Cable #6
Duane Swierczynski, story
Ariel Olivetti, art, Cable sections
Michel Lacombe & Val Staples, art, Cyclops sections
Marvel
review by David Uzumeri of Funnybook Babylon

So, Cable.

It was probably the most-hyped of the post-Messiah CompleX launches, got outsold by the Kyle/Yost/Crain X-Force, featured Ariel Olivetti’s puzzling new artistic style of attractive figures over Battlefield 1942 screenshots, and was intended to be the vector along which the most glaring hanging plot thread from the previously mentioned major crossover would travel.

Eisner award-winning writer Ed Brubaker, whose workload’s only dark spot was his at-best mediocre work on Uncanny X-Men, vetted his buddy in crime lit Duane Swierczynski, who was previously known in the comics field for, well, a Moon Knight annual. He hit us up with a five-issue fairly cliched futuristic Western, with a Good Cop and a Bad Cop and the baby as the prize and even a badass local chick who Nathan inspired to channel her inner, uh, badass. It wasn’t a stunning debut.

Two weeks ago, Swierczynski knocked me on the head with Immortal Iron Fist #17, a shockingly worthy follow-up to one of superhero comics’ greatest highlights recently, the Ed Brubaker/Matt Fraction run on the aforementioned book. This week, we get Cable #6, a much-needed investigation into the mind of Scott Summers regarding the justifications behind his recent actions regarding the Mutant Messiah Baby and his son, as well as the precautions he makes regarding the danger of Emma discovering his more morally ambiguous recent actions regarding Logan and the X-Force.

It’s a huge step up for the series, advancing the book from a stereotypical action story symptomatic of the worst excesses of Internet trolls’ dark mirror of “Bendis decompression” to, for one issue, a logical and insightful look into Scott’s mind regarding what is a pretty damn big ongoing story. Michel Lacombe, recently of the Punisher: Force of Nature oneshot with Swierczynski and the Tales of the Sinestro Corps: Ion oneshit with Ron Marz for DC, does an effective job channeling the now-pervasive Lark/Maleev/Azaceta/Phillips gritty style to illustrate a fairly morally complex and personal story. Meanwhile, Swierczynski’s script is far more relevant and taut than previous, providing a formerly unknown amount of both forward plot and character movement for a single issue of this traditionally glacial title.

In short, what I’m getting at here is that this is a good issue, solidly fitting into both the current Manifest Destiny landscape of the X-Men franchise and Swierczynski’s solid work on the adventures of Danny Rand. However, I’m skeptical as to his ability to maintain this pace in the future, especially as he’ll be further (in my mind) saddled with the stiffness and artifice of Ariel Olivetti’s current art style. I’m newly optimistic for future issues of this series, but the burden falls solely on Swierczynski’s shoulders to advance the plot and develop the characters at a rapid enough pace to maintain my interest to continue purchasing the book (despite the standard reviewer copy package, I’m also spending my cash on paper copies of this comic).