Shadow and Flame with Magik

Writer Brian Michael Bendis

Penciler Stuart Immonen

Inker Wade Von Grawbadger

Colorist Marte Gracia

Letterer VC’s Cory Petit

Trial of Jean Grey Part Five of Six

Issue opens with Gladiator reasking Jean for her plead.  He starts yelling at her, as she remains silent.

King J-Son arrives, enters her plead as innocent.  J-Son goes on to say everything everyone has ever said about this storyline when it was first announced.  Well, the nicer things.

Jean is clearly a teenager here, and not a woman.

Jean isn’t displaying the abilities of the Phoenix.  After AvX, is the Phoenix even a threat?

Jean isn’t at all the same person who died on the Blue Side of the Moon, the original punishment for (Dark) Phoenix’s actions.

J-Son also tells everyone how the Shi’ar sent a commando of killers to successfully kill every member of Jean’s family.  Minus Cable and Rachel, and any Madelyne Pryor samples Sinister has.  Hearing this upsets Jean, naturally, as she didn’t know about her family’s fate.

Gladiator is not pleased with this turn of events.

Meanwhile, The X-Men, Guardians and Starjammers are starting their plan to get down to the planet.

Angela is floating in space, I guess she can survive such an ordeal.  She doesn’t appear on any Shi’ar databases, so they start the process of bringing her on board, for science!

Drax would have liked a different approach, Gamora tells him this needed a lighter touch.

Angela is on the ship, she ‘wakes’ up and starts knocking Shi’ar fools out.

We are treated to a panel with dialogue caption boxes.  Drax doesn’t like this, someone tells him to be patient.  “I am Groot.”

Angel asks how long this is going to take?  Rocket accuses him of whining and stands up for Drax, stating Drax wasn’t whining.

I like how Scott is on the Starjammer, that is a nice detail.  He would want to be with his father, as long as possible.

Angela buzzes the two hero ships, her portion of the plan is completed.  There is a gag that only works in print.  Someone proposes to Angela. She thinks it is Rocket, she tells him he is to short for her.  Gamora corrects her, stating it is her who wants to marry Angela.  To which, Angela is open to.  This is funny and I enjoyed it.  It only works in print, as if you could hear the dialogue, you would have heard two women speaking.

In the Shi’ar Tribunal Hall, the Imperial Guard are escorting Jean away.  They are talking about the latest events, which is intercut with a conversation between Gladiator and J-Son.  The Imperial Guard can’t believe the trial went in this direction.  Gladiator can’t believe J-Son would so publicly disagree with him.

Hopefully those three pages are not the end all scenes of the trial.  I was hoping for more than opening comments.

Jean notices her bubble is weakening and escapes.

The next four two page spreads are simply amazing, Immonen and Von Grawbadger at their creative finest.  There are so many panels, and layout changes.  Also, one benefit is three uninterrupted page turns of no ads and glorious art.

Jean escapes, and telepathically knocks the Imperial Guard out, except fellow minder, Oracle.  Gladiator wants Oracle to bring Jean back.  Gladiator wants Jean dead, he wants to be known as the one who defeated the Phoenix.

J-Son is told by his staff that he has to leave the planet, for his own safety.  The planet is now on lockdown.  The entire planet, even the section on the complete opposite side of the planet is on lockdown.

The heroes are navigating their stolen ship to the surface.  Rocket must be their official pilot.  The heroes are informed to be careful, as the Earth girl has escaped custody.  Drax is impressed that Jean single handily took out the Imperial Guard, and now wants to meet her.

A fun gag with Scott wanting the ship to go faster.  Rocket states it can, if he wants the entire Shi’ar armada up his sakonnet.  Bobby says he doesn’t know what that is, but going to guess, no.  Rocket tells him that is a good guess.  I could stand for more Rocket / Bobby scenes.

Scott is determine to get to the surface.  Kitty tells him to be steady as Hank and X23 look shock at how urgent he is being.

We are treated to a lovely two page spread, no captions or dialogue balloons.  Jean is on the run, and tries to catch her breath.

The heroes land.  Star-Lord gives the big speech of their plan of action.  He wants the younger members to listen up.

Angela can track Jean, if she had her scent.  X23 speaks up, she has Jean’s scent and can track her.  Star-Lord makes a funny comment regarding not noticing her being on the ship before.

Drax’s job is to keep X23 safe.  She tells Star-Lord she can take care of herself.

Star-Lord continues.  He doesn’t want anybody to go half cock, full cock or any kind of, you know, cocked.  Does Bendis write the Guardians this well in their own title?  I may be tempted to read that series, if so.

Kitty tells him, that they got it.  Did he go off on that tangent, to put a certain idea in Kitty’s mind?

Corsair has a nice moment with Scott.  Scott seems okay with calling him, dad.  Corsair wants Scott to sit this mission out.

Corsair tells Hepzibah that he doesn’t want Scott making the same mistakes again.  I imagine, he means he doesn’t want Scott to date Jean.  Has he really ever meet Jean?  Corsair definitely met the Phoenix impersonating Jean and he for sure met Madelyne Pryor, her clone.  I’m not sure if he has met the real Jean.  He hasn’t even met teenage Jean yet.

Bobby wants to know if the air is breathable for humans.  Gamora tells him, they are about to find out.  Bobby isn’t sure if she is joking.  All the Guardians get some dialogue this issue.

The heroes open the door of their ‘borrowed’ ship.  In a fun page turn reveal, Gladiator and his Imperial Guard are waiting for them outside.

Gomora tells everyone to flank out, they will regroup later.  Angel is confused by this, as they outnumber them by three.

Manta proves why, as she knocks everyone out.

Groot is still standing, and punches Gladiator from behind.  Angela follows that attack.  Then Drax.  Gladiator, proving why he is the leader of not only the guard but a galactic empire, stands his own against these three.

Gladiator loses his cool.  He can’t believe the Guardians and the Starjammers are involved in this madness.  He also wants to know how the X-Men got all the way there – which is silly as clearly one of those space teams brought them.

Cyclops is done.  He gets two awesome optic blasts off on Gladiator.  Impressing his old man.

Gladiator tells him that the older him wouldn’t have been so foolish.  Scott wants him to bring Jean to him, or die.  Gladiator smirks, Scott is the same as his older self.

Issue ends with Jean showing up.  Enough is enough.  She states she is guilty, as she is a monster.

Once again, the new uniforms, so distracting with that lack of a belt but the floating buckle, what is that?  Didn’t notice it with the boys, but they don’t have breasts, so I imagine Immonen doesn’t need to draw them from the neck down.

This story concludes in Guardians of the Galaxy 13, and next issue is the big 25th Anniversary Issue that promises to have Paul Smith art!  So excited!