Saturday, November 20, 2010

Curse of the Mutants: Storm and Gambit #1 - Marvel

Ok . . this is one of those periphery books that I was talking about. This one I decided to pick up . . for the most part, because Chris Bachalo does the art. He's easily one of my favorites. So any chance to see some more of his work . . is ok by me. I've already read the first 4 issues of the new X-Men title, with it's Curse of the Mutants story-line. And this one, I think, fit's in somewhere during issue #2 . . or maybe between #2 and #3. Anyways, with Scott's plan to bring Dracula back . . hoping to thwart Xarus, they need someone to go after Dracula's body, and his head. So in this issue, Storm and Gambit are the ones elected to head to the Vampire island to recover the body. As a note, I understand that the first couple issues of Namor are spent with him recovering the head. I haven't decided if I'm going to pick those up yet, or not. Anyways, this is an action packed issue, with Storm and Gambit up to their necks in Vampires and Vampire blood. Along the way they come across Janus, first son of Dracula. I think he's helping them because he's not necessarily happy with the way that the Vampire-nation has progressed since his father's demise. He should be in power, but . . he's not. There's other factions at work here. And I know I'm jumping ahead, but . . I have to wonder . . what's Janus going to do when he discovers Xarus' plans? He's seems to be more than willing to help the X-Men with the return of his father. But . . he's got to have some ulterior motives. Anyways, Storm and Gambit are victorious on both fronts here . . they recover the body, plus . . Storm finds and deactivates the source of the shield covering the island. Unfortunately, in order to do so . . Storm has to sacrifice some innocents. The Vampires in control of the shield are hooked up to children through feeding tubes. But there's not really any way to shut down the device, or disconnect the tubes, without massive blood loss and death. So, it's either continue with the plan, helping the X-Men in their ultimate goal, or . . not do it and watch as she and Gambit suffer an evil fate. Storm does the right thing . . the only thing, really . . but . . in the process, it may have changed her forever. 'When I joined the X-Men I was a different woman. I swore never to take a life. But that changed. I made an exception. And exceptions became justifications. Taking a life became less horrifying. And today I crossed a line. I took another life. Not a monster or a Vampire. An innocent. I'm worried now. Because I wonder, the next time I cross that line . . will it be too much to bear?' Because of Storms conflict, I thought it was an interesting . . and relevant, story. I think Chuck Kim did a great job with it. And of course I wasn't disappointed with the fantastic art of Chris Bachalo. There were some really cool panels in this book. As an overview, I kind of have to wonder what they're setting Storm up for here. She obviously spending more and more time with the X-Men. Which leaves less and less time with her husband. But the more time she spends with the X-Men, I think she's questioning their motives, their actions and their agenda. I think eventually she's going to reach the point where she's either 'all in, or all out'. And if she decides that she's 'all out' . . what happens then? Anyways . . it's just something to think about. I thought it was a good book, and I'm glad I picked it up.

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