Truth

“X of Swords: Chapter 12”
X-Men #14
Written by Jonathan Hickman
Art by Leinil Francis Yu with Mahmud Asrar
Color art by Sunny Gho

“X of Swords: Chapter 13”
Marauders #14
Written by Gerry Duggan and Benjamin Percy
Art by Stefano Caselli
Color art by Edgar Delgado

• I was wondering how Mahmud Asrar was handling the deadline crunch of seemingly getting put on a third of last week’s Stasis special while being assigned to draw four other issues in the crossover, but now we know the answer: He only drew the framing sequences of this issue, and the majority of the issue is made up of repurposed Leinil Francis Yu pages from X-Men #12. Jonathan Hickman has made use of the old “reuse the art” trick before, but this is a particularly bold move, reframing the history of the mutants of Arakko as told to Apocalypse by Summoner from the perspective of Genesis. Whereas Summoner was trying to mislead and trap Apocalypse, Genesis is telling him the hard truth of things. It’s like hearing the same song played in a different, far more melancholy key. 

This creative decision is as artful as it probably was quite pragmatic, though it does make you wonder what the compensation deal was like for Yu in this situation.

• It’s interesting to see where Summoner and Genesis’ accounts differ and converge, with some bits of their stories perfectly aligning on particular panels. The most blatant deviations come towards the end of the story, with Genesis revealing that the demons of Amenth had bred captured mutants to create a hybrid warrior race and the demon conjuring Summoners, and that Genesis indeed killed the prior host of Annihilation and was obligated to wear the Golden Helm of Amenth and command its armies. And though she put this fate off for many years, she eventually gave in and all of Arakko succumbed to Amenth. This led to the conquest of Dryador, and onward to the next goal of taking Krakoa. The final text page of this issue is heartbreaking, spelling out the truth of Arakko: The mutants there are “prisoners in their own land,” oppressed by the Amenthi hybrids, the Summoners, and the Golden Helm. What was previously implied is now very clear – Arakko must be liberated from Amenth and the mutants loyal to Amenth. 

• Isca the Unbeaten plays an interesting role in this story – her power to never lose compels her to side with inevitable victors, which directly led to her sister Genesis being corrupted by Annihilation and Arakko falling to Amenth. She’s a narrative echo of Cylobel from Powers of X, who was bred by Nimrod to betray her fellow mutants, but the notion of people who are genetically compelled to turn against their own is an odd and potentially contentious theme for Hickman’s macro story. However, just as Cylobel turns against Nimrod, it seems very likely that Isca will side with Krakoa by the end of this story. But whereas this is a redemptive act for Cylobel, wouldn’t this just be another convenient turn of events for Isca? And besides, how exactly is surrendering one’s loyalties not a form of being beaten? 

• The “vile schools” of mutant-Amenthi hybrid warriors is another echo of a plot point from Powers of X – the breeding of chimera as a warrior class of mutants by Mister Sinister. And what’s going to be the comic in this storyline to really engage with the vile schools? Hellions, the series featuring Mister Sinister as the lead.

• There’s such a sad poetry in Apocalypse having to face this brutal survivalist ethos he’s been living with for centuries from the perspective of now having Krakoa, and seeing in Krakoa a real possibility of true mutant culture and prosperity that is entirely alien to these Arakki people who can only see a zero sum game of survival or destruction. Genesis sees only softness and weakness in Apocalypse and Krakoa, but she has lost all context for true civilization. The Arakki fight merely to conquer and survive in their miserable lives, but the people of Krakoa have something to truly treasure and protect.  Genesis is blind to the power of that motivation. 

• Marauders #14 is a welcome tonal shift from X-Men #14, reorienting the story back to the perspective of the X-Men swordbearers as they meet their counterparts from Arakko for the first time at a banquet hosted by Saturnyne. Much of the story focuses in on Storm, who carries herself with absolute confidence as she rebuffs the romantic advances of Death, and on Wolverine, who is openly contemptuous of Brian Braddock for not taking advantage of Saturnyne’s love for him to prevent the tournament. There’s also a fantastic little scene in which the Krakoan captains Magik and Gorgon look for weaknesses in their opponents and test Isca, who manages to spook even them. 

• Stefano Caselli noticeably steps up his game for this issue, and really outdoes himself in drawing the surreal banquet hall of the Starlight Citadel. He does some stellar work with body language and facial expressions through the issue, and is particularly impressive in how he conveys so many distinct personalities and interpersonal dynamics in the party scenes. He was very well cast for this sequence of the story. 

• Since starting this site I’ve paid a lot more attention to X-Men comics fandom, and doing that can be like stepping into a weird alternate universe in which everyone dislikes Wolverine and finds him boring. I can’t relate. But this issue, as with most Wolverine comics written by Benjamin Percy, makes a great case for why he’s such a widely beloved character. His brutish no-bullshit attitude is a necessary contrast with the pomp and circumstance of Saturnyne’s banquet and the absurd formality of her contest. When he stabs her on the last page it is a genuinely cathartic moment, even though it’s quite clear there’s no way he’s successful in this tactic. 

History

“X of Swords: Chapter 9” 
Excalibur #13
Written by Tini Howard
Art by R.B. Silva
Color art by Nolan Woodard

“X of Swords: Chapter 10”
X-Men #13
Written by Jonathan Hickman
Art by Mahmud Asrar
Color art by Sunny Gho

• This issue of Excalibur features guest art by R.B. Silva, who turns in his last X-Men interior pages for the foreseeable future as he moves on to become the regular artist on Fantastic Four. His work here is typically excellent and brings the grandeur, atmosphere, melodrama, and romanticism that’s in Tini Howard’s stories but missing from usual artist Marcus To’s pages. Howard’s plot moves along the macro story of X of Swords but plays out like a self-contained fairytale in which Saturnyne pits Betsy and Brian Braddock against one another in a ploy to strip Betsy of the mantle of Captain Britain and return it to her beloved Brian, but it all backfires on her in the end. By the end of the issue Betsy is affirmed as the one true Captain Britain and wields Saturnyne’s Starlight Sword, and Brian becomes Captain Avalon, retains his Sword of Might, and is given a new role as the protector of his brother Jamie’s realm in Otherworld. It’s a happy ending, at least for now. Howard’s narration at the end doesn’t bode well for the Braddocks. 

• X-Men #13 is more of a fable. The story is mainly focused on a flashback to Apocalypse’s life on Okkara that fills us in on what his wife Genesis was like, and shows us what actually happened as she and their children took off with Arrako into Amenth. The story we’ve seen before, which presented Apocalypse as a more decisive and heroic figure, is inverted – he was left behind by Genesis, who deemed him not strong enough to join them. His mission over all these years was given to him, to make the world strong enough to stand against the hordes of Amenth. Suddenly everything about Apocalypse makes sense, and the power-hungry despot is now a tragic romantic figure. 

• This issue establishes that the mask of Annihilation effectively is Annihilation – or, more accurately, the Golden Helm of Amenth. The wearer of the helm controls the hordes of Amenth, but the helm controls the wearer, which must be fit enough to be worthy of it. Apocalypse must face the avatar of his own cruel survival-of-the-fittest ethos, and likely rescue his beloved wife from its influence. It’s hard to imagine he’ll make it through this; it would feel like a cheat for this to not end in tragedy for the newly sympathetic archvillain. 

• Mahmud Asrar shifts his art style a bit for this issue – his linework is a bit thicker with chunkier blacks and more negative space, occasionally somewhat resembling the style of Mike Mignola. This is very effective in his depiction of the Golden Helm of Amenth and his evocative renderings of Okkara and war with the creatures of the dark world. Asrar is particularly good at conveying Apocalypse’s deep, centuries-old sorrow. His enormous bulk, once so intimidating, now looks like a manifestation of his overcompensation, and of the incredible weight of the loneliness and grief he carries with him. The first panel of the penultimate page, in which we see him looking down at his reflection in a pool of water before gathering the parts of his sword The Scarab, is a moment where we see him in a fully honest moment. There’s no one to observe him, no audience for his shows of strength, and so you see him without the clarity of purpose that was driving him for ages. In that panel he’s a sad old man who has been betrayed by his lost children, and must face the possibility that he’s wasted his long life. 

Creation

“Creation”
X of Swords: Creation
Written by Jonathan Hickman and Tini Howard
Art by Pepe Larraz
Color art by Marte Gracia

I’m shifting format slightly for this one, this is all going to be in “some notes” format.

• Pepe Larraz’s return to X-Men a little over a year after the end of House of X is as auspicious as it ought to be – the triple-sized opening chapter of a major crossover, as befitting an artist who has emerged as a defining – and more importantly redefining – artist on this franchise. Larraz’s pages here are top quality and play to his strengths in world-building and his raw talent for drawing evocative environments, nuanced body language, thoughtful page layouts, and perfectly paced and composed dramatic moments. It feels like a gift to read pages as well illustrated as this – the level of craft is above and beyond, particularly in a thing like the opening panel of the issue in which he effectively depicts a vast army with incredible elegance and economy of line. 

• The issue re-uses, recontextualizes, and in some cases alters the pages previously seen in the Free Comic Book Day special promoting this event. The tarot reading sequence feels right as the proper beginning of the story rather than merely a trailer for it, and I appreciate them using the obscure mutant Tarot’s interpretation of the cards drawn as a text page. It’s a clever bit of hand-holding for those of us who are either only dimly aware of tarot or totally ignorant. It’s interesting to note that the figures on The Hanged Man card have been changed somewhat – Banshee to Siryn, Glob to Rockslide, Trinary to Summoner – but I suppose that’s simply a result of plot revision. 

