Guess Who’s Back? X-Force 40

Introduction

Welcome back to my Volcano Base. It’s time to get into some comics. Today we’re talking X-Force 40.

I don’t know about you, but I’m a huge Quentin Quire fan. I have been since he was first introduced in Grant Morrison’s original run. I loved him in the Kieron Gillen era – you know, the ‘look at my t-shirt, look how many different sayings I can have on my T-shirt’ era.

So when, over a year ago, in issue 29, they killed Quentin off, I was bummed. I was devastated.

But lo and behold, we find out on the very last page of issue 39 that Quentin is actually still alive. He comes bursting through a portal with a badass pink sword, and he’s a lot older than he was the last time we saw him. Sporting a long beard, he’s just rocking the old man Quentin vibes.

Issue 40 opens with him telling X-Force that they’re all doomed. A tentacle comes through this portal that Quentin had just come through. It grabs Omega Red and takes off. This action prompts Quentin to push everyone else through the portal, too.

They’re on their way to Quentin’s base when they’re attacked by these creepy tentacle monsters. Like, look at these things. Lots of tentacles, a weird, huge face – generally speaking, something you don’t want to mess with.

As you can see by the panel here, we meet the rebellion, the people who’ve been fighting against the God of all mutants. It turns out the God of all mutants in this dimension is their version of Beast. And he is preparing to eat Omega Red. We don’t really know why. We just know that these Beast priests – those creepy tentacle monsters from earlier – dragged him to this altar and prepared him for a scary encounter with Beast.

Quentin has been fighting this version of Beast in this dimension for a long time. He says he’s getting tired. He needs help. And he’s telling them he needs help in the best way he can. This is all on their way to get to Omega Red.

And then they show up. Turns out they didn’t need the assistance. Omega Red took out the God of all mutants from the inside out and made quick work of him.

We think this is over, right? Like this is the end. We took care of the God of our mutants. Everything is good. Nope.

So it turns out that 616 Beast – you know, our main dimension’s Beast – seeded a bunch of multiverses with a bunch of versions of himself. Their jobs are to just lay low, chill out, gather data, make things happen behind the scenes until the time is right to strike.

Quentin can’t fight Beast on his own anymore, so he pleads for X-Force to join the fight, to take the fight to the Beast, and basically go multiverse hopping to take out Beast in every form.

It feels like we’re setting up like a mini run of The Exiles. The only thing we’re missing is a bunch of characters from a bunch of different dimensions rather than everyone from the same dimension.

As I said before, I’m super stoked to see Quentin back. He’s one of my favorite mutants. I’m hoping he sticks around, maybe in an advisory capacity. I don’t want to see him just disappear.

I’m kind of wondering if the ultimate goal of this book is to confront 616 Beast and if X-Force is going to be the group to take him out. There’s some poetic justice there because X-Force was sort of like Beast’s long arm of the law. So for them to bring Beast in and potentially kill Beast, there’d be some synergy there.

I’m also wondering if this team is going to be immune to the effects of the Fall of the Mutants because they’re going to be in another dimension. And what that’s going to mean for them when they come back.

Go pick this book up, enjoy. Bask in the Quentin Quire awesomeness and don’t forget to, like, subscribe and interact for more volcanic vibes.