Magneto (2014) #21 Final Issue Review
And so it ends here, with Magneto #21. There’s not a lot to say folks, so I’ll be quick in condensing my thoughts on the conclusion of this series and its perspective on Magneto! Read on!
Okay, the comic opens with a flashback to Magneto’s first fight with the X-Men. In this fight, he pronounces mutants as the new overlords of humanity while handing them their asses, and when we go to the present we find him acknowledging the irony of the situation. The world thinks he’s here to turn a new leaf, a lie the desperate tell themselves as the world is coming to an end.
Another flashback shows when he sinks a Russian submarine because they are preparing to launch a missile in retaliation for him threatening all the governments of the world. He intends to use them as an example. As they die and he watches, he knows there is no redemption and that hasn’t changed now. He sees and himself as a monster, now and forever.
Polaris can only watch on as he does this, having lost her powers. Briar comes up to her and offers her a hand, explaining that he took them because he didn’t want to sacrifice her. Polaris simply states he’s only lying to himself and her believing that. For him, the ends justify the means.
In another flashback her words are proven true as Magneto is talking with Charles and the X-Men, refusing to come to court for laws he doesn’t recognize. Charles warns that the way he does things won’t get the results he wants because it does more harm than good, but then some suits come up to him and tell him they acknowledge Genosha as his land. Not the good way to send a message.
It seems like he’s pushing back the other world back in the present, but Briar can see that’s not the case. His body can’t withstand the power and turns to ashes with nothing left behind, realizing that everything he’d done to this point has taken away everything from him for nothing. The comic ends with the world being destroyed.
Okay, review time.
There’s not much to write home about in the issue. It was the final one and, as we see, Magneto failed in the end. For both the issue and the series itself… well, there was no getting around how it was going to end. This massive crossover crap was always going to ruin it. The art was about the same and we mostly just looked into the final thoughts of a man who thrived on violence and murder to accomplish a goal, only for it to all be meaningless in the end. It’s a shaggy dog story, with the best anyone will be able to say was that he tried.
That’s it.
I give the issue a 3 out of 5, and the series as a whole a 3.5 out of 5. I liked the introspective into it, but the art wasn’t spectacular. The ending was screwed by the crossover, and ultimately everything that was sacrificed for was for nothing.
Magneto #20 Review
I’m back folks, or rather I never left. There just hasn’t been much in the comic world that’s interested me with Secret Wars. But I still read Magneto and some secrets are coming out in what I think is the second-to-last issue of his own series. So read on my review of Magneto # 20!
The comic opens with Mags bleeding from his mouth and nose, wondering if his doppelganger is on the other side trying to do the same and which has gone to greater lengths. He has no clue his doppelganger went nuts, caused that Ultimatum event that ruined the Ultimate-Universe, and is dead. It’s for the best.
Anyway, it turns our Briar was wealthy and bored when she got caught in his attack in Seattle that left her leg injured. She claims she tried to minimize the damage by manipulating him, but it also turns out that she likes the monstrous side of him and pain makes her feel alive. He tells her there’s more to be done before the end.
In the present we see Lorna trying to tell him to stop since he’s killing himself. He reasons that since they keep sending sentinels they have a chance and he was going to keep going, he just needed more power. The Marauders provide him with amplifiers and the charging will take five minutes.
He’s bought that time because Briar contacted SHIELD with her agent and gave them information about the Incursions so they’d back him up as he continued. Lorna also came because she was invited to a club for people who like Magneto, despite the fact he’d maimed them at some point. Yeah, it gets weird, but to each its own.
Anyway, she informed Lorna that he was going to die and it would be best to have his child by his side. The comic then cuts to him draining her powers, so that he can finish up and ends with him looking like he’s exploding with power.
Okay, review time.
All in all, I find this issue a conflicting thing. On the one hand, I know he’s going to end up failing because Secret Wars is a thing and this is hopeless. On the other, I think he’s doing great things and he makes a fair point.
I’ll give it a 4 out of 5.
Magneto #19 Review
Ha! Bet you thought I was done with my comic reviews! Well, the truth is I am unpleased with the Marvel Reboot and thus decided to skip the unnecessary bits and pieces. I’ll just wait until it settles down first.
But we’re here for a different purpose. That would be my review of Magneto # 19! Let’s get to it!
The comic opens with Magneto trying to stop the Incursion, but the Ultimate Universe is fighting back by deploying robots and the 616-Universe civilians are stupid enough to just watch. Naturally, Lorna goes to save the civilians while he thinks back to how he needed to interrogate his MGH dealer for something stronger, though it was likely to kill him if he used it. Turns out those people stayed behind on purpose to see Magneto, once again showing that he still has fans despite everything.
Some time in the past, Magneto visited some guy who looks like a demon known as Sugar Man. Normally he would kill the guy, but right now his knowledge of mutant genetics and he needs a way to boost his power quick and dirty. Once he gets that, he kills the man. It’s about what we expected from him.
Despite the enhanced MGH, the amplifiers, and siphoning Earth’s magnetic energies into his body, it isn’t enough power. Yet his body can’t handle it anymore, and between his addiction to MGH and the upcoming fight, he knows he’s going to die. So, before that, Briar asks her who she really is as the comic ends.
Okay, review time…
More of a transitional issue, showing the measures he’s taken in order to accomplish his goals and how he knows that his death is imminent. Still don’t see why Lorna is wearing her old outfit, but I guess that can’t be helped in the grand scheme of things. Overall, it’s nothing new but not bad.
It gets a 3 out of 5.
Magneto #18 Review
The last days of Magneto are here now that Secret Wars is out and about. This is my review of the 18th issue in the series of one man who only wants to protect mutant-kind. Uncanny X-Men doesn’t count anymore after that Tempus screw-up. Read on!
Okay, the comic abruptly begins with Mags catching up with his daughter. By which I mean Polaris, not the two who were un-retconned, who has donned her traditional clothing rather than her Serval gear as they face the end of the world. Since I have stuff to do today, I’ll keep this brief:
Mags has known about incursions for some time because he’s been in touch with Namor, who was part of the Illuminati, who was recently ganked by Black Panther for flooding his city during A vs X, and survived to join the Cabal. Are you with me so far?
