What I Bought 7/6/2021 - Part 4

Over the weekend, I managed to pick up all three comics that came out last week I wanted. So we'll get to those starting on Friday. In the meantime, here's the last two books from last month. Monday was for second issues, but today is for third issues. Trying to get over the hump in their respective storylines.

Way of X #3, by Si Spurrier (writer), Bob Quinn (artist), Java Tartaglia (color artist), Clayton Cowles (letterer) - Kurt has interesting DTs.

Kurt gets really hammered at the gala for reasons I'm unclear on, and frankly, don't get a fuck about. In the aftermath, he's wandering around and sees a cloaked figure handing out something to lots of mutants. And it's Stacy X! The comic is 5000% better for me already. Kurt is appalled to learn she's handing out contraceptives, which, well, he is Catholic.I guess he wouldn't agree to using his powers for abortions then. Stacy points out that plenty of mutants have been following the first law about making more mutants, and apparently just abandoning them at a place called the Bower Stacy and some other mutants run to care for them. (It's also a place people can come with partners they want to spend time with, however they define that.)

Bravo Krakoa, great fucking hustle once again. Maybe the first law should have been "make and raise more mutants," asswipes. Anyway, Legion's busy searching for, sigh, Onslaught, and also using his telepathy to short circuit a potential relationship between a couple of young mutants. Onslaught's still on the loose though, so they return to the bar, and it turns out Dr. Nemesis is hassling Dazzler all the time because he's actually really into her. Hell, man, who isn't, but I'm never a fan of the "hostility is a mask for attraction" trope.

So some of the residents of Krakoa are looking after the babies. Which is nice, but it sounds like a voluntary thing, rather than something the Quiet Council established. Actually seems apparent from what Stacy says the Krakoan government hasn't done shit for all its newest citizens, too busy in their dick measuring contest terraforming Mars. So the Bower is like when people start a gofundme to pay their hospital bills, because the U.S. government is a useless pile of shit. Yes, Krakoa has certainly moved beyond "sapien" thinking. Man, it is really hard not to want to see these assholes fall flat on their faces.

You Promised Me Darkness #3, by Damian Connelly (writer/artist), Annabella Mazzaferri (letterer) - Yeah, I got nothing for you.

The Anti-Everything and Sage are both moving their plans forward with 10 days until the big show. The Anti-Everything's plan is to steal power from as many other comet-affected people as he can. Sage's plan, well, Sage isn't saying, other than that his(?) plan is much better. It involves Sebastian getting control over his powers, since he was apparently important to the Anti-Everything's father's plan.

Which has possibly given the Anti-Everything an inferiority complex, or daddy complex. Something like that. We learn that during a flashback sequence to the first time he almost caught up with Sebastian and Yuko, and she used her power on him and his goon squad. Which might explain why that one girl had run off and was living in an alley last issue. There's another flashback before that, to the Anti-Everything finding some other comet types over a year ago and having what I assume was a fight. Connelly draws everything so closely focused on people's face I can't tell much of what's going on. But a character named Igny says she used an energy bomb, sooo, I guess there was an energy bomb.

I get Connelly's not really writing this to be some big superhero throwdown comic. It's more of a, creeping apocalyptic doom sort of thing. The sense of impending horror. Especially since the Anti-Everything seems to take powers by breaking people down and absorbing them into himself. Someone Sebastian and Yuko met was melting, and then she seemed to break into a bunch of little globs. Like the inside of a lava lamp. And when all he's doing is drawing people sitting around talking, it works fine. His tendency towards extreme close-ups is fine.

But man, it would be nice to actually be able to tell what's going on more often. Anytime something actually starts to happen, it's just a mess. The backgrounds are so inky and dark, even if you can distinguish the person and what they're doing, there's no context because you can't tell where they are in relation to anyone else. It's like every person in this comic is in their own separate little world, talking and acting, and sometimes it intermingles with someone else's world, somehow.