style, but it looks like someone kept clip art of some of Pollina’s worst drawings from early in his run and just copied them over and over again.  Cable also looked horrible this month, making me wonder what was going on behind-the-scenes in the weeks before the “Revolution” revamp.

X-FORCE #100 - March 2000

 

Dark Cathedral

Credits:  John Francis Moore (writer), Jim Cheung & Chris Renaud (pencilers), Mark Morales, John Czop, Scott Koblish, & Rich Perrotta (inkers), Marie Javins & Wilson Ramos (colors), Chris Eliopoulos (letters)

Summary:  X-Force is stunned to discover four iterations of Moonstar.  Meanwhile, Arcadia transforms into the Queen of the Star Swords.  The real Moonstar, bereft of powers, emerges from the crowd along with Proudstar and Risque.  The Queen takes the four Moonstars with her and creates a cathedral in the city.  Ulysses Dragonblood arrives that night and helps X-Force enter the cathedral, which they soon discover is a doorway into alternate realities.  Cannonball discerns that the four Moonstars emerged from four different Earths.  Eventually, Cable, Jennifer Kale, and Man-Thing arrive and help Moonstar defeat the Queen.  She then uses the power she absorbed to destroy the cathedral.

Continuity Notes:  

• The Sunspot and Siryn subplots continue, even though this is John Francis Moore’s final issue.  Sunspot spies on, and accidentally runs into, the girl whose body Julianna Sandoval now inhabits.  Siryn is possessed by her mystic necklace and flies out of her aunt’s house.
• After seeing a vision of an alternate reality X-Force that died under his leadership, Cable lets go of the team and encourages them to find their own identity.
• Moonstar emerges from the story without her cosmic powers, claiming that she’s back to mental projections and psychic arrows.
• Sunspot refers to the events of the New Mutants graphic novel (1982) as happening “five years ago.”

Review:  The final John Francis Moore/Jim Cheung issue, and I really wish I could say there was a  payoff to all of that Deviants/Eternals/Gatherers/Damocles Foundation stuff.  There isn’t.  The storyline ends with Arcadia going evil, revealing she’s from an alternate reality, and then retreating to that alternate reality off-panel after Moonstar kicks her butt with Cable’s psimitar.  Moore spent years setting up this storyline, occasionally to the point of tediousness, and I can’t imagine this is how he actually wanted to end it.  Regardless, it’s over, and while it doesn’t feel like much of a conclusion, there are still some nice anniversary issue moments.  The alternate reality scenes are a clever way to pay homage to the past of the book, going all the way back to the original New Mutants issues and extrapolating some strange worlds that could plausibly exist.  And not all of them are there just to play the dystopia card, as Moore treats one as a parody Ellis dimension in preparation for “Counter-X.”  It’s genuinely funny, and I’m glad Marvel allowed the scene to go through.  There’s also a cute exchange between Meltdown and Cable, mocking what a flop his “final” battle with Apocalypse turned out to be.

Trying to view this as a coherent story, though, it has numerous problems.  One major problem is Arcadia’s sudden turn into outright villainy; there’s some justification that plays off of previous stories about her fantasy life as a kid, but she remains a poorly defined villain.  And I’m still not sure what exactly Arcadia planned to do with the four alternate reality Moonstars, or why she chose those specific versions of Moonstar.  In addition, the issue already begins with too many characters to keep track of, but then keeps adding more as the story goes along.  Did Moonstar really need Ulysses Dragonblood, Cable, Jennifer Kale, and Man-Thing to defeat Arcadia?  What point do they truly serve?  Also, why was Risque brought back for this story?  She has a few lines of dialogue at the beginning and then drops out halfway through the issue.  And, bizarrely, Moore is continuing subplots he’ll never be able to finish.  Cutting away to Sunspot and Siryn during the already cramped main story serves no purpose, especially if these plots are never going to be resolved.  It’s also kind of annoying that Moore has to work in a quickie rationalization for Cable to once again distance himself from the team, just to set up that misguided “Counter-X” run.  

X-FORCE #99 - February 2000

Bad Company
Credits:  John Francis Moore (writer), Jim Cheung (penciler), Mark Morales (inker), Marie Javins (colors), Chris Eliopoulos (letters)

Summary:  The Demon Bear attacks San Francisco, and X-Force soon learns that Arcadia is its target.  She explains that the Bear has been stalking her since her last encounter with Moonstar.  Soon, the Bear swallows both Arcadia and Moonstar.  Inside the Bear, they see images of Moonstar’s horse Brightwind and Arcadia’s doll Mary Weather.  The doll explains that the Demon Bear was created when Arcadia absorbed Moonstar’s memories.  They must combine their reality-warping powers to unmake it.  After following the doll’s instructions, the Demon Bear disappears.  In the smoke, four versions of Moonstar emerge.

