Avengers VS X-Men #10: Review

The splash page of the current issue suggests 14 X-Men supposedly under Emma Frost's mind control, but even the long shot only has 13 bodies. As well as Cannonball, ComicBook DB lists Angel, Boom Boom, Hepzibah, Magma, Polaris, Sunspot and Velocidad. I'll accept Polaris, Velocidad, Boom Boom, Sunspot, Hepzibah, and half of Magma in that order in the main shot (even CBDB can't identify the half person on the left of the picture). Plus Angel on the end of the line in another picture. The splash page's inclusion of Dazzler, X-Man, Psylocke, Loa, Surge and Primal seems fanciful. The dragon Shao Lao (more usually called Shou-Lao) is the source of Iron Fist's power. Or at least the previous one was, because the dragon died when it gave Danny Rand the power, and this one was born in readiness for the next Iron Fist. Hope Summers can mimic other mutants' powers. But this shouldn't extend to Shao Lao's dragonfire or the Iron Fist. And I don't think she could previously use Scarlet Witch's Chaos Magic either. So all that training in K'un Lun has paid off!

Ed Brubaker writes the last section of the 2nd 5-issue round robin. This series is coming to the boil, and the Adam Kubert/John Dell art team are handling it perfectly. I'm going to use Julio's enhanced scoring scheme to give this issue 4.5. (And while I'm at it I'll go back and up last issue to 4.5 too.) Last week's single tie-in New Avengers #29 is covered in the Comments to #9. This week also sees only 1 extra issue. Avengers #29 is a replay of Wolverine & X-Men #12 showing Prof X's secret involvement on the side of the Avengers. As such it is set between AvX#6 and #7. I don't know whether this is before or after NAv#29. In both those issues Xavier pulled back from committing himself to the Avengers and went back to sitting on the fence. But later events have now tipped the balance (and tipped him off the fence).

Added later:- Comments on tie-ins in the 3 weeks between this issue and #11. All but one occur earlier in the saga. Uncanny X-Men #17 finishes off the Mr Sinister story. As such I place it before AvX#7. Sinister captures the Phoenix 5 and tries to use the Phoenix Force with his Madelyne Pryor clones. AvX:Versus #5's 2 fights are widely split in time. Angel vs Hawkeye is from before Hawkeye was burned and captured in AvX#7, and it presumably actually occurs during the Wundagore Mountain bit in AvX#4. But wherever it is placed Angel is seriously out-of-step with his current characterisation. Storm vs Panther is from AvX#9, where there didn't actually appear to be a fight. Wolverine & X-Men #15 and #16 occur out of order. In #15 the school is inundated with Avengers and refugees from Utopia, probably correctly between AvX#10 and #11. #16 is pre-AvX#9, where the Phoenix 5 meet the young new Hellfire Club.