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Jan 3

Fall of the House of X #1 annotations

Posted on Wednesday, January 3, 2024 by Paul in Annotations

As always, this post contains spoilers, and page numbers go by the digital edition.

FALL OF THE HOUSE OF X #1
“The Trial of Cyclops”
Writer: Gerry Duggan
Artist: Lucas Werneck
Colourist: Bryan Valenza
Letterer: Travis Lanham
Design: Tom Muller & Jay Bowen
Editor: Jordan D White

FALL OF THE HOUSE OF X. This is one of two linked miniseries to complete the Krakoan era, the other being Rise of the Powers of X. The format echoes the twin minis House of X and Powers of X that launched the Krakoan era.

The title also alludes to the Edgar Allan Poe story “The Fall of the House of Usher” (1839), though there’s no terribly obvious significance to that fact.

COVER / PAGE 1. Wolverine, Colossus, Nightcrawler and Shadowkat in action. We can see a couple of Orchis footsoldiers reflected in Colossus’s first.

PAGES 2-4. Cyclops dreams about being hung after an Old West show trial.

Timely was the name of Marvel’s Golden Age predecessor. It’s not immediately obvious what that has to do with anything either. Marvel does have an established Old West town called Timely – it was the setting of the 2015 miniseries 1872, which was part of the “Secret Wars” event, and was basically “the Marvel Universe, but a Western”.

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Dec 28

X-Force #47 annotations

Posted on Thursday, December 28, 2023 by Paul in Annotations

As always, this post contains spoilers, and page numbers go by the digital edition.

X-FORCE vol 6 #47
“The Greenhouse”
Writer: Benjamin Percy
Artist: Daniel Picciotto
Colour artist: GURU-eFX
Letterer: Joe Caramagna
Design: Tom Muller & Jay Bowen
Editor: Mark Basso

COVER / PAGE 1: X-Force – including Wolverine again – under attack from Stark Sentinels.

PAGE 2. Flashback: X-Force pick up Wolverine.

This takes place after Wolverine #40, which concludes Wolverine’s run of team-ups with non-mutant heroes, and before X-Men #28, where he shows up for the X-Men’s visit to Latveria.

PAGES 3-7. X-Force set up base at the North Pole.

Presumably the narrator means “somewhere deep in the Arctic” rather than “literally the North Pole”, since they’re obviously looking for an appropriately secluded location.

X-Force still have the mobile base that they were hanging around in during the Hellfire Gala (because the remote-controlled Colossus wanted to keep them at a distance where they couldn’t help). Now that the team have escaped Mikhail Rasputin, this means they can actually function as a team again.

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Dec 27

Immortal X-Men #18 annotations

Posted on Wednesday, December 27, 2023 by Paul in Annotations

As always, this post contains spoilers, and page numbers go by the digital edition.

IMMORTAL X-MEN #18
“Happily Ever After”
Writer: Kieron Gillen
Artist: Juan José Ryp
Colour artist: David Curiel
Letterer: Clayton Cowles
Design: Tom Muller & Jay Bowen
Editor: Jordan D White

COVER / PAGE 1. A giant Mother Righteous toying with Professor X, Jean Grey, Emma Frost and (oddly, because he’s not even a cast regular) Cyclops.

PAGE 2. Mother Righteous lets Jean lead her through the White Hot Room.

Mother Righteous is our narrator for the issue, breaking the pattern of each narrator being a member of the Quiet Council. That said, she has (effectively) been among the leading figures in the makeshift version of Krakoa within the White Hot Room, which probably qualifies her.

Mother Righteous started following the addled Jean Grey into the desert at the end of the previous issue. As she explains later on, she assumes (correctly) that Jean will be drawn to the location where she can try to ascend to Dominion status.

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Dec 22

Uncanny Spider-Man #5 annotations

Posted on Friday, December 22, 2023 by Paul in Annotations

As always, this post contains spoilers, and page numbers go by the digital edition.

UNCANNY SPIDER-MAN #5
“Fade to Blue”
Writer: Si Spurrier
Artists: Lee Garbett & Simone Buonfantino
Colour artist: Matt Milla
Letterer: Joe Caramagna
Design: Tom Muller & Jay Bowen
Editor: Sarah Brunstad

COVER / PAGE 1. Nightcrawler with techno-organic stuff rounding on him.

PAGES 2-7. Nightcrawler and Silver Sable reveal their ruse.

