When the Grim Reaper kills Captain America, Remender makes it definitively clear that the events of this arc will somehow be retconned. Put aside the deaths of Rogue, the Scarlet Witch, and Wonder Man. Ignore the possibility of Alex and Jan having a daughter, as Remender implies here (clarifying the narrator from last issue). Captain America doesn't die (unless it's a company-wide cross-over event, but even then it'll be quickly retconned). Of course, then Exitar blows up Earth, making it all the clearer that this story isn't going to stick.
However, at the end of the day, Remender and McNiven do such a great job of making this story so grandiosely epic that even I don't care about continuity anymore. If retconning the events of the arc at the end is the way that we get to read amazing and innovative stories like this one, then I'm all for it. (The "amazing and innovative" part is important. Otherwise, you just get "Age of Ultron." BURN!)
I thought the best part of this story was Odin's explanation that the Earth failed itself. On some level, it's representative of one of the answers of the Fermi paradox, that societies advance to the point of being able to enter the cosmic stage, as Odin puts it, or they destroy themselves with the technology that would've enabled them to do so. In the hands of other authors, it would've been treacly or, at least, overly simplistic. But, Remender really sells it, having Odin himself note that he was pulling for Earth. But, Odin claims that Earth failed to put aside its differences and thus doomed itself. Remender doesn't directly connect the dots, but Odin is clearly referring to humanity and mutantkind failing to come to a peace that would enable them to advance. It's this divide that Eimin and Uriel manage to exploit. (In fact, you could argue that mutantkind's own internal distrust got in the way, since Rogue killing the Scarlet Witch prevented her from possibly realizing that the Twins were tricking her and correcting for it.)
Along the way, though, our heroes are tested and actually fail. Cap rallies himself to buy Janet some time to destroy the tachyon dam, but it's too late, since Janet's failure to kill Grim Reaper essentially condemned Earth to destruction. (Remender leaves the ethical implications of that decision to us, and my college professor obsessed with the "trolley problem" probably has new material for the Fall semester.) Thor fails to stop Eimin and, as such, fails to stop Exitar from destroying the Earth. Iron Man and company can't manage to hold off Exitar. Again, this failure -- or, at least, the consequences of this failure -- requires retconning. But, it's so rare to read a story about superheroes failing on this large of a scale that Remender is truly in uncharted waters here.
**** (four of five stars)
No comments:
Post a Comment