Big Guns, Nostalgia, And Not Much Else: Reviewing ‘Cable’ #4
by Scott Redmond
Overview
Cable #4 finishes the miniseries off while proving that it’s the most skippable thing in the entire array of ‘Fall Of X’ titles. A story that will probably only speak to the most die hard old-school Cable fans who want to geek out over supporting characters that no one has wanted to really touch in the last decade or more.
Overall
6.5/10Sometimes there are stories that feel unnecessary, but are at least fun. Then there are those which are just unnecessary.
Enter Cable #4, the final issue of a miniseries that continues to prove the point of how aimless the entirety of the Fall Of X has truly been. A final piece for the Krakoan Age from Fabian Nicieza, Scot Eaton, Lan Medina, Cam Smith, Jose Marzan Jr., Java Tartaglia, and Joe Sabino.
Okay, look, the choice of words might be off. There is one way that this story was necessary, it put money in the pocket of comic book creatives. Which is always nice because we all know how cruel and hard this industry can be to those creating the works that the company makes billions from.
As a story though, there wasn’t much of a point to this. Other than a chance for Nicieza to pull out a bunch of old toys that no one has used since his regular time with the X-Line ended quite a number of years ago.
I’ll give one point of them achieving victory against their foe by using his ego against him. Overall, it just was really boring, overly expositional, made no sense, and felt like a ridiculous deviation in light of the threat that Orchis & AI pose in other X-books. Oh also, making a joke about how expositional your characters are, only to surround that joke with verbal diarrhea doesn’t make it funny.
All hands are on deck as it takes numerous pencilers and inkers to finish this story off. Eaton and Medina do superhero stuff fine, very house style sort of feeling. It gets the job done. Plenty of energy and good presence on the page, mostly nailing the emotions and story beats. Smith and Marzan’s inks bring a bit more heaviness and depth to everything.
Then there are Tartaglia’s colors which hit that middle ground. Plenty of big bright colors surrounded by more mundane neutral level colors to set up the world. Plenty of slickness to both tones, adding quite a bit to some of the bigger scenes.
Per usual, there is a lot of work for Sabino to do since there are so many words on the page. He works the best he can to make them work and flow on the page. Again, there is not a lot of room for any creative or fun deviations, since there is just so much to get on the page. Overall, it works and sets the tone for each bit of dialogue.
Cable #4 is now available from Marvel Comics.
