The Gen13 Trading Card Story and “Gen13: Interactive”

This entry covers the story from “Gen13: Series 1 Trading Card Base Set cards 73 – 81” by Brandon Choi,  Ryan Odagawa, Joe Phillips, Eric Shanower, John Lowe, either Jason or Gary Martin, Wendy Fouts, and Martin Jimenez, and also covers “Gen13 : Interactive” issues 1 – 3 by Mike Heisler, Jason Johnson, Edwin Rosell, and JD.

The trading card story is pretty inconsequential but, it’s always fun to see if we can work in these side stories. The Gen13 kids, Lynch, and Anna go on a trip to the mall to unwind. They wind up at a virtual reality game arcade named Virtual Valley. The man running it, known as the Psimaster has the VR create whatever reality the player wants, but also records and sells the footage. Eventually Anna saves the day, because as a robot, she’s not generating the fantasy environment in the VR. She also wrecks Psimaster’s equipment, so he won’t be able to pull this little scam again!

Now, “Gen13: Interactive” is a proper book… but no less inconsequential, but man is this some pretty pretty art! The kids and Lynch go to the zoo, they all get separated from each other and then all the kids get captured by a being known as Panic. What Panic wants is a sample of Gen-Factor, and he thinks the kids are the way to get it.

While the capture of the kids is usually fantastical and silly, the VR situations that Panic puts the abducted kids into is about the same. They are all a means to test the kids and their powers, but it’s, well, silly as hell. Bobby is a member of DV8 with Bliss and it’s being lead by Lynch, Caitlin is working at a phone sex line, Sarah is in the Puritan days and set to marry John Rolfe, Roxy is a Hooters waitress, and Grunge… well Grunge is the Maxx. The kids get free and find a way to transport away from Panic, but the location of the transport is random and again, silliness ensues! Roxy is inside of a “stripper cake” at a bachelor party in Kansas, Sarah is in Rio at Carnival, Grunge is in Hell, Bobby is hidden in a dressing room of a Vegas cabaret, and Caitlin is being harassed by the staff of a certain Southern California based comic book company.

Why all the silliness? Well the hook of this book was that the readers voted on what was going on in the book. Were all the suggestions to vote on wacky as hell? Some were, but others really weren’t. Like for our first situation with the VR, all of Caitlin’s options were silly asking if she should be turned into Snow White, a housewife with a sitcom, a nun, or a phone sex operator, while Roxy had the options to be a SEAL Team member, old maid, or Caitlin herself along with the winner of her becoming a Hooters waitress. So in some ways the ultimate silliness was up to those reading and voting, but there was enough craziness already built in.

Back to the story, we, through Lynch, find that Panic was an invention of Dr. Weir Dangle, a being made of nano-tech. Lynch contacts Dr. Dangle and they meet up and find Panic and the kids. What Panic wants is a mate, and while he can create duplicates of himself, problem that, is that they’re just duplicates, exact copies, no variations, just more of himself, not a mate. Panic was hoping that introducing some extracted Gen-Factor into the nano-tech one of his copies would introduce enough variance that a mate for him could be possible.  Panic unfortunately found that the Gen-Factor of the kids was altered enough through the generational hand down, it was no good for his purposes. Seems only a pure Gen-Factor sample will do, and Lynch steps up to donates some of his, mostly just so we can get this whole debacle over with. Poor John Lynch, starts out in the WildStorm Universe as a single guy w/ a lost son, ends up being the dad to Bobby, TAO, and now apparently Panic’s partner.

Continuity Corner

• I figure the kids have a little down time after getting back from Cray’s funeral, and that Lynch wants to keep it a little light for right now. A trip to the mall, a trip to the zoo, who thought everything would go so wrong?
• The card story has to happen after “Fire from Heaven” because Lynch calls Bobby “son” in his VR fantasy. And in “Gen13: Interactive” issue 1 we have Grunge and Bobby talking about Lynch being his father as if it is still new info the group is dealing with.
• Both stories have to occur before the events of “Gen13” v2 issue 18, as the team is in La Jolla with Lynch and Anna. 
• I place the card story before the story in “Gen13: Interactive” because I don’t think the kids would willing do VR for fun after being forced to by Panic in “Gen13: Interactive” issue 2.
• Panic would return in “Gen13: Wired” a call back that no one was expecting!

NEXT: “DV8” issues 1/2 & 5 by Warren Ellis, JJ Kirby, Humberto Ramos, Randy Elliot, Dexter Vines, Saleem Crawford, Sal Reglas, and Wendy Fouts

Where to Find These Stories

• The “Gen13: Interactive Plus” trade

“Union” Vol. 2 issues 7 – 9 and “Union : Final Vengeance”

This entry covers “Union” volume two issues 7 – 9 and “Union : Final Vengeance” issue 1 by Mike Heisler, Pop Mahn, Allen Im, Carlos Mota, Jim Lee, Travis Charest, Whilce Portacio, Scott Clark, Chuck Gibson, John Lowe, Gary Martin, Mark Pennington, John Tighe, Mark Irwin, Rene Micheletti and Sal Regla.