• Archangel was mostly played as a joke in his Angel persona in Empyre: X-Men, so it’s nice to see him depicted more seriously in this story, where his extremely fraught relationship with Apocalypse is foregrounded to highlight that while he’s essentially the protagonist of this crossover the X-Men have a very bad history of being traumatized by him. 

• It’s also nice to see Monet once again at the forefront of a story, as she drives much of the action plot in the second half of the issue in which the X-Men confront Saturnyne. Between this, House of X, Empyre X-Men, and Giant Size X-Men: Storm, Monet has been positioned as a major X-Men character and this makes a lot of sense – she’s a character with a big personality and a diverse list of extraordinary powers, making her an obvious person to place on the front lines of any battle. I like the way the typically haughty Monet is set up as a foil to the even haughtier Saturnyne here, and her casual mention that she’d be interested in taking Saturnyne’s job at some point. Maybe that’s just a funny line, or maybe it’s foreshadowing – we’ll just have to wait and see. 

• In the lead-up to X of Swords we were led to believe that Apocalypse was the one pulling all the strings, but as we see in this issue he’s been manipulated just as much as he’s been manipulating the mutants of Krakoa. His Caesar-esque betrayal by Summoner and his the Horsemen is hardly a surprise but still hits with some emotional resonance and we’re fully aware of what a crushing disappointment this is for Apocalypse after centuries of waiting to be reunited with his lost family. And of course, at the end of this issue we see that Saturnyne has been playing everyone all along, and has set up a conflict for her amusement or potential gain in which he’s only just a pawn. It looks like a big part of this story will be Apocalypse being forced into true humility. 

• At least a third of this story is rooted in the Captain Britain mythos developed by Alan Davis, Alan Moore, and Chris Claremont in the 1980s – most obviously the presence of two Captains Britain in Betsy and Brian Braddock, but also Saturnyne, the Starlight Citadel, and Otherworld. The map of Otherworld is intriguing, with references to expected characters like Jamie Braddock, Roma, and Merlyn, but also a few somewhat unexpected characters from this mythos like Mad Jim Jaspers and The Fury. The most surprising thing here is the suggestion that the missing all-powerful omega mutant Absolon “Mister M” Mercator is most likely the “unknown” regent of a realm called Mercator.

• The biggest curveball in this opening chapter by far is the revelation at the end of the issue that somehow S.W.O.R.D., the intergalactic intelligence agency created by Joss Whedon and John Cassaday in Astonishing X-Men, is somehow part of Saturnyne’s scheme. I can barely even speculate on how that fits into all this with Arrako and Amenth and Otherworld, but I like the feeling of having no idea where this plot is going. 

• As the issue ends we learn that the macguffin driving the plot of this crossover will be some kind of tournament between the swordbearers of Arrako and Krakoa, and we’re given the name of ten swords that will be wielded by X-Men who’ve been indicated on either the Ten of Swords card in the reading early in the issue or the covers of forthcoming issues.

Some of the swords are obvious – Magik possesses the Soul Sword, Cable recently acquired The Light of Galador in his solo series, Cypher is bonded with Warlock. The Sword of Might would be Brian Braddock and the Starlight Sword would be Betsy Braddock. Skybreaker would be for Storm and The Scarab would be for Apocalypse given their respective themes as characters. Gorgon has a history with Grasscutter and Godkiller in previous Hickman comics, and I would assume Magneto would take the latter if just for the pompous name. Muramasa, a blade infused with Wolverine’s soul, is obviously meant for him, which is troubling as that one also appears as the 11th sword of Arrako. Hmmm.

Amenth

“Amenth”
X-Men #12
Written by Jonathan Hickman
Art by Leinil Francis Yu
Color art by Sunny Gho

“Amenth” is a tremendously ambitious issue focused almost exclusively on world-building in advance of the X of Swords epic beginning next week. It’s quite a lot to take in. In 14 pages we’re presented with Summoner’s abridged history of centuries of a mutant society stranded in the fallen world of Amenth after the “Twilight Sword” of “the enemy” split Okkara into Krakoa and Arrako. We learn that the mutants of Arrako are led by Genesis, the wife of Apocalypse. Genesis was betrayed by a fellow mutant and killed by Annihilation, the god of Amenth. As we enter X of Swords, Apocalypse is called on to liberate the surviving mutants of Arrako from the siege of Annihilation and the hordes of Amenth. We’re left with some question of Apocalypse’s motives at the time of Okkara’s split, and his motives now. 

It’s all very good set up for the next big story, and establishes the most radical changes to X-Men mythology since House of X/Powers of X. The notion of an entire separate lost mutant society with centuries of history is wild, as is the revelation that Apocalypse is not the first mutant but rather the first of the second generation of mutantdom. There’s still quite a bit of story ahead in X of Swords, but it seems to me that the likely result of that story is the first level up in mutant society in terms of the galactic scale presented in Powers of X #2. It’s the next step in the evolution of Krakoa as a society towards greater scale as the macro story moves along – the alliance with the Shi’ar being an eventual logical step, and I suspect we’ll eventually see Krakoa ascend to some stage of “worldmind.” And then, maybe in the end…the Phalanx. 

This is Leinil Francis Yu’s final issue as the regular artist on this series and his work in conveying the grand scale of this plot is outstanding. Hickman’s plot is extremely demanding, with pages in which every other panel represents major historical moments on a large scale, and Yu delivers without making it all feel too heavy and overwhelming. I particularly like the way he drew the sequence with Genesis entering palace of Annihilation – it feels both Biblical and alien, and full of small details that suggest yet more history to be told. Yu has been a mainstay of Marvel Comics – and of X-Men projects – for over 20 years, and his work on this past year of X-Men with Hickman has been a career pinnacle for him. They’ve worked together on Avengers in the past, and in that series he was also pushed to draw sci-fi on a grand scale. It’s another example of Hickman seeing what an artist is truly capable of and pushing them to the next level. 

Onwards to X of Swords! 

Into The Storm

“Into the Storm” / “The World” / “Disintegration” 
Giant Size X-Men: Jean Grey & Emma Frost, Giant Size X-Men: Fantomex, and Giant Size X-Men: Storm
Written by Jonathan Hickman with Russell Dauterman (Jean/Emma)
Art by Russell Dauterman (Jean/Emma, Storm) and Rod Reis (Fantomex)
Color art by Matthew Wilson (Jean/Emma, Storm) 

The Giant Size X-Men specials were initially sold as stand-alone one-shots, but as it turns out three of the five issues are, in fact, a coherent story arc that appears to advance the slow-burning Children of the Vault subplot. These three issues amount to 90 pages of story, but the plot isn’t particularly dense: Storm gets sick following getting zapped in her attack on the Vault in X-Men #5, Jean Grey and Emma Frost discover that she’s got a “machine virus” and will die within a month, Monet figures out that she can be saved in The World, and Fantomex brings Storm, Monet, and Cypher to The World to eventually extract the virus from Storm’s body. 

The first issue of this arc is essentially a tribute/cover version of Grant Morrison and Frank Quitely’s famous “quiet issue” of New X-Men in which Jean and Emma perform a similar “psychic rescue” with Charles Xavier, and as such it’s more of a showcase for Russell Dauterman’s considerable skills as an artist. The Fantomex issue is also a blatant Grant Morrison tribute, with several scenes involving Fantomex quoted directly from New X-Men issues. This is all very nice and well-executed, but feels a little odd in the context of Jonathan Hickman’s larger project on the X-Men, which before this point had excised the “hey, remember this?” nostalgic references that had piled up quite a bit in recent years and fully metastasized in Mark Guggenheim’s vile X-Men Gold run. And true, those nostalgic nods were almost always to Chris Claremont comics, but the spirit is still the same. Also, the “hey, I’ve already read this” feeling makes these issues seem more slight than they actually are. 

The Fantomex issue illustrated by Rod Reis is quite good. The plot depicts scenes from Fantomex’s life in which he brings different groups of people into The World, the artificial environment with accelerated time where he was created and raised. There’s an implication of unreliable narrative, that there’s only so much we should believe about what we’re seeing from the perspective of a man who is a living lie from a fake world – a “living contrivance, a product… a hall of mirrors with no end” as Psylocke puts it in Rick Remender’s Uncanny X-Force. But as much as the truth of it all is ambiguous, we see how Fantomex’s awareness of this weighs on his actual soul. 

The big reveal of this issue is that Fantomex and Ultimaton – both products of A.I.M. and Weapon Plus’ project of developing mutant-hunting super soldiers in The World – are essentially identical twins raised with as much variance as possible. Fantomex was discarded as a baby, and the other gradually evolved into the Ultimaton we see in Morrison and Chris Bachalo’s “Assault On Weapon Plus” story. Each time Fantomex returns to The World he encounters Ultimaton at different stages of his development, always asking him if he would like to leave with him. Ultimaton always declines, and as time goes on sees Fantomex as an abstraction – “some primal direction of man, some primal direction of me.” The issue leaves off with Fantomex bringing Storm, Monet, and Cypher to The World, and the plot thread concludes in the Storm issue with Fantomex deciding to remain in The World with his ersatz brother. To be continued, of course, but there’s a nice emotional charge to this beat – Fantomex embracing the only sort of family he has, and giving up something of himself to help or guide this warped reflection of himself. 

The Storm issue covers interesting ground. It’s a story about Storm fighting for her life, though in the first few pages Emma Frost points out how “overly dramatic” this is given that they have the means to immediately resurrect her. The point of the story is that Storm is a person who would fight for survival regardless – she refuses to surrender to anything, she will always try to find a way to overcome obstacles. Storm is also quite dramatic. It’s part of her charm. 

