Welcome to Loneliness & Cheeseburgers Presents: Uncanny X-Men (Vol. 4), Issue #5! In the previous installment, in a fucking nutshell, Magneto and Triage are hiding in Genosha and then the Death Riders or the Dirty Devils or whatever you want to call them teleport to Genosha to, presumably, kill Magneto and Triage.

Thank god it’s almost over. I couldn’t be less invested in a storyline if I wanted to. Did people buy this stuff when it first came out and then punched a hole in their walls they were so mad? Because I have a fresh wall right in front of me that needs plenty o’ punchin’.

Uncanny X-Men (Vol. 4), Issue #5 [May, 2016]
Written by: Cullen Bunn

FINALLY, IT’S THE SUSPENSEFUL BATTLE BETWEEN THE X-MEN AND THE DARK R—zzzzzzzzzzz.

“The Dark Riders sealed the tomb!” yells Sabretooth. “We’re trapped in here!” Well, maybe you shouldn’t be cavorting around an ancient pyramid looking for Dark Riders in the first place, you dang group of numbnuts.

Monet “M” St. “M” Croix disagrees, and she flies through meters of stone, punching through all of it without even hurting a pinky finger. Let’s go guys! Anticlimactic events await!

In Genosha, the Dark Riders look around some ruins for their main target: Triage. They yell for Magneto to hand him over so they can be on their way. Despite Triage’s “BRRRT!!” face, Magneto considers this proposition…

…but then he uses his magnetic Magneto powers to launch a car right into one of them. FUH-WOMP! Then he uses the car to block laser blasts from the hooded-missing-eyeball guy. Magneto gets injured by this, but he’s still able to speak in labored sentences with plenty of ellipses. Triage is like “we have to move, motherfucker!”

He doesn’t move, though, motherfucker. He doesn’t move at all, motherfucker.

Get up and move, Triage! Stop fooling around like a silly billy!

So Triage gets stabbed. That’s not really good for him, now is it? “Kid can heal himself,” says hooded-missing-eyeball guy (I believe his name is Gauntlet?). “Lock his brain down, Psynapse. Make sure he’s worm food.” And worm food he is, before he even dies! The worms are crawling all over him already. Look at those worms go.

Well, now you’ve gone and done made Magneto mad as heck. He picks off a couple of Dark Riders like they were ants, mocking them for trying to fight him out in the open where he has the advantage. Gauntlet has his gun aimed at Magneto ready to snipe his stupid melon off his neck. “I want you to know… I respect you,” Gauntlet says. “But you’re too damn dangerous to live.”

This is when the panels get chaotic as the rest of the X-Men team pops into the fray. Gauntlet immediately throws a pity party. Magneto tricked them into wasting time while the rest of the X-Men showed up! Grrrrr! Arrrrgh! Raaawrrr! And, in the havoc, whatever mechanism that was locking Triage’s brain down is lifted. Triage gets up and starts healing his impaling wounds. He chides Magneto for using him as bait, but Magneto isn’t listening. Magneto does whatever Magneto wants and no one is going to stop Magneto. Not even Patrick Stewart!

“You’re an Inhuman, right?” M says as she punches a big Dark Rider who looks like The Thing with horns. “Your people use the Terrigen mists. And the T-mists killed someone… someone I cared about!”

Psylocke wipes Harddrive’s brain clean. Good work. “The Dark Riders are finished,” claims Magneto. Then he launches into a self-righteous speech that I won’t even talk about here. Magneto is long-winded and, frankly, embarrassing everyone by talking.

Then Magneto blows up the entire island of Genosha to kill the last Dark Rider – Gauntlet – as they all fly away in their ship happily and triumphantly. Even Triage thinks this is mega-fucked up. “Genosha was destroyed a long time ago, Triage,” Magneto says simply. And conversation is over.

Is fourteen seconds a long time ago? I can never remember anymore.

“Funny how you never mentioned that you’d wired the entire place to blow,” says Sabretooth disconcertedly. Magneto merely tells him that he’s not going to disclose everything to the team. No trust. Go fuck a duck.

