X years later, many secret events have taken place among the mutants of the world — including the one that changed Gambit and Rogue’s marriage forever. As Storm embarks on her quest to destroy Eegun, the devourer of Sorcerers Supreme, Gambit has a score to settle with Storm for the fate of his marriage. But what is the fate of the mystical world compared to the fate of two mutants? Storm and Gambit will have to figure out the answer to that question on the dirt road to hell and carnage. Rogue Storm #2 is written by Murewa Ayodele, drawn by Roland Boschi, colored by Neeraj Menon and lettered by Travis Lanham.
Upon returning to my childhood home of New Orleans, I decided to take an aimless drive through old stomping grounds to see what’s become of the things that made me who I am.
I’m so sad to say not much still stands.
The church I was baptized in no longer exists; it’s a nascent community center, presently closed, quite possibly to never open again. The church I was confirmed in, along with the school I spent seven formative years at, no longer exists. The school looks like an apocalyptic wasteland: weeds growing, walls crumbling, chairs left asunder, barely visible through lightly tinted, cracking windows. The church seems to have fared better — I squinted my eye through a closed door and saw a largely clean, intact vestibule. I’m not sure what’s to become of these buildings, but they will become something, eventually.
Both the school and the church are now for sale. How American.
So much of what was no longer is; so much of what could be may never be. How then, does one take an accounting of what is and what matters, knowing this too could disappear in the snap of a finger?
Or at the end of another issue.
Rogue Storm #2 tells two parallel stories — one of a cloned Rogue, another of a possessed Storm. I’m quite tired of Storm being possessed by someone else who wants to use her power without her permission. This was the crux of Storm’s first story cycle; it’s literally the plot of today’s Ultimate Black Panther #22. Why do writers feel the need to continually feed the trope of a mighty woman’s power under involuntary control?
Frustration aside, lovers of Ororo will be happy to know, this issue is decidedly Storm focused. We spend the first few pages in a hallucination, as the demon Eegun teases their adversarial dalliance and its eventual conclusion. The banter here is good, as it needs to be — this is the only space for us to get any appraisal of Storm’s personality and motivations. Her emotional arc here is vengeance inspired by abuse, again analogous to her character in the preceding Storm series. And like that series, there’s a lot of extraneousness here. Daniel Drumm is here (but still dead). So is Iceman. So are Warpath and Fantomex. Just like that series, one wonders how much better the comic would be if the extra wasn’t there to only serve as cannon fodder (they all die pretty unceremoniously), and those extra pages were spent on character development.
Regardless, the parallel stories form a cohesive whole: Storm was possessed by Eegun, committing atrocities in her name. Though captured, the soon-to-die mutants, led by the Rogue clone, freed her, feeling the need to take “justice” out on her, ignorant of her motivations or imprisonment. These soon-to-die mutants were then killed by a traitorous Akujun, and later Eegun itself. Jumping to the future, the demon, now empowered by just about every magical being on Earth, begins his assault on Storm and Gambit.
Yes, this is a lot. And a lot is … fine.
All of this is … fine. The story is fine. Gambit being the only one who wants to ask questions before shooting is fine. Storm being jaded and alone … isn’t fine, but works in the context of the comic. We don’t know what exactly happened to Rogue Red, though we can safely assume she wasn’t killed (yet) and will play a role in however this series will end.
And then what?
There doesn’t seem to be much here that will transcend the “Age of Revelation”; so much is already aligned with previous incarnations of characters and stories. There doesn’t feel like there’s anything significant or special here that a fan would want or need to carry forward. This feels like a story for the story’s sake, which is fine! Everything doesn’t need to connect to everything else! Stand-alone stories are good, great even!
If the stories are good, or great even.
This … this is pretty good, and I’m not sure how much nostalgia people will have for pretty good.
In 10, 15, 20 years, when someone for some reason is going down a nostalgia-fueled reconciliation of Storm, I wonder what they’ll think of Rogue Storm. More to the point, I wonder if they’ll even think about Rogue Storm, or if it will just be a footnote, abandoned and unloved, still for sale but not sold.
I hope the next issue provides something concrete to make the story stick. Yet I fear the irrelevance of my childhood churches may very well extend to this iteration of my favorite character. I want to say I’ll be sad. I want to say I’ll care.
But I’m not so sure I’ll even remember. I’m not so sure much from this run will still stand.
Buy Rogue Storm #2 here. (Disclaimer: As an Amazon Associate, ComicsXF may earn from qualifying purchases.)
A proud New Orleanian living in the District of Columbia, Jude Jones is a professional thinker, amateur photographer, burgeoning runner and lover of Black culture, love and life. Magneto and Cyclops (and Killmonger) were right. Learn more about Jude at SaintJudeJones.com.