Jill is unhappy with Union. Union keeps ignoring Jill to fight crime. Jill gets more fed up and leaves his ass for a stranger she met in an alley one day. That stranger saved her from some thugs. This stranger? Oh, he’s just Regent, the bad guy from Aegena, where he and Union grew up. Yup, that Regent! Turns out Mr. Douchebag engineered the whole alley attack on Jill thing just to steal her and then beat Union’s ass. Really, when you do that, you know you’re the bad guy, right Regent? There’s no possible way you thought you were doing something positive right? But to be fair, Regent seems pretty a-ok with his evilness. Dude is owning it!

And by owning it, I mean really mean owning it! You see, Regent has killed Union’s best friend Maikone! Then he kicked Union’s booty and paraded it around NYC for a few hours before taking Union’s unconscious body and tossing it into the sea. Sounds like a real bastard, no? Not only that but like every good villain Regent monologues like a real sonuvabitch, revealing that Union really didn’t kill all those Directorate soldiers back in Chichester. That was just a failsafe that went off when Regent’s pop died. A failsafe that Regent put into his own dad’s justice stone! Union only survived because he was in the eye of the storm, so to speak.

While Union is chilling at the bottom of the ocean, we find out that Regent has not only kidnapped Jill, but he’s also kidnapped Union’s former main squeeze from back home, Eliya. He’s holding both of them captive on his secret hidden base, in outer freakin’ space! Eventually, Union’s justice stone wakes him and leads him to said space base. That’s when all hell breaks loose!

Union goes in hot, and after a rocky start is holding his own against Regent. Meanwhile, Eliya and Jill get loose from the cages Regent was holding them in. Regent decides he’s not going to stand for a lowly Protectorate beating him up, so he tries to implant a second justice stone on this body! This just gives him more than he knows what to do with and Regent just starts blasting everything, resulting in ripping his satellite of loserdom apart. In the middle of this Regent tries to teleport away, but due to the doubled up justice stones he becomes some kind of portal/gate/black hole and sucks up everything, including Eliya, right in front of Union and Jill, who remain unharmed and unsucked up.

Union and Jill return to Earth and decide to live off the fake rich playboy life that Regent had constructed for himself. It’s not much, but it’s all they have except each other. And with these two, it’s a guess on how long that’s going to last.

Continuity Corner:

• Not only was Union not paying attention to Jill when he should have, but he’s also been blowing off StormWatch and he got a real dressing down from Bendix for not being around when he’s needed.
• The first few pages of issue 9 we are introduced to Data Assimilation Bureau of I/O consisting of Agents Kroger and Hanley and they both report to Director Sterling. I’m not sure we ever see these characters again. But if I’m wrong, let me know! They also refer to Director Rios and we’ll see him again in a lot of upcoming books. First in “Black Ops” but soon after that in pretty much any book that deals with I/O because he becomes the new director (until Ivana manages to steal that position from him.)
• Union makes a big comeback in “Fire from Heaven” which in all actuality was published well before “Union : Final Vengeance.” “Final Vengeance” had several delays but indeed was set before “Fire from Heaven” according to the final letter collum.
• Jill, however, we’re not going to see again. Maybe she finally left Union’s ass for good and that’s the reason for the despondency that leads to his suicide in “the Authority” volume one issue 21.
• Also, I don’t recall that we ever see the final fate of Eliya and Regent. Which is a shame as I liked Eliya a lot and would have loved to see the proposed “Union” relaunch with her at the center.
• During his fight with Regent, Union loses his staff. Don’t worry, he’ll steal one off of his alternate universe doppelganger The Sword in “Fire from Heaven.” Hrm… having an evil dude’s staff in your justice stone… maybe this is also something that leads to Union’s horrible last moments.

NEXT: “Cybernary” volume one issues 2 through 5 and “Cybernary : the Price” by Steve Gerber, Jeff Mariotte, Jeff Rebner, Richard Friend and John Tighe

“Union” Vol. 2 issues 5 & 6

this entry covers issues 5 and 6 of “Union” volume two

Union, this dude can’t catch a break. He gets home from his big adventure, helping to save the world with his part-time job at StormWatch, and he gets into a fight with his kinda-sorta-girlfriend. He’s also still paying for his drunken escapades in Chicago with the Savage Dragon. Not that I blame Jill at all, Union is just up and leaving without any kind of explanations. He’s playing an “asking forgiveness is easier than asking permission” kind of game, and fellas, that never ends well. But, by the end of the argument, he lets Jill know that she quit her crummy waitressing job, which does make her feel a little bit better.