“But where are you going to hide now?” Triage asks. “Where will we lay low? Genosha was your home.”

“The destruction of Genosha was a warning to the world,” responds Magneto. “I have no intention of ‘laying low.’ And you do not need to worry about where we will be residing… there will be no place for you there.”

This Magneto guy is a real jerkass, isn’t he? Not in the cute, cuddly, lovable Wolverine way either, unfortunately.

The X-Men take Triage to Limbo – X-Haven – which looks like Hell and is adjacent to Hell because it really is Limbo. Storm is there to welcome him. Everyone lives happily ever after.

“Thank you for bringing him,” Storm says to Psyclocke.

“Erik needed convincing,” Psylocke responds. “He doesn’t buy into what you’re doing here.”

“Why doesn’t that surprise me?” Storm says, shaking her head. Ohhhh, that rapscallion Magneto! Disapproving of Limbo, blowing up islands. Will his antics never cease??

Storm invites Psylocke and M to stay in cozy X-Haven. They have a Keurig! But no, they’ve got their own thing going on. And in spite of everything, Magneto has good intentions! Somewhere. When they find out what they are, they’ll let her know. “Just take care that you don’t become more like our enemies and less like X-Men” Storm warns. Storm warning! Get it?

In the Savage Land, whatever the fuck that is, War Room X has been activated with all essential systems and operations to Magneto’s specifications. Sabretooth has a question for Magneto about Triage. “You knew he could heal himself, right? You knew that if he got cut down, he’s be all right.” Psylocke cuts him off there. Magneto didn’t know the Dark Riders would actually come and was gambling. “And when you gamble, you have to be willing to lose something.”

I’m not familiar with this euphemism. Is this about how hard and not-worth-it it is to have sex with M?

Psylocke pulls Magneto into the other room to speak privately. She relays Storm’s wishes to have her and M join her in X-Haven. She reminds Magneto that secret plans will bite him in the ass if and when great X-Men such as a herself, M, and Sabretooth defect.

“’X-Men.’ If we’re going to fight for whatever shred of Xavier’s dream remains, I suppose that’s what they are,” says Magneto. “But never forget that Xavier had his secrets… and so do I.”

We end in Los Angeles with a conversation between the two biggest who-cares characters in this story, Mystique and Fantomex, while they fly in their ship. It’s so fucking boring that I’m going to skip it. They flirt and give each other fuck eyes while being combative. Yawn and ho hum.

The issue ends with Magneto stopping the ship in its tracks to talk to them. And sweet homely Jesus it’s finally over.

Final Thoughts

Boo to all of this! The next five issues of the story are part of the Apocalypse Wars event, so if I ever get around to that I assume that more regular X-Men players will be in the mix. And you know what happens when you assume, right? You make a C-U-N-T out of D-O-N-A-L-D T-R-U-M-P.

Welcome to Loneliness & Cheeseburgers Presents: Uncanny X-Men (Vol. 4), Issue #4! In the previous installment, the Dark Riders continue trying to kill healers while this F-list X-Men team tries to save all the healers they can and drop them off in Genosha where they will be “safe”. How? I have no idea. I don’t particularly give a shit, either.

I looked up a picture of Cullen Bunn and he looks like the kind of “nice guy” who thinks he’s owed sex after every platonic encounter with a woman, even if she’s a waitress at T.G.I. Friday’s. He also looks like a less albino version of Brother Ali, which is not a compliment.

Uncanny X-Men (Vol. 4), Issue #4 [May, 2016]
Written by: Cullen Bunn

The New York branch of the Hellfire Club are enjoying a festive masquerade, replete with alcohol, dancing, and orgy rooms. And while 99% of the patrons are wearing traditional eye-masks and ornate, flowery hats, one guy is standing there suspiciously with a fucking ninja hood. One woman points out that this man looks more… interesting… than the rest of the crowd. She then asks the guy to ask her to dance, which he obliges.

