Welcome to Loneliness & Cheeseburgers Presents: Uncanny X-Men (Vol. 3) Issue #5! The Revolution storyline comes to an end, and not a moment too soon! Several moments too late, in fact! In the previous installment, Cyclops attempts to convince some Jean Grey School peeps to come join him instead at the abandoned chemical processing plant / slaughterhouse that they are now calling the New Xavier School. He convinces the past version of Angel to join, aka Warren Worthington III, aka Who-Gives-a-Shit. Emma Frost convinces her three motherfucking creepy Stepford Cuckoos to join. The four new kids are starting to feel better about being abducted from their homes and families just a couple of days ago.

I don’t know exactly where this story is going, but Cyclops is going to fail miserably and I’m going to sit here and LAUGH and LAUGH at his disastrous downfall. I hope someone throws him out of a hot air balloon.

Uncanny X-Men (Vol. 3), Issue #5 [June, 2013]
Written by: Brian Michael Bendis

S.H.I.E.L.D. HELICARRIER, LOCATED 1000 FT. OVER RENO, NEVADA. Time to do some gamblin’ in the Biggest Little City in the World. Check out Lt. Dangle’s short shorts.

The agency is watching a recording of Cyclops addressing his fellow mutants after they kicked the Avengers’ asses (who I hope are still trapped in a time bubble for eternity) to join in on the revolution fun time, and anyone who gets in the way will get a baseball bat to the kneecap.

Commander Maria Hill tells Agent Coulson to turn the recording off as she rubs her forehead wearily. There’s no fucking way that the X-Men beat the Avengers without so much as lifting a finger, right? Come on, man.

Yes. One of the kids can make time bubbles, ma’am.

Hill looks concerned. “Scott Summers made a self-congratulatory incendiary speech, trapped the Avengers in time, and just… took off?”

Yes. They seem to be better than the Avengers, ma’am.

Well, shit. “These X-Men are going to force my hand here,” Hill says, “and they’re not going to like it.”

At the New Xavier School for the “Gifted” (read: “Unstable”), Illyana sits alone in a room all glum. Cyclops passes by and asks how he can help. Illyana tells him he can take a long walk off a short pier then stick a gun in his mouth and then she’ll throw a brick at his head, that’s how he can help.

Uh huh. So, what was that about at the end of the last issue there? Cyclops wants some info. What happened, lady? Spill. Cyclops needs to know everything at every moment at every time. Even in the stopped time, which is admittedly easier to know things about in the moment.

Easy joke here. I’ll skip it.

Cyclops is just concerned if she’s in trouble, and if she’s in trouble then does that mean the rest of them are in trouble? And then does that mean he’s in trouble? Looking out for #1 as always.

Return to an hour ago when Magik was having these fitz and the tantrums. All “AAGHH” and “AAAAGGGH” about it like an attention whore. “It… it was…” she struggles to remember those moments, “…nothing like this had ever happened to me before.” And that shit is crazy, because everything has happened to her before! You don’t even want to know some of the sex stuff, man. It would rattle that peanut brain inside your head.

Magik had been suddenly pulled out of the dimension and into the Limbo dimension! We see some real Hell stuff. A regular Dante’s Inferno.

Cyclops asks if she knew who did it.

And in Limbo, Magik had confronted her captor. “Are you just completely out of your mind, Dormammu? Who are you to touch me?!”

Oh great, I’m supposed to know who Dormammu is? She said it in these incredibly huge red letters, like it’s a big reveal that is supposed to make readers gasp! Well, let me tell you, the only gasp I did was for air after spending too many minutes in the BULLSHIT RIVER, my friends.

Dormammu looks like a face in a flame with big stone arms. “WELCOME BACK TO YOUR ABANDONED KINGDOM, RASPUTIN. DO YOU LIKE WHAT YOU HAVE DONE WITH THE PLACE?”

Really, you’re going to throw brand new stuff toward me in the last issue of a storyline? I ain’t havin’ it. Show me some Wolverine eating Cheetos on the couch.

