X-Men: Legacy #229 Review: Stinging Attack

Hey, everyone, jrpbsp here… Next up is ‘X-Men: Legacy’. Hope you enjoy it.

X-Men: Legacy #229 (preview)
Writer: Mike Carey
Art: Daniel Acuna

NOTE: Wolverine only appears in the background in this issue.

SPOILERS BELOW…

RECAP: The issue opens with Rogue trying to contact the Cuckoos to give them a report. She is trying to hide from the ghost consuming creatures but the room has a device that keeps asking for coordinates. It does not take the monsters long to find her and the chase is on again. By pure chance Rogue flies through the room where Roxy is being held but she has very little time to reassure the girl before the creatures catch up. Rogue still can not use Trance’s sting and is not sure how she will survive to free the girl.

Back on the Utopia, Gambit confronts Scott about his decision to let Rogue go alone. Remy is furious and has to walk away because his Death persona had come to the fore. Gambit charges a card and it kills all the plant life in the area. In another area or the island, Nemesis and the X-Club are finishing up a machine that prevents teleporting and dimensional travel. They ask Ariel to test it by trying to teleport to the mainland. She only goes across the room in the opposite direction.

Back in Emplate space, Rogue has fled the lighthouse and is leading the monsters to the unsafe area outside. One by one her pursuers are caught and destroyed by the bigger and nastier creatures there. Rogue heads back to the house knowing that time is running out.

Emplate is interrupted by D.O.A. and told that Rogue was there. Marius is sure that the rest of the X-Men will not be far behind so he decides to kill Bling! and move his house to a safer location. Rogue goes back to the same room she was hiding in before and starts working with the machine to get a suitable destination. Back on Utopia, Nemesis is reporting his progress to Scott when the Cuckoos interrupt and tell Cyclops that Hope is waking up.

In Roxy’s cell, Emplate has come to finish her off. Even though he explains it, she does not seem scared. When he approaches, Bling! fires off a nasty energy attack and we see that Rogue was hiding inside her and can now use the sting attack. Rogue blasts D.O.A. as well which gives Marius time to recover. Rogue tries to attack him again but he has changed his density to match hers and the sting goes right through him. He punches Rogue and then moves to feed on her while D.O.A. blocks Roxy from helping.

MY TAKE: This is a pretty good issue despite having mostly second and third-tier characters and a silly ’90s villain in Emplate. I have talked about Marius before so I will not revisit him, other than to say that he works surprisingly well in this story. Rogue really comes through as well, showing that she has a lot of strength to carry a title if she is done well. With her current power set, she is not some unstoppable force, and there is actually an element of risk for her. It makes a massive difference.

The plot continues the rescue mission and does manage to advance the story even though about half of the issue was one major chase scene. The Gambit side plot has potential although it is a story we have seen before. I just hope that it is handled differently than Warren’s transformations otherwise it will become redundant.

The Nemesis story seems a little pat though. He was supposed to be finding a way to breach to the other dimension and instead invents a warning system to alert the X-Men of a new incursion, and to prevent Emplate from escaping. It ties well into Rogue’s plan but there is no reason that Nemesis would know what she was doing.

There are a few other points that seemed a bit too convenient and took away from the story. The biggest was the unlikely timing of Rogue learning to use Trance’s sting. She spent nearly two issues trying to figure it out and then suddenly just has it? It read like lazy storytelling. So did her just randomly flying through Roxy’s cell. The other problem was that none of the big monsters even tried to attack Rogue when she flew through their area.  Other prey aside, she should have gotten some attention from the creatures.

In the end though, I still found myself enjoying the story. Rogue is really being put through a wringer here and is still managing to prevail. She is becoming a very strong character and much more interesting. I am sure that most of the story shortcuts are being taken in an effort to shorten the tale for Necrosha. Still I would have preferred that the story have the time to develop naturally rather then use luck and chance as plot devices. But that is not enough to really hurt the issue and I am looking forward to seeing the conclusion next month.

Thanks for reading my review for Wolverine Files. I will be keeping to this format for the most part but please keep the comments coming and I will see everyone again next time.

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14 years ago

Hey this is a good review. Thanks for posting it. I enjoyed reading the whole thing.

jrpbsp
14 years ago

Thank you much for the kind words.

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