The charade is over. These two know each other. One is Fantomex. The other is Mystique. They’re about 15 kinds of coy with each other. Fantomex wishes Mystique was dead, lol. Mystique wishes Fantomex would just fuck her and get it over with, lol lol. Fantomex doesn’t have much time for any games. “I’ve discovered something new in regards to our friends at the Someday Corporation. The mutants under their ‘protection’ have become little more than lab rats… experimented upon… augmented with technology I know all too–”

Mystique shushes Fantomex and tells him the Inner Council doesn’t have time for his discovery. The Inner Council wants the two of them to work together now to send Someday a message. And it’s this: “There’s a bomb in the lasagna.” Ha! Do you get the reference? If so, you’re as sad as I am.

Fantomex groans about this new arrangement while the laugh track roars. WHAT WACKY HIJINKS WILL THESE TWO ASSUREDLY GET INTO???

Let’s see what’s going on in Genosha right now. Triage is talking to Magneto. Magneto plans to send his scrappy team of literal misfits to fight the Dark Riders. “They’re Inhumans… at least some of them are… chosen by Apocalypse to cull the weak from the Earth,” Triage confirms. Magneto agrees. “What I’m saying is…” Triage continues. “There’s a good chance some of your crew is going to get jacked up.”

Yeah, no shit. Jacked up is the least of what will happen. That’s why Magneto has a healer next to him in Genosha. So he can be uninvolved in helping. Make sense? No? Well, allow Grandpa Magneto to explain himself:

“The Dark Riders view the current state of the world – the Terrigen mists that are killing our people – as a kind of weaponized natural selection. They are targeting mutant healers in some bid to speed our race on its way to extinction. Taking you on a mission that brings us into direct conflict with our enemies–”

Triage gets it. That’s some not-smarty stuff. “You must realize you can’t protect us all,” Triage tells Magneto. Magneto is silent at this smarty response. We’ll see how this will pan out (everyone but Triage will be killed, and Triage will rule the mutants and rename himself “Mr. Healer” is my guess).

Meanwhile, the Dark Riders are in Tibet with Xorn who doesn’t seem to be afraid that the one called Barrage is pointing a ginormous gun at the back of his head.

What he’s saying is that Xorn can’t stop masturbating in front of them. It’s enough to make a grown man blush.

“It’s strange…” Xorn says, gun in his face. “You talk about the death of the mutant race, but you have mutants among you.”

They argue about mutants for a few panels. Xorn posits that even if they kill every mutant healer on Earth, there is of course the possibility that healing can show up as a secondary mutation in the existing population. Then what, jive turkey?

Xorn then scares the Dark Riders by killing Barrage with brain electricity, and then the Dark Riders teleport out of there to Egypt.

“This isn’t right! Whines Deadbolt, the glowing blue skeleton man. “We’re strong! Barrage was strong! He wasn’t meant to fall… not to some pacifist monk!”

One of the Dark Riders shuts up Deadbolt by erasing his fear and doubt and replacing it with the True Gospel, which sounds sketchy as hell and not something I’d sign up for personally.

Meanwhile, Psylocke and M and the Third-Rate Wolverine are flying around Egypt looking for the Dark Riders’ hideout. Psylocke knows they’re here somewhere because she scanned their minds! You know, because any other way would be silly.

Archangel flies out nowhere and crashes into an ancient pyramid, obliterating it. Now that they’ve opened up an entrance, it’s time to infiltrate their filthy pyramid lair. They all jump out of the aircraft without a parachute – they even mention how jumping out of an aircraft without a parachute is batshit crazy – and then land softly and safely.

Smells like grandma’s catheter bag.

After trying to sneak around clandestinely and unnecessarily arguing amongst themselves, the X-Men get ambushed by the Dark Riders. The fight is long, rife with one-liners and other forms of talking that only serve to waste time.

Harddrive, a Dark Rider who is plugged into many computers, keeps an eye on the fight and on Triage/Magneto hanging around Genosha. Tabs, you know. Gotta keep ‘em on people.

In a brilliant flash of purple light, probably because they were losing like dogs, the Dark Riders teleport out of the fray. “I think this fight was pointless for them,” Psylocke says grumpily. “We aren’t their targets.”

