The story limps to its conclusion. The art remains tasty and there are even a few good absurd jokes. But the deus ex machina resolution lands with a thud. The "good guys" are almost totally passive and more than almost incompetent. It's a tough comic to enjoy. I know the uselessness of the X-Statix team is intentional irony, and the same label probably applies to the deus ex machina. That doesn't make it fun--at least not for me.

In spite of what Comicbook.com says, I did walk away from this book disappointed. I’m a big of Milligan’s X-Force and X-Statix, and this series had a strong start. But it spun its wheels for the past several issues, only to be wrapped up in the blink of an eye. I love the X-Statix cast, and there were some great new characters introduced too, but they all felt wasted in this finale. This would have made more sense as the second or third issue in this second season, giving individual characters more to do in subsequent issues. I know part of the series’ charm is how dispensable the cast is, but in X-Statix it never felt narratively underwhelming like it does here. This conclusion made the previous issues feel irrelevant when I think they were meant to feel irreverent. Don’t get me wrong, this wasn’t a disaster or anything. Just a let down.

Allred’s art is a knockout every time, though. I especially liked seeing Zeitgeist’s travels through different dimensions, it reminded me of Allred’s work on Art Ops. Mike and Laura Allred are the best artists in the industry. more