Welcome, one and all, to another edition of the Beat’s weekly Marvel Rundown review column. This week it’s Beast vs. Beast as a younger Hank McCoy faces off with his twisted older self in the explosive finale of Ben Percy’s 50-issue run on X-Force with artist Robert Gill. Oh, and a word of warning: This review contains significant SPOILERS for this week’s X-Force finale. So if you’re not ready for that yet, head down to the rapid rundown of other new Marvel titles, including Incredible Hulk #10, Ultimate Spider-Man #3, and a celebration of 300 issues in Miles Morales: Spider-Man #18. Then head back here after you’ve finished your stack of comics.
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X-Force #50
Writer: Ben Percy
Penciler: Robert Gill
Color Artist: Guru-efX
Letterer: Joe Caramagna
When the book on this era of X-men is written, Ben Percy’s dual runs as writer on Wolverine and X-Force will be remembered as both anomaly and highlight. Percy’s longform storytelling is a dying breed in serialized superhero storytelling and few have utilized the monthly ongoing so well. This final issue of X-Force is the cap on the Beast’s storyarc which has run throughout both books for nearly 100 issues. Amid all the sturm and drang of the Fall of X, this 50th issue of X-Force manages to navigate to a mostly satisfying conclusion of a tightly plotted thriller.
As the newly revived Beast, born from a cloned body and a mental backup from his 80s Defenders “Bounding Beast” era, seeks to stop the maniacal plans of his older self, he is joined by one-time best friend Wonder Man and chased by X-Force, who are unsure of his motives. In this issue, past and present collide as the internal war between the better and worse angels of Hank McCoy is made literal.
Where the issue falls short is mostly in the art. Penciler Robert Gill is a serviceable artist but his layouts are too loose, making action scenes disjointed or strangely paced. The final climactic moments feel rushed as Gill stuffs what should be the defining image of the issue—the elder Hank McCoy’s sacrifice—into a narrow column of panels. It makes it harder to buy into the sudden turn. For all of Percy’s meticulous plotting, the art makes for an anticlimactic end for one of the most interesting characters of the Krakoa era. The art simply doesn’t let Percy’s story unfold as clearly as it should.
Guru-eFX’s colors help tighten up some of the layout problems and Joe Caramagna’s letters dance around the characters and shaky panels to drive at clarity. This all sounds harsh— Gill’s work isn’t awful, but it is just shy of the quality to make this issue pack the emotional wallop of its script. Still —Beast finds something resembling redemption, or perhaps better stated, a second chance.
Beast’s sacrifice feels sudden and somewhat unearned in part because of that artistic disconnect, but Percy’s script gets us most of the way there. Throughout Wolverine and X-Force we’ve not seen Beast show remorse or wrestle with his utilitarian principles. In this final issue, a culmination of Beast’s long descent into villainy, we realize that it is because he has divorced himself completely from the idealism of his youth. Keeping a mental backup of his more carefree days, Hank McCoy has effectively bottled up every part of himself that would doubt and externalized it as a reminder of failed dreams. Here at last he he admits to his younger self he could not bring himself to destroy that spark of optimism for good. In the end, The Beast is not defeated by X-Force or Wolverine. He must literally wrestle with himself. Faced with something more innocent, urged to remember his friendship and loyalties by a part of himself he had locked away, Beast rescues his old friend Wonder Man, who is willing to give his life to stop Beast’s megalomaniacal plot. In the end, he gives his life to save another. It is a redemptive act that recognizes the gravity of his dark deeds.
It is not enough.
I find it unlikely we will get much regarding the younger, revived Beast dealing with the ramifications of his older self’s war crimes and cruelties in the new era of X-Men books. But in a way only superhero comics can, Percy has managed to simultaneously give clear-eyed punishment and a second chance to a character. There is something both hollow and hopeful in that. The story ends with a reset to something familiar and comforting, but as the topper of a long-running narrative, it still manages to resolve a riveting and tortuous character-focused story while balancing the demands of corporate synergy. In this finale, Ben Percy nails the defining tension of superhero comics: the eternal superposition of “The End” and “To be continued.”
Rapid Rundown
- The Incredible Hulk #10
- No stranger to Hulk horror stories in the wake of Immortal Hulk, the Incredible Hulk team have found a similar but wholly different approach in bringing horror Hulk to monster of the week action. In this installment, writer Phillip Kennedy Johnson spends the runtime having Charlie stalked by a Dark Souls boss, Nephele, while Hulk learns of his next opponent. Odd though that the book starts the conflict on Hulk needing to find Charlie, and the resolution is listening to Nephele’s deviant origin. But we’re not here for plot, we’re here for the heavy inked French Quarter streets that Danny Earls imbues with enough Bloodborne energy that we forget realism and luxuriate in the surrounding crypts. With New Orleans in mind, color artist Matthew Wilson brought back warm orange streets and a purple undertone that tiptoe transitions to gothic blues in the underworld scenes– this creeping approach helps reinforce the villain’s slow stalking instead of loudly contrasting in an impactful manner as we’ve seen in previous Incredible Hulk outings. Oddly enough, with Earls guest-starring, we’re able to see the difference between Nic Klein’s handlettering and the digital lettering from VC’s Cory Petit. Here, Petit uses dramatically less sfx and when he does go for it, the result visually clashes with Earls’ art unlike with Klein’s work; that’s not a knock on either, but a different approach to lettering Earls’ work would’ve gone a long way to make the pages sing. Overall, #10 gets us through the motions to the showdown with Nephele well enough, so if you’re enjoying the weekly monsters, I can’t blame you. — Beau Q.
- Miles Morales Spider-Man #18 (300)
- Writer Cody Ziglar is joined by artists David Marquez, Sara Pichelli, Juann Cabal, Matt Horak, Luciano Vecchio, and Federico Vicentini to celebrate the 300th (legacy number) issue of Miles Morales being Spider-Man. In the wake of the “Gang War” storyline and the repeal of New York’s vigilante act, Mile’s growing list of advisories, including Rabble and the soon to be out of work Agent Gao of the Cape Killer squad, make an all-out push to take out our young web-slinger. As a celebration issue, the artists add their unique flares to the action, style, and humor of this high-octane slugfest, sprinkled with purposeful character moments that deepen Mile’s supporting character bench, and one hell of a level up for Miles. —GC3
- Ultimate Spider-Man #3
- Each new issue of Ultimate Spider-Man continues to surprise in the best ways. Once again, writer Jonathan Hickman swerves left when readers probably expect him to go right. Issue 3 introduces this world’s Spider-Man to The Green Goblin. Their interactions, like the first issue’s twist, goes in ways unique to this world. Hickman keeps creating interesting ways tying a friendly neighborhood hero into the bigger picture of this Ultimate universe. Here, Green Goblin, who’s been taking down Wilson Fisk businesses, fights a familiar bullseye adorned assassin. Surprising no one, he works for the real people in charge and is on loan to Fisk. Meanwhile, Hickman gets to have showing a thirty something Spider-Man figure out superhero stuff and who to trust. Marco Checchetto clearly relishes drawing the physicality of Spider-Man. He’s great at the weird, funky web slinger poses but also the downright goofy ones. Checchetto also renders the more everyday stuff with the same aplomb. That said his compositional choices favor low angles giving those scenes a tense feeling. As always, Matthew Wilson gives this book its own color palette. He favors oranges to give this book a gritty, grounded look. This book just keeps up the promise of that first issue. —DM
Next week: Deadpool #1 and Spider-Man: Shadow of the Green Goblin!