Continuity Notes: 

• Siryn is visiting her “aunt” (actually her mother’s cousin, according to the narrative captions) Victoria Donnely in Looking Glass, California.  In an antique shop, an elderly woman puts a necklace around Siryn’s neck and it begins to glow.  
• Sunspot, meanwhile, is adjusting to life in the Hellfire Club.  The story hints that his first love Juliana, recently resurrected by Selene, might actually have memories of him.
• While fighting the Demon Bear, two mystery figures in business suits (Mr. Wu, Miss Lloyd) spy on Meltdown.  Wu cryptically says that they “need a third.”
• Risque makes a sudden appearance during the Demon Bear fight to aid Proudstar.  Later, armed SHIELD agents arrive and target the Bear.  It reads as if both of these appearances are creations of Moonstar/Arcadia’s reality warping powers, but the next issue confirms that they're really there.

Review:  It’s John Francis Moore’s penultimate issue, and true to form, it’s crammed with subplots, narrative captions, and New Mutants references.  Evoking the Claremont/Sienkiewicz “Demon Bear Saga” is a dangerous move given its canonization over the years, but after months of teasing, Moore makes it clear that he’s not honestly trying to write a sequel to the original story.  Instead, it was just a tease, setting up the final stage of the Moonstar/Arcadia story.  Arcadia is of course tied in with the prolonged Deviants storyline that’s become something of a drag on the book, but Moore does a decent job this issue of making Arcadia interesting in her own right.  The flashbacks to her childhood (memories Moonstar now shares) are pretty effective in fleshing her out, and Cheung gets some mileage out of Arcadia’s living Raggedy Anne doll that conveniently tells the heroes what they need to do.  However, I have to say that the subplots seem more intriguing than the main story.  And with only one issue left, it’s hard to imagine that they’re going to be properly addressed before Moore’s departure.

X-FORCE Annual ‘99 - November 1999

Loose Ends

Chapter One: Picking Up the Pieces

Credits:  Fabian Nicieza (writer), Chris Renaud (pencils), Rod Ramos/Scott Elmer/Rich Perrotta (inks), Kevin Somers (colors), Sharpefont (letters)

Summary:  Rictor and Shatterstar are recruited by Verschiagen Industries after a fight with Rictor’s gun-running family.  They arrive prepared to train against Verschiagen Industries’ test subject, V-2, or to rescue her if she’s being held against her will.  Suddenly, a young man named Hanransha enters.  While trying to stun V-2 long enough to free her, he accidentally kills her with his mutant powers.  Rictor and Shatterstar escape with Hanransha and discover that V-2 was his half-sister.  Hanransha is trying to find the rest of his siblings that were also bred in labs.  His next lead is Martin Strong in Colorado.

Continuity Notes:  This story resolves, of all things, the cryptic subplot from X-Force #43 that had a mystery man sneaking into a mystery lab.  According to Hanransha, this was his father, who was killed while trying to rescue him.

Review:  In response to overwhelming reader demand, or at least a letters page worth of requests in an issue of X-Force, Rictor and Shatterstar return, along with Fabian Nicieza.  Nicieza left quite a few dangling plotlines when he was forced off the book, and probably the most annoyingly cryptic of them was that subplot scene in X-Force #43.  Considering that Marvel annuals were firmly dismissed as filler by the late ‘90s, what better place to wrap up a five-year-old storyline that barely anyone remembered?  It’s possible that a few of the fans that really wanted to see Rictor and Shatterstar again also remembered this unresolved mystery, and most X-Force readers have fond memories of Nicieza’s run on the book, so this actually sounds like a decent use of the annual format.  As a lapsed X-completist, I was probably in the prime demographic for this issue, even though I skipped it at the time.  I didn’t have a lot of interest in Rictor or Shatterstar, wasn’t regularly buying X-Force, and didn’t care for the art.  I can’t say that I missed out on a great comic, but the lure of unresolved X-continuity might have drawn me back in had I known that an old mystery was being resolved.

Chapter Two: Strong Attractions

Credits:  Fabian Nicieza (writer), Guz Vazquez, Rod Ramos, and Rich Perrotta (art), Kevin Somers (colors), Sharpefont (letters)

Summary:  Rictor, Shatterstar, and Hanransha arrive at the StrongH.O.L.D. headquarters, where they face Martin Strong and Neurotap.  They’re shocked when X-Force enters and defends Neurotap.  They explain to their former teammates that Strong is providing for the medical care of Neurotap’s family.  Strong reveals that Hanransha’s powers will continue to go haywire while he’s separated from his mother, who is none other than Hanna Verschiagen.  Neurotap leaves with Rictor, Shatterstar, and Hanransha for Germany, where they’re soon abducted by Hanna Verschiagen.

Continuity Notes:  Rictor is given the new ability to use his vibratory field to fly, so long as he straddles a large piece of wood.  And, yes, Nicieza wrote this as an intentional joke, playing off the fan speculation that Rictor and Shatterstar were gay.

Review:  Everyone remembers Martin Strong and Neurotap from X-Force Annual #2, right?  Actually, I don’t even remember X-Force Annual #2, aside from the pulse-pounding debut of Adam-X, the X-Treme.  This issue reminds us that Martin Strong is a mutant fish-man that uses genetic research in order to gain a new body, and to find a way to eradicate mutantcy.  Neurotap is his reluctant assistant, who works for Strong because he pays for her family’s medical treatments, treatments they need because she nearly killed them when her powers first surfaced.  Presumably, this story is supposed to resolve her character arc and offer her some resolution, but in practice, it reads as yet another plot point jammed into an already packed comic.  Not helping the story at all this chapter is the art, which resembles a bad Humberto Ramos impression.

