A Sort of Summary
I'm going to summarize all the various stories separately here, since I think that it's the only way to make sense of the issue.
- Miguel finds himself in the "Fatherland," an oasis populated by the best medical and scientific minds that the world had to offer. Xina is there and tells him that the "All-Father" has assembled them to find a cure for the techo-organic virus before it consumes the world. Miguel says that he has to go save Uproar and Wulff, but Xina says that she was only able to risk saving Miguel from the "contaminated zone" because of the value that he brought to the mission. Miguel refuses to stay and begins to battle his way through the Fatherland's defenses to find the boys. Meanwhile, the "All-Father" is not surprisingly revealed to be Doom, who secretly allowed Xina to save Miguel for the same reason, his value to the mission. Doom is revealed to be cooperating with a technarch named the "Emissary." The Emissary needs Doom since he knows the location of the "Scout," who/which the Emissary needs; Doom allegedly "needs" the Emissary because he "allowed" Doom to create the Fatherland since it's "advantageous to the rebirth." Before Miguel manages to escape the Fatherland, he runs into Doom.
- Sue Richards continues to press an exhausted Reed to focus more on returning them to their time rather than trying to ensure that he saves the combined knowledge stored in the world's databases before all the computers are flooded. Johnny and Sue discover that the portal to the Negative Zone is open and leave Reed, who refuses to go because Ben gave his life to help the 2099 people. In the end, Reed finishes his computer and joins Johnny and Sue, who managed to keep the portal open (almost killing herself in the process). They then enter for parts unknown.
- Underground, Bloodhawk and his team enter the alien spaceship that they discovered at the end of last issue. Winn realizes that it came from Mars, but notes that Mars hasn't had intelligent life for millennia. They discover bodies inside the ship and Winn notes that they didn't seem to have suffered an outside attack, hypothesizing that it was sabotage. Hodge touches the wrong button and explosions ensue. Willow bonds with a dead alien to use his retinal pattern to stop the explosions (something that she saw done in a movie), but can't revert to her original form, seemingly having become a technarch.
- Strange finds herself underground as well. She's approached by a lizard-like creature called Umi who offers to teach her magic. She arrogantly refuses, to the displeasure of some sort of rock creature who taunts her in an attempt to judge her skills (seemingly with the intent to train her).
- On Mars, Father Jennifer and the X-Nation kids are held hostage, since the Ares colonists inform them that they're not sure who's human anymore. (Captain Pike, who we last saw speaking with Tyler Stone in "Spider-Man 2099" #45, makes an appearance here.) One of the X-Nation girls has a fight with Smith, her apparent boyfriend, and leaves Ares.
- The Wild Boyz have Uproar and Wulff and force the former to engage in some sort of gladiatorial fight, similar to the one that Dorian was fighting at the beginning of issue #1. (Also, the names of the Wild Boyz are confirmed and two other ones, "Warbird" and a woman, "Fiona," are added to the roster.)
The Review
This issue starts with Xina invading Miguel anally with a probe and goes downhill from there. (No, really.)
Unfortunately, as I said, the plots themselves -- Raab and Kelly's only real focus -- are disconnected. Given that we have six separate stories here, it's impossible for Raab and Kelly to really focus on any story for long enough to make it interesting. Moreover, it's hard to see any sort of overarching story; only Miguel's adventures in the Fatherland seem to have the potential to impact the other stories. We also seem to drop some of the threads from last issue. We don't learn why the Wild Boyz had the Mistdweller in the first place (or who the Big Boss is) and we seemed to have dropped any concern over the future leadership of the Savage Land. Moreover, we have new mysteries introduced here, such as the contaminated zone, but we never learn much about them. Is the contaminated zone the same as the mist from where the Mistdweller emerged? It seems like it could be, since the contamination seems to be the techno-organic virus. But, again, Raab and Kelly don't bother to explain that.
I still feel like I missed a dozen or so issues between "Fantastic Four 2099" #8 and "2099 World of Tomorrow" #1. Given that this world doesn't even look like the 2099 world that I used to know, it's hard to identify with anything Raab and Kelly are doing here.
The Bad
1) OK, so, Xina is alive. Last we saw her, she was driving her convertible with the Net Prophet somewhere in the Southwest (I think), but we now learn that she was somehow miraculously saved and brought to the Fatherland to do science-y stuff for doom. I'm more or less willing to accept that coincidence without further comment, since I've got bigger fish to fry, but I'll admit to being totally lost when it comes to the Dr. Doom plot. I have no idea why Doom would be working with the Emissary. He seems to have everything that the Emissary wants (the location of the Scout), but the Emissary has nothing that he wants. Since the Phalanx hasn't taken over the Earth yet, his threat about only allowing the Fatherland to exist because it's convenient for him seems empty. After all, him and what army? As such, I have no idea why Doom would tolerate him. Unfortunately, Raab and Kelly don't even try to offer a reason.
2) Sue Richards has been criminally -- criminally -- mis-characterized throughout her appearances in the 2099 titles, but that crime reaches epic proportions in this issue. Last issue, the remaining members of the FF seemed to hold out hope that Ben was alive, but both Sue and Johnny forget him entirely this issue. (Sue doesn't even mention his name.) Reed at least says something about trying to honor his memory, despite not seemingly putting too much effort into trying to ascertain his fate with any certainty. But, Sue whines throughout the issue about wanting to see her son, something that seems unbelievable for a noble character like Sue Richards, given that she's just witnessed the near-total destruction of Earth. Despite knowing that countless lives (including other people's children's) depend on Mr. Fantastic's genius, all she can do is whine about him spending more time focused on helping this world than trying to return to their own son? Really? We've got no sense of noble sacrifice? Instead, when the opportunity presents itself, she's on the first train home, barely giving a second thought to the fate of the 2099 world or Ben Grimm. Some superhero.
3) The underground stories are incredibly boring. At first, I thought that both Bloodhawk's team and Strange had stumbled onto the Phalanx, but it appears neither of them have: Bloodhawk's team is facing some vague Martian threat that may be linked to the Phalanx and Strange is trading barbs with a living rock. I just...yeah. I have no idea why Raab and Kelly are spending time on not one, but two stories that don't seem to have anything to do with anything else happening in this series.
The Really Bad
Raab and Kelly kill off Halloween Jack in two panels, a victim of the Wild Boyz's gladiator ring. Ugh. It's like they're just moving through a checklist to make sure that they touch every character whose fate remains unclear.
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