Quick Hits: 2/22/11

Rejoice True Believers, it's yet ANOTHER all-Marvel edition of Quick Hits! I'll get back to DC tomorrow, but today is a Marvel-ous day. See what I did there? Pretty clever, no? Meh. Anyway, we have three comics to get through so hows about I shut my yap and get started?

Generation Hope #4:

Summary: Having captured Kenji(the EVIL Japanese “light”)the X-Men load him onto their plane and fly back to Utopia with Hope and the other 4 “lights”... God, I REALLY hate that term, “lights”... I don't know why, but it really irks me. Maybe it's just me. Anywho, the X-Men touch down on Crazy Mutie Island and tell the “lights” that they'll be given rooms after they get checked out by Dr. Nemesis. The animal-like “light”, Teon(I think that's his name...) decides to attack Wolverine to see who the alpha... um, alpha animal themed mutant is and gets put in his place by Wolvie. While the other “lights” are getting their various check-ups, Emma Frost and Lord Summers talk to Kenji who explains that he never meant to hurt anybody, he wasn't in control of his body, etc. Emma doesn't think he's lying, so Lord Summers agrees to let him stay on Crazy Mutie Island. Nemesis tells the “lights' about their powers, and they are given rooms. They meet up with the now contrite Kenji and he apologizes to them all profusely for his earlier actions before heading to his room to act all crazy.

Thoughts: I basically still have the same problem with this comic that I've been having with this series thus far... None of the “lights” stand out. Besides Hope, I only know them by vague descriptions... We have Animal Boy, Blue Girl, Self-Loathing Girl, and Horny Boy... Those are REALLY sucky codenames... Well except for “Horny Boy”. That has potential. The other ones though? Pure suck. The only new mutant who stands out is Kenji, and that's only because he's crazy. The last page teaser image showed that the kids appear to be getting costumes next issue, which means codenames should follow(I hope!). Once they have codenames I'd figure they'd become more distinctive and I'd be able to tell them apart better... Or at least that's what I'm hoping for.

Score: 7 out of 10.Oh, you KNOW he's up to no good!


Wolverine and Jubilee #2(of 4):

Summary: Jubilee wakes up in a strange room and finds a glass of blood which she takes a sip of before wondering where she was. Wolverine enters the room and tells Jubes he had taken her to Siberia, since there wasn't many hours of sunlight, and even when there was sun, it was usually overcast. Wolvie decides to do the whole “tough love” thing to snap Jubes out of her vampire funk, but Jubes is on to Wolvie's games and isn't buying. After Wolvie's failed tough love experiment, the two head back to their hotel where the hotel owner tells them some sort of sob story about zombies having invaded a mine in the town. The duo head to the mine and Jubes basically singlehandedly defeats all of the zombies while Wolvie watched. With the zombie trouble taken care of, Wolvie and Jubes head back to their hotel room, and this issue ends with Wolvie waking up to find the mysterious vampire woman from last issue standing over the fallen Jubilee.

Thoughts: See, now THIS was what I wanted out of the last issue of this mini-series! Just Wolverine and Jubilee. Not the rest of the crazy, and QUITE annoying X-crew. I liked Wolvie's attempts at forcing Jubes to deal with what she had become in his own unique Wolverine style, and I was even happier when Jubes caught on to what Wolvie was playing at and wouldn't feed into his games. I mean there really wasn't MUCH story advancement, but that was fine, as the dialogue was really well done and captured Wolvie and Jubes relationship really well.

Score: 7 1/2 out of 10.I'd bet Wolvie didn't see THAT coming!


Amazing Spider-Man #654.1:

Summary: Although this comic was called “Amazing Spider-Man”, it very easily could have been called Amazing Venom, since the new Flash Thompson Venom took center stage here. We see Flash on his first mission with the Venom symbiote, trying to mess up Flag Smasher's Ultimatum plans. Flash infiltrates a meeting between several of the world's major economic players and spots an Ultimatum agent, placing a bug on her person. Later on, Flash discovers that Ultimatum had captured one of the people at the meeting, and using the bug he placed on the Ultimatum agent he is able to track the terrorist group down. Flash finds the captured man and tries to get him out of there, but is accosted by Flag Smasher and his goons. The goons throw some grenades at Flash, blowing his legs off, which puts him into an old school, “I'll eat your brains!” type Venom rampage. Flash decimates the goons, and bites off Flag Smasher's hand before regaining control and getting the captive out of there. Upon meeting with his commanding officers, Flash explains that the mission went well, and although disturbed by what he had seen, the captive doesn't let on that Flash lost control. Although they can't prove anything, Flash's commanders suspect something fishy happened on that mission, and are concerned when they take the symbiote off of Flash but are only able to get 99% of the symbiote out of Flash...

Thoughts: I definitely enjoyed this issue, and as such am REALLY looking forward to the upcoming Venom series. Several important things happened here, namely Flash losing control of his temper and the symbiote taking control of his actions, as well as the fact that 1% of the symbiote remained in Flash's system, meaning permanent bonding with the symbiote is a possibility. Oh, and on a personal note, it was nice to be able to type the word, “Flash” in a comic book review again, even though this wasn't the Flash I necessarily want to be reading about...

Score: 8 1/2 out of 10.Yummy!