The X-Axis – 23 September 2026
WOLVERINE #28. (Annotations here.) By current standards, this is a busy week – two ongoing titles, two miniseries and a oneshot. Neither of the two ongoings is on particularly good form, though. Wolverine‘s main selling point is some decent interior art from Martín Cóccolo, who really does draw a nice-looking Mexican restaurant, and can make Eagle Plaza feel plausibly city-centre. The giant holographic Forge is nicely done as well. But the point of the story seems mainly to be to set up Lady Deathstrike in a new version of her “obsessed with adamantium” set-up, which both feels like a step backward for the character, and doesn’t even make sense – her father didn’t create adamantium, he created a process for bonding it to the skeleton. That’s the whole reason why she used to be obsessed specifically with Wolverine and not, say, Ultron. And there are some wonky plot mechanics going on here where the idea seems to be that she’s manipulated Wolverine into breaking into the adamantium storage room for her, judging from dialogue, but nothing actually seems to happen to back that up. I do still like Cóccolo’s art on this book, but it’s all a bit half baked otherwise.
GENERATION X-23 #8. (Annotations here.) This is a book I generally really like, but this particular issue is a bit of a misfire. The basic idea that the individual Generated might actually have started as abducted children rather than being created in a lab is perfectly fine – it would give the book somewhere to go next. The problems with this issue are more to do with the fact that the Generated themselves get very little space to do anything, and the Nanny / Orphan-Maker plot feels weirdly incomplete. This book looks to be ending with issue #10, so it’s entirely possible that the story has been cut short in order to get on to something else. But what we get seems to boil down to Nanny seizing control of the facility in order to treat some vaguely-specified injury to Peter, Nanny discovering a bunch of babies (and surely “who was looking after them” is an obvious enough question that someone should have asked it), Nanny initially defending them, and then Nanny just dumping them on the heroes and leaving – presumably taking Peter with her, because nobody suggests otherwise. On top of that, guest artist Emilio Laiso seems to have some extremely odd ideas about how big Nanny is (which I’m assuming is because nobody sent him the correct references), and there’s a big deal about an underground stairwell where everyone goes down and just comes straight back up again. Definitely an off month.
Generation X-23 #8 annotations
GENERATION X-23 #8
“Human Resources”
Writer: Jody Houser
Artist: Emilio Laiso
Colour artist: Erick Arciniega
Letterer: Ariana Maher
Editor: Mark Basso & Alanna Smith
COVER: Laura and Gabby in action against a mostly off-panel Nanny, with a battered Logan lagging behind.
PAGES 1-3. Laura and co find a massive hole in Facility-23.
Laura’s narration on page 1 is just a recap of the previous issue. As I pointed out before, Laura is apparently unaware that Nanny and Orphan-Maker escaped from the Pit in Sabretooth #5 (2022), and then went on to appear in Sabretooth & The Exiles. Logan also talks later on as if he thinks they were both last seen in the Pit. I’m not entirely convinced that anyone working on this comic knows about the Sabretooth stories, but fortunately, nothing really turns on it.
Wolverine isn’t healing because this story takes place between Wolverine #21-22, at which point his healing factor is suppressed by nanotech. There’s no particular plot reason for him refusing to explain this – he evidently just doesn’t want to talk about it and get interrogated. Most other books have ignored this storyline (which is now over), but for this book’s purposes, it’s actually quite handy that he can’t try to dominate the scene.
Wolverine #28 annotations
WOLVERINE vol 8 #28
“Reforged”
Writer: Saladin Ahmed
Artist: Martín Cóccolo
Colour artist: Jesus Aburtov
Letterer: Cory Petit
Editor: Mark Basso
COVER: Just a Wolverine pin-up.
PAGES 1-2. Wolverine and Forge have dinner.
Yeah, I feel like going back to this format for a while.
The previous issue ended with Wolverine deciding that he should have the adamantium restored to his right-hand claws. Understandably, he’s approached Forge to sort this out for him. Forge was closely associated with X-Force during the Krakoan era, and he’s as good a choice as anyone to sort this out. We’re also told later on that he has “the world’s only store of liquefied adamantium on the planet” (sic). This is the first significant appearance he’s made post-Krakoa, although he did have cameos in X-Men: Hellfire Vigil and X-Men United #1. No, of course it isn’t, what was I thinking? It’s his first appearance since the previous run of X-Force, and he’s looking rather happier than he was in those issues.