Magneto wants to save their world, meaning he has to destroy the 1610 world. He has the means of doing so because, before the above-mentioned shanking, Namor gave him a thumb-drive containing all the information he had on the incursions, just in case something happened to him.
So he, his daughter, and the Marauder clones are doing their best to save people as he siphons as much energy as possible from the Earth, and will likewise do the same when the other world gets closer and use it to destroy it. By there’s a catch.
As the comic ends, we see that they still have Sentinels in the Ultimate Universe, which I thought had been scrapped after Kitty Pryde became the mutant leader of them all, but apparently not.
Okay, review time.
To be brief, I don’t think that this issue carries all that much weight in light of Secret Wars. We know he fails because issue #2 is out and the end of the first one was where we watched the two worlds end. And why has Polaris suddenly appeared? Honestly, it would have been better to end it last issue.
It gets a 3 out of 5.
Magneto (2014) #17 Review
Magneto’s attempts to rebuild Genosha have come under threat by a murderer that has a mysterious past with him. Who is this killer? How does it end? Read my review of Magneto #17 and find out!
Okay, so the comic begins with the Marauders clones searching for the killer, while Mags thinks on why mutants are returning to Genosha. Some seek asylum, others a home, but Magneto thinks that it was pride that had him move to rebuild his fallen utopia. Pride has a heavy-cost, and more than once it’s been paid for in blood.
Briar points out that he believes a mutant is responsible, leading to a memory where he watched as fellow escapees from the Holocaust were being gunned down and Hitzig narrowly missed him, though his parting words still manage to haunt Mags. Turns out this is horribly relevant as Hitzig is alive and the murderer haunting Genosha. So that issue where we saw the psychic creation of the Nazi surviving after Red Onslaught had been dealt with turned out to be a lot more relevant than we thought.
The thing is from Mags’ mind, brought into the world and made real. This makes killing him again rather difficult for Magneto, and he slips away. Magneto realizes he will continue to do this because the only way for it to continue to exist is to make him suffer, meaning it will never end up less he does something drastic.
Meanwhile, Briar goes to sleep in her own quarters, where Arclight is jealous of her. It turns out that the shade of Hitzig is there and decides to kill her to make Mags suffer, as nightmares like it usually do. Magneto remains blissfully ignorant of this, instead going to confront a mutant who he believes has something to do with this.
It turns out that the illusionist mutant, Amy, could bring things to life, but she couldn’t control them. After what the Red Skull did to her, she ends up pulling Hitzig out of his head accidentally and she can’t stop it. She didn’t come to a remote beach to hide, but because she knows what he has to do to end it and doesn’t want anyone to see him when he does it, otherwise everything would fall apart.
The comic ends with the Hitzig shade turning to ashes and Magneto contemplating how his legacy has spoiled under the ruins of his own darkness, having to kill the child to save what he had left.
Okay, review time.
Once more, Magneto’s tale ends with blood being spilled in order to do what is best for mutants. This time, much like the knock-off Omega Sentinel, it was someone who had no control over what they were doing, but because of an outside power influencing them. It’s tragic, as expected of this series.
5 out of 5.
Magneto (2014) # 16 Review
The comic opens with a flashback to the events of decimation, when Utopia was established. Somehow, Magneto found out about X-Force and had them go after someone. Despite that, he needed to see the body. Whoever it was, you could be sure they had to be someone twisted for Mags to send out X-Force rather than do it himself.
In the present, Mags is rebuilding Genosha and Briar is helping to foot the bill. She doesn’t have anywhere else to go since she’s helped him out so brazenly, but he’s understandably confused why she did all this for him. Her response is to lower the blinds and kiss him, regardless of the fact he’s thee reason she’s wearing a brace in the first place. Dude has skills.
While Mags is getting busy, some of the other mutants are hiding away from the camp. They came to his island, but don’t want to live under his rule until they see what he’s all about, being a former terrorist and all. Naturally, someone cloaked in the cover of darkness comes and prepares to kill them.
Post-coitus, Mags finds himself dreading that a new beginning often serves as a preamble for disaster. He’s proven right when they stumble upon one of the boys from last night’s corpse. He can tell it was placed there deliberately and the one who did it relished the act of cruelty.
They follow a blood trail and find the others, along with a Nazi Swastika painted in blood on the wall. Whoever started clearly doesn’t intend to stop. It’s made worse when Mags returns to find that the killer had apparently be inside their trailer while they slept and painted it in the bathroom mirror, with a message telling him to keep the furnaces warm as the comic ends.
Okay, review time.
Well, a new plot-line begins and it starts with a murder mystery. I liked how they pointed out the symbol commonly recognized as a swastika existed thousands of years before the Nazis in several different cultures, yet Hitler’s ass managed to taint the entire thing. It goes to show how one very large act of evil can dye everything associated with it in it’s color.
4 out of 5.
Magneto #15 Review
Okay, last time we checked Magneto surrendered to SHIELD for some inexplicable reason. We find out that reason in Magneto #15. Here’s my review and recap.
The comic begins with him being walked into a Helicarrier, soon to be moved to a more permanent location because he’s too dangerous. When she calls him out on killing people in cold blood, he asks her how many mutants are murdered each day and she tells him that they aren’t her department before leaving out. We then get a flashback to Magneto visiting Charles and warning him about Cerebro falling into the wrong hands.
Two guards are left to watch him, with one being a callous asshole because Magneto crippled their colleague. I get why he did it, but he signed his own death warrant once the power dampener goes off and Magneto breaks free as Briar is being told they’ll have to debrief her. Magneto’s inner-monologue reveals he broke on-board because he was told they had a version of Cerebro by an Agent Rodriguez, who is helping him because her boyfriend had been a mutant who was killed by a hate-group.
He deletes every one of the catalogs the government has on mutants and decides to make a grand spectacle so they remember this day by unleashing clones of the Marauders. He finds Briar and explains he doesn’t want to completely destroy them because SHIELD still has its uses and he doesn’t want to go to war just yet. Someone didn’t tell the Sabertooth clone that, so Magneto puts him into the plane engine and turns him into a smoothie to kill him off.
Agent Rodriguez then tells him to surrender, keeping her head down so she’s still of use to him. He then warns the lady that this was a demonstration and if she comes to Genosha again, it will be worse the next time as the comic ends.
