X-Men: Schism #4

Mercifully ditching the Hellfire Kiddie Club, X-Men: Schism takes a sharp rise in quality only to then stumble again when the big moment between Cyclops and Wolverine finally arrives.

I have been saying from the beginning that there is a really good story here that just needs to be allowed to come out, and finally, with the exclusion of Jason Aaron's ill conceived Hellfire Club subplot, that gets to happen. We are back to focusing on the divide between Cyclops and Wolverine, which finally manages to form into something concrete in this issue. It's really all about the children and whether or not they should be sheltered from the more serious hardships of being a mutant. Both sides' positions are easy to understand, and neither really comes off looking like the bad guy. Although, Wolverine's does come off as the weaker when he asks if turning kids into soldiers is what the X-Men have come to.

Here is a little history lesson for Wolverine. The X-Men were founded by Charles Xavier turning five kids into soldiers to fight things like Sentinels. Moving on.

I rather like the monster Sentinel in this issue. The concept of a Sentinel with incredibly advanced hardware running on really dumb software, making it too dumb to be shut down or reprogrammed by the geniuses, is pretty amusing. Also, it's slow moving, unstoppable approach toward Utopia creates a very ominous atmosphere that works really well.

While the Hellfire Kiddie Club doesn't actually appear, the stain they have left on this story remains as we are reminded that this whole crisis is coming about because the X-Men have essentially been owned by children. That is a minor thing and not the worst thing about this issue.

No, where this issue starts to fall apart is when the fracture between Cyclops and Wolverine actually happens. It starts off well with the two of them at a standoff in regard to their positions and Wolverine doing something to force the issue. This plays out well, until Jean Grey gets brought up absolutely out of nowhere for a moment a cheap heat between the two characters. It is a really stupid moment that sours that entire clash they had brewing. With the way it is framed, it doesn't even make sense as something brought up in the heat of the moment or built up to at all. Aaron just throws it in because he apparently can't help himself.

Things deteriorate further from there, because it is time for the brawl. Aaron and Alan Davis are working the butts off to make a brawl between Cyclops and Wolverine work, and I have seen that Aaron will continue trying next issue. But it just doesn't work. There is a glaring problem with this. If you are in Cyclops' line of sight and he wants you to go away, you go away. Unless you're a heavy-hitter, that's it. End of story. This issue features Cyclops ripping a Sentinel a new one from a mile away just a few pages before his point blank blast on Wolverine has all the effect of a shove. The fight sequence really is trying so hard, but it's just silly. It's like they're play fighting with Cyclops barely even trying to hit Wolverine and Wolverine just waving his claws near Cyclops.

Overall, I think the damage has already been done to X-Men: Schism, and it just can't recover. Jason Aaron can't seem to help himself. Just when he reins in his fascination with evil children, he just has to include references to Jean Grey even if they don't fit into the context of the moment. It seems like every time this story starts to get really good something unnecessary is included to kick the legs out from under it. Still, this is a pretty good issue up until the end. With one issue left to go, I'm more ready to just move on from all this and hope better stories are waiting.