When Union goes to think over the happenings of “WildStorm Rising” and about finding his place with StormWatch as well as with Jill, he’s interrupted. No mind that he’s sitting atop the Statue of Liberty, when someone wants to find you, they’ll find you. The “they” in this case is the witch Rhiannon. She pretty much just straight out casts a spell that sends Union into a parallel universe.

Luckily, Union is dropped off in this new universe pretty much where he was in his universe. Also, this universe’s Rhiannon was there to greet him. I call this the Sideways Universe after the title of issue 5 because, why the hell not, you know. It’s better than nothing. So, Sideways Rhiannon catches Union (and the reader) up to speed on an evil bastard named Lord Necros who has pretty much taken over either much of the world or just New York and the rest of the world lives in fear of him. He’s done this through magic, which is a bit more powerful here in the Sideways Universe.

Sideways Rhiannon leads Union to her team’s hideout. Only it looks to Union as if they’re getting hit by a subway car! Not so, it’s just Sideways Alex Fairchild using his telepathy to make you think a subway car is hurtling at you! Oh, those crazy Team 7 guys! Sideways Rhiannon gives some more background on Necros’ rise to power, and we see a bit more of Necros getting mad and wanting to crush Sideways Rhiannon’s new champion, but not much happens until the end issue 5 when Sideways Caitlin Fairchild shows up! And by “not much happens” I mean that the hidden rebel base is found by some of Necros’ minions and Sideways Caitlin Fairchild shows up, took them down and being all sassy.

A few days prep and now it is time for the main event. It’s time to take the fight right to Necros himself. Union, Sideways Rhiannon and the Sideways Fairchilds lead the cause. But when it comes to the big battle vs. Necros, Union starts to lose his nerve. Come on Union, don’t be a big baby! Suddenly Union is down there, mixing it up with Necros, but he isn’t doing too well. In fact, it looks like Union got killed by Necros in a huge purple blast! What? Is this the end of our hero? Wait, no, of course not, it was just Sideways Alex Fairchild and his wacky powers of perception!

Sideways Alex Fairchild’s death turns out not to be in vain. It gave Union the balls to jump into the fight. And bonus, because of everyone, even Necros, thought that Union was already in the fight, Necros used a ton of power when he shot the snot out of Sideways Alex Fairchild, leaving him fairly weakened. Before Necros can draw more power Union starts to share the energy from his justice stone/staff with Necros. It is more than Necros can take and he croaks, too.

Sideways Alex Fairchild pretending to be Union ends up for realsies dead.

Ultimately, Union has saved the day. Sideways Rhiannon helps Union heal fast so that she can get him home. Before he goes away, Sideways Caitlin Fairchild tells him to leave normal Caitlin Fairchild alone, cuz he’s nothin’ but trouble! When Union is back to his normal reality he’s told by the regular Rhiannon that she’s left him a gift back at his home. The gift turns out to be Jill Monroe with a magically changed mind about how mad Union had made her. Messing with somebody’s mind like that? Not cool Rhiannon, not cool at all!

Continuity Corner:

• Last we saw Rhiannon she was taking over the body of Rainmaker in the “Gen13: the Unreal World” one shot.
• Sideways Rhiannon informs Union that his justice stone is a living creature as much as he is. This is kinda seems like new information to Union, but it also seems he’s suspected this. I mean, he’d flat out know it was living if he had been paying attention as a kid in “Union” Vol. 1 issue 0 where his people explain it to him in school.
• I always wanted to know why there wasn’t another Union for the Sideways Universe. What happened to their Union? We know alternate Unions exist, or at least we will once we meet The Sword during “Fire from Heaven.”
• Sideways Rhiannon mentions that the version of Necros in the regular WildStorm Universe never had a chance to get as powerful as hers. I was always wondering if we’d ever meet him. I suspected Cull from “Gen13: the Unreal World” due to it also featuring Rhiannon, but so much of it doesn’t quite feel right or add up for my liking.
• Sideways Alex Fairchild mentions that he’d lost another of his children to Necros, which is another in a long list of hints that Caitlin has a sibling. We get it already WildStorm!
• We’ll visit the Sideways Universe again sans Lord Necros at the end of “Savant Garde” issue 2 and several issues after that.
• Speaking of alternate universes this is only the second for sure one that we know about. The other one is where that Alternate Pilgrim from “WetWorks” is from. I still have my suspicions about where exactly the Huntsman and pals came from in “WildC.A.T.s” Vol. 1 issue 10, but that could just be space. Next up we have the parallel universe that all the baddies from “Fire from Heaven” live and that’s about it… well until Ellis comes along and busts open the Bleed!