Okay, review time….
No complaints. In fact, this brightened my day give what happened in Uncanny X-Men #31. 5 out of 5.
Magneto #14 Review
Magneto #14 review is here! Read below!
In the aftermath of Axis, Magneto finds himself amongst the ruins of Genosha, where he acts as the guardian of those mutants that remain from the camps Red Skull had established. While there, he receives notice that SHIELD is coming and tells the boy to inform the others to keep their heads down. He takes MGH, determined not to be as weak as he had been the last time Genosha was under siege by the enemy, and then proceeds to do as planned.
Speaking of that last time, he had been injured as shown in the flashback and forced metal into his skin to make his legs move. He wanted to protect them, but his loyal followers took him to the bunker and told him to live on since he wasn’t strong enough. Now back in the present, he states he knows how this will end, but he will determine how it will be remembered.
The SHIELD agents land and promptly gets manhandled. Looks like Briar ‘forgot’ to inform them that he was powered up. He tells that he knew they would meet again, and could almost forgive them for hunting and attacking him, but not in Genosha.
He points out that they can muster all of this to capture him, but didn’t have the decency to try when Sentinels were laying waste to it in the past or Red Skull merely days before. They were too busy to even help with the clean up after both cases. And then, to punctuate the point, he drops a giant hand on them.
Now, it’s clear they don’t stand a snowball’s chance in hell right now. But, like he said, he knew how this would end. Thus, he decides to surrender for some reason unimaginable to me as the comic ends.
Okay, review time….
We see once more that Magneto continues to be haunted by his past. For everything he’s done, for as much as he loathes others, he clearly hates himself just as much for not being there when they needed him. And it can be said that he’s still feeling the effects from seeing Charles’ ghost, which may play a role in why he decided to simply call it a day. Whatever happens next is anyone’s guess.
5 out of 5 is the score.
Magneto #13 Review
After the events of Axis, we go to a look into a day in the life of his new assistant, Briar Raleigh. She gets out of a taxi and enters into what may as well have been a super-villain fan swap meet, with booths and stands set up to peddle goods around, like photos and videos of attacks. There she meets with one guy named Henry.
Like her, Henry bears a scar from when Magneto attacked Sacramento and he was a camera man filming it. He was part of a program named Mutants Among Us and, to keep a long story short, he loses his eye in the process. It’s then some of the other girls come up and are willing to tell her the story of how they got their scars if she tells them how she got her leg brace.
The story they tell if obviously fake, but she gives them a DVD that tells how she got her leg brace. She thinks its fine since they all are connected thinking Magneto hurt them some way, even if self-inflicted. It’s then that those annoying agents of SHIELD show up and ask her Magneto is.
Magneto, as it turns out, is wandering around the ruins of Genosha as the comic ends.
Okay, review time.
This comic was more filler than I would have liked. But it was a somewhat unique look into the lives of those who were touched by Magneto….
I’ll call it a 3 out of 5.
Uncanny X-Men #29 Review
Following up from the last issue, Magik visits Doctor Strange in the past, interrupting his…. Private time. I guess even the Sorcerer Supreme is entitled to getting action on the side. Anyway, Magik discusses the problem and asks what he can do about the issue with Malloy. He gives her a suggestion.
With Magneto, Malloy, and Cyclops, Magneto thinks that Cyclops is going too far while Cyclops defends his actions and eventually Malloy sends him off to the school. Magneto then feels he failed Cyclops because he didn’t notice that he had a breakdown and was now endangering them all. Tempus thinks to herself that she can go back in the past to fix all of this, which Celeste calls her out on because she read her mind and knows what happened to her.
To sum up the events of the Eva special, she got lost in time and eventually ended up in the year 2099. There Magik was the Sorceress Supreme and she stayed for seven years, mothered a child and had a husband, before losing control of her powers and ending up at the beginning of Mankind. Morgan Le Fay was there and explained to her that the future she had been to no longer existed, but she ended up trying to get back only to find everything had changed and Stark had become Sorcerer Supreme. He tells her the truth of the matter and then helps her get back to her own time.
Anyway, the rest of the X-Men are divided on the whole time-travel thing while the adults are stuck at the Jean Grey school and learn that Beast essentially screwed up when he told everyone that Malloy was a threat. This is proven when Magik shows up with the Eye of Agamotto, intent on using it to see into him and what he is capable of, when Helicarriers arrive and open fire. The comic ends with the sight of three skeletons burning and Eva arriving in the past to greet Charles Xavier.
Okay, review time…
In truth, I’m more than a little mad. They keep dragging this arc on and, from the looks of it, plan on retconning the entire thing if she prevents his death somehow. That would mean, much like BOTA, the entire thing was a waste of time.
It gets a 3 out of 5.
Magneto #12 (AXIS Tie-In) Review
The AXIS Tie-In picks up where it left off, with Magneto enjoying it a bit as he gets to break Sentinels and revel in the irony of the “heroes” knowing what it’s like to be on the receiving end for once. He wants the members he recruited to keep pressing the advantage and uses it long enough to free his daughter and the Sorcerer Supreme and tell them to get to work on the spell. There’s then a minor flashback to Charles and Mags in the past arguing about peaceful co-existence and how naïve the thought is.
Red Skull then mind rapes all the villains, causing Magneto to have to hold them off. He lasts until the Sorcerer Supreme gets compromised and Carnage gets in a few good licks. Then Doom steps in and they get to work on the spell. Another flashback shows that this was when he first revealed he was a mutant to Charles to kill members of HYDRA who were coming after them, telling Charles that one day his squeamishness will cost them dearly.
The spell goes off. The heroes and his daughter still see him and the others as villains (which is ironic given what’s happening in the main series). Charles’ psychic ghost appears and tells him that mutants need him to be their shepherd and champion. Magneto responds that suddenly he feels the fear he felt and that Charles was afraid he wouldn’t be there to guide them, but he will lead them and help them find a way to live in peace. Because he walks off too soon he doesn’t hear as the ghost says that he thinks Magneto was right.
He then finds more mutants, including the girl he freed before, Amy, and gets their collars off. He tells them that they’re all safe together now. As the comic ends we see that creepy ass Nazi dude from his mind now in the real world. Oh, crap…
Okay, review time.
