Way of X issue 4. Kill no man. SPOILERS!

[Su_Whisterfield]

Apologies for any typos, not proof read it.

Synopsis

Starts with a datapage of Arakko (mars) and Lost/Marinette telling us a fable.
It’s a story about tribal people surviving and not surviving bad times. The villain is brother Tiger who kills and cannibalises two of the tribe. Their daughter flees. When the rains return and the tribes flourish, the daughter returns, wanting vengeance but the tribal leaders tell her that past sins have been forgotten and forgiven. The daughter does not agree.

Kurt and David are trying to understand her story. Is Lost the daughter? Did Cortez kill her parents? Is it a commentary on Krakoa’s forgiving of past mutant crimes?

David hangs a lantern on The Council throwing Sabertooth in The Pit for crimes done before the Kill No Man law was in place, asks Kurt if he wants to unite his mutants behind a show trial for Cortez sins. Kurt declines.

Lost is living on Mars, she’s been relocated as the lower gravity makes her powers less effective (so no one is puking around her) and she can learn to control them.
Kurt and Legion are no closer to giving her closure, David notes that she is much more articulate when telling her story.

At this point, Olympus Mons (biggest volcano in the solar system) starts to go off and, as seen in the preview, Dust comes through the gate. She’s there to deal with the dust clouds brought up by aresforming Mars. She’s spoken to the Arrako mutants, they just consider the dust storms as another challenge.

Leaving Lost and Dust on Mars/Arakko, Kurt and Legion (with, as always the Xorn brothers in tow) head through the gate.

Kurt has gone to New York where Fabian Cortez is entertaining himself.
He’s in Central Park by the Krakoa gate and he’s brought the damaged Gorgon with him.
Cortez is boosting Gorgon’s psi powers so he can feel the hatred in the crowd of humans who have gathered around him, Cortez is betting that he will tip over and rip his mask off, turning the onlookers to stone. Cortez really is a piece of shit.

We get a datapage from Dr Nemesis, confirming, Cortez is a piece of shit.

Legion and Charles meet in the Green Lagoon.
Charles gives his son a gate seed (I thought the gates grew from little seedlings?) and they discuss their relationship, or lack thereof.
In the background, the mutants in the Green Lagoon are getting angry.
We find out what the Xorn brothers are there for. It’s an excellent page. Couple of pages.
Charles does something stupid, trying to take the name of their enemy from Legion’s mind against his will. Chuck really is an overconfident idiot at times.

This triggers Onslaught to manifest in Charles and for all the mutants in the bar to attack each other.

David asks the Xorn brothers to do their thing. Oooh.
Well, let’s just say that the The Five are going to be busy for a few days...

Meanwhile, in NewYork, Cortez is still torturing Gorgon by amplifying his telepathy. But he’s currently blocking Gorgon’s eyes, so he’s not currently turning anyone to stone. Yet. The citizens of New York are in immanent danger, even though they don’t realise it.
Cortez presents Kurt with three options, Kurt can kill Cortez to stop him, he can kill Gorgon to,stop him or he can go stand in front of Gorgon and become (briefly) a martyr.

Cortez wants Gorgon to kill the flatscans, he wants to ignite a human/mutant war.

The crowd has attracted an ice cream man, they are still watching Gorgon suffer and their hatred is feeding his pain.

Kurt, being Kurt, has a non-violent solution.
He performs a pratfalls into the ice cream cart, amusing and entertaining the crowd of humans.
The change in atmosphere has an immediate effect of Gorgon, overwhelming him with happiness.
Kurt drags Cortez away, leaving the blissed out Gorgon in New York (is that wise?) and tells he he’s going to engage in some meaningful conversation.

Scene cuts to Lost on Mars. Is that who Kurt is taking him to?

Legion and the Xorn brothers are also on Mars, Legion absorbs the gate seed, he’s using his body to make a gate that Onslaught can’t breach, he calls it the Temple Gate.

[jwatson]

For me this is the worst x-book i read this era hands down.

-somehow legion is the only righteous one here because he has the two xorns ready to take his head off when he steps out of line. "puleahse" if that was the case they would have taken it off when he came up with the idea to send onslaught to a planet inhabitting millions of mutants. A planet he just basically sent lost to because though krakoa is for all mutants, not all mutants like throwing up.

