{"id":5010,"date":"2020-01-09T22:25:33","date_gmt":"2020-01-09T22:25:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/?p=5010"},"modified":"2020-01-09T22:25:33","modified_gmt":"2020-01-09T22:25:33","slug":"new-mutants-5-annotations","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/?p=5010","title":{"rendered":"New Mutants #5 annotations"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

As always, this post contains spoilers, and page numbers go by the digital edition.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

COVER \/ PAGE 1.<\/strong> Deathbird fights Cannonball and Sunspot… which doesn’t really happen in the issue.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

PAGES 2-3.<\/strong> Sunspot recaps the plot.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Two pages of in-story recap is a lot, but it’s been three issues since we were last dealing with this cast and this storyline. In plot terms, at least, there’s still no apparent connection between the two strands of this series. Sunspot’s recap of the plot is basically accurate, despite all the comedy egotism – and note that Sunspot doesn’t actually name<\/em> any other characters in this entire sequence.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

Murd Blurdock.<\/strong> As previously mentioned, Sunspot’s “space lawyer” is a Daredevil parody, but this panel seems to miss the original joke: he’s from a race of blind aliens with radar sense, and instead of a radar sense he has perfectly normal eyesight.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Sunspot and Cannonball.<\/strong> Even Hickman’s rather delusional Sunspot acknowledges that he’s trying to keep himself in Sam’s good graces. Judging from Sam and Izzy’s expressions in the art, he is not being anywhere near as successful at this enterprise as he would like to believe.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“Regardless, space politics is no laughing matter…”<\/strong> The two (unnamed) characters seen in this panel are Oracle and Mentor of the Imperial Guard. We saw them both in issue #2, but they weren’t obviously at odds in that issue. We’ll see later on that Oracle is very much not on board with Gladiator’s plan to bring in Deathbird to train Xandra as empress.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Deathbird.<\/strong> Sunspot manages to spend half a page drooling over her without actually mentioning her name. I think<\/em> this is indeed the first story where he’s met her, though she’s been around for years. All of the Shi’ar are meant to be bird-aliens, but Deathbird is a mutant who is much more visibly bird-like than the others.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

PAGES 4-5.<\/strong> Recap page and credits. This is “Endangered Birds” by Jonathan Hickman and Rod Reis.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

PAGES 6-8.<\/strong> Oracle persuades Gladiator to keep Deathbird’s arrival a secret, then instructs the Shi’ar Death Commandos to kill her.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Oracle.<\/strong> Clearly she considers herself among the people who object to Deathbird’s return. Her advice to Gladiator is presumably intended to make it easier to get rid of Deathbird without a big public response, but it’s sensible enough on its own terms. Shi’ar public opinion surely ought to be pretty alarmed at the return of Deathbird. As for the people she’s talking to…<\/p>\n\n\n\n

PAGES 9-10.<\/strong> Data page on the Shi’ar Death Commandos. These characters were introduced in a storyline from Uncanny X-Men<\/em> #466-471 (2006) when they wiped out the Grey family bloodline. A; they’ve shown up occasionally since then, as the Shi’ar Empire’s black ops squad. The characters listed here are all established members, most of whom are somewhat blank slates. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The opening paragraphs contrast them with the Imperial Guard who – following Hickman’s Avengers<\/em> run – have a whole training programme in place so that fallen members can be replaced by somebody else using the same identity. The Death Commandos are just a bunch of mercenaries to whom that doesn’t apply… except for leader Black Cloak, presumably because he was rather graphically killed by Rachel Grey in War of Kings<\/em> #5, as revenge for the death of her family. It seems that the Black Cloak seen here is a new one, so conceivably somebody we know might be under the mask.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Death Commandos are:<\/p>\n\n\n\n