Okay, now on one level, this is quite clever. Issue #4 went out of its way to verify that they’d checked Nightcrawler’s DNA and it definitely wasn’t Mystique. But since then, X-Men Blue: Origins has established that Mystique does change her DNA when she copies someone, in order to rationalise the Azazel/Nightcrawler connection (as shown in flashback on page 6). So when this issue does the reveal that the scan was just wrong, it’s not just a cheap retraction of the cliffhanger.

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Dec 21

Astonishing Iceman #5 annotations

Posted on Thursday, December 21, 2023 by Paul in Annotations

As always, this post contains spoilers, and page numbers go by the digital edition.

ASTONISHING ICEMAN #5
“Out Cold, part 5”
Writer: Steve Orlando
Artist: Vincenzo Carratù
Colour artist: Java Tartaglia
Letterer: Travis Lanham
Design: Tom Muller & Jay Bowen
Editor: Mark Basso

COVER / PAGE 1. A shattered Iceman.

PAGE 2. Flashback: Mr Clean defeats Romeo.

This takes place before page 23 of the previous issue, and shows Mr Clean defeating Romeo while Iceman was off in New York. Clyde, the guard drone was seen in issue #1, and mentioned again by Iceman as one of his security measures last iissue.

Romeo actually puts up more of a fight against Mr Clean than you might expect from him, because it turns out that his empathic powers also extend to imposing painful emotions on people when he hits them. I’m pretty sure that’s new. I’m not entirely sure it makes sense – his powers don’t normally depend on touch – but it’s a nice idea, so what the heck.

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Dec 20

Wolverine #40 annotations

Posted on Wednesday, December 20, 2023 by Paul in Annotations

As always, this post contains spoilers, and page numbers go by the digital edition.

WOLVERINE vol 7 #40
“Last Mutant Standing, part 4”
Writer: Benjamin Percy
Artist: Ibrahim Moustafa
Colour artist: Frank D’Armata
Letterer: Cory Petit
Design: Tom Muller & Jay Bowen
Editor: Mark Basso

COVER / PAGE 1: Wolverine and Spider-Man in action against Stark Sentinels.

PAGE 2. Tribute to Alison Gill.

PAGES 3-7. Wolverine enlists Spider-Man to help him enter the Orchis space station.

Oscorp. Peter is leaving the Oscorp building, where he currently works in Amazing Spider-Man. (Norman Osborn is good right now, if you haven’t been following it.) Spider-Man is wearing the Oscorp hi-tech version of his costume here, hence the little glowing bits.

“You’ve alive?” Peter knows perfectly well that some mutants are still on Earth – aside from anything else, he’s appeared over in Uncanny Spider-Man – but presumably this is the first time anyone’s mentioned to him that Logan wasn’t among the mutants who went through the gates in X-Men: Hellfire Gala 2023.

The Orchis jet was stolen by Logan in Wakanda last issue, as the footnote says. If its rightful owner Jun Wei is “expected back at her post in less than an hour”, Wolverine apparently came straight to New York in the hope of getting Spider-Man to help. Seems a bit ambitious, but who knows, maybe he wasn’t specifically looking for Spider-Man. Maybe he just figured that the best way to round up some allies at short notice was to head to Marvel Manhattan, swing a cat, and see who he hit.

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Dec 15

Dark X-Men #5 annotations

Posted on Friday, December 15, 2023 by Paul in Annotations

As always, this post contains spoilers, and page numbers go by the digital edition.

DARK X-MEN vol 2 #5
“The Mercy Seat”
Writer: Steve Foxe
Artist: Jonas Scharf
Colour artist: Frank Martin
Letterer: Clayton Cowles
Design: Tom Muller & Jay Bowen
Editor: Jordan D White

COVER / PAGE 1: The two Madelyne Pryors fight.

PAGES 2-5. The Goblin Queen tries to persuade Madelyne Pryor to join forces.

“Carmen Cruz wanted nothing more than to be part of the X-Men.” Referring back to her origins in the cast of Children of the Atom, basically about a group of human fans cosplaying as mutants. Carmen, the one actual mutant in the group, made it to Krakoa with her heroes but has only come to the foreground in the context of this very questionable iteration of the X-Men.

“You let them neuter your mutant abilities?” We were told in issue #2 that Orchis had used Blightswill to remove the Goblin Queen’s mutant powers, and that she didn’t care, claiming to have long since outgrown them. She claims here that she was also lulling Orchis into a false sense of security.

