Comics / Comic Reviews / Marvel Comics

Uncanny X-Force #12

By Dan Horn
July 28, 2011 - 14:41

The X-Force has been stranded in the Age of Apocalypse by Dark Beast during their search for a fallen Celestial's life seeds, which may be able to cure Warren Worthington of his Archangel persona, and they've fallen in with the AoA X-Men. Anxieties are high when a Sentinel scout finds the X-Men's underwater base, and it becomes imperative that they find a resolution to their predicament. Conveniently, the very life seeds the X-Force had been scouring for may be the very thing the X-Men need to defeat their antagonist, the heir of Apocalypse. The X-Men and X-Force formulate a two stage plan to recover whatever life seeds they can from the crash-landed Celestial and to rescue the AoA Gateway from a high-tech prison to return X-Force home. Unfortunately, the team undertaking the prison job is met by substantial resistance, and an unlikely foe.

It seems a bit strange that the whole foxhole love thing is going around with seemingly everyone in this issue. After a few kisses, I was feeling the sappiness, sticky on my fingers as I turned each page. I wasn't really getting the candor from this issue's melodrama that I usually perceive from Remender's character work. Esad Ribic's cover also betrays the surprise of a key plot point as the sexual tension between Fantomex and Psylocke boils over.  Something else, infinitesimal by comparison, really irked me. Kirika, the daughter Logan would have had with Mariko, at one point uses the phrase "inversely disproportionate." I believe that's what we in the literary community would call a double-negative. It doesn't really make any sense, or at least it doesn't make the kind of sense Remender intends it to. Maybe I'm just splitting hairs.

Uncanny X-Force #12 is a strong installment, just not quite as strong as previous issues, but definitely nowhere close to being as weak as UXF #9, that one obligatory "bad issue" in this otherwise great series. "The Dark Angel Saga: Chapter 2" begs some really interesting questions, like if the life seeds will kill Apocalypse, wouldn't they kill Warren, too? And, of course, if X-Force can simply transport back to a better world, why couldn't the AoA X-Men just come with them and leave their tortured, barren alternate reality behind?

Brooks, Currie, and White are a powerhouse artistic team. As much as I miss Ribic and Opena's work from early in the series, Brooks and Currie's ultra-detailed panels are fantastic, if not a bit more mainstream. As long as Dean White is on colors, I think I'm happy with any artist on this book, really.

Rating: 8 /10

Last Updated: August 31, 2023 - 08:12