Uncanny X-Men #11 (SPOILERS/DISCUSSION)

[Rosebunse]

Doesn't help that the books are pretty much the opposite in thematic, Aaron is basically going for the "Isn't this cool, BP is the leader now and there is war with vampires and freaking Blade is involved!", while Rosenberg is all "You poor thing, what the world has done to you!" (i think that is issue pretty much spell out that neither Logan or Scott is expecting to get out this alive).

Logan will probably rekill the already dead Daken in Return of Wolverine. I can't really blame Scott or Logan for being suicidal at this point, especially since even if they succeed here, it'll just be the same shit forever and ever.

And I don't hate what Aaron is doing in Avengers. It's refreshing. The guy just revels in the superhero genre and loves being attached to it.

It's interesting to have this book right beside the Age of X-Man because, well, most of the X-Men revel in it too. They love being auperheros, they just don't always get the chance to. That's what makes all of it a lie over there so heartbreaking.

Gloom and doom at its gloomiest and doomiest. This makes past extinction stories like a freakin' joke. Loved it.

A few thoughts:

1. Is this even how Blindfold's powers work? Just... what?
2. There is no freakin' way this happens in the same universe as X-Force, lol.
3. There is no freakin' way Emma is still King of anything, lol.
4. The "My herooooo, %#S& it, he ain't alone" scene was efffin' perfect.
5. Welcome back, Logan. It's been too long, a-hole.

I think Blindfold's powers normally show her a way out of danger. Here, they're showing her that the only way she doesn't get killed is if she kills herself first. While I think that's actually sort of interesting, it seems like a somewhat dangerous sentiment to compare to real life suicides.

And who knows what Emma is doing. She lives in a different world than everyone else. She doesn't have to worry about a vaccine. Besides, most mutants are not going to go to her for help.

[BishopsJuice91]

I liked it, the tone was good for an X book. Didn’t like the X-Man stuff before but it was a set up to this and this book delivered what I wanted. It kinda grounded the franchise and made me wanna see where they’re going in the near future.

[AJpyro]

The Blindfold story should never have been told at all, or at least have had a different outcome. I don't understand how anybody can think that showing a girl whose superpower is to see the future decide that the best thing to do is kill herself is supposed to be in any way helpful to people who are suffering from depression. I'm fine with the X-Men going through difficult times and facing adversity, but this book was straight up misery porn.

Honestly its Blindfold thats shatter my enthusiasm further.

You mean to tell that even with Cyke and Logan back, her only option was suicide? If thats the case then whats the point of any of this?

If she was wrong ib her future sight, then she died for nothing.
If she waa right then the rebuild of the xmen won't amount to anything.

That ending was even that hopeful. It felt more like stalling the actual problem as long as there ia something else to hold your attention.

[Fildro]

I can't stand more Gloom and doom and shock value deaths. Unfortunately I am out.

[Strong Girl Daken]

Cyclops is back and Uncanny is in the middle of a Decimation. Can this character be used for any other story?

[AHRNIHAL]

Cyclops is back and Uncanny is in the middle of a Decimation. Can this character be used for any other story?

Nah,being nu-magneto he's good at.

[AdamFTF]

I can't stand more Gloom and doom and shock value deaths. Unfortunately I am out.

Honestly, I'm kind of feeling you there. I mean, it's not bad for an X-Men book to be dark. They have been before. It's just that the darkness was always offset by the hope the X-Men had and the fact that they were fighting for a better world. It's getting kind of hard to suspend my disbelief to the point of believing the X-Men may win someday. And Cyke ain't really turning me into a believer.

[Prof. Warren]

Loved the main story. Totally dug the grittier vibe and Scott's attitude. And the last page with Scott and Logan's reunion was perfect.

The backup stories were just ok. But the main story has me excited for what's next.

[The Kid]

I really really really liked the coloring n a few of the pages. Like the one where Cyclops was on the roof shooting the bottles. It was a very interesting contrast of black and red.

The story however is terrible. As Cyclops said "Every X-Men story is the same" and sadly that's been true since at least Decimation.

I enjoyed the previous issue where Cyclops had his realization that maybe he was too polarizing and maybbe he was too quick to resort to violence to solve the mutant problem and he was going to try to do better. Then by the end of this issue him and Wolverine are standing in a literal pile of corpses.

The writers of the X-Men have had the same problem over and over again for nearly two decades now. They want to write mutants as an endangered species, which means they need to swiftly inflate mutant numbers just so they can drastically reduce them in a violent fashion. Then the X-Men are 'forced' to respond to the near extinction of their kind by doing 'whatever it takes' to keep them safe aka "standing their ground".

But they seem to be missing the point of the X-Men. They are a superhero team, they're supposed to be better than the people they fight against. Using the new comic as an example Cyclops and Wolverine did NOT need to kill all of those people. They are perfectly capable of incapacitating them. By not doing so not only is it going against Cyclops' revelation in tthe last comic, thus making that comic a waste of time, it is continuing the reduction of the X-Men from a superhero team to a team that's as bad as the people they fight. As a comic book the natural narrative SHOULD be that after Cyclops and Wolverine trounce them there should be some kind of inward reflection by those hate groups where they realize that the X-Men showing them mercy makes them question all of the hate docrine they've been given and maybe being a bigot is wrong. What we have instead is stories where the Purifiers, Reapers and other bigots have a moral ground to stand on when they can go find a pile of corpses left behind by Cyclops and say 'see this is why all mutants need to be destroyed look at what these guys did.' And the cycle of hate continues.

