This entry covers “Gen13” volume two issues 8 and 9 by Brandon Choi, Jim Lee, J. Scott Campbell, Humberto Ramos, Alex Garner, Al Gordon and Wayne Faucher.
Our boys and girls in Gen13 are still hiding out in San Francisco where they were last seen after their adventure with Michael Cray. Lynch is resting up as good as he can without the Gen-Factor. Roxy has been having nightmares starring the mysterious Trance, much to the concern of bother Caitlin and Anna. So, how long have the team been hanging out in San Francisco? Well, long enough for Grunge to get a haircut. A haircut, while it undermine’s his nickname/codename a bit, it’s a much better look for him. Wait, what is this site? “Styling the Storm : One Fanboy’s Fashionable Take on the Clothing of the WildStorm Universe”? No! Let’s get back to the recap!
Some of the kids decide that they are going to go dancing, while Bobby and Sarah decide to stay in their safe house along with Lynch and Anna. While on the way to the club Roxy sees Trance out of the corner of her eye, but he disappears quickly enough to make the rest of the kids question her freak out. Later at the club, Roxy, Grunge, and Caitlin run into Trance again. Instead of big-time freaking out, Roxy just lets Caitlin start dancing with him. I mean, she has a bad feeling about it all, but she must be playing it cool. Once Trance puts Caitlin in, well, a trance and they walk out of the club together does Roxy get the nerve up to put a stop to it. It’s too little too late for her and Grunge just encounter a creepy little girl who hands them the address of the old amusement park. The girl tells them if they ever want to see Caitlin again, that’s where she’ll be.
Turns out this was all an elaborate ruse for Trance’s minions to get the jump on the rest of the Gen13 kids, as well as Lynch. For the most part, it works. Every Gen13 member is teamed up with someone who can easily thwart their superpowers. I’m of the mind that Trance specifically sought this team to deal with Gen13. It was a stroke of genius to turn Caitlin bad to take down Lynch too! But for all his planning he didn’t count on two things. The first being Queelocke opening a portal to bring in Anna, an android he cannot mind control and is hella tough. And second, that once his team isn’t matched up against their ideal Gen13 opponent that they are easy to defeat.
The reason Trance wants to add the Gen13 kids too his army is because wants revenge on Damocles. We never find out how they’re tied together, so it is kind of a letdown. Of course, Trance knowing Damocles does explain why he was first around when the Bounty Hunters showed up at the Soil Machine. He was watching for them, it was just a bonus that he met with Roxy leading him to more members for his revenge society. Trance also knows that The Sword is after Qeelocke. Trance, for all his faults, is really out to stop Damocles, which is something the whole WSU can get behind during “Fire from Heaven.” Too bad he doesn’t show up to help.
With Trance and his crew on the run, the kids want to follow and continue the fight. Right at this moment, Lynch gets a call. It’s his Team 7 pals! They’re taking the fight to Craven and they’re going to need his help. Hell, bring the kids, let’s make this a party!
While all this has been going on we’ve been seeing Threshold and Ivana get their team of Gen-Active teens ready to fight the Gen13 team. They’ll soon be called the Deviants or, yah know, DV8 for short. They are ready to stop wasting virtual versions of Gen13 and get their hands on the real deal.
Also, we see Capt. Lucius Morgan and his daughter Daphne from the Coda Island story. Turns out Lucius is looking up an old friend, one Alex Fairchild! He lets Alex know he’s met Caitlin as well as that he’s heard Kaizen is messing with some Gen-Factor stuff. They agree to head to Gamorra and see what they can find out, on the Gen-Factor projects as well as on the current whereabouts of Caitlin.
If that’s not enough, there are two more threads woven throughout these two issues! The first is a nightmare experienced by a teenage boy named Ethan McCain. A character who will become a big player during “Fire from Heaven.” The other character we meet is a young Gen-Active man who goes by the name Absolom who seemingly has control over ground next to him. Currently, all we know is that he’s on Gamorra and is from a different clan that calls Gamorra home.
Continuity Corner:
- The last we saw Trance was in “Deathblow” volume one issue 17 trading information with Miles Craven. We know he was asking for information on Kaizen Gamorra, yet we haven’t seen him confront Kaizen or know what he’s doing with that information.
- The next we’ll see Trance and friends is a long way off in a few issues of “Gen13 Bootleg” then he’ll bother some of the DV8 kids in “Gen-Active.” None of it has anything to do with his relationship or knowledge of Damocles.
- At one point Trance almost gets to say that Caitlin and Roxy are sisters before Qeelocke summons Anna to come kick his ass. I cannot believe how long and how often they teased this!
- What an introduction for Absolom. Too bad we’ll never see him again! He’s supposed to be a brother of Grunge’s but the only way to know any of this is from the “WildStorm Universe Source Book.” So it is acceptable that we don’t know any of this. I wonder how he and his story line got dropped? Note: his father didn’t fare much better in this department either.
- Not sure if it has already been mentioned, but Capt. Lucius Morgan was a member of Team 7. We’ve never seen him in any flashbacks, so I figure he was like Bloodmoon and quit the team early and didn’t get super-powers. But later we’ll see him with some… so… yeah, I dunno… he must also have the power of half-assed retcons.
- When Lynch gets the call it seems like the whole gang is already there with Cray. We don’t really see them all coming together, but it’s interesting to note that they were all together when they called. Considering how much some of them hate each other, that’s a pretty tall order.
NEXT: “Brass” volume one issues 1 through 3 by Richard Bennett and Aron Wiesenfeld
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