Chapter Three: X-P8

Credits:  Fabian Nicieza (writer), Ken Lashley and Rod Ramos (art), Kevin Somers (colors), Sharpefont (letters)

Summary:  X-Force arrives and rescues their teammates.  While fighting X-Force, Hanna Verschiagen continues to drain power from her children, unconcerned that she’s killing them.  Shatterstar listens to their pleas and cuts their conduit lines to Verschiagen.  The children, including Hanransha, die.  As he dies, Hanransha thanks Shatterstar for ending their mother’s evil.

Continuity Notes:  Neurotap decides to leave Martin Strong’s service at the end of the story.  Cannonball gives her Professor Xavier’s card, promising that he can help her family.  She promptly disappeared into obscurity, but luckily she escaped Frank Tieri’s routine mutant genocides in the pages of Weapon X.

Review:  The final page asks readers to write in if they want to see more of Shatterstar, Rictor, and Neurotap.  Specifically, they want people to write, “We want our Triple-X!”  Hopefully, in large print on the back of a post card that your local mail carrier can easily read.  

Nicieza was apparently serious about using this story to sell Neurotap as a character, which makes me wonder why so much of the story was spent on Hanransha, his siblings, and Hanna Verschiagen and her evil corporation.  I actually don’t have a problem with Neurotap; her core conflict automatically makes her a little sympathetic, and her powers are non-generic and interesting enough.  She’s also one of the few minority female mutants, so an editor looking for more diversity within the X-line (or a producer working on the X-Men movies seeking a part for, say, Rosario Dawson) might consider her worth a look.  But this specific story doesn’t center on her in any meaningful way, and the core story it does present is rather dull.  The plot also doesn’t really do an awful lot with Shatterstar and Rictor, even though they’re nominally the stars.  But, hey, that one page from X-Force #43 finally got resolved.

X-FORCE #98 - January 2000

Temptation

Credits:  John Francis Moore and Jim Cheung (story and art), Mark Morales (inker), Marie Javins (colors), Chris Eliopoulos (letters)

Summary:  Sunspot wakes in a fantasy world, instantly recognizing it as the work of Selene.  Selene reveals that she’s forcing the rest of X-Force to live out their fears in the Hellfire Club’s Nightmare Chambers, while Moonstar is tortured by Blackheart in the Club’s basement.  Selene tries to recruit Sunspot into the Hellfire Club as her Black Rook, but he refuses.  After Sunspot reunites the team, and Moonstar is rescued by Hela, Selene makes her final offer: the resurrection of Sunspot’s deceased love, Juliana.  He reluctantly agrees to join Selene.  The rest of X-Force is freed, while Juliana’s soul emerges in the body of a recently deceased teenager.

Continuity Notes: 

·         Sunspot’s age is once again incorrectly listed as fifteen instead of thirteen when his powers emerged.

·         Selene’s motivation for enticing Sunspot into the Hellfire Club is to enact a final vengeance against his father, a former member she apparently disliked.  I don't recall the two of them feuding in an actual story.

·         Proudstar’s nightmare has him on his reservation moments before Stryfe’s attack, unable to warn them.  Cannonball is trapped in a coalmine with his father.  Jesse Bedlam is in a mental institution.  Meltdown is interrogated by the police regarding the death of Maurice “Tiger” Antonini.  This story confirms that she killed Tiger in self-defense during her days as a runaway, and that this is the “dark secret” she’s kept from the team.

·         Juliana goes on to live the life of the girl she’s overtaken and forgets her own identity.  This is the ironic twist that comes with Sunspot’s deal with the “Devil” (Blackheart).

·         The Hellfire guards during this era are actually demons wearing traditional Hellfire uniforms.

I Love the '90s:  During their fight with Hellfire guards, Jesse Bedlam remarks that he feels like he’s in the moshpit at Woodstock ’99.

Review:  Wow, forty issues have passed since X-Force #58, a forgettable issue that split up the cast and had each member live out a fantasy.  Now, they’re living out nightmares, with the exception of Sunspot, who’s still hung up on the idea of being a famous soccer player.  John Francis Moore/Jim Cheung is a stronger creative team than Jeph Loeb/Fill-in Guy, so this is at least more entertaining, although much of this issue also reads as filler.  The goal of the story is to get Sunspot in place as the new Black Rook of the Hellfire Club, but the impact of his decision is blunted by the amount of time spent on the numerous cast members.  Sunspot doesn’t get to make his choice until the next to last page, leaving his friends only a few panels to actually react to his decision. 

