Uncanny X-Men #33 annotations
UNCANNY X-MEN vol 6 #33
“Wild Ride, part 1: A Different Kind of Prison”
Writer: Gail Simone
Artist: Luciano Vecchio
Colour artist: Matthew Wilson
Letterer: Clayton Cowles
Editor: Tom Brevoort
COVER: Rogue and Gambit alongside guest star Gabriel the Devil-Hunter. Yes, he’s a pre-existing character. We’ll get to him.
THE X-MEN:
Rogue and Gambit seek Gabriel’s help in dealing with Gambit’s possession. Gambit is co-operative, but still feels an urge to eat human flesh, and bites Gabriel without apology when he comes near. Gabriel is able to get a lesser demon out of him – Thenassil – but this seems to be only part of Gambit’s problem, with the real issue being to do with his Eye of Agamotto itself. He turns into Wyvern again, to fight off Thenassil.
The Eye’s unnamed true owner is apparently Thenassil’s master, and Thenassil suggests that he is so awful as to explain why the Vishanti “refus[e] to touch this particular Agamotto’s Eye”. As we’ve mentioned before, there are multiple Eyes of Agamotto; the other main one is normally associated with the Sorcerer Supreme and is currently in the possession of the Scarlet Witch. The Vishanti view it as belonging to their chosen sorcerer, although how far they can dictate that is a storyline over in Sorcerer Supreme.
Monet. Having been invited to cover for Rogue and Gambit back in issue #29, she’s finally spent her first night at Haven House. Adjusting to a normal bed after months in Graymalkin seems to be a strain. She assumes that Alice St Croix is a servant, which doesn’t go down well, although she seems happy to accept the arrangements once she understands what they are. The New Mutants don’t like her, but she seems to win them over somewhat by giving them a chance to wear their new costumes.
Quicksilver. He’s still primarily there to support Monet. He makes a reasonably sincere effort to be supportive to Calico, which she absolutely rejects on the grounds that he’s not Gambit. He gets irritated by the New Mutants’ rejection, and grumbles that Gambit and Rogue wouldn’t have “abandoned” them if they cared so much.
Calico mentions that he’s “not even a mutant”. Quicksilver’s back story is an utter mess; the current version of history, from Uncanny Avengers vol 2 #5, is that he and Wanda are orphans who were given powers by the High Evolutionary. This retcon was driven in part by a desire to separate him from the X-books for film licensing reasons, and it’s been widely downplayed since, with stories reasserting Wanda and Pietro’s relationship with Magneto as their father figure. Nonetheless, Calico is correct that, in the current state of continuity, Quicksilver is not a mutant.
Jubilee is tactfully keen to make sure that Monet is okay after her time in Graymalkin. Money mentions that Jubilee was briefly a prisoner there too – that was in issues #7-8.
Nightcrawler is praying for Gambit’s soul. Wolverine joins him, possibly more to show support to Nightcrawler than anything else.
GUEST STAR:
Devil-Hunter. Father Gabriel is a pre-existing character, though quite an obscure one. He was created by Doug Moench and Billy Graham and appeared in four issues of Haunt of Horror in 1974. His back story is that he turned to the priesthood and became an exorcist following the horrible death of his wife; his missing eye is a self-inflicted injury during a period of demonic possession. He made his debut the year after The Exorcist was a hit, and it’s not a coincidence.
Following his brief run in Haunt of Horror, he made some very scattered cameos, before winding up as a supporting character in Hellstorm in 1993-94. In that series he had lost his faith and become an alcoholic, and he wound up as an invalid. He hasn’t appeared since, though, so he’s had plenty of time to recover.
In this story, he’s a defrocked priest and seems to be back to being a grumpy exorcist. He seems pretty unimpressed by Rogue and Gambit and doesn’t regard either of them as good people. When bitten by Gambit, he has a vision of a transformed Gambit having apparently killed the X-Men. He claims to be unable to help, implying that it’s because Gambit’s possession is nothing to do with Christian demonology (he says that Gambit’s evil is “of a language I do not speak”). However, when Rogue mentions something called “the Iron Cathedral”, he reluctantly agrees to help. This doesn’t seem to be a reference to anything in particular.
Thenassil claims that Gabriel is holding a copy of the Darkhold. (It can’t be the original, which is currently merged with the Scarlet Witch.)
