Amph X-Men: Second Coming

So, we're about half-way through right now and have seen the plays from all of Bastion's main allies. We've had three deaths, one maiming, one sent to another dimension with a team of heavy-hitters sent after, the X-Club taken out of the picture (until we see their one-shot), the involvement of the Avengers (yay, not ignoring the obvious), and now what Bastion plans to do to contain and exterminate.

So far we haven't had any real involvement from Hope (other than a fight with Dani that so didn't last as long as it should have) although with her last scene we know that will change from next issue. We also know from the cover images released for the next event, the Messiah Complex outline included in the TPB, events from the past few months and just simple logic who she really is and what she will become.

So what do people think so far? How will it end? Who will still be around when the dust settles since it's been hinted at/outright said that there will be other major losses?

 

I'm liking it but it's not up to the level of Messiah Complex. A bit of a letdown.

 

I think there are a couple of factors to that. Part is that with the exception of Endangered Species there wasn't really any lead-in and the set-ups were not obvious.

This time though, we've had Manifest Destiny, Necrosha, Messiah War, and Utopia among others. We've also been expecting a lot from this, and I think that the meaty part of the story is yet to come, whereas all 3 acts for Messiah Complex had big surprises.

Plus for me, MC had the better artist line-up. It shouldn't make a big difference, but for me it does.

 

Yeah, MC had Chris Bachalo. SC has... Greg Land.

 

I haven't read the latest issue yet, but so far I like it. I'm a bit disapointed, kitty's back but hasn't done anything.

 

Let's compare.

Messiah Complex: Billy Tan, Chris Bachalo, Marc Silvestri, Humberto Ramos and Mike Eaton

Second Coming: David Finch, Terry Dodson, Greg Land, Mike Choi and Ibraim Roberson


To my mind, MC has the better art line-up that have more consistent styles. But I will admit it's a bit of taste.


And as to Kitty, well she's still trapped in her insubstantial state at the moment.

 

Eh, other than Mike Choi I'd pick any of the Messiah Complex artists first. Bachalo

 

Bachalo needs to be chained to a desk and given nothing but X-Men scripts.

My perfect line-up would be Bachalo and Ramos on the 2 main titles as their art is so complimentary. Choi still on X-Force. Tan on New Mutants. Land and Biannchi switching 5 issue arcs on Astonishing. X-Factor leave with De Landro as it fits. And Skottie Young giving us the younger generation.

 

I am still confused what the point of bringing her back was. Seems odd to bring her back suddenly on the eve of a major storyline, but to keep her out of events. I am grateful she is back but it seems like such a waste to bring her back without purpose or meaning, especially since her actions that led to her being cast away in the bullet seemed to be such a noble sacrifice.

I am hoping she's an 11th hour character that changes the tide somehow, but I doubt it.

 

I could do with less Deus Ex Machina in my comics, not more.

 

I could do with less useless character resurrections that accomplish nothing more than selling books, in my comics. But alas that doesn't seem possible these days. The best I can hope for is that her resurrection (so-to-speak) at the dawn of an event, will play into that event in a meaningful way or at least have some relevance, instead of getting forgotten about and just eventually accepted. This reeks of terribly sloppy storytelling.

 

Touche.

 

i have seen its first part. it is full of action. will wail its second version.

 

The Blind Science one-shot this week made me finally start to appreciate the X-Club. Dr. Nemesis is so full of win.

 

Blind Science was a great one-shot. Nemesis was good, and it was a nice treatment of Rao to see more of why she did what she did, and also that she saw through the whole thing.

The scene with the kitten though was just awesome.

 

Anyone seen a reading order for all this stuff? I'm somewhere in the arc with Cable and Hope in the future. I assume they come back, not sure which arc happens next. WTH is X-Necrosha? I'd rather skip any filler material and stay with the main over-arc.

 

X-Necrosha was an X-Force storyline that takes place after Messiah War but before Second Coming. It's about Selene resurrecting old X-Men and X-Men villains as zombies that spilled over into X-Men: Legacy and New Mutants. It has nothing to do with Second Coming and is totally skippable as it made no major changes and basically sucked. As for an actual reading order of books involving Hope Summers:

Messiah Complex
First two Cable arcs
Messiah War (Cable/X-Force crossover)
The rest of Cable (ended after issue 25 with a Cable/Deadpool flashback story to Messiah Complex that was actually pretty decent)
Second Coming

 

Actually, it does impact, as one of the more central characters to some of the story was re-introduced with X-Necrosha. Without him a certain skill set was completely gone and would have required a lot more shuffling to fill the roles he has played.


And I'm realising what the issue with Second Coming is, it's too slow. UXM 525 really didn't advance the storyline anywhere near as much as it possibly could have. Despite some of the reveals in there, about half was a rehash of previous information.

 

Cypher's resurrection and return in Necrosha might be cool if you're a New Mutants fan (which I'm not). But he is far from a "central character" in Second Coming. He's needed for his power, not his character.

As far as the pacing is concerned, I don't have a problem with it. It's fine when you remember that Second Coming is a 14-issue story. There are bound to be slow parts as characters move into place and plots slowly begin to unfold. I do think there are some questionable choices going on though. Did we really need 4 pages for the Fantastic Four to show up just so they could say "Hmmm, I don't know how to fix this." Which is exactly what we've already heard from the Avengers?

 

Thanks guys. Probably skip Necrosha and just Wiki it, not really a New Mutants fan either. Is Utopia & Dark X-Men important to all of this? I think I read the first issue of each, then skipped the rest to follow the main Dark Reign/Seige storyline

 

All Utopia did was move the X-Men from San Francisco to an island (Asteroid M) off the coast of San Francisco.

 

The X-Books have been underwhelming since Morrison left, IMO. Not bad per se but... not good either.


So, just one book to end Second Coming. Final thoughts? Since MCX I was very interested in Hope but... yeah, I lost all interest on the little minx thanks to the very boring SC. I don't even care if she's the new Phoenix avatar or not.

 

I highly enjoyed Messiah Complex. The best X-over ever IMHO. That being said, outside of X-Force and X-Factor I find it hard to care too much about the X-men these days. It's been non-stop events for them for 6 or 7 years now:

House of M
Decimation
Civil War
World War Hulk
Messiah Complex
Manifest Destiny
Secret Invasion
Messiah War
Utopia
Necrosha
Second Coming

They need to slow it down. I mean, they were in their Marin base for what, six months? Event fatigue is even worse for the X-Men right now than it is for the rest of the Marvel U. At least they weren't involved in Siege too heavily. As far as I know, New Mutants was the only X-book that crossed over with that. I think that the X-Universe needs to stop and explore the world they are in once SC ends and have smaller, self contained stories for a little while.

Second Coming has been alright. It's head and shoulders above Necrosha or Messiah War for sure. I'll have a more firm opinion tomorrow after the final issue hits.

 

Agreed on MCX and X-Factor, my bad. The rest of the X-line? Eh. Carey and Bachalo's stint on X-Men was interesting, so was X-Force, but...

And they're already promising the X-Books are going to be "more integrated" with the Marvel universe. Call me a cynic but... I read that and what I see in the future is new X-Force/Secret Avengers, X-Factor/Atlas, Wolverine/Iron Man and Whatever/Whatever Else crossovers.

 

I thought Astonishing X-Men was appropriately named, and wish they had ended it with the Giant Sized issue.