After a fun detour of three titles, we are back to our bookends.
We get a flashback to Miles and his mentor, Mister E, who is telling Miles of his destiny. Mister E isn’t thrilled with how Miles’ friends, Illyana, and Laura, are always distracting him.
In the present, Miles, now the Scarlet Spider, is engulfing the planet in crimson.
Illyana, Legion, must know the Scarlet Spider. He was proud that he stopped Laura from becoming the Vision, but actually, he is the Vision.
Colossus, who is a giant sized X-Manifestation, wants to usher in an age of heroes. Since he is still around, we know Laura wasn’t killed, which is a huge relief.
Laura is no longer X-Tremis, she is now . . . Weapon Phoen-X. (Get it?)
We find out Scarlet Spider’s mentor was actually . . . Blackheart.
In another flashback, we see Ilayana bragging on her big bro, being the best of the X-Men, even better than Storm. It would have been pretty cool to get an X-Men title in this event. Well, besides the two bookends, and Ghostlocke. I suppose we got plenty of X-Men in this event.
Weapon Phoen-X makes two attacks. The first to Scarlet Spider, and then apologizes to Legion for the second.
It appears that Laura sacrificed herself to restore Miles, but we mustn’t forgot that she was going by Phoen-X just a few pages ago.
I suppose Laura was apologizing to Legion for the upgrade as now Illyana is . . . Phoenix Supreme! She looks awesome here.
Phoenix Supreme starts cleansing Blackheart.
Before she can clearly defeat him, he attempts one last move, and opens an infinite void.
Illyana doesn’t have complete control over the Phoenix, as she just got it, but Miles jumps in to try to sacrificed himself.
Together Miles and Illyana take the fight to Blackheart.
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That top panel is pretty cool, combining both the Phoenix and Spider imagery.
Illyana hints that they didn’t defeat Blackheart alone.
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I love this chat with the Phoenix and Illyana so much, the Phoenix is so tired of human business.
Plus, Illyana is riding her yokai, Lockheed!
The Phoenix agrees to help Illyana as she loves to fight as much as she love to sleep.
Issue ends with Miles creating a shrine for Laura, who shows up as her own version of a yokai.
We get two pages where we see the cast of the other three one-shots, which I’m sure is nice for the writers who didn’t have to incorporate those stories, they just had to show the character designs.
I definitely liked the first issue more, as it had a lot more of Lockheed, but at least we got one panel of him this issue.
The coloring this issue was breathtakingly beautiful!
Northern Italy, a location no map shows. Three centuries ago. La Cattedrale oi Ferro. The Iron Cathedral. A ritual is performance.
A frecciorossa train in Northern Italy, three centuries later. Rogue, Gambit, Gabriel, and Repent are traveling together. Repent is quite thirsty, and apparently has a demon inside him, but a nicer one than the one Gambit has inside him.
Apparently Repent’s mother died during child birth, which is super sad, and she had a demon inside of her, so when she died, it transferred over to Repent. He tired to perform his own exorcist, costing himself an arm, an eye, and his sanity. I checked, and he has one black eye, and one red eye.
Monet is on day three of leading the Uncanny X-Men, and they find themselves fighting a big bruiser of a guy, Calamity.
Logan, who Monet thinks of as a Canadian, but the way she does it, feels loaded. Logan confirms that Calamity is a 22 year old, who isn’t being mind controlled. Calamity was one of the mutants held captive, until he got promoted to tormentor. With that knowledge, Logan attacks Calamity, berserker rage style.
I really appreciate that Monet isn’t tempted to stop Logan, these are child traffickers. Monet gets the killing move on Calamity.
Monet is tearful that she gets to free the children. Though I can’t help but think about how she was cool with holding mutants prisoner who were just being a little loud in public.
Rogue and company make it to the Iron Cathedral. Repent explain the world has always known mutants, which makes sense as we are well aware of Apocalypse and Selene. Like modern mutants, the ones from centuries ago were hunted as they were feared. Some died here, while trying to cast out demons that didn’t exist.
Rogue threatens to kill Repent if Gambit is hurt. Repent doesn’t seem too concerned.
We learn that Repent’s mutant power is to transmute liquid, any liquid, into holy water. One of those classic mutant powers that is created out of the situation the mutant needed most.
Wyren arrives, claiming the underworld hates two things, mutants and priests. Rogue uses her mutant power to transfer the demon to her, so that Gambit is weakened, and can have the other Eye of Agamotto carved out of his chest.
