Alex Irvine’s prose adaption of the famous Days of Future Past storyline done by Chris Claremont, John Byrne and Terry Austin.
Turning 48 pages into 264 pages, quite the feat! I don’t necessarily need the hardcover. I’ll be more than happy to wait for the paperback.
At least it isn’t a novelization of the movie, that I would pass on.
Written by Michael Ian Friedman
Anyone know who the cover artist is? Seems like I’m the first to ask that question, online.
This is a pretty fun novel. It reads very much like a Star Trek novel, that happens to have the X-Men. The greatest of the X-Men, Shadowcat, is barely used. She appears in 26 of the 264 pages. In my younger days, I apparently kept track of them on an index card. Below, I’ve scanned all 26 pages so you can not only sample of the book but also enjoy the Shadowcat experience.
There are some fun moments such as Picard and Storm’s attraction to each other, Wolverine and Worf’s buddy romance. Angel being ripe jerk to the Enterprise crew. There is even a cameo by Lee, Kirby and Ditko – poor Lee.
The story of the book is that on Xhaldia, a new crop of people with powers start emerging and the planet doesn’t know what to do with them. Well, they do know to try to both encamp them and to fight and attempt to kill them.
Here are the pages that Kitty Pryde can be found on.
41
42
50
95
113
131
133
140
159
165
175
183
184 & 185
186 & 187
188
213
254 & 255
256 & 257
259
260 & 261
264
Sorry for the quality of the pages, I tried to get the book to lay as flat as possible but the majority of the pages are still readable.
. . .
Big Brother 18 : Episode 14 – July 21, 2016
Will Da’vonne go home or will Tiffany finally go home? Let’s find out!
Paulie and Zakiyah’s showmance is not getting any television time, neither is Zakiyah.
Dman, they went home and interviewed both Cody and Vanessa. At least we’re getting it out of the way now. I just told my wife that I bet Vanessa is all proud of Tiffany and isn’t seeing any of her own mistakes in Tiffany’s game.
But First! Apparently Production doesn’t know who is going home – that’s pretty awesome! They must love that.
oh man, they show Tiffany talking about Da’vonne flipping her hair onto Tiffany. Are they going to show all of the racist comments that Tiffany made? My Tumblr really blew up over Tiffany’s comments. Da’vonne is going to try her best to not blow up. Paulie is ready to break the tie in Tiffany’s direction. He’s growing a beard too.
Natalie is trying to make slop for the first time. Natalie asks Paulie to ask James if she wants to make him some slop. James says he’s a big boy and will make his own slop. Such an overreaction. Poor Natalie, she can’t choose a good man in the house. James finally has a lady interested in him and he’s burning it. Well, they seem to be getting along now.
Natalie goes in for a hug and James quickly touches her breasts. It looked awkward but the showmance is a real mance – for now.
Frank is talking to Paulie and Corey about maybe keeping Tiffany. In DR, Corey can see why they should get rid of Da’vonne. Paulie is adamant about getting rid of Tiffany.
Tiffany tries to talk to Nicole about voting out Da’vonne. Tiffany comes on so aggressive, like she rehearsed it in her head and now is trying to get all of the words out, as fast as possible. She does the same to Paulie. It is so exhausting to hear her game. Paulie is now concern about Da’vonne blowing up his game.
Da’vonne walks away from all of the houseguests in the kitchen. Da’vonne goes upstairs to find Zakiyah and Michelle. Two people Production doesn’t care about. One of the rules of Big Brother – if you are on the block, don’t let the house see what it is like to not have you around in it. You have to be present.
Da’vonne makes the mistake of telling James she wants the showmances out of the house. She meant Nicole / Corey and Paulie/ Zakiyah. Poor James, he’s currently IN A SHOWMANCE with Natalie! He will be Da’vonne’s target after a few weeks. James rightfully tells Paulie, so now he’s even more convince to let Da’vonne go.
