100th Anniversary Special X-Men #1 review

[Dusk]

Summary:

The time was 2am on the 22nd of Jan, 2061. Scott Summers, the new President of the United States, was having trouble sleeping in the White House after the inauguration, and Emma, his wife, used her powers to help him sleep. After he fell asleep, a mysterious person came in and attacked Emma, and she disappeared in a flash of yellow energy, along with all her belongings.

It was then revealed that 8 hours ago, during a private party, Scott was looking at the riots and protesters outside the White House and thinking about how he came so far, convincing himself that he needed to use necessary force to bring peace to the nation by making sure things are equal for everyone, be they humans or mutants.

Back to the present time, the protesters outside the white house saw the lights of the yellow energy and interpreted it as a signal from God, and they used that as a reason to storm the White House. Wolverine went out to stop them, while Beast went to ensure Scott's safety. Scott notified them that his wife was missing, but to his horror, Beast replied that she had been dead for years. Scott then realised that they had mistaken his wife to be Jean Grey, and subsequently, deduced that someone had altered everyone's memories except his. Believing the humans outside were the ones who abducted Emma., Scott went out to confront the protesters with a speech and declaration of justice, where he was shot by one of the protesters. Accidentally activating his optic blasts while he was falling, his blasts hit and injured several civilians.

Scott was then taken back to the White House to be healed, but the TV news reports of his attack on the protesters indicated that the peace he fought so hard for was over. However, Scott decided his first course of action must be to find Emma, and with Beast's help, they discovered that, not just Emma, but everyone on Earth was disappearing and blinking out of existence. As a wave of energy washed over them, Scott suddenly found himself in The White Hot Room, confronted by the Phoenix in Jean Grey's form. Jean revealed that she has removed everyone from existence, because the future that Scott's presidency would bring would be a world of war and disaster. As Scott broke down from the news, Jean told him that he and she and the remaining X-Men could still change the future by undoing the past and transforming time and space. Scott accepted that possibility of a better future and Jean led him to the past.

In the new present day, Scott is married to Jean and surrounded by friends and family on their anniversary day. People who were once dead were now alive, though nothing else about the current world is revealed. And thus, the story ends with the words, "The Beginning".

My opinions:

This was the worst of all the 100th anniversary specials released so far. It has awkward pacing, flashbacks where they didn't need to. Scott giving up on fighting the Phoenix to save the entire world and Emma, opting to change the past doesn't sit well with me at all. At this point, he should have spent far more time with Emma then Jean. Does he have so little love for Emma? And once again, even after promoting that all the specials are in the same time period and universe, this story obviously doesn't fit in with the world settings of any of the previous stories. And frankly, this story was lazy. It pretty much screams, "I can't be bothered to come up with a future story arc and just write one part of the story, so let's just do a one-shot and then reset the whole universe at the end." In fact, I'm no longer looking forward to the rest of the specials, so this will be my stop. Thanks for reading.

[FluffyCyclopsRLZ]

Phoenix/Jean's characterization was spot-on. Gotta give props for that, at the very least.

[Ambaryerno]

It seems there's pretty much just three types of time-travel stories:

1) The future sucks, send someone back in time to make it better.
2) Villain goes back in time to make the future worse, hero follows to stop it.
3) Hero accidentally sent back in time. Try not to screw it up.

Everything else is just a variation of one of the above.

[xiyon]

Still a more entertaining book than the recent Uncanny o/

[Jackraow21]

This was garbage. Nothing good I can say about it.

[FluffyCyclopsRLZ]

Still a more entertaining book than the recent Uncanny o/

President Summers driving a tank around and yelling at people was indeed awesomely insane.

[xiyon]

President Summers driving a tank around and yelling at people was indeed awesomely insane.

As is Scott confronting the Phoenix's obsession with him.

[Dispenser Of Truth]

The ending of this was the embodiment of everything wrong and regressive about how X-Men comics are so often written. It's literally a comic about how every progression and development the X-Men have had--a franchise inherently about moving into the future--away from soap opera superheroics towards attempts at actual social relevancy beyond "these superheroes are actually feared and hated! Like, even more than the rest of the Marvel heroes!" in the last 10-15 years was a mistake, and everything should go back--as ever--to Claremont.

[keeper444]

thanks for the review Dusk, I said before and said now this is the year of JOTT, lol, but seriously I like the scott/jeen-phoenix parts but thats all.

[Shambles]

I should have figured this was a "what if" book; just Awful.

Also isn't Amity(terrible codename) a bit old to be creeping on Shogo

[Dosas]

I've just read it, I don't have words to describe this awfulness.

[Mari]

I liked all the portrayal of the future, except to the point that Emma was taken away.

I liked how Scott relentlessly pursued his lost wife.

Other than that, I hated it. And I don't usually hate things so easily.

[nx01a]

The Good:
>Scott's implants... or whatever.
>The art was nice.
>Triage's powers also heal more than just people, as evidenced by his staff sprouting leaves and flowers shooting up from the ground when he heals Scott.
triage1.jpg

The Bad:
>What exactly has Scott's power evolved into? Manifesting energy orbs/'eyes' that shoot his optic blasts at different targets? Did he and Goldballs have a Jean/Psylocke power swap/merge incident at some point? It would explain why Goldballs isn't seen in this future.
cyc1.jpg

The Ugly:
>Still with that stick after all these years, Triage? Do you even kendo, brah?
>President Cyclops riding on a tank while... and Jean killing psions painfully so she can altering history so that Emma... ...and Xavier's psi and gene-recording device that can't be manipulated even by the Phoenix... and...

The Verdict:
I'm sorry, but this really was a horrible issue that misses the mark on so many narrative and character levels.

[Sardorim]

So, is it worth getting?

Does it show older versions of the other All-New Mutants or only Triage? What about the Stepford Cuckoo's?

[nx01a]

So, is it worth getting?

Does it show older versions of the other All-New Mutants or only Triage? What about the Stepford Cuckoo's?

It has Eva doing a nice power stunt. The Stepfords are there, too, though they don't really do much. Morph/Amity/whatever is there, also.

Honestly... I wouldn't advise getting it because I think it's a really bad story. If you want more Eva, then sure.