-David kills everybody, everybody in this book with the help of Xorn but hold on they are the good guys because the writers said they are. You will not recognize a single character in this book from this era, or any era they were in because they are written to fit exactly whatever the plot wants.

-Nightcrawler goes from looking like a jerk, exiling Lost through the rejects gate, to looking boredline evil as he watches what he doesn't know is a pretending gorgon in a scene that looks like he is being stoned. To looking like a absolute FOOL when he is joisting around and falls into some icecream as though he was back at the circus. To utterly incompetent as he finds out goron and Cortez no less were teaching him a lesson.

If you want stories that make no sense. Pocket continuity that ignores what happened just issues before. And pretentious characters who make everyone else look uttely incomeptent then look no futher than Way of X#4.

Oh and you know how this book gives no one the benefit of the doubt, well we are suppose to assume that legion and the xorn bros are in the right and the only ones seemingly not affected by onslaught.

And those are just a few of the problems here. I didn't even go over the terraforming thing. 1/10 from me. I wish i had a physical copy so it could find it's Way to the Trash Can.

Edit: After reading above he says every devil needs a temple so i assume he is creating a place for onslaught not to keep him out.

[Su_Whisterfield]

Edit: After reading above he says every devil needs a temple so i assume he is creating a place for onslaught not to keep him out.

Legion says “what mutants need is a place where the devil can’t whisper in their ear”

[Grunty]

Legion says “what mutants need is a place where the devil can’t whisper in their ear”

Interesting wording. It can either mean a place where he can't reach them or one where everyone can see him, meaning they know when he tries to affect them.

[loke13]

Wait I'm confused. Lost isn't "exiled" to Planet Arrako she's just there to get a better grasp on her powers. She can return to the main island at anytime right?

[jwatson]

Wait I'm confused. Lost isn't "exiled" to Planet Arrako she's just there to get a better grasp on her powers. She can return to the main island at anytime right?

Then why compare it to sabretooth being exiled within krakoa. And the gate was literally called the "outcast gate"

[G-Man27]

I think the reference to Sabretooth was brought up due to Cortez not Lost

[Dthirds3]

Then why compare it to sabretooth being exiled within krakoa. And the gate was literally called the "outcast gate"

They were comparing Creed being in jail for the shit he did before the laws were made with Cortez who broke laws before they were made yet is free and arguably more of a dick.

Outcast gate is the name of the gate. There over the top with names.

[loke13]

Then why compare it to sabretooth being exiled within krakoa. And the gate was literally called the "outcast gate"

No idea but regardless the reason why she's on planet Arrako is to better hone her abilities. And it doesn't seem like anything stopping her from floating right back through the gate regardless of what it's named right?

[Dante Milton]

Then why compare it to sabretooth being exiled within krakoa. And the gate was literally called the "outcast gate"

Sabretooth was mentioned in reference to Cortez. Legion is saying that even though Cortez broke the law before the formation of Krakoa, like Sabretooth technically did, he should be punished similarly. The Outcast Gate was named such by Gerry Duggan in Planet Sized, probably as reference to the Arraki.

[AJpyro]

So my take:

-Really get tired of kurt being on the backfood of all these problem. At the very least he makes a thrid option to Fabian's bullcrap and reminds us that the guy is a wimp.

-Soorya's grumbling about the volcanoes and such just feels like its trying to find something to complain about. Hopefully she has a more substantial appearance before the end.

-Charles Xavier does have empathy. He like any other man, is flawed and prone to self destructive pride. I get that David has many reasons to say this, as others, but its not true.

-Also Fabian's little test is stupid. Isn't there someone in charge of recently messed up resurrections? How was he able to just stroll out with Gorgon?! A former Captain General?

-I did like Lost's story and the implications of it all. And the mention of Sabertooth's imprisonment. I don't care about Sabertooth but the mutants, especially those still evil, should really be thinking about it.

-USing a seed and building a place to ward off Onslaught? Good call. Guess it needed the seed to happen and Charles was reluctant to hand one over. I don't know much about actual Zorn and Xorn so would them hanging around David to kill him if needed in character?

So 3/5. Not bad but not good.

