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

HELLIONS #13
“Don’t Look Back, part 1: Weary Travellers”
by Zeb Wells, Rogé Antônio & Rain Beredo

COVER / PAGE 1: The returned Sinister clone stands triumphant over the “original.”

PAGE 2. An epigraph from Nightcrawler. These show up repeatedly in Hellions, even though the character himself rarely appears, but we haven’t seen one since issue #10. Obviously, they anticipate his spiritual leader role in Way of X. In this story, of course, it’s Sinister whose past is catching up with him.

PAGES 3-5. The Right despatch their Zeta team.

This is going back to the Hellions’ battle with the Right in issues #7-8. Since there are two entire storylines that have passed since then, either the rest of the Right have only just got around to investigating what was going on here, or this is technically a flashback. We’re told later on that over a month has passed since this story.

The specific Right members seen here appear ot be new, including Zeta Team. Zeta Team are wearing facepaint with the traditional Right smiley faces, but don’t have any of the other familiar high-tech armour. For whatever reason, their facepaint is in green and yellow, normally the colours of HYDRA rather than the Right.

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

CABLE vol 4 #11
“Depression”
by Gerry Duggan & Phil Noto

COVER / PAGE 1. A close-up of young Cable’s face, with the Light of Galador superimposed on top. This is a companion piece for the cover of issue #12, which shows the other half of the older Cable’s face. The sword is placed over Cable’s eye, mirroring the familiar glow of Cable Classic’s left eye.

PAGE 2. Epigraph. Cable says the line later in this issue, but it’s at least a double meaning here, referring both to Cable’s knowledge of the future, and to the fact that the readers probably know where all this is going.

PAGE 3. The Five debate whether to resurrect Cable Classic.

Last issue, Kid Cable was pressing for the original Cable to be resurrected in order to help deal with the threat of Stryfe. As hinted at last issue, his plan seems to be to get the Five on side, and then use Cerebro himself to download the relevant mind. Hope is naturally keen to assist, since she views Cable as a father figure – and she makes the reasonable point that the Five are so essential to Krakoan society that they can never really be punished.

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

X-FACTOR vol 4 #10
“Finale”
by Leah Williams, David Baldeon, David Messina, Lucas Werneck & Israel Silva

COVER / PAGE 1. X-Factor dance at the Hellfire Gala.

This is the final issue of the series, and it’s a Hellfire Gala tie-in. So there’s an awful lot of racing to tie up loose ends here.

PAGES 2-4. X-Factor prepare for the Gala.

Jean-Paul and Kyle are discussing the Five’s practice of removing traumatic memories when resurrecting mutants – at least in those cases where they understand that it was requested. The most obvious case of that happening was with Domino in X-Force, though in that case Colossus lied about Domino’s wishes.

Rachel and Daken are talking about Daken’s relationship with Aurora, which has evidently just become common knowledge (at least within the team). Off to the side is the new Rockslide, resurrected in “X of Swords”, whose plot never really got a chance to go anywhere.

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

WAY OF X #3
“Joy of X”
by Si Spurrier, Bob Quinn & Java Tartaglia

COVER / PAGE 1: Nightcrawler nurses his hangover while a mutant baby hovers nearby. Pixie and Dr Nemesis are still blind drunk.

PAGE 2. Data page, with pictures of the Hellfire Gala invitation, and a brief note from Professor X to the mutants present. Whether because he really means it or because he’s trying to make an argument that will appeal to the whole of Krakoa, Professor X is asking for everyone to at least behave civilly towards the humans, which he claims will be more intimidating.

He reminds everyone of the three laws of Krakoan nationhood, which is handy, because this issue wants the little-mentioned first law – “Make More Mutants” – to be at the forefront of our mind later on. Quite how the Professor is hoping people to act on it during the Gala is not so obvious, but maybe he’s anticipating a very enthusiastic afterparty.

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

S.W.O.R.D. #6
“This is What Comes Next”
by Al Ewing, Valerio Schiti & Marte Gracia

COVER / PAGE 1: Abigail Brand distributing mysterium to assorted aliens (who we can see reflected in its surface).

PAGES 2-6. Captain America and Dr Doom.

Although this is a “Hellfire Gala” tie-in issue, we open with the Gala itself already finished, and Captain America looking up at Mars, terraformed an hour or so earlier in Planet-Size X-Men #1. We previously saw some of Captain America’s reaction in the epilogue to Marauders #21: “Well, you solved one big problem, but I’m worried you might have made an even bigger mess. I just hope you all know what you’re doing.” The “one big problem”, we now know, was what to do with Arakko.

In sharp contrast to the triumphalist tone of Planet-Size X-Men, the tone here is almost mournful, laying all the stress on the fact that the non-mutants are being excluded from the sort of interplanetary expansion that he always saw as a hopeful vision of the future. Cap sees the main lesson here in terms of division and separation instead. And he’s right, of course – the mutants will be in full-on hubris mode for most of this issue too, so this is a very interesting way of starting the issue. It’s no accident that Captain America, the Marvel Universe saint, is being used for this role.