Louisiana. A guard is freaking out about all of the uncaged mutants, gross, and Jubilee swiftly kicks him. Then she destroys the house they were in.
I like Nightcrawler and Quicksilver working together, plus the green & white looks great with the black & red in these panels.
Kurt says that not every evil wears capes, which is a silly take on that expression.
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Always great to see Ember and the New Mutants joining into the battle.
The land owner tries to flee in his fancy limo, but Howler is there to finish the job.
Howler is justified, but is also sad about the whole thing, Logan tells him it is okay. I love that it is Becca who holds Howler.
I love how the local police show up, recognize the situation completely, and not going to do anything more than give Monet a citation, maybe.
Issue ends with Gambit free of demons, or at the very least, this demon.
Variant Cover Annie Wu, I took a chance on the Muppets variant cover, and was treated to Emma Frost and Miss Piggy, so that was the right choice.
Shadow Play, Part 3
Our Monthly dose of Kitty Pryde, let’s see how much of her we get!
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I do like how this is the title that gives us all of the mutants.
I like how Kitty is the one to approach Wither. Psylocke confirms Wither’s psi-imprint is darker now.
Logan, on the other hand, is being a real jerk, and being rude to Blade.
Blade is fully aware that only his mind is here, but is willing to make Logan bleed. Logan is still holding onto Blood Hunt resentment. Logan clearly doesn’t share my philosophy that we can’t hold characters responsible for their actions during a crossover.
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We see Kitty’s blue glove as Emma calms everybody down. She wants some answers.
Wither is involved in something that Blade attempted to help out with.
I like how Wither has turned to scriptures to express himself in Atlanta.
Wither was attacked by vampires, and turned, so not only does he have a death touch, he also can turn people into vampires, so he can do some touching?
He was about to turn someone when Bloodline, Blade’s daughter, shows up to stop him.
She suspects Wither is the one who killed all of these people, and he tries to explain it, but she just wants to end him, so he puts her into the ground. I’m not sure why her blade didn’t kill Wither, or at least punctured him.
Wither does explain the situation. His vampire powers are messing with his mutant powers, so he has to wait for people to die, then suck the blood as his powers would destroy their organic matter. Which does line up with how I understand his powers, so good job Ewing and Narcisse for taking the time, and explaining this.
Bloodline offers a temporary, and very uneasy, partnership. They can’t hurt each other, so she invites him over to her mom’s house. He’s lucky her father wasn’t here for this nonsense.
Bloodline and Wither attack the vampires, and Blade shows up, and he kills the vampires. Their boss is a mutant vampire, which I like Jubilee quickly saying, it happens. That’s funny.
Blade further explains that the mutant isn’t a real vampire, but a copycat. She comes around vampires, temporarily gets the bite powers, uses it to make more vampires, who are loyal to her.
Prodigy tries to explain to Wither that now isn’t a great time, as they are dealing with their own shadowy darkness.
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I like Kitty and Psylocke hanging out, as Blade explains he doesn’t need the X-Men, he’s just here as Wither asked him to attempt this exchange.
We get Dani Moonstar!!! In an awesome splash page reveal. She’s willing to help Blade. Prodigy will join the team, and since they’re in England, Dani believes they can get Chamber to help.
Blade misses no time in making sure everyone knows he is in charge.
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Iceman is going to check on Magik and Nightcrawler’s class, as he’s being very fussy. Kitty isn’t sure if now is the best time for that.
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I love so much whenever Magik and Nightcrawler hang out, and them teaching together is such a treat!
Magik is so much more than a goth raver with a giant sword! She also has a lot more infernal aura than Kurt.
I love Mal and Gabby, I mean Scout, chatting about Shadow King. Mal wants to know, and Scout offers up a quick sheet about him. He’s evil, a telepath, lies, and makes you doubt yourself and others. Yep, that’s the Shadow King. Plus, a nice reference to Krakoa as Gabby did have to deal with him over in New Mutants V4.
The issue ends with Bloodline, and her captures, Justina – who is wearing a very cute red bow in her hair, and the vampire who created Blade.
This was a solid issue! No Marigold, but that’s okay.
I would have bought the Geoff Shaw Fall Fantasies variant cover, if I had seen it by the time I had to submit my DCBS preorder.
We see the full conversation Chairman Beast and Magneto had, where Beast offers him a place on 3K. We are actually in Magneto’s dreamscape, so he is visited by Xavier. It is nice to get a bit of a recap of Resurrection of Magneto, with his wall of names he’s killed.