Once Thenassil is driven off, Gabriel declares Thenassil’s master to be out of his league, and points Rogue and Gambit elsewhere.
SUPPORTING CAST:
Calico. She’s gone back to sleepwalking, as she did in issue #8. Quicksilver’s attempts to offer support to her are firmly rejected, seemingly on the basis that he isn’t Gambit and she sees him as trying to take Gambit’s place. When Quicksilver takes umbrage and says mean things about Gambit, she lashes out at him and has to be stopped from seriously injuring or even killing him. As usual, Ember is with Calico.
Ransom, Deathdream and Jitter are also unreceptive to the newcomers, though they warm up a bit after being allowed to wear their new costumes. M seems to be winning them round a bit by the end. I don’t think they actually get referred to as the New Mutants in this story, but they were given the name last issue.
Alice St Juniors. She’s grumbling about the fact that Haven House still hasn’t been repaired since having a hole blown in it (in issue #28).
Waffles. M enlists it to help in training.
VILLAINS:
Thenassil. The demon that Gabriel exorcises from Gambit identifies itself as Thenassil, Tormentor or Thieves. It’s not an existing character. It manifests as a sort of large black fly with other flies around it. Gabriel initially calls it a lesser demon, but later says that it’s a “named member of an infernal court”. Gabriel and Thenassil both seem to agree that he’s a mere servant of the Eye’s owner.
Mutina. She’s hanging around on the fringes, watching the New Mutants train and wishing she could join in. That fits with her storyline of continually helping the team out while keeping up her obnoxious front.
Sabretooth. According to Deathdream, the spirits of mutants can “wander a bit” from the Dark Artery and “get confused”. Somehow, Sabretooth has wound up in this category despite dying on Krakoa in Wolverine #50 in 2024. It may be that there are mutant spirits connected to the Dark Artery even though they aren’t physically interred there. In Sabretooth’s case, he remembers fighting Wolverine, but doesn’t know where he is, and believes that he’s in a confusing fogbank. He accepts Deathdream gently leading him back. The implication seems to be that Sabretooth hasn’t moved on to an afterlife of any sort.
Three other ghosts are also seem in the cemetery – also apparently in limbo. Two of them are clearly Feral and Rusty Collins, both of whom died in X-Factor vol 5 #1. On that basis, the third one, who appears simply as a blank face in the corner of the panel, is presumably their teammate Cameo, who died (and debuted) in the same issue.
At this point, Simone is just showing her Marvel horror knowledge. It’s weird why she just didn’t go to Wanda or Clea. It’s still a decent Doctor Strange book instead of a good X-Men book.
Devil-Hunter should not be confused with Devil-Slayer, who is actually Demon-Hunter.
Wow, I remember the ’90s Warren Ellis Hellstorm series. Decent Hellblazer/Spawn pastiche.
There’s really a new X-villaon called Flamequake?
The most fanfic name ever?
Quicksilver’s argument that if Gambit really cared for Calico, he wouldn’t have abandoned her is just ridiculous. He’s under a curse that’s turning him into a cannibalistic dragon- he shouldn’t be anywhere near kids. I realize that this is probably Pietro’s own guilt over letting his daughter Luna down on multiple occasions but still…
@Maakuj- Or why not go to Illyana? Her Souldsword cured Dani’s parents from being magically transformed into the Demon Bear and Megan from being magically transformed into an evil dominatrix. You’d think it would be the perfect solution for Gambit’s problem.
Well, Pietro’s default setting is ‘asshole’, so… that tracks.
How did Rogue know about the… let me check that again… Dominican abbey near Hong Kong? And that she would find Jesse Custer, sorry, Gabriel the Devil-Hunter there? And how does she know he exists?
…and why go to him and not one of at least a dozen other supernatural experts she’d be closer to due to being a longtime X-Man and sometimes a leader of (one of) the Avengers (teams)?
I’m all for X-Men breaking out of the mutant corner and interacting with the wider Marvel universe, but at least some logic / explanation would be nice.
Okay, I had to look it up, and in case anyone else is wondering, the Billy Graham who created Devil-Hunter is not the Billy Graham of whom you’re thinking. Which is too bad, because that would have been wild.
