This is Entry 283: Age of Uh FINALE, part 2

Oh… Age of Ultron, what are we doing to do with you?

Welcome back to the final part of the chapter to my review of the “Age of Ultron” comic. It’s been a long time coming but we made it. Not as originally planned but we are here. The end of an Age.

Issue 10

The cover: Various characters we have not seen for a few issue fight a weird looking Ultron. Not sure what it is about this cover but it looks weird. I thinks it’s Ultron himself. He looks weird. Not looking the look of his body. His head looks odd but then his head has always looked weird. I've looked at the cover a dozen or more times & I'm still not sure who's head that is at the bottom.

The Short Review of the Issue: WHAT THE HELL?

Longer Review of the Issue:

We start “some Months ago”  which may or may not be the “months ago” as mentioned & seen in Issue 5. We are in Hank Pym’s lab. He’s doing science stuff. A message pops on his screen telling to “follow the white rabbit”. No… He’s told open his door. He thinks it’s Janet, his wife. Might be ex-wife, depending on when this happened. But really it couldn’t have been Janet since if this was really a few months before Issue 1 had come out, Janet had been dead for awhile. So… Hank thinking it’s his dead wife playing a joke on him is a bit strange.

He open the door to find no one but a package. Down the hallway a bit is Sue Richards in Invisible mode. Hank closes the door to find a tablet computer with a note that reads “play me” on it. He presses play to find a message for himself!

*DUN DUN DUN DUUUUUNNNNNNN*

1 Question: Did they have tablet computer in the 1970’s when He most likely made that message for himself? That could be explained away as Sue put the message on the tablet. Another question: Did he have a “home video camera” to make the video?

Another thing I noticed: Video Hank looks like he’s dressed in the latest fashions of the 1980’s. And yes I’m off on yet another tangent: that’s what this comic make me do. I have spent so much time reading, re-reading, looking it over that I can’t help be question it all!

The Message basically goes like this:

“Hi Hank! It’s Hank! You don’t remember making this video & that’s because that’s how it happened to be BUT if your seeing this it means that we still got a chance to stop Ultron from doing a massive no no. We have scrwed up a lot of things so let’s not screw this one up!”

We flip the page to see reused art! I didn’t notice when the book first came & hadn’t in the few times I had looked through the issue BUT today I did. It was all because I happened to look at another related book. One that I’m not sure if I’ve mentioned before.  In May 2012, for Free Comic Book Day, Marvel came out with a book, Avengers: Age of Ultron! It’s the prequel that I had forgotten about until I go to this point in my first reading of the book. There was a little over a 1 year in between books (the FCBD book & Issue 1). My forgetting of the book might because it didn’t seem all that memorable of a book (it’s still not).

I guess that’s ok since everthing you need to know about the old comic is ok with it since Marvel pretty REPRINTS 8 PAGES from the original FCBD comic as is in Issue 10. Those 8 pages are the later half of the FCBD book. The only changes in Age of Ultron #10 are a few speech & text bubbles. The rest is EXACTLY THE SAME!

What happens in both books:  A group of Avengers all rush into a secret base run by the Intelligencia (a group of “super smart” super villains). They had kidnapped Spider-Woman as she was checking out something in a jungle somewhere (the earlier book doesn't say where so let's just say The Savage Lands). The thing that is found was a Space Knight (from the 80’s comic ROM Space Knight). You remember them from earlier in Age of Ultron, don't you? Of course you do! They aren't reference ANYWHERE by name but there is one vaguely Space Knight looking guy on Nick Fury's wall of photos back in Issue 2!

Back to the reprinted pages: The Bad Guy want it & didn’t want the Good Guys to have it so they kidnapped her which of course means the Good Guys are going to go to rescue her. Yeah... real smart!

We have a multi-page fight scene. The Bad Guys give up but not before finding a way to turn back on the Space Knight (some are robots, most are cyborgs). But OH NO! This Space Knight is holding a secret, It transforms & is really ULTRON! Ultron had been out in space the past few years so that wasn't that much of a stretch.

