Well, here it is. The long-awaited Gen13/GenX crossover, entitled "Generation Gap." What a disappointment. But we'll get to my thoughts after the review.
The story begins in the past, before Sean Cassidy was known as Banshee, when he was an Interpol agent. Sean is attempting to stop a major criminal named Carlos Remirez, but an unexpected turn took place. Carlos managed to get his hands on a young mutant by the name of Jamie who has the ability to create teleportational portals, but must wear a special suit to hone his abilities due to his young age. An attack goes out as shots fire from both sides, then a third group enters: The Black Razors, led by John Lynch. The boy is hit, he goes unconscious, as does Cassidy. Remirez escapes through a portal created by the boy, but doesn't bother taking Jamie with him.
Today. Remirez is long forgotten, unable to do any terrorist activities anymore, due to lack of money, support, and overall power. He's living in the slums now, which is perfect for what Trance has in mind. Trance is villain from the Gen13 comic, with the ability to control minds and enter hypnotic suggestions. Though he is neither a mutant, nor an SPB (super-powered being), he is still powerful. Him and his band of freaks enter the place where Carlos is staying and bribe him for information. Carlos tells them of the little boy that he left behind, swears his life on that being the truth, and asks for his money in return. Trance and his freaks leave the warehouse in flames, Remirez still inside. After that, the boy is then in Trance's possession after they break into the facility where he is being held and steal the boy who has been in a containment unit since that attack long ago.
Which brings us to Gen13. They decide to go and stop Trance, being that they have had conflicts with him before, and Lynch, their mentor, knows about the boy. Elsewhere, Generation X decide to do the same. Gen13 arrives first, but are not doing to job of stopping Trance very well. GenX appears after and a fight breaks out between the two teams. This lasts a whole 1 minute until Emplate decides to show up because he detected a large amount of power eminating from one of the people here. The power he seeks was coming from both the boy and Queelocke, a little transporting green alien thing. Apparently, Queelocke has much more power than that, and Trance knows it. So he makes a pact with Emplate, promising him the alien. Trance hypnotizes Queelocke and creates a portal with him which they escape through. Grunge decides to follow, while Husk is clinging to him from the fight. When the two arrive on the other side, Paige knees Grunge where the sun don't shine accidently and kisses him over the mouth to stop him from shouting out. How quaint.
Anyway, to make a long story short, they release Jamie from the containment pod, have him use his power to go to where Trance, his freaks, and Emplate are, and another fight breaks out, this time the two Gen's are working together. While Emplate and Trance are fighting, everyone else on the bad side gets wooped by the two teams. But, as always, the bad guys get away, without the goods. The two teams talk with Jamie and decide that it's best he lives his own life now, so they leave, going their separate ways.
Now onto the bashing. This comic sucked. Sorry, but that's my opinion. The writing was terrible, it was so condensed I almost got lost myself, and there was hardly any real plot! It was all simple dialogue and terrible planning. Instead of writing all those paragraphs I could've just said, "The two teams meet each other to stop Trance, then Emplate, and to rescue a mutant boy who can make portals. They fight against each other, then they work together and win." That's it. Not only did they completely avoid what people have been wondering regarding the two teams clashing (like can Synch synchronize his aura with the members of Gen13? We know Emplate can't sup on Trance, but he's an alien, apparently), but they also made it completely messed up regarding how they come about to be in the same universe. Obviously, the Image and the Marvel universe are very different and there's no way one of these teams could exist in another's, so, although this was a self-contained story and it wasn't even made to be possible, they should have at least tried to have it make sense. Overall, I think the only thing good about this was the art, done by Art Adams. Other than that... yeuch.