LAURA KINNEY: SABRETOOTH #3
Writer: Erica Schultz
Artist: Valentina Pinti
Colour artist: Rachelle Rosenberg
Letterer: Cory Petit
Editor: Mark Basso

COVER: Laura fights Apocalypse.

This is the final issue of Laura Kinney: Sabretooth, which was the stand-in book for Laura Kinney: Wolverine. That book isn’t returning in 2026, though Laura is moving over to a new title called Generation X-23.

PAGES 1-3. Revelation sends Laura to Arakko.

Last issue, Laura failed to stop dissident mutants from escaping through their gate to Arakko, a group that included Gabby, Akihiro, Laura’s son Alex, and Shark Girl. Laura sustains a head injury in that story, which she rather oddly ascribes here to “Sage’s force field”. Sage did have a sort of energy bubble thing in the previous issue, but it injured Laura’s arm, not her head.

At any rate, the basic idea seems to be that when her healing factor repairs damage that affects her mind, it also shakes off some of Revelation’s control over her. That would be consistent with Revelation’s need to reprogramme Wolverine in Amazing X-Men #1.

Laura still expects to get away with addressing Revelation as “Doug”, and is naturally annoyed at being mind controlled, particularly given her back story. She announces her intention to quit but instead is compelled to go to Arakko – the portal was indeed still running at the end of the last story – and bring everyone back. This sounds a lot like a suicide mission, since it’s hard to see how Laura could ever do that singlehandedl, but she does in fact round up some men before proceeding with the mission.

Note that Revelation also asks Khora to arrange for Sage’s teleporter to be brought to him – this doesn’t feature into the plot of this issue, so presumably it’ll come into play elsewhere in the event. It also begs the question of how Revelation expected Laura to get back, if indeed he did. We were told in issue #1 that this teleporter was somehow powered by the consciousness of Blink, something which also never figured into the plot – so perhaps that too will show up somewhere else.

PAGES 4-5. Apocalypse puts Gabby and Akihiro in the arena.

As threatened by the Arakko welcoming party at the end of the previous issue. Apocalypse seemed to have interrupted that scene to ask for information about Revelation, but no, we’re doing Day 1 Arakko stuff where people fight in an arena because that’s just what they do there. The opponents are Shark Girl and Rictor; Shark Girl arrived along with Gabby and Akihiro last issue, and presumably Rictor was in the same boat, though we didn’t see him. Rictor idolised Apocalypse in the Krakoan era, which might explain why he’s rather more enthusiastic about the fight than anyone else.

This version of Akihiro seems to turn into Hellverine as his equivalent of a berserker rage, with the demon that possesses him having the upper hand during these periods.

PAGES 6-8. Laura and her forces arrive.

Somehow they can calibrate the teleporter to arrive right in the arena. How did they know where to aim? Or maybe the teleporters send them to the same location and one of her soldiers teleported them into the building. Let’s go with that, shall we.

Laura’s narration is back to rationalising Revelation’s instructions, but focussing on her desire to protect and reunite with her family – presumably because it’s the most immediate concern she has that’s consistent with Revelation’s instructions.

PAGES 9-10. Gabby saves Alex.

Alex’s headache is due to his powers emerging, as seen later in the issue. We were told in earlier issues that he hadn’t developed any mutant powers, which was awkward in the Revelation Territories, but apparently he’s just a mutant after all. Stress seems to be the factor in making his powers emerge, which is nothing unusual.

PAGES 11-13. Laura stabs Gabby.

As Gabby points out, Laura has done a complete U-turn since issue #1, where she wanted Gabby and Akihiro to get Alex to safety on Arakko, but Revelation’s mind control prevents her from seeing this clearly. The idea here seems to be that when Gabby tries to warn Alex to stay back for his own safety, Laura flies into a rage because she’s being kept away from him.

PAGES 14-17. Alex’s powers emerge, killing everyone in the arena.

Laura’s dying thought is that she was easy to manipulate because she wanted to belong. This doesn’t make a great deal of sense, because Revelation’s whole concept is that he can control literally anyone. Perhaps the idea is that because he was able to manipulate her, he didn’t have to break her to the degree that he did with Logan.

The issue ends on an utterly bizarre note with Apocalypse trying to enlist Alex in his army and Alex crying that he’s lost everything before a caption reading END. This would make more sense if Alex was going to show up alongside Apocalypse in the Finale one-shot, and the final page was being pitched as a cliffhanger, but presented as an actual ending, it’s simply baffling.