Forge is back living in Eagle Plaza in Dallas, which was his home base in his early appearances back in 1980s Uncanny X-Men. We did see it briefly during that X-Force run. The name “Aerie” for Forge’s penthouse also dates from around that period, I think.
Daredevil Villains #88: Lifeform
DAREDEVIL ANNUAL #6 (1990)
“Predator”
Writer, colourist: Gregory Wright
Artist: Cam Kennedy
Letterer: Richard Starkings
Editor: Ralph Macchio
We may have finished Ann Nocenti’s run, but we aren’t moving on to DG Chichester just yet. It’s time to check in on Daredevil Annual.
The last character that we covered from a Daredevil Annual was the Mind-Master, who debuted in Annual #4, way back in 1976. After that, Daredevil didn’t get another annual for over a decade. But in 1989, the book got another annual. Daredevil Annual #5 was a tie-in to the line-wide “Atlantis Attacks” event, with Tyrannus and Viper as the guest villains, and as such, it doesn’t concern us. It may be most notable for being misnumbered as a second Daredevil Annual #4. (The version on Marvel Unlimited has corrected the number.) But it must have done okay, since further Daredevil Annuals continued to appear through to 1994, all of them written by Gregory Wright.
For 1990, instead of a single line-wide event across the annuals, Marvel opted for crossovers among smaller groups of titles. Most of those groupings made sense. “Days of Futures Present” had the X-Men, the New Mutants, X-Factor and the Fantastic Four, in a story about Franklin Richards from the Days of Future Past timeline. “Terminus Factor” had Iron Man, Captain America, Thor, Avengers and West Coast Avengers. The three Spider-Man annuals did their own story. And that left…
Um. Well, it left Daredevil, Punisher, Incredible Hulk and Silver Surfer. Natural bedfellows, I think you’ll agree.
The X-Axis – 16 September 2026
DNX #1. (Annotations here.) I’m really not sure how Cyclops’ jaw is meant to work on that cover. Or where the light’s coming from if it’s glistening on both sides of his visor at once, come to think of it. But anyway. This event seems to be the climax of the 3K storyline that’s been running throughout Jed MacKay’s X-Men run. And I’m rather relieved to see it being kept to just X-Men and a couple of issues of Fantastic Four – DNX, after all, seems to be basically just extra issues of X-Men. But where “Age of Revelation” went wrong was in trying to turn the middle act of an X-Men storyline into a linewide event. By all means let’s keep it focussed.
This first issue is basically the X-Men showing up to stop 3K from releasing the X-virus in Philadelphia, while 3K continue to squabble amongst themselves, and the Alaskan Beast tries to get the Fantastic Four to help out with the plot. It’s fairly straightforward stuff, but I enjoy Federico Vicentini’s art, particularly on the Chairman. There’s a nice angle here with the way he can’t seem to understand why a bunch of people he only enlisted as an alliance of convenience to get this point are looking over their shoulders now that they’re about to become expendable. Despite being openly manipulative with them, he can’t understand why they aren’t true believers.
X-Men #37 annotations
X-MEN vol 7 #37
“Psi-War”
Writer: Jed MacKay
Penciller: Netho Diaz
Inker: Sean Parsons
Colourist: Arthur Hesli
Letterer: Clayton Cowles
Editor: Tom Brevoort
COVER: Kid Omega and Cassandra Nova fight in the mindscape.
This is a DNX tie-in issue.
PAGE 1. Kid Omega prepares to fight Cassandra.
This is technically a flashback to “three minutes ago” – i.e., immediately before Kid Omega attacks Cassandra during the scene in pages 11-13 of DNX #1. Page 16 of DNX #1 (where Kid Omega confronts Cassandra in the mindscape) takes place between pages 1-2 of this story, and the rest of the issue picks up from there.
He’s speaking telepathically with someone who isn’t identified at this stage, but since she goes on to say that “you’ve got backup” at the start of page 2, we can take it that this is the character he calls in as back-up later in the issue.