The Battle Back, whoever goes home actually goes to the special Friday episode that airs tonight (it is 5:20 am right now as I type this). I’ve been catching some flack as I just learn of this Friday episode last night. Apparently they have said it on the show but I must have missed the two mentions of it.
Julie Chen, showing the similarities of the siblings. Tiffany is a hot mess, like her sister Vanessa. Paulie is a flirt, like his brother Cody. Is Paulie older than Cody? Their father’s name is Paul, is why I’m asking. I don’t miss Vanessa, at all. Tiffany’s shared DNA isn’t what makes Vanessa a target – it is her emotional outbursts and crazy style of talking.
Frank has been barely shown this week. Which is probably the right call on his part, lay low.
Speeches. Audio problems! Da’vonne tries to keep it light. Natalie is nervous and gives James a shoutout, she keeps hers fun. Tiffany has put on her normal face and voice, is this the mask?
Paul looks like Paulie 2.0, that must be on purpose, right?
Votes.
Michelle – Tiffany
Zakiyah – Tiffany
James – Tiffany, he thought about it
Commercial Break.
Nicole – Tiffany, not confidant
Frank – Tiffany – it is official, Tiffany is heading out tonight
Corey – Tiffany
Bridgette – Tiffany, with regrets
Paul – Tiffany, first vote in quite some time.
Tiffany got all the votes! I hoe she doesn’t win the Battle Back! Ideally, she is too emotional to play and can’t concentrate. OR! That they just send her packing immediately. I’m still hoping that Glenn wins and gets to play after spending so much time in sequester.
Chenbot asks Tiffany about her game choices. Something that has been recapped enough. Nothing new is coming out of this. Tiffany would not be so emotional if she was given a second chance to play, she’ll dial it back. her DNA won’t allow her ot keep her emotions in check. The goodbyes are friendly enough. Whoa, they shouldn’t have shown Da’vonne’s. I guess Production figures those two won’t work together. Tiffany’s mind is blown over Battle Back.
Julie announces that the teams and BB Road Kill are coming to an end. Once Battle Back is done, we’ll be back to Proper Big Brother.
CBS All Access has twice now not aired the full basketball Verizon commercial. We get the first few seconds and then it skips. They will have to do two make-goods.
Battle Back. This must be the jury house. Glenn wasn’t evicted, he didn’t win a competition. He’ll go after the Vets. Jozea. I guess it isn’t jury house as he’s by himself. Who is he playing volleyball with? Victor, definitely in a third house, is trying to be more zen. Bronte has been tanning and relaxing. She’ll come back with vengeance! I don’t really miss any of these people.
Julie tells the houseguests that the team twist is done. Also the BB Road Kill is over and there will only be two nominees.
No Head of Household? I guess they are going to allow the Battle Back winner to compete in that comp as well. Which is the way to do it as that winner is going to be target numero uno.
Julie also hinted that a secret is going to be revealed. My wife told me that is referencing Pandora’s Box that is coming back.
I’m working at Hastings tonight so I should be able to watch tonight’s episode when I get home.
Friday Battle Back
Sunday – HoH
Wednesday – Veto
Thursday – Eviction
My wife tells me that the feeds are down for the next few days because of this. I guess tonight’s episode is going to be live too as Julie will be there.
Down With The Monsters!
Inspiration Bill Mantlo & Ron Frenz
Script Todd Dezago
Pencils JonBoy Meyers
Inks Nathan Massengil & David Newborn
Colors Digital Rainbow
Letters Dave Sharpe
Cover by Randy Green, Rick Ketcham & Chris Sotomayor
Really, this is just a hardcover bound version of Marvel Age – Spider-Man Team-Up Issue Three.
Which in turn is based on the Marvel Team-Up Issue 135, hence the inspiration credit. That issue was reprinted in Marvel Tales 245, though both are super affordable.
So I ordered this book for my son, Walker Dennis. I thought it being close to twenty five dollars, that it would be made out of softer material – like a children’s book. Instead it was a hardcover and direct copy of the comic I already own, minus the ads. I had ordered it, so it was mine. If he destroys it, at least we were able to read it to him as a bedtime story.
