Uncanny X-Men #335

Uncanny X-Men #335
Writing: Scott Lobdell
Art: Joe Madureira

Note: See X-Men Unlimited #12 next
What Went Down: Ozymandias opens the issue walking under a sculpture of the Fantastic Four mourning the loss of Franklin. He is staring at his risen lord Apocalypse. Apocalypse knows that Onslaught is a threat to him, and this fact is reinforced by the appearance of Uatu, the Watcher. Uatu and Apocalypse apparently already know each other, and Apocalypse explains that he is here to observe the end of the Age of Wonders.

In an Avengers Quinjet, the Avengers fly over the ruins of Xavier’s mansion. Nate Grey senses that the X-Men are alive, when suddenly the plane is forced down and ripped open. The X-Men and the Avengers have a minor conflict while Jean Grey ensures that the Avengers are really who they say they are; the X-Men are paranoid after the betrayal of Xavier. Nate mistakes Jean for Madelyne Pryor, a clone of Jean that Nate resurrected after he came to the main Marvel Universe.

Frustrated, Nate uses his mental powers to take all the X-Men’s memories and show the Avengers what Onslaught really is. Cyclops blasts Nate to free his teammates. Nate claims that he knew Xavier was evil from the moment he came to this world, and Wolverine tries to pounce on him. The X-Men inform the Avengers that Xavier has somehow been influenced by Magneto, creating Onslaught, which causes Quicksilver and the Scarlet Witch to feel guilty about the actions of their father.

On Muir Island, Moira MacTaggert is briefing Excalibur about Onslaught. Many of the former X-Men want to go to America to help, but Moira insists that they need to stay and unseal the Xavier Protocols.

Below the mansion, Bishop replays Jean’s urgent message, confirming that Xavier is indeed the X-Men traitor. Gambit walks in and Bishop sort of apologizes for accusing him of being the traitor.

In another room, the Avengers and X-Men explain that Onslaught is pure psionic energy. Jean guesses that the transformation was spurned by the shutting down of Magneto’s mind in X-Men #25. Storm brings up that all information about Onslaught at this point has been supplied by Onslaught, which really means that all the “hints” up until now should be ignored because the writers didn’t organize this story very well. X-Force shows up, and they are assigned to protect Nate Grey, since Onslaught’s research showed he had an interest in the young mutant. Part of the heroes break off to warn the Fantastic Four while Cyclops and Jean go off to Muir Island for the Xavier Protocols. Another group is tasked with searching for Magneto, since he is supposed to have some part in the creation of Onslaught. Storm says she is worried about Cable, so she goes off to meet him in his title.

Wolverine says he has a hunch about Onslaught, so he tells the Vision that he’s going off to follow up on it. Vision comments on the contradictory nature of Wolverine as he drives away. Iceman fills Warren and Betsy in on recent events. Bobby calls Psylocke out on seeming cold and detached, which of course is attributed to the Crimson Dawn. They are sent to meet Scott and Jean on Muir Island. In the sewer, Dark Beast excitedly takes Onslaught to his lab. He starts to explain to Onslaught that he did not actually create the Morlocks, he just experimented on them, but Onslaught attacks him because he already knows all this information. He asks McCoy about soldiers for his army, while inside Onslaught, Charles Xavier is shown to be floating alone in oblivion.

How It Was: Whereas the Onslaught: X-Men one-shot set up the main ideas of the story, Uncanny #355 briefly reiterates those ideas and sets up the various missions that will hopefully further the plot. The major flaw is that none of these missions actually affect the plot other than the oh so brief appearance in Excalibur to get the Xavier Protocols to build the plot device that helps the heroes fight Onslaught. Finding Magneto doesn’t affect the story, finding Cable doesn’t affect it, you can probably already guess what’s going to happen in Fantastic Four without reading it, and Wolverine’s spirit journey to find Onslaught’s origins doesn’t really impact how they fight him at all. This means that the majority of issues in “Phase 1” end up being the equivalent of filler.

Once again, these aren’t really problems with the issue, only the narrative structure of the event. As far as the issue itself… it’s dense—there’s a lot of exposition on top of an unnecessary “heroes’ misunderstanding” to generate some action. Apocalypse shows up, making you believe that he’s going to play an important role, but all he does is appear in an issue of Cable before disappearing. As usual, the Watcher is dragged out to make sure that the average Marvel reader understands how “significant” this story is. Plus, this issue was many readers’ first impression of Nate Grey, which shows him as an over-hyped, whiny teen who just irritates all the heroes.