I think it’s safe to say that Magneto has been inverted, but he was already teetering the line so…. Anyway, I call it a 4 out of 5.
Magneto #11 Review
Okay, Magneto is involved in the whole Axis event and despite me not covering the main event I will chip in with my review of issue #11 of his solo series! Read below for more!
The comic opens with Mags thinking how heroes rise during the worst of times and he may have been responsible for several coming into creation, but that doesn’t matter now that they are dropping like flies again Red Onslaught and the two Adamantium Sentinels that he picked up courtesy of Tony Stark. They’re picking off heroes, so Mags is needed to step up. Rogue tries to backtrack on what she said about him being no better than the Red Skull for killing him now that they need him, which doesn’t do wonders for her image since she just compared him to one of the most evil men in Marvel, but he pretty much sees through it and goes to help anyway.
He gets shot in the back and then feels guilty since the original Onslaught was born from his own hatred and rage and killing the skull set it free once more. So he’s afraid that if he kills it then something worse would come about. So he runs away from the fight and back to Raleigh, wondering that when he’s dead and gone will his legacy be all the bad things he’s done.
I know he seems a bit whiny, but he makes a point. For all he’s done his people, mutants, are still suffering and he’s unleashed hell on the world. I don’t blame him for that since, like Raleigh said, he couldn’t have expected that and the skull was a powerful telepath who egged him on. He had it coming.
Still Raleigh decides tough love is in order and pulls up all the bad things he’s one both before and after his power loss and she doesn’t hold back. But she shows him he also saved someone, using his anger. It’s hollow, but it shows that not everything he’s done has been completely bad and the mutant race is better off because of him, not the things he’s done.
Mags takes the advice to heart and goes on a little trip around the world, recruiting Mystique and Sabertooth, Carnage, Absorbing Man, Hobgoblin, Loki, Doom, and Enchantress. Deadpool finds him though. They all team-up to take on the Red Onslaught since heroes just aren’t cutting it as the comic ends.
Okay, review time.
Once more we got a look into Magneto’s head and Mags recruits everyone through different means. Mystique and Sabertooth via their loyalty to their race, Hobgoblin by force, Doom and Loki since they see him as equals and have had fair dealings, Absorbing Man by telling him to do something with his life, and so on. I’m getting Forever Evil vibes from this and I loved that DC event.
5 out of 5.
Magneto #10 (2014) Review
Magneto has been captured by the Red Skull! What cruel fate awaits him? Read on and find out!
Our comic opens with Magneto strapped to an upright table where he laments that he trusted his failing powers rather than using his secret weapons, thinking if he had another chance he would use it. Red Skull shows up with the turtle guy and then he basically mocks him about having Charles’ brain and then put an illusion in his mind of the Nazi who he failed to kill back then, Hitzig, to break him mentally before turtle guy does physically, giving him fifteen minutes top. Yeah, he should have killed him when he had the chance and I say that to both of them.
Magneto retreats into his memories to withstand the mental torture. He chooses when Luna was born, but that memory gets perverted by Hitzig, who tells him he’s been running since they met and still can’t escape him and he wasted his powers. He then goes to when his first child was killed in a fire since it reminds him why he fights, and then with Rogue in the Savage Lands I’m assuming, but both of those get twisted as well. And kicker was the destruction of Genosha, but that one did him in.
For the first time in the series, Magneto just flatly gives up now that he is no longer able to retreat into his memories. Turtle boy then gets ready to carve out his eye before Rogue, Scarlet Witch, and Havok popped up to save him. I know it seems contrived, but it actually makes sense if you’ve stomached the latest Uncanny Avengers. To save time, the S-Men broke into the Avengers Mansion and kidnapped Scarlet Witch and Rogue while Alex was nabbed off the street after having half his face burned off and losing his daughter to Kang. It’s that kind of comic.
Anyway, they bust in and save him and he decides to keep his promise about having a second chance. He bites into his skin, where he apparently has a stash of MGH made for him two issues ago planted. The comic ends as he suddenly gets a boost of power with the intention of completely fucking up the Red Skull.
Okay, review time.
Uh… not much here that we didn’t know in terms of development to be honest. If anything I’m more upset that he gave in near the end there. But I guess we need downs and ups for a balanced comic. It gets a 3 out of 5.
Magneto #9 Review
The March to Axis begins in Magneto #9! Read my review below about this tie-in to the event!
The comic begins with Magneto returning to the island nation of Genosha, a land that was once a safe haven to millions of mutants after he took it from the mutant slavers and then ran it. Then Sentinels came and destroyed it, now it’s a labor camp where mutants and inhumans have been rounded up. Magneto enters through one of many escape routes he had and sees the bodies piled up, reminding him of the time when he was in a labor camp and forced to feed corpses to the fire. On his way back he passed a man named Hitzig, and endured it with the intention of killing the man.
He frees two women he finds of their collars, but they panic because if they are caught without the collar they are screwed. It’s here that he learns that Red Skull took Charles power, and he tells them to run and cower while he’ll shoulder the fight and they can live with the shame, because they lack the conviction. He recalls that he failed to kill Hitzig, but let someone else do it and lived with the shame and humiliation, intent on making amends by killing Red Skull.
Unfortunately the S-Men sneak up on him and cost him the element of surprise. Apparently he killed one of their families or more, but he’s intent on killing Red Skull and tries to do so again only to be interrupted again. They chide him for coming without back-up and even he has to agree that he was too eager to prove himself. Once goat-face girl gazes at him and strips him of his power, they corner him.
Magneto sees one of the girls from before, whose collar he removed and can project minor illusions, and tells her not to help him since there was nothing either of them could do. The S-Men then gang-beat him as the comic ends.
Okay, review time….
Yeah, I’m the glad the series is continuing but Red Skull is a monster. I always thought the Uncanny Avengers dropped the ball in letting him get away and this only proves it. I’m not exactly thrilled about the upcoming cross over, but maybe they won’t botch it as bad as they did Battle of the Atom.
5 out of 5.
Magneto #8 Review
It’s time to put an end to the MGH hunt in Magneto #8. Read my review of how he does so with surprisingly little bloodshed.
