The X-Axis – 8 July 2026
UNCANNY X-MEN #31. (Annotations here.) Another nice quiet week, then – just two X-books, at least in the main Marvel Universe line. I’m not complaining about that. Uncanny X-Men is still in the “Mars Needs Mutants” arc, which looks like it’s going to be about a bunch of aliens we can’t communicate with showing up to exterminate a bunch of innocent Brood. I’m still puzzled by the fact that the Brood had the aliens’ guns in the previous issue and not in this one. That reads like some sort of error, but it’s one that confuses the plot, so it matters quite a bit. Still, I like the design for the new aliens, and the basic idea seems solid enough. The Vig is quietly establishing himself as a fun supporting character, and the bits with the Outliers’ school dance work well enough. Mutina’s storyline is working for me too, with the continuing mismatch between what she says and what she actually does. As for the Greymalkin B-plot, it feels a bit detached from everything else, and the whole turning mutants into weapons thing is nothing new, but at least it seems to be finally coming to a head.
WOLVERINE #23. (Annotations here.) Well, Julius Ohta’s art has some memorable moments. I do like his Taskmaster towering over Wolverine, and the way he’s using the sai as a kind of improvised claws. He sells the terrified scientist at the end rather well, too. Beyond that, I really don’t know what Saladin Ahmed is trying to do with the book at this point. I’m just about willing to look past the idea that Cecilia Reyes can knock up an anti-nanite serum in ten minutes, but what’s any of it meant to be about? Maybe it’s meant to be something about Wolverine’s anger being both his strength and his weakness, but that’s hardly new either. I certainly don’t know who was crying out for a new incarnation of Post, a character who was killed off more than 25 years ago and never had much going for him beyond his character design (and then only when drawn by Andy Kubert). There’s nothing especially bad about this on a page-to-page level, but when I stand back I just can’t see anything new here.
Bleeding Cool’s Weekly Bestseller List is out . Uncanny X-Men 31 came in 7th. Wolverine 23 came in 10th. On the one hand it’s good that Wolverine actually made the top 10 list, but on the other hand it got beaten by Black Cat.
(I’m still surprised by how well Stephanie Phillips’s Daredevil is holding up.)
On the other hand, Black Cat is good, and Wolverine is at most mediocre.
For what it’s worth, I mostly enjoyed this week’s Uncanny, some eyerolls at the Graymalkin scenes nonwithstanding. I don’t get why Simone is trying to retroactively complicate the prison scheme and, at the same time, make warden Ellis more… well, not sympatethic as such, but… minisculely less evil?
I mean, I get why you would do that when the plot was ongoing. I don’t get why she’s doing it in the wrap-up.
Unless… oh god, is this plot still not wrapped-up? Are there secret laboratories full of bad guys, somehow ignoring the riots and changeover above them?
When will this be over? Will this plotline run until Ellis’s space lasers burn Graymalkin Prison to the ground, so a new school can be magically built overnight?
Huh. Whatever did happen to warden Ellis’s space lasers? Oh well.
Moving on to Wolverine – eh. At least Taskmaster will get out of this plot with a slap on the wrist.
There is something weird going on with the art, though. Logan enters the apartment, thinks to himself ‘a shrine?’ and it’s… well, first we don’t see the interior, and once we do, it’s an apartment. With a single framed photo of the obligatory dead wife.
Also, they say every character has some fans – are there people dancing in the streets now that All-New, All-Different Post is a thing?
I get the impression that the Graymalkin storyline started as something quite different, which got derailed, probably by Xavier being yoinked. It spun its wheels for a while, and what we’re seeing now is a hasty rewrite to tie it off and be done with it. I can’t recall any hints that Ellis was anything but an ultra-competent evil mastermind, that the prison was a front for something worse, or any of that. There was space lasers and Avians and hints that Prisoner X was someone we’d seen before.
Spacw lasers? I thought it was space sonic cannons. Might have to check that again, but I thought it was Simone being droll.
I am genuinely amazed that in all her decades of existence, Cecilia Reyes has never, to my knowledge, been saddled with a code/mutant name. Probably because of her steadfast refusal to actually do mutant team things most of the time.
(Not even Lifeshield, or Doctor Border, or something really stupid!)
I liked this Uncanny, too. It’s ok for a comic to be dumb fun and I think the character moments really work. This one even turned me around a bit on the Graymalkin plot. I agree with everyone that it looks like it got messed by Imperial. I’m kind of all for Simone just going crazy with it at this point.
The sales figures for June are out. Uncanny X-Men 29 came in 24th. X-Men 31 came in 37th. Uncanny X-Men 30 came in 39th, X-Men United 4 came in 46th, and What If Uncanny X-Men 1 came in 48th.
X-Men United is doing better than I thought it would. I can’t imagine why considering all the complaints about the writing. Maybe it will last longer than 10 issues.
That What If Special did pretty well all things considered.
I wouldn’t be sure about that:
https://bleedingcool.com/comics/are-we-getting-a-big-x-men-relaunch-in-december-2026/
Something has been bothering me. Deathdream is a lot like Klaus from the Umbrella Academy TV show (not so much the comic), right? The difference is instead of being a deadhead, he likes to remind everyone that he’s really goth in every interaction, but the motivation for this seems to come from the same place.
Or is it just me?
Sagatwarrior-Probably just another relaunch from issue #1 (under Brevoort) with the mansion restored as the headquarters finally. We’ll see Uncanny X-Men #1, X-Men #1 (same writers on those two), Astonishing X-Men #1, Classic X-Factor #1, Uncanny X-Force #1, Wolverine #1, Unkillable Wolverine #1, Wolverine Team-Up #1, New Mutants #1, Generation XYZ #1, plus twenty other can’t miss mutant titles!
Si-He’s also kind of Dead Girl from X-Statix, including the Goth motif.
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