{"id":9704,"date":"2023-12-27T20:05:22","date_gmt":"2023-12-27T20:05:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/?p=9704"},"modified":"2023-12-27T20:05:22","modified_gmt":"2023-12-27T20:05:22","slug":"immortal-x-men-18-annotations","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/?p=9704","title":{"rendered":"Immortal X-Men #18 annotations"},"content":{"rendered":"

As always, this post contains spoilers, and page numbers go by the digital edition.<\/em><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>IMMORTAL X-MEN #18<\/strong>
\n“Happily Ever After”<\/strong>
\nWriter: Kieron Gillen<\/strong>
\nArtist: Juan Jos\u00e9 Ryp<\/strong>
\nColour artist: David Curiel<\/strong>
\nLetterer: Clayton Cowles<\/strong>
\nDesign: Tom Muller & Jay Bowen<\/strong>
\nEditor: Jordan D White<\/strong><\/p>\n

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

PAGE 2.\u00a0<\/strong>Mother Righteous lets Jean lead her through the White Hot Room.<\/em><\/p>\n

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.<\/p>\n

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.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Mother Righteous has cast herself in previous issues as working within the logic of stories. An obvious example, and possibly relevant to this issue, is when Sebastian Shaw complains to her about not getting the control of Krakoa that he expected, in issue #14: “You made a deal with a magician. A speller. A storyteller. You make a deal in a story, and it’s never quite what you wanted.” Here, she sees the appeal of transcending time and space as being to leave the ongoing effort of participating in the story and enjoying a permanent happy ending. Of course, there’s a further degree of irony here since she really\u00a0is<\/em> part of a story, and she can’t really escape it, because the Dominion plot is merely another part of the story.<\/p>\n

PAGE 3.\u00a0<\/strong>Recap and credits.<\/p>\n

PAGES 4-5.\u00a0<\/strong>Destiny’s liffe is saved.<\/em><\/p>\n

This is the aftermath of Mother Righteous turning Krakoa against the refugee mutants in the previous issue. She tried to kill Destiny last issue to prevent her from passing on any warnings about her (Mother Righteous’s) plans. Just before she did so, Destiny realised that because she was already outside space and time, she could speak freely about the Dominion, and tried to warn Mother Righteous not to proceed with her plan – we’ll find out later why that would have been in her interests. Mother Righteous was then disturbed before she was able to conceal the body, and Elixir heals her.<\/p>\n

In narration, Mother Righteous explains how her “thank you” magic works – she\u00a0can<\/em> use it as a hook to pull people into one of the lamps that hovers around her, but more commonly she just uses it as a hook that she can cash in once and bring about a response.<\/p>\n

“I burned up Mystique’s promise to lash out at her missus.”<\/strong> In issue #12, Mother Righteous forces Mystique to kill Destiny. Destiny is promptly resurrected, but loses her vote on the Quiet Council as a result.<\/p>\n

“Burned up Rasputin’s to take on Hope.”<\/strong> Also in issue #12, where Mother Righteous gets Rasputin to hold Hope at bay when she tries to get back into the Quiet Council chamber.<\/p>\n

“Burned up what was left of all my Krakoan favours to make Krakoa angry to give me a chance to get away after stabbing Destiny myself.”<\/strong> Last issue.<\/p>\n

PAGE 6.\u00a0<\/strong>Jean leads Mother Righteous to her destination.<\/em><\/p>\n

“I used about half of the favours to play with the mutants’ connection to the gates when they were forced to walk through them by Orchis.”<\/strong> In\u00a0X-Men: Hellfire Gala 2023<\/em>. This confirms what was already fairly obvious: Mother Righteous is responsible for the mutants ending up in the White Hot Room, rather than on Arakko, as Orchis had planned.<\/p>\n

“The place mutants are all kind of connected to.”<\/strong> I’m not sure the White Hot Room has traditionally been connected to mutants in general, as opposed to specifically the Phoenix. We’ve seen non-mutant characters visit the White Hot Room before – off the top of my head, Echo was connected to it while she was the Phoenix, and a whole bunch of characters visited it in the 2022 Defenders: Beyond<\/em> miniseries.<\/p>\n

Still, it’s overwhelmingly connected with the X-books, and maybe that’s enough of a link to serve as a limitation for a character like Mother Righteous.<\/p>\n