The comic begins with our useless agents of SHIELD coming to the site of where the Predator X remains are. Turns out they’ve managed to piece together what happened pretty well and they even manage to get a computer that the master of magnetism trashed working again. Because of this they claim they know exactly where he’s heading.
Magneto himself is venturing into a ghost town, noting that like any living thing it can die. But it’s in this town where the ones who’ve earned his ire are holed up and making MGH. The men shoot up instantly with the stuff when he walks through the front door and gain powers, but he claims he only wants to talk. They don’t believe him, which is smart, but rather than simply ganging up on him they reveal they admire mutants and don’t hurt them since the ones they get are already dead.
He wants it to stop, but it’s a very good business and he doesn’t think that Mags can take them down because he’s lost his powers. Mags knows he’s goading him, but he’s also right. Still, he notes that the difference between someone who’s a real mutant and a MGH-user is that they haven’t been persecuted and think they’re immortal just as SHIELD busts in and starts shooting with rounds meant to kill Mags, who he notes only shoot because they look like mutants at the time.
The head of the operation tries to run with his cook, but Magneto puts a stop to that. The useless agents chasing him tells him to stand down, but he rightfully points out that if they did a better job of stopping this crap he wouldn’t need to keep doing what he’s doing. The agent ignores him and thinks he’s just a feeble old man hurting people to make himself relevant.
Magneto promptly states she doesn’t understand him and he doesn’t answer to her, before escaping with the MGH cook. He takes the cook to a lab that his new friend bought and tells him to perfect the MGH formula so he can regain all his lost powers as the comic ends.
Okay, review time.
What can I say, Mags is a man with more than one goal and this time he only personally killed one person. It’s clear he pretty much set it up so SHIELD would do the dirty work for him, and he got what he wanted without having to strain himself. That’s a master planner for you, folks.
The air was a little off at the end, but other than that it was a solid issue at 5 out of 5.
Magneto #7 Review
Magneto has more work to be done and this time he’s going overseas to do it in Magneto #7.
The comic starts with him in a cell in Hong Kong, having allowed himself to be captured by some douchebags in order to get the drop on who’s been kidnapping mutants off the streets according to Briar, who has a private jet to get him there. Like he said, most people don’t recognize him without the helmet. If they did, they wouldn’t have nabbed him of all people.
To his surprise, they have not only sentinel tech, but a creature called a predator x. This thing is covered in metal and hunts down mutants, but Magneto is more than his powers. He was defined by his experiences, and once the predator x gets some of his blood and establishes a psychic link, it got a full blast of them and ended up crippled long enough for him to shove a bone through its brain like a boss.
He then gives everyone else five minutes to clear out before he beats the hell out of the assholes setting up the fight, letting them have a taste of what the mutants they sentenced to death felt like. Passing two more predator x creatures, he comes to the holding cells with only two mutants left alive. The mutants reveal the bad guy sells those who can’t fight off, only for Magneto to learn he’s been making MGH from the captured mutants, which Mystique pulled on Dazzler up until recently.
He grabs the guy, gives him a shot of it in the eye, and then tosses him down to the two remaining predator x creatures so they can munch him as the comic ends.
Okay, review time…
A quick issue with Mags dishing out his brand of justice is always something I can respect. While it has ties to the plot of someone giving tech to people way above their means, it is somewhat skippable overall. Not that I would recommend it.
4 out of 5.
Magneto #6 Review
Magneto now has an outlet for his rage and he’s going to express it in Magneto #6. You’ll get my review here and now. So let’s dive into it, shall we?
The comic opens with two nameless SHIELD mooks following up on another Magneto slaughter. They show Scalphunter, a marauder clone, the same amount of respect they do the last few people who were victims of Magneto’s wrath, only he kind of deserves it. Magneto took extra steps to make sure this one survived, because after he cut off all his limbs he cauterized the wounds to make sure he couldn’t heal.
The story then skips to Magneto going through their ranks after his new partner-in-crime gave him a leg up on them. Because they’re clones and when one cell is killed another cell activates, he’s got a lot of work to do. She leaves him to it, but suggests that rather than simply breaking them he should keep them for himself.
Magneto, as he watches over the ones fleeing from him, recalls how the Morlock Slaughter on the orders of Sinister, just because they were imperfect. It was genetic cleansing, something Magneto is all too familiar with, and in his time as a villain he at least never made his followers kill mutants in the name of genetic cleansing and betray their entire race. Ultimate Magneto did, but not mainstream one.
He kills Harpoon with a crane before nearly passing out after killing Riptide. The rest move in to finish the job, recalling he’s nowhere near as powerful as he used to be. He still gets past there defenses, revealing that he’s already discovered how to do so through some metallic fluid that lets him drive it right into their brains because it’s the third time he’s done it. When they ask why he’s killing them when they are mutants, he proclaims they don’t fit his definition of mutant because of their actions.
As the comic ends it is revealed that by leaving Scalphunter alive he’s found another cell ready to be activated and can reprogram them to serve his will.
Okay, Review time…
Nice to see that the new girl is earning her keep already and the story is progressing, but the art work felt a little worse than usual on my eyes. I’ll call it a 4 out of 5.
Uncanny X-Men #22 Review
It’s time to bring the conflict between Bubblehead and both factions of the X-Men to a close as I give you my review of Uncanny X-Men #22!
The issue opens with Magneto bringing Dazzler to Triage, since Elixir is still missing. Emma and Magneto take a look at her and think that Mystique has gone too far, even compared to them at their worse. I can’t say since I wasn’t around for those times, but what matters is that Dazzler is healed and pissed off.
Meanwhile, in Westchester, the townspeople see what’s happening in the distance and figured it was only a matter of time before SHEILD came after the X-Men and decide to get out of the way. But not before Hijack lives up to his codename and hijacks someone’s car. The school is under attack and has to be abandoned while Maria Hill has to contact the Avengers and White House about this little screw up, as well as ordering Dazzler shot on sight for walking away with no proof she’s involved, which is illegal.
This is when their nuclear anti-mutant payload gets unleashed and they turn out to have even newer Sentinels. Yeah, good luck explaining that. See, you can’t trust SHIELD not to have weapons of genocide.
