New Mutants 73 - Inferno

Illyana goes back to where it all started.

New Mutants #73

Writer: Louise Simonson
Penciler: Bret Blevins
Inker: Al Williamson & Mike Manley
Letterer: Joe Rosen
Colorist: Glynis Oliver
Editor: Bob Harras
Editor in Chief: Tom DeFalco

Illyana battles S'ym knowing that she could destroy him but at a terrible cost. Meanwhile others search for her. Sam (Cannonball), Rahne (Wolfsbane), Bobby (Sunspot), Warlock, Boom Boom and Rictor are delayed by a street that comes to life and won't let them pass. Colossus strides through New York alone and forces demons to take him to S'ym. Magneto and the rest of the Inner Circle of the Hellfire Club are confronted by N'astirh who tries to make a deal with them; Wolfsbane hears part of the conversation and she and the others are soured on their headmaster further. First Colossus and then the New Mutants reach S'ym and discover that Illyana is now entirely encased within a suit of armour. Ashamed she flees into Limbo with the New Mutants following whilst Colossus battles S'ym. Within Limbo Illyana declares she must stay there to rule it as the Darkchilde, rejecting her human side, and that her whole life has led to this moment. Things get worse on Earth with demons attacking the church where Dani (Mirage), Rusty and Skids put up a spirited defence despite their wounds. Rahne realises that because time doesn't exist in Limbo they can save Illyana's younger self from going down this path. Searching through multiple portals they find the six year old girl who first came to the realm but are then confronted by her older self who wants to kill her. Rahne tells Illyana that contrary to what N'astirh claimed there is a choice and she can save her younger self. Returning everyone to New York the older Illyana sucks most of the demons, including S'ym, back through the portal then throws away her Soul Sword. Colossus and the New Mutants find the armour with a voice crying out - inside is the younger Illyana freed from her dark path with the older self having sacrificed herself to save the day. But N'astirh is still on Earth with plans.

This is the final New Mutants issue of Inferno, a special double-sized issue that brings the title's contribution to the crossover to a conclusion. In doing so we also get a very definitive conclusion to the story of Illyana. In addition the regulars get their first encounter with any of the X-Men since the latter's apparent deaths as Colossus shows up to help his sister. Though Illyana herself gets a scene of coming to terms with the realisation that this is indeed her brother, the reaction of the others is limited to Bobby commenting that they though Colossus was dead and Magneto glimpsing from afar the X-Man being carried by two demons and deciding that it can't be him. But it's an appropriate guest appearance for a highly personal tale.

The themes of child abuse and corruption have long been central to Illyana's story as her childhood was stolen and she was brought up around men who used and abused her. One of her abusers was S'ym and now she is stronger and more powerful to fight back - but he is also more powerful than before. She cannot bring redemption through confronting her abusers and instead seems fated to forever be the corrupted being who was once an innocent little girl. Convinced she has no choice in the matter any more there seems nothing her friends can do to help her. The metaphor is strong and effective. The solution less so.

Limbo has been established as a realm where the rules of time work differently from Earth. This is reinforced early in the issue as demons remind Colossus that, "Time different in Limbo. ... One time is all time in Limbo... is part of Limbo's special magic." It's sufficient to prepare for the moment whereby the older Illyana is effectively negated when her younger self is rescued from the realm just after her arrival with the realm's magic able to overcome the logical rules of time travel and altering a character's history making it work in the narrative. But it also feels unsatisfactory given the metaphors. Real life abuse victims cannot just make their torment have not happened. At most they can suppress the memory but it is not easy to simply lock away a bad memory and never think it again. They can help save others from being abused but not turn the clock back. Thus Illyana's end is not so much overcoming the effect of the abuse to live as committing suicide. For the rest of the New Mutants may have saved her from the whole experience and triumphed but for her it's not the best outcome to a story that's been running ever since she first entered Limbo many issues earlier.

The art on this issue manages to capture the themes of darkness and salvation well. One of the main problems throughout the crossover has been the rather silly look of S'ym. Here we get him drawn in demonic poses and coloured especially darkly which makes the character look credible but he really needs to lose the cigar. Otherwise the key moments are well drawn especially Illyana's final transformation and action.

Overall this is an ending that both does and doesn't work. As a story of the New Mutants ending the threat of the demons and saving Illyana it's a viable ending. But as a conclusion to a very personal saga that has long served as a metaphor for child abuse it's utterly unsatisfactory.

Alpha Flight 80 - Acts of Vengeance

This issue is a combination of one big battle between three different factions and a massive infodump about Llan the Sorcerer and how he's been manipulating a lot of recent events in order to produce the necessary violence to generate a spell to open the "Eye of the World", also known as the "Gateway of Night", in order to access dark power.

Alpha Flight #80

Writer: James D. Hudnall
Penciler: John Calimee
Inker: Mike Manley
Letterer: Janice Chiang
Colourist: Bob Sharen
Managing Editor: Marc McLaurin
Editor: Danny Fingeroth
Editor-in-Chief: Tom DeFalco

The first problem is that the magic used in the story is not made terribly clear in all circumstances. So whilst it's explained that the participants in the fight were all manipulated in order to produce the violence, it's not clear why this has to be done in Winnipeg, a city barely a hundred kilometres from the Canadian-US border and nowhere near the Eye's location way up in the north. If it's because somehow the violence has to be generated on Canadian soil, as the previous issue and Talisman's insistence that the villains be thrown out of the country implies, then it becomes especially silly as the idea ancient magics are tied to modern political entities within artificial boundaries (and it's hard to think of a bigger artificial boundary than the Canadian-US border) is just risible.

