Broken Frontier

New Mutants #14 is an interesting issue.  It’s essential to the "Second Coming" storyline, in that a lot of things happen, but only in the sense that major decisions are made and implemented by the X-Men.  Following the dramatic deaths and major battles of the previous issues, I’ve come to expect huge happenings and dynamic action sequences that are visually dazzling but remain relevant to the story.  Unfortunately, the most dramatic thing that happened in this issue was Colossus nearly had his arm torn off at the elbow.  On the other hand, Colossus nearly had his arm torn off!  That’s insane!  As far as I know, that hasn’t happened before, and it was quite a thing to see.

Fair warning though, the only villains in this issue were mindless Sentinels and nameless human henchmen in the future.  This issue doesn’t focus as much on the nature of the conflict between the mutants and the humans, but how overwhelming the odds against the mutants are.  The story has an Empire Strikes Back feel to it, in that after a costly victory (Hope’s safe retrieval at the cost of Nightcrawler’s life), the enemy regrouped and began attacking our heroes in full force, gaining back their original ground and taking more.

At this point in the story, all of mutantkind, save X-Force, is trapped in the barrier.  Wave after wave of powerful Nimrod Sentinels continue to pour out from the time sphere.  All of their teleporters are dead, and the most dangerous among them have been sent to the future on a suicide mission to cut off the Sentinel supply at its source.  Recently, Cyclops asked Professor Xavier to unleash his Omega-Level son, Legion, on the Sentinels.

I have to applaud the writer, Zeb Wells, on keeping this issue exciting.  It is, essentially, an issue comprised of segues that checks in at the various battlefronts between the major events of last issue and the next.  Cyclops makes an inspiring Gladiator­ or Lord of the Rings style speech rallying the remaining mutants.  Hope and Rogue decide to join the battle, Legion is unleashed, and X-Force makes it past the outer gates of the Sentinel factory.  Still, Wells’ writing kept me turning the page and left me wanting to know what happens next.

The art was a team effort, with Ibraim Roberson, Lan Medina, and Nathan Fox on pencils and Brian Reber, Matt Milla, and Jose Villarubia on colors.  Each of the three artists has a very distinctive style which, in a story like this, helps to keep the readers on their toes.  The action and settings of the scenes change very quickly, so the change in artists and colors helps the reader reset before the next series of events.  The artists’ styles match the scenes very well.  The scenes within Legion’s mind were especially fun because of the quirky style that they were drawn in.  It actually looks like what you would expect the inside of a mental person’s head to look like.