Anyway, before they all get wiped out, Hijack pulls a big damn heroes and stops the entire fleet from functioning. Although the sell-out was about to switch teams, I’m not question how he got to New York so quickly. What I am questioning is why his powers are working when we know for a fact that Bubblehead made the Blockbuster Sentinel immune to his powers before. I’m calling it an ass-pull, but it gets the job done as he has the Helicarrier open fire on the new killer robots.
The two teams gather as Cyclops and Beast go after the one responsible since his powers were being controlled by nanosentinels by Dark Beast… wait; didn’t Dark Beast get captured in the last issue of Astonishing X-Men, after Iceman froze a good part of the world over? I knew SHIELD couldn’t hold Mystique, but come on! And, as tempting as it is to assume that this is the cause of their broken powers, we all know that the nanosentinels don’t explain why Magik was forced into her dark-side form or why Colossus was screwy and the best Forge could whip up was some tech to keep him all metal, or Magneto, who could sense metal, not noticing.
Ass-pulls all around!
Anyway, the initial blast managed to damage his suit, killing him. But he left a bomb behind that Hijack takes care of. Thus the day is saved, minus the fact that Maria Hill will probably be fired considering that all of this happened on her watch, as Cyclops points out before Dazzler quits because Mystique managed to kidnap her on the Helicarrier and the X-Men were the ones who saved her.
Okay, review time.
Ummm, ass-pulls all around really take away from it all. Let’s be frank, I don’t care about Dark Beast being the one responsible because it’s a lighter ass-pull and… well, no one’s going to miss a version of Beast being dead.
But really, this cluster-fuck was manufactured to try and tie everything up in a neat little bow from the fact that Hijack was selling out to the other team and just so happen to be useful to having a familiar villain be killed off.
On one hand, it’s finally over. On the other, Mystique still got away and, while she lost her main source of MGH, she can always find some other mutant and hook them up to make more.
So… 3 out of 5.
Magneto #5 Review
A short and late review is better than no review at all as I cover Magneto Issue #5.
The comic begins Magneto pondering that there was comfort in basic activities, living an ordinary life. But because he’s the Master of Magnetism he doesn’t find any comfort in it like the flock of sheep normal people are, merely that he’s wearing a mask at present and the people around him will become causalities once he takes it off. That’s why he likes small towns, less people die when he goes on the war path… at least that would be the case if he believed that he can be redeemed, but in truth it gives him a chance to recover away from prying eyes.
Except there’s one nosy lady who gets involved in his business and he corners her in an alleyway. She, Briar Raleigh, claims to be a friend who wants to help him and knows about his mountain base. Since she knows that eventually he’s going to go berserk on people again and it’s only a matter of time, she wants to keep him busy by giving him targets to go after that she knows he would want. She even knows his favorite Brandy, so she’s been stalking him for some time.
Briar reveals she has information on even the SHIELD Taskforce assembled to take him down and the Marauders. She tells him that she knows he’s going to war again, and she won’t stop him. She just wants to make sure that only the ones he’s targeting are the causalities, rather than innocent people like she was.
As the comic ends we get a flashback to the aftermath of one of Magneto’s rampages in what looks like Seattle, where Briar’s family was killed and her leg was damaged. He sees her as a shepard of the flock of people, and muses should he let her live.
Okay, review time…
So, like the other chapters we deal with the aftermath of Magneto’s rampages, only this time we have someone who was crippled by him. It’s interesting to see that Briar should hate this man with a passion, but instead she’s helping him out. She’s figured that he’s going to keep being who he is and the only thing she can do is to help minimize the number of people who have suffered for it by giving him a guiding hand.
She doesn’t like him, but it seems like she isn’t letting her personal feelings get in the way of something she deems important. And then she apparently has decent detective skills to get all that information, so she’s got my respect.
Despite lacking action, I give the issue a solid 5 out of 5.
Magneto #4 Review
Magneto’s hunt for those responsible for the poor-man’s omega sentinels has come to an end, but his task isn’t done in protecting mutant-kind. So today we take a moment to look into why he fights once more in this review of his solo series 4th issue.
The story begins with Magneto walking through a pristine and isolated mountain forest. He states he chose that spot because it reminds him that the world is much bigger than the war he’s fighting and had his youth not been stolen from him he may have enjoyed taking a break in the wilderness. Then he opens a lock hidden in a tree with his powers and reveals that he has a secret base in the mountain. Apparently he hadn’t been there in a few years but came back after his latest mission.
Not the omega sentinels one of course. We cut to a scene where a school bus carrying mutants is heading to a remote farm. The seemingly jerkass humans taking them there make many references to god and how they’re better off ignorant of what awaits them, so it goes without saying they’re Purifiers. Naturally Magneto would have words with them and you discover just how brutally he can murder someone with barbed wire. Broken powers my ass.
Turns out that farm they were taking those kids to was a research facility and many dead bodies are laid about as Magneto strolls through to find dissected mutant kids who were taken apart and had their powers cataloged before they were killed. Yeah, I don’t care how you sugarcoat this or dress it up with religion the Purifiers are fucking monsters worse than most of the villains in Marvel.
Therefore, rather than pointing out their hypocrisy on calling out Magneto killing ‘innocents’ when they do shit like this, I point out the dumbasses thought to do it in metallic armor while confronting someone who could control metal. The fight is more of a slaughter, as it always has been, and while he claims they fight because of misguided faith I claim they did it because they got off on killing mutants and it let them get out their violent urges while waving a banner of religion as their shield.
Back in that mountain base it turns out that Magneto has the names of thousands of mutants killed before their time with each one to serve as a scar and fuel his rage. As he adds dozens more to the list from dealing with that last mission, it’s clear that this is a memorial and the first of many. But the rest of the memorials are carved in the blood of his enemies and on their graves to remind him of how small the world is in the face of his rage because of things like this as the comic ends.
Okay, review time…
I hate the Purifiers. Let that be known. Monsters and villains with ambitions are better than these sanctimonious pricks and makes for a damn good reason why Magneto does what he does.
Art-wise the comic is about the same as always, but what moves this story is the plot and the message sent as Magneto adds those names to the list of countless others. 5 out of 5 is my score for this.
Uncanny X-Men #21 Review
And we’ve reached a turning point in Uncanny X-Men #21 folks! Read this review for my thoughts on the matter!