Oh man, is Magik ever pissed. And she’s cute when she’s pissed.

You can tell me to learn my place any day of the week, Sister.

Dormammu asks her, bluntly, if she can even fathom the madness that she has brought to Limbo. She says she doesn’t give a shit, and she leaps at Flame Head with her comically large sword. Then he lights her on fire for a bit to make an example out of her.

This Dormammu chap points an angry finger right back at her and tells her that he waited and waited for her to let go of the Phoenix force and/or have the Phoenix force destroy her. Whichever came first. And it sucks, because the Phoenix’s destruction of everyone’s super mutant powers, especially hers, is “ripping his world apart”. Not good. Time to die, little one.

“You are a threat to my existence,” continues Dormammu like the awful windbag that he obviously is. So he sticks his giant burning finger through her torso and makes her go “NNYYAAGGHH!” Like the Pillsbury Dough Boy sorta.

Dor Mammu tries to damn Magik to death, but instead of being damned to death during this boss fight, she evolves into a second form. “HOW… DARE… YOU?!”

Oh snap, Dorma Mmu! “He forced it out of me,” she recounts to Cyclops, “he forced me to reveal her… my darker self. The Darkchilde.”

Ah, ok then. *checks watch*

She’s lost control, just like the woman in that Joy Division song. She didn’t even know what was happening! “It was like I was watching a movie,” she later says. Yeah, maybe one of those shitty action movies where you can barely even tell what’s happening, like X-Men: The Last Stand or something similar! She beats and bashes this mofo, warns him not to touch her like this again! Or even LOOK at her! Or be in the same dimension at the same time! Or anywhere at any given moment, honestly.

She makes short work of this dude. Then she looks at the lower demons, hundreds of them, who are all standing around looking mean and dumb. She waves her sword around, and they all take off scared in the opposite direction.

You wish, pal. I’m the one taking Centrum Silver everyday. Not you.

Dormammu just won’t give up the yap yap yap yap yap. YOU DON’T KNOW WHERE YOUR POWER IS COMING FROM. YOU WILL PAY. YOU ARE A STUPID LITTLE GIRL. YOU DON’T KNOW WHAT YOU’RE DOING. Yap yap yap. Magik tells him to put a cork in it.

But the thing that made her super man was that Dormammu was right. Her powers are all fucked up. Just like Cyclops’. Just like Magneto’s. Just like everybody’s. Maybe even Kitty Pryde. She probably phased through a wall and got stuck with the rats.

“The difference here is mine are connected to magic – to Limbo,” she explains, and that’s probably worse than Cyclops burning his dick off with his eyeballs. Well… maybe it’s similar…

“For the first time since I was a little girl proper… I am so scared. I am so confused. And I do not know what to do,” she admits. She really should’ve booted Cyclops out of the room instead of telling him this stuff. This is need-to-know basis stuff only, and he doesn’t need to know! I don’t want him to know anything.

And it sucks because things seemed ok a few days ago. Now there’s a kid who shoots gold balls out of his butt, and now she doesn’t know which way is up, and everything is just so nuts.

Cyclops advises that she perhaps go visit Doctor Strange to see if he can help. HA! The Avenger? Fat chance. How about an actual good idea for once in your sorry–

“AAAHHGG!”

Sucked back into Limbo again. This back-and-forth might take a while. Grab a snack.

The newbies are starting to get unnerved, and they were all already unnerved. The oldbies tell them not to worry, Scott can handle this. The newbies have not been successfully unnerved.

Frost turns to her cuckoos to ask if the three little hellraisers know what’s going on. They tell her that Illyana’s powers are broken too. And it’s not good. Especially since it seemed like she was fine. But of course she’s not. I saw that one coming a hundred miles away! Give or take seventeen feet.

Magik is doubled over on the floor while Cyclops begs her to explain what’s happening. She’s not answering. It sounds like Cyclops wasn’t paying any attention to her whole story! Limbo, man! Davidmamet! Demons! Hello?!