The mechanics of the plot of this issue are driven largely by Monet and Cypher, who are clearly two of Hickman’s favorite characters. The story serves as a reminder that part of Monet’s impressive set of powers is advanced intelligence, and her genius is ultimately what saves Storm. Monet largely serves a plot function here, but her presence in this story, as well as in House of X and Empyre: X-Men amount to Hickman making a case for her as an essential X-Men heavy hitter from here on out after years of the character being sidelined as a result of relative obscurity. 

Cypher is more of an observer and interpreter in the plot, just as he was in the Nightcrawler special. At the end of the issue we see the machine virus entirely removed from Storm’s body and held in a containment field to prevent it from rapidly evolving in the artificially accelerated time of The World. In the epilogue we see that Cypher recognizes that the machine virus is sentient and conscious. This is left as a ticking time bomb, as the possibility of an artificial intelligence developed in the artificial time of The Vault attaining “evolutionary critical mass” in the slightly different artificial time of The World can become an existential threat to mutants down the line. 

We’ll be returning to this machine virus thing at some point, but it’s hard to say which ongoing plot this beat connects to – is this going to remain a part of the Vault thread? Or maybe, since there’s a direct tie from A.I.M. to Orchis, this is part of how their Sentinels evolve to a Nimrod state? It could just as well be part of the Phalanx subplot. Just as with the mysterious tower built for Emma Frost in the Magneto special, it feels like it could be quite a while before we find out the actual significance of this issue to the macro plot. 

These specials were designed as showcases for artists, and as can be expected, these issues give a lot of room for Russell Dauterman and Rod Reis to flex. They’re both quite good but I prefer the loose, gestural qualities of Reis’ art to the extremely tight and slick lines of Dauterman. The latter’s work is beautiful and dynamic but a bit too stiff at times, and while he can draw very nuanced facial expressions, there are many panels where the faces seem oddly blank and vacant. Dauterman is called on to draw abstract environments in both of his issues, and while they work well on his terms, they seem rather cold and static compared to Reis’ more surreal and dreamlike drawings within The World. It’s an intriguing contrast of styles, with Reis more connected to cartooning while Dauterman’s aesthetics are more rooted in animation. 

One War, One Mutant

“One War, One Mutant”
X-Men #11
Written by Jonathan Hickman
Art by Leinil Francis Yu
Color art by Sunny Gho

This issue is another tie-in with Empyre, after the previous issue and the Empyre X-Men miniseries which concluded last week. It’s interesting to read these in the context of Al Ewing and Dan Slott’s main Empyre miniseries, which has its merits but has struggled to convey narrative momentum or deliver any memorable setpieces. This issue – 22 pages, only 16 of which are directly related to the Empyre plot – presents all the beats of a big event story in concentrated form without feeling rush or as if it’s missing any connective tissue. On top of being a far more entertaining and exciting story, it shows the X-Men easily triumphing over the invading Cotati aliens through their collective power and creativity, which in context of the broader Empyre story make the event’s primary protagonists the Avengers and Fantastic Four look like fumbling chumps. 

The Cotati/Empyre stuff is really just a MacGuffin in this issue. The real story is in pushing along simmering plot points from X-Men #1 and #7 – the emerging narrative among Krakoans that Magneto is the nation’s greatest hero, and Exodus making that a major talking point as he indoctrinates the children of Krakoa. The Exodus fireside chat scenes in #7 and #11 have a creepy ambiguity to them. For one thing, it’s strange for one of the heads of the Krakoan state to be hanging out with little kids in the woods at night. But more than that, you see how Hickman has Exodus saying a lot of things fully in line with the Krakoan triumphalism of the Dawn of X period, but always pushing a few steps further towards a radical mutant supremacist dogma. I like that Hickman is presenting this as a slow and insidious shift, starting in the shared joy of the birth of the Krakoan nation but gradually moving towards inevitable ideological conclusions. 

Exodus has always been portrayed as a zealot, and as someone in thrall of Magneto as a symbolic figure. The concept of the character has always been strong, but the greater Krakoa story is the first time Exodus has been put in the position to fully develop and reach full narrative potential. Just as other characters in the Quiet Council represent threats from within Krakoan society – the sociopathic Machiavellian scheming of Mister Sinister, the ticking time bomb of Mystique’s justified resentments, the corosive ruthless capitalism of Sebastian Shaw, the egotism of Magneto, the messianic hubris of Xavier, the hidden agendas of Apocalypse – Exodus is the personification of radical nationalism. 

Exodus exerts his power through influence, making a point of passing his views to the children, and in mythologizing Magneto in a way that will inevitably bring out the worst of his vanity. Magneto is a hero in this story; we see him at his best as he protects his people in a show of incredible power in tandem. But it’s been pretty clear from House of X #1 that we’re in for a long, slow, and heartbreaking story in which Magneto’s arrogance eventually becomes a big problem. Pumping him up as a great leader and supreme champion seems like a sure path to him making a terrible decision down the line with the absolute conviction that he’s doing something heroic. I have a feeling Hickman’s long game with Magneto is to present him as this heroic figure for a long time before this heel turn happens, so when it comes it’s totally gutting. 

Some notes: 

• The issue begins with a scene in which some semi-obscure younger mutants from the 2000s meet Summoner, the character from Arrako we met in #2. This is the first we get a sense of his personality – friendly and erudite, but raised in a culture obsessed with strength – and it’s mostly a tease of what’s coming in X of Swords. The best part of this scene is quite subtle, as silhouettes of characters we know to be villains from Arrako in X of Swords promo art appear in the shadowy backgrounds of the panels. The final line of the scene says it best: “Well…that’s ominous.” 

• Hickman’s issues have been light on text pages recently but we get a good set here in the form of an official report from Cyclops to the Quiet Council relaying minutes from a meeting of Krakoa’s military captains. As with a lot of the best text pages, this gets across a lot of information that would have been dull as expository dialogue. It also feeds directly into the issue’s plot, as Cyclops discusses the possibilities of mutant powers combining in tactically useful ways, which is displayed in the story as Magneto, Iceman, and Magma work together in the battle with the Cotati. This is a natural progression of Hickman’s concept of how The Five collaborate to resurrect mutants, but it’s also elaborating on a concept going back to the early days of Chris Claremont – the “fastball special.” 

• I can’t help but notice that Exodus’ star student, the white kid with a pink mohawk and glasses, looks a lot like Quentin Quire. Which is not to say there’s an in-story connection between the two, but that Quire originates as a student radical in Grant Morrison’s New X-Men. Maybe we’ll be seeing him as a deliberate parallel with Quentin as this story progresses. 

Fire

“Fire”
X-Men #10
Written by Jonathan Hickman
Art by Leinil Francis Yu
Color art by Sunny Gho

Vulcan has been a regular supporting character through Jonathan Hickman’s run on X-Men so far, largely played as an overly serious foil to more established characters – his biological brothers Cyclops and Havok, and his new housemate Wolverine. Vulcan is a tricky character who was introduced in Ed Brubaker’s mid-2000s run as a complicated retcon: He’s the lost Summers brother, he was chosen by Charles Xavier and Moira McTaggert to lead a doomed team of forgotten X-Men on a mission to Krakoa, he went off to space to become a tyrannical Shi’ar emperor. There’s even more to it than that, but mostly in “cosmic” Marvel books I have never read. There’s a lot of reasons many reasonable writers would run screaming from this extremely convoluted character, particularly as he’s never had much of a compelling personality beyond spite and madness, but given how much of Hickman’s X-Men hinges on the intersection of Xavier, McTaggert, and Krakoa – not to mention Cyclops being a lead character – he’s sorta cornered into dealing with him and his now-resurrected lost X-Men. 

“Fire” does not call back to the part of Vulcan’s story that intersects with Moira and Krakoa, but it does properly reintroduce Petra and Sway – though really, given how little they’ve ever appeared as living characters, it’s more like a regular introduction. Of the four lost X-Men that Brubaker introduced in X-Men: Deadly Genesis, these are the two who died on Krakoa. (Darwin, who appeared as part of the trio who disappeared into The Vault in issue #5, survived the experience and was featured as a member in Brubaker’s Uncanny X-Men run.) Petra and Sway are depicted as rather messy hedonists intent to drink heavily and get wild at the Summers House on the moon while the “boring mutants” are off on vacation. They come across as cheerful types who are not particularly bothered to be residents of a living island that once killed them both. Resurrection seems to have a way of making people very forgiving about such things.

The issue mainly boils down to Vulcan encountering a group of invading aliens connected to the Empyre crossover event and them tampering with his mind, seeing his reborn and stable form as a broken version of him, and introducing a corrupting element that will undermine his progress and redemption. This sets Vulcan up for an eventual return to his primary role as an antagonist, most likely whenever Hickman’s ongoing Shi’ar story kicks into high gear. The interesting part of this development is more that Vulcan’s story becomes about him knowing this has happened and actively resisting the lure towards madness and destruction. 

Hickman has put a lot of effort into putting the traditional X-Men mutant villains on paths towards antagonistic roles without undermining the notion of Krakoa unifying all the mutants. House of X set Sabretooth up for an eventual revenge story after he was cruelly imprisoned by the Quiet Council, and Powers of X set in motion some grand betrayal by Mister Sinister as part of establishing the resurrection protocols. Exodus appears to be on a path towards cultish zealotry in parallel with Nightcrawler’s creation of a mutant religion, and it looks like we’re set to discover Apocalypse’s true motives in X of Swords. And then there’s Mystique, who will undermine the Quiet Council as she seethes in fully justified resentment of being denied the resurrection of her wife Destiny. It’s pretty clear that once the Mystique/Destiny/Moira plot comes into play, we’ll be entering the end game of this whole thing. 