[Dante Milton]

This was good. Figuring out a work around to Lost's powers on Planet Arakko so that they can have an actual conversation and get some much needed backstory on her was clever. Looking forward to her getting the closure she deserves and seeing how Nightcrawler manages to accomplish that while respecting the absolution of a Krakoan fresh start. Cortez continues to be a character you love to hate, I do hope he gets some kind of comeuppance. It was good to see Kurt resolve the hostage situation with a non violent solution (although I'm not sure why he didn't just teleport Gorgon away?), very in character for him. I'm intrigued by Legion's "temple" and how it's supposed to keep Onslaught out. The Green Lagoon scene was brutal, but Legion did warn Xavier, no big surprise that Xavier assumed he knew best and subsequently endangered everybody. My only real disappointment is that I wish Spurrier could address the problems of Krakoa and Planet Arrako without making the characters look a bit irresponsible and thoughtless. I'm appreciating Quinn's art more with every issue, but I don't much care for the coloring.

She can return to the main island at anytime right?

That was my interpretation, yes.

[Proxy]

So my take:

-Really get tired of kurt being on the backfood of all these problem. At the very least he makes a thrid option to Fabian's bullcrap and reminds us that the guy is a wimp.

-Soorya's grumbling about the volcanoes and such just feels like its trying to find something to complain about. Hopefully she has a more substantial appearance before the end.

-Charles Xavier does have empathy. He like any other man, is flawed and prone to self destructive pride. I get that David has many reasons to say this, as others, but its not true.

-Also Fabian's little test is stupid. Isn't there someone in charge of recently messed up resurrections? How was he able to just stroll out with Gorgon?! A former Captain General?

-I did like Lost's story and the implications of it all. And the mention of Sabertooth's imprisonment. I don't care about Sabertooth but the mutants, especially those still evil, should really be thinking about it.

-USing a seed and building a place to ward off Onslaught? Good call. Guess it needed the seed to happen and Charles was reluctant to hand one over. I don't know much about actual Zorn and Xorn so would them hanging around David to kill him if needed in character?

So 3/5. Not bad but not good.

For me this is the worst x-book i read this era hands down.

-somehow legion is the only righteous one here because he has the two xorns ready to take his head off when he steps out of line. "puleahse" if that was the case they would have taken it off when he came up with the idea to send onslaught to a planet inhabitting millions of mutants. A planet he just basically sent lost to because though krakoa is for all mutants, not all mutants like throwing up.

-David kills everybody, everybody in this book with the help of Xorn but hold on they are the good guys because the writers said they are. You will not recognize a single character in this book from this era, or any era they were in because they are written to fit exactly whatever the plot wants.

-Nightcrawler goes from looking like a jerk, exiling Lost through the rejects gate, to looking boredline evil as he watches what he doesn't know is a pretending gorgon in a scene that looks like he is being stoned. To looking like a absolute FOOL when he is joisting around and falls into some icecream as though he was back at the circus. To utterly incompetent as he finds out goron and Cortez no less were teaching him a lesson.

If you want stories that make no sense. Pocket continuity that ignores what happened just issues before. And pretentious characters who make everyone else look uttely incomeptent then look no futher than Way of X#4.

Oh and you know how this book gives no one the benefit of the doubt, well we are suppose to assume that legion and the xorn bros are in the right and the only ones seemingly not affected by onslaught.

And those are just a few of the problems here. I didn't even go over the terraforming thing. 1/10 from me. I wish i had a physical copy so it could find it's Way to the Trash Can.

Edit: After reading above he says every devil needs a temple so i assume he is creating a place for onslaught not to keep him out.

Agreeing with these takes and because I have no sense of self-preservation I read the book.

I don’t know if Way of X #3 just left a bad taste behind or if Spurrier’s writing style is not for me but I found this issue to be….not good, but I’m less angry about it?
Better than 3 but not as good as 1 & 2.

What I liked:

Getting to hear more from Lost.
The brief conversation between Legion and Xavier.
Dust’s powers look really impressive and continue to be displayed as background pieces while some of the stories going on, good job Bob!
Fabian Cortez being Fabian Cortez

What I did not like:

Am I to assume that Lost has been fired from her Nanny job and exiled to mars for not being able to control her powers when under onslaughts influence, triggered by whatever beef she has with Cortez. That does not seem fair. What message is Spurrier going for here? Was punish the innocent the message…..cause that’s what happened.