OHHHH, I’M SORRY. Is this place not good enough for the guy with the fluffy angel wings?!?

She lifts herself up crying and still insisting that she is ok. She’s not ok. There’s a definite, smelly aura of not-okayness permeating the air.

Angel Worthington Worthless XXXIV is being a snooty snoot, but Magneto, for one, is delighted that the strapping gent decided to join their elite ranks! As long as he brought the dip! Heh heh. Those potato chips need something *nudge*, eh Worthington??

“I’m proud of you for breaking ranks with the other original X-Men,” Magneto smiles. “You will do well here.”

Well, if you put it that way, Worthington will NOT do well here! Just try and make me live up to your expectations, you old man. You have some pennies stuck to you. How about you magnetize some real money?

Magik’s screeching and groaning is scaring the cuckoos. They look up to Frost with actual worried eyes, wondering if Magik is going to be ok. This is the part where Frost has them snared in her manipulative trap all over again!

“I-I don’t want to mess this up for us,” Magik tells Cyclops while sitting on the floor. “We need to make this school work. We need this. This has to be our second chance.”

Cyclops gives her a BIG OL’ SMILE, looking like Tom Cruise wearing Wayfarers. “We’ll fix ourselves, retrain ourselves, get our students on their feet… then we’ll get this new mutant revolution on the road. Okay?”

Okay, Dad. Thanks.

In the other room Worthington congratulates Magneto on seeming less crazy! It’s a good look.

Christopher the Healer is drooling over blonde triplets. They turn around and give him 1000-yard stares with their dead, soulless eyes. “Look at you… what’s your name, handsome?”

Christopher the Healer is making a face like he thinks he’s about to get his dick sucked by three identical girls, but then he doesn’t remember his own name.

Listen, ladies. Christopher’s got some real healing powers! He’ll show you. Just lie down, and… *forgets sex*

SPEAKING OF SEX, Magik and Cyclops emerge from their seven minutes in heaven looking fresh as springtime daisies! And thank the stars, because Warren Wuthering Heights III the Angel is tired of not knowing where he is, why, what, where, why, and where he is! Eva Bell thinks Cyclops is the sexiest thing since sliced bread, which is gross and I won’t speak anything more of it. Except that now Frost is gonna have a fucking rival now to fight over Smelly Cyclops.

Scottie 2 Hottie explains to the room that they’re all going to visit dear old Doctor Strange soon to fix Magik’s Limbo Disorder, but Magik’s outbursts suggest that she never actually agreed to this bullshiz, and this confused Cyclops because he definitely heard himself say that it was an agreement! “Oh crikey hell!” the Australian was heard to say.

Because Magik is freaking out Limbo-style again. And this time, she took the rest of them with her.

Final Thoughts

Speaking of being in Hell, I’m in Hell too. Reading this with my tired eyeballs.

Welcome to Loneliness & Cheeseburgers Presents: Uncanny X-Men (Vol. 3) Issue #4! In the previous installment, the Avengers show up in Australia to argue with Cyclops for about ten years before Eva decides to time-freeze them in the land of kangaroos and giant spiders. Where they remain to this day!

Magneto shows up to confess his sins, but he claims he did it to get the government on his side! Now they can really fuck shit up! I agree. And I hope they do.

After Cyclops cools down and Emma Frost convinces him that Magneto done good, they pay a visit to the Jean Grey School of Real Mutant Studies and Not Whatever the Hell Scott Summers Thinks He’s Doing. It’s unclear why they’re there. We’ll see now, though!

Uncanny X-Men (Vol. 3), Issue #4 [June, 2013]
Written by: Brian Michael Bendis

Welcome to Comic Book Artistry 101. Note Illyana on the cover. It’s not enough to have a bare midriff, exposing her soft torso to all manner of fatal attacks such as ax-chopping or large-wooden-stick-impalement, but it’s also practical to have a circle of fabric cut from her top in order to expose cleavage. This is what we call “fanservice to the mouthbreathers”.