NEXT: “Backlash” issues 9 – 11 by Brett Booth, Jeff Mariotte, Sean Ruffner, Dan Norton, Melvin Rubi, J.J. Kirby, Sanda Hope & Edwin Rosell

“Union” Vol. 2 issue 3

this entry covers “Union” volume 2, issue number 3

Looks like Union, having scored that sweet sweet StormWatch gig, is now flush with cash! Seems that even being on retainer pays pretty damn well! Jill decides this can only mean one thing: Vacation time! And where are Jill and Union going to go on vacation? Why Chicago of course! We all see where this is headed right? Yup, team-up with the Savage Dragon!

But before the greatest cop in Chicago gets involved we have Union and Jill flying by airplane to Chicago, much to Union’s dismay. Union has also started going by the name Homer for his civilian identity. And is it me, or Union with that oversized button up, and big hair remind anyone else of Tommy Wiseau in “the Room?”  Oh, it is just me, ok. Anyway, they’re meeting up with Jill’s friend Kathy from college.

Kathy is really trying to show Union a good time. She takes him to the Sears Tower. She takes him to a video game arcade. She takes him to the Art Institute of Chicago. Hell, this guy is just a Cubs game and a rousing rendition of “Danke Schoen” during German-American Appreciation Society Parade away from the full on “Ferris Bueller” experience and he can’t even manage a smile! What a Cameron he is. It isn’t until Union has his first beer that he even acts like anything more than Mr. Dour Pants. Figures, if a guy calls himself Homer, that guy is going to be in love with beer.

A couple blocks away our plot is building. The Dragon is as undercover as he can be. I just typed out all what was going down in that exchange, but I read it back, twice, and it didn’t make sense. I put this down more to my lack of being able to type well, and less due to the fact that it is super convoluted. I mean, it is convoluted, but a skilled comics blogger could’ve sorted it out for you. I’ve failed you again dear readers! Now you know why I don’t have a Patreon for this site. Ain’t nobody gonna pay for this!

Soooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo… it ends up that the bad guys cause the Dragon to fly through the big glass window of the bar. Union, noticing that the Dragon doesn’t look like normal humans, decides the Dragon must be a monster and decks him. Union is a bit of a racist. One of the barflies points out that the Dragon is a cop. That’s a word Union understands, and he knows he has messed up. He goes to help the Dragon up, and the Dragon decks him. I still think this is funny. I swear I’m not twelve!

A lot more superhero shenanigans later and the boys decide to team up and take down the bad guys. Once the bust is over what are two super dudes to do? Why go to a strip joint and down a lot more brews. Of course, Lightweight McGee Union can’t hold his booze and throws up in front of the Dragon in a public restroom. When he winds up back at Kathy’s place, he’s still so wasted that he passes out on the floor. This causes Jill to seriously rethink their relationship. Dude’s a mess, time to move on girl!

Continuity Corner :

• Nothing. Sorry, there’s not always going to be stuff to put here on such short entries.
• Really, this was a simple one and done with the only consequeses being Jill getting her life together without having Union in it.

NEXT : “WildC.A.T.s” Vol. 1 issue 18 by James Robinson, Travis Charest and Troy Hubbs

“WildStorm!” issues 1 – 3

this entry covers issues 1 through 3 of “WildStorm!” an anthology of short stories, some which were longer stories divided up between issues 

I’m just gonna start off this entry by letting you all know that I’m just going to break it up into the individual stories. I’m not sure if there is very much to tell as some of these stories are rather short. When it comes to short story collections, they sometimes work better if you divide all the stories up so that they can occur better with their respective titles, but in this case, the first three issues work pretty great all together like this for their respective titles.

In the Gen13 story, “Now Departing from Gate 37” we have Roxy and Grunge shipping a package for Lynch at the San Diego airport. While on this chore they witness two shady individuals try to kidnap a child. Of course, they save the kid, by crashing a helicopter, and also find out that the would-be kidnappers are from I/O! They figure the boy must be gen-active and that’s why I/O was after him. Roxy and Grunge tell the family, due to no one seeing them cause the helicopter crash, a freaking helicopter crash, it would seem that anyone from I/O would assume that the boy died in the crash along with the agents. Since the family is going to Chile, Grunge just tells them to stay there and hide, no one knows the boy survived, so if you keep a low profile you shouldn’t be bothered again by any secret government kidnappers.