Thor decides to do something stupid by hitting Ultron in the chest with his hammer, BIG EXPLOSION happens. This is the point where the 2 comics change. In the FCBD comic, lots of destruction. Bad Guys look like they are dead & the heroes try to regroup. They think about tracking Ultron down BUT Iron Man says that pointless since “He has seen the Future” & it’s crappy. That’s where the FCBD comic ends. A year long cliff hanger!

Where it changes in Issue 10, just before Thor does the stupid thing, Iron Man gets a call from Hank. Iron Man takes the call but tries to brush him off since “He’s busy” But Hank continues to talk & is “sending” Iron Man something. Maybe it’s an E-Mail? tonystark@IMsuit.org! Hank has sent Iron Man “Highly Evolved Calculations” & Iron Man isn’t sure they’ll work but Hank says they will. Iron Man “launches the code” over Wi-Fi i guess since Iron Man never touches Ultron or get near him. Is the Iron Man suit Wi-Fi enabled? If not then how did Hank send Iron Man the stuff? All while Hank is chatting with Iron Man to do the thing, Thor hits Ultron with his hammer. BIG EXPLOSION!

And what happens? It still destroys the Intelligencia’s hideout but after the explosion, Ultron isn’t gone & he’s confused. The “kill code” as Hank calls it which “is very specific to a backdoor code portal program” that is in the “deepest recesses of his program”. 

All while Ultron is confused, the Avengers attack. Ultra says that they are “adding buffering code to my infrastructure”. He wonders how they were prepared. He suspects Iron Man & his “father” Hank Pym. Thor zaps Ultron with a bolt of lightning. The fight between the Avengers & Ultron is all distraction so Hank can completely uploading the “kill code” to Ultron. 

Fight! Fight! Fight!

Load! Load! Load!

Ultron starts to crackle with energy. The program loads, Ultron shuts down & once more Thor smacks Ultron with his hammer. Pieces fly everywhere!

Iron Man ask exactly what happened. Hank replies:

“We sent him what looked like an average backdoor trojan horse code, but the trick of it was — When Ultron tired to defend himself and re-code it an shut it down… It triggered a self replicating virus that was implanted in at his creation. By the time he could process what was happening… There was nothing left of him.”

Iron Man asks a very good question: Why didn’t we try this before? Hank Replied: I didn’t have it before.

Before we got into the ending. Let’s chat about the “kill code” for a bit. I'm crying all kinds of BULL SHIT on that working. That’s some “access port on the Death Star” Deus Ex Machina level of tying up a loose end that they didn't bother having in the main book. It has been clearly stated that Ultron had upgraded, updated, recreated himself dozen of times since he was created. To me it would seems rather stupid of the robot to not close up a fatal back door in his programing. WHY LEAVE IT OPEN LIKE THAT? Sure, He might of thought “no one could get into my programing that far in for that to be a problem?” If that’s so, why leave it open? WHY?

With Ultron defeated you know what? The past 9 issues & the 8 tie-in issues NEVER HAPPENED! THE AGE OF ULTRON NEVER HAPPENED! They also never told us how Ultron got from blowing up a building to taking over the whole world! Or how long it took for him to do that? Those are 2 questions I have been asking since Issue 1 & they still aren’t answered or even hinted at. Also, we never find out what happened to the Future Group! They simply drop out of the series at issue 6! But what does it matter what they did or even if they ever accomplished anything since THE AGE OF ULTRON NEVER HAPPENED! They had no need to go to the future to stop Ultron from taking over the world since he never did! Also, they say that Ultron was controlling the world from THE FUTURE! But how did he get there? He was there in the present, blew up & then waited years of time to get to the future so he could change the past? But if he did that wouldn’t that cause a time paradox?

TOO MANY QUESTIONS WITHOUT ANY ANSWERS!

Now on to the ending of the series. Wolverine & Sue fly away from somewhere (maybe Pym’s lab). They land on a roof top & say their goodbyes. Then time literally breaks.