This issue burns away a lot of the momentum that Onslaught: X-Men gave it. While it’s nice to see that all of the individual heroes have a role to play at this point, the fact that none of these threads really influence the overall plot at all really hurts this book. This issue consists of a bunch of facts we already know and some in-story advertisements for a bunch of other books to come out later. Plus Storm’s dialogue pretty much admits at the start how poorly planned out this thing was to begin with, what with none of the build up to this story really mattering. While the Bishop and Gambit scene is handled well, especially Gambit acknowledging just how shady he really is, the rest of the X-Men are already getting forced to the side in a storyline where they should be central to the events, since this involves their mentor. It’s disappointing to see so much potential that later just gets squandered.

C-

Onslaught: X-Men

Onslaught: X-Men
Writing: Scott Lobdell and Mark Waid
Art: Adam Kubert and Pascual Ferry 

What Went Down: Our prologue begins with a shocking revelation; the video of Jean from Bishop’s timeline, the one that started the whole X-Traitor storyline, is in reference to Professor X turning into Onslaught. Here we get the whole version with the missing sections.

Cutting back to earlier, the story begins with Xavier sitting in his den and throwing a picture of himself and Magneto into a fire. He laments about the failure of his dream before summoning the X-Men to the study. Jean Grey is the only one who knows that Xavier is really Onslaught, but she hasn’t had an opportunity to tell anyone. Dark Beast is still worrying about his infiltration being discovered. Jean recaps all the X-Men’s encounters with Onslaught while Xavier announces that his dream was a mistake.

Jean continues to worry as Charles talks, and she discovers the Cyttorak Gem on his desk; unknown to her, the Juggernaut has been trapped in the gem by Onslaught. Jean continues to probe the Professor’s mind, but Xavier covers her head with a “psychic muzzle.” While the X-Men rush to Jean’s side, Xavier transforms into Onslaught.

Onslaught offers the X-Men an opportunity to join him. When Cyclops brings up the similarities in his tone to Magneto’s, the villain demonstrates his psychic powers on some of the X-Men. Cyclops blasts him, but Onslaught uses his powers to freeze the X-Men in place before disappearing. Gambit frees the X-Men by charging the floor with energy, and Jean fills the team in on what she has learned. Gambit brings up how Bishop has been looking for a traitor in the X-Men, surprising him. The team splits up with one unit going after Cerebro, even though it’s still supposed to be broken, while the other team goes to the ready room.

At the Baxter Building, Franklin—the son of Mr. Fantastic and the Invisible Woman, is talking to his imaginary friend Charley—who is really Onslaught, while the Fantastic Four eat breakfast. Charley gets mad at Franklin and shatters a glass. The FF think Franklin is responsible, and Mr. Fantastic asks his son to go down to the lab with him.

In the Ready Room, the X-Men discover that Xavier has been researching Franklin Richards as well as Nate Grey. Onslaught mentally controls Cannonball and attacks the rest of the team. At the Avengers Mansion, Nate Grey is trying to convince the Avengers that Xavier has turned evil. They are skeptical, but they agree to check out his claims. Onslaught taunts Bishop for failing to discover that he was the traitor before going off to Cerebro.

In the Cerebro Room, Cyclops is busy disconnecting the computer when Iceman detects Onslaught by measuring the body temperatures in the room. Onslaught turns Cyclops’ powers on Jean, Iceman, and himself. Then he reveals that he has known about the Dark Beast’s presence the entire time and has been helping to hide him from the other telepaths. Dark Beast agrees to join Onslaught; the villain has to siphon some of McCoy’s thoughts to maintain his control of Xavier for some reason.

Later, Onslaught has neutralized Jean’s powers and is attempting to steal the secret to the template of the Phoenix Force from her mind. He takes a break to tell Dark Beast to dispose of the X-Men’s bodies, and Jean takes the opportunity to run away. She escapes to a communications room where she records the message from the prologue.

During the part at the end of the message, the part where it looked like Jean died, it turns out that the flash of light was just the other X-Men coming to the rescue. All the X-Men attack together, seemingly killing Onslaught. Of course, it turns out that the body they killed was really an illusion. Onslaught prepares an energy blast to kill all the X-Men, but Bishop manages to intercept and absorb it. Onslaught and Dark Beast teleport away, leaving the X-Men to ponder what they are going to do. At a secret location, Onslaught manages to activate an army of Sentinels.

