Reviewer: Jesse Baker
Story Title: The Day After……..
Written by: Chris Claremont
Penciled by: Randy Green and Aarron Lopresti
Inked by: Rob Hunter, Norm Rapmund, and Don Hillsman
Colored by: Lare Molinar
Lettered by: Virtual Calligraphy
Editor: Mike Marts
Publisher: Marvel Comics
“Y’Know Petey? Magneto, Apocalypse, Sinister, Sublime, even Cassandra Nova;
at their worst none of ’em ever hurt us as badly as this….” Wolverine’s
meta-text comment of Brian Bendis’s latest literary abortion…..
I had a rant all planned out in my head. But when writing this review, I said “F#ck it….” since it’s the same thing I’ve said non-stop since last fall.
Bendis is a cancer, a disfiguring disease, and now his evil has dealt a crippling blow to the X-Men Franchise. Why this man, whose lack of talent outside maybe one or two issues of Ultimate Spider-Man has the power to bend the entire Marvel Universe over backwards at his pleasure, I don’t know. I don’t know why Joe Quesada lets him, given that God knows that the more power he gives the little f#ck, the more likely the suits in charge of the company might one day say “Why are we paying Quesada money for a job, when Bendis has the real power?” Be afraid Joe, be very very very afraid. After all, Bill Jemas thought he was bulletproof and look how fast he was run out of town….
So it falls to Chris Claremont to deal with the latest whim of the idiot Bendis, which is “Let’s whittle the entire mutant population down to under just under two hundred”. A move that is up there with “Let’s replace Spiderman with a clone!” and “Let’s replace Batman the biggest piece of sh#t in the world!”, in terms of famous comic book f#ck-ups.
Claremont creates the notion that with 90% of mutantkind losing its powers, it becomes open season on all mutants, as anti-mutant violence begins to consume the globe. The US Government, bastion of evil and intolerance thanks to the current Bush Administration, unleashes “I Can’t Believe It’s Not Operation Zero Tolerance” upon the world to deal with the new problem.
The book tries to tell a story but mainly it’s ads for the newest wave of X-Books: New Excalibur, New X-Factor, Son of M, House of M, and of course X-Men: Ed Brubaker is a hit-or-miss writer, but he’s a very handsome man so I won’t say anything bad about him!
The issue ends with a cliffhanger, as Sentinels show up at the Mansion. And not the generic Wild Sentinels, but the humanoid Sentinels! Will the X-Men and the mansion be reduced to ash and rubble? And how long until Claremont, Milligan, and Whedon hang Bendis by the neck with a rope until dead, so the madness can end and this stupid ass plotline can be reversed faster than you can say “Incredible Hulk was created by Skrulls”?