DNX #1 annotations
DNX #1
Writer: Jed MacKay
Artist: Federico Vicentini
Colour artist: David Curiel
Letterer: Clayton Cowles
Editor: Tom Brevoort
COVER: The X-Men and the Fantastic Four facing the camera, basically. The art is by Kaare Andrews.
DNX is a crossover running through this five-issue miniseries, X-Men #37-41 and Fantastic Four #17-18. X-Men #37 also comes out this week.
This feels like a story more suited to the scene-by-scene format, so let’s go with that. I’ll use the story pages, since Amazon’s reader still persists in listing every comic as starting at page 2.
PAGE 1. Cyclops recaps the Age of Revelation.
This page is essentially a recap of the “Age of Revelation” event, set mostly in a future timeline in which Revelation had released a “X-Virus” that turned some humans into mutants, and killed the rest. The future Cyclops and Beast attempted to swap minds with their present-day counterparts in order to kill Revelation before any of this could happen, but accidentally swapped places with the original Beast – the Chairman of 3K – instead.
Daredevil Villains #87: Shotgun
DAREDEVIL #272-273 (November 1989)
“Liberation” / “The Billion Dollar Ashtray”
Writer: Ann Nocenti
Penciller: John Romita Jr
Inker: Al Williamson
Colourist: Max Scheele
Letterer: Joe Rosen
Editor: Ralph Macchio
There’s still a way to go in the Ann Nocenti run after these issues, but this is where we leave it. While she created a string of new characters in the early part of her run, the later issues feature longer storylines and returning or guest villains, with a couple of one-off stories about everyday bad people along the way.
So, to be specific, issue #274 has Skip Ash as the villain. Issues #275-276 are an Acts of Vengeance tie-in, with guest villain Ultron. Issue #277 is a one-off story about a manipulative psychiatrist. Issues #278-282 feature Mephisto and Blackheart. Issue #283 guest stars Captain America, and the villains are assorted corporations. Issues #284-290 are a Bullseye storyline. And her final issue, issue #291, has Bullet.
Which means that for us, Ann Nocenti’s run draws to a close with the entirely unrepresentative figure of Shotgun. These two issues are part of the Number Nine storyline, which we’ve already looked at in the context of Skip Ash. As you’ll remember, Skip is a factory farmer who’s doing illegal operations for the CIA on the side. But he’s also got a laboratory which is altering women to make them “perfect”, and one of them, Number Nine, has been freed by his semi-estranged daughter Brandy. Since this is still a superhero comic, Skip calls in some favours from his government contacts to try and get Number Nine back. And so they send Shotgun to help out.
The X-Axis – 9 September 2026
WOLVERINE #27. (Annotations here.) Another quiet week, then. Just the two books. It’s been a long time since we were getting this sort of week on a regular basis. It’s quite refreshing, to be honest.
That said, even without much in the way of competition, Wolverine continues to underwhelm. This is a weirdly half-formed story. Saladin Ahmed spent an age setting up the first Adamantine storyline, and presenting the resolution as an epic battle. That story ends with Wolverine somehow losing the adamantium on his right-hand claws. And now, about six issues later, we get the Adamantine coming back for a dashed-off two-parter. There’s no apparent rhyme or reason to this – it really does seem to be Wolverine and some of his counterparts being arbitrarily yanked to another dimension so that they can fight the Adamantine again and summarily dispatch it. There’s nothing apparently at stake, and no real explanation of why we shouldn’t expect him back in another few months.
Inglorious X-Force #9
INGLORIOUS X-FORCE #9
“A Force to be Conflicted”
Writer: Tim Seeley
Artist: Michael Sta. Maria
Colour artist: Romulo Fajardo Jr
Letterer: Joe Caramagna
Editors: Mark Basso & Alanna Smith
COVER: The two X-Force teams fight.
X-FORCE:
Cable. The entity that’s been possessing him throughout this series is named Catharsix. Cable remains oblivious to the fact that he’s possessed; his own dictaphone recordings actually show him talking to himself, but he apparently can’t register the other voice.
The previous issue ended with another time slip, in which Cable’s mind appeared to be transported to the Askani timeline, somewhere amongst the flashbacks in Cable vol 1 #1-2. There’s no direct follow-up on that – Cable’s mind appears to have returned to the present day, and he either doesn’t remember or doesn’t mention what happened.