“I take a tiny fraction of their mutant gift and make myself a mutant-me homunculus…”<\/strong> In issue #15, Hope verified that Mother Righteous (or more accurately, her projection into the White Hot Room) was a mutant, at least as far as she could tell: “She is a mutant. Her gift is really diffuse. Like Legion’s gift but microscopic. Many gifts, none of them solid.”<\/p>\n

PAGES 7-8. <\/strong>Professor X and Mr Sinister arrive on Muir Island.<\/em><\/p>\n

The red diamond in page 7 panel 1 is the transport diamond that Sinister conjured up in the previous issue.<\/p>\n

Muir Island<\/strong> was traditionally Moira MacTaggert’s base of operations (and the place where she grew up), so Sinister is claiming that her link with that location in all timelines made it an especially suitable location for his “Moira Engine” – the collection of Moira clones that he could use to reboot the timeline every time it went in a direction he didn’t like.<\/p>\n

Professor X openly questions whether the one-dimensional murder robot appearing in other titles is really a continuation of the same character. You and me too, Chuck.<\/p>\n

“Jeffries gas.”<\/strong> Apparently a gas based on the mutant powers of Madison Jeffries.<\/p>\n

“I have my own hidden backups, which should include the data from the Sinister timeline.”<\/strong> We were told in Sins of Sinister: Dominion<\/em> that Sinister had been denied all of the knowledge of what happened in the “Sins of Sinister” timeline, but Sinister is claiming here that he believes there to be a whole set of back-up data that wasn’t erased – he simply never had time to access it before being thrown in the Pit.<\/p>\n

PAGES<\/strong>\u00a09-10.\u00a0<\/b>Mother Righteous and Jean Grey arrive at a tower.<\/em><\/p>\n

“Filled a universe with himself and set it on fire…” <\/strong>The “Sins of Sinister” crossover, again.<\/p>\n

“The ol’ Arthur C Clarke thing.”<\/strong> Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic. Originally from a letter he wrote to\u00a0Science<\/em> magazine in 1968.<\/p>\n

The point here is that the four Sinister clones were created to explore different routes to Dominion. Mother Righteous is supposed to be pursuing magic, while mutants were meant to be Mr Sinister’s angle. But, as Mother Righteous points out, the actual impact of magic in the Marvel Universe, at least at her power level, boils down to a bit of manipulation around the edges. Her rationalisation for harnessing the power of mutants herself is that their powers are so inexplicable as to amount to magic in practice, which (given the story-based nature of her magic) is good enough to count as far as she’s concerned.<\/p>\n

PAGES 11-12.\u00a0<\/strong>Professor X and Mr Sinister discuss the data from the other timelines.<\/em><\/p>\n

Professor X is apparently reading the minds of people around the world in order to fill the blanks in his engineering knowledge.<\/p>\n

Sinister’s argument is basically that the Dominion’s point of vulnerability is the event at which it leaves space and time and achieves transcendence; if that event could be erased from history then it’s at least possible that the Dominion wouldn’t survive (though Sinister allows for the possibility that, once it’s transcended, it’s outside causality altogether).<\/p>\n

The concept of it not having “come into full power yet” is a bit confusing in the context of something which, by definition, is outside time. But I\u00a0think<\/em> the point here is that the Dominion’s power to affect events in the real world is much more limited prior to the point of its own creation, because of the risk of cancelling itself out. Once the point of the Dominion’s transcendence has passed, it will be able to use its full power much more freely. Sinister assumes that if the Dominion\u00a0could<\/em> intervene more freely, then it would do so.<\/p>\n

Jonathan Hickman’s original conception of the Dominions seemed to envisage that there were a whole bunch of them out there and that they probably just didn’t care that much about the little people. But then, his concept was also an entire hive-mind; we’re talking here about a one-person Sinister Dominion.<\/p>\n

Professor X reveals that Sinister’s records already contain information about timelines where the two other Sinisters – Dr Stasis and Orbis Stellaris – tried and failed to become Dominions. Sinister has never mentioned this before, even as something which eliminates them from consideration, and we’ll find out shortly why that is.<\/p>\n

“Legion was my first option…”<\/strong> Mother Righteous was originally introduced in\u00a0Legion of X<\/em>.<\/p>\n

“I rule me.”<\/strong> Legion’s mantra, mainly from\u00a0X-Men Legacy<\/em>.<\/p>\n

PAGE 13.\u00a0<\/strong>Mother Righteous marches Jean Grey into blank space.<\/em><\/p>\n