Vulcan’s trajectory is an interesting counterpoint to that of Mystique. Both are former enemies playing at being reformed members of Krakoan society, but whereas Mystique is only playing along to advance her personal agenda, Vulcan seems to genuinely want to be a better man and live up to the example of his brothers. Mystique embraces the moral rot in her, and her capacity for causing chaos, but Vulcan now lives in fear of this destructive element in him. Even before the alien intervention he knew he was a bomb waiting to go off – now he’s stuck worrying that he is powerless to defuse it. As with the other mutant villains set on a track to return to form, his plight is very true to the core of his character and is driven by relatable motives. The difference is that he’s the character positioned to overcome his worst impulses. 

Some notes:

• It’s hard not to notice how between Hickman’s X-Men, Gerry Duggan’s Marauders, Ed Brisson’s New Mutants, and Benjamin Percy’s X-Force there is a real obsession with showing X-Men drinking heavily, with a few characters being depicted as problem drinkers. It’s a little weird, and I imagine it must grate on sober readers quite a bit.

• I love that Hickman has made elements of Ed Brubaker and Mike Carey’s parallel mid-’00s X-Men comics very crucial to his own work, while virtually nothing from Joss Whedon’s much more popular concurrent Astonishing X-Men series has come into play. But of course – Whedon’s take was deliberately retro, and he didn’t actually add much to franchise in terms of big ideas. (But hey, Armor has showed up, so that’s something.)

The Reading

X-Men: Free Comic Book Day 2020
Written by Jonathan Hickman and Tini Howard
Art by Pepe Larraz
Color art by Marte Gracia

Every year Marvel issues a special Free Comic Book Day comic designed to hype up whatever major event is coming along, and the headlining story in this year’s edition is basically a trailer teasing the first X-Men crossover of the Hickman era, X of Swords. Even aside from hyping up the next big arc, this issue is exciting if just because it reunites Hickman with Pepe Larraz, the artist of House of X. The two have a remarkable creative chemistry, and Larraz has asserted himself as the definitive artist of this X-era. The pages, which rely heavily on his gift for character design and evocative environments, feel like home. 

The familiarity of Larraz’s line is helpful in grounding the issue, which otherwise pushes the reader off the deep end into unfamiliar territory. The opening pages introduce Apocalypse’s original Horsemen, who he lost when Okkara was split into Krakoa and Arakko centuries ago. I’m not certain exactly what happens in these pages, but it establishes them as powerful and brutal characters who seek Opal Luna Saturnyne, the Omniversal Majestrix of Otherworld. There’s certainly some missing threads here, but the Horsemen and the lost island of Arakko being connected to Otherworld makes more sense of Apocalypse’s machinations through Tini Howard’s Excalibur series. It’s all starting to click together. 

The remainder of the issue teases out the rest of the story as Saturnyne does a tarot reading to get a sense of what may be coming to her. Hickman, Howard, and Larraz provide a feast for speculation, particularly in the final three cards. I’m not going to indulge in that for now, but I will say I’m quite pleased that Archangel, Banshee, and Penance are being positioned as prominent characters in this story after being largely absent from the first wave of Dawn of X books, and that Storm seems to have a major plotline in this arc. This, along with Giant Size X-Men making Storm central to the ongoing Children of the Vault thread, gives me hope that after many years of being sidelined we may be entering a phase when Storm is restored to her proper place as a crucial character in this franchise. 

Wait And See

“Wait and See”
Giant Size X-Men: Magneto
Written by Jonathan Hickman
Art by Ramón Pérez
Color art by David Curiel

It’s been a bit difficult to find the appropriate level of expectation for the Giant Size X-Men issues. Each of the three published so far has felt less substantial than any of the regular issues of X-Men written by Jonathan Hickman, and have done more to gesture in the direction of future stories than deliver something more satisfying in the moment. The comics have all delivered in terms of serving as showcases for talented artists, and with this Magneto issue the Canadian illustrator Ramón Pérez– mostly known for his indie and web comics – gets to show off his considerable craft on a very mainstream title. Hickman’s primary interest here seems to be in letting the artist flex, and in laying in plot details for later on. The former is a great idea when working as a writer in a visual medium, the latter goal is fine in the abstract but in the case of this issue it mostly just undermines a story that presents itself as a quiet character study. 

The plot of the issue is basically that Emma Frost has asked Magneto to acquire an island for her, and he accomplishes that with the help of her profoundly arrogant ex Namor, the mutant monarch of the seas. At the end of the issue we see Magneto assemble a tower with a Sentinel head built into the side for Frost, and well, that’s that. We’ll find out what Emma is going to do with this island some other time. It looks cool, so there’s that. There’s some bits of deep sea adventure in the middle of the story with Namor, but in narrative terms that’s what happens in 30 pages.

The meat of the story is mostly in observing Magneto at this moment of his life. He’s typically a character defined by his unrelenting ideology and antagonistic relationship with humans, but in this issue we see him rather contented by the founding of Krakoa and his station as one of the fledgling mutant nation’s leaders. Magneto has been a steady presence in Hickman’s story thus far, but his most memorable scenes have involved him making grand and unapologetically arrogant speeches to human leaders. This facet of Magneto is not on display in this issue. Instead we him willing to wait patiently for Namor among a bunch of puffins on a small island, and dining with Emma Frost, a woman he clearly recognizes as both a peer and a friend. The latter is notable – even though these characters have a good amount of history as colleagues, it’s actually pretty rare to see Magneto engage with someone besides Charles Xavier or Rogue as either a respected friend or confidant. His tendency is to be alone, and to project a superior aloofness.

Magneto, Emma Frost, and Namor are all characters with major superiority complexes and a flippant contempt for humans. In contrasting today’s Magneto with two characters he has so much in common with, we see how much he’s changed in the recent past. His rage has subsided upon the realization of his lifelong dream of a mutant nation, we see him as magnanimous and respectful - not just of Emma and Namor, but of the human man living on the island. The entire story is him doing a favor for Emma, whereas Magneto’s role since the start of House of X has largely involved him sending other mutants out to do his bidding. I get the sense that in the long run of Hickman’s story, this will be understood as a glimpse of Magneto at a good moment in his life. This state cannot last for him, and that’s his tragedy. 

The matter of Emma’s island tower is intriguing but makes the issue feel unresolved and incomplete, and since the issue ends on an inert “that’s it?” moment it undermines the understated character development that was the actual focus of the issue. It may have landed better if the issue ended on another quiet Magneto moment, or if Perez’s last page didn’t feel like such an abrupt ending. But I think Hickman is more to blame here – whereas the previous Giant Size issues have advanced an ongoing mystery with Cypher and presented a cliffhanger with Storm, both of which are tied to macro plots introduced in House of X/Powers of X, it’s hard to get a sense of how significant this story development is when all Emma says in the end is that she intends to…invite people to this island. Uh, sure? I trust Hickman enough to pay off on this in some way, but this could just as well be an entire issue about Emma Frost needing a place to hold off-site meetings. 

Unlike the other issues of Giant Size X-Men, this one was not conceived with the artist in mind. The issue was originally meant to be drawn by Ben Oliver, and Ramón Pérez stepped in when Oliver had to bow out of the commitment. He did a good job with it, particularly in drawing the most uneventful pages where it’s really just Magneto hanging out on an island and looking off into the distance. He presents Magneto as a powerful but unknowable figure, but also someone with an obvious soulful interiority. His ability to convey this is crucial to the successes of this issue, since Hickman really went “show, not tell” in this story. 

Haunted Mansion

“Haunted Mansion”
Giant Size X-Men: Nightcrawler #1
Written by Jonathan Hickman
Art by Alan Davis
Color art by Carlos Lopez

The Giant Size X-Men special issues written by Jonathan Hickman were originally meant to be annuals for the first five ongoing series from the Dawn of X launch, and though this issue features none of the cast from Tini Howard’s Excalibur, it seems obvious that this issue was intended to be the Excalibur annual given that it’s illustrated by Excalibur co-creator Alan Davis and features a handful of core characters from that series as they appeared in the late ‘80s. The story also prominently features Cypher and Magik, who Davis drew in memorable mid ‘80s New Mutants annuals written by Chris Claremont. Hickman makes the most of Davis’ familiarity with these characters not just for nostalgia’s sake, but for rooting this story in which the Krakoa-era X-Men visit their old home in “classic X-Men” aesthetics of an artist who has had multiple runs on X-Men titles over the years. When the issue opens on interiors of the abandoned X-Mansion, it immediately feels authentically like you’re in the place if just because it’s Davis’ recognizable ultra-clean linework.

This is billed as a Nightcrawler story and while he’s very prominently featured in the plot as the leader of this mission, the most intriguing parts of the issue center on Cypher and further hint at something strange about the current state of his relationship with his techno-organic best friend Warlock. Though it was fairly obvious to anyone familiar with the character, this issue is the first to confirm that Cypher has been “wearing” Warlock on his right arm. This isn’t at all unusual for the character, but the weird thing here is that it is for some reason a secret he’s keeping this a secret. The first suggestion of this came in X-Men #7 where Cyclops stumbles into the two of them hanging out, and in this issue Cypher begs Magik to keep it a secret before explaining himself and she’s rightly sort of baffled why this would be a secret to begin with. Hard to say where Hickman is going with this thread, but I suspect it will eventually pay off on the panels in which he appears to infect Krakoa with the techno-organic virus – a form of the Phalanx – in Powers of X #4. 

