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Sometimes you know a story is going to be exciting and every issue before that has made you believe but the issue arrives four months late and you’re not impressed. Where did the wow go? If you read Astonishing X-men, you know what I mean.

I just recently read my copy of “Astonishing X-men” #24. It’s a good story, but I’m not excited about it. This story arc started out in February of 2007, and has ended in 2008, leaving me less than enthused. The writer, Whedon, wrote a great story and Cassaday, the artist, drew some great art but I’m just in a “blah” moment at the end of the issue. Why can such a powerful storytelling team leave me so neutral in my reactions?  Probably because this five-issue story has taken a year to get to this last issue; honestly what kind of bi-monthly shipping schedule is this?

I wrote in a previous column that there are some reasons to wait for late and delayed comics but, this situation is different. These comics were advertised as an ongoing series to be distributed every two months. What I received was two issues in one month, the next issues arrived three months later and the following arrived after another four months. This isn’t what I was told to expect, but yet this is what I got.

While I did get the final issue in my hands something had gone wrong. The delays hurt the story telling. When the two books arrived in the same month, I started to feel some momentum. I started to get absorbed in the plot, but then the three month delay between issues occurred. I read the delayed issue kind of dazed because it had been a while since I read the previous issue and had trouble reconnecting the characters and the plot. I would read it and ask myself “who are these people, again? What was so important in that last issue?” When you have to decipher a story, it takes away the time and attention used to enjoy it, which is what I did. I finished the issue, reread it to try and understand what was going on, and once I did, it didn’t impact me. The delay killed my comprehension and that hurt the story.

As issue 24 arrived with another monthly delay I read it. The situation in the story is dire but I find myself not as absorbed into it as I should be. I find myself feeling like I haven’t been reading the past issues in the story even though I know I have. I feel left out of the story and so I feel less then excited at its conclusion. This isn’t the intention of the story. This shouldn’t be the intention of any story worth publishing. A good story should absorb the readers and keep them along for the ride. Awkward delays in the telling of a story end up distancing the reader from the story, causing a disconnection that hurts the process.  No reader or writer wants that to happen. As I finish the issue I find myself caring very little and feeling no sense of resolution, even though I hoped I would. Let’s hope “Giant Size Astonishing X-men” does what this title couldn’t.