GENERATION X #26 – April 1997

Adrift Credits: Scott Lobdell (writer), Joe Bennett (penciler), Joe Pimentel (inker), Richard Starkings & Comicraft (lettering), Marie Javins (colors) Summary: After emerging from Black Tom’s bio-pod, the members of Generation X are stranded in a large body of water. M flies ahead to find help, and later returns exhausted. She tells the team that they’re as good as dead. Meanwhile, Banshee runs a computer scan but is unable to find his students. Inside an Operation: Zero Tolerance base, Jubilee fights against Bastion’s First Strike team. When she accidentally harms one of them, she risks capture and performs CPR on him. After she escapes the building, she runs out into a snowstorm and collapses. A man in a parka takes her back inside. Continuity Note: Nightmare speaks to Emma Frost again, telling her that his vision has come true (which is a stretch, since his vision in #22 was a lot more gruesome than what actually happened in the last issue). He still wants her to work with him, but she refuses. I’m under the impression none of this was ever resolved. Review: For some reason, a local drug store started selling this title after it stopped carrying the rest of the X-titles. Since the next few issues lead into the Zero Tolerance crossover, and my collection of the spinoffs gets spotty at this point, I’ll do full reviews for the next two or three issues. Unfortunately, there’s not a lot to say about this one. Half of the issue is devoted to establishing that the team is stranded in the middle of nowhere, which worked great as a cliffhanger last issue, but the story doesn’t advance at all over the course of the issue. The Jubilee subplot isn’t bad, but it also ends exactly where it began. There’s a hint that Bastion is actually impressed by Jubilee’s respect for human life, which may or may not tie into the ending. Because Joe Bennett’s art is so generic, it’s impossible to tell if the man in the parka who saves her in the end is supposed to be Bastion (of course, this raises the question of why Bastion would need a parka). It’s always strange to see someone outside of Chris Bachalo draw these characters, but Bennett’s combination of early Image art and the faux-manga look really doesn’t work.