The story picks up where it left off with Cyclops blasting the JGS staff as his powers run out of control until he passes out. Naturally things go from bad to worse as Magik goes Dark Childe and summons a dragon. Storm puts them both down with a bolt of lightning and the group needs to decide what to do with the two as Beast says he’ll handle it. Part of me was cheering that Beast may have been done in by the blast, but it was false hope. Maybe he’ll try to redeem himself by not being a douche-bag, but he doesn’t even get a chance as Mystique wearing Dazzler’s skin has come for the two of them with SHIELD backing her in Helicarriers.
Wait, back up a page. How the hell does Storm know that Magik has Limbo inside of her? She shouldn’t know that unless her daughter from the future told her, and I’d like to have seen that on-panel or at least an admission. And why the hell is Quentin in his bathrobes outside in the rain? Plot-holes!
Uh…anyway, back in Madripoor we have the Blob earning respect the only way you can in the place: kicking the shit out of everyone else in a bar brawl. Like he said, he was an original brotherhood member and he will be respected. But naturally his drug-gained powers fail and he needs his next fix, so like all junkies who know where the source of their drugs come from he goes to get some fresh from it.
He leads Magneto straight to Dazzler, who rightfully points out Mystique has made him a druggie and he should be ashamed. Magneto does not tolerate mutants being exploited for MGH and given the rampage he’s been on in his own series, the only reason Blob is still alive is because they’ve known each other so long. Magneto frees her and they both set out to go fuck up Mystique’s plans.
Back at the JGS it comes as no surprise Maria Hill is there and wants Cyclops. She’s got the hots for him and this is a chance she doesn’t want to pass on. But, since having something wrong with him could potentially back fire while in bed, she gives Beast an hour to see what the hell he can do to fix it, much to the shock of Mystique-Dazzler. They don’t have five minutes before Helmet Head, who I now suspect is a future student of Beast’s from his dialogue, takes control of their Helicarriers and open fire.
Beast, in another moment of shocking competence, tells Storm to take the battle head-on and keep the school intact while he figures out who is responsible by examining Cyclops and Magik. Man, getting chewed out by the Watcher did some damn good after all. Too bad he got shot. As for Maria Hill, SHIELD once more proves their incompetence as they explain they’ve been compromised (again) and Storm brings down the lightning on them.
We then have a brief cut to the NXS school, where the kids have been looking all over for Emma. Her daughters don’t even need to read her mind to know she’s worried and annoyed for Cyclops since he left without her, like you would expect from an ex-girlfriend who isn’t out to ruin your life because you broke up with her. This is a rarity, of course. She says she can feel something is wrong and just as she does something in the sky comes falling down towards them.
The JGS sends out a message for the students to get to the emergency bunker as Quire reads Maria’s head to try and figure out why they’re attacking and Mystique-Dazzler is just walking away. Meanwhile Beast still proves himself a douche-bag by talking trash to an unconscious man he’s known his entire mutant career, but he does say he knows who is responsible just as the Helmet Head tells him it’s time to show him who’s the smarter one as the comic ends.
Fucking teasers! Would it have killed them to just say the guy’s name in the last panel so people could rail about it! Stop dragging it out, Marvel!
Ahem… okay, review time.
The art was not to my liking but sadly was standard for this series, which is a damn shame considering how All-New X-Men is goddamn beautiful. Even worse is the fact that the pages are a jumbled mess to me as they cut away at the worst times. They couldn’t have done the NXS scene before the scene with Maria appearing?
The plot is moving, so there’s that, but I can’t give this more than a 3 out of 5.
Magneto #3 Comic Review
Magneto’s finally found the people responsible for making the poor-man’s version of the Omega Sentinels and now he’s going to make them pay in issue #3. There’s surprisingly little bloodshed, but I still enjoyed it. This is my review.
Our comic opens up at the tent city from last issue, where the SHIELD douche-bags have arrived to kick everyone out of it since Magneto went waltzing through and leaving bodies. Leaving aside the fact that the police were probably aware of the place and let it be until SHIELD comes barking orders, they question Samuel and treat him like he helped the man kill those bastards despite it being clear he doesn’t know a damn thing. This is why no one likes them, television show be damned, but it shows the ramifications of those who were just at the wrong place at the wrong time or are unjustly punished for a good deed.
Magneto himself laments he isn’t as strong as he used to be, since then he would have tossed the building into space. Instead he’s relegated into sneaking around until he comes across the process being done and recalls how the X-Men and him have kicked Sentinel-ass so much that they’d gotten to the point of underestimating them. Then Genosha happened and a nation of mutants millions strong was wiped out in a single attack, a nation he ruled as a safe haven for them.
He maps out the building with a magnetic pulse like a bat does sonar and finds a Master Mold, which he can’t destroy on his own with his powers nerfed. So instead he finds this nerdy looking scientist woman who’s thanking three-freshly minted omegas for sacrificing themselves for this, which Magneto calls BS on. Toying with both human and mutant lives to play at being God is nothing but vanity.
The three attack him, but he makes short work of them after getting nicked by a blade before he gets a name out of her. She’s Elizabeth Alain, the project leader. That was just the person he was looking for to help him shut it down. She resists of course, but that ends as he forces a paper clip into her skin and moves it through her slowly and agonizingly until she leads him to the console room.
She explains that the mutant murders that Colton committed were oversights, an accident. The facility was meant to be a human refuge for those who fear mutants and wanted to be segregated from them. Someone direct them to it so they could create guardians to protect them. Her speech eventually gets on his nerves and he kills her, because all while she’s doing it he remembers Genosha and how that ended, and he brings the place down with a few keyboard strokes.
As the comic ends he wonders if he was too rash, not with killing her but with not getting the name of who led her to the Master Mold and figures he’ll find them just the same.
Okay, Review time…
Now, I have to say either that woman was naive and stupid or she was a liar. Using ramshackle Omega Sentinels at all is not only morally questionable, as it requires messing around with a human being and those people from the Tent City were being forcibly taken, but downright paranoia fuel.
At least with the giant ones when people see them coming they can run. That lowers the number of civilians killed in the crossfire for the most part. The Omega Sentinels are meant to be stealthy so as to sneak up and kill mutants, not guard people when you consider how loose they are with their weaponry.
