Cable: Love and Chrome is something quite new to me. It's a character story that I haven't seen much about in the past, but it's one that feels like it's stuck in another era. That the character of Cable is one that has a very niche audience. After all, Cable is a character that came straight out of the era of strong men heroes like Arnie, Stallone, and many others. At the near peak of television sports like wrestling. It makes sense that this is a character that doesn't gets a whole lot of attention from audiences and creatives, but also can be quite difficult to write a story around. Not quite the same interest as the other X-Men characters which tend to have a bit more engaging narratives in comparison. Though all of this draws me into the Cable character quite a bit, to see present attempts at telling stories around him feels special, especially when they're individual stories that don't have him in the background for the most part. So far, the Cable: Love and Chrome story has been quite close to its name: a story about a man that's mostly made of chrome at this point, suffering from a virus that is constantly attacking his body. The only thing keeping him alive being the seemingly endless modifications to his body. Though he's not the only one faced with such horrors of existence.
This brings into the equation the love side of Chrome. A soldier that is suffering from a terminal illness, but one that is also subjected to the constant travelling through time alongside the loneliness that comes with having no real life or identity. Despite the tough man exterior, he's a character that is constantly in need of community, really wanting to find a group of people that make him feel the concept of home for once. Where the endless violence of his life isn't actually what he wants, it's just an unfortunate circumstance that came with the life he was thrown into. In the previous issues we saw how Cable had fallen in love with someone just like him, having stumbled across a community that did in fact give him everything he'd always wanted. They discussed their fears of dying, their realisation of inevitable death regardless of having a virus or not. Though we recently discovered that Cable's new love was diagnosed with another illness that will have her die sooner than expected. It has been an emotional start to the comic so far, but I've really liked that it hasn't been about action in its entirety, we're seeing a very human side to his character and seeing how he reacts to the world when given something to fight for. And that was the story so far as Cable joins a resistance movement and finds a new home.
Here we get a little more context into the factions spreading the virus, and how they've been trying to enslave everyone that does get it. The resistance movement having plans to fight against the faction but also bring them to a total collapse. While Cable is stuck in a coma, he's fighting against the virus in a dream state, being chased through fields by robots. All while he's thinking yet again of the inevitable death that will come. The realisation of what really matters in life: the people around you. Him and Avery having their minds linked in the previous issue, leading to them sharing memories and emotions. Avery at the same time heading herself towards a suicide mission now that she knows she's slowly dying, though refusing to die without fighting against someone for something she cares about. Cable mentioning the realisation that there's nothing worth living for if you have nothing worthy of fighting for. It's a bit cliche in how this all unfolds within the comic, but it's a nice touch to see the development of Cable's character and how he's discovering his place in life despite the decades of killing and suffering. The issue expands upon this connection Cable has with Avery, the way the two realise that the only thing they have is each other. And that brings them closer to their demise when they're thrown into battles to protect each other.
All of this does come to an emotional conclusion to the volume though: Avery's suicide mission does in fact result in her death. One that brings Cable deeper into his suffering. And that felt powerful, where Cable was ready to really turn into a monster and seek out revenge. An interesting change though was that this only had him instantly place Avery into a dream world as he said his goodbyes to her, only to then immediately state that the resistance's next agenda is to quite literally undo time and bring Avery back. Given that this volume kept referencing the concept of time and how we all feel we have it when we really don't, I'm interested in how this will work. Part of me thinks it won't work out and that this will be an emotional, hate-fueled rampage from Cable to fight the one thing he simply can't: time itself. The one thing he's explored to no end, jumping through different eras, constantly running from his problems or fighting people with brute force. But always aware of the clock ticking in one way or another, to which nothing can be done about it.
This was probably my favourite issue yet. It was emotional for the right reasons. And the narration from Cable as he speaks on his awareness of the fragility of time, the importance of love and having good people around you, and his own internal suffering from the virus; it all brought together a story that gave more context into the character and gave more reason to care and support him. A life constantly through time, but also constantly at death's door, and now finally with something to live for, it's immediately taken from him. It does feel like Cable's ready to spill some blood from here on. And that does excite me a lot about the future issues.