“I’m not here to fight,” Cyclops claims, standing in a pose reminiscent of that famous screenshot of Brad Pitt from Fight Club except for the exposed rippling abdominal muscles! “We’re not here to fight anyone. Especially not fellow mutants. We are here to clear the air as best we can and make you an offer.”

It’s a trap! Smite the motherfucker! Send him packing. Hit him with the BFG9000 that you first found in E3M3: Pandemonium! Something!

“Scott Summers, you are out of your mind,” exclaims a wide-eyed Kitty Pryde, who cannot even begin to fathom how out of his mind Scott Summers is! HA CHA CHA CHA!

Later, Pryde assembles her posse of not-out-of-their-mind Jean Grey School X-Men, such as the ice guy, the storm lady, and a pink-haired man. Emma Frost’s creepy Stepford Cuckoos are there looking like the twins from The Shining except there are three of them. Frost tells them they look well. They tell her to go to hell.

Gah! Dowse them in gasoline! Set them on fire! Keep them away from me, for the love of everything that is sacred and holy and filled with candy.

The first thing that gets pointed out, as it’s been pointed out many times already, is that Cyclops murdered Charles Xavier. Oh boo hoo, that guy was a jerk. I heard Ol’ Strong Legs was known to repeatedly kick his wife. Just a dropkick down the stairs! But I suppose they were all witnesses to this murder? Hard to argue with that, unless Cyclops has Memory Manipulating Laser Eyeballs. And I don’t think he does. I checked my notes and he can barely tie his shoes.

Cyclops admits that, yes, maybe he did a teensy murder in front of everyone. But who hasn’t in this day and age? But hey, maybe he didn’t! Did you guys ever think of that? “Do you think that I set out to murder a man who raised me?”

Yeah, I dunno? Maybe? You’re acting weird, so it’s possible.

While Cyclops attempts to reason with people who hate his guts, Frost spends a lot of time telepathically communicating with her Cuckoo Clocks of Doom. The Cuckoos can’t believe the Jerk X-Men are there to try and recruit them. Frost insists that, after all they’ve done for them, they should toe the fucking line!

“Girls, I know you think you hate me. I know you think you don’t need me. But no one on this planet understands you better than I,” Frost starts gettin’ all persuasive-like with it. Looking like she might have the upper hand here. What a fool.

One of the triplets tells her to go to hell again, but the other two are like “we missed you mommy”. They just feel betrayed and abandoned is all. And now that Frost is back… she seems abnormal. Like maybe her powers aren’t working correctly! That might be a huge factor in this right now.

Thank you for finally asking for it! Wolverine, get the shovel.

Cyclops continues trying to talk his way out of being an idiot, but we all know that’s a fruitless venture. I see that Wolverine looks like he’s ready to take Cyclops up on his “kill me” offer. Even when Cyclops was good Wolverine still would’ve been happy to do it.

“You don’t have your powers anymore, do you?” says Creepy Cuckoo #2 with a Creep Cuckoo Grin. It’s awful. “You can’t read our minds.”

Oh shit. Uhhh… “Girls, be nice.” Heh. Well, that’s quite a reaction. “The only reasons she can hear our thoughts is because we’re letting her,” continues Cuckoo #3, whose smug disposition suggests some real toying around is about to commence. Frost freaks out a little.

So what kind of thought-manipulation do they delve into here? They throw Frost into a mind void. Just a bunch of white nothing. Describes me pretty well too, don’t you think?

“You keep thinking we’re trying to impress you,” says Cuckoo #78 or whatever, appearing as a very large vision looming over the slightly scared woman. Frost still thinks this. It’s all very impressive after all, you gotta admit. Some scary serial killer shit. Here’s the upper hand part: the girls finally have some power over Frost. They can finally see what makes her tick. And they can finally get into her brain without getting blocked. Strap on those boots, they’re going in!

Get off me, Scott! No means no! No means no! Ahhh!! No no no! Stop! *rape whistle* *can of mace in the face*

They see a vision of Cyclops on top of Frost when he was Phoenixing around and steal her powers. Well, that sucks. Sorry, Frost. The Cuckoos didn’t know that. That sucks. Sorry.

