The Grandfather Paradox is a thought experiment about time travel and paradoxes. It was the plot point of the first Back II The Future film. If you went back in time and killed your grandfather, you would erase yourself from your family’s timeline. So, how could you do this if you don’t exist in the first place? Let’s take it a step further and discuss the ethics of execution. Imagine you have a time machine. You have the chance to go back in time and smother Hitler in the crib. Would you do it? This premise is a major plot point in Rick Remender and Jerome Opena’s Uncanny X-Force.
Substitute Hitler with Idi Amin, Saddam Hussein, Stalin, or Mao Zedong. Due to political persecution, forced labor, botched political policies, and executions, Mao may be responsible for 55 million deaths; no one knows for sure.
Choose any monster of history you want; could you jump in a time machine and smother that monster as an innocent baby in a crib? Not the adult monster, the innocent baby yet to become a monster. Paradoxes may be self-correcting. What if you didn’t avert the catastrophe you meant to stop? You would still be guilty of infanticide.
Remender’s Uncanny X-Force
Although the story is much deeper, Remender’s Uncanny X-Force run is a treatise on the “Hitler in a Crib” thought experiment. X-Force finds themselves wavering on killing the reborn, child-form of Apocalypse. He’s history’s first mutant, and the “monster,” in this thought experiment.
I highly recommend you buy Uncanny X-Force by Rick Remender Omnibus. It is a thought-provoking and action-packed story featuring the best interpretation of Deadpool in comics. The team features Wolverine, Psylocke, Fantomex, and Archangel.
Here is what you need to know about the story: X-Force is a covert kill squad that takes out deadly threats with extreme prejudice so as not to stain the X-Men’s name.
En Sabah Nur, or Apocalypse, is the first mutant. He is an immortal genius with many powers, including telepathy, the ability to communicate with machines, teleportation, and more. In Marvel Comics, Apocalypse became a global supervillain who killed billions during the Age of Apocalypse storyline. (Charles Xavier did not exist, and Apocalypse took over the world.)
Apocalypse dies after the event. A mysterious mutant cult, Clan Akkaba, resurrects the immortal Apocalypse as a small child. So, Uncanny X-Force, aware that Apocalypse is back but unaware that he is now a child, goes on a covert mission to kill him.
Uncanny X-Force – The Characters
Remender writes these characters with an emotional deftness that makes you, the reader, question the goal of Uncanny X-Force. There is multiverse hopping and great action sequences, but the Uncanny X-Force team struggles with the ethics of their mission.
In the opening storyline, Uncanny X-Force finds child Apocalypse. No one wants to kill him, except for Fatomex, who shoots him in the head. However, Apocalypse is resurrected again, and the team semi-adopts him and renames him Evan. Even though the members hate him, they find themselves arguing for his existence when they encounter their X-Men colleagues.
Archangel goes insane in this storyline, and the team struggles to save him. Psylocke was born a British woman, Betsy Braddock, reborn as an Asian assassin, but recently separated into Betsy and Kwannon, the personality of the original Asian assassin. (Don’t ask.) When Fatomex is kidnapped by Captain Britain, Betsy’s twin brother, Betsy betrays him to save Fantomex.
Wolverine fights his son, Daken, to preempt another conspiracy. Wolverine has to make a heartbreaking choice about ethically killing himself.
Deadpool has the most sympathy for Evan. Remender writes Deadpool with acidic wit seen through a pragmatic and philosophical angle. Deadpool does not believe that a team of godless assassins can judge Evan. Deadpool tells Evan, the child Apocalypse, that even he is worthy of redemption.
Evan, the child Apocalypse, the purely innocent resurrection of a brutal monster who previously massacred billions, looks creepy. Still, he is a child. He is not the monster that the X-Men and X-Force fought before.
Jerome Opena, Esad Ribic, and the other artists draw Evan in a way that constantly forces the reader to reassess the “Monster in a Crib” thought experiment.
Buy This Comic Now
Remender’s Uncanny X-Force run came out in 2010. It is forgotten by many and unknown to modern fans. I highly recommend that you buy it now. The Uncanny X-Force Omnibus by Rick Remender is a 928-page hardcover that collects all 35 issues of the series.
Buy the hardcover for $168 at Amazon right now. It’s worth it for the quality of the story and art. However, you can also buy the Kindle version for $40.
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