Powers of X [01] : The Last Dream of Xavier *spoilers*

[GeneTitan]

cutie



The text pages are showing us information that would usually take arcs or more than a double page spread to convey. Hickman is compressing key information that we need while still giving us art with the primary story. It’s a win/win, you’re also paying for the writer.

I like the text only/information pages. I'd rather have this then 2 issues where absolutely nothing happens and the characters just talk and the story is decompressed as hell. Decompression is what made "Phoenix Resurrection" drag out in those middle issues.
And why is Nimrod THICK AS FUCK?!!!

Overall, I'm loving HOX and POX and I'm super intrigued and excited (which I haven't been FOR YEARS with X-Men comics). I'm on board with Hickman.

[JKtheMac]

What do these three similar character designs have in common?

fortune.jpg

Visually there is a motif of radiating lines in orange. One from a gem that is supposed to represent or enhance the 'third eye' and the other two evoke virtual reality and visualising something intangible.

Story wise one is a fortune teller, one is trying to realise his dream and the last is trying to reclaim a soul. At first glance they are not that closely linked.

But there is also a design similarity between these two characters:

Sim.jpg

Its only an echo, but the green costume and the golden earrings / shoulder pads could be a subtle clue. Which has me thinking what do they have in common. And what they have in common is that the people in the first picture are all trying to read them.

The fortune teller was selling his wares as Moria walked past, presumably he wanted to do a cold reading. Charles is depicted trying to read Moira'a mind, and the Librarian is trying to reclaim the soul / mind of Cylobel.

If the prediction that Charles was surprised because he couln't read Moira's mind is true, and that she is actually a secret mutant "Moira X", and if the 'black brain' mutants are from her genetic stock, then it is possible that the four people shown on page one. Early Charles, Krakoa Charles, Nimrod and the Librarian are all effectively trying to interrogate Moira.

Moria is shown interrupting a dream of peace. Charles is watching doves. Does she challenge his dream in some way? Is Krakoa Charles also dealing with a more recent revelation from Moira? Someone he could never totally trust if she is unreadable.

Maybe the whole issue is actually about not being able to see the future and on another level Mutants and humans not being able to see each other clearly. The X^2 story is all about both sides trying to learn the other's secrets. Nimrod and the tower evoke the Tower of Babel a parable about different cultures not being able to communicate without a common language.

As an introductory issue there are many secrets and none of them have been learned. Moira and Cylobel stand between the two parties. They are inscrutable and not fully trusted.

[GeneTitan]

Yeah, I don't think two characters saying "As you know" while putting blocks of text that occupy the whole page are better than the elegance of this.

Bendis is notorious for this. The first page of, I believe, AVX issue 11 is Captain America talking to hulk with way more text than necessary. He's literally repeating things and it just takes up too much space and slows down the story.
I'm glad Hickman is writing this. The Bendis era of Uncanny was boring, way too decompressed and I'll take these info. pages anyway over an entire issue of a book that doesn't move the story along.

[billee0918]

080220D0-C76A-4BAA-A6F4-10681AB903B4.jpg

So these have starting to blossom in my yard.
Looks like I’ve been chosen!

[Purplevit]

Bendis is notorious for this. The first page of, I believe, AVX issue 11 is Captain America talking to hulk with way more text than necessary. He's literally repeating things and it just takes up too much space and slows down the story.
I'm glad Hickman is writing this. The Bendis era of Uncanny was boring, way too decompressed and I'll take these info. pages anyway over an entire issue of a book that doesn't move the story along.

Completely agree.

[Fokken]

And why is Nimrod THICK AS FUCK?!!!
.

This-rod (Nimrod) is actually a Chimera of Rockslide, Maggott and Glob. heh.

[HeartofTheStoriesWeTell]

That's a side effect of the internet, that in addition to providing more knowledge to people than they've ever had, it also allows misinformation to be spread. Someone says something, someone else repeats it, someone else repeats it, etc., until it's all over the 'net, but no one can remember the source or provide any supporting evidence.



I have the physical X-Men #25 comic, and if someone hadn't addressed this, I was going to pull it out, because I remembered no such thing ever being said.

Which serves to illustrate the point about the spread of misinformation on the internet.

I am new here so i feel a little foolish...i also have a copy (but put away in moms crawl space with allmy 90s books. .but i swear i not only remmber them saying it...but i remember being told he always had TK back then...(it was the start of my comic collection)

I had started with my buddies copy of the end of excutioner song, and xmen 19 was the first issue i bought myself

[PrezValentine]

080220D0-C76A-4BAA-A6F4-10681AB903B4.jpg

So these have starting to blossom in my yard.
Looks like I’ve been chosen!

Now on to figure out if it's one of the flowers for the pills, habitats or gateways.

[JKtheMac]

Some random thoughts on names.

So Percival. He looks a little like Hope. We get very little to go on about him. His only words are about the dream. He appears to evoke the death of the dream of coexistence.

Of course the choice of name is evocative too. Percival the Grail Knight. He who failed his test by not asking the necessary question aloud, and thereby the Wasteland remained. He who quested for the grail to correct his failure.

Our Percival dies in the wasteland that is The Nexus. The dream seems to die with him. War continues. Hope dies. Who is the Grail King in this story? What was the question that he never asked?

The Nexus is also a very interesting name. Is this the bottleneck of probabilities. Is the future unfixed beyond this point? Will Powers of X mainly be about this specific time and place and explore possibilities that arise from it?

[Fokken]

Our Percival dies in the wasteland that is The Nexus. The dream seems to die with him. War continues. Hope dies. Who is the Grail King in this story? What was the question that he never asked?

New Nexus. Who dis?

[JKtheMac]

New Nexus. Who dis?

It’s a place. The scene is set as “Northern Territory. The Nexus.” Also, it is something the team have been “Rifling Through”. The place they are in looks like a junkyard, hence me equating it with the Wasteland.

It is said they accessed the Mainframe in The Nexus.

Hang on. I missed the point of your post. You were asking “the question”.

[JKtheMac]

I have been looking up “while you slept the world changed” the words of both Charles and Percival, and it seems to have been an old slogan used by Unisys. They had mugs and inspirational posters. I wonder if this was on Hickman’s wall, once upon a time in an old boring workplace. Did he sip coffee from one of those mugs? All the while thinking how sinister it sounded.

It does make me wonder if Percival is inadvertently letting the machines know what they were searching for. Details of the dream. As if the survivors on Asteroid K have lost context and want to know what it was all for.

[Ororo101]

No preview for HoX2?

[JKtheMac]

Further to the low level telekinesis of Charles, while looking at early issues I noted that even in #1 he is guiding an airplane by “thought impulses”. This makes three low level instances that could theoretically relate to electrical manipulation. The other two being manipulating circuits and tinkering with a brain. I still feel like I am missing a smoking gun I once read, that was a little less subtle, but the idea that it was a book seems to be me misremembering the book scene that Jean had in #1.

[Triniking1234]

No preview for HoX2?

Probably on Saturday or Monday