The Good
This is what an X-Men book should be. It's a completely new take on this team and the idea of being a mutant. Instead of the good guys waging war on the bad guys. The mutants have to deal with starting a brand new life on their own piece of land. It's the coolest and most interesting thing the ultimate version of the X-Men have done in any of their books. Even with all the power in the world, it can still be hard to do something as seemingly simple as growing crops. I love the direction this book is going. Brian Wood has raised the bar here. United We Stand/Divided We Fall were great on their own accord, and he made the fallout of those events into something even better.
The art team of Carlo Barberi (pencils), Juan Vlasco (inks), and Jesus Aburto (colors) provide panel after panel of eye candy. Panel after panel, we are treated to a visual treat that compliments the amazing talent of Brian Wood's writing. Everything looks great here, and I loved the page layouts and panel setups. I have nothing but positive things to say about the art.
You know you have a good villain if you hate them for all the right reasons, and in this issue, I found myself despising two of them. We get a bit of Mach Two here, and everything she does is all just to take control from Kitty Pryde, a person she believes should not be in control. Essentially, Mach Two is upset she lost the election of who would lead them. She's quite the sore loser.
One of her pawns is Psylocke, who seems do be doing as much as she can to get Rogue on her side. Their conversation together is pretty enraging, as Psylocke plays towards Rogue's emotions and reminding her that she can never have a relationship with anyone because she can never be physical with them. Psylocke comes off as a huge (b-word) here. It's a character you're going to love to hate.
The Bad
While I love everything that's going on here, there's too much going on for this book, currently. Between Kitty trying to lead this group, the plans to create crops, Jimmy finding radiated area, Pyslocke being a horrible person, Mach Two trying to gain control of the reservation, and Tony Stark being all Tony Stark, this issue would have been much better with 10 extra pages, just to slow it down a bit.
I hate Blackheath's hair. It really bugs me.
The Verdict
I've been a firm believer that ULTIMATE COMICS X-MEN was a book people need to read, but I had no clue it would become my favorite series in the Ultimate line of comics. While there may be a lot going on here, which makes these smaller pieces of the larger story feel a tad rushed, it's still brilliant nonetheless. The aftermath of the major Ultimate crossover book is just as good, if not better, as the event itself. This is a great new take on this team and world.
Overall, I highly recommend this book, unless you hate awesomeness.