And this should be a big deal.  Sunspot’s been a member of the team for years, and his antipathy towards the Hellfire Club goes all the way back to his first appearance.  If you’re doing a story that has Sunspot leaving the team to join the Hellfire Club, this should be full-on classic mutant melodrama.  It’s great that Moore is actually using Sunspot’s often ignored past with the Hellfire Club in a story (Who even remembers it was Reese, Macon, and Cole who killed Sunspot’s girlfriend?), but Juliana is given such a small role in the issue her appearance has little impact.  It’s also nice to discover someone at least tried to use the All-New, All-Demonic Hellfire Club in a story outside of Chris Claremont, but again, this is too rushed to be truly engaging.  This is a story that didn’t need to kill a dozen pages with fantasy sequences, but did so anyway.

X-FORCE #97 - December 1999

Cracked Foundation

Credits:  John Francis Moore (writer), Anthony Williams (penciler), Scott Elmer (inker), Mike Thomas (colors), Chris Eliopoulos (letters)

Summary:  Selene takes Sunspot to the Damocles Foundation headquarters, where the Reignfire symbiote is being injected into a Gatherer in order to reawaken it.  Selene and Sunspot are abducted by Sword and detained.  Meanwhile, X-Force visits Sledge, following the revelation of Cannonball’s forgotten adventure.  Ulysses Dragonblood and Arcadia Deville are with him.  With the help of Veeg, they teleport X-Force to the Damocles Foundation, hoping to stop the reawaking of the Gatherer.  The heroes reunite with Sunspot, but Selene betrays everyone by using magic to reanimate the Gatherer.  Moonstar and Arcadia combine their reality warping powers and destroy the Gatherer and Reignfire.  Furious, Selene swears revenge.

Continuity Notes: 

• Following the events of Fantastic Four Annual ’99, Selene now leads the Hellfire Club.
• Ulysses reveals the origin of his brother, Odysseus Indigo.  Indigo is a Deviant who left the tribe and formed his own splinter group of Eternals, Deviants, and humans, all determined to “create and control the next species that will rule the planet.”  Ulysses was a member until he realized his brother’s interests were “entirely selfish.”  He left with Arcadia. 
•  Sledge tells Cannonball that he’s a Deviant who also abandoned his people.  He claims that he views himself as an American, and was offered citizenship after he aided the State Department in the 1950s.
• The Gatherer de-evolves Sword into primitive lizard creatures while under Selene’s control.
• Arcadia and Moonstar now sense a strange connection following their encounter in X-Force #83.  Arcadia says she’s now having dreams about the Demon Bear.
  
  

Review:  Plot, plot, plot, plot.  It’s not necessarily a bad plot, mind you, and this is one of Anthony Williams’ better fill-in issues, so it does look nice enough, but this is yet another issue that’s more about the Damocles Foundation than X-Force.  The character hooks are fairly weak (Cannonball now remembers meeting Sledge, and Arcadia and Moonstar now have a vague connection), so too often this comes across as generic heroes fighting a generic menace.  The one interesting play on past continuity, Selene’s offer to Sunspot to claim his place in the Hellfire Club (presumably a reference to his deceased father’s membership), is quickly ignored so that the multi-faceted uber-plot must be fed.  In a way, it’s impressive that Moore’s brought together almost every aspect of his several years on the title into one giant storyline, but unfortunately, it’s a massive story about a rogue Deviant and his numerous plot devices that doesn’t relate to the characters in an engaging way.

X-FORCE #96 - November 1999

Family Secrets

Credits: John Francis Moore (writer), Anthony Williams (penciler), Mark Morales (inker), Marie Javins (colors), Chris Eliopoulos (letters)

Summary: Cannonball breaks his uncle Lucas Guthrie out of prison in order to learn the truth behind the images he saw in Genosha. Lucas reveals that he was duped into stealing a Celestial Golem from a warehouse. When Lucas realized he was in trouble, he asked Cannonball’s father for help, which lead to the eleven-year-old Cannonball sneaking into the back of his truck. They delivered the Golem to a Deviant facility, shortly before Sledge suddenly appeared and destroyed the Golem. The Deviants killed during the melee were buried by the Guthrie brothers, and Cannonball’s memory was erased by one of Sledge’s devices. With Domino’s help, Cannonball returns Lucas to jail. Meanwhile, Meltdown is being stalked by Triune Understanding followers, Selene reveals to Sunspot that a SHIELD agent is actually a plant for the Damocles Foundation, Moonstar sees an image of the Demon Bear, and the remains of Reignfire are delivered to Indigo.

I Love the '90s: Jesse Bedlam tells Meltdown that her powers are literally “da bomb.”

Creative Differences:  Kurt Busiek revealed on Usenet that John Francis Moore's portrayal of the Triune Understanding openly breaking the law did not match the instructions he gave to Marvel editors at the time.

Miscellaneous Note: The Statement of Ownership lists average sales for the year as 76,034, with the most recent issue selling 61,372 copies. It’s not hard to guess why Marvel began considering a relaunch around this time.