How It Was: Another year, another X-crossover. As we all know from the success of Age of Apocalypse, every good crossover needs a double-sized one-shot with no ads to start it off. And not only is this a crossover across the X-books, we’re going full-on Marvel Universe wide inter-company crossover with this one. As the first issue of the story, this is probably the most that’s going to happen plot-wise until the Onslaught: Marvel Universe one-shot that ends it. I’ll get more into why this whole crossover is a bit of a mess, but let’s look at this issue a little closer.

Well Onslaught finally shows off how powerful he is, and it’s a wonder why he didn’t attack sooner to get it over with. Flashbacks to X-Men #50 and Uncanny #322 and #333 try to make this feel like a resolution to a grander, cohesive story, but really this just starts out of nowhere. The “hints” earlier don’t really point to a particular plan, and as you’ll see later, Onslaught’s agenda is never addressed beyond wanting to destroy the world…because he’s evil. The issue does succeed in giving us the broad, general ideas: Onslaught is Xavier, he’s really powerful, he’s interested in Nate Grey and Franklin Richards because…some reason, and he’s somehow connected to Magneto. That’s not bad for a first issue, except that this is pretty much what every other writer goes off of for his next two issues without really adding all that much to the plot until the end.

This is about what you’d expect from a hero like Professor X turned evil story. Waid and Lobdell take their time going through the beats: the X-Men can’t believe it, Onslaught shows signs that he’s not totally in control, the X-Men come to terms with the fact that they might have to kill him. Nothing is exactly subtle—from the villain’s reaction to Magneto’s name to the way Gambit brings up the X-traitor plot thread that has been rehashed over the last couple of months to the X-Men’s discovery that Onslaught could kill them but chooses not to. Of course later in the story, Xavier and Magneto turn out to play absolutely no part in the resolution of the story, so you could call this a misdirect, but it feels more like improper story planning. With so many at Marvel wanting to recapture the Age of Apocalypse, but on a larger scale, this issue tries to create some structure that really hasn’t been built up to as well as it was in the previous event.

Because Onslaught spawns from Xavier’s mind, he has the power to manipulate his students’ minds, and this leads to some interesting results, like having Cannonball freak out or Cyclops turn his powers on his friends. However, Onslaught develops so many other powers including super strength, energy blasts, EMP blasts, etc. that it starts to make him feel less unique. The X-staff is going for a cosmic-level bad guy ala Dark Phoenix or Thanos, but Onslaught never feels thought out enough to resonate as much with the readers.

It’s good to see the Dark Beast finally get something to do other than complain about life with the X-Men in his head. The X-Men’s confusion is well handled, but this thread leads to one of the other problems with this crossover. In order to have just about every Marvel title “tie in” to the story, sometimes events happened in the completely wrong books. So the Dark Beast/Beast storyline that has been running for months in the X-Men titles gets resolved in X-Factor, the origin of Onslaught happens in Wolverine, and Magneto/Joseph—who has been set up as a future X-Man already in the X-Men titles—gets discovered in Avengers. Again, none of these stories ever really contribute to the overall main plot (which should be combating Onslaught) whatsoever.

Still, I can’t help but notice that most of my criticisms, while originating with this issue, have more to do with the overall structure of the story than the issue itself. I actually quite like this one. The video from Bishop’s future is a nice touch, and a lot of the action is really good. All the X-Men’s reactions feel well done, although Xavier/Onslaught tends to talk a little too much and Jean’s inner ranting about Onslaught goes on for far too long. And of course, I can’t really understand the plan in the middle of the issue to split up when they’re facing the supposedly most powerful enemy they’ve ever faced. The ending struggles a little to involve Bishop, since he really had nothing to do with the resolution of the Traitor storyline. It feels tacked on to make Bishop the hero of the issue since he also won’t do a lot in the fight against Onslaught.

While this issue feels significant to a point, it’s a shame that most of the storylines either shift to unrelated books or disappear completely from the story. Out of the dozens of issues that are going to crossover, only two or three are going to deal directly with fighting Onslaught, so he never really gets developed as a character. There’s an interesting idea here about him being a manifestation of Xavier’s repressed feelings and emotions, but it gets bogged down in connections with Magneto and plot devices that serve no purpose. The traitor thread does get resolved, but this also feels shoe horned in. This is an exciting enough issue that is a little too long for its own good; it does a good job of setting up the main ideas, but the story never really develops any themes or developments beyond these general ideas.

