“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

“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