Review: Yes, more Deviants. Moore does handle Cannonball’s relationship with his criminal uncle fairly well, and there are a few nice moments that center on Cannonball’s embarrassment when Lucas takes him to a strip club, but…will this ever end? If Moore wanted to do a story with the Deviants in X-Force, fine, but I don’t think he needed two to three years to set the idea up. I also don’t understand why it’s necessary to drag Cannonball’s past into the story, going so far as to reveal that he had a secret adventure with the Deviants that was erased by Sledge, of all people. Isn’t Cannonball’s past much more effective if he simply had a normal life in Kentucky before discovering he had mutant powers? What are the odds that he would’ve run into the creations of the Celestials, the cosmic beings responsible for human mutation in the first place? And that his life would be saved by Sledge, a mystery character his future teammate Proudstar will one day encounter following an X-Force adventure? There’s no obvious point to this; it needlessly complicates Cannonball’s past and doesn’t offer any significant advancement of the Deviant storyline. To Moore’s credit, he’s still keeping numerous subplots alive, but it’s not a good sign when the main story is much less appealing than all of the subplots.

X-FORCE #95 - October 1999

Magnetic Distraction

Credits: John Francis Moore (story), Jim Cheung & Nelson DeCastro (art), Mark Morales/Rod Ramos/Rob Stull (inkers), Marie Javins (colors), Chris Eliopoulos (letters)

Summary: As X-Force tries to escape with the cybernetic brain Archie, Magneto arrives to block their exit. Moonstar’s new quantum powers are the team’s only advantage. When her powers short out, Cannonball is forced to call Jesse Bedlam, who’s waiting at a nearby power plant. Using his powers, Jesse creates a massive blackout, which enables the Magistrates to penetrate the capital. Magneto is forced to abandon X-Force, and with Quicksilver’s help, the team escapes. Archie is connected to a Life Model Decoy, and Cannonball is given another Memory Box. Absorbing the memories, he realizes his father and uncle might be guilty of murder.

Continuity Notes: Jesse Bedlam drops a vial of his pills near Domino. He’s forced to admit that he takes electro-neural inhibitors because his powers interfere with his brain chemistry.

Review: So, as it turns out, Peter Wisdom and his friend the sentient brain don’t serve any great purpose, although this storyline does inadvertently set up Wisdom’s role in X-Force’s upcoming relaunch. One disadvantage to John Francis Moore’s dense plotting is the occasional lack of gratifying payoff when a story’s concluded, which is what Wisdom’s story falls victim to. Moore does establish Archie as an old friend of Wisdom’s and gives them a reunion scene (and something of a happy ending for Archie) at the conclusion of the issue, but their story has been so rushed it’s hard to care. I get that Moore’s trying to make Archie more than just a plot device, but cramming his history with Wisdom into a couple of panels isn’t a very effective way of pulling the idea off.

Overall, though, this is still a decent arc. X-Force’s past with Magneto is acknowledged in a brief flashback, and although Moore’s writing Magneto as the villain Marvel wanted him to be during this era, he’s not as irrational and aggressive as he often appeared during these days. He’s actually able to maintain a conversation with X-Force and present his point of view somewhat reasonably. And Jim Cheung undeniably draws a great Magneto, so the fight scenes look fantastic. This has largely been a diversion from the big story Moore’s been building for months, but it’s entertaining in its own right and unlike some of the previous issues, doesn’t come across as flagrant time killer.

X-FORCE #94 - September 1999

Artifacts & Apocrypha

Credits: John Francis Moore (writer), Jim Cheung (penciler), Morales/Stull/Ramos/Koblish (inks), Kevin Tinsley (colors), Comicraft (letters)

Summary: X-Force arrives in war-torn Genosha, at the request of Peter Wisdom. Cannonball demands Wisdom reveal the origin of the “memory box” Wisdom mailed him. Wisdom introduces X-Force to Delphi, a native Genoshan who captures memories in boxes. In exchange for a memory from each member, Delphi gives them a box that contains information they need for their mission. Wisdom reveals that he’s called the team to retrieve a crashed Black Air satellite named the Faraway. After a brief confrontation with Quicksilver, Wisdom leads X-Force to its location. He picks up a sentient brain, which triggers an alarm. Meanwhile in Brazil, Sunspot rescues Selene from two Deviants.

Continuity Notes:

· The remnants of the Genoshan magistrates are still fighting with the Mutates as the story opens.

· Wisdom tells X-Force that following Excalibur’s disbanding, he’s worked with former Black Air members to make amends for their previous actions. This issue also marks the debut of his infamous eye patch. According to Wisdom: “I lost this eye trying to stop a reactionary KGB cell in Siberia from unleashing a viral bomb the Reagan Administration developed.” A year later, Warren Ellis will reveal in X-Force that the eye patch was a scam Wisdom used to pick up women.

· The concept of sentient, disembodied brains (this one is named Archie) showed up earlier during John Francis Moore’s Factor X run.

· The memory box Wisdom mailed to Cannonball belongs to someone from his hometown. Cannonball sees himself as a child running from a fight between two superbeings.

· The memory Meltdown gives Delphi is when she first used her powers as a teenage runaway to stop a street punk named Tiger. What happened to Tiger is left vague; if Moore’s idea is that Meltdown killed him, it’s possible this is the “dark secret” from her life as a runaway she’s always kept hidden.