Then we see the Earth in a black void for a panel & then it’s back out in space with the sun, moon & stars. Tony Stark, The Beast & a blonde guy (might be Captain America) are looking at a holographic monitor. They ask what happens & the answers straight from the book is “Wolverine repeatedly abused the space-time continuum” and They broke it.

The group says they’ve time traveled before this time might of been one time too many. The last 8 pages of the book are all preview bits showing some of the breaks: Galactus has crossed over to the Ultimate Universe & Angela (originally an Image Comics character) is now in the main universe.

That’s it. That’s the end.

There were 7 artist on this book. Bryan Hitch (the artist for the 1st half of the series) get credited for his reused art from the FCBD book. The Angela pages were done by Joe Quesada. The Parts with Sue, Wolverine & the breaking of time look to be by Carlos Pacheco. The other artist from the past issues (Brandon Peterson) is back.

This issue is a mismash of things. The Last 9 pages are just “ads” for other books. There is the reused 8 pages of art from a past book. That’s half of the book. There is 5 pages of the breaking of time. That's 22 pages. Most comics are that long! The amount of pages that aren't ads for other comics, reused art or breakage is 11 pages (minus all the ads). 11 pages that finish up the series but then this issue throws out the first 9 issues to tie up the plot threads from the Free Comic Book Day comics (which on sale for money under a different name).

——————

There was an epilogue book: Age of Ultron #10 A.I. which was to be a bridging point between Age of Ultron & Avengers A.I. It’s a good book. It’s written by Mark Waid & is devoted to Hank Pym. It gives you an overview of his early life & career leading up to the events of the series. I read Avengers A.I., it was an enjoyable series. Neither Avengers A.I. or this epilogue have much to do with the main series. I’d more call this issue Avengers A.I. #0 then Age of Ultron #10 A.I.

There was also a 5 issue “What If” mini series revolving around Age of Ultron vaguely. It’s also pretty good.

And that’s it. The Age is over. We can all now move on with our lives!

But what about the Movie? Or the Age of Ultron related book that’s coming out as part of this summer’s Secret Wars?

Then I guess I'm not done. *sigh* Well... you can all now move on with your lives.

This is Entry 282: Age of Uh FINALE, Part 1

Welcome back to the Age of Uh! The on again, but mostly off again review of the “Age of Ultron” comic book series. I now have to say it’s the comic series & not the movie. I can say this: the movie will mostly be better then the series. It seems everything that bares the name of “Age of Ultron” that is not the main series is better then the main series. This will be the final part of my review of the series. So… Let’s finish this thing!

———

Last Time in the Age of Ultron: I made a whole recap post of the 1st 5 issues of the series last March. I also made a post about the Age of Ultron tie-in issues for Superior Spider-Man & The Fantastic Four last March. Now that we have that out of the way, Let’s briefly talk about the rest of the tie-in books!

If it had the word “Avengers” in the title it was a good tie-in book (Avengers Assemble #14AU, Avengers Assemble #15AU & Uncanny Avengers #8AU). It seems that Uncanny Avengers actually tied into both series (it’s own series & Age of Ultron).This probably due to the fact that Kang was there in the issue. And of course Kang would be aware of a change in timelines because Kang is cool like that! The Ultron one shot (which does not have Ultron in it) dealt with his biological son, Victor Mancha & how he got involved in this Age.  It didn’t tie into the main events of the series all that much. I’m guessing it was just there to remind people that Victor existed & the prep them for Avengers A.I. The last 2 tie in Issues (Wolverine and The X-Men #27AU & Fearless Defenders #4AU) I’ll get to when they tie into the main series.

On to the series…

ISSUE 6

They fight floating Ultron heads in a blue void on the cover. That is a theme with a number of the covers. Issue 4, 5, 6, 7 & 10 all have a solid color as the background. Issue #2 & 9 almost has a solid color for the background but has minimal detail laid over a single color.

Brief Recap: In Issue 5, 2 plans where suggested on how to deal with a problem like Ultron. Plan A: Go TO THE FUTURE to stop Ultron from doing stuff. Plan B (suggested by Wolverine): Go back to the past & stop Hank Pym from creating Ultron. And by “stop” he means “kill”. At the end of Issue 5, the group went with Plan A & most of group headed off to the future. Wolverine stayed behind & asks any of those left if they know how to use the time machine.