Spurrier either doesn’t know Nightcrawler as a character or he is completely indifferent to him. Kurt is sometimes sort of in character if you squint, but other times he’s just so off that it’s jarring! I agree with Jwatson that the characters are more often than not, unrecognizable and are written to fit the plot.

For example, the ice cream scene. On one hand, I could say Kurt is in character to clown around and ham it up for an audience. And his decision to ‘make em laugh’ does display his empathy and intelligence in this situation. On the other hand we have Gorgon, who is not in his right mind thanks to the botched resurrection and Fabian has lured him into a public human space. Kurt defuses the situation from hostile to jovial, all good so far. But he then proceeds to LEAVE Gorgan with the humans who just proved their attitudes can turn on a dime! Nightcrawler, go back for Gorgan or at least get someone to escort him back to krakoa for his and the humans own safety! I know that handing out ice cream to kids scene was supposed to be cute but Kurt just left him with what I assume to be a very pissed of ice cream man with a bill that needs settling.

Personal preference:
As I said, the clowning around is fine, but I would have preferred to have seen Kurt do something more indicative to his more well known circus talents (tumbling, acrobatics etc) just because we haven’t seen him do acrobatics in ages!

Also it’s probably best Spurrier is taking a break from twitter, I can’t imagine the mob is going to be happy about Kurt surprising a trauma victim (Lost) with her aggressor for a ‘meaningful conversation’. Especially when this is expanded upon in issue 5.


Spurriers style:

I’m sticking to the format I predicted:

A mutant shows up to lecture Nightcrawler about morality and everything the higher ups are doing wrong:
I’ve talked about Dust at length before so I’ll skip over that, but Fabian does it too. Although Fabian doing it is more forgivable because he’s awful and the audience are meant to be irritated by him. So in this case, I found Fabian okay, Dust wasn’t.

Obligatory jab at kurt being religious:
Spurrier REALLY ramped this up in book #4. Kurt talked directly to 4 people in this book (Legion, Fabian, Dust and Lost) and three out of those four made jabs, and kurt never instigates the remarks. He doesn’t talk about religion first, everyone around him does. It’s almost as if that’s all they know about him I know the books have already been written, the ship of change has sailed but I get it spurrier, you feel some type of way about religion, enough already, please!

Nightcrawler remains passive and ineffectual to the plot:
Kurt doesn’t contribute to the overall plot here, but I will say he is more active at least, and it could be leading to him being an active protagonist in book #5. (I live in hope).

Legion plays the active role to move the plot forward because it’s his book:
I think it’s pretty self explanatory. Legion is becoming more and more pretentious and morally superior.
Also a bit hypocritical to harp on about religion and then have Legion making a temple? (I’m really not sure what he’s doing with this temple thing, is he creating one, or is he the temple itself? I assume he can do that?).

Pixie and Dr Nemisis are there:
As cannon fodder this time. Pixies got a second death under her belt I guess.

I have no self control so I’ll probably still read it…..whether I support it anymore, well it’s still a no from me.

[jwatson]

Agreeing with these takes and because I have no sense of self-preservation I read the book.

I don’t know if Way of X #3 just left a bad taste behind or if Spurrier’s writing style is not for me but I found this issue to be….not good, but I’m less angry about it?
Better than 3 but not as good as 1 & 2.

What I liked:

Getting to hear more from Lost.
The brief conversation between Legion and Xavier.
Dust’s powers look really impressive and continue to be displayed as background pieces while some of the stories going on, good job Bob!
Fabian Cortez being Fabian Cortez

What I did not like:

Am I to assume that Lost has been fired from her Nanny job and exiled to mars for not being able to control her powers when under onslaughts influence, triggered by whatever beef she has with Cortez. That does not seem fair. What message is Spurrier going for here? Was punish the innocent the message…..cause that’s what happened.

Spurrier either doesn’t know Nightcrawler as a character or he is completely indifferent to him. Kurt is sometimes sort of in character if you squint, but other times he’s just so off that it’s jarring! I agree with Jwatson that the characters are more often than not, unrecognizable and are written to fit the plot.

