Completely agree with your assessment of C&D. I couldn't put my finger on exactly why this issue felt so empty, seeing how I've enjoyed the book since its launch. Recently though its been kinda spinning it wheels and depending more of set-dressing. If it is indeed over with 50 (this has been more or less confirmed, yes?) its sad to see one of the most consistently original books in the X-Line-Up go out on such a whimper; the first twelve issues showed signs of greatness that have slowly seeped out, with the last bit of life slipping once Cable "died."
once again, Carey stands out as one of the only X-Men writers in recent years who clearly cares about how his stories fit into the wider history, and understands that continuity can be a resource as well as an irritant.
What about Peter David?
Also, consider that Astonishing is badly off schedule, somewhat a celebrity project and adhering to it's own special kind of continuity (not universe wise, but theme/style wise and more towards past continuity than concurrent continuity). Likewise, Brubaker did a space story where too many connections to other books would likely have felt forced.
Ultimately, IMO the x-books had a phase with little interconnection, but Carey is not the or one of the (few) writers going against the trend. Rather, circumstances and editorial direction went from looser cross-continuity to closer.
NXM's MCX issues are being done by Humerto Ramos, rather than Skottie Young who's the one running late with #43. Indeed, both NXM & X-Factor are using fill-ins for the crossover (Scot Eaton for the latter), and UXM and X-Men have been using fill-ins in the lead-in so that their regular artists have had time to stockpile crossover issues. There is no seeming reason why any of the issues should be late (famous last words 
).
> Completely agree with your assessment of C&D. I couldn't put my finger on exactly why this issue felt so empty, seeing how I've enjoyed the book since its launch. Recently though its been kinda spinning it wheels and depending more of set-dressing. If it is indeed over with 50 (this has been more or less confirmed, yes?) its sad to see one of the most consistently original books in the X-Line-Up go out on such a whimper; the first twelve issues showed signs of greatness that have slowly seeped out, with the last bit of life slipping once Cable "died."
I think a big part of the problem is that the book's been seriously derailed three times* - and arguably four - by having to tie into other plots, with the last being Carey's nicking of Cable, which has resulted in a Year Four where the title character who's been driving the major plot when allowed has been essentially completely absent, and another book (X-Men) nuked the premise, literally.
[The three times were (1) Liefeld's X-Force killing off Cable, which required five issues (#15-19) to set right just when the book had traction; (2) the Blood of Apocalypse tie-in (#26-27), which went off-tone and really didn't work much, and (3) obviously, the Carey/X-Men thing, which derailed it from #36 on. The arguable fourth was the Civil War tie-in (#30-32), which Nicieza worked in well enough, but seemed to come at the wrong spot - Domino Principle was originally meant to run four issues, and got hacked down to two because the CW arc needed to be done then.]
And, yes, Nicieza's off with #48 when his contract runs out, and then there's two fill-ins to run the series out as an anniversary issue (although, oddly, #49 was solicited with Nicieza writing, even though he's said both in interviews and on message boards that he's too busy to do the last two issues, and he's had a word with his replacement about them....)
Huh...do are the just reformatting the book because Nicieza leaving? Was it a pet-project of his? I mean, obviously he had a vision for the book...and yes, those are excellent points where the story got sidetracked due to larger plot reasons. Its funny, for a pair of characters who were seemingly on such a far outside track of the Marvel Universe, they seemed to have gotten very popular since the book started. Well, really just Cable I suppose.
Nicieza's apparently leaving early because the book's been cancelled, so he can take some (undefined, unless I missed it) non-comics work.
I thought this was Carey's best issue, because he lets the pacing down a bit and gives the characters some room, instead of the "Grant Morrison JLA" frenetics that tend to dominate in the past. Plus, good art, for once.
You know I've been thinking about what happened with Cannonball, and felt adding telepathy to Sinister's power set was a surprise. Was there any chance it was Exodus who was supposed to mindwipe Cannonball?
If Wanda is this easy to find someone ought to just grab her, take her to Strange and see if they can make her fix things.
And I after the last issue I hope Iceman does something nasty and creative to Mystique eventually. Let him explore his powers.
The thing about the books with Morrison's direction seems to be almost as soon as he wrote it Marvel was deciding they didn't want that as the direction.
> You know I've been thinking about what happened with Cannonball, and felt adding telepathy to Sinister's power set was a surprise.
While it's slightly obscure in that it's not used much, Sinister HAS had telepathy since his early appearances (although the only time I remember him using it post-Inferno was in the Onslaught tie-in issues of X-Man & X-Force, where he managed to shut down Nate Grey).
Mmm, it strikes me more that Nicieza saw the writing on the wall and wondered how many crazy people he could have Deadpool meet before the ship sinks entirelly. It feels a bit like he's throwing his hands up in despiration. We've had a Wolverine/Hydra story, A Captain America time travel story, a FF pseudo-science story, and next month is a Dr. Strange story. It's all been pretty light-hearted, and frankly if I were him, I'd be kind of bitter, with the main character of my book being removed with a stunning amt of regularity over the book's run (see the list above).
And indeed the Scarlet Witch is very easy to find. Hawkeye tracked her down about a year ago in New Avengers, talked cryptically for five minutes, and then had sex with her. And then he left.
Well, #40 (the Cable monologue issue, which fits between about two panels of X-Men) shows significant bitterness, with both Cable and Irene Merryweather, well...