Quite a chunk of the story is taken up with the origin of Llan, but it feels a waste as he doesn't directly interact with the fight in Winnipeg. Instead this feels like preparation for future issues of the series which is great for regular readers but there's been nothing in these two issues to encourage people picking them up because of the crossover to hang around. The connection to events elsewhere is tangential to say the least and the choice of villains shows another sign of poor communication as the Owl has been used elsewhere in Fantastic Four and there's no explanation given for him being here as well. The battle itself is intense yet feels strangely inconsequential, with Talisman continuing to manipulate the other members of Alpha Flight to bring a conclusion.

Overall these issues feel very much like they were written parts of a regular ongoing saga then suddenly realised they had to take part in the crossover and so hastily pulled in a few villains from other series with a contrived explanation. The result is another extremely disappointing chapter that just doesn't feel a real part of "Acts of Vengeance" but rather a terrible advert for the current series.

Alpha Flight #80 has been reprinted in:

• Acts of Vengeance Crossovers Omnibus (2011)

Alpha Flight 79 - Acts of Vengeance

We come now to the first issue of "Acts of Vengeance" featuring Canada's superhero team, Alpha Flight. Or maybe not quite, as this issue comes during a period when the team has been ordered to disband by the Canadian government and replaced by Gamma Flight. However the Alphas are still operating independently out of a new headquarters in Edmonton.

Alpha Flight #79

Writer: James D. Hudnall
Penciler: John Calimee
Inker: Mike Manley
Letterer: Janice Chiang
Colourist: Bob Sharen
Managing Editor: Marc McLaurin
Editors: Carl Potts and Danny Fingeroth
Editor-in-Chief: Tom DeFalco

The problem is that this issue, written by James Hudnall and drawn by John Calimee, isn't very good at explaining the current status quo, with most of the key details coming on the penultimate page. And more generally there's not a great deal to introduce the team and explain who the current members are. Alpha Flight does not interact that much with the rest of the Marvel Universe due to their location and so prior knowledge cannot be assumed. Especially as this story implicitly suggests they have been forgotten by the alliance of supervillains since they aren't specifically targeted. Rather the main focus of this issue is about a load of nasty things coming into Canada from the United States, whether villains fleeing the Super-Powers Registration Act or pollution that's destroying the fish and wheat.

Unfortunately these elements seem awfully contrived. The pollution scenes feel especially tacked on - one is the opening page of the story, featuring characters not seen elsewhere, the other is in a field as Vindicator flies over. Both scenes just push the point of greater pollution being created by Canada's neighbour to the south, in an era when there was a sudden explosion in concern about the environment, but it feels overtly preachy. The villains coming as well isn't convincing either. As seen elsewhere, the Act is only draft legislation before the US Congress and most of the villains are high on wanted lists anyway. The story may be trying to evoke the Vietnam War draft dodgers who fled by moving to Canada but again feels odd. And the reaction from Talisman may be focused on the potential for the villains to become agents of some foe called the Sorcerer (another ongoing plot point that isn't explained for crossover readers) but the response is simply "we have to deport them" in an issue called "Outsiders". This attempt at Canadian eco-nationalist propaganda, written by someone from California, feels very awkward and stilted.

The villains in question are Nekra, the Scorpion, the Owl and the Asp, though the last two are only shown arriving on the final page. All are converging on Winnipeg and so Alpha Flight's Talisman starts transporting individual team members to pick the villains off one by one before they can unite. The fights soon attract the attention of Gamma Flight.

This is one of the weakest issues in the whole "Acts of Vengeance" crossover. There's no real attempt to introduce the current situation for readers brought in for the event (most of whom probably won't have stayed around), some terrible attempts at analogies, excessive preachy points in scenes that serve no other purpose and a rather random use of the cast. The result is a rather tedious slog.

Alpha Flight #79 has been reprinted in:

• Acts of Vengeance Crossovers Omnibus (2011)

Quasar 7 - Acts of Vengeance

There's a handful of issues that don't have an "Acts of Vengeance" banner that nevertheless form part of the crossover. One such is Quasar #7 in which the cosmic Avenger encounters the cosmic powered Spider-Man. The two have met before, back in the days of Marvel Team-Up before Quasar went off into space for years, but we now get Spider-Man's only interaction with any other hero whilst he has his powers (the Hulk of this era doesn't count). It's reasonably self-contained, which is probably why it's been left out of all the Spider-Man based collections of the cosmic storyline.

Quasar #7

Writer: Mark Guenwald
Penciler: Mike Manley
Inker: Danny Bulanadi
Letterer: Janice Chiang
Colourist: Paul Becton
Editor: Howard Mackie
Editor-in-Chief: Tom DeFalco

In spite of the lack of a crossover banner, we get a foe that neither have fought before, Terminus, the alien destroyer of worlds. There's no link to the alliance of leading super-villains, just a menace that has resurfaced from where it was trapped and setting out to devastate the Earth. Earlier we get the almost obligatory fight between super-heroes when Quasar investigates Spider-Man as part of a mission to check all aliens on Earth in order to find the one predicted to kill his mentor Eon. Spider-Man has no time for this and lashes out, firmly explaining he doesn't need help to find out what's going on.

But despite this, Spidey responds to a call for help later on when Quasar discovers Terminus coming close to attacking New York and quickly realises he can't deal with the menace on his own. Thor is unavailable and the offered Captain America would be no use, but Spidey's strength comes in handy. Spider-Man has his doubts, but Quasar knows what buttons to press by pointing out the webslinger claims to now be the strongest man on Earth and has friends and family in the city.

Given the scale of the menace that Terminus threatens, it's a rather quick dispatch and suggests the primary purpose of the story is to move the planet wrecker into a particular position in preparation for a forthcoming larger story. As a result this story is quick and inessential.

Quasar #7 has been reprinted in:

• Acts of Vengeance Omnibus (2011)
• Quasar Classic Volume 1 (2012)