We get a different take on what could have happened on The Iron Night, where he just collapses, and dies, so this issue is pretty much Magneto’s It’s A Wonderful Life.
Without him living, 70s Beast continues his other experiments. Oya moved on from her Krakoa torment. Ben Liu didn’t have a mentor, so I guess Magneto has been doing more with them than we’ve been treated to.
We are reminded there was a Second Iron Night, when Myraid grew large and in charge, and attacked Merle. Was Magneto important to that fight? I can’t remember, he must have been.
Without Magneto, when Glob Herman was shot (apparently he will always be shot), Quentin Quire and Oya simply burn through Merle. Which brings missiles to Merle.
Xavier questions why Magneto was given the future virus, which I also have questioned, but figured we’ll find out eventually. Magneto suspects it is because he is the Master of Metal, and like metal, he must endure. I guess this is a reason?
Magneto wants to know if this was the real Xavier, but he plays it coy.
Variant Cover Skottie Young, I would have gone with the Dike Ruan or Tony S. Daniel variants that both have Magik on them, but they didn’t reveal those in time for my DCBS order to be submitted.
Issue opens with Agent Lundqvist hanging out in Juniper, looking at the Trask statue that Juggernaut spent an entire day not breaking.
I love it when characters speak in logo. Do you think it sounds differently?
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Juggernaut fights Galatea, who I’m glad we are name checking people. Cyclops tells them to switch, so now Magik is fighting Galatea.
Psylocke fights Psychovore.
The Baxter Building. New York City. Drs. Richards, 70s Beast, and Ben are still chatting about Magneto. Apparently no two mutants share that much DNA, because of their powers, which maybe makes sense? Magneto’s powers are making it so they can’t treat him properly, or remove the Age of Revelation virus code. Just like how Kate Pryde’s phasing power messed up her resurrection.
Reed needs Human Torch and Ben Grimm here to perform a radical operation. I imagine it is because he views all problems through a lens of how can the Fantastic Four solve this?
3K Mothership. Grimm and Johnny are fighting Joseph.
Chairman Beast knows that Cyclsop’ inside man is Schwarzschild, which I figured was the case last issue. He’s just not that much of an inside man, as he’s not on the mothership. Chairman Beast can’t launch the virus because of a computer error, so Wyre has to do it manually.
Psylocke defeats Psychovore with a poison thought, as she’s awesome.
Oya is fighting Juice, so we get to see a cool ice versus water battle. Cyclops helps in this fight.
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Constellation is down.
I like Magik giving Galatea one more chance to surrender, but she’s not one to ever surrender. She can do this all day.
Wyre shows up to manually release the virus, but Juggernaut has been wrecking the place.
I like Johnny making fun of the knock off versions of Magneto and Beast. He doesn’t know Astra, but is assured she is a knock off of somebody, which is very funny.
Chairman Beast does NOT find this funny, as she’s the original Beast.
I do like that Johnny takes the time to recognized that even he is a knock off of the Jim Hammond Human Torch. So, we’re just having lots of fun here.
Johnny performs the Clean Room Protocol and burns all of the oxygen in the room, which doesn’t hurt Grimm at all. I’ve read that he’s essentially immortal, which is very interesting, and sad, as he has quite the family.
Cyclops walks into the room to declare he has defeated 3K. I love these two chatting, this should be the event. Chairman Beast recognizes the weakness of 3K, and now wants the X-Men to help him.
Turns out Chairman Beast had a backup plan. He releases the virus through the Trask statue, which I knew they should have teleported it away when they had the chance. Or at the very least, put a dome around it.
Kitty Pryde and the cast of Astonishing X-Men (Volume 3) are confronting Orbis Stellar, one of Sinister’s alts, the spade one. That’s fun seeing a Krakoa villain in an earlier story.
Logan claws right through him, as Orbis isn’t our main villain here. I’m not that familiar with Orbis Stellar, outside of his design.
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I just love how the X-Men are more annoyed with Logan than anything else. Did he have to do that this way? Probably not. Let’s try not to get someone else’s blood all over your teammates.
Kitty is looking for the egg that brough them here. She offers to phase through some doors, but Beast wants a moment to hack the system. If he can’t do it, he’ll place himself back with the Avengers. I miss Kitty and Beast being pals, so much.
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They were looking for Phoenix eggs, which I guess is a thing, and instead,, found some other sort of egg. dun dun DUNNN
Cyclops’ ‘alert,’ would make for such a great final word, but Beast gets to start a “you look inter,’ then we skip a week, so this explains why Kitty isn’t in the solicitations for the rest of the series. At least she gets a great back up feature that we’ll get to below.