It’s about this moment that the stones collapse over the X-Men, trapping them in the ruins of the pyramid. Psylocke realizes that this is a diversion while they go after Triage and Magneto in Genosha.

Affirmative. The Dark Riders are going to make us eat our own rectums. Roger that.

Obviously, Magneto is prepared.

A brilliant flash of purple light appears in the sky. The Dark Riders are here!

Final Thoughts

I need to reiterate that I DO NOT FUCKING CARE about any of this X-Men team. Why am I reading this? I should have done my research.

Where’s Scott Summers? I’d rather watch him cry for hours than read whatever the hell this is.

Huff.

Welcome to Loneliness & Cheeseburgers Presents: Uncanny X-Men (Vol. 4), Issue #3! In the previous installment, who cares. I don’t like this series one bit. Let’s just keep it rolling.

Uncanny X-Men (Vol. 4), Issue #3 [April, 2016]
Written by: Cullen Bunn

Uh oh, Magneto literally has blood on his hands! The cover art is a little on the nose already! What other allusions, metaphors and idioms are they going to shove down my throat today?

There is a protest outside Seattle, Washington’s M-Pox Crisis Center. “Mutants = Disease” says one sign. “Don’t Bring Sickness” says another. “Finish the Damn Book, George R. R. Martin” on yet another! Psylocke maneuvers through the crowd incognito, and by that I mean she has her big pink lightning bolt-esque eye-mask thing on. Magneto’s with her looking all dolled-up Magneto-style. “I can tweak the surface thoughts of everyone in the crowd as long as they’re distracted. They can’t see us.”

You better hope not, baby. The crowd looks like they’re going to eat a bunch of mutants for breakfast like so many Berry Berry Kix. They sneak into a tent where Triage is hanging out healing M-Pox victims much to Psylocke’s surprise. But Triage, rubbing his sleepy eyes, tells her that the cure is only temporary. He then looks straight into Magneto’s face and says “Magneto…”, so now everyone is up to speed!

“I thought you were dead or something,” says Triage. “But here you are.”

Like a bad habit, son.

Triage wants to help mutants, but he’s done with the X-Men. Fuck the X-Men and the big, beautiful horses they rode in on.

We can throw your bones in a sack and dump them out an airplane, too, if you’d rather do it that way? I’m game.

Psylocke’s lockey-senses start tingling. “…they’re here. I’m picking up three of them.”

Oh no! Not the Rough Riders! Or the Dirty Riders! Or whatever they’re called, I don’t remember! They’re here to shove Triage’s buttcheeks up into his anal cavity! Run!

“All mutant healers have been marked for death,” Psylocke says with a face that suggests she’s mad at Triage for not knowing this already. “You’re next.”

Magneto says “I’ll deal with the riders” and then he makes them pancakes.

The Dark Riders try to use wind powers to blow tents out of the way, revealing that sweet, sweet healer man candy, but Magneto is here to distract them with some boogity-boogity glowing eyeballs. And he warns Psylocke not to stop him or else it’ll be her butthole that she’ll be pulling Triage’s buttcheeks out of.

While Magneto distracts them, Psylocke attempts to penetrate their brain skulls. But they’ve been trained to resist psychic intrusion! So now what? Well, since Magneto is distracting them, Psylocke is able to penetrate their brain skulls. That seems awfully underwhelming, you know.

In about four seconds, Psylocke is done and now they have everything that they need. Magneto, you can now fuck them up royally with your ultra magnets and your dipoles and your what-have-you. And after he does that (and he does it quite gruesomely, I may add), he turns back to Triage. “Now, Mr. Muse… as my associate mentioned… you need to come with us.”

Triage doesn’t wanna. He needs to be here treating the M-Pox. Magneto informs this sucker that the Dark Riders will just send more forces next time. Buttcheeks and buttholes, remember? You’re in deep doo-doo unless you come with the big, scary X-Men.

Awww, I wanted to make a sign. It would have said “The X-Men suck and Wolverine smells like a dead cat”.

