Stormwatch #21

Is this one of those 3-D paintings that were pulled off the market because they were sparking psychic abilities in the viewers?

Everybody buckle up and put on your dimension hopping safety silver cords! It's time for a trip into The Magenta Timeline!

But first, the theme song for The Great Magenta Time Line!

It's the Magenta Time Line!
Get on board!
The Magenta Time Line!
We'll ignore
The New 52 paradigm!
To a place where Ted Kord's still alive!
Amanda Waller might be thin!
And where Stormwatch can re-begin!

In the Magenta Time Line!
With Jenny Soul!
The Magenta Time Line!
There's a new Lobo!
Get on board! Just ignore! the stories that were told before!
Roaring to a new timeline where Wildstorm might survive!

In the Magenta Time Line! Oh-ee-oh!
The Magenta Time Line! Let's time warp!
The Magenta Time Line! Really time warp!
The Magenta Time Line!
OFF WE GO!

This explains so much about the Preboot Lobo!

Jim Starlin, I mean The Magenta Time Lords have a brief discussion where they try to explain why Lobo is so unexplainable. How can one character be more powerful than every other character in the entirety of the DC Universe and still manage to lose every fight against every opponent he encounters?! How can a creature regenerate from the smallest of skin cells and yet be killed by Rob Liefeld's Deathstroke? How can a creature that doesn't mind exterminating planets allow himself to be raped by Bueno Excellente and then blackmailed by Hitman who has the video of the event in multiple locations? Why wouldn't he just destroy Earth to make sure nobody ever sees the footage? Okay, that was an unfair example because it was from the Preboot years. But I'm assuming the sodomy still happened in The Magenta Timeline!

Eventually The Magenta Time Lords chalk it up to their not knowing everything even though they know everything because not knowing everything makes life worth living. Or something.

Stormwatch sends the Zealot Lizard People on their way with a hearty thank you for saving us but could you please get out of our space now. The Lizards seem nonplussed by this reaction because they're used to being turned away on people's porches when they're merely trying to pass along the good word. I think the good word is "The Bruticus are cunts." When the Lizards leave, Hellstrike decides the best next course of action is to go have some drinks at a local Douli-7 bar.

We also find out that Jenny Soul is sixteen. So the year in the Magenta Time Line must be 2017 since Century Babies are born on the first day of the new century. Or Jim Starlin made a huge mistake! Or things work differently in the Magenta Time Line! Oh man. What a genius! I can't point out any mistake by Jim Starlin because he can just reply (while wagging his finger in my face), "Unh unh unh! Magenta Time Line! Things are different!" The man is bulletproof!

Unluckily for Stormwatch, Lobo is currently in the bar they just entered! Luckily for Stormwatch, he doesn't seem to know he's supposed to kill them.

The Magenta Time Lords were trying to keep Lobo sedated because he's a loose cannon (that's a cannon that doesn't mind how many balls are shoved down its throat). Looks like Lobo can keep himself sedated though.

The Magenta Time Lords decide the best way to deal with Stormwatch is a barroom brawl. So they mind fuck the Bruticus and the Caimonites so that they'll assault and kill Stormwatch. The Magenta Time Lords are stupid. Just let Lobo off his fucking leash! He can kill them all! Although he was beaten once before by Jenny Quantum in another colored Time Line, so Jenny Soul might be more than a match for him.

When Hellstrike says "a couple of alternative lifestyle types," I'm fairly certain he meant "faggots." I'm just saying it reads more realistically and truer to the crux of his lament that way. I'm not saying I approve! I'm a fucking critic, okay?! I have to point out flaws! Be confident in your portrayal of your characters! Let them be themselves! Who else but a bigoted asshole would think of Apollo and Midnighter as "alternative lifestyle types" before thinking of them as "bad-assed ass-kicking bad asses out to kick major ass"?

While Stormwatch fights the two nobody alien races, Lobo stumbles out of the bar. The Weird and Jenny Soul follow him so that Jenny can enter his mind and read his emanations! But she's only sixteen! She's going to lose so much innocence going into Lobo's mind!

Inside Lobo's head is the trap set by the Magenta Time Lords! They're waiting behind his frontal lobe and ambush Jenny Soul! The Magenta Time Lords lay out a bunch of bullshit to Jenny Soul in the hopes that she'll buy what they're selling. Only one time line exists where Jenny Soul will not ruin the Magenta Time Lords' plan. So the Magenta Time Lords tell her a great big lie about Lobo destroying the universe in every time line except one. Hey! Guess which one that will be! To get Jenny Soul to create the one time line she probably shouldn't create, they tell her Lobo needs to be in a specific place at a specific time. And then they send her back to make her decision. And the little dope goes with the Magenta Time Lords' plan. Well, who wouldn't trust a guy with a flaming face that proclaims he's saving billions of people by manipulating timelines while ignoring all of the lives that never get to exist because of his machinations?

Does this mean they're double crossing Lobo as well? That won't end well.

Stormwatch catches up with Jenny as Lobo begins to channel some mysterious energy. They decide that the best thing to do is wait around and see what happens instead of maybe killing Lobo or moving him from the exact spot he supposedly needed to be in. Meanwhile the Magenta Time Lords begin crowing about how they're now instituting their best time line ever: The Ebony Timeline!

Stormwatch #21 Rating: +1 Ranking. Goddammit! So now they won't be the Magenta Time Lords anymore? They're the Ebony Time Lords? Or should I simply have referred to them as the Crayola Time Lords? And Lobo is being seriously underutilized here! I hope he helps defeat the Crayola Time Lords and is offered a job with Stormwatch. That would be entertaining. For me! And probably not entertaining for thousands of people who fucking hate Lobo.