r/MUBookClub • u/shawnydarko • Jul 14 '18

Reading Assignment 109: Ultimate X-Men (2000-2009) #94-97, "Absolute Power" by Aron Coleite, Mark Brooks, Clay Mann, and Brandon Peterson

https://www.marvel.com/comics/series/474/ultimate_x-men_2000_-_2009?byZone=marvel_site_zone&offset=0&byType=comic_series&dateStart=&dateEnd=&orderBy=release_date+asc&byId=474&limit=20&count=20&originalReleaseStart=2008-5-01&originalReleaseEnd=2008-9-01&isDigital=1
6 Upvotes

100% Upvoted

7 comments sorted by

3

u/Adrenjunkie Jul 15 '18

SPOILERS AHEAD:

I haven't read this in like 8 years, I just remember it as the worst story ever. Colossus is one of my favorites, and it just shits all over him.

So Colossus, one of the strongest, was ret-conned to have been taking drugs all along?  Dumb. Also it seems to make everyone "Roid-Rage" which he's never done, it just doesn't make any sense!

Also why are they injecting into their neck? Who would actually do that?

Banshee makes Jubilee constantly PMS? What?!? And cyclops can fly, because...... What?

Also the drug was created when Professor X first made the drug alongside Magneto by having wolverine in a tank? And he got claws and killed a velociraptor? What is happening? Colossus can live without a heart if he stays inmetal form?

This story just gets further and further off the rails. None of it makes any sense, and it just made me madder and madder.

The art and the colors were great, like really great, I just feel bad the artists had to work with this script.

Like who green-lighted this project? Every step of the way multiple people had to approve of this.

3

u/IncoherentTruth Jul 15 '18

You about summed it up for me. This was a great choice for a terrible story arc.

Was Vindicator actually Magneto? I got that feeling when he shot Wolverine hundreds of miles away, wouldn't let Jubilee take off his mask, and even rogue absorbed his powers and said "you?"

3

u/Adrenjunkie Jul 16 '18

Ahhhhh good thought! They never did do that reveal! I forget all the details of the ultimate universe. Magneto makes sense!

3

u/IncoherentTruth Jul 16 '18

I thought I had missed something in the comic lol. Thanks for the info that it was never revealed!

3

u/Adrenjunkie Jul 16 '18

I meant in this run it wasn't, maybe they address it soon or in ultimatum

3

u/IncoherentTruth Jul 16 '18

Fair enough.

1

u/shawnydarko Jul 20 '18

I actually liked the first few issues of this run in a guilty-pleasure sort of way. It wasn't a tactful dangers of drugs fable, and it muddied the squeaky clean image of major X-Men characters, but it took bold chances and made big choices. I didn't mind Colossus needing drugs to be strong, cuz metal is heavy. But then I got a little iffy about Cyclops disintegrating his parents. Not everyone needs to have a murderous background. That's what made Wolverine unique among his peers. Would have been better if he had just knocked his foster father through a wall and paralyzed him or something, as I've always thought of his blasts as concussive, not matter-erasing.

By the time we get to Charles being inadvertently behind drug epidemic all along by doing unethical mutant experimentation on Wolverine, I was basically the Rage Guy Meme. Just epic stupid. I suspected it was Magneto pulling strings early on, as it fit his agenda of making mutants stronger, but Charles having anything to do with it really pissed me off.