Onefinemess

Look.  Wait, hold up.  I’m not saying it’s bad, I’m just saying I don’t think I like it.  See?  I’m not even 100% sure yet.  Let’s work this thing out.  Talk it out like civilized folks.  Civilized folks who talk to themselves.    Online.

Aside from the mega-violence – oddly, adult me is not a fan.  OK, Digression. (Digression says “O HAI IS ME!”).   I think young me might have really liked this book, or at least the idea of it.  I remember being pretty jazzed (young me would not have used that word.  Wait, this is me we’re talking about (albeit younger) maybe I me would did) about the initial run on X-Force.  The idea of finally “taking care” of some pretty horrible villain loose end types appealed to the something something in young me.

That and all the pouches – right?   I mean, who doesn’t love pouches?  OH.  You mean those are muscles?  Well shit, how are you going to store bullets in muscles?

Nevermind that I don’t think the original X-Force ever actually “took care” of anyone (did they?), I still liked the idea. I mean, there were some pretty terrible villains out there that didn’t deserve to be continually revolving dooring shit up like they were comic book villains.

So.  20 yea—-HOLD THE FUCK UP.  20 years later?  Shit (Young me: “You got old.” Digression:”O HAI AGE. OVEN MITTS!”  See also: Spatula City).  OK so where will I be?  Right, 20 years later, give or take a year, we’re here:

After a couple volumes in between, of course.  OK, look.  Let’s just be honest here.  Me, even.  Just one of me. I’ll be honest with you.  I was going to provide some more background, but now I’m bored.

One of the reasons I don’t like it is that it continued the beating of the dead horse that is returning to the Age of Apocalypse universe.  I loved that universe as much as the average of everyone else who loved it +/- 6 points, but you know what makes a finite story LESS COOL EVERY TIME YOU DO IT?  That’s right, CONTINUING THE STORY (Digression: “O HAI CAPS!”  Did you know that caps look is cool control for cruising?).  Because everyone wants a sequel to Star W-… bad example.  Watchmen.  Everyone wants a sequel to Watchmen, or V or the Reality Dysfunction, or WHATEVER, right?

WRONG.

Good stories that end are good, at least in large part, because they n-fucking-d.

OK, so yeah, they resurrected a dead story, punched it around and (Digression:”O HAI DISCLAIMER!”  Uncanny X-Force is very well written and plotted, there is some great stuff here skillwise.  Remember, I’m not knocking it – put your underwear back on your head! – I’m just working through why I don’t think I like it) and now we’ve got another ongoing comic book set in that universe.  Yeah, they mixed it all up and changed everything the fuck around but… again.  OK, not again, for the first time this post I guess – in my old age, I like things that end.  And so few things in comics end… at least in mainstream superhero comics.

Digression: “Look, I’m tired of all the yelling, can’t we just be peacable about these interruptions?”  “Not if you can’t spell peaceable – fool!”  I know there are comics outside mainstream superheroics – I even read some of them!  But I have a sweet tooth for the X-universe.  Yes yes I know it’s asking way to much to expect a finite end to any ongoing x-arcs.  I take my joys where I can find them in the bits of completion that come from occasional mini-arcs.  Other stuff too, but this is not the place for that.

SEE THAT’S WHAT HAPPENS WHEN YOU STOP YELLING!  I digress for too long.

Right. So this X-Force actually kills people.  Because as hard as the 90s wanted to be, they were still pretty douchey and the pouches full of bullets made it hard to get anything done but here in the slick 00s we behead the fuck out of shit.  Fool!

Maybe it was when they turned AoA Iceman really bad and then had him do bad things  and then AoA Nightcrawler followed him to the 616 universe and, with the help from X-Force, killed the kill out of him.  Maybe seeing an Iceman die like that stomped on some last vestigial part of my childhood love of the super folk.  Maybe because Iceman was one of my favorites (up there with Cannonball & Sunspot).  Maybe I just didn’t drink enough coffee that day.   Only digression knows for sure

and he’s not telling.

Was that not the most depressing thing ever?  Young me gets sick every time I look at it.  But that’s cool, because he needs to grow the fuck up, right?  Life is hard!

Again, I’m not complaining.  I’m not saying I wish they hadn’t done this or they shouldn’t or they can’t or any of that bullshit.  Because it’s bullshit, I understand how characters in the Marvel & DC stables work.  And, it’s not the most horrible thing I’ve seen in a Marvel comic by a long shot – have you seen the Marvel Zombie stuff (primarily the earlier volumes)?  Wow.

NOT FOR ME.

But at least that (more or less) happens outside and around standard continuity.

Did I ever get to my original point?  (Digression:”DID HE EVEN HAVE ONE?”  Shut up with the sense making or I’ll stop digressing right n

tl;dnr: Hell if I know.

- aside from the mega-violence, there’s some real quality story here, and occasionally some solid pencils & colors & inking.  I just think it’s not what I’m looking for in a super-hero book.  Which is probably why I stopped buying it a while ago.  I hear it’s splitting into two separate books in the next round of Marvelmania.  Wow.  Seems like overkill, eh?  Digression?  Digression?  Nothing?  Did the rabbit hole get too deep?

It’s got 4/5 interesting folks (sorry, Domino).  And I have this weird feeling that maybe it won’t be weirdly slaughterrific… but I think I’m still too burned to bother.

This one.  Man I just don’t  know.  Female Fantomex?  Spiral?  But… Mohawk Storm.  But also PUCK?  You lost me.  Sorry.  And Bishop is a confirmed villain now.   Kinnnnd of a bummer for the first Black X-Man, eh?  (Don’t even get me started on Synch.  GRRRR).

I was going somewhere with this.

Or was I?

Tags: Iceman, Nightcrawler, Uncanny X-Force, X-Force

This entry was posted by onefinemess on Monday, October 29th, 2012 at 9:14 pm and is filed under columns, Comics, stuff I don't like. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.