We start Issue 6 Wolverine having already traveled TO THE PAST! The comic says “years ago” & they are right. It’s the 1970’s! But due to the sliding scale that super hero comic use they can’t say that since most super heroes have only been active for a “few years”. Normally 5 to 10 years. Wolverine sniffs out that he was followed. How? Neither of the 2 people had showered “in at least a week at least”. That is another vague reference to this Age’s timeline. Wolverine could be referring to the time that it took to travel to the Savage Land (which took a week) or he could be referring to the Age it’s self. It’s the first reason that still make me angry. How did Ultron take over the world in few days? If it was even a few days, there is never any firm established timeline to when Ultron took over the world or even if he did. Large parts of the world were unmentioned in the series.

The person who followed him is Sue Richards, The Invisible Woman. She came along to keep an eye on him. Shortly there after, Wolverine has her cloak both of them since younger Nick Fury shows up in one of SHEILD’s flying cars. He gets out his car & walks into the cave. There is mention why Fury was there, it wasn’t to set of the cave bunker. We clearly see it already made later on. He also doesn’t stay long since we flip the page, Fury comes out of the cave to see the car is gone! Wolverine & Sue have stolen it! OMG!

We now join the future party in THE FUTURE! Ultron still hasn’t taken over the Savage Land apparently.  I guess he’ll let organic life remain alive just as long as it’s in a jungle in the Antarctic. The Future Party then realize that Sue isn’t with them (she was to go with them but decided to go with Wolverine because of “the look in his eye”). So… without Sue to keep them invisible they still decide to go ahead with the Mission. Quicksilver is to run ahead of them really, really fast so he’s “invisible”. I still think the plan to go to the future is stupid. Ultron is in the future & somehow figured out a way to control the past (their present) from there. Ultra could easily have known that the Future Party was coming & could have easily set a trap for them. But we never find that out since after this issue, we never check in to see what is going on with the Future Party due to stuff Wolverine will do at the end of this issue.

Another thing, Issue 6 marks the 1st issue with new artists. Brandon Peterson takes over for Bryan Hitch in the “Present” which I guess is for the group that went to the Future & Carlos Pacheco does the art for Wolverine & Sue in the Past.

Wolverine flies back to New York. They land Wolverine goes to talk to Hank Pam & he knows where he is because he can smell him!  Hank is in his lab & is examining a dead/unconscious/turned off Dragon Man, which is an “Artificial Intelligence”. Dragon Man looks like giant purple half dragon, half man creature but is a robot of some sort. Hank is thinking out loud. His speak balloons are a taupe colors which I guess to give the look of “paper” old comics were printed on. Hank rambles on about robots that can think for themselves. How he hasn’t made anything meaningful since The Pym Particle. (How to do create a particle? I always assumed he just discovered it, named it after himself & not created it.) As he looks at the creature, he says the next breakthrough in AI should be his! This is where Wolverine (with white speech balloons) comes in. 

Basically it goes like this…

“I’m here to stop you from screwing over the world!”

“Who are you?”

“A guy from the future! The future you screwed over by creating a robot!”

“You picked the wrong place to break into!”

“I don’t care! Don’t do the thing I know your thinking of doing!”

“Who are you?”

“I’m from the future! Don’t do the thing!”

“Do you know who I am?”

*Wolverine pops his claws out*

“yeah. Don’t do the thing!”

FIGHT SCENE!

Back to the Future & the Future Group has arrived in Ultron control New York.  It’s a lot more brightly colored then in past issues. What we saw on the cover (a fight with Ultron heads) happens. There are a lot more heads & more then 3 people in this fight.

We cut back to the past fight. Sue comes out to try & reason with Wolverine.

“Don’t do the thing your thinking of doing!”

“I gotta! it’s the only way!”

In between that, we cut back & forth between the past & the future. 