Review: How much plot did John Francis Moore manage to cram into this issue? I’d say around four issues. If you’re feeling generous, you might say five. In this issue, we’re introduced to Delphi and the memory box concept, reintroduced to Peter Wisdom, dumped into Genosha’s latest civil war, witness to a Quicksilver/Cannonball fight, discover a (somewhat) dark secret from Meltdown’s past, discover another bizarre secret from the past of Cannonball’s small town, and catch up with Sunspot, who’s deportation subplot has branched out to include Selene and (of course) the Deviants. Insert your own Brian Michael Bendis joke here.

If you don’t remember what comics were like in those faraway days known as the “eh-tees,” this could easily be viewed as too much for anyone to grasp in one issue. It isn’t of course; anyone with the reading level of a nine-year-old and the honest motivation to read shouldn’t be lost by Moore’s dense plotting. None of this is confusing, there’s just a lot of it.

There is an argument to made, however, that the compressed plotting doesn’t do Jim Cheung any favors, since much of his work in covered in balloons and captions. That’s understandable, although people like Jack Kirby had larger chunks of text thrown on top of their work, often to elucidate stories much simpler than this one. Someone might also argue that the Delphi and the memory box concept is a distraction from the main story, but I think it works very well here. Moore isn’t shortchanging the reader on concepts; he could’ve had Wisdom hand out manila file folders with the needed information, but instead he’s introduced a new character and an intriguing new concept into the mythos. I doubt anyone’s actually used the memory boxes since he left, but clearly there’s a lot of potential there. If this story had been published during a healthier period of X-titles’ history, I think the idea wouldn’t have sunk into obscurity so quickly.

X-FORCE #93 - August 1999

Temple of the Dying Sun

Credits: John Francis Moore (writer), Anthony Williams & Chris Renaud (pencilers), Hector Collazo & Scott Koblish (inker), Kevin Tinsley (colors), Richard Starkings & Comicraft (letters)

Summary: Astarte and Electryon of the Eternals dupe X-Force into traveling to an island overrun with quantum disruptions. As Moonstar uses her powers to combat the hostile landscape, Astarte and Electryon secretly siphon off her quantum energy. When Moonstar is trapped underground, she meets the alien Ry’lor. He explains that his spacecraft’s quantum drive is responsible for the island’s problems, and shows Moonstar how to make contact with the entirety of the quantum force. Moonstar uses her powers to free her teammates and defeat Astarte and Electryon. Ry’lor repairs his craft and returns to space. Meanwhile, Domino returns home as Sunspot packs his bags.

Continuity Notes:

· Astarte and Electryon are working for Odysseus Indigo, who wants to study the quantum energy wielded by Moonstar.

· Ry’lor claims to be an alien who arrived on Earth thousands of years ago. After being worshipped by primitive man, his followers turned on him when he shared his technology with them. He massacred his disciples in response and has lived in seclusion ever since.

· A mysterious package addressed to Cannonball arrives from Genosha while the team’s away.

I Love the '90s: Jesse Bedlam (perhaps the first time he uses that surname) brags that he can easily shut down the alien technology and be back home in time for Win Ben Stein’s Money.

Review: Unless you really wanted to see a showcase of Comicraft’s variety of fonts (I’d guess around five appear this issue), there isn’t much here. Reader sentiment had solidly turned against the Eternals/Deviants storyline by this point, and I can’t blame them. John Francis Moore is making some effort to connect this story to the actual cast, but the alleged deep conversation between Moonstar and alien sun god Ry’lor is lifeless. Apparently, they’ve both learned a great lesson about the importance of moving on, but the issue is packed so densely the scenes have no impact. The visuals might’ve saved the issue, since the artists are given an entire issue of crazy Kirby-esque images to draw, but this was clearly done as a rush job. Anthony Williams & Chris Renaud are odd choices if the creators were really going for a Kirby vibe, anyway. Was it really impossible to find one of the many artists who specialize in Kirby pastiche to fill in? I would love to see what Mike Manley could’ve done with this material.

X-FORCE #92 - July 1999

Strange Interlude

Credits: John Francis Moore (writer), Mike Miller (penciler), Holdredge/Mei/Candelario/Collazo/Palmiotti (inks), Marie Javins (colors), Comicraft (letters)

Summary: Domino finds herself trapped inside Halloween Jack’s citadel. After enduring his mind games, Domino finally learns that Jack’s escaped the flooding of the polar ice caps by traveling back in time one hundred years. While examining this era, he’s fallen in love with Domino, and is now offering her a chance to live with him and avoid being killed in a future X-Force mission. She refuses and intimidates him into returning her home. Meanwhile in San Francisco, Sunspot faces deportation and a mystery figure seeks Moonstar for help.

Continuity Notes:

· Halloween Jack is a character created by John Francis Moore during his run on X-Men 2099.

· Domino is initially led to believe she is in Firenze, Italy. An inner monologue reveals that she first met Cable there while tracking an international arms dealer.

· Halloween Jack lists the names of people inadvertently hurt by having Domino in their lives: “Your sister. Your ex-husband Miles. Grizzly. Victor Lomenzo.” The stories behind her ex-husband and Grizzly have already been told. Her sister and Victor Lomenzo are new mysteries. The story ends with Domino attempting to “make amends” by calling Victor.