The “Deathblow” story isn’t so much a story of Michael Cray, so much as it is something that happens while Cray is around. This seriously could’ve happened to any of the WildStorm heroes, but it happens to befall Cray. So there Cray is, stuck in traffic and there’s a crazy guy yelling in a Celtic language who rode a stolen horse over Cray’s car and busted the windshield. I’m not being rude, the dude is legitimately crazy. Of course, Cray has no idea of this until after he’s done kicking this dude’s ass and the guy’s doctor fills him in. Not that Cray seems to care, he just wants to know who to bill for his car repair. To be honest, this doesn’t really feel much like Cray at all. It feels a lot more like Brock Sampson, to tell the truth.

In the “Spartan” story we find the titular Spartan scoping out a factory that’s producing Hunter-Killers. In fact, they’re new improved Hunter-Killers! Also, Spartan’s not the only one, Ben Santini and the Black Razors are there too. No one is really happy about this “team-up” to stop a bigger bad and spend more time bickering amongst themselves rather than investigate the factory. Worse comes to worse and Santini is knocked out and the Razors aren’t sure who to follow. First, they follow Fleming, until they all decide he’s a dink and they start taking orders from Spartan. During all of this Spartan is having a crisis of conscious as to why anyone would follow him, a robo-man. In the end, the Hunter-Killers are stopped, the factory is in ruins, Santini is fine and Spartan learns a valuable lesson about himself and teamwork. Gag.

In “Taboo” we finally learn how Amanda Reed ran afoul of the Cabal and ended up in Purgatory Max. I’ll admit I had my doubts about this tale, but the creative team pulled it off fine. See, the Cabal was trying to trick Amanda into killing the doctor that first bonded her symbiote suit to her. Amanda, didn’t want to, she fled, and Pike finished the job. Once the doctor was found dead, the authorities reviewed the security footage from the doctor’s office and found Amanda all over them. They hunted her down, captured her, had her stand trial. She was found guilty and then sentenced to Purgatory Max for life. Well at least up until Slayton came to break her out.

Finally, we get Union starring in “My Enemy, My Monkey” a short little yarn that is… well, it’s about the dumbest story in these books. Union sees a giant cyborg gorilla being ridden by some kind of samurai lizard man in the middle of New York City. Union dives in to stop this crazy occurrence, only to find out he’s on the set of a movie. How hilarious. For me, it doesn’t track, simply for how damn long the fight goes on before the director yells “Cut!” Also, throughout the whole story Union is still treating the man in the gorilla suit as if he is an actual gorilla, and Union has never seemed that dense or ignorant before. Hell, he just saw the lizard samurai take off his mask, he should’ve put two and two together like we’ve seen him do before! Also, there’s a crazy fan that wants revenge on the actor playing the lizard samurai, revenge by shooting, and Union stops him because, hell, he’s there. Man, this is dumb. I’d almost rather see this lizard samurai/cyborg gorilla movie!

Continuity Corner :

• I’m basing the Gen13 story placement off of that fact that it was reprinted in the “Backlist” trade along with other early adventures of the team. In that book, it occurs between issue 0 and issue 1 of volume 2. From a storytelling perspective, you need something in between those issues to justify the time jump that occurs between issues, most noticeably seen with Rainmakers hair length. “Now Departing from Gate 37” is just another one of the things they did in the period. With us reading this as part of the WildStorm Universe, on the whole, we have other titles showing us time progression to account for that.  So, yeah, we’re keeping it in the early days where it is needed, but we are having a different placement than if we were reading it as just a perfect progression for “Gen13”
• For the placement of “Deathblow,” I think this is the time that Cray spent in New York telling Rayna about the Los Angeles job, in “Deathblow” Vol. 1 issues 13 and 14. It also explains why he’s so close to Virgina before we see him in “Deathblow” Vol. 1 issue 16.
• From the way that Spartan talking about Marlowe, it’s pretty clear that the little guy is still around, so it has to take place before “WildStorm Rising.” Also, Spartan isn’t wearing his StormWatch gear so it can’t have happened after “WildStorm Rising” at all. And because Marlowe basically disappears after he gets back to Earth during “Fire from Heaven” there’s no place for this story to take place at any other time.
• I also like to think that this is what Spartan was up to when Warblade was off in “Warblade : Endangered Species”.
• It is nice to see the Black Razors as depicted in WildC.A.T.s Vol. 1 issues 15 & 16… well pretty much. Coleman isn’t really the right skin color, but everything else is close enough.
• There’s a member of the Black Razors being referred to as simply “Fleming.” No word on the first name being either Alex or Cyril.
• While everyone wants to seem to place this Taboo story much earlier in the timeline, because it is her origin, both parts are clearly labeled “Five years earlier,” so it’s a flashback. Also, having this story take place right before she’s on the lam again in “Backlash” issue 7 adds a certain sense of tragedy to that storyline. She’s not good at running on her own. Also, “Backlash” issues 1 through 5 are so tightly strung together there wasn’t room to put it closer to her introduction.
• When Slayton was breaking into Purgatory Max to get Taboo in the first place there was such a big deal made about him both breaking in and out, as if no one had ever done that before. Obviously, Pike had, or else how could he have been there to taunt Amanda? I just don’t see the authorities letting Pike just come and go as he pleases.
• I think this is a good place for “My Enemy, My Monkey” as well, because Union is still in New York at the end of “Union” Vol. 2 issue 2. He goes to Chicago in “Union” Vol. 2 issue 3 and we don’t see him leave that city at the end of the issue. Also, there’s no real explanation as to how he got onsite to start fighting with Majestic by the time issue 4 rolls around, he’s just there. There’s not a lot of decent windows for this story to take place, honestly. I was surprised I found this one!