“Don’t do the thing your thinking of doing!”

“I gotta! it’s the only way!”

“Don’t!”

“He allowed your family to die! He allowed all of your friends to die!”

“Don’t do it!”

*Sue starts to cry*

*STAB*

And Hank is dead with a crying Sue just standing by. She turns away so she doesn’t see him die but she still let’s it happen. She asks what happens now. Wolverine walks away & says they go home back to “whatever is waiting’ for us… Hell, we know it’s got to be better than what we left.”  Let’s flashback to issue 5 to when Sue said that traveling back in time & doing Wolverine’s plan might “completely obliterate the space-time continuum”. The tie-in Issue for Wolverine and The X-Men #27AU takes place after stealing the SHEILD car & before they get to New York. it’s a skippable story. Doesn’t truly add anything to the over all story. None of the tie-in books do really, some of are just better side stories then others.

ISSUE 7

The cover is once more in a blue void, We see a group of heroes & the results of Wolverine’s trip back in time. 

Starting here in Issue 7 & going to Issue 9 (along with 1 tie in book: Fearless Defenders #4AU) is the “good” part of the series. At least for me. It’s was something I enjoyed reading. It is sadly buried here in the later half of the series & is under developed. Too bad they spent the first half doing much of nothing!  Wolverine & Sue fly back to the Savage Land. They talk about what has been done. I just noticed the flying car vaguely resembles a Delorean. They land & Wolverine pushes the car into a bush. Why? They’ll need it IN THE FUTURE! Because no one is going to look under that bush that has tire tracks leading into it for the next 30 some odd years! They then fight a T-Rex. After fighting it off, they head back to the cave. Wolverine notes that the young Nick Fury has left. How? they don’t say. Maybe in this altered timeline, he was never there. BUT he was since Wolverine still smells him. Maybe Wolverine is smelling Fury’s scent from before Wolverine altered the timeline? There many, many, many, many, many, times in my reading & rereading that I could easily spends minutes (over)thinking of what is going on in the series. Most times I come up with no answers, only more questions.

Sue & Wolverine go into the bunker in the cave, use the time platform to travel BACK TO THE FUTURE!

*cue the Huey Lewis*

They exit the cave & the Savage land is now ittered with a bunch of junk. Looks like a Airplane graveyard. Sue even says “looks like the Savage Land is now an Alien Spacecraft junkyard” when they get closer to the junk. They find a Skrull skull. Wolverine comments the Secret Invasion must of ended differently. Sue brings up that there are Kree ships there & she says The Kree/Skrull War (an Avengers storyline from the 70’s) must of ended differently.  They go invisible as a trio Starkguards come by.  This is the second sign that Wolverine done screwed up real good! They go back to the cave, amazingly the car is still there & it still works after sitting there for years! 

They fly back to New York. The car must be really fast since the 1st trip from New York to the Savage Land in Antartica took 8 days. This was without the help of any flying machine because Ultron could sense their usage of a airplane FROM THE FUTURE!  With them using a flying car it’s apparently no big thing to just pop on down to the Savage Land. The Manhattan skyline is surrounded by 6 mini SHEILD Hellicarriers. Sue starts to freak out a bit. Wolverine basically tells her to “calm your tits. The world is still here. It might be one that I totally screwed up & might be a different kind of bad then what he left but at least people are alive!”

The car is then hit by a laser which make them bail out. As they touch down, they are meet up by The Defenders! They are Doctor Strange, Captain America (who has an eye patch), The Thing, The Hulk, Cyclops (sporting a visor like the one from Age of Apocalypse), Starlord, Wolverine & someone who could be Captain Marvel (who we find out on the next page is Janet Van Dyne but isn’t called The Wasp).  Some of the Defenders think that Wolverine & Sue are Skrulls. But The Thing thinks that it might be the real sue (who is “back” from somewhere) & the Defenders verion of Wolverine says other Wolverine smells like him. There is a lot about Wolverine being able to smell stuff in this series. Brian Micheal Bendis does know that Wolverine has other powers, right? 