Review: I followed X-Men 2099 for most of its run, but only have vague recollections of any specific storylines. I tried to reread the series a few years ago but for some reason it couldn’t hold my interest after the first few issues. I do remember Halloween Jack as a Joker-style “embrace chaos” mad scientist who was friends with one of the X-Men in his previous life, which somehow gave Moore license to insert him into numerous issues of the series. Like I said, nothing in X-Men 2099 made much of an impact on me, so I can’t say I’m thrilled to see an issue of X-Force dedicated to an obscure villain from a mostly forgotten ‘90s imprint. (He was a villain, right?)

Moore tries to justify the insertion of his old creation by making this a Domino solo adventure, which of course means more vague hints about her shadowy past will be dropped. And, naturally, since Halloween Jack is from the future, he knows how Domino is going to die and it just so happens to tie in with the large Deviants story Moore’s been building for years. I don’t mind this so much, but the rationalization that Halloween Jack just happened to come across Domino’s photo while studying this era and is now madly obsessed with her is…well, I guess it’s elegant in its simplicity, but it doesn’t feel like much of a motivation. Unfortunately, at no point during the story did I ever get a sense for why Moore likes Halloween Jack so much, which is a problem. Obviously rushed fill-in art by Mike Miller and five inkers doesn’t help matters either, making this the weakest X-Force issue in a while.

X-FORCE #91 - June 1999

Fallout

Credits: John Francis Moore (writer), Tommy Lee Edwards (penciler), Al Williamson (inker), Marie Javins (colors), Richard Starkings & Comicraft (letters)

Summary: Unable to speak, Siryn wanders San Francisco. After briefly considering suicide, she buys a liquor bottle and contemplates drinking again. Eventually, she visits an Alcoholics Anonymous meeting instead. Banshee arrives to check on Siryn and spends a futile night with X-Force searching the city. She returns hours later, says goodbye to Proudstar, and leaves behind a resignation letter.

Continuity Notes:

· Banshee knows Domino as “Beatrice.” They apparently met when she was very young in Madripoor.

· Fearful that their friendship is in jeopardy, Meltdown breaks up with Sunspot while they’re searching for Siryn.

· Sunspot is soon detained by INS agents who say he’s in the country illegally.

· Detective Napoleon Sanders, the police officer that’s been trailing Domino since issue #73 catches up with her in San Francisco. To their mutual shock, she begins to glow and disappears.

· Siryn claims she almost gave away two years of sobriety, which would place X-Force #31 two years ago in continuity. I’ll once again point out that these specific time references are peculiar when you consider how adamant Marvel is that some of their characters should not age at all.

I Love the '90s: A calendar shows Siryn’s birthday as some point in the late ‘70s. This issue also establishes her age as twenty-one, which means she would have to be born in the ‘90s today.

Review: Siryn is given an issue-long goodbye, which is appropriate considering her long history with the book. Because Marvel still had some faith in the “every issue is someone’s first” mantra, there’s a plethora of flashbacks in this issue establishing not only Siryn’s backstory, but Banshee’s as well. Moore works it into the story smoothly, using the old continuity to establish Siryn’s motivation for drinking and setting up the significance of her decision to leave the team. For anyone not engrossed with Siryn’s dilemma, Moore’s also thrown in a decent amount of subplots to keep the title’s momentum going. I’m sure the INS agents Sunspot encounters are frauds, but it’s amusing to see a writer finally address the legalities that the foreign X-members never seem to face while staying in America.

Periodically, you need one of these cast changes to keep things interesting, and while Siryn isn’t a character I would choose to dismiss, I can see where Moore’s coming from. With the addition of Domino and Jesse Aaronson, the book is packed with characters, so someone probably should be leaving. Cannonball is widely viewed by the audience and the characters as the true leader of the team, which makes Siryn’s role slightly superfluous. This also opens the door for Moonstar to make a play for team leadership, since she’s been groomed for the role going back to the early days of New Mutants. Proudstar’s response to her departure also opens up avenues for new stories.

Fill-in art for the issue comes from Tommy Lee Edwards, who’s about as far away from Jim Cheung as you can get. His style fits the brooding story, even if some of his faces are extremely off-model (his rendition of Meltdown resembles a blonde James Woods). My favorite panel is the flashback to Siryn meeting X-Force for the first time, since Edwards has chosen to draw them in the Mignola-style.

X-FORCE #90 - May 1999

Armageddon Now Part Four - Rude Awakening

Credits: John Francis Moore (writer), Jim Cheung (penciler), Morales/Stull/Koblish/Mei (inks), Marie Javins (colors), Comicraft (letters)

Summary: Bedlam dons a psionic-amplifier to control the disoriented Armageddon Man. Siryn leads an attack against him, but is severely cut in the throat by Feral. Jesse betrays his brother and disrupts the psionic-amplifier, inadvertently freeing Armageddon Man. Bedlam escapes with most of the New Hellions, content with the catastrophe Armageddon Man will create. Tarot and Magma stay behind to aid X-Force, who manage to contain Armageddon Man once more. He’s handed over to the Senator, with the threat that X-Force is closely watching his next move. Later, at the hospital, the team discovers Siryn’s vocal chords have been severed.