Why does Mutina have a New Mutants-style costume? At the risk of sounding like I’m asking for more Outliar page time (I’m not), it would be nice to resolve her story and either have her join or shove off.
Monet ordering breakfast makes me wonder if Rogue have them any background at all on what she was doing as substitute teacher. I get wanting M and Quicksilver there to protect the kids, and it probably would have made sense to recruit a telepath a long time ago, but the whole thing seems like a mess.
The Warren Ellis Hellstorm series was excellent. I would recommend it.
I would not recommend the original Gabriel, the Devil-Hunter stories. Bad Exorcist rip-offs. I do know of the comic artist Billy Graham, who is not the same Billy Graham, but I didn’t realize he co-created Gabriel. That is pretty wild, just the fact that the comic creator with the same name was a co-creator of that character.
Also not to be confused with Superstar Billy Graham, the man of the hour too sweet to be sour.
@Kryziek Ceran:
It is possible that Rogue learned of Gabriel directly or indirectly through the Fantastic Four, who he helped once back in 1980 (#222-223).
But the story all but tells us directly that she did not; instead, Gabriel happened to be at the specific church where she asked for help. Presumably it is somewhat nearby, or a church that she already has some story with, or perhaps it was recommended by Nightcrawler (who was hinted to have been renewing his ties to the Catholic Church in early issues of this volume).
Gabriel is not exactly a stranger to self-delusion, but he says something to the effect of having been expecting the arrival of Rogue and Gambit. I would not necessarily believe him, but I can’t rule out that he was guided there or had some sort of vision. All the more so if he is with a copy of the Darkhold.
It almost makes _too much_ sense if the person Gabriel is wanting to contact is Wanda. We may be leading to a guest appearance from her, and perhaps to a meeting between Darkhold Kid and Deathdream. If Strange Academy resumes, Hotoru is a natural for the cast.
“Or why not go to Illyana?”
I mean, there’s any number of curses, possessions, portals, power-ups and golems that she could instantly get rid of. Everyone from the Wrecking Crew to Werewolf By Night would be solved. But it would be about as interesting as a comic about Cypher solving Linear A script.
@Mark Coale
Flamequake is kinda treated fanficy within the context of the story, that whole Brotherhood are basically depicted as fanboys of the 20th century mutants (similar to how the Bishops idolize the X-Men)
““Or why not go to Illyana?”
I mean, there’s any number of curses, possessions, portals, power-ups and golems that she could instantly get rid of. Everyone from the Wrecking Crew to Werewolf By Night would be solved. But it would be about as interesting as a comic about Cypher solving Linear A script.”
Yeah, but having Illyana as the X-Men resident magical expert at this point means having to at least address why she’s not the immediate in-house resource for matters of this nature. Of course, just saying “she’s busy with something” when she’s an active member of Scott’s team and also doing other sorcerer stuff helps. Same way you don’t have her on call for teleportation.
Then you have to rule out Doctor Strange (off-world), Wanda (out of dimension?), Clea, Doctor Voodoo, Wong, Amaranth, Baron Kaoz, Jennifer Kale, the Ancient One, the Ancienter One, the Ancientest One, Daimon Hellstrom, and a few others, just to justify going to someone who hasn’t been used in decades. 🙂 But look, I get it, wizards are busy and can’t just drop everything to help most of the time.
I can’t fault Gail for wanting to use different characters rather than rehash “Wanda helps out yet again for the thousandth time,” as long as it’s logical and makes sense.
I know, logical and makes sense. I ask a lot of comics.
Good point. They should at least put in the effort to handwave it away.
I hadn’t realized that Gabriel was so obscure, since a sex-swapped version of him was one of the main characters in the Helstrom TV series so I assumed he must have been a big figure in the ’70s.
Best issue in a while, if only because I didn’t find myself asking, “Wait, what?” quite so often.
Only when Mutina showed up in a New Mutants uniform.
And when Rogue and Gambit took their really, really serious magical problem to the answer to an Obscure Marvel Trivia question.
And when Monet didn’t realize she was speaking to the owner of the house she was staying in, because apparently nobody introduced them despite spending at least the last several minutes in the same room.
And when the Outliers, who are supposed to be teenagers, kept acting like 10-year-olds. Oh, wait, actually, I guess I do know the answer to that one. It’s because their backstories are so horribly traumazzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz Oh, sorry, put myself to sleep for a minute, there.