The book opens up with Peter Parker being bullied by Flash – a typical high school day for poor Peter.
I like the lesson from the narration caption – sometimes being a good guy means having to tolerate people.
He dons his Spider-Man costume. A young girl steals another gal’s groceries and runs off. Spider-Man gives chase, and everyone around thinks he is chasing her for her groceries.
She mumbles to herself that Callisto isn’t going to be happy, as she heads into the subway station.
Spider-Man follows her there, people still think he is harassing her. A hand grabs her and Spider-Man doesn’t know what happened.
Turns out the Morlock, Sunder, grabbed her. She is also the Morlock, Dreamer. She casts a spell to make him think he is handsome and she runs off.
Next, we see Kitty Pryde in a modified version of her X-Men trainee uniform. She is in the Danger Room, doing great, as Xavier, Storm and Wolverine watch.
Once the session is over, Xavier tells Kitty that it is bad enough that he is constantly putting her life in danger, he doesn’t want to deprive her of a proper childhood. He has volunteered her babysitting services to the Michaels’ family. If this is a friend of Xavier’s or an ad from Craigslist that Xavier found, who knows? This family hasn’t been heard from since.
The Morlock Tunnels. Callisto is walking around as Spider-Man crawls about. She tells Ape and another Morlock to find Dreamer. She instructs Sunder to take Leech and find Spider-Man.
Which they do! Leech turns off Spider-Man’s powers and Sunder knocks him out. I thought Leech’s power only worked on fellow mutants?
Kitty is babysitting the Michaels’ children. They watch a scary movie involving mutants, but more like the monster type than the human type.
Kitty tells them to go to bed. She reads them a story, but they are still afraid of mutants. Kitty has to break it down for them that mutants are just people with extraordinary powers.
While reading to them, Dreamer comes crawling out of the ground – right outside the Michaels home. Of course.
The Morlocks that are chasing Dreamer, see Kitty and the children. Kitty can’t expose her secret so she lets them be taken. Once she has a plan, she will risk anything to keep the children safe.
Sometime later, in the sewers.Dreamer shows that she can make cartoon monkeys. Spider-Man is getting his powers back. Dreamer and Kitty are going to help with the escape plan, as they both announce they are mutants. The Michaels children are surprised, as they thought mutants were scary looking.
Shortly. Kitty unlocks the door and Spider-Man takes it off its hinges – which alerts the rest of the Morlocks. why she didn’t just walk them all outside, is beyond me.
Dreamer and the kids just motor off. Leech arrives and shows Spider-Man and Kitty are shut down. Dreamer and the kids come back, and the kids reveal they don’t find mutants scary anymore. Issue ends with Calisto’s heart going three sizes bigger and everyone gets to go home.
A fun little story.
This is a Young Readers novel, written by Barry Lyga. From doing some quick research for the image above, apparently this had a subtitle of, Worst Day Ever – but that doesn’t appear on the indicia or the cover of my copy.
The fun aspect to this book, is that it is written as if it is a printed blog. I like how the images used in the book are explained away. There are panels from comics throughout the book, so that it isn’t just text. The panels are pulled from various titles and artists, and it is explained that the main character is an artist and likes to use various styles. That is some clever writing, with production in mind.
The main character and his power is what I really want to discuss in this review. Before that, the main reason why I bought it was two reasons. I flipped through it and saw that Kitty Pryde made a few appearances and it was used at Hastings, so it was only $2.49.
The main character of the novel is, Eric Mattias. He is writing his blog as he is a student of Xavier’s School for Gifted Youngsters. He is writing the blog as he has the worst mutant power of them all. His mutant power is, as it described on page ten – people don’t notice him. If he concentrates really hard, he can get people’s attention.
This book came out in 2013. In May 2014, three guys got together and write X-Men Legacy 300 – Mike Carey, Simon Spurrier and Christos Gage. Together, they created . . . ForgetMeNot. Who, in comparison to Mattias, has it so much easier.
