So this arc has the tagline SECOND COMING * REVELATIONS… I get the tie in part – the anti-mutant forces attacking pretty much every mutant left, simultaneously -  that works.  What I don’t get is the REVELATIONS bit.  What is there to reveal?   Peter David is big on long boiling revelations… hmm, let’s check the solicits.

Next month:

The mutant hunter Bastion has sent the Mutant Response Division and the newly resurrected Bolivar Trask after X-Factor with one mission: Kill them all. And it seems thus far that all is going according to plan. Meanwhile in the jungles of South America, Strong Guy has to form an extremely unlikely alliance if he wants to save Monet from the MRD.

June:

At last! All the members of X-Factor are reunited in this climactic, slam-bang X-plosion of a conclusion as Trask decides to take matters into his own hands and personally direct the forces of the Mutant Response Division into a full blown war against everyone’s favorite mutant detective team!

Huh.  No clues at all.  Not even a tease of a giant revelation (which Marvel tends to do, especially for this book… see July‘s solicitation blurb:

Remember when we warned you about the shocking twist involving Madrox’s baby? Remember when the return of Shatterstar wound up making every comics-related website? Well, that was just a warm-up for the shocking end of this issue. X-Factor gets a new client, a tall green-garbed woman with a deadly secret, but that’s just a set-up for the jaw-dropping final page that’s going to reignite the Internet and have fandom going, “Did you BELIEVE what happened at the end of X-Factor #207?!”

Yeah so.  You got me.  Normally, I would guess that the marketing folks just thought it sounded cool… but X-Factor is usually running a different course… soooo.  Something.

X-Men Legacy 235: Second Coming pt 4: The X-event continues!  People die (a d-list character who did actually feature in a favorite, 8 issue, limited series of mine.  From the 80s.), people get shaken around without their leg (Karma! OUCH.  Somewhere I read that she was getting some kind of a big overhaul… so uh, bionic leg I guess?, the X-Men finally get a clue and start fighting back, and Warlock goes uh… Warlockian.

Still no clues as to what the hell is going on with Hope, although I think it should be pretty obvious from, oh, the solicits for the X-MEN PHOENIX FORCE HANDBOOK (A Second Coming tie-in!).  How the hell is one of their stock reference books being billed as a tie-in?  The hell?  There is NO STORY in those things.  Usually?

Oh, and Greg Land, my favorite “artist” pulled “art” duties for this one.  And it was probably the least offensive thing I can remember seeing by him.  Yes, all the women had the same faces (I didn’t realize X-23 was in the issue until I saw Rogue with her powers later on… I thought she was Psylocke the whole time!).  Yes, there was a near-full page spread of Rogue standing with weird tiny-wings and splayed legs, ready to receive it in the backside and yes I swear that every time I saw a male face I could almost recognize which celebrity he was tracing and  yes, yes it did suck.  But it was slightly less sucky than other issues.  Maybe because I read it really fast, in the car?  Going back through it now I’m finding more and more stupidity…  You know what?  When he’s not drawing faces it’s pretty OK.  As soon as the faces come out it’s ARGOEGUHUHBOOM.  There is a great page with Warlock that I swear is actually another artist.  Oh.  Maybe he just traced that… O.O

Note: The cover at left is not the one I got.  For some reason I can’t find an image on the net (yet) of the non-variant cover.  WTF?

Guardians of the Galaxy 25:  Another strong issue – and the art was great too!  Except for a few panels where someone is drawn getting clearly atomized, yet no one gets atomized?  All the bystanders are dead… so?

So yeah.  Thanos is back.  And he’s pissed.  The one guy that actually wants to stay dead, and Magus had to go and be a dick and bring him back…  We get to see Thanos unloading physically like we haven’t in quite a while, but Quill has one trick up his sleeve… and it’s a hell of a trick.

