So the kids got back from the early 1900s at some point and returned to L.A. for volume 3. The initial creative team was Terry Moore and Humberto Ramos, but I don't have any of those issues, not being a particular fan of Ramos' art. I gather they set up shop in a beach house owned by Chase's parents at one point, that aliens came looking for Karolina, which resulted in Xavin pretending to be her and getting killed, or hauled off to stand trial for something and probably be killed.
I have the last 5 issues, the first of which is a fill-in where Molly takes a trip to San Francisco to see if she wants to live with the X-Men (she doesn't), and the team plays Truth or Dare and Nico hatches an evil magic serpent egg hidden inside a Sons of the Serpent staff Karolina stole on a dare. You can either blame Nico for shitty aim, or Chase for refusing to sit still and play the game properly, take your pick.
After that, Kathryn Immonen and Sara Pichelli have a 4-issue arc where the older kids hold "prom" in the house for themselves. The house gets hit by a drone being used by some military guys to smuggle things under the radar. I think it was redirected by Victor, looking for music for the "prom" and hacking into some encrypted channel, but that's not made clear. Old Lace dies, Klara freaks out, Chase freaks out, Chase's uncle - who actually owns the house - shows up.
That stuff I said last week, the original six having a little bubble no one else can fully breach? In full effect here. Nico's idea of comforting Karolina about Xavin being gone, possibly dead, is to say Karolina was more teacher to Xavin than partner, and if Xavin really is dead, then it was for Karolina, so she should make the best of it! *slow clap* Bra-vo. Would have been better off brandishing the Staff of One and shouting, "Therapy!"
When dealing with the magic snakes, each of which that births an egg which quickly hatches and repeats the process, Chase dares - as part of the game - Victor to eat one, which kills it. Chase admits he didn't know that would happen, he just figured if it didn't work, Victor is a machine, so they can just rebuild him. Chase is angry about Old Lace dying and talks about killing Klara. Nico tells Victor at one point to make like a suicide toaster and jump in the ocean.
When Chase's uncle finds the package the drone was carrying and offers it to them as a way to have some money, after also helping them find transportation, Chase uses the weird interdimensional box that's holding the package to trap his uncle, and just walks away. Can his uncle survive in the box? Who knows? Certainly not Chase. The uncle, Hunter, does survive, and somehow still wants to help Chase after that.
It's funny, because Immonen refers back to the story Chase told during their volume 2 NYC jaunt about killing a hobo who tried to steal his van (which Chase later insisted was a lie he convinced himself was true.) Now, the "hobo" was his uncle, who may have just been trying to talk to Chase after he bailed during a fight with his parents, and he didn't die, though he has an artificial hip from being run over. By Chase. Who then just kept driving. Chase apparently flew past Guilt over this some time ago, and settled firmly in Anger.
The book isn't helped by miscommunication between Immonen and Pichelli. The drone hitting the house and seeing Old Lace dead freaks out Klara, who causes a bunch of vines to grow and trap them. But it's unclear if they're under the house or still within it. Concerned destroying the vines might somehow hurt Klara, Nico tries a spell I assume is meant to make the vines transparent or crystalline (Nico says "Crystal Light"), so they can see their surroundings. It's drawn like she either disappeared the vines, or teleported everyone onto the beach. The house is nowhere in sight. Seeing a handful of military guys, Nico magicks up a giant log cabin ("Abraham Lincoln"), but it looks like they're just standing in a purplish void with some rubble. When really, they're still somewhere in the remains of the house, because Hunter leads Victor to an underground hanger with some vehicles to escape in.
Really just a mess of a run, top to bottom. Immonen's work occasionally has these issues, where it feels like she either left too much unsaid, or didn't make sure the instructions to the artist were clear, but it's especially bad here. At least it ends with Chase getting hit by a van because he followed a girl he thought was Gert across a busy street. The last page is him getting treated in a hospital while the rest of the cast sits around waiting for him to show up again. Every dark cloud, eh?
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