Triage asks straight up if these X-Men are going to stop the dudes killing all the healers, and the answer is “sorta”. The problem is that the Dark Riders have a head start. They’ve already killed a million billion healers and there’s just you and Yuna from Final Fantasy X left.

Speaking of nothing I just talked about, Monet “M” St. Croix flies to Tibet to barge into a Buddhist temple to deliver a warning to some sittin’-cross-legged menacing figure shrouded in white with glowing turquoise eyes. Always with the glowing eyes. “I know who you are,” says the figure. “And I know of the grim tidings that have brought you before me. While I appreciate your concern… I hope you will also respect my wishes when I say… I have no intention of leaving this place.”

Why? It looks like a dank shithole to me. Is it rent-controlled? Is that what it is? The figure is named Shen Xorn, and after some quick research on Ask Jeeves I became bored to tears so I stopped looking him up. Monet tells the healing mutant that bad guys are coming to hurt the healing mutants. And that means him. He’s not taking it seriously.

Monet informs the guy, who has been living under a rock since Obama brought some sass to the White House, that mutants are dying, Terrigen mists are sweeping the continents, and democracy is crumbling in Hungary.

Xorn offers Monet tea.

Isolation gets boring after a while, actually, right? Come with the X-Men and they can protect you while you chat with Wolverine about… armpits. “If the mists find me here, so be it,” Xorn says, sipping his drink. “And if these hunters you warn me about come for me… perhaps I will offer them tea. In any case, I am prepared for the fate that lies before me.”

Sounds like a real manly man, this guy. Meanwhile, Triage has been successfully scooped up by Magneto and Psylocke and they’re flying in the Magneto Jet talking about why the Dark Riders want the healers dead.

It’s probably because you talked hella smack about their mamas.

Magneto and Psylocke fill him in on the whole thing. It’s because of natural selection being interrupted and also because healers aren’t very environmentally friendly. Littering all over the fucking place, honestly.

So here’s the bright idea: Magneto and Co. are smuggling all of the healers and whisking them away to Genosha. The Magneto Jet lands in the dry, dusty desert where, once upon a time, Magneto was trying to build a mutant colony as a refuge. Because that would have been fun. Hey, mutants. How about some sand for dinner?

Magneto reminisces about how a rogue sentinel killed 16,000,000 mutants (eek!) and how a Terrigen mist cloud killed 60 more (ook!). So that was the end of that idea. “Now… Genosha is naught but a staging ground for war,” Magneto says bleakly.

Sabretooth is already there waiting, and he wastes no time being scary and intimidating for no reason with Tirage. Then he briefs Magneto and Psylocke on Monet’s failure in Tibet. Meanwhile, Psylocke was able to figure out “the hole” where the Dark Riders are hiding. They’re going to carpet bomb the place! With kisses!

Tirage realizes that he is the only healing that these second-rate X-Men were able to save. When this is brought to Magneto’s attention, he absent-mindedly goes “we’re gonna carpet bomb the Dark Riders’ hideout with kisses, son.”

Meanwhile, at the Someday Corporation storage facility, some guy who fancies himself as Fantomex snoops around with a couple of companions. “The Hellfire Club went to a lot of trouble to locate this little warehouse,” he says. “Now that we’re here, let’s make the most of our time.”

*gets out the Twister mat*

They find a room packed with stasis tubes. “Look at them all,” Fantomex says. “Mutants who have willingly placed themselves in a state of suspended animation… hoping to one day wake up in a better world.”

And then it’s a whole bunch of BRAKKA BRAKKA BRAKKA BRAKKA BRAKKA BRAKKA BRAKKA!! That’s gunfire, you see. Should’ve been obvious from the onomatopoeia, right? Anyway, Fantomex gets away in his weird pink spaceship and starts talking to Mystique on the videophone.

The plot thickens.

?

Final Thoughts

Fuck this shit. It took me three sessions to get through this write-up and I’m not about to let this shitty comic ruin my day. Except it already has! My lividity knows no bounds.