Frost doesn’t believe them. That was mean. Bad Cuckoos! “You wanted to hurt me and you hurt me.” Frost gets up off the floor and dusts herself off. “You wanted to embarrass me and you embarrassed me.”

Hey, look on the bright side! The Cuckoos are just like her and this is exactly what Frost would’ve done as well! Let bygones be bygones!

The girls insist that, no, they aren’t just like her. They’re their own people. They’re changing. They’re breaking off. Leaving the nest. Letting go of the teet. It’s Chinatown, baby.

OK, fair enough. If you little creeps don’t want to go to Scott Summers’ New Unaccredited School of Being Really Bad at Things, then that’s your prerogative. She can’t do anything about that! So she won’t. Bye.

Enough of this useless pursuit. Going back to “The New Xavier School, Somewhere in Canada” (just like the location of Cyclops’ girlfriend), the new recruits are shuffling around wondering where the hell their leaders are. The school entrance appears to be a large drainage culvert, which proves the kind of slipshod operation this really is.

BENJAMIN DEEDS. Chameleon-like abilities!
EVA BELL. Creates time bubbles!
CHRISTOPHER MUSE. Healer!
FABIO MEDINA. Projects gold balls out of his body!

Together they are!… confused! Christopher says that, in the meantime, maybe the four of them should pick out their rooms in the dormitories.

“I guess it’s like summer camp,” Eva says, considering the idea. They race over to the housing area, where it sucks. No decorations on the walls. No towels in the bathrooms. No real separation of male/female living areas, which is obviously a problem for Eva, but Benjamin assures that not only will they all keep it in their pants, but they’ll cut their dicks off if they have to! He didn’t say that, though. I’m saying that.

Cheeky like a fox!

Christopher says he can’t promise not being rapey, but I think Eva likes him so maybe she doesn’t mind him being a total asshole. “Let me be the first woman to tells you… if there’s anything to like about I will find it myself. You don’t have to put on a show.”

Yeah, she likes him.

“Did you find it yet?” Christopher asks all cute and coy. Yuck.

Going back to the real school. The Jean Grey school. The school wherein the accreditation documents aren’t scrawled in crayon and stuffed into a drawer, Frost continues schmoozing her cuckoos. They start talking about something I think I have no context for: the original X-Men staying here in the present. Is this related to All-New X-Men where it’s like X-Men Babies and Jean Grey is still alive? “They just appeared in the present to screw with Cyclops’ head but they decided to stay,” explains Cuckoo #Something. “The faculty doesn’t talk about them. Like we don’t know they’re here.”

Ah, yes, it is related to that. They’re all 16 and Jean Grey is alive, but are they invisible or something? The Cuckoos say that all their thoughts are scrambled and inhuman. Also, Jean Grey ain’t shit. Everyone said she was the shit, but she ain’t shit. “We are 10 times the psychic she is,” one explains HAUGHTILY. They can read Grey’s thoughts and she doesn’t even know it! It’s mostly about Scott Summers though. She can’t even pass the Bechdel test in her own head! Also she’s like “how can I love a man who killed my Big Bald Idol?” The dude couldn’t even walk!

Cyclops and Frost are over here trying to sell his stupid school to the faculty. “We’re accepting applications now. Even from time-displaced original X-Men who are probably destroying the fabric of time and space by being here.”

Kitty Pryde can’t believe her ears about this lunacy! Magento explains that these new mutants popping up every which way across this dumb Earth will lead to confusion and fear that must be anticipated early before people grab their pointy, pointy pitchforks and start poking mutants in the tuchas. “We can train you to fight back and for each other,” Cyclops explains to the students, “At the New Xavier School.”

All right, Scotty! You’re out! Get to the sidelines!

Later, at the janky New Xavier School, Fabio Medina is running around like a tortured goose and launching balls all over the place. A smattering of very terrifying dinosaurs are tearing these kids up as they all scream bloody murder.

