New X-Men? #95

All-New, All-Different X-Men #95

“Warhunt!”

Chris Claremont and Dave Cockrum

Summary

Barely surviving the destruction of their plane, the X-men fight on against the Ani-Men, Nefaria, and the threat of nuclear armageddon as time runs out against Nefaria’s doomsday weapon.

Rolling Commentary

Page 2: In case you missed my comment last issue, the cover says it all. This issue an X-Man will indeed die. And stay dead, even. And within two issues, I doubt if anyone will care. Fun cover, though. And whoat! for last issue recap! Moving right along with the story now.

Grr. Why must Colossus keep switching alphabets? I mean, I know he’s going back and forth between Russian and English, but when the Russian is written in its native Slavic alphabet, I can’t even try to pronounce it, and what fun is that? I like how Storm is physically stronger than Banshee. It amuses me for some reason. Huzzah for Colossus’ landing, as well. And thus we have fake-out death number one, Page 3.

Is Page 5 fake-out death number 2? I don’t know if we should count it or not. Anyway, huzzah for Nightcrawler kicking ass and for easily navigated military facilities. And is it just me, or Nefaria kind of lack in the leadership of his men department?

Page 9, and I want to know how Storm can start a freaking monsoon inside a building. There’s not that much water vapor in the air. I’m sorry, but no. And how come Storm only ever does cool shit like this when they’re up against mindless soldiers and the like, but never when they’re fighting Magneto?

Page 11. Umm… Colossus is very… protective of Wolverine, isn’t he?

Page 16. Man everyone seems so casual about near nuclear death. Luckily, Charlie mentally scanned the system (somehow) and we’re not all going to die after all. Lucky us.

Page 18. So Thunderbird and Nefaria are now dead. Except Nefaria will be back. Alas.

Post Mortem (literally)

First off- and I thought of saying this last issue- what kind of ultimate weapon is called a “Doomsmith”? It’s not cool. It’s not imposing. It’s just silly. Ultimate weapons should not have silly names.

Thunderbird is dead. For real. He now joins the ranks of Changeling and Professor Xa- no, wait, umm… Changeling and Mimic- no, see, that still doesn’t work… Umm… well, he’s dead. For real. You will never see him alive again in a comic unless he’s either from an alternate universe or if he’s one of the two other people who, so far, have become Thunderbird since he died. That said, his powers were pretty non-descript, so whatever. Nefaria isn’t nearly as dead, though, which is unfortunate.

Other than that, this issue is really bland. Thunderbird’s death is kind unimportant too, really. We barely know the character at all. He just kind of dies, right there. We don’t know him well enough to feel sad or anything, so he just stops being there. I give it one issue, and then they’ll stop talking about his death and forget he exists. And I’m talking about the readers as well as the characters here.