There's so much here that it's hard to know where to start.
There's a moment in this issue where I wondered if Remender and Cassady hadn't gone too far. In describing the dystopic America that Red Skull sees before him to Steve Rogers, they portray a gray landscape of overweight rednecks shopping at Wal-Mart stores, dousing themselves in "antibiotics to offset their diet of sugary sweet drink and mounds of carcinogenic cow flesh!!" Zounds! I mean, I get where they're going with this approach. The Skull is trying to get to Steve's inner '50s man. In fact, the Skull is pretty insightful, questioning whether Rogers is fighting to preserve the current America or trying to bring back the old one. It picks up the theme that Brubaker pushed in the last series of "Captain America," but does more with it than Brubaker managed to do. But, at some point, I just felt like maybe Remender and Cassady had gone a little too far in portraying "rednecks" the way they did, as some sort of monolithic enemy of American ideals.
And, then, Rogue appeared and told the Skull, "Don't you go dumpin' on rednecks, Nazi....we're awful hazardous when riled." And that's when this issue became one of my favorite ones ever.
As that sequence shows, this issue is a tour de force of characterization. Remender portrays Wanda as finally forced to let go, losing the restrictions that she had placed, sub-consciously, on her powers since M-Day as she faced down Thor. But, no matter how assured Wanda is of her performance, how renewed she feels for not falling prey to the Red Skull's manipulations, Remender does what almost no one does in comics: he doesn't let it trump her past. In Rogue's eyes, Wanda will never, can never be redeemed. Remender reminds us that the unity squad isn't just about human-mutant unity: after the events of recent months, mutant-mutant unity could use a push as well.
Amidst it all, though, Remender doesn't lose sight of Alex. He's quiet here, but he drives the issue. Remender presents the tragedy of Alex and Scott's parents' death (or, at least, apparent death) in a more emotionally frank way than I think I've ever seen it presented. He speaks to the difficulties that Alex has faced in his life in just that one page and then has him explode onto the field. He supports Wanda, emotionally and physically, as they push back the Red Skull. He makes the call to trust Wanda when she says that she can take Thor and goes to save Rogue's life. He's there to absolve people of their sins after the Skull's control has faded and people realize the crimes that they have committed under his influence. He is the leader that Captain America thought that he could be, something that I don't know if any of us -- Alex, included -- thought possible.
It was all really just thrilling. I can't remember any issue so emotionally charged and draining, any issue that really conveyed what it would be like for actual people and not just fictional characters to be placed in this harrowing situation. Maybe it was Cassady having everyone hugging -- Cap hugging Wanda, Alex holding Rogue. But, whatever it was, they really just sold the emotion of it. You felt the relief that they had managed to stop the Skull and the frustration that they had not been able to capture him. Remender reminded us how deadly of a threat the Skull is by telling us that Cap and Havok both seemed ready to kill him. Although they survived, Remender made it clear that it was only a matter of time before the Skull returned.
And then you flipped the page.
Cassady's amazing recreation of the "Days of Future Past" cover earlier in the issue takes on all new meaning in the epilogue, where it appears that Red Skull is still using Xavier's brain, this time to become Onslaught. A dead Immortus? Apocalypse Twins "locking" the era as "prime?" "The moment the Seven became One?" We are engaged in storytelling on an epic scale. But, it's not Jonathan Hickman's definition of emotionless automatons. Remender is giving us characters that I have loved my entire life and reassembling them into the best versions of themselves under the most difficult circumstances. I love Alex Summers and I love Wanda Maximoff, and seeing them at the height of their individual powers but possibly unable to stop the threat looming in front of them (literally) is emotionally powerful.
This is superhero comics at its very, very finest, people.
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