Legion <\/strong>rejected Mother Righteous and vanished in X-Men: Before the Fall – Sons of X\u00a0<\/em>#1. As she says, Legion does still owe her a favour, and since he isn’t among the mutants in the White Hot Room, she hasn’t cashed it in yet.<\/p>\n

“From Stasis, I learned Orchis was going to kill Jean.”\u00a0<\/strong>Presumably during one of the conversations in\u00a0X-Men: Before the Fall – Sinister Four<\/em> #1, or something similar. Killing Jean was (understandably) a priority for Orchis in\u00a0X-Men: Hellfire Gala 2023<\/em>.<\/p>\n

“In the Empire of the Red Diamond future…”<\/strong> Again, “Sins of Sinister”. The suggestion is that Mother Righteous gained the knowledge to carry out this plan from the information that was sent back in time from the “Sins of Sinister” timeline.<\/p>\n

PAGES 14-15.\u00a0<\/strong>Professor X tells Mr Sinister about the data from the previous timelines.<\/em><\/p>\n

It turns out that two of Sinister’s aborted timelines saw Dr Stasis and Orbis Stellaris attempt to achieve Dominion status, and fail. Not only does Sinister not remember any of that, he can’t even see it on the screen. Presumably, this is how all four clones were designed, for the reasons that we’ll come to at the end of the issue.<\/p>\n

Sinister suggests that Mother Righteous is able to trick people into accepting her in large part by taking advantage of story logic, which works for her due to magic. Of course, in a sense, it works for\u00a0everyone<\/em> in the Marvel Universe.<\/p>\n

PAGE 16.\u00a0<\/strong>Data page. A note by Mother Righteous about the mechanics of her power. Part of the angle here seems to be that Righteous (at least for her own consumption) treats the mystery of magic as a rather mundane feature to be taken for granted. The fact that it’s vague, hazy and mysterious is, as far as she’s concerned, simply a stock feature of magic that marks it as the sort of thing that she can take advantage of.<\/p>\n

“Pocky’s mutant magic.”<\/strong> Apocalypse’s theory of mutant magic, from\u00a0Excalibur<\/em>. Righteous is very sceptical about this idea that the mutant gene is somehow literally connected to magic, but allows for the fact that the basic concept would be consistent with the notion of blood magic. For her purposes, however, all that matters is that a lot of mutants\u00a0believe\u00a0<\/em>it to be true, in part because of the way Krakoan society has promoted “mutant essentialism”. This is the same term that Professor X used to refer to Krakoa’s more identity-driven tendencies in issue #13, when talking to Cypher, and he made clear that that he “despise[d] the concept”. In at least one sense, he was right: Krakoa’s national mythology amounts to a story that Mother Righteous was able to exploit.<\/p>\n

PAGES 16-22.\u00a0<\/strong>Mother Righteous tries to ascend, and fails.<\/em><\/p>\n

Mother Righteous has forgotten the basic message she gave to Shaw in issue #14: that she operates by story logic, and therefore there must be a twist. She gets repelled by the Dominion in the same way that Mr Sinister did in “Sins of Sinister”. Destiny then steps in to explain why this didn’t work.<\/p>\n

PAGE 23.\u00a0<\/strong>The fifth Sinister AI switches on.<\/em><\/p>\n

The narrator compares the four Sinister to clones to mere information-gathering AIs; all they were supposed to do was gather the necessary information and report back to the\u00a0real<\/em> Sinister AI, which was then going to use their acquired knowledge to become a Dominion. And, apparently, since it had already set up the four Sinisters in that way, it’s in a position to block their respective ascensions without interfering with its own back story.<\/p>\n

The four broken chambers, in which the Sinister clones were created, were first seen in issue #8. The basic layout of the room is similar in that issue, but the ceiling design is rather cleaner, and doesn’t have the crown-logo light seen here.<\/p>\n

PAGE 24.\u00a0<\/strong>Data page: the final AI declares itself to be the ghost of the original Nathaniel Essex, and takes the name Enigma. The line “You were told you had new gods” refers to Magneto’s speech to the human ambassadors in\u00a0House of X\u00a0<\/em>#1 which, in this reading, becomes another example of Krakoan-era mutant hubris.<\/p>\n

PAGE 25.\u00a0<\/strong>Trailers. The Krakoan reads RISE OF THE POWERS OF X. This is the final issue of Immortal X-Men<\/em>, but the story continues into that book.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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 Jos\u00e9 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 […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[31],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9704","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-annotations"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9704","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=9704"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9704\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9708,"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9704\/revisions\/9708"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=9704"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=9704"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=9704"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}