One Week Later, Xavier’s School for Gifted Youngsters. The Blackbird is back, and attached to a bigger ship.
Xavier and Multiple Man are watching the duo ship enter the atmosphere.
We get to see our cast for the issue – Storm (who is completely bald, which isn’t her typical look), Rogue, Psylocke, Hope Summers, Jubilee, Cannonball, Gambit, Nightcrawler, and Colossus.
Storm is wishing she had gone on the mission, but Hope tells her that no mission needs two great leaders.
The ships crash, and instead of the X-Men, we get . . . Xenomorphs!
Poor Cannonball, he was saying his classic line of how he is nigh invulnerable when he’s . . . and he gets got.
Xenomophs acid spit is strong enough to melt Colossus’ metal arm, so we now know that.
One of the Xenomorphs has adamantium claws, so that’s happening. I wonder if we can tell which one Kitty birthed?
One of the Xenomorphs grabs Madrox, because of course they do, his mutant power really is perfect for villains.
We see the Xenomorphs have brought Madrox to Logan, who is also a perfect vessel for more eggs. Logan offers to put Madrox out of his misery, but right before he knows he is in misery, so he hesitated. Which is the greatest commandment, Thou Shall Not Hesitate.
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Ugh, we see Kitty’s dead body, so unfortunately, she is done with the main story. But don’t worry, dear readers, we still have that backup.
Because of Emma is Mother, we see there is a Queen Xenomorph, who also has diamond powers, so good luck there.
Logan births another baby Alien.
Xavier and Storm talk about how these are not the Brood, so that’s nice to address that. They are knockoffs of the Brood, and more feral.
Beast left a recording, and thought he had taken care of the threat.
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Turns out, there is a Xenomorph that is worst than one with adamantium claws or diamond skin, one who can phase through walls. There is no escaping that one.
And now that we think about it, the Mansion is locked down, but not to one that can phase through walls.
This segment ends with a new team arriving – Deadpool, Sage (maybe?), Cable (with a beard), Bishop, and Abigail Brand, who should be doubly invested in stopping this as they killed Hank.
. . .
Writer Chris Claremont
Artist Dave Messina
Color Artist Rain Beredo
Letterer VC’s Travis Lanham
I was really really hoping that someone would remember that Lockheed is the Brood’s greatest nightmare, so he should be involved in a story involving Brood knockoffs.
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Of course, Chris Claremont would remember that. This story takes place during the time Kate Pryde was attending the University of Chicago, working on her doctoral thesis. She is a bartender at Belles of Hell, and sometimes Lockheed is with her at college, and sometimes, he isn’t, and this time . . . he is!
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Kate is surprised by a visit of a Brood Queen Angel. The Brood Queen claims Lockheed trusts her, but I’m not sure of that.
The Brood Queen wants to work with Kate to deal with a greater threat.
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The Brood Queen is very impress with Kate, she has great skills, and of course, in the right place, and right time, and has great instincts. Plus, Kate has a reputation, and hope.
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Kate needs Rachel, as this is written by Claremont.
The Brood Queen teleports them to the Danger Room, where we see Gambit (I imagine so someone, me, will tell people to check out Claremont’s Gambit Wanted), Gambit has a face hugger on his . . . face. Rachel, no facehugger, and Logan, who does have a facehugger.
I looked it up, facehuggers are the second step in the Xenomorph life cycle, and are called, Ovomorphs.
We hear Magik’s voice, and we see that she turned Lockheed into a gauntlet, which seems very rude. Though he does make for an interesting looking gauntlet.
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I can’t believe we are given a backup story, written by Chris Claremont, that features Kate Pryde, Lockheed, and Magik! Plus, Rachel!
Illyana claims Lockheed is her dragon, and transformed him like she will transform Kate.
Illyana even changed Kate’s outfit to be her yellow and blue suit, instead of her X-Treme X-Men suit.
Kate is very much looking forward to turning evil with Illyana.
This entire page is very charged.
Plus, now my mind is racing about how this places Rachel into the role of good girl to Illyana’s bad, and Kitty having to choose between them. While the entire time, Lockheed is a gauntlet, for some reason. Let him be a dragon!
Oh, and Illyana mentions how her new friends have done something to her, so more on that later, as she’s definitely not showing any signs of becoming a Xenomorph.
It is interesting that Jeph Loeb isn’t writing the fallout of X-Men of Apocalypse, but leaving that to Steve Orlando. I wonder if that mini had a different ending, and they decided to add an extra page to set up this mini. This is the mini where Age of Apocalypse Gambit switches lives with 616 Gambit.