ForgetMeNot’s power makes you forget about him, once he is out of your line of sight. Mattias’ power is that, even if he is in front of you, you still can’t see him. Xavier knows both of them, but it hurts his head, concentrating so hard, to be able to register Mattias. Mattias tries to make his hero name, Nowhere Kid or Nowhere Boy.
Mattias, early in the novel, causes Colossus to trip over him in a Danger Room scenario.
My main issue with this novel is this, does Lyga know that ForgetMeNot exists and is essentially a middle aged man version of his 13 year old character? His novel came out first, so do any of the three ForgetMeNot creators know about the book?
Eric, Wolverine and Angel go on a mission where they rescue Cannonball from Unus the Untouchable, so it isn’t in continuity but it is a fun book. A very fast read.
There is an intense battle with Wolverine and Sabretooth, towards the end. Kitty Pryde shows up too.
Written by David Benioff, it was published in 2001.
I got it for page 39
and page 40
The book has a Prologue and 24 Chapters
I’m still waiting for someone to put up the scene from the movie of Marty / Edward Norton saying the line about the X-Man who phases through walls. Who, of course, is Kitty Pryde, Shadowcat of the X-Men! My favorite character of all time!
Each chapter isn’t an hour of Marty’s life, which is what I first thought when I saw the final chapter number. Does anyone else do that? I usually look at how many pages a book has, I read the last paragraph and then I check to see what the last chapter number is. I’ve never determined buying a book, based off of this information but I do it every time and I’ve done it for years now.
One benefit of having David Benioff writing the screenplay of Spike Lee’s adaption of the novel, is that it feels like an aspect of every page is represented in the film. Small details, parts of dialogue, thoughts given form, there is some detail from every page, that is in the film. Which is an amazing accomplishment, or at the very least, it feels like that. I’ve made a point of not rewatching the film until I’ve finished reading the novel but that is what I remembered from the film.
Written by Mark Rader
Illustrated by Art Mawhinney
This is a Play-a-Sound book.
It has five pages, the last having the X-Men (Kitty, Storm, Cyclops, BeaWolst and Iceman).
I bought it when Walker Dennis was still in his mother’s belly and it only took him almost sixteen months to darn near break the spine on it. I’m sure he would have enjoyed it more, if we could have found the replacement battery but I couldn’t find a 1.5Vx3 = 4.5V, whatever that meant.
But for a board book, he enjoyed flipping the pages.
. . .
Enjoy Free Comic Book Day 2015! Through DCBS I am getting – Secret Wars 2015, All New Avengers, Bob’s Burgers, Doctor Who and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.
Hastings is allowing seven free comics, per customer.
by Link Yaco and Karen Haber
Published June 2000
This is a great scientific look at the X-Men. It is broken into five parts –
Psionics
Jean Grey
Professor X
Mastermind
Storm
Scarlet Witch
Exotic Powers
Magneto
Cyclops
Havok
Unus the Untouchable
Shadowcat
Nightcrawler
Physical Attributes
Wolverine
Quicksilver
Blob
Angel
Beast
Colossus
Iceman
Rogue
Technology
Cerebro
Sentinels
Xavier Mansion
Blackbird
Alien Races
Shi’ar
Brood
Here are the Shadowcat pages –
If you can find a copy, I would highly recommend it. The science is explain pretty well and it is taken rather seriously. There is also a Science of Superman book out there which I recall being pretty good too.
I didn’t see a list like this, so here is an initial one.
If you like your stories without visuals – here is a list of Prose Novels that feature Kitty Pryde :
Watchers on the Walls by Christopher L. Bennett
The Return by Chris Roberson
Planet X by Michael Jan Friedman
I haven’t had a chance to read these but they have Kitty in them :
Astonishing X-Men Gifted by Peter David
Days of Future Past by Alex Irvine
Written by Thomas Macri
Illustrated by Patrick Olliffe and Pete Pantazis
Don’t worry, I bought the book for my son, Walker Dennis. Are there other children’s books with Kitty in them?
