Because it's #500.

What's with Angel if he's going the the archangel stuff in X-force...before this? So I guess we know how that ends

If Legacy is about Prof X and Gambit right now, and all the x-men are in Uncanny...why is Astonishing still running? It features..some of the cast of Uncanny but in the same time and place..

Whoever is editing this shit needs to be fired

oh and why the hell is Gambit, Rogue and others on my cover if they all have nothing to do with this issue?

Screw that. Miss Sinister in Legacy was infinitely cooler than Cyke yelling "Suck it!"

Um, ok, Bruction. The dialogue really blows.

As I recall, he does it in their first or second fight, back in the late seventies, as I recall. Something about sensing the disturbance in the magnetic field, or some such.

I'll probably pick up the Layla Miller one shot when it comes out, though, and I'll be far more likely to pick up X-Factor once Layla or Pietro return. But for right now, I'm trying to save money, so adding a new series on doesn't really make sense for me.

Hey, you can't always find appropriate pictures of the same model to trace, you know.

(Speaking of which: Mission Impossible 2 Tom Cruise = unmasked Cyclops, right? I'm not crazy for thinking that was the source?)

And if there’s a story point, where a character talks about how great the view is….shouldn’t, I don’t know…YOU SHOW THE VIEW RATHER THAN THE WINDOW THEY’RE LOOKING OUT OF?!?

Agreed. I really expected a splash page or something to show off the view when it was mentioned. Didn't cause any sort of ALL-CAPS rage or anything, but it was surprising.

I want more info on The Blob as well. He sure did get rid of all that excess skin in a hurry. I'd guess that story is coming.

None of the plot threads Brubaker and Fraction introduced in this issue were remotely compelling for me, especially not enough to put up with art this bad. Maybe I'll check out the next arc once Dodson comes on board, but for now, I'll stick to Legacy, X-Force and Astonishing for my monthly mutant fix.

Still, between this and Astonishing, it does seem like the books at least have *some* sort of direction now...

I also raised an eyebrow at the notion that Magneto's gimmick made him MORE powerful than before. Huh, "before" he was able to manipulate the Earth's magnetic fields!! And now he gets utterly trashed by freakin' Cannonball?!?

And can somebody explain how Angel singlehandedly dismantled a Sentinel? Since when is Warren THAT competent/efficient?

I hope this will get better on later issues, because this issue was a huge disappointment.

If I had any faith in Marvel Editorial a number of my problems wouldn't be there. But as history has shown that it's more likely that Brubaker's star power lets him ignore what's happening elsewhere, rather than setting up things for future exploration.

Such as:

The Blob. A month or so prior to this story, he was a mass of suicidal flesh who was part of a terrorist group in X-Factor.

Magneto. Boy he swallowed a whole bunch of crazy between his pretty rational style in X-Men Legacy just a bit ago.

Cannonball...isn't he busy doing something un-X-men like over in Young X-Men?

Speaking of which....We have Hellfire plots going in YXM *and* XML...yet we're supposed to be..surprised? of one showing up here now?

Didn't the X-Men just do the whole "Every mutant in the world can come to us for sanctuary" thing? Shouldn't someone..Wolverine maybe? mention that that didn't turn out so well?

(I have a problem with the story logic of someone getting "decommissioned Sentinels" as it breaks Disbelief...they're either weapons of a supervillain, in which case the Government would confiscate them, or they're Government tech, in which case anything functional wouldn't be handed out. When the Government "decomissions" battleships, they scuttle them, take out all the tech, and drop them into the ocean to form artificial reefs. But in the world of SHRA, they just hand out giant robots with weapon systems? You'd think Tony Stark, at least, would be concerned about such things. This is a continuity problem like the others but a "The world doesn't work this way" problem)

Why is Angel going on about how he can walk around with his wings out? How long ago was it that he hid his wings? Angel is a very public figure...a rich pretty playboy super hero. Shouldn't that whole scene have gone to, I dunno, Nightcrawler? (Who himself long ago decided not to hide who he is?).

On the story structure itself...X-Men just randomly appear in the story when they're needed. "Hey, we need someone teleported at this point." So Nightcrawler suddenly shows up in the story. It might have been intended to give a feel of the X-Men "gathering" but it felt more like just sloppy storytelling.

One final story issue...the new "Headquarters". Brubaker said that he thought it made no sense to keep rebuilding the school when everyone knows where the X-men are....so their "new secret base" is a large complex on the northside of the bay, that according to mapquest you get to by going across the Golden Gate Bridge...It supposedly overlooks the bay, so it really can't be that hidden. I mean, sure, all the workmen floating around can be trusted not to reveal the location (They're likely holo-workmen, which would explain why they were photoshoped in to the picture). But then they send a telepathic message to every mutant out there to come join them. So...Those, y'know Evil Mutants..who are the ones constantly blowing up the school they left cuz people knew where it was. Even ignoring X-Villains, I'm sure someone like Whirlwind might find some use for that knowledge, what with him being a member of the Masters of Evil.

But let's move away from the story and look at the "art"
I won't even talk about Land's cut and paste of porn models rather than drawing..that's passe. But the standard to aspire to is to have your backgrounds be photos you steal and run thru the Photoshop hi-pass filter a bit? And shouldn't in a scene where the writing says how they've shown all the parts of the new headquaters, they should...you know, show the new headquarters rather than an empty room with generic workmen? A third of a page is taken up with some guy in a baseball hat!!!

And if there's a story point, where a character talks about how great the view is....shouldn't, I don't know...YOU SHOW THE VIEW RATHER THAN THE WINDOW THEY'RE LOOKING OUT OF?!?

Oppressed group, acceptance, San Francisco... Northstar?

It's great to see a situation where these characters may be able to live a life, but please, PLEASE let have a Northstar that doesn't act snarky, like he's putting up a protective wall against the world. We could actually see him have a relationship with someone, rather than be portrayed as alone.

It's good to see a new approach - real life is opposing fewer things nowadays...