Whoever directed her had far more ominous intentions, so either she was too stupid to realize it or she knew and was sugarcoating it. It doesn’t matter now. So, it was a good issue and I can’t really find any fault with the comic or story that detracts from it.
5 out of 5.
Magneto #2 Review
It’s that time again. I’m back with my review of the most mature and violent X-Men comic in production right now, Magneto #2. Read on folk!
We begin with SHIELD interviewing some of those caught in the crossfire of Magneto’s last fight. You don’t invade a police station without someone being injured and there’s no getting over the fact that taking down the kid turned into a dime-store Omega Sentinel had shaken some people to their very core. However, we learn that he has some fans that rock ‘Magneto was right’ shirts harder than Quentin Quire and I must say I am slightly as disturbed as the SHIELD agents who ponder what unholy terror he would be if his powers ever got fixed.
Meanwhile, Magneto arrives at a shanty-town made of tents and people who fell down through the cracks of society called Down Acres. He finds their plight familiar because in the 1940’s he was in a similar situation when he and two others started smuggling food to survive and feed their families. He and another made it, but they could only listen in as the other didn’t and was held at gunpoint.
Magneto meets with the person in charge of Down Acre, a seemingly nice man named Samuel who welcomes him in and offers to feed and shelter him as long as he pulls his weight. Once in private though, Magneto gets to the point by asking about the men who took Colton, the poor young man who was turned into that killing machine last issue. Men come in the night and offer them work, but when the people wised up that they never returned the men started taking them—starting with the ones who fought back.
It was an all too familiar thing for Magneto as he recalls that fateful night, when his friend that got caught was given a choice out of desperation. He tells the name of the other friend, not Magneto, in exchange for being allowed to take his food back to his family. He is promptly shot in the head while the other friend flees, leaving Magneto to learn that desperation and hunger could make men break. He thinks back to that day, that his name wasn’t the one that was uttered, and wonders if it was necessary for him to do as he does to determine the course of history.
With that in mind, Magneto promptly kills the men coming with rusty nails. No banter, no declaration, just an ambush that graphically kills them all with the exception of one since he can’t afford the luxury that is mercy. To the final one he gives a similar ultimatum to the man who killed his friend, information so that he could walk away alive. The man talked in desperation to survive, and Magneto guns him down now that he knew where to strike.
Okay, review time.
This was a powerful issue. Rather than relying on action, we look at some of the hardships in the past and present, how desperate times makes men into monsters. Magneto has never shied away from being a monster, so long as it was for a cause that would ensure his people don’t go through the same shit he went through.
This issue gets a 5 out of 5.
Magneto #1 Review
Something violent to wash down the aftertaste of this week’s Uncanny X-Men
The Master of Magnetism has struck out on his own and I’ll be following along in the path of destruction he has laid out as we review the first issue of the Magneto solo series.
The story starts in Cape Girardean, Missouri, where some unfortunate barista is having the pleasure of being questioned about the murder that transpired moments ago. And when I say murder, I mean the victim got skewered by sign posts through his mouth until he was pinned to the ground. The barista states that the assassin knew his routine and had a brief discussion before he ripped the fillings out of the victim’s mouth, threw him into the street, and then replaced them with said sign posts, and that for this guy killing was like autopilot.
We then go to Kansas, where Magneto contemplates his circumstances in the motel. He knows he’s got a one-way trip to hell, but right now what he’s doing is for the greater good of mutants and so his actions are all that matters. This is shown in a minor flashback to when he met the victim of the murder, who contributed to many of the Anti-Mutant organizations even if he never once pulled the trigger himself. Magneto made him pay for what he did in the past by taking away his future and he would do the same for others.
It’s then a maid arrives and gives him some newspapers that he asked for. He can tell she knows the name he’s given her is an alias and that he’s dangerous, but very few people know what Magneto looks like without the helmet. Still, he makes sure to tip her very well. Never let it be said he was mean to the help.
He then goes to his poster board map, which outlines where he’s tracking down the enemies of mutants. He’s lower on resources than before, going from some of the most sophisticated tech to old laptops and newspaper clippings, but he’s still managed to stay out of the hands of SHIELD and those who would be interested in him. SHIELD’s gone as far as to place fake reports of attacks on mutants to draw him out, but he can tell real from fake and figures they won’t take him seriously until he hits a target too big to ignore.
Until then he focuses on his next target, in Mountain Air, California. It took him awhile to get there since he was flying under the radar, and while tracking the killer of three mutants was easy enough he didn’t expect him to turn himself in. Magneto acknowledges that he’s jailed, but thinks that’s too little of a punishment and not nearly severe enough for the grimness of his crime.
So he strolls into a police station and calmly calls forth all the metal he can to clear out the cops while reforming a helmet to match the rocking black motif he’s got going on. I doubt it’ll offer him psychic protection like the normal one does, but it’s the image that counts. After taking care of the police in the way, he confronts the killer who seems frightful and wants him to leave, even shocked that he murdered someone. Then the freaky stuff happens.
His chest tears open, his arms twist into weaponry, and he opens fire upon Magneto. He’s a poor-man’s version of the Omega Sentinel, a human turned into a death machine. Magneto puts him out of his misery by ripping the machinery away, leaving him dying and in pain.
In the man’s final moments Magneto asks who turned him into that monster, realizing he was as much of a victim as those he killed. He gets a location and relates to his pain of being unable to stop himself like he was on autopilot. And then he swears to find the ones responsible for this and make them pay as well as the first issue ends.
Okay, review time.
Now, this was a good start overall. The plot picks up some time after Magneto dropped a building on Mystique and flew off, so we’re catching up on what he’s like after doing this for some time. There’s no time wasted in-between and we get straight to the grittiness that’s evident in the artwork.
Character-wise, I felt Magneto was spot on. He’s always had mutants’ best interest at heart and punishes those who deserved it for endangering the species. While he’s had moments where he was a flat-out villain, the current version of him tries not to overdo the killing of innocents or straight-up human bashing. You could see it on his face in the final page that he felt bad about it, but there was really little choice in the matter…that being said, if you try to lynch him after he saves your ass from a train wreck, he will drop all the wreckage on you.
I can’t really think of any faults to the story for the opening of the series and it was a decent read, so I’m giving Magneto #1 (2014) a perfect 5 out of 5.
Twilit Dreams Circle 