Original recipe Wolverine & Sue get way but not for long because smells. Doc Strange using his powers to disrupt Sue’s powers during a fight. OG Wolverine throws a trash can lib at Doc Strange which cause him to stop spell casting. More fighting is going on. The Wolverine’s fight each other. It looks like Wolverine might of killed himself (and that won’t be the last time he’ll do that in this series). Actual Wolverine is taken down by a punch by The Thing. We find out on the next page, Wolverine did not kill himself. We end the issue on a cool image of what Iron Man looks like in his altered timeline. Or more altered timeline. I still not sure if the 1st 6 issues take place in an altered present timeline or in the future. Also, according to this page: the Mini-Hellicarriers belong to Iron Man. He also has his own Iron Man drones but they don’t look exactly like he does as Ultron does/did.

ISSUE 8

On the cover, Wolverine & Sue are in an alley way. Iron Man is hovering before them.

We open on Iron Man, which I don’t think he’s called that in this timeline. He’s just Tony Stark & I doubt he can take off his suit. He has taken the captured Wolverine & Sue. He has also gained access to to their memories somehow. Images are floating all around him. 2 Images are covers from past comics (Age of Ultron #1 & Secret Wars #1). Another is the image of Scarlet Witch’s face breaking apart into puzzle pieces from House of M.

In the room with him is Emma Frost & Charles Xavier. They are discussing if what they are seeing is true. Emma & Charles confirm that those 2 are who they say they are, just the versions from their timeline. It is brought of that in this timeline, it’s not Captain America. He’s come up in the world & is Colonel America!

Tony says “We’re saying these two lunatics have broken the timeline. They went back in time and broke it."

Yes, Tony. That’s what they are saying & what I’ve continued to say since this series has come out.

Tony goes to interrogate Wolverine.

What we find out:

1. Tony can’t leave his suit. He is the suit. He doesn’t have a lower body. He lost it in the “Latveria/Asgard War”. He tried to stop Morgana Le Fey from taking over Europe & the World.

2. It seems like Jarvis is a computer program. Keeps talking to a Jarvis but a Jarvis is heard & never actually seen.

2. Hank Lab’s has a security camera in it (something Wolverine didn’t think was in place at the time).

3. The Skrulls had been blamed for Hank’s Death & The Avengers had broken up shortly after that.

4. They were abandoned by Asgard. Doesn’t say who exactly “they” are (The Avengers or Earth in general) or if it was before or after the war.

5. The “Mini-Hellicarriers” are called Starkguard Carriers which I guess makes Starkguard the SHEILD of that timeline.

I want a book, 10 issues, of this timeline. There is a lot of cool sounding/looking things in it! Where is my Latveria/Asgard war book?

During the Interrogation, The Defenders are just hanging out awaiting further word on the dopplegangers. Frost & Xavier tell them to go away & leave Stark to his business. They says “Screw that!” and a fight breaks out.

Alt-Tony brings up one possible way Wolverine could have gone about solving the Ultron problem: Have Pym create Ultron but have him install something hidden in the programing. Let time run it’s course. Before Tony can finish off his thought, he’s told their is a security breach. It’s the Defenders!  Before Tony goes off to deal with it, Wolverine says it’s a nice theory (it’s more then a theory in a few issues).

The Thing, Cyclops & Alt-Wolverine get to Sue’s cell & open it. She’s gone. Or she turned invisible & when they opened the door, she ran out. She is found by Tony who can “see all spectrums”. The Starkguard carrier is then attacked by Morgan Le Fey & her army. She flies in a fire breathing flying creature. Her army flies in with her wearing very Doctor Doom looking armor (the Doom/Le Fey connection is gone into a bit more detail in the Fearless Defenders tie-in).

MULTI-PAGE FIGHT SCENE!

The issue ends with at least 2 of the 6 Starkgaurd Carrier’s crashing down onto New York.

ISSUE 9

Wolverine stabs Wolverine in a void composed of speed lines on the cover.