B

X-Men: Prime

X-Men Prime
Writing: Scott Lobdell and Fabian Nicieza
Art: I’m not writing seven names in here. Look it up somewhere else.

What Went Down: It’s been two weeks since the Legion Quest storyline. Jean is in the woods searching for Wolverine. Wolverine is staying in the woods partly because he broke his promise to the X-Men about not hurting Sabretooth and partly because this latest fight has unleashed more of his feral nature, and he’s having trouble controlling it.

In the mansion, Bishop is discussing recent nightmares that he’s been having; he doesn’t know that they are a side effect of the Age of Apocalypse storyline.

A man named Dennis, whose mutation is beginning to surface, is trying to get to the Xavier Institute in hopes of finding the X-Men. He stops at a diner to get some food.

In a newsroom, a man named Clay asks Beast’s girlfriend Trish Tilby if she’s sure she wants to air a story about the Legacy Virus.

At a damn in Wyoming, Forge is leading X-Factor on a mission that involves disarming a bomb and capturing the villain Mystique. Mystique is about to escape, but a mystery person, who I think is supposed to be Onslaught, attacks her.

Cyclops and Beast are making food when Bishop has a flashback to the A of A. Since Cyclops and Beast were both villains in that reality, Bishop attacks them, but then he realizes his mistake.

Inside the diner, Dennis gets nervous about the other customers possibly discovering he’s a mutant. Also, a woman named Marrow kills a homeless man. She announces that she is a former Morlock, and that she is lighting a candle to contact the very first of her people.

Back at the mansion, we learn that Gambit is in a coma after kissing Rogue during the crystal event. This also seems to have had an effect on Rogue since she’s run off on a road trip with Iceman. In Florida, she dances with a bunch of guys, but Iceman interrupts when he feels that they are getting too close to touching Rogue.

At that moment, Trish Tilby goes on air and breaks the story of the Legacy Virus and the fact that it has spread to a normal human, Moira Mactaggert. We get some response scenes from the Gen X kids, Senator Kelly, and Moira and Rory Campbell.

The customers in the diner became very agitated by the story, so Dennis decides to leave; the customers take note and decide to follow him because he might be a sick mutant.

The X-Men try to comfort Beast, but he is very distraught that his girlfriend has sold them out. Professor X tells Cyclops to contact Cable, but he is interrupted by a huge psychic event that affects both him and Psylocke. This event turns out to be the arrival of Nate Grey from the Age of the Apocalypse universe.

In England, a villain named Emplates visits a woman named Gayle Edgerton. He asks her about Chamber from Generation X. In New York, Dennis is running, but the mob of angry humans catches up to him. Dennis accidentally turns into a lizard person, which scares the mob into attacking him.

Professor X feels this attack, but he cannot pinpoint where it is coming from due to all the interference from Nate Grey’s arrival. Apparently X-Force has moved into Arcade’s headquarters, Murderworld. They are busy training when a self-destruct sequence activates, forcing the team to flee.

In the X-Factor storyline, Mystique tries to impersonate Val Cooper, but Forge figures out the ruse. The team is about to leave when Havok explodes.

In Genosha, Excalibur is searching for information about mutate acceleration with the first mutate ever. The Sugar Man is observing them, and he activates a device that incinerates the mutate. Sugar Man also announces that he has existed in our time for twenty years now.

Up in space, Colossus is leading a group of Acolytes to inspect a piece of space debris that unbeknownst to them turns out to be the frozen remains of Holocaust. Marrow signals the first Morlock, who turns out to be the Dark Beast from the AOA.

Xavier and Storm are trying to save Dennis, but they can’t find him. Because of his telepathy, Xavier can feel every injury Dennis receives. The X-Men find him, but they’re too late; Dennis is dead. Xavier gives a sad speech to end the issue.

How It Was: Presenting X-Men Prime: either because we’re back in the prime Marvel Universe, or because the X-Men are only divisible by one and themselves. Bad math jokes aside, this issue is pretty important because it sets the direction of the X-books for months and months to come. Well…at least for half of them. The rest of the scenes are basically filler to pad out the comic, since there are no ads, although the central X-Men storyline is solid and does a good job with the central themes of the book.