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Dec 13

X-Men Red #18 annotations

Posted on Wednesday, December 13, 2023 by Paul in Annotations

As always, this post contains spoilers, and page numbers go by the digital edition.

X-MEN RED vol 2 #18
“The Mended Land”
Writer: Al Ewing
Artist: Yildiray Çinar
Colour artist: Federico Blee
Letterer: Ariana Maher
Design: Tom Muller & Jay Bowen
Editor: Jordan D White

COVER / PAGE 1. A group shot of the cast, for the final issue.

PAGES 2-3. Genesis raises Arakko Prime from the sea to fight Kaorak.

“Autumn Island.” In other words, what’s left of the Autumn Lands now that most of it has got up and walked across the planet. The rebels shown in page 2 panel 2 include Kobak, Khora, Zsen and Sunspot, as well as a bunch of background characters.

“Nine left, eight, seven.” When we left Jon Ironfire last issue, he was singlehandedly fighting his way through the White Sword’s champions – already reduced from 100 to 99 by his own departure. Evidently he’s been doing well.

Genesis is carrying both the Annihilation Staff and Purity (the sword); she still has Sobunar by her side, even though we’ve repeatedly been told that he wasn’t entirely thrilled with some of her choices. Storm challenged Genesis to “raise your island and fight” at the end of the last issue, and she takes up the challenge.

Arakko Prime is the part of Arakko that was the original counterpart of Krakoa on Earth – in other words, Arakko the island, rather than Arakko the planet. The narrator calls it “the living island”, mirroring how Krakoa was billed back in Giant-Size X-Men #1.

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Dec 6

X-Men #29 annotations

Posted on Wednesday, December 6, 2023 by Paul in Annotations

As always, this post contains spoilers, and page numbers go by the digital edition.

X-MEN vol 6 #29
“House of Doom”
Writer: Gerry Duggan
Artist: Joshua Cassara
Colour artist: Marte Gracia
Letterer: Clayton Cowles
Design: Tom Muller & Jay Bowen
Editor: Jordan D White

COVER / PAGE 1. The X-Men fight the Daggers of Latveria.

PAGES 2-4. Flashback: Dr Doom intervenes as Professor X is about to announce Krakoa to the human race.

This is an insertion into the flashback that opens House of X #6. The opening dialogue and Xavier’s Magneto’s speech about ending all the disagreements between them is from the original, as the opening line that Professor X delivers before Doom answers him back. The rest of the scene is original material that takes place between pages 4 and 5 of House of X #6, boldly shoehorned into the middle of Professor X’s speech.

It doesn’t entirely make sense that Doom has a V-for-Victor style Cerebro helmet of his own, before Professor X has even publicly debuted with this design, though he does suggest later in the issue that he is relying on some sort of actual foreknowledge of events, rather than simply correctly predicting that Krakoa’s collapse. And the design is wonderful.

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Nov 30

X-Men Blue: Origins #1 annotations

Posted on Thursday, November 30, 2023 by Paul in Annotations

As always, this post contains spoilers, and page numbers go by the digital edition.

X-MEN BLUE: ORIGINS #1
Writer: Si Spurrier
Artists: Wilton Santos (with Oren Junior) & Marcus To
Colour artist: Ceci De La Cruz
Letterer: Joe Caramagna
Design: Tom Muller & Jay Bowen
Editor: Sarah Brunstad

COVER / PAGE 1: Mystique and Nightcrawler (in his Spider-Man costume) in action together. I think the thing in the background is meant to be the Stark Sentinel from Uncanny Spider-Man #4.

X-Men Blue: Origins. The title is a play on the ongoing series X-Men Blue that ran for 36 issues in 2017-2018.

PAGES 2-5. Flashback: Mystique resists Professor X’s mental control and falls off a cliff.

This is a straight recap of a scene in X-Men: Hellfire Gala 2023 #1. We were told in that issue that her body was taken away by the sea, and naturally she showed up again in New York in Uncanny Spider-Man #1.

The recap narrator is the mysterious Bamf that hangs around talking to Nightcrawler, invisible to everyone else, in Uncanny Spider-Man; for present purposes, though, he just gives us a bare-bones recap of Hellfire Gala.

PAGE 6. Flashback: Mystique escapes the Hellfire Gala.

Basically, Mystique picks herself up pretty much immediately, already obsessing about “my baby” (as she has been in Uncanny Spider-Man). She kills and replaces a random Orchis soldier and escapes that way.

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