All's Fair In War
Okay, so now we're getting somewhere. The story is finally moving along in a constructive way.
This issue does a lot of following Stryfe's thoughts over the importance of Hope, who he even senses isn't a mutant. He just about kills a few characters and almost gets killed himself. On the other end of things, Angel confronts Apocalypse, who wants Warren to kill him like Angel's Horsemen name (Death) would imply. Also, the rush to save the future builds momentum as X-Force is left with 28 minutes until they get pulled back to the present day. Bishop gets what's coming to him and Stryfe owns a lot of people.
Now, the complaints. Still find the art really messy and it occurs to me how strikingly different Cable and X-Force look, causing a lack of consistency. Also, this arc was billed by many to be the sequel to Messiah CompleX and while it still revolves around Hope, I don't feel the grand, epic story that CompleX had. I don't expect this to re-calibrate the X-Universe, but I don't see this story leading to big change to the direction of the "Messiah Story." I'm still of the group who believes that Hope will be an Anti-Christ... so, we'll see.
This issue was better than the last few parts, the writing is better in terms of the X-Force section. I'm really only reading this because of this arc at this point and to see how it ends. If you're doing the same, you've picked this up. If you're new, read the lead-ins or wait until the TBP at this point.