Aside from advancing this plot, the issue is a straightforward mystery plot that resolves in a reveal involving the Sidri, a fairly obscure alien race introduced by Claremont and Dave Cockrum in the early ‘80s. It’s enjoyable entirely at face value, but even as a fairly throwaway one-off issue it does push the macro plot forward in terms of showing us the current state of the X-Men’s former headquarters, adding another alien alliance that may factor into Hickman’s slowly percolating cosmic plot, and nudging along the Cypher thread. Not bad, all told, and plus it’s always a pleasure to see Alan Davis draw Nightcrawler in action. 

The King Egg

“The King Egg”
X-Men #9
Written by Jonathan Hickman
Art by Leinil Francis Yu
Color art by Sunny Gho

Before Marvel formally announced Jonathan Hickman would be taking over the X-Men franchise they ran a few in-house teaser ads, the first of which was a white page with text that read: “When two aggressive species share the same environment, evolution demands adaptation or dominance.” So far we’ve seen Hickman address this theme with mutants vs humans, mutants vs artificial intelligence, and mutants vs homo novissima. This issue hits the theme on an intergalactic level, with the story opening in the distant past with the Kree Supreme Intelligence authorizing the genetic manipulation of the highly adaptive Brood as a weapon against their rival empire, the Shi’ar. The King Egg produces a patriarch which can sieze control over the intergalactic Brood hive mind and shift their purpose towards killing the Shi’ar. The Brood queens have responded to the threat by sending all their drones to destroy it. Here we have an advanced species subverting the adaptability of another species, and that species fighting for its survival at all costs. 

The majority of this issue is big action in outer space with the X-Men, Starjammers, and Shi’ar Imperial Guard fighting off the Brood. Leinil Francis Yu is always great with space battles, having previously done this sort of thing with Hickman when they worked together on the Infinity storyline in Avengers. There’s a great sense of scale and momentum in his pages – it’s all very much a comic, but the art conveys the feeling of a big budget movie. 

The story wraps up with a surprise twist – Broo, the mutant Brood student of the X-Men who has joined Cyclops and his crew on this mission, is compelled to eat the King Egg and suddenly becomes the king of all Brood. As a result of this, the mutants have effectively taken control of the Brood via the gentle and good natured Broo. This is a brilliant use of Broo, an extremely annoying character who now has a strong sense of purpose in the greater scheme of things. It’s still hard to tell exactly where Hickman is headed with this space storyline, but it’s safe to say we will eventually see the mutants try to use the Brood as weapons. But will Broo, always portrayed as a sweetheart, be down with this plan? Or will the serum created by the Kree in the King Egg override his every intention and push towards their plan in attacking the Shi’ar? 

Notes:

• The next issue is a tie-in with Empyre, an Avengers/Fantastic Four event about the Kree and Skrull uniting against Earth. It seems pretty likely the complications of the Kree’s meddling with the Brood will be the occasion for intersecting the plots? 

• Jean Grey’s monologue expressing the point of view of the Brood queens is a necessary bit of exposition, but I like how it’s also an expression of the character’s profound empathy. 

Swarm

“Swarm”
Written by Jonathan Hickman
Art by Mahmud Asrar
Color art by Sunny Gho

“Swarm” picks up where Jonathan Hickman left off with his brief run on New Mutants, with that group back on Krakoa and in possession of an egg that Wolfsbane stole and brought home with her just for kicks. As it turns out, it’s a Brood king egg and the Brood have tracked it back to Earth, and are invading Krakoa in swarms. It’s the most conventional story Hickman has done so far in the main X-Men book, but it’s advancing his larger space opera macro plot and delivering a jolt of action film energy that the series has been light on amidst the more philosophical focus of recent issues. 

If you are new to all this, you should know that the Brood are an alien race that Chris Claremont and Dave Cockrum introduced in the early ‘80s and are rather transparently the Marvel version of the xenomorphs from the Alien franchise. Hickman’s use of the Brood emphasizes the creepy otherness of the species, particularly in the scenes of the issue in which we observe teeming masses of Brood crawling through the husks of the space whales they use as organic spaceships. Mahmud Asrar, a familiar X-Men artist of the recent past who fills in for Leinil Yu on this issue, is particularly good at drawing the creatures in action sequences in which they’re still quite scary even as Cyclops, Magik, and Mirage wipe them out.

 I’ve never been particularly fond of the Brood, but Hickman and Asrar make me rethink my position on them as a threat. They emphasize just enough of what makes them distinctive to keep it from feeling such a blatant Alien rip-off while nailing the coolest visual aspects of “what if the X-Men fought a thousand xenomorphs?” 

This is the first traditional multi-part story of Hickman’s run so I’m going to hold off writing about the bigger story, so let’s move straight to notes…

• Vulcan features heavily in this issue, and will be central for at least another two issues going on the covers for those comics. Vulcan is a very complicated character – he’s the biological brother of Cyclops and Havok, but was raised in Shi’ar space and has a complicated backstory that involves both the history of Krakoa and a Marvel cosmic event by Dan Abnett and Andy Lanning that I never read called War of Kings in which Vulcan, leading the Shi’ar, clashed with Black Bolt of the Inhumans leading the Kree. Hickman calls back to that story in this issue with a text page recapping the ending of War of Kings, in which Black Bolt and Vulcan are lost in the Fault, a rip in the fabric of time and space. This page is followed by a page of Vulcan lost in the Fault which directly echoes a page from Hickman’s FF #6 in which Black Bolt is lost in the Fault.  

I’m a lot more intrigued by Vulcan’s connection to the history of Krakoa, which was introduced as a massive retcon in Ed Brubaker’s Deadly Genesis miniseries. In this issue we see Vulcan after getting wasted with Petra and Sway, two recently resurrected mutants who were part of a failed second iteration of the X-Men that Moira McTaggert and Charles Xavier sent to Krakoa before the assembling the third wave of X-Men including Storm, Wolverine, Nightcrawler, and Colossus from Giant Size X-Men #1. This is a crucial element of the Krakoa story that Hickman has yet to address – like, what does the Krakoa we know from House of X onward have to do with the hostile monster island from the first modern X-Men comic? What was the early process of getting Krakoa the sentient being on board with being Krakoa, the mutant nation? And how do Petra and Sway feel about living on Krakoa when Krakoa murdered them?

• Perhaps the greatest flex of Hickman’s X-Men thus far is making two of the most annoying characters from Jason Aaron’s awful Wolverine and the X-Men run, the cutesy Brood mutant named Broo and Kid Gladiator, tolerable in their appearances in this issue. He doesn’t really do much to change either character – Broo is basically still a baby monster who’s always like “indubitably!” and Kid Gladiator is still a child version of Gladiator who is always like “RAD!” – but they’re both a lot less aggravating in this context than in Aaron comics where it seems like he was rather convinced they’re the most hilarious things in the world. Broo, always a novelty character up to now, has a clear utility in this issue’s plot too. It goes a long way.

• Always a pleasure to get even just a page of Hickman’s Sunspot! 

Crucible

“Lifedeath”
X-Men #7
Written by Jonathan Hickman
Art by Leinil Francis Yu
Color art by Sunny Gho

Let’s start with audacity of the title. Given that this is an issue about an event called Crucible that is mentioned by name many times over, it would be sensible to simply call the issue “Crucible” or similar. But no, Jonathan Hickman can’t quite ever be bold enough, so he named it “Lifedeath,” after one of the most famous and acclaimed Chris Claremont stories in which Storm struggles with life after losing her powers. It makes sense: This is an issue about what becomes of the million mutants who lost their powers to the Scarlet Witch’s “no more mutants” spell in House of M, and how to be reborn with their powers they must first die. It’s the core dilemma of the original Storm arc taken to a new extreme, with Nightcrawler and Cyclops on the margins of the story pondering the spiritual implications of the Krakoan resurrection protocols. 

Hickman takes his time doling out hints of what Crucible is through the first half of the issue, indicating the solemn intensity of the occasion and how heavily it weighs on the other characters. The context is revealed as we see Exodus explain the reason for the event to a group of mutant children around a fire in the forest, emphasizing the great evils of the Scarlet Witch and the horrors she inflicted on mutantdom with just three words. The children repeat language from the text pages referring to the Scarlet Witch and M Day in House of X #4 – “the pretender,” “NO MORE” – and suggest that an emerging part of Krakoan culture is the vilification of Wanda Maximoff and, by extension, the Avengers. This indoctrination makes sense, particularly given the extreme lengths the Krakoans must go to rectify her deeds, but the reader is aware that Scarlet Witch is still written as a heroic figure in Avengers comics. It now seems inevitable that she will enter this story at some point and have to reckon with a mutant nation indoctrinated to think of her as a Hitler figure. 

This scene is the first indication of what Hickman is planning for Exodus, a somewhat underdeveloped villain created in the 1990s that he’s placed on the Quiet Council. The main thing about Exodus is that he’s from the distant past – he was raised in the 12th century but held in stasis by Apocalypse for centuries – and that he’s a zealot who aligned with Magneto’s most extreme beliefs but was more harsh and unyielding. It would seem that Exodus’ zealotry is being positioned as a parallel to Nightcrawler’s spirituality here, as we see Nightcrawler wrestle with moral questions and decide that he must start a mutant religion for those questioning their faith in the context of Krakoan culture and the implications of endless rebirth. If the pure and heroic Nightcrawler is offering a theology based on kindness, forgiveness, and pursuit of peace, Exodus is clearly fostering a more violent and unforgiving fundamentalism in his young followers.