Since we’ve already established that the Legacy Virus is a blatant metaphor for the AIDS epidemic, the writers choose to center the book on the consequences of people learning about it. The fear, the hysteria, the unjustified hatred of people who have no control over their condition: this issue handles them all pretty well. And even though Dennis is a pretty boring, generic guy, the scene where Xavier feels every bruise and broken bone does build tension, empathy, and sympathy. The scene is very jarring in how it basically mirrors very real world current events where youths were beaten to death for being homosexuals. It’s a powerful moment that feels as relevant today as it did a decade ago, and I’m impressed that the writers were brave enough to not let the X-Men save the victim to emphasize the seriousness of prejudice.

Unfortunately, teasers for all of the other X-book storylines keep sporadically interrupting the main story. The other stories range in quality, but the major problem is that most of them don’t tie into the main story in any important or thematic way; they’re just shoved into random parts of the book. As for what we get, well there’s one page of Generation X sitting on the couch and two more pages that introduce a new villain, so completely unnecessary. X-Force’s new headquarters blows up, so they’re “exciting” new direction involves moving into the X-mansion with the X-Men for a while…yawn. However, X-Factor and Excalibur’s scenes seem to be very significant and do a good job of making the reader possibly want to buy those books.

As for the effects of the Age of Apocalypse, the characters from the reality are seemingly slipped into continuity in the most convenient and contrived ways possible. Sugar Man has actually been in the Marvel U for twenty years? What the heck was he doing that he’s chosen right after the crossover he debuted in to make his move. Having Dark Beast as the retroactive founder of the Morlocks is kind of interesting, but nothing is ever really done with this.

The art is a mess here. The scenes with the main X-Men are pretty good, but this definitely wasn’t Bryan Hitch’s best work, a lot of characters have noses that are too big, and Storm’s hair is the wrong color in her scenes for some reason. The worst art easily belongs to the scenes with Rogue and Iceman in the dance club; it looks like an art style better suited for a comic strip in a newspaper with all the awkward looking figures and expressions.

It’s hard to believe that there was a $5 comic in the 1990s, especially when the regular books were still being sold for $1.95. While there are some good sequences, most of the book feels tacked on and unnecessary. This definitely would have worked better if it had stuck to the PRIMEary X-Men (get it), but Marvel was trying to bring all the X-Teams closer together so more people would start buying the side books. With its gimmicky see-through lenticular cover and needless side scenes, this book represents some of the best and worst aspects of comic books in the 90s. Nevertheless, it’s worth a look if you can get it on the cheap like I did.

C+

X-Men: Omega

X-Men: Omega
Writing: Scott Lobdell and Mark Waid
Art: Roger Cruz

What Went Down: Holocaust is toying with his captive, Magneto, while his father Apocalypse watches. Apocalypse taunts his prisoner and explains the trap that has been set for his X-Men. The villains still have possession of the M’kraan Crystal, which the X-Men need to fix the time stream. Elsewhere, Angel takes the time to rescue Karma, but she apparently dies in his arms.

Blink teleports the X-Men to the pens, and they fight some soldiers. After the fight, Gambit pulls the Dark Beast out of some rubble to use him to get into Apocalypse’s base. In another part of the city, Cyclops and Jean Grey are leading the prisoners of the pens to freedom. Unknown to them, Cyclops’ jealous brother Havok is following them. At the same time, Angel flies into a defense tower carrying a load of explosives, freeing up the way for the X-Men, and making it possible for Nate Grey to escape.

The Shadow King tells Apocalypse that the southwest territories have been bombed; Apocalypse prepares for reprisals. He’s about to finish off Magneto when Nate Grey shows up and attacks. Magneto finds his helmet, and the two prepare to battle Apocalypse and Holocaust.

Blink teleports the X-Men to the chamber holding the M’kraan crystal, and another fight begins. Destiny glimpses the regular universe in the crystal and announces that she, Bishop, and Illyana are the only ones who can approach it. Holocaust and Nate fall through the ceiling, and Magneto approaches his X-Men. He gives a speech about the necessity of sacrifice and the fate of the universe. Colossus has issues with his sister potentially being sacrificed, but the X-Men begin fighting anyways.

Outside, Jean projects a telekinetic shield to try to protect the prisoners from the bombs that have been triggered by the Human governments. Wolverine, known as Weapon X, makes it through the shield with a parachute. Nate beats down Holocaust some more.

In the midst of the main battle, the Sugar Man escapes from Colossus’ boot to the M’kraan crystal, so he’ll show up later in our universe. Colossus freaks out and decides that he has to be with his sister. Iceman tries to stop him, but Peter shatters him. Gambit attacks him to hold him off. At the crystal, Destiny tells Illyana to use her powers to create a portal for Bishop to go through.

