X-men #33: Review & Spoilers

[Til]

I agree with everyone saying that the art was the highlight. It was really good. As for the story...well, I think it was a step up from prior issues, but that's still not saying much. Nimrod sparing Cyclops is just dumb on every level. It reminds me of Dr. Evil's overly-elaborate and easily escapable plans to kill Austin Powers. Only this isn't a parody. I also just get the feeling that Duggan is going through a checklist of old plot points and characters that need to be wrapped up by the end.

[CGAR]

Duggan definitely checked out.

[Jwyatt]

Magik's teleportation is working as of this issue, right?

[Wolverine12]

Magik's teleportation is working as of this issue, right?

Yes according to Realm of X but apparently it’s still not in X-Men.

[Wolverine12]

Something I just thought of, I wonder if Devos “backed up” his consciousness like how the mutants do with Cerebro. Maybe he’ll pop up again in a new body or something.

[plasmaintights]

Nimrod seems to be secretly being played by Dabney Coleman, or maybe Jon Voight in Anaconda -- or Mr. Burns in a big (non) blue meanie suit?

[Havok83]

Yes according to Realm of X but apparently it’s still not in X-Men.

Her teleportation got fixed in the last issue when Pollaris yanked out the problematic nannites

[Wolverine12]

Her teleportation got fixed in the last issue when Pollaris yanked out the problematic nannites

Oh that’s right! Makes it even sillier in this issue.

[Criticalfan]

Her teleportation got fixed in the last issue when Pollaris yanked out the problematic nannites

Duggan sounds like one of those movie stars "I don't even watch my own movies." He just writes whatever and promptly forgets his own storylines. I agree with those saying he's checked out.

[sunofdarkchild]

I wouldn't say that Duggan forgot he resolved the nanite plot. It's more that she was never part of the actual story, and devoting a sidequest to resolving the dangling nanite plot from almost a year ago didn't change that. If having her back was going to be relevant, he would have done more than have her pour some water into a sentinel's head when she got her powers back. Having a powerful sorceress with the power to teleport a star destroyer across the universe isn't part of the story even though she's physically there and by all rights should be cutting loose and busting out her spells if Orchis was 1/10 of the threat Duggan pretends they are.

[Kingdom X]

I wouldn't say that Duggan forgot he resolved the nanite plot. It's more that she was never part of the actual story, and devoting a sidequest to resolving the dangling nanite plot from almost a year ago didn't change that. If having her back was going to be relevant, he would have done more than have her pour some water into a sentinel's head when she got her powers back. Having a powerful sorceress with the power to teleport a star destroyer across the universe isn't part of the story even though she's physically there and by all rights should be cutting loose and busting out her spells if Orchis was 1/10 of the threat Duggan pretends they are.

Someone should have been honest with Duggan when he pitched year 3 of this book. He has always struggled with giving his casts’ proper due and equitable focus. So I will never understand WHY he choose to play into his biggest weakness by having this nebulous cast of characters that dip in and out of focus for FoX. He would have been better off focusing on a small cast of characters and saving the rest for “here comes the cavalry moments”. The closest thing anyone has had to an arc in this last third of his run has been Synch… and he already learned that he needs to get over Laura at the end of year 1.

[lefthanded]

Something I just thought of, I wonder if Devos “backed up” his consciousness like how the mutants do with Cerebro. Maybe he’ll pop up again in a new body or something.

Does that even matter? He is such an irrelevant character that has received no development. I dont think anyone would be clamoring to see more Devos in the future.

Devos should have been a name to fear, like Trask. Instead, Devos / Feilong / Gregor have less impact despite their Sentinels being theoretically more successful against Mutants than Trasks were.

They might as well just use a random character instead of trying to use the “Devos IP” (much like how Duggan also shoehorned Hydra-Cap into becoming Flag Smasher).

Exception: If Ewing decides to use/reference Devos in one of his future comics, I’d be all for that.

[Cyclone_Ablaze]

I enjoyed it.

Happy to see Dr. Devo get destroyed. :-)

[lefthanded]

The killing in this book is beyond egregious. I cant even defend it anymore. Duggan would be better off simply implying that its happening rather than having it shown in the goriest ways each issue. It lost whatever impact it was supposed to have. Im surprised he's holding back and hasnt had Kamala smash some skulls yet

Exactly. We get a two page spread of Wolverine killing meaningless goons when:
(1) Seeing mutants win (by killing viciously) after losing has already lost its impact since Duggan as overused it
(2) We’ve seen Wolverine kill, and kill gorily before so we don’t need to have seen it. We could have just seen the beginning trap, then had a single panel later where Wolverine is telepathically communicating while all the dead enemies are in the background. We would’ve had no problem imagining what happened.
(3) Those two pages could have gone towards developing literally anything else. Have Devos catch the X-men in a more clever trap so that the X-men do the look like idiots for standing in a cluster. Have Doom’s X-men fight longer instead of just one-shotting Devos in an unsatisfying manner. Have Cyclops trick Nimrod into letting him live instead of the Austin Powers Dr Evil conversation we got. etc
(3)

[Havok83]

Exactly. We get a two page spread of Wolverine killing meaningless goons when:
(1) Seeing mutants win (by killing viciously) after losing has already lost its impact since Duggan as overused it
(2) We’ve seen Wolverine kill, and kill gorily before so we don’t need to have seen it. We could have just seen the beginning trap, then had a single panel later where Wolverine is telepathically communicating while all the dead enemies are in the background. We would’ve had no problem imagining what happened.
(3) Those two pages could have gone towards developing literally anything else. Have Devos catch the X-men in a more clever trap so that the X-men do the look like idiots for standing in a cluster. Have Doom’s X-men fight longer instead of just one-shotting Devos in an unsatisfying manner. Have Cyclops trick Nimrod into letting him live instead of the Austin Powers Dr Evil conversation we got. etc
(3)

Dont forget the pages dedicated to showing Kitty and that Doom X-man slice people in half