In the final third of the issue we see that Crucible isn’t merely about a depowered mutant dying to be “made whole” in resurrection, but rather a sacrement informed by Apocalypse’s “survival of the fittest” ethos. Melody Guthrie, the younger sister of Cannonball and Husk, must face the hulking and enormously powerful Apocalypse in a duel in which he taunts and tests her. The mutants of Krakoa don’t want to deal with mass suicide of depowered mutants – they want a show of dedication to fight for their people. They must be found worthy. 

This makes sense, but is also sort of troubling. The ritualistic nature of this speaks to both Apocalypse and Exodus’ roots in the distant past, and shows how their taste for bloody sacrifice and symbolism is shaping the emerging culture of Krakoa. This is another contrast with Nightcrawler’s sensibilities as a Catholic – he’s a very New Testament sort of guy, after all. It will be interesting to see how his hippie-ish brand of Christianity informs a new religion based upon many ideas that his culture has disproven, or at least called into question. 

Some notes:

• Hickman continues to tease the details of Cyclops, Jean Grey, Wolverine, and Emma Frost’s apparently bisexual polycule situation. I realize some would love for this to all be spelled out and made full canon, but I actually prefer him sketching this out in ways that suggest something as filthy and overtly queer as the reader wants it to be. Don’t get hung up on the plausible deniability, get excited by how far he’s willing to go to suggest that Wolverine and Cyclops are regularly fucking each other. 

• I love that Cannonball, always an incredibly normal and down-to-earth dude, is just getting used to raising a family in the alien Shi’ar culture and comes home to discover that everyone he knows has created a new culture that’s maybe twice as strange. But hey, his dead siblings are alive, so he’s he to complain? 

• We finally see Warlock separated from Cypher’s arm and it’s very odd and creepy. It’s hard to tell whether this is hinting at something bad, or just showing us that Cypher is just a really weird guy with very unusual friends. 

Endangered Birds

“Space Jail” / “Endangered Birds” / “Spoilers”
New Mutants #2, 5, and 7
Written by Jonathan Hickman
Art by Rod Reis

I already wrote about the start of Jonathan Hickman and Rod Reis’ mini-run on New Mutants back in November, but am now circling back to cover the subsequent three issues which have been published in a loose alternating pattern with a parallel story by regular series creators Ed Brisson, Flaviano, and Marco Failla. I’ll get to that stuff a bit later on once they’ve had a bit more time on the book. Given how tonally fresh and visually exciting the Hickman/Reis issues have been, the other issues have mostly felt like drab fill-ins in context and I’d like to get a better feel for what Brisson does on his own terms here. 

It was very wise of Hickman to lean so heavily on humor and self-awareness in this New Mutants arc, not just in terms of varying the tone of the overall X-Men line, but to flex some elements of his style that can get lost in his reputation as Mr. Epic Worldbuilder. The sitcom-ish tone also serves the characters well, at least in that each of them gets to be reintroduced as the essence of themselves as originally defined by Chris Claremont. A lot of baggage is being shed here in the interest of resetting this part of the franchise, and I’m all for it. In most cases this does nothing to go against how the characters have been written over the past few decades, but it’s very noticeable in the case of Wolfsbane, who seems to have regressed to a gentle naïf after about 30 years of stories in which she is traumatized and hardened. Maybe this is a hint that Xavier et al are omitting certain traumas from some people who are resurrected, or maybe it’s just Hickman bringing Wolfsbane back to what made her such a lovable and relatable character in the 1980s and it’s not something to overthink. Given the tone of this arc, the indication seems to be more the latter scenario. 

The focus of this arc is very much on Sunspot, who is obviously one of Hickman’s favorite characters and is now set up to be a central figure in all Shi’ar plot going forward. I’m quite pleased with this development as I adore Hickman’s version of Sunspot and also the way Sunspot’s narration makes a lot of Shi’ar plot I typically find rather dull and overly complicated quite fun and vibrant. I have a near lifelong history of disliking Shi’ar stories, but this one was a joy to read and I now feel invested in what happens with the Shi’ar empire and how it will intersect with the X-Men’s plans in the future. Even as a fan of Hickman going into this, I was skeptical about whether he could make me care about this aspect of things, but here we are. 

Some notes: 

• The “fuck or fight” scene with Magik in issue #5 is very funny, but also notable as one of the few times I can remember Magik being played as an overtly sexual person. She’s often sexualized in illustration, but despite frequently being played as a subtextual girlfriend of Kitty Pryde, she’s never had a real romantic or sexual plot. (I might be forgetting something, but I don’t think so? I know she had a few flirty lines in Brian Bendis’ run.) 

• The use of the Shi’ar Death Commandos from the Claremont/Chris Bachalo run in the 2000s continues Hickman’s reverential use of characters designed by Bachalo. 

• The text page replacing what could have been “seventeen glorious pages” of action in issue #7 with a tabletop game is both hilarious and formally inventive. A reminder that we’ve only scratched the surface of what can be done with the text pages! 

• This arc is a real star turn of Rod Reis, who impresses on every page with his distinctive approach to color and design, and mastery over gestural drawing and facial expressions. Thankfully he’s sticking with Hickman for a Fantomex special in the near future, and will hopefully continue to work with him through the duration of his X-Men tenure. Or maybe an Image book together? They have remarkable chemistry; it feels like they’ve only just begun their collaboration. 

• Cypher has been walking around with what appears to be Warlock as his left arm all through this arc and in House of X/Powers of X, but this has not been addressed in the text. I wonder when Hickman plans on getting into that, as it’s obviously significant.

The Oracle

“The Oracle”
X-Men #6
Written by Jonathan Hickman
Art by Matteo Buffagni
Color art by Sunny Gho

My favorite narrative threads introduced by Jonathan Hickman in House of X – the machinations of Orchis, the confrontation of Moira and Destiny, the suicide mission on the Orchis forge, the looming threat of Nimrod, Xavier and Magneto using the promise of resurrecting Destiny as a method of manipulating Mystique – come together in “The Oracle,” the best single issue of an X-comic to come out since House of X/Powers of X gave way to the Dawn of X. Given that we’ve had to wait a bit for this to come together makes it feel like a payoff, but it’s still just set up. We now have a full sense of Mystique’s arc for the Hickman X-Men mega-story, and it’s something that pulls together everything that’s ever been interesting about one of the franchise’s greatest antagonists: Her nihilistic cynicism, her duplicitous and conspiratorial nature, her deep love for Destiny, and her limitless capacity for spite and bitterness. At the end of this issue Mystique is set on a course to become a threat to the grand project of Krakoa for reasons that make a lot of emotional sense. Even if she ends up doing horrible things, it’s easy to be on her side in this. 

At the beginning and end of the issue we see Destiny and Mystique together in flashback, as Mystique is told a vague prophecy that lines up with her experiences in the present. I love seeing them together because it’s the only time you ever see Mystique be vulnerable or deferential with another person. Destiny is the only person she truly trusts and admires, and there’s an implication that she’s also somewhat responsible for her political radicalization. Hickman’s characterization of Destiny is not far off from Chris Claremont’s depiction of her in the 1980s, but he leans harder on her essential spookiness and her icy ruthlessness. “They want us blind for some reason,” she says, accurately sensing that the removal of her special form of sight is deliberate. Moira’s fear of Destiny is rooted in her traumatic experience with her at the end of her third life and is tied to her tremendous guilt for her actions in that timeline, but I also get the impression that she understands that if anyone would call bullshit on the Krakoan mutant togetherness project and have the means to build a faction of skeptical mutants it’s Destiny and Mystique. Moira’s anxiety about this has now guaranteed that it will come to pass. 

The panel in which Mystique shouts “I WANT MY WIFE BACK!” at Xavier and Magneto is the emotional climax of the issue, but has more power in that Hickman is finally spelling out something that’s been elided for decades due to editorial policies, though it was screamingly obvious to anyone who read Claremont’s comics. This isn’t actually the first time the nature of their relationship has been made canon, but it’s certainly the most important. The metatextual aspect of this adds to a few extra layers of pathos to the story, particularly when you consider that Claremont’s writing implied they’d been living together as a lesbian couple for several decades and that they were as out with that as they were about being mutants, though Mystique’s shape-shifting always gave her the option to pass. 

One of the ways Xavier and Magneto are using their leverage over Mystique to their advantage is by having her spy on the Orchis station to make sure that the X-Men’s mission in House of X was actually successful, as they all died out of range of Cerebro and no one had retained their memories when they were resurrected. She returns with a good news/bad news message: Yes, the Mother Mold was destroyed, but it seems as though Dr. Gregor and Director Devo are moving along in creating something that looks quite a lot like Nimrod. We don’t actually know what the Orchis scientists are doing, though it’s connected with Gregor’s odd plan to revive her husband who died in the X-Men’s raid, but it moves that plot along in a way that invites speculation. It moves Mystique’s story forward by complicating her motivations – she cares enough about her people to want to stop Orchis, but not enough that she is willing to do anything more until she gets Destiny back. She tries to use this as leverage over Xavier and Magneto, and fails. The bitterness sets in, and it’s clear those men have no idea how much of a mistake they’re making by protecting Moira. 

Some notes: 

• Hickman has been writing Xavier and Magneto as a gay couple in subtextual ways, so it’s interesting that they’re the ones thwarting the reunion of a lesbian couple whose relationship is now entirely official in the text. 

• The plot point of Dr. Alia Gregor seemingly attempting to revive her dead husband in the form of Nimrod is a clever thematic parallel with Mystique’s quest to revive her lost wife, but also a cruel irony in that by raiding the Orchis forge, the X-Men apparently hastened the creation of the thing they were desperately trying to prevent. And I like that there’s a more poignant emotional context for the origin of Nimrod – it’s not just motivated by MUTANTS BAD, but rather a consequence of mutant aggression.

