What’s Covered?
New X-Men # 151 - 154
Roster Watch
Synopsis
The "Here Comes Tomorrow" story by Grant Morrison is a dystopian possible future, meant to show what could've happened if Cyclops quit the X-Men after Jean died.
NXM # 151
Writer - Grant Morrison
Pencils - Marc Silvestri
A man (Tom Skylark) and his friend Rover (a Sentinel) encounter 5 Nightcrawlers (crawlers)
Rover kills 4 of them
E.V.A. shows up and they fly off together
Pretty cool to see E.V.A. (the separate nervous system of Fantomex) show up as her own character. It looks like the Beast (it's the Beast we know) is creating an army of Nightcrawler creatures with various power sets.
The Beast says:
“ mankind nears final extinction. The mutants are but one of many species fighting for survival in this New World. All great and small, rich and poor, will fall to my dominion. And receive their makers mark..”
One “crawler” follows them to the institute, it has lazer eyes (Cyke) and Multiple Man powers. It’s trying to destroy an egg (phoenix egg).
(new) Beak comes to help. Looks badass.
The Beast takes the Phoenix egg. Took down Rover (The Sentinel).
The “Three in One” (remaining Cuckos) are in control
Cassandra Nova is in charge. Talks to Wolverine.
I still don't understand how Nova is alive, why she's acting in the interest of mutants, or why anyone trusts her.
150 years earlier
Emma is trying to convince Scott to reopen the school but he says that he’s going to quit
So this seems to be the backdrop of the story. Jean is dead, Emma wants to re-open the school, but Scott just wants to quit everything.
NXM # 152
Writer - Grant Morrison
Pencils - Marc Silvestri
Apollyon, the Destroyer, leads an army of "Crawlers" on behalf of The Beast
Apollyon is one of those characters who is never really fleshed out, but immediately gives off the aura of being important.
EVA and Tom are flirting
This doesn't go anywhere but I kind of wish that it did.
Tom, Rover, EVA, W, Cassandra Nova, Beak are a team
Apollyon is a U-Men
The Beast resurrects the Phoenix Egg
Says to call him Sublime
So this is the piece that connects the entire Morrison run. Sublime was not a person, but a living parasite. More on this later.
NXM # 153
Writer - Grant Morrison
Pencils - Marc Silvestri
In Panafrika, home of the Termids
Phoenix destroys the bug- ike Termids
One skull is left conscious
This seemed like a cool concept but we learned almost nothing about them and they died just as quick. Similar to "Cassandra Nova is good now," we get "there's an entire race of intellectual bug creatures now!"
Appolyon really wants to be made whole by getting a Phoenix graft
Crawlers go after a talking whale
Don't ask.
NXM # 154
Writer - Grant Morrison
Pencils - Marc Silvestri
Beast denies Apollyon and injects himself with Phoenix DNA
W talks to Jean/Phoenix
Convinces her that humans deserve a chance
I feel like I've seen this before.
Beast took Kick and was infested with Sublime’s sickness. That's how he went mad.
So Kick was part of the Sublime stuff too!?
Cassandra and Martha (No Girl) are chatting before Cassandra is blown up
Beast kills Beak (Our Beak’s grandson) and EVA
Wolverine slashes at Beast’s eyes, but is then left powerless. Maybe dies?
Jean pulls out the Sublime from Beast, then Apollyon decapitates him
I don't know why I just couldn't get into this story.
In the past, Jean wants Scott to date Emma so that this future storyline never happens
If Scott and Emma run the school, Beast doesn’t resort to using Kick.
This seems like a convoluted way to get readers to be ok with Scott dating Emma.
My Connections and Creators
Hmm, where do I start? Did I like this? I didn't hate it. I didn't love it. Like the last Morrison arc (Planet X), everything seemed to happen so fast. I somehow both appreciated that it was different from Days of Future Past, while also not liking that it was too similar to Age of Apocalypse. However, while both AoA and Here Comes Tomorrow introduced new characters and factions, we didn't take the time to settle into the world. Like, why bring up that there is a whole country of bug people but then not take a second to explain how the hell that happened!? Why introduce a mysterious mutant whale? I want more bug people!
Marc Silvestri was back! That was super cool. I recall liking Silvestri during the Claremont era, but never appreciate him as much as others seemed to. However this was a breath of fresh air. Maybe I'll just never settle into anything that's too different from that 90's style I grew up with.
The X-Pressions has some good editorial commentary in the back of 154. First, a comment about Cassandra Nova:
"We hope you can live with a little bit of mystery there, though you'll note it is strongly suggested that Cassie isn't quite who she seems to be..."
First, I'm actually relieved to hear that she might have been somewhere else because it didn't make any sense that she would be back and alive and reformed. In fact, that felt quite lazy. Also, I bet you five bucks that this remains forever unresolved.
Second, there's a comment about Scott and Emma:
"Many of us grew up with Jean and Scott as THE definitive comic book couple! But we hope that after you've read the issue you're holding now, you'll understand Grant's master plan: it's Jean herself who chooses for Scott to be with Emma, in order to prevent the horrible events of 'Here Comes Tomorrow.'"
Yea, I don't know about that one. It reminds me too much of "Don't worry, Maddie is evil so it's ok that he abandoned his wife and child for an ex girlfriend." Jean's only ok with Scott dating Emma because it needs to happen to avoid an apocalypse. It doesn't change the fact that Scott cheated on his wife and is once again a dirty bastard.
Finally, a comment about Beast:
"It was indeed disillusionment, as well as science that made him what he became - though perhaps not quite in the way you anticipated."
Let's talk for a second about the Sublime of this all. This reveals that Sublime was behind everything all along? Let me go through the stories and try to connect some dots:
I'm not quite sure if Sublime was supposed to be connected to Cassandra Nova during E is for Extinction, however I don't think so.
Obviously the entire Germ Free Generation story is about Sublime, but now we know that John Sublime was just a human under the control of the Sublime organism.
This also makes sense why John Sublime seemed to want to fall to his death. I had thought it was Martha (No Girl) Johannson, but I think it was actually the organism getting out of the spotlight.
Apparently Sublime had its fingers all over Riot at Xaviers. The drug Kick, which was featured prominently throughout this run (and appeared in the sister series as well), was really a version of Sublime.
So Kid Omega (Quentin Quire) and his Omega gang were all under the influence of Sublime.
Finally, Sublime could provide the biggest cop out. Magneto may have been influenced by Sublime in Planet X. That could explain why Magneto was being so evil and so goofy, however that doesn't change my dissatisfaction with that storyline and how he was treated as a character.