Dark Avengers Uncanny X-Men Exodus

This was okay. First off, it's kind of anal-retentive of me, but I still think all the "Utopia" stuff is a misnomer, because the island doesn't appear until near the end, and even then it doesn't play much of a role in the story until the epilogue. The X-Men could have just fought the final battle in San Fran, with no difference in plot. (And how unbelievably egotistical of Cyclops, to call the island "Utopia". This egotism isn't even called out, so I guess Fraction doesn't notice it. On the other hand, I guess at this point mutants would be used to their  leaders selling them fantasies--after all, we humans are--so no one bats an eye.) But whatevs. I never expected this to be a GREAT crossover, but it was kind of neat to see the interactions between the factions. I'm not mad about paying $4 an issue.

Where Fraction looses points with me is all the stuff between Cyclops and Emma. Any "planning" that they might show later on (in a post-mini tie-in?!) is just ham-fisted. It's obvious that Fraction never intended any great overall, cohesive plan. As this series wrapped up, the reader doesn't get any sensation along the lines of "Ah! So THAT's what Cyclops was up to! Okay, NOW things I saw before make sense to me!" No, there weren't any hints along the way, with the exception of maybe sending Dani to re-become a Valkyrie or whatever. (And are we sure that one Valkyrie would be enough to beat THE GOD of WAR? Well, gee, I guess so, since I might be accused of sexism if I conjectured that one female warrior wouldn't be enough to overcome the embodiment of war, which happens to be male. Anyway. It actually wasn't a BAD plot twist, though, honestly.) It's like Fraction just had a checklist of places he needed to "get the characters to" by the end of the series. And now they're all there. But don't tell me that there was some brilliant behind-the-scenes plan; he didn't give the writing that much depth along the way.

That said, the new status quo is undeniably compelling. As is usually the case with Fraction's run on Uncanny, though I often quibble with what's actually on the page and how superficial the characters' personalities seem, the actual overall story is interesting, a page-turner that tries to get at the heart of what mutantkind might face, given the circumstances they're currently in: with Norman Osborn in charge and with the lingering M-Day problem.

Of course, you might as well say that this should only have been an X-Men series. I never read Dark Avengers before this, but I take it that the regular readers of that series are kind of pissed that Brian Bendis couldn't give them two more issues over the summer. But, y'see, sort of the point of Utopia was to make the X-Men feel like part of the Marvel Universe again. You have to factor that into the equation. Don't get me wrong, I think Bendis should have remained writer, if only to preserve the artistic continuity or whatever. But this story tried to be a big crossover that "mattered" to the Marvel Universe in general. Did it succeed at that? Not really, but it tried.

I've never been a fan of Deodato, but his art here was fine. He portrayed the fights fairly well. He's obviously a good, consistent, dynamic artist...but I just don't care for his character models. And the inking/coloring was typical Marvel-house muddy.

I was joyed to see Dodson on here, though. I wasn't expecting that. The Dodsons' art has really been great at establishing the slick style of Fraction's X-Men, who have the personalities of brightly-colored sexy cartoons--and Dodson art matches that perfectly, without getting into icky pornstar territory (cf. Greg Land's contributions--though I don't HATE the guy). Dodson really draws a perfect White Queen. When you flip the page, and go from Deodato art to Dodson art as Emma goes into the mindscape of the Sentry? Perfect stylistic transition.

All and all, it was a decent crossover. Not without its faults (why on earth would Fraction reduce the potency of his pro-human extremist villains by changing them into inhuman robots?), but at this point, we almost expect to put up with bullshit in crossovers, in exchange for a "big" story involving different franchises.