• Matteo Buffagni did a wonderful job as a fill-in artist on this issue, and his Sean Phillips/David Mazzucchelli-ish inky noir qualities were very well-suited to this particular story. I’m particularly fond of how he drew the subtleties of body language in the Destiny/Mystique flashbacks and how the surreal aspects of Krakoa appeared when filtered through his blunt realism. 

• The page revealing Mystique’s appearance in disguise in earlier scenes in the Orchis station was brilliantly executed, and recalls a similar trick Hickman used in his Avengers run showing the reader how the boy who became Starbrand had been in the backgrounds of scenes through the issue. 

• This is the first issue of an X-Men comic since House of X #1 to not include text pages, and the issue contains a few extra pages of art instead. They made the right choice here for the story, but I think that breaking the formal pattern was a subtle nod that this issue was meant to seem particularly heavy. 

• Gotta love the very low-key introduction of SENTINEL CITY on Mercury. Yikes!

Into The Vault

“Into the Vault”
X-Men #5
Written by Jonathan Hickman
Art by RB Silva
Color art by Marte Gracia 

It’s such a pleasure to have RB Silva back with Jonathan Hickman. It hasn’t been all that long since they worked together on Powers of X – and they did make a small Mister Sinister story interlude in the recent Incoming special – but enough time has passed and enough artists have worked in the new X-Men world that Silva and Pepe Larraz designed for it to feel a bit like… coming home… for Silva to show up on this issue. Leinil Yu is still the regular artist for the known future, and while he’s been doing some of the best work of his career on the past four issues of X-Men, the chemistry of Hickman and Silva is so strong that it’s hard to come away from this issue without hoping he cycles into the regular artist slot before too long. 

It’s pretty obvious why Silva was assigned this particular issue. Powers of X proved him as a brilliant designer for sci-fi concepts and particularly good at interpreting and building on visual ideas established by Chris Bachalo. In this story we revisit the Children of the Vault, created by Mike Carey and Bachalo for the “Supernovas” arc in the mid-2000s, and get a look inside The Vault, a construct with accelerated artificial time that pushes human evolution forward. Charles Xavier, with the knowledge of Moira McTaggert’s experience in the distant future of Powers of X with the homo novissima, has identified this machine creating post-human beings, as the top existential threat to humanity. But the X-Men know almost nothing about the Children or The Vault, and need to send a group of uniquely qualified mutants – X-23, Synch, and Darwin – for a reconnaissance mission. 

Silva’s depiction of the inside of The Vault is brilliant – it’s like nothing and everything, a vast digital nowhere with elements that indicate technology and nod towards old depictions of virtual reality spaces, but mostly just comes across like an unknowable dark void. It’s instantly memorable, and the decision to make sure all pages within The Vault are laid out side by side in the print edition has the great effect of emphasizing the enormity of it.  The use of data text page elements merged into the design is also quite brilliant in both conveying information and advancing the distinct visual aesthetic of the line. Given that this issue ends on a cliffhanger with the team stranded within The Vault, it’s pretty clear that establishing this vibe was crucial, and Silva nailed it. 

This issue continues a pattern of every issue by Hickman setting up further story, and is particularly effective in making you desperate to know where the plot is going. It hadn’t occurred to me at all that he’d be pursuing the homo novissima thread from Powers of X so soon or that he’d explicitly tie it to the Children of the Vault in the present day, but it’s quite obvious and works very well. Unless I’m forgetting something marginal, Hickman is the first writer to dive into the Children since Carey left, and as he did with handling the Phalanx in Powers of X, he’s done a very good job of fitting them into his tech narrative and elevating the stakes accordingly.

When Carey and Bachalo introduced this concept it was in some ways a workaround the “No More Mutants” status quo, but posed the question of what would happen if the X-Men had to face a species that was a step beyond them, reversing the usual humans vs mutants dynamic. It’s hard to imagine this story moving forward without the mutants having to confront some incredibly dark notions – like, they can’t possibly consider genocide, right? But then you look at the membership of the Quiet Council and realize if put to a vote, the more ethical and noble members of that body  – Xavier, Jean Grey, Storm, Nightcrawler, Kate Pryde – are in the minority. Yikes.

Some Notes:

• It’s nice to see Hickman continue to show love for Scott Lobdell and Chris Bachalo’s characters from Generation X. Synch, a character who has been out of circulation for about 20 years or so, makes his return in this issue via the resurrection protocols. He’s very charming in his scenes, but the text page of his medical file indicates that he’s very rattled by the experience of coming back to life years after his death to find all his former classmates have moved on with their lives. I suppose this explains a bit of why he’d agree to a mission that could go on for hundreds of years. It’ll be interesting to see what happens to him and his fragile emotional state after being trapped in The Vault.

• I’ve never been particularly fond of X-23 – I have a pretty harsh bias against “legacy characters” – but I think having her lead this mission into the unknown is a brilliant use of her that puts her at the center of a major narrative thread while also clearing her off the board for a little while. 

• I wonder if it’s just a coincidence that Hickman keeps showing Storm a bit overworked and rattled, or if this strain and her refusal to take it easy is setting up something for her down the line. 

Global Economics

“Global Economics”
X-Men #4
Written by Jonathan Hickman
Art by Leinil Francis Yu with Gerry Alanguilan
Color art by Sunny Gho

It’s remarkable how quickly Jonathan Hickman’s radical new vision for the X-Men has become the new normal, to the extent that this issue in which Charles Xavier, Magneto, and Apocalypse go to the Davos World Economic Forum to discuss the destabilizing effect of their new flower drugs on the global economy lands as a “yes, of course” rather than a “wait, what?” Truly, this is the All-New, All-Different X-Men. 

“Global Economics” builds on threads established in the first issue of House of X, and brings back two characters introduced in that issue – Chinese ambassador Ma Mingyu and the plainly sinister U.S. ambassador Reilly Marshall. Over the course of this story Reilly is revealed to be plotting an assassination attempt on the Krakoan leaders, but that plan is foiled by Cyclops and Gorgon. The bulk of the issue focuses on Xavier, Magneto, and Apocalypse addressing the concerns of the global elite and stating their intentions and goals. Each of them play to their strengths: Apocalypse intimidates with his enormous size and vast historical perspective, Magneto lays out the mutants’ plan to turn the capitalist system against humans to gradually negate their power and influence, and Xavier takes off his Cerebro helmet for the first time in the series to offer a message of love and faith in the possibility of coexistence. 

Xavier and Magneto’s respective monologues contrast their essential differences – idealism vs cynicism – but also the way the other’s perspective informs their current actions as they work together as the leaders of mutantdom. Magneto’s anger and ego are apparent in his gloating about the way he intends to whittle away the humans’ economic power, but he’s also set aside overt terrorism and violence in favor of pursuing soft power. Xavier is earnest in his desire for peace and expression of love towards all, but refuses to back down from claiming what is “rightfully ours.” For once they are on the same page philosophically, but in their words you see both the seductive qualities of their approaches to rhetoric but also the weaknesses that will no doubt lead to both of them making mistakes over the course of this run. It seems inevitable that Magneto’s self-aggrandizing anger – “you have new gods now” – will lead to something terrible happening. Xavier’s naïve hope will certainly be taken advantage of by some cynical, opportunistic force. 

This issue establishes the new role of Gorgon as a “captain” of Krakoa charged with protecting members of the Quiet Council. Gorgon is a relatively recent Marvel creation – he was created by Mark Millar and John Romita Jr for their best-selling “Enemy of the State” storyline in Wolverine in 2004, and his since been featured in many series as an antagonist but rarely in actual X-Men books. Hickman has a history with the character, having featured him in both Secret Warriors early in his Marvel career and later in Avengers World. Gorgon’s monologue in this issue lays out his change of heart, renouncing his previous service of Hydra and The Hand and embracing the visionaries of the Quiet Council. He’s “enlightened,” which means he’s embraced a brutal sort of mercy – he obeys the Krakoan law of “kill no human” but leaves an entire crew of assassins horrifically maimed. It’s not fully necessary, but it would be nice to see a bit more of how Gorgon came around to this change of heart, and his apparent reconciliation with Wolverine, who recommended him to this new position. 

Notes:

• Leinil Francis Yu continues to shine in small details on this series, particularly in the establishing shot of the dining room and all the well-rendered shots of food. I can’t imagine that when he signed on for another go at the X-Men he anticipated having to draw steak in two different issues, but he’s done well with it. 

• Very curious to see where Hickman is going with Reilly Marshall. In the first issue of House of X we learn that he’s a former black ops agent for both S.H.I.E.L.D. and S.W.O.R.D., but has a hidden affiliation that he managed to keep from the Cuckoos’ psychic probe. Is he involved with Orchis? Or perhaps some other concern that we haven’t learned about yet? One thing I find interesting about Marshall’s designed is that the other human characters introduced in House of X and this issue have extremely distinctive appearances that speak to their races and cultures, whereas he’s got the generic secret agent James Bond look – a blandly handsome clean cut white man. Seems pointed. 

Hordeculture

“Hordeculture” 
X-Men #3
Written by Jonathan Hickman
Art by Leinil Francis Yu
Inks by Gerry Alanguilan and Yu
Color art by Sunny Gho and Rain Beredo

The biggest surprise of Jonathan Hickman’s X-Men and New Mutants so far has not been about plot developments – all that renovation was left to House of X/Powers of X – but rather about the tone: Who could’ve predicted from all that heavy and portentious setup that it’d be so funny? New Mutants is played like a sitcom, and while X-Men has been doing a lot of world-building and filling out big ideas, it’s been very light-hearted and sorta goofy. In this issue the X-Men discover that their newest enemy is a group of ecological terrorists comprised of four elderly women who are rather transparently based upon the cast of Golden Girls. That may sound awful, and it probably would be in the hands of a lesser creative team. But Hickman’s dry wit and Leinil Yu’s designs make it all work, and this quartet of scientists is played for laughs while revealing themselves to be a credible ongoing threat to the X-Men and Krakoa. 