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

WOLVERINE vol 7 #13
“What They Did in the Shadows”
by Benjamin Percy, Scot Eaton, Oren Junior & Matthew Wilson

COVER / PAGE 1: Wolverine fights Deadpool, unnoticed by the Hellfire Gala guests. Not remotely the central focus of this issue, but if the cover had shown the real main action, it would have spoiled the plot of X-Force #20. This issue is effectively the second half of that story, and more of a bonus issue of X-Force than a Wolverine comic. Wolverine is in it for five pages, and has five lines of dialogue.

PAGE 2. The John Paul Leon tribute page.

PAGES 3-7. Wolverine stops a Terra Verdan from attacking a partygoer.

In X-Force #20, we learned that after X-Force stopped the telefloronic plant creatures from taking over Terra Verde in X-Force #10, the Beast used the plants to take complete control of the entire country. The Beast brought a bunch of zombified Terra Verdean diplomats to the Hellfire Gala with the intention of having them mingle and sing the praises of Krakoa to anyone who would listen. At the end of the issue, Sage discovered that the diplomats’ coding had been hacked (by someone unknown). As we see in this issue, the result is a bunch of diplomats who now have plant powers, and are understandably very angry indeed. Why they’re attacking an innocent guest is less clear.

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

X-CORP #2
“A Shark in the Water”
by Tini Howard, Alberto Foche & Sunny Gho

COVER / PAGE 1. A stylised picture of Monet at the gala, with the same mock pharmaceutical layout elements as we had in issue #1. The “mg” after the issue number seems to be standard, and the number of tablets is presumably the number of pages in the print edition (counting adverts).

PAGE 2. Monet prepares for the Hellfire Gala.

Sunspot was shown as being involved in X-Corp before he relocated to the Shi’ar Empire. We’re told later in the issue that he invested a lot of his own money, so he does indeed have a legitimate interest in what they’re up to.

Sebastian Shaw. Monet elects not to listen to his message at all. Again, though, Shaw has perfectly good reasons for contacting her – he’s the Black King of Hellfire Trading, with responsibilities for distributing the pharmaceuticals that X-Corp manufactures.

Professor X. Generally recapping the events of issue #1, and questioning Monet’s decision to reveal the X-Corp HQ at the end of the issue. He seems to be saying that she’s messed up the planned orderly release of a home office technology, and is exposing X-Corp to attention that it isn’t ready to deal with yet, since it doesn’t actually have the product ready to launch. Whether Monet actually has a proper plan, or whether she’s just arrogant, remains to be seen.

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

NEW MUTANTS vol 4 #19
” Party of the Century”
by Vita Ayala, Alex Lins & Matt Milla

COVER / PAGE 1: The New Mutants arrive at the Hellfire Gala, presumably to be greeted by Emma Frost.

PAGE 2. Warlock arrives at the Hellfire Gala.

This is a “green carpet”, presumably because of the plant-themed nature of Krakoa. The rope and bollards seem to be made of Krakoan plants too.

The guy with the beard is named later in the issue as Barry thee Artist, and he’s a new character. Presumably he’s one of the celebrities who was invited to the event.

PAGE 3. Recap and credits. As with most books this month, the layout is altered to suggest a Hellfire Gala invitation.

PAGE 4. Warlock & Mirage mingle with the guests.

I’ve no idea what Captain Marvel is referring to when she mentions Dani owing her a game of pool.

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

PLANET-SIZE X-MEN #1
“Fireworks”
by Gerry Duggan, Pepe Larraz & Marte Gracia

Planet-Size X-Men. This one-shot is the first issue to bear the name. It’s a play on Giant-Size X-Men, of course.\

COVER / PAGE 1: Marvel Girl, Iceman, Storm and Magneto hovering on a rock in the shape of the X-Men logo, in front of a (presumably Martian) red background.

PAGES 2-6. The omega mutants begin terraforming Mars.

What’s actually happening in this scene is fairly self-explanatory – really, the plot of this issue boils down to “the mutants terraform Mars and teleport Arakko there, and do it all live for the attendees at the Hellfire Gala to watch”. It’s an exercise in showing it at length to emphasise the scale of the endeavour.

Attentive readers may be asking “Hold on, doesn’t Krakoa have a presence on Mars already?” Indeed it does, and the fact that it’s not mentioned in this issue rather suggests that it’s regarded as an unwelcome complication. We saw a flower being planted on Mars in House of X #1, and the resulting Red Farm in Marauders #8. But the script for House of X #1 clarifies that the Martian presence is in the Garden, a very small area of Mars which was already terraformed by Ex Nihilo during Jonathan Hickman’s Avengers run. This is the first time that the mutants themselves have tried to terraform the place.

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

CHILDREN OF THE ATOM #4
“Captured”
by Vita Ayala, Paco Medina & David Curiel

COVER / PAGE 1: The Young X-Men – as I guess we’re calling them – in battle with the new U-Men. Since it’s his spotlight issue, Marvel Guy is front and centre.

PAGE 2. Benny wants to be left alone.

Peter Corbeau Preparatory. In issue #1, the school was simply called “Corbeau Preparatory” (and we saw the sign on the building). The establishing shot in that issue bears very little resemblance to what we see here. Peter Corbeau was a scientist supporting character who originated in Incredible Hulk but showed up from time to time in X-Men as a friend of Professor X, particularly in the early years of the Claremont run.

Benny basically doesn’t like the company of others beyond a small circle of friends he feels comfortable with. Following the pattern of the previous issues, we’re taking turns with each character getting a spotlight issue, and it’s now his turn.

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