I think the title is going on hiatus for a few months now.  Or something?  While the next cosmic event – I think it’s the Cancerverse (think a Marvel U where Cthulu-esque things won) vs. 616 – called THE THANOS IMPERATIVE (which doesn’t have the word “cancer” in it) – runs.  Which is kind of a bummer and kind of cool at the same time, because I won’t be spending any extra money to pick up the event.  I guess.

Oh, and I’ll leave you with a cover that I found particularly amusing.  Because, seriously, what the hell is going on with her belt?  Skirt?  Weird underwear?

The season has slipped back into obnoxious up here in the Portland of the West (I’m not talking to you Portland, Maine!).  Freezing wind (not literally, yet), cold nights, and RAIN.  RAIN.  Yes, someday we will move and leave you far behind.   New Mexico?  Hawaii?  New England somewheresabouts?  Somewhere!  All we need is that perfect moneymaking job!  Like… being a writer.  That totally pays about $40k a year if you luck out and bust your ass.  Wait.  That’s not that much at all.  Doh!

…

There are no movies that look interesting to me because a) I rarely watch trailers and b) when would we have the time?  I suppose I should start netflixing all the stuff I’ve missed this year….right?  American Pie 12 here I come!

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Marvel announced at least three big events so far for next year: Second Coming (X-Men event), DoomWar (seems Black Panther centric, but has X-men & FF members &…Deadpool.  Kay!),  and Siege – the final “ending” of the Dark Reign stuff and return to semi-normalcy with Cap/Thor/Iron Man Avengering around together again.

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Books.  Books.  I haven’t read anything in a while.  I’m slowly working my way through a book of interviews with Michael Moorcock.  He’s been known to write a book in ?3? days I think it was.  Fucknutty!  Somehow I’ve made it to date without reading a single one of his books.  Cardinal sin, I KNOW.  I should be able to find some in old school paperback pretty cheap though, maybe I’ll do that after I finish (and start…) Name of the Wind.  I’m so afraid it will suck I haven’t touched it yet.

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I haven’t tried to watch a single episode of Heroes since my failure to complete the first one.  Jen seems to be enjoying Flashforward though, and it seems moderately interesting.   I think, if it doesn’t go the way of X-Files/Lost?/Heroes etc. (ie dragging out the initial premise to Herculean lengths, then never resolving it satisfactorily because you’ve inserted so much bullhsit in there in the attempt to stretch it out to 7+ seasons) it sounds like it could be decent.  We had a conversation about the different things we’re willing to invest in a TV show – I’m much less willing to start watching any kind of ongoing show these days because I lack the confidence that TV writers have the balls to end something.  If a story is only meant to run 1-2 seasons, that’s all it should run!!  But, of course that runs completely counter to TV programming-think.

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Nothing particularly new to me in the world of music.  I think I may like She & Him.  Still trying to decide. I like some of the songs, but I need to hear the whole album and I’m reticent to buy it without hearing the entire thing first.  I do dig the retro-50s vocal thing she’s doing though.  I like the sound, but not so much in its original context – amusing, yes?

I’m debating ordering Dear Leader‘s now album – it’s ex-Sheila Divine frontman Aaron Perrino’s current project.   They were a great band that I think was just hitting their stride when they vanished so hey, good luck with reincarnation.

I heard a rumor that Jawbox was going to be on some douchebag’s late night show.  That guy from SNL who couldn’t keep a straight face to save his life.  Can’t remember his name for some reason.  Crazy.

The Monsters of Folk album is ok.  Not ok enough for me to rush out and buy it, but ok.

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Z has a selection of chorus lines he says now when he’s in the mood, inevitably going from one to the other.  “Beating like a hammer” (Metric), “It’s cold outside”, (classics), “hit the road jack/don’t come back no more” & a few others I’m brain farting on right now.  He usually knows 1-2 extra lines of the songs as well.  It’s freaking adorable.  He’s starting to get a little bit of melody going too.

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I’m in one of those “everything bores me” phases right now, hoping it will end soon.   Could just be the seasonal doldrums.