Where to find this story:

• the Gen13 story is collected in “Gen13: Backlist” trade paperback

NEXT : “Union” Vol. 2 issue 3 by Mike Heisler, Ryan Benjamin, and Tom McWeeney

“Gen13 : the Unreal World”

this entry covers the one-shot book “Gen13 : the Unreal World”

We join the story already in progress… and we see Fairchild as a waitress? Say what? And she’s having a terrible, no good, very bad day. Turns out she’s not alone, in another part of La Jolla a young orphan named Roxy is getting into a food fight at a Catholic school. So yeah, it’s pretty clear to see, something is amiss.

That something turns out to be a man named Cull. He’s tall, wears a face paint, as well as boots that make it look like he has two gigantic toes, and he’s the guy who is in control. By control I mean, he’s basically erased everyone in La Jolla’s memory and substituted them with whatever he wanted. He then commands them all to watch him on television every night. Watch him sit there and stare at the camera. It’s all rather dumb, Cull comes off as the kind of guy with a godlike power, but he’s too damn dull of a person to do anything interesting with it. It’s not like he even realized that he’d ensnared the members of Gen13 in his trance, or else one would hope he’d have a plan to prevent his demise from them, or at least use their powers for evil, something like that at least!

Anyway, Caitlin and Roxy eventually bump into each other at Caitlin’s job and remember who they really are. They then go hunting for the other members of the team. Lynch is a soccer coach, Bobby’s a hobo and Grunge is a preppy little son of a bitch. Once they break them all out of their fake lives, they all get to Sarah and find out she’s pretty cognizant of what is going on. Before she gets a chance to fully explain what’s going on, a pissed off Cull pops in to kick everyone’s ass.

The team ends up… well… working like a team and takes out Cull. While Cull is laying on the floor, not getting taken into custody, or restrained in any way, we see a ghostly figure fly out of Sarah. This is Rhiannon, the witch. Seems as if she can leave her body and take over others. She’s a witch, that’s totally a witch thing! Anyway, she did this so that she could hide from Cull and get together a group to help her stop him. Hurrah, it worked and Rhiannon takes off leaving Sarah wondering what the heck had just gone on, and why is there a creepy fetish freak laying on the floor? Is anyone going to do anything about that guy? Just leave him there never to be seen again? Oh, OK.

Continuity Corner:

• Why place this book here of all places? One of the reasons was that there’s a note in this issue that it takes place before “Gen13” Vol. 2 issue 8. The other is a bit more obscure. I’ve mentioned before the “Gen13 : Backlist” collection. It collects the 1/2 and 0 issues of the series. It also has the first issue of Vol. 2 in it. After that issue, we’re presented with “the Unreal World” to close out the book. It looks like to me that it had been established that “the Unreal World” takes place after Vol. 2 issue 1 and before Vol. 2 issue 8. When we look at Vol. 2 issues 3 – 7 are an arc we see that the kids far from La Jolla, on Coda Island and in Rome, not to mention that Lynch isn’t with the kids at all during this time. Lynch doesn’t rejoin the kids until “Deathblow” Vol. 1 issue 21, which if you don’t read makes Lynch’s return in “Gen13” Vol. 2 issue 8 seemingly come out of nowhere, so for me, it would be just too jarring to see a story like this after what they just went through, not that picking up at 8 is much better. There are only a few places for this book fit into continuity. Right after Vol. 2 issue 1 or Vol. 2 issue 2. I like it better just after issue 1 because we get one more story with the team before being tossed into the “WildStorm Rising” cross-over. Also, it has a lighter tone, much like these early few issues.
• Cull did seem to know the identity of Lynch, and of Team 7. How he knew that is anyone’s guess. I thought that was all classified. Maybe he read Lynch’s mind, that’s my best answer.
• We won’t see Rhiannon the witch until later in Union Vol. 2 issue #5 where we will learn… well, not too much more about her.
• Rhiannon drops a hint to the relationship between Caitlin and Roxy… I swear, there’s like a million not-so-subtle hints to this, that us fans were yelling at our comics “Just tell us they’re sisters already!” making the actual reveal a bit anti-climatic.