Writing wise it's obnoxious that we have to constantly go on these circles where a writer wants to artificially inflate the mutant numbers, kill off the inflated number along with X-Men they consider unimportant in order to prop up the few X-Men they are interested in. I always feel terrible when these new story lines come out because it's just another round of "OK which X-fans are going to be disappointed that they just killed off their favorite character for shock value." This time it was Loa, Blindfold and Velocidad fans. Then after the writer finishes their shock-death openers they retread the same story where the propped up X-Men have to make 'the hard choices'. Even though murdering someone who did you wrong isn't a hard choice, that's the easy one, that's literally been a theme of comics for over 50 years.

If they want to write comics like this then they should think about writing a Punisher, Suicide Squad or an X-Force book where force meeting force is the theme of those comics. An X-Men team of morally compromised people is not a superhero team book and it's not the kind of book that made the X-Men popular to begin with.

I enjoyed this story but I do agree that the whole extinction storyline has run its course. They really need to move on from. I really hope this will be the last one but I'm not gonna get my hopes up

[PsychoEFrost]

I'm gonna agree with the last few posters. Having a character that can see the future take one look at it, then kill themselves is gritty x edgy to power of Hot Topic. It's so melodramatic that the entire issue could be sponsored by Vans and My Chemical Romance. I mean we're one forced abortion of a mutant baby on panel from being a straight up Frank Miller comic.

I don't watch Game of Thrones. Hell, I stopped watching The Gifted, and for the same reason: when everything is grim and gritty and dark and depressing and there is no hope for anyone: WHY SHOULD THE READER/AUDIENCE CARE?

So yeah, count me out.

[Wiccan]

I don't even like Blindfold or anything but I found that story deeply disturbing and Rosenberg going on twitter being all "i WaNtEd To ShOw ThE cOnSeQuEnCeS oF dEpReSsIoN aNd" is pissing me off.

[TheCape]

I'm gonna agree with the last few posters. Having a character that can see the future take one look at it, then kill themselves is gritty x edgy to power of Hot Topic. It's so melodramatic that the entire issue could be sponsored by Vans and My Chemical Romance. I mean we're one forced abortion of a mutant baby on panel from being a straight up Frank Miller comic.

I don't watch Game of Thrones. Hell, I stopped watching The Gifted, and for the same reason: when everything is grim and gritty and dark and depressing and there is no hope for anyone: WHY SHOULD THE READER/AUDIENCE CARE?

So yeah, count me out.

I was listening "Hell is for Children" during the Blindfold story personally .

[PsychoEFrost]

I don't even like Blindfold or anything but I found that story deeply disturbing and Rosenberg going on twitter being all "i WaNtEd To ShOw ThE cOnSeQuEnCeS oF dEpReSsIoN aNd" thing is pissing me off.

Did he actually say that?

What the actual fuck...

Spoiler alert: three time suicide survivor here. Offing myself is one of those things I'm just not good at. Two more times and the paramedics will buy me dinner. And everything I just typed (all true by the way) is still more tasteful than that.

[spirit2011]

I don't even like Blindfold or anything but I found that story deeply disturbing and Rosenberg going on twitter being all "i WaNtEd To ShOw ThE cOnSeQuEnCeS oF dEpReSsIoN aNd" is pissing me off.

Oh dude... I found blindfold dead so useless, we know things are really bad for mutant, her suicide was just hopeless and contrinuted nothing
Felt gratuitous.

[Prof. Warren]

For me, the problem with X-Men stories is that they have no hope. It's meant to be a metaphor for oppressed minorities and all the stories they have are about how hopeless all of this is and apocalyptic futures where things get worse. It's too depressing and a disservice to what the franchise should be representing.

Who are you to say what the franchise "should be representing?"

I'm sure every X-Man fan - as well as every X-Man writer and editor - has their own ideas about that.

To say there's one thing it "should be representing" is presumptuous.

And as long as the protagonists have the desire to fight and struggle, there's hope. Is the struggle often overwhelming? Is it hard to imagine a better world at times? Yes, of course.

But that's life. No one who fought for civil rights decades ago, no one who saw many of the social advances that have been made, would think that we'd still have so many battles left to fight or that there'd be so many people out there who want to turn back progress.

It's a despairing situation. But it's real and, as a book that has reflected real life struggles with prejudice and oppression, it'd be wrong for X-Men to do too much sugar coating.

The X-Men are considered dead, mutant cures, the mutant population on brink of extinction (again) and I'm meant to believe no one cares? It's not going to be all smiles and fun, but this constant depressing pessimism throughout the franchise has got to end. I've become numb to these type of stories and it feels like the X-franchise takes place on a completely different earth from the rest of Marvel. I'm meant to believe the entire superhero community see's mutants suffering and the X-Men possibly die and not care.... They can miss me with that sh*t.

People do care. We saw people like Ben Urich and the Avengers express concern in this issue. But as far as anyone can tell, the X-Men are gone.

It's up to Scott and Logan to change that.