Issue opens with the Uncanny X-Men (Jubilee, Monet, Nightcrawler, Rogue, and Quicksilver) fighting a giant amoeba, when AoA Gambit arrives. In a very gross choice, Gambit goes in for a kiss with Rogue, but she stops him, immediately, as that’s not her husband. But why would he even attempt a kiss with her? This was the fans concern, that our Rogue would be tricked into being with this Gambit, and Orlando is smart to immediately shut this fear down, and hard.
We see 616 Gambit (or Wyrn, maybe?) in AoA, and AoA Rogue and Magneto seem to be chatting with Remy like they don’t realize a switch has happened. 616 Gambit wants to know where Annalee is, which is interesting.
AoA Gambit meets up with 616 Vig, hinting that there is an AoA Vig, who is also gross to deal with. They fight fight fight.
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We get a flashback to the Mutant Massacre, the first one, where we see Callisto, Storm, Colossus, Rogue, Logan, and Nightcrawler. There is a lady with short hair between Storm and Colossus, and they are clearly coming out of a stepping disc. Does this issue make it to the collection?
So, 616 Gambit made the choice to switch, as he feels compelled to save the AoA Morlocks, due to his eternal guilt over his involvement in the Mutant Massacre? That does seem worth of a miniseries. Though a lot of work to set up this miniseries, and an interesting choice to not just have two Gambits working together, but I guess it is also an exploration of 616 characters’ opinions on Gambit that we see through AoA Gambit?
We’re off to an interesting start.
Do we think Gambit plays a major role in Avengers Doomsday, and that’s why we are getting all of these Gambit miniseries?
Jubilee drops Logan off at what appears to be a giant mansion. Logan confirms he can smell Glob Herman, Madrox, and others, would be nice to know who else Infernal Hulk has, but from what I can remember, it is those two named characters.
Infernal Hulk references how Damacus was ages ago, but Logan doesn’t remember that. For pages upon pages, which looks very cool, Logan and Infernal Hulk fight, tearing large parts of their flesh off. Then Jubilee shows up, and Logan gets very concerned.
I am reminded that this is the same Jubilee that went head first into danger in Tomb of Apocalypse 1, so I guess this is a new character trait of hers. She is tired of being on the sidelines.
Jubilee blows up instead a great light, who we hear the voice of Angler come out. Logan’s true curse is to outlive everyone, and probably be there when he loses everyone. The bright light eventually turns into Captain Marvel. Iron Man sent her to find The One Above All, and came back with Nick Fury Sr, so now Hulk War is truly in danger.
This comic has a friendly Time Bomb, and 3K X-Men have a deadly Time Bomb. That’s interesting.
Wolverine explains to Time Bomb how The Quiet Council made some decisions, but no one is going to lock up Time Bomb for learning how to use her powers. She could also take a second to explain who there is no more Quiet Council.
We see a giant hole in the floor, that reveals a secret stairwell inside a secret lab, which is never good.
I love how Logan is getting along with the Generates. Gabby thinks Wolverine and Logan should hang back, as they are adults, and Nanny’s whole deal is to protect young mutants. They both say, No, at the same time, and Logan says he rather be an adult than the alternative. With guesses like, a baby, or dead, and Logan smirks that he’s been both a baby, and dead. Which is funny, and also, it is weird being an X-Man.
I’m so happy we kept the Krakoa Nanny redesign, with the lips. Why would we ever get rid of that?
Is Nanny always this huge? She’s like two Logans combined. Wolverine notices Nanny seems off, as starts asking questions.
I love Wolverine trying to rationalize with Nanny. She asks Nanny, who she is calling, Elenor, to humanize her, for help. Nanny mistakes help for raising, and becomes very intrigued.
Nanny recaps, in song, how her and Peter, Orphan Maker, got to this lab, which is very fun.
Logan is a lot of fun this issue. Laura wants to split the team, Logan stays with the Generates, and Laura & Gabby went with Nanny. They see all of the babies, and Laura is trying to piece everything together. Then Port opens a portal, and Logan an the Generates arrive. He was outnumbered.
I also like how Time Bomb is confused by the names, Arnold & Tabitha, as she is used to numbers being used for names.
Logan is going to make some calls, to see where the babies came from, which I’m sure whoever he call is going to have some issues with Nanny.
Issue ends with X-Infinite approaching a sleeping Lobster armored gal, so we’re not quite done with him. But first, we have a road trip to plan.
