Marvel Noise: Review: X-Force #5

Sunday, July 13, 2008

Review: X-Force #5

The Archangel of Death is back, and somebody‘s going to have hell to pay for robbing him of his flesh and blood wings! Using the alien enhanced blood from Angel’s feathered wings, the Reverend Matthew Riseman has made an army of winged warriors called the Choir to help carry out his plan of mutant eradication. But first, the Reverend must deal with the small problem of the recently reactivated Bastion who is using the body of the Purifier’s former leader and Riseman‘s mentor, William Stryker, to carry out his own plans for mutant extermination! As X-Force continues their hunt for the Purifiers, will they be caught in the middle of the extremists groups own civil war? The Angels and Demons arc is racing to it’s bloody conclusion in part 5 of this hot new series from New X-Men scribes Craig Kyle and Christopher Yost and Marvel Young Guns artist Clayton Crain!

When I first heard the premise of this new book, I thought it sounded like a fantastic idea! I was really excited about the more covert, militaristic aspects of the X-team that would be featured. I thought the first three issues of the series were fantastic. Kyle and Yost were doing an excellent job of keeping me engaged in the story and the big reveals at the end of each issue were leaving me wondering what was going to happen next and racing to my LCS to pick up the next issue. However, with the last two issues I feel this series has taken a turn to focusing more on the team trying to rescue and take care of each other and less about the mission they were assigned, which was what I was excited about to begin with. After the big reveal of some of the most prolific mutant killers from the X-Men’s past at the end of issue three, I thought things would really be heating up. But other than a very brief appearance by William Stryker in this issue, we haven’t heard a beep from the mutant killers since. Other than the team fighting among themselves, I feel that the action that was so prevalent in the first couple of issues has been missing. Regarding the series’ art, I feel Clayton Crain started the book strong but believe he has been losing steam with each issue since. While I really liked the new look he has given Archangel, I felt as if certain parts of this issue were rushed and left partially uncompleted. While this issue may not have been everything I’ve been hoping for from this series, I’m definitely not ready to give up on this book yet. I’m keeping my fingers crossed that this first arc is going to end with a huge bang and set us up for some truly excellent stories to come!