At the Human High Council in Europe, Apocalypse’s defense grid is attacking England. Magneto busts in on Apocalypse and creates a suit of armor out of stray pieces of metal. However, Magneto is forced to hesitate because Guido is holding his son. Outside, Havok attacks and kills Cyclops and Jean. Weapon X kills Havok, and then sits by Jean as she passes away. Logan is reminded of a legend about the Phoenix.

Bishop travels back to the moment right before Xavier jumped in front of Legion. He’s about to interfere when he is stopped by himself from the past.

Back in the AOA, Morph is injured, and Dark Beast makes his way to a teleportation device. Quicksilver quickly scrambles the coordinates, since Dark Beast’s destination is the crystal. Shadowcat decides to get in front of Colossus, hoping their love will stop Colossus’ rage. Instead, he accidentally kills her, and Gambit in turn kills him. Peter apologizes to his sister, but Quicksilver is forced to intervene and save Illyana from enemy guards.

Rogue uses her powers to remove Guido’s mass and rescue her son. Nate Grey attacks Apocalypse and steals a shard of the M’kraan crystal that the villain was holding. In the past, Bishop beats up his past self and tackles Legion out of the way. Bishop stabs himself with Legion’s energy blade, absorbing and redirecting the energy until it consumes Legion. Legion sees the Age of Apocalypse and apologizes, saying he only wanted to help. Legion dies, and the past X-Men are sent back to the present. Charles, Magneto, and Gabrielle forget all about the recent events in Legion Quest, although they all have a sense as if something important just occurred.

Magneto and Nate have Apocalypse on the ropes, but Holocaust interrupts the fight by shooting Nate. Nate has no choice but to stab Holocaust with the M’kraan shard, sending them both into the regular Marvel Universe. Apocalypse wonders why Magneto isn’t fighting back, but it is because he is concentrating. Magneto tears Apocalypse in half, then walks off to spend his final moments with his family before the nuclear weapons go off. He takes the time to thank Charles Xavier for changing his life.

How It Was: Well, it’s double-sized, shiny, and there’s not an advertisement to be seen in it. Nevertheless, it still feels really rushed as Lobdell tries to plow through the storylines of nine books in one single finale, plus the whole Age of Apocalypse story has to be resolved so that everything can revert back to normal next month. So this book goes at a pretty fast pace. A lot of inconsequential characters like Dazzler and Exodus completely disappear because there isn’t enough room for them, and poor Roger Cruz already has more than enough characters to draw. A lot of other characters are left up in the air; Morph gets injured, but we never see what happens to him. Nightcrawler and Jubilee get forced into the background as nothing but fighters.

All the same, there are some really awesome moments in this issue. Rather than discuss them all, because it is a really big book, I think I’ll list my favorites.

1. Colossus accidentally kills Kitty Pryde
2. Magneto rips Apocalypse in half.
3. Magneto and Nate Grey vs. Holocaust and Apocalypse.
4. Weapon X avenges Jean.
5. Nate Grey to Apocalypse, “This is for Forge!”

I will elaborate on my number one pick. I can see how many would see Colossus’ reactions as out of character, but I think that given his reactions to Illyana’s death in the Marvel Universe, his behavior isn’t that far-fetched. I mean Illyana’s death pushed Peter to join the evil Magneto’s Acolytes and later he sacrifices himself to help cure the Legacy Virus (much, much later, we’ll get to it). Plus you throw in the fact that his students all died under his care, and I think it’s perfectly natural for AOA Colossus to become overwhelmed by his emotions. And the speech he gives to Illyana as he’s dying is so well done down to the part where he wants her to stay with him, but she can’t.

Not every moment is solid. The fact is that the only way that this story could have any impact on the greater X-universe was to have some of the characters make it back to the normal universe; the ways in which these characters make it to the Marvel Universe are rather contrived, and none of them have had any groundbreaking moments in the last decade or so. Yes, X-Man had his own book for a while, but most X-collectors never really bothered with it, and it rarely affected the wider X-Men franchise.

I must say that the end is superb; I love how the panel is engulfed in white and you’re left to figure out if it’s a nuclear holocaust or reality fixing itself. And while the story doesn’t have very many ramifications for the characters, it is a well-constructed story with a solid direction that opened a lot of possibilities for writers to play with the characters and themes of the X-Men and present them in a new light.

B+