This is a Level 3 book. Which means it is meant for Super Readers, Grade 1 – Grade 3. It has paragraphs, suspenseful story lines and character development.
This book is 48 pages, so we were able to read it over several nights to our five month old.
There are seven chapters.
I like this book and wish there were more of them.
This book adapts Uncanny X-Men 141 and 142, the Days of Future Past Storyline. There are some slight changes, which should be expected.
In the future, Wolverine is also collared so he can’t use his powers.
I like on page 7, the homage to 141’s cover. Also how Wolverine has Reed Richards temples.
Chapter Two, is essentially an adaptation of Uncanny X-Men 129 – Kitty’s first appearance. Just without the Emma Frost and the Hellfire Club. Also, instead of Colossus coming to Kitty’s house – it is Jean and Cyclops.
In the future, I like how Rachel Summers is wearing her current costume, turkey jacket and everything!
Chapter Five, Kate wakes up in Kitty’s body. Jean is wearing a costume unique to this story. Jean confirms Kate’s story and Cyclops tells the team that they are heading to Washington DC. I like how he doesn’t ask any follow up questions, that is the life of an X-Man.
Mind you, Xavier is present in those pages, Jean is there just to show Jean. Or maybe that is why Cyclops didn’t question the tale, as Jean confirmed it.
In this book, they are merely only trying to prevent Senator Kelly’s kidnapping. Which makes sense of a change.
I do like how the book has the correct Brotherhood, all are present. Avalanche is in a costume that is also unique to this book.
Another thing to note, is there a rule of how many chapters these books can be? The first six chapters are barely five pages each. Chapter Seven is nearly the combined number of pages. Actually, it is just a double length chapter once I did a page count.
Story ends the way it does from Uncanny X-Men 142, except it is Mystique with the crossbow. Kate takes her out, regardless. As soon as she does, she faints as her mission is a success. I like how the image shown appears like Cyclops is holding Colossus back from going to Kitty. There can only be the one X-couple when Jean and Scott are around.
Book ends with SHIELD taking Mystique away.
Here is hoping that this book sells and they make more children’s books based off of Kitty’s adventures with the X-Men. Kitty’s Fairy Tale, would work, for one.
I saw a couple sample pages of this book, by Tim Leong and knew I should buy it. I read it on the Kindle Fire, so my page numbers might be off.
I was pleasantly surprised that Kitty Pryde made many graphs, and even more surprised when Lockheed and Magik was represented, at least once.
Page 22 – Character Line Up, has Lockheed around two and a half feet tall and Kitty at five and a quarter.
Page 87 & 88 – The Many Affiliations of the Marvel Universe, Kitty is associated with three : The X-Men, Excalibur and The New Mutants.
Page 100 & 101 – Battle Breakdown. Now I am not sure how accurate this one is, it keeps track of how many battles characters have won, tied or list. Kitty has been in 201 fights, won 55 percent, tied ten percent and lost 35 percent. Lockheed, 166 fights, won 55, tied 15 and lost 30 percent. This is a two page graph, so it wasn’t the easiest to read on the Kindle.
Page 139 – Character Kingdom, under Mammals, then Feline, we find Shadowcat.
Page 147 – To The Grave and Back, tracking how long characters have stayed dead. Magik, from 1993 to 2009. A very long sixteen years.
Page 191 – A Peek Inside the Jean Grey School for Higher Learning. Kitty is Headmistress, and teaches Ethics 101 – Forgetting Everything You Ever Learned from Emma Frost.
Page 215 & 219 – Ranking the Characters in the Marvel Comics Universe, Kitty is on page 219.
If the above doesn’t tempt you, then the below graph may, as it is the first one I saw, and I knew then, that I had to see the rest.
| Number One Lockheed… on Star Lord and Kitty Pryde… | |
 | Luke Petersen on Bounce Patrol |
 | John Klein III on Astonishing X-Men 15 |
 | MoxieMk5 on Astonishing X-Men 15 |
| Moxiemk5 on SDCC : New Mutants @ Home |
Shadow and Flame with Magik 