I like to imagine the original pitch Hickman gave to Marvel editorial in which he had to explain that from now on flowers would be central to the X-Men mythos, and that they would need to have enemies going forward who would want to steal and breed their special mutant flowers. Hordeculture – NOT Whoredeculture! – are a group of rogue botanists who were radicalized by their experiences in the agrochemical and biotech industries and have decided to take it upon themselves to sieze control of the world’s food supply and return to the world to a “natural state” with seven billion fewer people on it.

Of course, Krakoa throws their plan into chaos and they successfully steal Krakoan flowers for their studies. The X-Men lose, and this sets up inevitable chaos down the line. This issue is just…planting seeds…for later developments, but it’s a rather fun bit of narrative gardening.

This issue is the first where we get a glimpse at the new interpersonal dynamic of Cyclops, Jean Grey, and Emma Frost. It’s been a very long time since these characters were all together in print: They were the central love triangle of Grant Morrison’s New X-Men in the early 2000s, but Jean died at the end of that run and it’s only just now that all three are alive together at the same time. Hickman is clearly having a lot of fun with this, and is deliberately subverting expectations while leaving all salacious details to the subtext. So from what we’ve seen in this and the last couple issues: Jean and Emma have a catty rivalry but also respect one another as friends and colleagues, and there is a strong insinuation that there is an open relationship situation in which Emma gets to “borrow” Cyclops from time to time, but Jean is his primary partner. (Presumably a fair trade-off for Jean to hook up with her housemate Wolverine now and then.) What a fun, sexy time for them all.

Some notes:

• As the X-Men accumulate new enemies from the worlds of science, politics, and business please note that almost all of them are elderly and/or white. They all have very understandable political agendas that are more about seizing or maintaining power than any kind of overt bigotry. They act in self-interest and self-preservation to either perpetuate the status quo or bend it to their advantage. This is a major improvement over the various human enemies X-Men writers have been working with for ages.

• Yu continues to nail key panels. Let’s take a moment to appreciate the body horror of this panel, which low-key reveals just how sinister the women of Hordeculture can be…

•…and this glorious reaction panel, which ought to get a second life on social media. 

Summoner

“Summoner”
X-Men #2
Written by Jonathan Hickman
Pencils by Leinil Francis Yu
Inks by Gerry Alanguilan
Color art by Sunny Gho

“Summoner” is clearly built to continue some momentum from other recent X-Men comics – we’re still spending time with Cyclops and time-displaced children Rachel and Cable, there are references to the events of the New Mutants and X-Force comics from last week, and the plot advances the Arrako/Apocalypse/missing Horsemen thread from Powers of X – but the actual content of the issue feels more like coasting. 

That’s fine, since we’re still finding our bearings and getting used to how familiar characters behave in the new status quo. In the case of the leads in this issue, we’re still seeing Cyclops form a traditional family unit out of his bizarre set of blood relations. It’s maybe slightly weird that the other characters don’t call attention to this, but it makes a lot of sense that Rachel and Cable – who is a teenager at the moment, having killed the older version of himself in Extermination – would be eager to finally have the dad they always wanted. You know, a dad who is physically only about 10-15 years older than either of them, but a dad nevertheless. 

I quite like Hickman’s take on Cyclops. He’s leaning into the character’s rich and complicated back story without directly referring to it, and presents him as though all the bizarre facts of his life are just lived reality and weird to others but mundane to him, kinda like someone who's been a celebrity all their life. As a reader fully aware of the context and subtext, it all reads as “this is a total weirdo” and “this is a capable leader who’s seen it all and isn’t easily rattled.” Kind of a chicken-or-egg thing with him, really. Hickman has fun with Cyclops’ dialogue too, allowing the character to poke fun at his weird life and history of bad decisions based in horniness. And then there’s this line, which shamelessly panders to everyone who was VERY HYPE about the layout of his house on the moon in the previous issue…

The rhythms of this issue feel similar to the more low-key world building issues at the early stages of his Avengers run. It’s a straight-forward adventure, but the meat of the issue is in establishing some new concepts by having the heroes encounter it in the field. In the case of this issue, it’s the notion of “Summoners,” the magic-wielding heroes of Arrako, the lost twin of Krakoa. At the end of the issue a fragment of Arrako merges with Krakoa, and the Summoner meets with Apocalypse, who clearly intends to bring back the rest of Arakko and make Krakoa whole again. This is not tremendously thrilling in and of itself, but it’s reasonable to assume this is headed towards some climactic resolution in the near future. Hickman seems very aware of that, and wisely leans on jokes to make this a fun read. (I quite like the callback to Sunspot’s “…and that’s why people love me” from last week’s New Mutants in the Cable dialogue. Maybe this is going to be a runner?)

Leinil Yu’s art leaves a bit to be desired in terms of depicting facial expressions but he excels at illustrating freaky monsters and exotic terrain, and that’s what really matters in this issue. His best image in this issue, in which the trio of X-Men ride through tall grass towards the Summoner in the distance, is very striking in its simple, elegant composition and owes a lot to the cinematic tradition my friend Sean T. Collins calls “monumental horror.” The monsters are cool looking, but this shot is genuinely creepy. 

The Sextant

“The Sextant”
New Mutants #1
Written by Jonathan Hickman and Ed Brisson
Art by Rod Reis

There isn’t anything disappointing about Jonathan Hickman and Rod Reis’ revival of New Mutants besides the fact that Hickman will be not be sticking around beyond the first arc, which is setting up elements of space opera plot that will blossom into something bigger for the X-Men line at some point in the future. Hickman explained in a podcast interview for SKTCHD that aside from his regular work on the primary X-Men comic, he’ll be doing brief runs on other series to tell bits of stories that are crucial to his macro-plot. This is a cool idea, but if you’re invested in the core classic New Mutants cast – Sunspot, Magik, Mirage, Wolfsbane, Cypher, Karma, Cannonball – it’s bittersweet to have a writer nail the essence of these beloved but often under-written characters and then bail so quickly. These issues are going to have to be savored. 

Ed Brisson, the only X-Men writer to carry over from the pre-Hickman era, is ostensibly the co-writer of this issue, and will be the sole author of the series once Hickman wraps the opening space adventure. Brisson can be pretty good, but I don’t really notice any traces of his voice or aesthetics in this issue.  The tone and script is about as Hickman-y as it gets, albeit on the more light and funny end of his spectrum. A lot of the issue is devoted to establishing ideas about where the New Mutants – and the other younger characters like the cast of Generation X and the students that populated the X-books of the 2000s – fit into the grander scheme of mutant society as the first generation of mutants plentiful enough to develop actual community, setting up plot for the Shi’ar story, and elaborating on the mechanics of Krakoa and its miraculous fauna. It’s a comic book that’s heavy on ideas, but still mostly is focused on the joy of getting to spend time with these revitalized characters. The characters are having a reunion of sorts in-story, but the more important reunion is the audience and the characters. It feels like hanging out with old friends. 

The issue is packed full of wonderful character beats and genuinely witty dialogue, to the point that it feels more like a hang-out sitcom than a standard action-driven superhero comic. Hickman has fully internalized the voices of the characters as established by Chris Claremont in the 1980s, and the smallest bits of plot are enough to set the conversational dynamics in motion. Hickman lets the characters conform to their archetypes – Sunspot is vain and egotistical but extremely warm and generous, Mirage is tough as nails but very thoughtful, Magik is intense and scary – but he allows for shading and growth. This is particularly noticeable in Wolfsbane, who retains some of her classic naif qualities but is more mature and has distanced herself from her fundamentalist upbringing while still seeming idealistic and spiritual. 

The star of the show is Sunspot, which should come as no surprise to anyone who read Hickman’s use of the character in Avengers. I think it’s safe to say that no one has ever loved Sunspot the way Hickman does, but in writing him, he’s certainly won many people over on the character’s charms. A lot of Sunspot’s personality could come across as grating but Hickman has a great feel for the nuances of his ego, and makes it clear that he’s a very pure and decent guy. The more arrogant elements of his character are quite cute because they aren’t fully delusional, and are the words of someone who has the raw confidence to be openly proud of his achievements. When he says a line like “I’m an amazing hero and that’s why people love me,” it just makes you go, “damn, Sunspot IS an amazing hero and that’s why I love him.” The joke isn’t that he’s not self-aware, but that he somehow lives life without much anxiety and zero imposter syndrome. What must that be like? 

Rod Reis’ art in this comic is top-notch. The fundamentals are all strong – nuanced facial expressions and physicality, storytelling, compelling backgrounds – but there’s also a level of stylishness that sets his work apart. Reis, who started as a color artist, colors his own work and it seems clear that he’s thinking about color as a compositional element on the most basic structural level of his pages. The current X-Men is blessed with a lot of top quality color artists but what Reis accomplishes here is probably the most effective at conveying the somewhat alien beauty of Krakoa and signals a sense of “you are looking at something fresh and new” that backs up the more radical moves of the storytelling. This isn’t so much the case for other new X-Men titles like Marauders and Excalibur, where the artists Matteo Lolli and Marcus To deliver quality draftsmanship that nevertheless looks a bit too ordinary and “house style” for comics that are otherwise quite ambitious and forward-looking. Those books look fine, but New Mutants looks like the future.