Let me just say that I’m not a fan of Jason Aaron’s writing.I bought the first twelve issues of Scalped and didn’t read them until I had all twelve in hand. Then I sat down and read them and by issue five I knew I would never buy this book again. It wasn’t for me. Perhaps I’ve read too much or just was jaded by from too many comics.Maybe and just maybe it’s because he writes in the most obvious way possible. Scalped didn’t surprise me once and yet all I heard about it was how different it was and you never knew where it was going next. Maybe that’s would be true if you hadn’t read another comic in your life. The same thing happened on Wolverine,I bought the first six issues (month to month) and after each issue I was left wondering why no one else could see what Aaron was doing. With Schism I was already unimpressed by it just from the announcement that it was coming. I find it interesting that the editors are actually saying that this is the event that they’ve been building to since Messiah boring Complex. After all those hoops and muddled story lines the end result is X-Men Gold and Blue again? Hello 90’s, we’ve officially returned. That’s all I could think of while reading this book.
The story begins with Logan showing up on Utopia with arrows and throwing stars sticking out of his body. He’s greeted by the new generation of mutants led by Hope, who stands ready for combat training. He tells them to piss off in the nicest way possible, but not before lecturing one of them about playing with dolls rather than combat training. He lies down to “sleep for three days”when Cyclops shows up at his door and tells him he needs him. Logan gets up and gets dressed even though he has a hilarious sign on his door that says “Do not disturb or you’ll be stabbed multiple times.” The best part is that Cyclops came to his room to find him and then asked him if he was supposed to be at combat training. P.S. Cyclops wrote the schedule that put Wolverine at combat training.
The next boring batch of scenes has Cyclops at the UN giving a speech on the world’s nations disarming their Sentinel programs. Kid Omega aka Quentin Quire shows up and makes the entire UN tell the truth. For that they sick some Sentinel’s on Cyke and Patch and they remark on how jacked up it is that someone brought Sentinel’s to a speech about disarming Sentinel’s. From this one-act every nation starts showing off their Sentinel’s that they have in hiding even though the entire mutant population lives off the coast of San Francisco. Then Wolverine buys the girl from before a doll. Actually he makes Kitty buy the damn thing and he gives it to her. P.S. the girl is fourteen and probably isn’t thinking about dolls anymore any ways (granted I know that's not the point). My point is that the use of the doll is outdated and not as forward thinking as the rest of the story is pretending to be. You can't have a relic concept of girls with dolls and then have your version of necular disarming at the same time. One of those concepts ends up looking rather silly.
If you don’t see where this story is going then you don’t deserve to know. This “big event” is so transparent that it’s not even funny. I can’t even in good nature call it a “big event”, because there’s nothing new here. It’s just recycled story lines from Chris Claremont, John Byrne, Grant Morrison and Frank Quietly. Literally Aaron and (I’m assuming) the editors, have taken the table scraps form those two runs and put them on the same plate; and that color of that plate? Blue and Gold.
This series may already be on the fourth issue, but I don’t seethe point of reading anymore. I already know what happens and Marvel’s marketing machine wouldn’t let you not know, even if I wanted. The biggest problem I had with this book was that Cyclops and Wolverine got along really well. It’s completely against their characters since they’ve always butted heads;it’s what kept each character in line. But here… they’re friends and I find that less believable than the entire world armed with Sentinels. I do still agree with everything Aaron said about Alan Moore though, even if I don’t like his writing he’s still right in that regard.
Score: 2/5
Writer: Jason Aaron Publisher: Marvel Comics