Immortal X-Men #1 Review/Spoilers

[pkingdom]

Agreed. I just put it down and said to myself that this is the first book that has really wowed me since the whole Krakoa era began.

I just want to reiterate that I think the big reason we didn't get this book sooner, and the big danger of the book going forward, is that this book will overshadow all the others and be the only really 'important' one.

I'm always one of the more cynical ones here, and a part of me thinks that a lot of Council shakeups people are suggesting sound more 'endgame' kind of thing for Krakoa. I don't think Sinister is going anywhere until this whole thing is about to end. Colossus though is in the Percy plot prison and that could go away anytime.

[charliehustle415]

Oh, absolutely.
Gillen probably thinks it's very clever (and to a more comicbookscience/intellectual mind than mine it probably is) but...in the context of the overall story told in this issue, it really doesn't add anything except "OMGSinisterclonedMoira!!!" shock value but we already suspected he was cloning and doing Chimera shit long time, there was no need to make it overly complicated.

Literally me. Read BobbysWorld's explanation twice and then after that was like, "Imma just roll with it."

Yeah totally, it makes me wonder if this is a hand wavy thing where they try to do away with the fear of timeline resets forever.

If timelines can be reset all the time and within a single timeline then it doesn't matter

*also I see the irony of talking about things mattering in a funny book (because duh, none of it matters)*

[Devaishwarya]

Literally me. Read BobbysWorld's explanation twice and then after that was like, "Imma just roll with it."

LOL. Exactatiously.

I don't think it's "hand-wavy" in that sense, more like a magician's distraction...but I do think they're trying way too hard to make it more "involved" than it actually needs to be. Gillen could have said Sinister was getting his info from Madame Zelda and her crystal ball and it would have made just as much sense.

[BobbysWorld]

As far as this issue indicating anything about Krakoa's ultimate fate or doom goes....I still think people aren't giving the writers in general enough credit. Like someone said that having Hope on the Council representing the Five earlier could have averted Vita Ayala's first New Mutants arc, but like......personally I think that kinda misses the point of that arc? Yes, the New Mutants ended up in opposition with the Five ideologically speaking, when it came to the subject of Gabby, clones, Cosmar, Cerebella, etc.....but they were SUPPOSED to, IMO? That was literally the reason that story existed.....to explore the idea that the older New Mutants, for all their experience and best intentions, still had more to learn about how other mutants' lived experiences and needs were different from their own.

Like, I don't think that an out and proud nonbinary writer like Vita just happened to write a story where a young mutant girl with body dysmorphia issues was told to just accept her body the way it was....and that was meant to be the end of it. The later New Mutants arc where Dani and the others accepted that mutant experiences weren't monolithic and it was okay for mutants like Cosmar and Martha to need actual change rather than just self-acceptance.....like that arc didn't just happen because people reacted to the earlier arc and said no, Dani and the others were wrong to say what they said to Cosmar! The later arc happened because the later arc was ALWAYS the destination. The older New Mutants only took the ideological position they did in the first arc in order to cement it as a story about making mistakes in the early days of Krakoa. Not having all the answers yet, not realizing yet that some of the answers they were giving out without even thinking about it, taking them for granted, weren't actually the RIGHT answers, or at least not the right answers for every mutant asking certain questions. Ayala's first arc didn't need to be averted because the point of it was never the New Mutants getting it right, right from the start. It was about laying down a trajectory of growth, of learning - both for the teachers AND those they were trying to teach.

And you can't write characters growing, learning from their mistakes, realizing they're making mistakes and trying to do better....without also including stories where first, they make those initial mistakes.

Krakoa's not actually meant to be seen as a paradise, and I don't think it ever was. The writers have never tried to present it as a flawless END result, but rather an admittedly flawed beginning. Cyclops even had a line in one of Hickman's first issues about how no, they don't pretend they have it all figured out yet, that they have all the right answers with their new society.....they just decided well we have to start SOMEWHERE.

So I don't think its a given that a changing of the guard with the Quiet Council, that sizeable shake-ups throughout the course of the Immortal X-Men series, like....the mere existence of shake-ups doesn't actually say anything about a countdown to the end unless you're taking it for granted that Krakoa was always doomed to be a failed experiment, instead of it just being a starting point that has plenty of room for growth and improvement....and an active desire TO grow and improve.

