Shows of Force

[colonel_green]

Three scans from Age of Heroes #1, and four from X-Men: Legacy #236, the eighth part of "Second Coming".


 

The Age of Heroes book brings us various episodes from the new era; the largest story (eleven pages) by Kurt Busiek, focusses on Mayor Jameson, who is jubilant about the latest Siege-related stuff. People are afraid, and now he thinks they can finally be afraid of the right thing: superpowered people in general. This will be his moment.

Walking among "his people", he is in Time Square, when the news on all the big TVs there reports that the impact of Asgard slamming into the Earth in Siege #3 has caused a major reverberation in the New Madrid Fault, resulting in a massive flooding of the Mississippi Delta that threatens to wipe out some nearby city:

 

An irritated Jameson heads back to his HQ, and orders his aides to scrap the Memorial Day speech he was going to give in favour of one welcoming the Avengers back, reasoning that sometimes the best way to lead '"is by getting out in front of wherever they're going anyway." But he orders the aide to save the earlier draft, since "you never know" what future situation might arise.

Also, first page, second panel: James, I'm pretty sure you can't fly; Clint's on a glider, what's your excuse?

Elsewhere, "Second Coming" continues. Bastion implements his endgame: encasing San Francisco in a giant, impenetrable sphere, within which a portal to the future is opened to flood the area with Nimrod-class super-sentinels. Cable and Hope discuss what they're going to do:


 

The X-Club (Madison Jeffries, Dr. Nemesis, Dr. Rao) are stuck outside the bubble, trying to analyze it. Dr. Nemesis diagnoses it as "quantum-irresolvable"; it shifts between being matter and energy depending on what method you try to use to penetrate or analyze it). Then the Avengers (Captain America, Iron Man, Thor, Hawkeye, Spider-Woman) arrive, apparently having decided they care about mutants this week (well, actually, they arrived to see what was up with San Francisco):




Meanwhile, within:

 
 

Comments

[sherkahn]

uhm, hi. I'm Thor, God of Thunder. This is my mystical mallet Mjolnir. With it I can break through armored aricraft carriers, summon storms, channel lightning, wreak havok with god-blasts, fly to the stars and teleport.

Wait, did I forget it's ability to teleport?

[colonel_green]

He does, often enough.

[freezer]

That is Thor's usual battle plan:

A-D) Hit it with Mjolnir
E) Use Mjolnir's high level abilities
F) Go "World Of Cardboard" on someone.

[midnightvoyager]

It's not fair to World Of Cardboard right off the bat. You have to ramp up to it.

[arbre_rieur]

And has been doing so for pretty much as long as the character's been around, really.

In the late 90s or early 00s, they finally gave a handwave explanation: that his ability to generate portals is affected by the position of the stars and planets, the alignment of mystic forces, other inconstant factors, etc.