I'm a fan of Domino, the mutant assassin with the power of luck and some weird skin tone issues. But these past few years have been a trial for Domino fans, since the books she is in are either terrible and/or cancelled.
Which brings us to X-Force #8. Domino is back in yet another X-Force book (wasn't the last one cancelled last year? So many Marvel cancellations blur the memory). Will this be the book that breaks the pattern? Will Domino finally be lucky?
So far, Domino has been far from lucky in this run. Kidnapped, tortured, flayed alive, her DNA being used to create a race of Domino killer clones, our girl has had easier times.
Since this is X-Force (generally the darker of all the X-books), things have been grim. But in this issue, Domino starts hitting back, tracking the people who tortured her to Russia. Colossus agrees to accompany her, probably because he's Russian and because apparently he and Domino have a thing? I must have missed that.
The issue started off well, but quickly derailed. Domino taking out another assassin was cool. But when we get back to the new mutant base, there is a weird scene where Colossus apparently advocates Domino commit suicide so she can heal from all the trauma she's suffered. When did this happen? Colossus has always been a gentle soul, an artist. Now he's offering to help murder a friend.(On the new base--the island Krakoa--no one can die: you just get reborn, brand spanking new.) Domino is all uh-uh about that, and off they go to Russia to deliver vengeance.
Even that's clumsy. In a scene that doesn't appear in the comic, apparently Domino suffers a fatal injury during the battle. From what I gather, she's going to die and will be reborn. But--we never see her getting hurt. She's fine one page, and near death the next.
Sloppy.
Aside from that, writer Benjamin Percy writes Domino well, but the story isn't clear in many spots. Why didn't more X-Men accompany Domino? Wasn't this a threat to all the X-Men? The island is clogged with mutants--surely someone else could have joined them.Why don't we see how she was hurt? Why is Colossus now the Death Panel for the X-Men? Why did Colossus crash the train? There was no need for that. And the most important question: how did this get past an editor?
The art here is passable. There is a nice scene with Domino and Colossus fighting on the train against a small cadre of Domino assassins, but it's hurt by the writing, which gives no character to these assassins at all. (We at least had some with the first assassin at the story's beginning, but the others are just figures to be hit and killed.)
So, not an issue to inspire hope. But Marvel has been on a slide for awhile now, and here's more proof of that.
