The issue didn't focus on what I wanted, but I'm completely taken by Reader and Xiaoyi. Read Full Review

It's important that Xiaoyi's story is told because it is an all-too-real example of human trafficking. Like Xiaoyi, most trafficking victims internationally are women, people of color, and at a disadvantage because they don't know the predominant language. Xiaoyi illustrates the unequal power dynamic when she asks Reader, who is speaking English, "What are you saying to them?" It's a well-written story but, due to the tonal shifts and dark subject matter, a jarring experience. Read Full Review

Unfortunately this is where this issue ends. Instead of focusing on other stories, it focuses on a changed Medusa, or at least one somewhat different from previous issues, and if this carries on it might have a negative impact on coming issues. At the same time though, the novel approach to the crossover here works and minimizes the damage, especially with the other story focusing on the other two characters on the run. It is there where this issue finds its strength and it is well enough played, although this is the weakest issue in the series thus far. Read Full Review

Charles Soule and Ryan Stegman's "Inhuman" #9 is a mixed bag that oscillates between poignant and schlocky. While a lot of elements are at play in this crowded book, it moves a lot of pieces into place for what looks to be a thrilling follow up issue, thanks in large part to the effective build up here. Read Full Review

Inhuman's Axis tie-in comes at the worst possible time, as the book's increasingly promising direction is forced to take a sudden and unwelcome swerve. Read Full Review

Inhuman continues to be a frustrating series because it tantalizes with so many intriguing things but does it in such a condensed form that you really don't feel like you're invested in it. The sporadic nature of the releases aren't helping nor the artist changes, particularly when characters become flat out unrecognizable. This issue suffers doubly so because it's an AXIS tie-in and I have no real attention for that storyline. Between that and the Spider-Verse event that's heavily impacting Spider-man 2099 for me, I'm being reminded why I avoided superhero books in general for quite awhile. This series started off with a lot of promise, but it feels like it's hitting a lot of very short form stories at this point with no real significance or proper payoff, leaving me questioning how much longer I'll go on with it. I suspect it'll turn on a dime again soon enough and tantalize me with something else, but it's a frustrating near-addiction for this book. Read Full Review

This story has great potential, but that potential goes unrealized. Instead, we get a repeat of themes long explored in other Marvel books, including previous versions of the Inhumans' history. To make matters worse, it is only a bridge connecting the end of one event and the beginning of another. One wonders whether it is also meant to resonate with plotlines emerging on recent television programs. It is not so much a literary effort as an engineering project, an exercise in calculated creation much like the Kree experiments that brought forth the Inhumans themselves. Unfortunately, there is no terrigen mist to awaken the story's latent power. Read Full Review

Dear god, not this again.