What I Bought 3/25/2026

It was 90 here yesterday, but I will not turn on my air conditioning. Not yet. Plus, it's barely into the 50s today. Lousy Smarch weather. Here's two comics from this week.

Fantastic Four #9, by Ryan North (writer), Humberto Ramos (penciler), Victor Olazaba (inker), Edgar Delgado (colorist), Joe Caramagna (letterer) - 

The FF get their tails kicked by Evil Sue and run with their tails between their legs. Galactus gets left behind. Ha! Regular Sue tries to reason with Evil Sue, since fighting her isn't working. Talking doesn't work either. In fact, Evil Sue decides she ought to make another just like her, and Johnny barely manages to cut in before his sister gets the same brain surgery.

Oh, and Earth is being attacked by aliens of some sort. I don't know what they're supposed to be; Ramos just draws them as big purple things with sort-of grasshopper legs. Don't really think that should be such a serious problem just because the FF aren't around. The Avengers and the X-Men deal with aliens, too!

I have to wonder at Evil Sue's motives for wanting to make Regular Sue just like her. If she can do everything, if the rest of the FF are useless, if Galactus is no match for her, what does she need a duplicate for? I kind of hope this isn't a Killing Joke, where she wants to prove anyone that goes through this will end up acting like she does.

I'm toying with the possibility she wants to die, and figures another Sue like her is the only thing strong enough to do it. A death wish wouldn't really track with her notion that she no longer feels guilt, but unless Evil Sue has a very different educational background from Regular Sue, she's not a brain surgeon. How could she be sure she burned out the right part of her brain? She admits she's holding back, that she lets Sue hit her with some attacks to see if she'll go for the kill. She's playing with the rest of the team, just throwing things at them to keep them busy while she tests Regular Sue.

I guess that could just be villain ego. Get to the end and find out Evil Sue is just like Doom, she like monologue and show off too much.

Generation X-23 #2, by Jody Houser (writer), Jacopo Camagni (artist), Erick Arciniega (color artist), Ariana Maher (letterer) - Laura is this how you make friends?

All the teenagers with powers were kids being experimented on in the facility where they currently live. But, as the apparent leader, who calls himself X-Infinite, tells us, one of the test subjects got loose and released some kind of vapor that killed everyone. And X-Infinite is the only witness. Not suspect at all! 

The handful who didn't die stuck around and call it home. They tend to have several powers, as a result of being experimented on, and they all refer to themselves by their experiment numbers. X-73, X-92, and so on. More concerning, X-Infinite insists on referring to Laura as "X-23", despite her repeatedly saying her name is "Laura." Not concerning!

Scout participates in a little training exercise with the others - just enough to give us some general sense what their powers are - until X-73 suddenly starts generating heat. Or fire. Either way, he's not immune and despite Laura's encouragement - to the extent, 'You have to control it!' qualifies - he blows up. And when she wakes up, X-Infinite says she has to answer for his friend's death.

I don't feel like Houser is being particularly subtle that something isn't on the up-and-up with X-Infinite. On the other hand, he isn't wrong that maybe they're safer in this secure facility than accepting Laura's offer to join whatever mutant school is currently available. If they don't think of themselves as mutants, or even if they do but don't particularly want to get missed up in X-Men nonsense, that's their business. Laura doesn't need to be proselytizing.