CABLE #87 & BISHOP #16: Dream's End Pt II & III

Mystique's big moves continue against the Kelly Campaign and on Muir Island!

Originally Published January 2001

The "Dream's End" Storyline continued through Cable, and then Bishop's, book, each following a thread of Mystique's coordinated attack.

In Cable-- after an interesting but ultimately unrelated excursion to the past when a time-tossed Cable met Rogue -- the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants is launching an open strike on Kelly. Cable, as we know, is embedded within the campaign to defend him.

Gambit and Beast are also nearby to lend some assistance.

Also present is Colossus, who had been hiding "in plain sight" with the use of an image inducer.

While they fight and exchange pointed debate about whether it's right to kill a bigoted politician who wants them dead, our attention is drawn to a mysterious, gaunt man in a trench coat of mystery, coughing and wheezing on the sidelines.

When Avalanche and Post point out to Cable that Kelly literally wants to put all mutants in death camps, Cable retorts, "I've made my choice," as if that makes any sense. He then does the unheard-of and moves the Blob.

You know you can just say words, right?

Also present is Sexy Lady Mastermind.

Who had been manipulating the X-Men into thinking they were fighting Post et al, when really they were just punching air. In reality, Post is thiiiiis close to actually killing Kelly.

But Coughing Man -- aka Pyro(!!) -- turns the tide by setting Post on fire, thus preventing the assassination.

With his dying breath, Pyro asks Kelly to promise to stop all the bloodshed. Kelly seemingly decides right then and there to reverse his lifelong position against mutants in honor of the One Good One that saved him.

This was not a very good comic and not fun to read, unless you like a bunch of clatter about Cable & Co fighting the Brotherhood, and even then it was not very satisfactory. Its heart was in the right place, as X-Men comics tend to be, with the fuzzy-wuzzy message of unity and making a difference, but I think this story would have a very long way to go toward earning such a message by examining the multi-faceted nature of hatred, bigotry, and institutional oppression. Alas, that's a bit much to ask.

But seemingly, this puts an end to the long-running Senator Kelly assassination plot, once and for all? Yes? Can we move on?

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Well, I guess he's no longer the last X-Man, is he

Originally published January 2001

An ocean away, the other temporally-tangled man of action arrives at Muir Island just in time to save Wolfsbane from a dark fate at the hands of Sabretooth.

She's not a cat, you're a cat. She's a... jeezes, do I have to spell it out for you? 

There's no love lost between Bish and Sabes, harkening back to the last time they faced off.

 

Bishop sends Rahne to go find Mystique, in case Moira's life is in danger. IN his travels, Bishop finds, of all people, Senator Kelly, who is supposed to be busy being murdered in Boston right now.

As the two debate the finer points of distinction, Wolverine interrupts -- that's not the real Senator Kelly, that's the shapeshifter they're looking for!

To which Bishop says -- no shit! But if they're talking she's not killing.

"Violence isn't always necessary"? Are we sure Bishop isn't a shapeshifter?

In the confusion, of course, Mystique gets away.

Rahne doesn't find Mystique or Moira, but she does find Sexy Toad strung up by his own tongue. This would appear to be the work of Rogue, whose powers continue to bug out.

Before they can talk much longer, however, Rahne is hit by a blast from behind...

It's Mystique, wielding Forge's famous de-powering gun!

You know what Chekhov said: if a de-powering gun appears in a 1984 issue of X-Men, it will be fired in a 2001 issue.

Elsewhere, Bishop and Wolverine find Moira, lying broken and battered near death in her destroyed lab. However, with some of her few remaining breaths she's able to explain that Mystique's manipulation of the virus, so that it affects humans, has given her the key to cure it once and for all.

Outside, Mystique reveals that no, she's not going to use the gun to strip Rogue of her mutant powers, but it is intended as a cudgel to keep her fellow mutants in line now that the Legacy Virus in its human-attacking form is set to spread across the globe. As far as evil plots go... I've heard less unhinged.

It's clear that Mystique has fully gone full-tilt bananas as she attacks her own daughter. Rogue succeeds in disarming her, and offers to take her to Charles for help, but Raven has one last trick up her sleeve...

You know what happens when you bring a gun to a knife-fight, right?

I know what you're thinking, and Rogue is thinking the same: How can Mystique stab her when she is, in fact, invulnerable? Well, the answer to that question, per Mystique is, BECAUSE I CAN. SHUT UP.

That's so Raven

Bishop and Wolverine arrive just in the nick of several seconds too late actually. They have a stand-off: Bishop demands the stabilizing agent that will help cure the virus, but Mystique has Rahne as a hostage. She takes aim at Wolverine with her de-powering gun, potentially dooming him to a slow agonizing death from adamantium poisoning (for the second time this year.) But before any of them can get a shot off...

"Wha" indeed? It turns out Rogue had enough of Wolverine left in her to commit a little matricide.

And... scene.

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Further Thoughts:

Neither of these comics was particularly good, but we're in the middle of a story and gosh darnit we've got to get through it somehow. It's fair enough that we've got action, suspense and stakes, but it feels haphazard in the way we're suddenly talking about the Legacy Virus again after years of it barely being a concern. As with the hopefully final-final-for-real-THIS-ONE.doc assassination attempt on Sen. Kelly, as well as the climax of the Cable-Apocalypse storyline, it feels a bit like we're clearing out all the longest-running 1990s plot threads as quickly and thoroughly as possible as we try to clear the decks for the new decade.

Your enjoyment of this comic might ultimately hinge on whether you think it's in character for Mystique and Rogue to be at each other's throats like this. On the one hand it doesn't feel good that she turns on her supposedly beloved adoptive daughter, who for many years she has expressed a desire to protect. On the other hand, she is cast -- and not necessarily against type -- as a murderous terrorist revolutionary villain, and so a little inconsistency, when the chips are down and she has competing interests, might be expected. I think we as readers wants to see the good in everybody, especially mutants, even "bad" ones, but somebody's got to be the bad guy. (A comic where a female villain acts unhinged? Written by Scott Lobdell?? Now I've seen everything.)

No, I didn't like this, but I'm trying to see where it comes from and where it goes. In the end, it's a story we've just got to grit our teeth and get through. For my part, my biggest question is: When did Mystique become an expert geneticist anyway??