“One Second Later”
Creative Staff:
Story: Geoffrey Thorne
Art: Marcus To
Colors: Erick Arciniega
Letterer: VC’s Joe Caramagna
What They Say:
A DEATH ON THE TEAM?! Attacked from all sides, with a team member’s DEATH in the offing, and struggling to accomplish their mission, X-Force fights to seal the latest and worst Fracture Node threatening the Earth. Can X-Force pull through, or will they fracture and doom the world? The most surprising X-book of the season is just heating up – if you haven’t been reading it, now is the time to JUMP ABOARD!
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers):
A new X-Force launch drew me in to check out the start of the series and this book looks to be doing something familiar as we’ve seen over the years with a select group trying to solve all the big critical issues of the world within a single issue or so. This run comes from writer Geoffrey Thorne and they manage fairly well here while not going into the weeds or even the edge of the forest to explain any recent events for new readers. Marcus To tackles the art side with Eric Arciniega on the color design and it’s a pretty straightforward book that’s not overly detailed. It lays out the scenes well, flows well, and the designs are generally pretty good without being too stylized. It’s more a journeyman approach than the last time I read an X-Force book which was all style over substance, so I can appreciate it.
The arrival of Storm and the Avengers at the end of the previous issue was certainly one I wasn’t keen on since it felt like it was taking on too much. Of course, we get the “twist” here that it’s not the Avengers we know but rather one from through the portals where the monsters are coming from. That has a lot of conflicting emotions for both sides – though that comes more after the obligatory fighting and even one of them saying “Shouldn’t we talk first?” Well, that’s more a writer thing because they know fans want the action. It’s decent but kind of forgettable since everyone does come together after a bit and sorts through the information. It is interesting to get details on their world where Ishtar is the Empress and they serve as her Avengers, but also that the Phoenix had shone there once which allowed Rachel to use her abilities to mimic it here which helped to stop the fight from spiraling too hard.
The event itself is something that does spiral out of control, however, since Nulkon was the problem on the other side and Forge is able to figure out that he’s working through various locations to open portals here that would turn into permanent openings. So it’s a race to stop him from the final location and the scale of events goes big since it’s happening all over the world. It’s fun to watch the Avengers step up and fight to the death in some cases – there’s no emotional weight behind it since they’re pretty much just alts – but it does get more serious when Noriko figures out that she’s key to stopping Nuklon but that it’ll come at the cost of her life. You can see how it tears at Forge and how Sage is demanding that there must be a way that will avoid that, but it’s in that moment where things either happen now or they lose and Noriko makes the hard choice. But that’s going to lead to new choices by others on the team that could break it all.
In Summary:
X-Force continues to be a fun book overall but it’s also one that is just barreling through things at a really fast pace. And that’s definitely its downside because it undercuts the character and emotional moments, which is part of where comics have been for a long time in this particular area. Noriko has had some decent moments since she signed on but nowhere near enough to make this big moment for her to resonate like it should. This is something that happens at around issue twelve at the earliest if not later. But everyone is in a hurry to get to the good part that the foundation of making it a good part is lost. You can insert some mental leaps to make it work – I did that with this issue – but it doesn’t make it memorable in the long term and instead just provides that short burst of serotonin that you lose quickly.
Grade: B-
Age Rating: 13+
Released By: Marvel Comics
Release Date: November 6th, 2024
MSRP: $3.99