Where to find this story:

• the “Gen13: Backlist” trade paperback

NEXT : “Deathblow” Vol. 1 issue 15 by Brandon Choi, Mel Rubi and Rick Magyar

“Union” Vol. 1 issues 0 – 4

this entry covers “Union” issues 0 through 4

Where to start with a book like “Union.” Well, I guess issue 0 falls in continuity first, even though it is just a fast paced explanation of the world that Union and Regent (last seen in “StormWatch” Vol. 1 issue 3) come from, and their particular histories examined. It can kind of be a dry read when you place it in continuity, as you only really know Regent and here’s this book about his past, and for some reason another character named Ohmen. Perhaps reading it after immediately after “Union” Vol. 1 issues 1 through 4 might work better, as you’d have more of a vested interest in both characters. Either way, the book moves fairly swift and straightforward, all the while cramming in a lot of information. This is at a contrast with the rest of the series, which is never as straight forward as this, but to it’s credit, the rest of Vol. 1 certainly has much cooler artwork.

The art for “Union” Vol. 1 (issues 1 through 4) was done by Mark Texeira and it is fantastic! I’m not saying that anyone else that ever drew Union didn’t do a good job, they mostly did, but Texeira killed it so hard, that every other artist was just playing catch up. When I was younger I wondered how WildStorm convinced Texeira to do this comic, because all I knew of his work was the cover of “the Outsiders” by S. E. Hinton that the upperclassmen were carrying around (which, sad to say, I can find no image of now, but I know that it existed, it was ubiquitous!) I always figured him for a big time commercial artist, so to see him on a comic blew my mind. I learned later that he was mostly known for comics, but that still doesn’t stop me from being in awe of the art on this book to this day.

Back to issue 0 we see two young men growing up on opposite sides of a war. One is Rigian, price of the ruling class known as the Directorate, who is practically disowned by his father when his little brother Darnel is born. The other is a baby born the same day, known as Ohmen of the underclass known as the Protectorate. We see both boys grow up and find their places in their home planet of Aegena, though Rigian finds most of his place in his culture while spending time on Earth away from his family. Earth you say? Oh yeah, the Directorate have a way to get back and forth from Aegena to Earth, and the Protectorate has no knowledge of this, and it allows the Directorate to plan their battles in secret, as well as have a hidden place to retreat to. The two boy’s stories start to come together when some Directorate soldiers attack the school where Ohmen’s father teaches, and Ohmen’s father dies. Schools were supposed to be in a safe zone and not to be attacked, so the Directorate kind of feel bad about war going too far, so Rigain, his mother and brother are sent to address the Protectorate and apologize for the actions of the Directorate. Before he can say too much, a few Protectorate at the gathering go crazy and attack the Directorate. Rigain’s mother and brother parish in this attack and Rigain swears off his stance of peace and takes the name Regent and vows revenge against the Protectorate. Ohmen on the other hand is upset by what the Protectorate did at that rally, and is talked back into doing his duty by his kinda girlfriend Eliya. This leads Ohmen into a battle where two Directorate soldiers trick him into flying through the portal to Earth, where he crash lands in Maine and issue 1 begins.

That’s the basics of the plot, but there’s one more thing you should know about, and that’s the justice stones. The justice stones are Aegenan technology that gets implanted on Aegenans when they reach a certain age, and it becomes one with their physiology. It ends up looking like a small done on their chest, and from it they can pull an electric rod to beat people with. It also gives them the power of flight while holding it. The color of the rod, at least for the Protectorate, reflects their rank in their military hierarchy. Pretty fancy ass tech! While we only see the weapon in rod form here, we later see a justice stone user shape his into a sword. The justice stones are also tied into the electromagnetic field of the planet they are on, so it must be recalibrated before moving to a different planet, lest it malfunction and either kill or inhibit the user. So that’s most of the backstory, all that you need really. There’s a bit more of the relationship between Ohmen and Eliya, as well as Rigain and his father, but, meh, whatever, on with the actual content!

We meet Ohmen as he is being rescued from atop a frozen lake after he crash lands on Earth in a remote area of Maine. That rescuer is Jill Monroe, an artist who moved up north from New York to escape the big city and give herself more time to create and take in nature. She doesn’t know she’s rescuing an alien, just a guy she saw try to fly away after crashing. After being saved Ohmen takes up residence on Jill’s couch and proceeds to sleep for a few days to literally recharge his batteries. Ohmen and Jill spend 6 months in seclusion while Ohmen learns everything he can about Earth as well as start to utilize his justice stone. It is during this time that Ohmen takes up the name Union, as the word “union” is basically a simple way to express “cold fusion” which is what is going on in his justice stone. Uh… yeah, sure Ohmen, you’re Union now, whether or not that makes a lick of sence. While at a bar Jill and Union see a report about a few aliens flying around upstate New York and Union immediately recognizes them as Directorate soldiers. Before Jill can ask Union anything about it he’s off and flying to the town of Chichester, NY, secret headquarters of the Directorate on Earth.