“I could watch this all day,” Magik says as the New Xavier faculty leans against a railing.

Cyclops gets thunked in the head and decides to call off the dinosaurs. Magneto presses a button on his iPhone 3G and the room returns to its normal, un-dinosaured state. The kids are strewn about the room looking like abject failures!

The only thing Fabio did was press a bunch of buttons on a phone he found like a child. Then the Danger Room turned into a DANGER Room! The faculty finds this all somewhat humorous, except for the part where the Danger Room isn’t supposed to be activated unless someone else is working the controls or running an actual program. So, maybe, the Danger Room got a mind of its own! Nah, been there, done that, got the t-shirt.

The kids are in awe! Wow! Cool room! Except for the fearing for their lives part, and possibly actually dying? I don’t know yet if the Danger Room can actually hurt you? Dinosaurs certainly can. It really does seem like an irresponsible room.

“Wait, that wasn’t real?” asks Benjamin, not keeping up at all with this. “We never left this place?” And then Eva has to answer him because she’s much smarter than all the rest of them. Including Cyclops!

While Benjamin and Eva argue, Magik suddenly gets whisked to something that looks like Hell for a quick minute. No big deal.

Illyana, get back here you silly goose!

So she disappears, and the kids wonder if this is also some crazy Danger Room shenanigans. She floats about them among visions of a fiery inferno. Everyone except Fabio looks up and sort of frowns. Fabio has his hands on his head looking like he’s perforating holes in his esophagus from all his shrieking. Creepy looking ghouly ghouls flicker among the flames! Then she’s back on the floor. It’s all quite dramatic, really.

“Illyana? Are you okay?” Cyclops asks the definitely not okay woman. She just needs a minute to pick herself up and dust herself off. The other X-Men aren’t really sure what the fuck just happened. Magik runs away insisting that she’s fine. The others are very perceptive: she’s not actually fine! Cyclops is going to talk to her later, which is going to exponentially add to her not-fineness. You can bet your butt.

Hours later, outside the very snowy drainage ditch opening, Benjamin and Eva talk about how the staff at the New Xavier School of Bubblegum and Duct Tape left them in the lurch again.

“They left again,” Eva says, arms crossed, staring off into the distance. “Back to the other school to see if any of the Jean Grey school wants to be part of this school.”

It’s all starting to get depressing, isn’t it? No direction. No real planning. Benjamin asks Eva if she’s still unnerved by the Danger Room. She goes “OI! NAAAUUURRR!” but really she’s “still processing the fact that Captain America hates her”.

You better not turn into me while we inevitably end up fucking. I will ruin you. You’ll be trapped in a time bubble and launched to the end of the universe.

“I’m worried that our teachers have more problems than we do,” Eva looks forlorn.
“I’m waiting for them to decide to be completely honest with us,” Benjamin adds. As he gets closer to Eva, his appearance starts changing.

Is Scott Summers good? Is he bad? Are we here to do bad things? Is it with good intentions? THESE are the questions that need answering! Also, where’s the Fuck Room? lol!

Fabio emerges from the culvert to let the two know that the faculty are back. I hope they explain themselves quite thoroughly, y’hear?

“Students…” Cyclops begins with a stoic face of grim triumph, “I’m happy to say we have some new blood here at the new Xavier school.”

It’s Warren Worthington III, the guy with the angel wings whom I barely know. “He has come here from the past to do right by the dream of Charles Xavier.” Yeah, that sounds like a waste of time.

Also, the three Cuckoos are there. “And these are the Stepford Cuckoos. Very special students of ours.” Yeah, is that all you have to say? You don’t even know them at all, do you Scott? They all look the same to you, huh? Typical.

The students are like “all right, yeah, this is a little better”.

Then Magik has her Hell Problems again. The End.

Final Thoughts

One issue left! Where this is going, I can’t say at all! Maybe Cyclops will accidentally blow up the school trying to use his Blast Vision to look for his tiny dick. Stay tuned, “loyal” readers!