Continuity Notes:

· Feral reveals that she was diagnosed with the Legacy Virus while in the Vault. She uses this to justify becoming even more hostile and violent.

· Tarot has been given new powers since her resurrection. She takes the form of Death, explaining that she can “not only project the imagery of the tarot arcane, but…can now assume their mantle.”

· Magma only stays behind to prevent the nuclear plant from melting down. She’s still adamant about not being a hero. Paradigm, however, returns to the site of the battle and makes peace with the team, claiming that he “learned much” from Moonstar’s journey through his psyche.

Review: Unfortunately, this turned out to be a poor use of four issues. The introduction of Bedlam does resolve one of the title’s mysteries, and some forgotten characters are added back into play, but there’s no escaping the fact that this is a story arc devoted to a vaguely defined villain using a ridiculously overpowered plot device for generic evil. Fine for one issue maybe, but devoting four months to this is beyond excessive. Plus, injuring Siryn in the final chapter feels like a tacked-on stab at making this arc more relevant than it truly was. Moore’s a good enough writer to actually generate decent material out of her injury, but we didn’t need issue after issue of Bedlam, the New Hellions, and the Armageddon Man to get to this point.

Making this storyline even more frustrating is the casual characterization shift for Magma, which is never explained, and the fuzzy resurrection of Tarot, which also remains a mystery. The most promising aspect of the story is the revelation that Feral has the Legacy Virus. Marvel never knew what to do with the Virus storyline, but if you think about it, Feral is the perfect character to be infected. As a not-very-heroic hero who went over to the dark side, her reaction to the infection could go in any direction. A writer could use this as an opportunity to humanize the psychopath, or push her further over the edge. Plus, she’s expendable enough to be a realistic candidate for a death scene, without being obscure enough for her death to be lumped in with throwaway characters like Infectia. Yet, we’re only a year or so away from the Legacy Virus’ quickie resolution, so nothing’s done with the idea. Instead, Feral’s left in the background and only dragged out when it’s time to depower/mutilate/kill a recognizable character. Speaking of which, have the Bedlam Brothers met similar fates in the modern Marvel Universe?

X-FORCE #89 - April 1999

Armageddon Now Part Three - Hellions Triumphant!

Credits: John Francis Moore (writer), Terry Shoemaker (penciler), Bud LaRosa (inker), Marie Javins (colors), Comicraft’s Albert Deschesne (letters)

Summary: Under Paradigm’s influence, X-Force retrieves the Armageddon Man and takes him to Bedlam’s base inside an abandoned nuclear plant. Feral and Switch kidnap Senator Owen Danville and take him to Bedlam, who orders Danville to contact the government and convey his demand of a billion dollars in exchange for keeping Armageddon Man inert. While they wait for the government’s response, Bedlam catches Jesse trying to escape, but convinces him to stay. Tarot, however, turns on Bedlam after foreseeing the destruction that Armageddon Man will create. With her help, Moonstar frees X-Force of Paradigm’s influence. Jesse tries to protect Tarot from an enraged Bedlam, and is decked by his brother. Suddenly, the coolant tower collapses and Armageddon Man emerges.

Continuity Notes:

· Moonstar connects to Paradigm’s psyche while under his control and learns his origin. Paradigm was a young telekinetic in Hong Kong who was injected with a sample of “a techno-organic alien” by a mysterious group of scientists.

· Senator Danville once served as an Army officer on the Alamogordo project. This would be the early mutant research project led by Xavier and Juggernaut’s fathers, as revealed by Fabian Nicieza in X-Men #12. (Which was an embellishment on Stan Lee’s original idea that Xavier and Marko were scientists doing atomic research together.) According to Bedlam, after the deaths of Kurt Marko and Brian Xavier, Armageddon Man’s inert body was “secreted in a Utah missile silo -- until I learned of his location from a ex-CIA operative.”

· Tarot claims that her death at the hand of the Sentinels was “transient” and that she owes Bedlam for nursing her back to health.

Review: Since most of this issue is dedicated to getting the plot device of Armageddon Man in his proper place, it’s a bit of a drag on the storyline. The erratic characterization of Bedlam also hurts the story, as Moore has him shift from mutant extremist to greedy extortionist to left-wing activist all in the course of a few pages. As Bedlam points out, none of these stances necessarily contradicts one another, but rather than making the character appear complex, he comes across as an unfocused concept.

Moore does take the time to give Paradigm an origin, and explore Jesse and Tarot’s motivations for joining Bedlam, but that’s really the extent of the character work. And even then, we’re left with the bizarre explanation that Tarot, who confirmed that she was truly dead last issue, was in a “transient” death that Bedlam somehow managed to prevent. It’s hard to tell if this is just another vague clue, or the real explanation for Tarot’s revival. John Francis Moore tends to steer away from this kind of gratuitous, half-formed mystery while writing X-Force, so I’m hoping that this isn’t the last word on her revival. Not that it would be any cheaper than revealing that Emma Frost was in a coma after her definitive death scene, mind you, but Moore tends to be better than this.