2.69 (434) X-Force vol 2 #2 ... Marvel ...

Thanks to those who pvt msg us, we return with the second review on this run of the X-Force characters and this time, we are not going to bitch about the artwork because Clayton continued in this vein for the rest of his tenure

In chapter 2, there are three main things of note. They follow hot on the heels of issue 1 but 3 and here are the three:

1. Wolfsbane - Rahne - is captured by the Purifiers. Why? Because even though she looks feral in her werewolf stage, she is supposedly the nice one owing to her upbringing and thus is the damsel in distress. Unfortunately while rescuing her, the X-Force team had no idea what was done to her while she was in captivity

2. X 23 - we see Laura as how she is meant to be. Focused. Obsessed with the objective and thus makes her more effective than Logan and Warpath and she proved it here in buckets as she let nothing turned her aside and boy is she nasty! Awesome fight scenes!

3. Magus - yaaaay we see the return of Warlock's daddy. Warlock of the New Mutants not of the Thanos and Silver Surfer and here is one mean daddy who the Purifiers decided to retrieve from where he was last seen for their future uses (ominous bells are a tolling)

So as you can see, you get a lot of story for your dollars!

Ratings: 7/10 (again would be higher if not for the artwork)

2.66 (431) X-Force vol 1 #19 ... Marvel ...

Okay we were going to stop on X-Force after that last review but what the heck? When we saw this, we just had to do it because X-Force from day 1 has been about grim and gritty, teeth bared and posing in impossible poses while supposedly jumping into the thick of battle. So this issue is a HUGE switch of pace

Here we see the epilogue after a 3-issues mutant crossover of that era called Executioner's Song wherein the mysterious new bad guy named Stryfe finally goes all out against the entire world only to finally be stopped by the entire X-teams combined along with some other villains. Now in the aftermath of all that nonsense, we see that misunderstanding and mistrust runs rampant between X-Force and the rest of the mutant teams

And in de facto field leader, Cannonball who was always the insecure one in New Mutants and later on, the lame one in X-Men ... well here not only did he fight for the philosophy of the X-force team and his mates ... but he ultimately became a man and a hero here when he dared challenge the Professor's dream and philosophy ... between the open hand (prof x) and the closed fist (cannonball) ...

You have to read this to understand what I meant by the last sentence. Worth your time

Ratings: 7/10

2.65 (430) X-Force vol 1 #15 ... Marvel ...

For those who are not following the first version of X-Force, you may not know of Tolliver. He is a shadowy guy in the background supposedly rich and powerful and trying to do mysterious things of which we are never shown and thus never understand him until his demise

His demise SPOILER ALERT begins and ends here and after this, it continues as a scavenger hunt in a Deadpool limited series. Even that while interesting ... is like the saying where the journey is more interesting than the ending itself

Ah well ...

But what made this great is the cover! We have huge fight scene between Cable and Deadpool with everyone not knowing whether Cable made it out alive at the end or not (come on!)

So basically finally using his brains, Cable figured that all his shit stems from Deadpool who is working for Tolliver. Tolliver has captured Cable's ex-team member the real Domino and Cable decides that it is time for him to bring the beatdown and here he comes, clunky armor and guns and what-not!

Ratings: 7/10

2.64 (429) X-force vol 2 #1 ... Marvel ...

Just when you thought comics couldn't get any darker, here comes a relaunched X-Force but I have to admit, this version is just awesome because here we get to see, no holds barred, the darker side of what the mutants especially Wolverine titles have been promising for years. In short, you get blood and gore and every issue is filled with such "fun"

About the only challenge here is actually the artwork. I like Crain and his digital works just fine but dude it is still artwork regardless of medium or tools used. Here everything is too dark and muddy. It feels like a cheap copy of a B-grade horror movie if you know what I mean

However, the storyline is just plain awesome

We open up with Cyclops telling Wolverine he has finally decided that there is a need for the kind of shitstorm that Wolverine always talked about and this took Wolvie by surprise (love the banter). However, Wolverine is not too keen on who has been assembled. So why the change in style for Cyclops?

Because the so-called humans have upped their game plan with something larger in mind and is now busy even killing other humans to get at some sort of ultimate weapon. So NO SPOILER ALERT here because it is that awesome a storyline but who are the bad guys?

Well we have all the various factions of humans against mutants including Bastion, Magus, Donald Pierce, Graydon Creed, Cameron Hodge, William Stryker and Matthew Risman ... is that enough for you?

When you reached the final page, all I can say is that this issue sure isn't padded!

Ratings: 8/10 (would have rate higher if not for the artwork inside)