Excellent. Bring A Thesaurus.

This collaborative offering from Adam-Troy Castro, Eluki Bes Shahar, Jason Henderson, and Tom DeFalco is absolutely loaded with Marvel heroes & villains. The plotting is impressive, the characters are extensively researched & consistent with canonical lore, and the superhero combat is well-choreographed and described with mind's-eye vivid skill.

• Book One (Time's Arrow: The Past) introduces the multi-timeline threat of Kang the Conqueror and focuses on Spiderman and Cable.. but follows four teams of two heroes sent to different points in the remote past timelines of various Earths by Professor Xavier (the Old West; prehistoric times; etc) in an effort to thwart the "Arrows" threatening continued progression along those timelines.
It introduces concepts and advances the overall story nicely.
• In Book Two (Time's Arrow: The Present), four mindblowing alternate realities - including ones where The Wrecking Crew and Magneto are good guys and where the X-men are murderous bad guys - drive the story.
The episode is action-packed and non-stop adrenaline-driven. It may be the most fast-paced superhero combat adventure that I have ever read.
• 'Time's Arrow: The Future' returns to more of a plot-driven story - transporting the superhero teams into the near futures of their own timelines in the multiverse.. witnessing the horrible consequences of Kang's efforts and seeking/destroying the Arrows in the form of high-tech "Time Platforms".
They are tasked with destroying those alternate realities and saving our current existence.

Overall, there may be too much happening in these books and too many heroes explored too extensively (it can be overwhelming).. but the entertainment value is insane.

As to presentation: Tim Paige is nearly flawless in reading the book. His female character interpretations are occasionally subpar, but Paige is spot-on with regard to diction, timbre, cadence, and tone. Bravo to Dreamscape Media producers.

Altogether, this Spiderman/X-men team-up surprised me. Comic books are generally immature compared to the High, Dark, and Epic subgenres of Fantasy that I consume most. This one for certain includes sophomoric elements but has enough adult-like themes (and a distracting) relentless pace to render it worth 9.5 stars out of 10. My chief concerns are with occasional tendencies to over-the-top drama during emotional scenes and a slightly too extensive vocabulary. The book verges on pretentious (but not overwhelmingly so). It's worth a Credit.

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Doing The Time Warp Again…Marvel Style!

Fans of Spider-Man and the X Men…REJOICE! This is an EPIC trilogy across the multiverse with unique alternate versions of our heroes, and plenty of familiar faces too. Written in 1998, I found out it very interesting how one alternate timeline visited is very similar to the events of Civil War, 8 years before that comic event was even written!

Kang is a remarkable villain who shines throughout, the books are very well read by Tim Paige, and comic legend Tom Defalco includes plenty of Marvel Easter eggs that will put smiles on faces.

Enjoy the emotional, mind bending, time travelling, wild ride known as Times Arrow!!

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