The Dark Angel Saga
By Rick Remender and Billy Tan
Despite the moniker bringing back memories of Rob Liefeld, shoulder pads and cylindrical rifles, Uncanny X-Force is a thrilling series, perhaps the best of the mutant books after X-Men took a dive with its Spider-Man guest issues. A black ops assassination squad charged with doing the dirty work that must remain secret, X-Force was formed by Cyclops after the events of the Messiah CompleX. When this knowledge became public, he shut it down, only for Wolverine to start it up again, this time without the approval of Scott Summers.
The newest version of X-Force is a mixture of the old and the new; team leader Wolverine, Psylocke, Archangel and newcomers Deadpool and Fantomex. I was dubious about the series, to be honest as the Chris Yost series was a blood-filled over-the-top massacre a month that I thought could not be topped. The rebooted and renamed series under Remender doesn't attempt to replicate its predecessor, however, and instead concentrates on character development and plots that challenge the team in their level of danger. The first mission involved the rebirth of Apocalypse, the second was a duel with the Shadow King. This series does not mess around.
One of the continuing threads of the Uncanny X-Force has involved the confused and complicated state of Warren Worthington III, the high-flying Angel. One of the founding members of Xavier's School for Gifted Youngsters (no matter what Matthew Vaughn says), Worthington was a pretty rich boy with nerves of steel. In the 90's, he was assaulted in the Morlock Tunnels, his wings clipped. Desperate and depressed, Apocalypse offered him a new life by giving him back his wings, sharp metallic blades that transformed him into the Angel of Death, Archangel. A blood-thirsty and deadly creature, Archangel was a totally different character from the Angel readers become familiar with. After betraying Apocalypse and rejoining the X-Men, he was still a changed man, both physically and mentally. A door had been opened in his mind revealing a savage killer.
The intervening years have been complicated for Warren to say the least, but most recently he has reverted back to his old feathered playboy form, seeming to finally be at peace. That image was shattered when he willingly reverted to Archangel and back again. Dipping into the darker recesses of his psyche, Warren was able to use his Archangel self as a member of X-Force without consequences, or so it seemed. In the Uncanny X-Force, Betsy Braddock (Psyclocke) has been helping him in therapy sessions to develop psychic blocks to restrict the power that his darker self has over him.
It appears that this has failed.
In the previous story, Archangel and Psyclocke were both taken over by the Shadow King, the evil psychic entity who had also taken over a soldier in charge of a nuclear missile aimed at the X-Men's island home of Utopia. Breaking control, Warren was able to free himself, Betsy and soldier from the Shadow King's hold, yet he still killed the soldier in a momentary fit of rage. The act remained secret from the rest of the team who assumed that Warren did what was necessary until video footage was leaked to the press, specifically a newspaper that Warren Worthington owns.
Wolverine launched onto the scene just as Archangel was about to murder the reporter, intent on revealing the truth about the X-Men's secret hit squad. The battle was fierce and revealed that Wolverine respected his teammate far too much to kill him, no matter what the threat. It fell to Betsy to use her psychic talents and pacify Archangel long enough to get him into a restraining cage.
With no other expert on Apocalypse' technology or methods, the team decide to spring the Dark Beast from captivity. A distorted version of the furry genius of the X-Men and Avengers, the Dark Beast is one of the soul survivors of an alternate reality known as the Age of Apocalypse, a twisted reality where Professor Xavier died before his school could be formed. The Dark Beast theorizes that the death of Apocalypse at the hands of X-Force has caused Warren to become the avatar of Apocalypse, a being placed on Earth by the Celestials to push forward the evolution of mankind. The only option to 'heal' Warren involves an expedition back to the alternate reality where the Celestial plan has succeeded and Apocalypse reigns supreme.
The X-Men have been struggling of late to find their identity in the Marvel Universe. It has been a relatively smooth process, but the main series has wavered in quality to be honest. Both New Mutants and X-Men Legacy have just finished their Age of X story line, but the main X-Men book is just getting started in gaining traction under new series writer Kieron Gillan. It's a solid start, but for my money the real action is happening here in X-Force.
One of the most fondly remembered events that brought in new readers (and creators) to the X-Men comics, a return to the Age of Apocalypse may be just the thing to get fans of the series reinvested in the merry mutants. With the upcoming X-Men First Class film (opening June 3rd), people will be looking for a comic to fill an X-shaped need. The Uncanny X-Force is a good place to start. It's not a traditional X-book and stars an unusual cast of characters, but Remender's scripts have been just fantastic so far, making it a critically hyped monthly series.
Recommended:
Uncanny X-Force: The Apocalypse Solution
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