For example, the ice cream scene. On one hand, I could say Kurt is in character to clown around and ham it up for an audience. And his decision to ‘make em laugh’ does display his empathy and intelligence in this situation. On the other hand we have Gorgon, who is not in his right mind thanks to the botched resurrection and Fabian has lured him into a public human space. Kurt defuses the situation from hostile to jovial, all good so far. But he then proceeds to LEAVE Gorgan with the humans who just proved their attitudes can turn on a dime! Nightcrawler, go back for Gorgan or at least get someone to escort him back to krakoa for his and the humans own safety! I know that handing out ice cream to kids scene was supposed to be cute but Kurt just left him with what I assume to be a very pissed of ice cream man with a bill that needs settling.

Personal preference:
As I said, the clowning around is fine, but I would have preferred to have seen Kurt do something more indicative to his more well known circus talents (tumbling, acrobatics etc) just because we haven’t seen him do acrobatics in ages!

Also it’s probably best Spurrier is taking a break from twitter, I can’t imagine the mob is going to be happy about Kurt surprising a trauma victim (Lost) with her aggressor for a ‘meaningful conversation’. Especially when this is expanded upon in issue 5.


Spurriers style:

I’m sticking to the format I predicted:

A mutant shows up to lecture Nightcrawler about morality and everything the higher ups are doing wrong:
I’ve talked about Dust at length before so I’ll skip over that, but Fabian does it too. Although Fabian doing it is more forgivable because he’s awful and the audience are meant to be irritated by him. So in this case, I found Fabian okay, Dust wasn’t.

Obligatory jab at kurt being religious:
Spurrier REALLY ramped this up in book #4. Kurt talked directly to 4 people in this book (Legion, Fabian, Dust and Lost) and three out of those four made jabs, and kurt never instigates the remarks. He doesn’t talk about religion first, everyone around him does. It’s almost as if that’s all they know about him I know the books have already been written, the ship of change has sailed but I get it spurrier, you feel some type of way about religion, enough already, please!

Nightcrawler remains passive and ineffectual to the plot:
Kurt doesn’t contribute to the overall plot here, but I will say he is more active at least, and it could be leading to him being an active protagonist in book #5. (I live in hope).

Legion plays the active role to move the plot forward because it’s his book:
I think it’s pretty self explanatory. Legion is becoming more and more pretentious and morally superior.
Also a bit hypocritical to harp on about religion and then have Legion making a temple? (I’m really not sure what he’s doing with this temple thing, is he creating one, or is he the temple itself? I assume he can do that?).

Pixie and Dr Nemisis are there:
As cannon fodder this time. Pixies got a second death under her belt I guess.

I have no self control so I’ll probably still read it…..whether I support it anymore, well it’s still a no from me.

Exactly my problem with the lost scene. Also somehow david should just be believed. None of this started happening until he showed up but somehow he is the only solution and we should believe it because if he was wrong xorn and zorn will take care of it. This is night and day from the david that was just in his last appearance written by Spurrier or the one that was written anywhere else.

And imagine how she must have felt being ostrichized and told you have to walk through the "outcast" gate. Not even to the city, they left her outside on some blanket with absolutely no protection, no backup from potential emerging wildlife. Nothing.

[Malachi]

I think one thing to remind ourselves about this series is that no one is suppose to come out looking good. All scenes where you think Legion or anyone is wining the argument or looking good is just that characters view being presented but not directly challenged by Kurt. Mostly because Kurt isn't there to challenge anyone when they are describing their views. This of ocurse makes Kurt come out as less assertive or just rather bland. There could be better ways to follow this journey with Kurt being more active in the situations. Particulary more of the fun charming acrobat Kurt. The circus performer. A part of him that seems to be in opposition with him as a religous person in the stories i have read with him dealing with his faith. Not sure why.

It's a bit sad that the most fun and engaging parts of this story are the ones without Kurt. I think the scene between Legion and Xavier where good. Showing of both of their hubris. More alike then they want to aknowledge. It seems Legion always brings out the version of Xavier he expects. I think that is clever writing.

As stated before the part of Sooraya and her views of religion not being shown is a waste. I like the visuals of her powers and the dust cloud.