Check Mate!
X-Men Legacy #236
Second Coming: Chapter 08
Okay, I had good stuff to say about Land’s last turn at the pencils for this X-Event. This time it is definitely a mixed bag. Maybe he was in a hurry to get this issue done, I don’t know but it definitely didn’t take away from the story as it has sometimes in the past. I don’t care for the way he draws Rogue in this issue, his Spider Woman is better than John Romita Jr’s, and his Emma Frost looks like Jessica Simpson. Also I have no idea who Sontos is talking to. I think it was Magneto but I just couldn’t tell.
Carey does an excellent job, but I didn’t care for the 1980’s style declaration of actions by Angel. “I think I might wear my other face, if that’s okay with you.” It just seemed out of place and every time I read that interaction and with Ice Man and the follow up comments I just think we would have been fine with full art panels. Most the rest of the book is spot on.
I was actually surprised to see the Avengers being brought into the midst of this story so soon after SIEGE, but it is the heroic age after all. We basically have Bastions Check Mate on Utopia happening and three teams including the X-Club and the Avengers trying to break down a barrier that not only trapped the mutants on Utopia, but also part of San Francisco, cutting off power and communications. Then a portal opens up and we are treated to a surprise. I don’t know what was a bigger surprise though the fact that it was Nimrod, the fact that it was more than 1 Nimrod, or the fact that Nimrod series sentinels didn’t look like giant pink jello molds and everybody still recognized them.
4 out of 5 Nimrods (Only mass produced 50 years before their time.)
