Thursday, April 2, 2015

Not so New Comic Review: Earth X #7

                We begin this issue, as with all issues, with a conversation between Uatu and X-51.  This time around though, it’s not much of a conversation as X-51 has apparently deleted his personality circuits as Uatu requested of him.  The focus of this issue then becomes clear as the origin of The Hulk presents itself, all expertly rendered by John Paul Leon and muddied up with colors from Matt Hollingsworth.  Before we head back down to Earth, which is pretty customary after these origin stories, we stay on the moon and see that John Jameson has been exiled there, and as he transforms into a werewolf, we get an indication as to why.  Apparently, John has been monitoring space and sees something large heading toward the Earth. Not being a Watcher, he feels it is his duty to warn Earth about this coming threat.

                Down on Earth, Reed has teleported from the X-Mansion to Ben Grimm’s doorstep, surprising him in the middle of the night.  Ben doesn’t mind as it seems like it’s been awhile since the two have seen each other.  Leon does a good job through the acting of the characters to show Ben going from sleepy-eyed annoyance to excitement in a couple panels.  Reed is not just making a friendly visit though as he requests some schematics that he left with Ben for safe keeping.  What are these schematics, you ask?  Oh, just the schematics of Charles Xavier’s brain, that’s all.  So what does Reed do?  He stretches his brain so that it resembles Xavier’s, giving him Xavier’s telepathic abilities.  This is odd as it makes mutation into a physical, not necessarily chromosomal “gift”, but it fits the story and doesn’t stretch things too much.

                Back at Clea’s Sanctum Sanctorum, Hulk is about to journey to the land of the dead.  He begins his descent and we eventually see all of the Marvel heroes that have died, and they are fighting all of the villains that have died.  The crazy thing is that the heroes and villains not only do not realize that they are dead, but they think that the living heroes and villains have perished.  Within the realm of the dead, Hulk encounters the spectre of Dr. Strange, who is neither alive nor dead in either reality.  Strange tells Hulk that Loki has allied himself with the being that killed Strange.  Back in the land of the living, we learn that if the candles burn out, that Hulk will be stuck in the land of the dead (it’s a magic thing, I guess).  To prevent that from happening, Thor travels into the land of the dead to bring Hulk back, leaving little Bruce all alone with Clea, who turns out to be the individual that killed Strange and allied herself with Loki.
 
                We end with Cap and Daredevil arriving in New York along with the Skull’s forces.  He shows up at Ben’s door with the X-Men, to recruit him to the cause.

                The appendix in this issue deals with member’s of Hulk’s extended family/rogue’s gallery.  There’s not much to be said about them really, but Alex Ross’s pencil illustrations that accompany the text are as beautiful as you would expect.


Next Issue:  Cap’s recruitment drive continues, does it include a bake sale?  I hope it includes a bake sale.  We learn more about the fun little relationship that Loki and CLea share, and what happens to Hulk and Thor?

No comments:

Post a Comment