Reviewer: James Hatton
Story Title: Days of Future, Present, Past Participle
Written by: Scott Lobdell
Penciled by: Clayton Henry
Inked by: Mark Morales
Colored by: Digital Rainbow
Lettered by: Comicraft
Editor: Mike Marts
Publisher: Marvel Comics
DO YOU WANT A BOOK THAT’S GOING PLACES?
DO YOU WANT A TITLE ON THE FAST TRACK!!?
HIGH ACTION, HIGH ADVENTURE YOUR CUP OF TEA??
…yeah, go grab another book – this one is on its last issue.
Sad huh? A book that had promise to grab hold of the ‘funniest book out there’ rung dies after twelve issues. I blame each and every of the people NOT reading this review. Why? Because not only did they not care enough to check out the review – they probably didn’t even think to buy Alpha Flight… the bastards.
Truth be told this book just isn’t for everyone. It’s for people who don’t want grittiness, over the top soap-opera drama, and continuity strong comics. It’s for people who want a fun title that makes you laugh at the, sometimes unnecessary, theatrics of comics. It made pot shots at X-Men, time travel, clones, and even the ‘Previously On…’ section. For me, that’s golden.
Story!
Okay, so at this point in time it’s a bit silly to rehash the entire storyline, especially when it unequivocally doesn’t make sense. A throw away Omega Flight character who has the power of bringing in versions of himself from the future has come to Alpha Flight to stop himself from being pulled to the past to die. Get it?
So, Alpha Fight sends back it’s members to the past to try and save his life, and in doing so causes more time conflicts than they started with. Acid rain, a world full of robots, alien invasions.. all of it culminating into a world where their first mission never happened. See, self referential in it’s silliness.
Well, by the end of it – the plot is resolved as best as it can be, and it leaves it wide open for what would have been Scott Lobdell’s next arc – but sadly we are given two pages at the end to just close everything out. It’s quite easy to see where he was going with the story, but we are left without that since … well, there will be an empty spot on the shelf next month between Aquaman and Alan Moore’s Yuggoth Creatures.
Art!
When a cover calls out to me as ‘cool’ – I mention it, and this cover does that. It’s a complete throw away to a Volume One Alpha Flight cover where the Guardian died… except ironically, not only does nobody die in this book… the only thing that goes away is the book itself. I would like to believe that this is the joke. If it’s not – ah well, I got a chuckle out of my own little joke.
Otherwise, the internal art is just fine – fun, light, and colorful. It’s everything it should be… for the last time.
Overall!
Now, the problem with putting a rating to this book is that as a solitary issue it fails. Horribly. It’s there to end the storyline, and tie everything together, which it barely does … but that is it’s point! So, we’re giving it a high rating for what it’s supposed to be, not what it is. If you dig? Eh, whatever.