Union arrives in Chichester and instantly gets his booty kicked by the Directorate. Union mistakenly believes that the Directorate has sent a few soldiers after him and had no idea of this town belonging to them. The Directorate have no idea the Union accidently found his way to Earth so they are thinking he is some kind of spy for the Protectorate. Oh these Aegenan scamps and their comical misunderstandings! Eventually King Darian (Regents father) shows up during Union’s torture and as he’s smacking the hell out of Union with his justice stone rod, Union goes full nuclear and somehow destroys all of Chicester, NY. Union, feeling mighty horrible about this, you know, accidently taking out an entire city, Directorate soldiers and families or not, decides to commit suicide by jamming Darian’s justice stone rod into his justice stone. Union passes out and somehow survives and as far as justice stones go, he levels up.

When Union awakes he is finds that StormWatch has surrounded Chichester and is trying to save any survivors and find the cause of the disaster. They also notice traces of a familiar energy that they’d like to find out more about. The energy is that of Regent, who just kicked their asses earlier, and this town was full of Directorate tech, so that makes a certain amount of logic. Too bad they’ll never discover anything about the Directorate or Regent here, as Union is going to cover everything up out of further guilt. At the same time he is doing everything he can to buy the trust of Jackson King, even giving his fingerprints so he’s in the police system and has a record on file as a super powered being. In any other story, blowing up a town and tricking the authorities wouldn’t be seen as a positive one, but Union pulls it off due to his down right Duddly Do-Right sense of honor. In fact, “Union” the book pulls it off by dividing the story up so we see Union helping out StormWatch as much as possible before finding out 3 issues later that he was the cause of the destruction in the first place. Very clever writing Mr. Heisler.

Before we are bookended with the full story of what happening Chichester we do get a few issues of Union going to New York City for a little vacation with Jill. He takes down a super powered villain known as the Quickness. In the course of this action he pisses off Jill by stranding her, but also finds the being behind the Quicknesses super-speed, a being known as Mnemo. Mnemo is a crazy looking, highly intelligent, alien or mutant something-or-other. He captures Union and means to figure out what makes him tick. Why is he so interested? Because he’s found a Protectorate soldier before, but this one didn’t survives his trip through the gate, and Mnemo wants to find a way to revive this man, or at least his justice stone. What does Mnemo get out of this? Turns out Mnemo is a weapons contractor for the feared Kaizen Gamorra. What? That name doesn’t strike any fear into your heart yet? Well, it will soon enough! In fact, you’ll get down right sick of that name after a while, but it all evens out in 10 years once “the Authority” starts being published.

Due to Union running off to go fight the Quickness, Jill gets stranded in NYC by herself. When he catches back up to her they get into a fight and she storms off back home to Maine. What a great guy that Union is, save the world, lose the girl! Of course this is when Union is captured by Mnemo. After Union gets free he goes back to Jill’s place to find she isn’t alone. In fact, she’s chilling with Union’s sorta ex-girlfriend Elyia! Elyia means to bring Union back to Aegena, but Union makes a compelling case to stay on Earth. First, he feels guilty about what he did to Chichester. Second, his justice stone is not only calibrated to Earth, but due to its upgrade who knows what’ll happen with it back home. Third, he doesn’t say this, but he digs on Jill and besides it looks like Elyia has herself a new man anyway. Before Elyia leaves, she lets Union know that Regent could not be found back home or in the rubble of Chichester, so odds are he is on Earth someplace and to look out for him. I still call this a bold move for “Union,” to have a big bad set up, and our hero is not even confronting him in its own limited series!

These books are still very entrenched in the then Image Universe. There are several references to Supreme and Youngblood throughout the book. We even get a cameo from Velocity from “Cyber Force.” The StormWatch appearance was great, but this was a WildStorm book, so that carries pretty well. Also, to have had Regent make his debut in “StormWatch” was a pretty bold move. If you only ever read “StormWatch” you see them almost get wiped out by a guy you never see again in that series. Then to find out he’s related to the goings-on in “Union” and to hardly see him in that book kind of infuriated me as a kid! I really wanted to see Regent and Union through down in “Union,” but the powers that be had other plans.

Next : “WildCats Trilogy” issues 1 through 3 by Brandon Choi, Dafydd Wyn and Jae Lee (with a short story from Steve Seagle and Travis Charest)