Captain Universe / X-23 #1

Title: Captain Universe / X-23
Issue: #1
Date: January, 2006
Publisher: Marvel Comics
Writer: Jay Faerber
Penciler: Francis Portelle
Inker: Raul Fernandez
Colorist: Impact Studios
Letterer: VC's Rus Wooton
Editor: Nathan Crosby, Mark Paniccia

Okay, so there's this cosmic power, the "Uni-Power" that grants superpowers to those in need. It's the power that made Spider-Man cosmic-powered back in the '90s. Anyway, when it possesses a person, they become (no, I'm not making this up)... CAPTAIN UNIVERSE!

("Universe Man, Universe Man/Size of the entire universe, man/He's got a watch with a minute hand/A millenium hand, and an eon hand/And when they meet it's a happy land/Powerful man, Universe Man" -TMBG. Sorry. Okay, I'll stop now.)

Anyway, the Uni-Power has malfunctioned, and it's wandering the Marvel Universe in its own crossover series. All of this is explained in a text introduction.

And then, a villain proceeds to give the exact same introduction in a dialogue infodump prompted by the lame excuse that another villain didn't pay attention to the briefing (this gal is the Scorpion, but not the Scorpion from Spider-Man; this is some green-haired chick who basically seems to be Madame Hydra/Viper, except with a shorter attention span).

But this book isn't about that. It's about X-23, who's basically Wolverine, except that she's prettier, wears less, and has less personality. So she starts fighting with some invisible commando-types, and seems to be doing just fine, but gets Uni-Powered anyway.

She ends up teamed up with Scorpion, who explains that she's the GOOD Scorpion and not the Spider-Man villain. In order to make the point that X-23 is the strong silent type, writer Jay Faerber has Scorpion chatter incessantly while saying pretty much nothing.

Eventually they find themselves in a house that is set to self-destruct in 3 minutes. They know this because a random bad guy tells them that the house is set to self-destruct in 3 minutes.

Scorpion has a hard decision to make and ends up showing some heart, and the ending is actually considerably better than all of the silliness that led up to it. A text feature on the history of the Captain Universe character is more interesting than most of the story was, and we get a last-page teaser showing the next "exciting" guest star (Gladiator? Really? THAT is supposed to sell comics?).

You know how some comics are harmless fun? This was harmless and really bad.

Rating: 3/10