The Outliers really are written like they’re under the age of 10. I mean, my 11 year old has more emotional regulation than these teenagers. Exploring trauma is fine and all, but the Outliers are on such an extreme spectrum that they’re pulling the book into near-unreadable territory. I have been willing to forgive the multiple plot defects in this series because Simone is good with the character work, but it needs to be dialed back.
But hey, I dug seeing Gabriel again! I was a big fan of the Hellstorm series in the 90s (which was good even before Ellis took it over, Len Kaminski had a great-if-brief run for a few issues) and I had no idea that Gabriel hadn’t popped up anywhere since then.
I’m ready for this run to be over. When’s the next relaunch happening?
I did a bit of “Wait, what?” when they kept addressing Monet, who they don’t know and don’t like, as “Professor.”
At least Graymalkin is gone? Or is it? Why on earth did Monet keep everyone except Shaw there by force anyway?
I’d be glad to see the back of it but the time for handwaving was several issues ago.
@AQ: You’re assuming that anyone besides us actually watched Helstrom.
And that show was full of seriously obscure characters so I wouldn’t put too much stock in who the writers chose to use.
@AQ, Taibak- In fairness, Gabriel had a fairly major role in Hellstorm’s 1990s series. it’s just that the 1990s series only lasted 21 issues and Gabriel has hardly appeared in anything else.
The problem with Feral’s ghost appearing is that she was clearly shown as having survived as Maria clearly appeared in New York City Central Park crowd scene of the opening double-page spread of the HellFire Vigil , along with her sister Lucia.
And how does Gail’s ongoing plotline with Gambit fit with the revelation in Jeph Loeb’s XMen of Apocalypse Omega that 616 Gambit and 295 Gambit secretly switched places at 616 Gambit’s insistence (apparently 616 Remy wanted his AU counterpart to experience what it was like to be actually formally married to Rogue , since he absolutely sympathized with 295 Remy’s eternal misery at losing 295 Rogue to 295 Magneto , both of whom also appeared in the ending to escort the 295 XMen back home*)
* also 295 Sabretooth , the OG Heroic Mr Creed chose to stay behind in 616 in order to start over, as well as get medical treatment to save a seriously-injured 295 Wildchild, so 616 has a Sabretooth again , and he’s a White Hat , it’s Inverted Sabretooth 2.0 LOL
I’d hazard a guess nobody will ever bring up anything from X-Men of Apocalypse.
@Jdsm24- The image of “Feral” is very small and she’s never referred to be name. I didn’t think it was Feral the first time I read it.
@Michael,
True , but try telling that to her fans (actually ai’m
also one of them LOL as someone else theorized , maybe Maria actually got a literal Feline 9 Lives secondary mutation ala DC’s WildCat from her time as a ghost servant of cat and dog gods during Petr David’s XFactor’s Tier storyline)
@KrzysiekCeran
Too late , current word on the proverbial e-street is MCU Phase-whatever synergy with AoA Remy joining the 616 Avengers
Synergy? But the MCU doesn’t have gambit or AOA?
I haven’t watched X-Men 97 but I assume that’s the synergy mentioned, especially Season 2. But that’s different from MCU synergy specifically, so maybe I’m missing something.
@cj
Gambit will be in doomsday played by Channing Tatum following his Deadpool appearance last year.
97 Gambit was the focus of the most recent episode, he died last year but Apocalypse brought him back as death, until he Charles and rogue saved his soul with the power of love. The bad news is that may mean he has to wear a morrison era costume like the rest of the team which do not look good in animation.
“Why didn’t they go to Illyana?” is just “Why don’t they call the Avengers?” on a smaller scale. It’s one of those things you just have to let go with shared universes.
I see some people here thought it was fun to see Gabriel again, so my guess is that’s the main reason Simon selected him out of all the other mystical characters she could have picked. Because it was fun.
@Alistair, that makes more sense, thanks. I haven’t seen the latest Deadpool, don’t really plan on watching Doomsday, and don’t have much interest in the MCU as a whole, so it’s not surprising I missed that.
@thekelvingreen, definitely something that’s a limitation of shared universes that we have to let go of, as you’re saying. Batman No Man’s Land was a good example: no way the Justice League would let Gotham get to that state but pretending they would led to a great era and run of stories.