Issue 9 picked up where Issue 8 left off with a massive 2 page EXPLOSION! We then get another 2 page spread, this time showing the destruction. Still not as worse looking as the OG timeline. But there are more dead bodies scattered about NYC then in the OG timeline. Wolverine climbs out of the destruction. He’s missing his leg below the knee, only his bones remain. Tries to walk on it, can’t. Lays there on the ground for 5 days (according to the comic) as the leg regenerates. Shortly after it, He is attacked by one of Le Fey’s Doomesque army guys. Fight Scene! Wolverine wins.

Wolverine walks off, finds Stark laying on the ground trapped under some rubble. Stark talks about how one man (Hank Pym) could make such a difference. Stark knows that Wolverine will try & go back & fix things. He says that Wolverine can’t do that because “Time is an Organism” & every time someone travels through it Time rips & tears. The more you travel through it, the more you hurt it & actually kill time. Stark begs Wolverine to no do the thing he’s thinking of. That’s a theme of this later of the book: asking Wolverine to no do stuff but he does it anyways.

I think the book implies that Stark dies (the lights of Stark’s armor have turned off) & Wolverine walks on. We flip the page & Wolverine is once more in Pym’s lab in the 1970’s. But this is “flashback” to 1st trip back in time. Wolverine tries to reason with Pym, doesn’t go all that well & a fight scene break out.

We cut to Sue Richards waiting by the flying car. She is approached by someone, says “are you done so quickly?” The mystery person knocks her out. We cut back into fight & another Wolverine has appeared on the scene in 1970’s appropriate costume. The fight stops.

The reason 2nd Wolverine is wearing the costume is that “it’s all Fury had in his secret bunker”. Not only Fury paranoid but he’s also a kleptomanic. There is a discussion between the 3. Mainly between the 2 Wolverines’. Newer Wolverine proves he is Wolverine. They have to move on to “Plan B”! I thought stabbing Pym was Plan B, Plan A being talking to him. We are technically on Plan C. Pym just sits there amazed at what he’s seeing (2 people at different times in their life? Time travel? How does that work?)

The “Plan B” they are going with is the plan that Alt-Tony brought up last issue. Wolverine says that *he* can’t do it, Pym has to do it. Pym says he doesn’t make robots, he’s just been “tinkering” around with some A.I. stuff. The newer Wolverine says that it’ll be Ultron, Pym says he won’t make it. BUT Wolverine says he has too. Everything has to go as it once did before he came back & killed him. Wolverine only wants to avoid the last part where Ultron takes over THE WORLD!

Pym isn’t sure how to do that, New Wolverine explains about implanting a virus or a code into Ultron so that “when the thing is about to go full-blown — it just can’t”. Yes, “The Thing”! That’s how Ultron takes over the world! He uses The Thing! Why not use The Stuff? I hear it’s twice as powerful!

Pym brings up a good point: If he creates Ultron & the world has to go on as it did, what is to stop him from using this fail safe the 1st time Ultron becomes to much of threat? How could he let Ultron do what he did/will do known that he has the “kill switch”?

Future Sue comes in to say that Pym has to forget that he put in the kill code. Pym is still unsure about all that he is asked to do:

“So all I have to do is create an artificial intelligence that doesn’t exist yet… Put a time release program inside of it that doesn’t exist yet… Make my self forget about it and go about my life… How do I do this exactly?”

Good question, Dr. Pym. He don’t get an answer since we flip the page & are in the Savage Land. Sue asks what they are going to do with 2 Wolverines. Newer Wolverine asks for a minute alone with his other self. They walk off & talk about which one is not going back. Newer Wolverine says he is not since “he saw stuff”. Original timeline Wolverine pops his claws, We turn the page & Wolverine has blood on his claws. He killed himself: is that homicide or suicide?

This is intercut with flashbacks to Pym in his lab in the 70’s, he’s working on something. We turn the page to see the creation of ULTRON! Last page of issue 9 & it’s the 1st time he’s been seen in the whole series! That is if you don’t count anytime he is seen on the covers of the series.

This is it! 1 More issue to go & this is where it all goes off the rails.

Next Time: Issue 10!