Cable rants for a bit about people's inability to see him as anything other than Big Guns Guy - "The mind plays tricks. | For some time now, it's been telling me I can help change the world. But all along, some scratching subconscious doubt kept reminding me...|...all that I'll ever be is what people expect out of me..." |[...]| "I can't be what I want to be. Because I always have to be what they need me to be. Tragic, tortured, gun-toting tough guy. Over-powered mutant messiah. Such extremes to what I really am, who I've always been, if anyone had been paying attention."
And Irene gets the immortal line "I knew this was going to happen...the second he told me he was going to work with the X-Men again...I knew...|...it would lead to ruining everything we worked for."
Which, let's be honest, is barely subtext if it is at all. It's the writer's thoughts on getting his book's premise thrown in the bin by another book, and one of the leads "killed off" by the same book, put into the character's mouths.
"Smash" guest stars the Hulk. And that's basically the plot. It guest stars the Hulk, and the X-Men fight him for most of the issue.
That's a fair criticism, but bear in mind that Parker's just using that for one issue of First Class, whereas Marvel as a whole is using that as the basis for a line-wide crossover!
Foolkiller is baffling. The creators have been talking in interviews about how it's allowing them to tell Punisher stories that they can't tell in the Marvel Universe, which seems very odd. First of all, they're jamming a largely unrelated character into a role in which someone else is a better fit, and secondly, there are two Punisher ongoing books that Hurwitz could take over for five months if he was really that desperate to write a Punisher story. It's a very odd justification for a new series.
...and to follow on from above, your note about Foolkiller appealing to the audience of Saw is probably much closer to the truth than all this "I want to tell a Punisher story but can't guff".
That should be:
all this "I want to tell a Punisher story but can't" guff.
Oops.
"Carey's nicking of Cable..."
I believe the main driver here is the new CABLE solo title, which Carey is merely helping to set up.
I've felt that C&D have been circling the drain for quite some time now, and as somebody mentioned, all the sidetrack stories weren't really good for the book's momentum. The last issue I was really excited about reading was that T-Ray one a while back. Now, I read it more out of habit. And with knowledge of the book's demise, everything feels like filler, almost exactly like those last five issues of Agent X after Gail Simone left and the book was just waiting to die.
For me, the series has had some nice moments, but nothing that really compares to Deadpool's solo series. I've always chalked that up to Nicieza not giving us a good supporting cast, something that Kelly, Simone, even Priest did extremely well. Add that to the fact that Deadpool doesn't really have any enemies and you lose a lot of what makes a comic book great.
Well Dirk Anger's not doing anything any more, and he'd make a great recurring nemesis for Deadpool.
I'm not sure I understand the though process behind why a MAX version of Punisher is needed. After all, isn't Punisher-... er, a character with a MAX title?
Or is the difference really in the "Saw" mentality, in which case admittedly we're not dealing with a transparent Punisher rip-off, since for all his madness, Punisher doesn't get off on how creatively he manages to kill someone?
Adam, it's very odd. In promo interviews, the creators have been talking about telling Punisher stories that they can't normally tell, but if, as you say, the key difference is that the Foolkiller enjoys what he does, then it's not the Punisher at all. Then again, it's not really Foolkiller either, but so it goes.
I haven't read the issue, to be honest; I'm just going off of all the reports, which say that Foolkiller basically has seen "Se7en" so many times that it's gone to his head (he mutilates the genitals of a bunch of college rapists - 'cause, y'know, that's irony).
Mr. Castle would've just shot each of them in the head and been done with it.
What I don't get about this Foolkiller comic is that it appears as if the protagonist is actively seeking him out, even though he's an unsavoury character in his own right. It would be like a street thug who mugs people looking for the Punisher to help him deal with criminals and killers worse than he is. That wouldn't happen because Punisher would probably kill the mugger as well as his enemies.
Were any of the previous incarnations of the Foolkiller big on avenging people?
I think Nathan's going to try and get the Foolkiller to help him out.
Axel Alonso recently said "Deadpool has a place in the X-Universe, and that place starts with Wolverine". Deadpool's Wolverine: Origins arc starts in January. So that means that a new ongoing will spin out of that arc, which is bad, and that Way will be writing said ongoing, which is worse.
Oh dear. Daniel Way writing Deadpool? The horror.
Brett, the original Foolkillers were more satirical; one hated hippies and war protestors, another hated materialism. The 90's version was less satirical, but it could be argued that it was a spoof of the Punisher at that time.
The current one has no satirical edge as far as I can tell, just violence for violence's sake, it seems.
Brett, in fairness, I think we're supposed to be well aware that Nathan is doing something very silly and self-destructive. I think it's meant to be a "moth to the flame" sort of thing.
Daniel Way on Deadpool? A writer known for, ahem, weighty, dramatic stories and they're putting him on a character known for aburdist black comedy? Have they gone mad?
Just wanted to comment on the Foolkiller review. I just read the issue, and it was okay I guess.
What struck me was that you, Paul, as well as other reviewers, has had the opinion that this Foolkiller ha nothing to do with Gerber's version. To which I answer that the whole plot so far is lifted from his 1990 Foolkiller series (man reaches rock bottom, the world is presented as place without justice or meaning, man gets cryptic messages from serial killer with perverse sense of justice, man begins to identiy with him etc).
There's LOTS more gore, of course.
But to be honest, I doubt this series will end up as bleak as the original, philosophically speaking. Steve Gerber was on a SERIOUS nihilist trip when he wrote tht one.
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