The Quiet Council as a system of government, self-selected and regulated with no accountability and no real input from the masses they govern.....like yes, absolutely, it is not a sustainable system of government and I don't think the writers are unaware of that? The COUNCIL was always built to fail, I think, to eventually reach a make-it-or-break-it point where something has to give, where it has to make way for a more inclusive, representative system of government that actually serves the people it claims to serve rather than just the agendas of the people who sit on it......but the Council being unsustainable and with an eventual endpoint is not actually synonymous with the same being true for Krakoa as a whole. This Quiet Council won't last for ever, but the writers are milking the drama of this particular collection of mutant leaders while it DOES last.

And when everything finally comes to a head, when this particular house of cards finally collapses, yes, there IS a possibility that will spell doom for all of Krakoa, but just as likely it'll be a crucible moment where the more heroic members of the Council, the characters who do still actually believe in the idea of Krakoa even if they have their own personal agendas as well...have to finally weigh the needs and wants of their people as a whole versus their own personal goals or ideas and make a choice as to which of those two they're going to ultimately prioritize. All of this, the messiness of the Council, the fact that as it exists now, it ISN'T built for the people, with the needs and wishes of the Krakoan people prioritized the way those should be.....all of this could be said to be the way its presently written as in order to heighten the stakes, to escalate the tension while journeying TOWARDS that particular decision-time....just as easily as it could be said it exists to foreshadow an ultimate end to the entire nation as a whole.

Yeah, the Council is messed up. Yeah, its not a good system. Yeah, its heavily weighted with members who are outright villains at worst, self-motivated at best. Yeah, it has to change if there's to be any chance of Krakoa making it in the long run. Yeah, its a powderkeg of drama and potentially dangerous consequences and fallout that could spell destruction for mutants as a whole.

That's not a guarantee of anything other than.....eventual conflict and drama. The actual outcome of that conflict and drama isn't actually foreshadowed simply because the writing is doing its job of making things feel dramatic and suspenseful.

Omega level projection remains the persistent theme of a lot of reader interpretations. At some point, people have GOT to work on telling the difference between what a story is saying and what they just really really really WANT a story to be saying. The only actual precog in this thread is the fictional one in the actual story. Speculation is not the same thing as reading comprehension. If some of you are tired of me sounding like a broken record on this particular point, like.....right back at ya.

And just as an example, when thinking that a storyline that culminates in Sinister being dealt with or written out would be an endgame type of situation that acts as a bookend for Krakoa.....consider that the same point could have been argued about Apocalypse's controversial presence on the Council at the very start of the Krakoan era.

.....And he was written out of the books, sent offscreen, within the first year of the current era. Sure, we all know he's going to return eventually, but the Krakoan era is still ongoing and thriving without his active presence, and without his departure from the Council or the books having had any explicit negative repercussions for the rest of the books or the Krakoan nation itself.

There's absolutely zero reason the same can't hold true for wherever they take Sinister's storyline.

[Rev9]

wait if it nullifies her previous lives, how do we have the Omega Sentinel in the current timeline?

So confused

In my headcannon to make everything simple I link life 10a and 10b to life 6a and 6b. In 6a Wolverine kills Moira to send her back to begin life 10a where mutants win ,in 6b Moira's golem of life 10b has been subsumed by the Phalanx and infects Wolverine with it also, after killing him.

The real Moira would be dead if Phalanx had arrived to annihilate life 6 regardless of who was the last standing as she's just a biological organism, so it had to be the golem.

The events of life 10 likely happen hundreds if not thousands of years sooner clued in by life 10a CoV coming out before they are fully cooked.

While 10a happened because we follow what happened in 6a real history is 10b because the golem (or Sinister now armed with the knowledge) ascended, sent OS back in time to put the breaks on 10a , OS made sure with Nimrod that Moira couldn't be saved in time from Mystique and Destiny, she was depowered and Krakoa cancer kicked in in her regular cells.Being bitter she became fully against mutantdom.As a last ditch gamble she had an android with her consciousness created as a failsafe and this android is likely the one that creates the 'feared cure' and is yet to be stopped.Although I can't prove how Moira would bluff her way about a cure that is undone with her death in any previous life.I get the feeling her recall of her lives was being messed with ,with this 'ghost memory' of a life she won't get to live as herself but may live out as a cyborg/robot.

All that being said it's anyone's guess where the future goes from here with Sinister's scheme, it may well be life 10b is going according to his design in life 9 , create Omega chimeras to ascend to the Titans through his own design , hence why Irene knows he is the ultimate winner and sees him in every timeline

Let's hope I'm wrong.

[Mercury]

Oh wow, completely missed this one. As my previous comment to you showed, I ain’t ignoring you. Thanks for the welcome. Been under the weather mentally and don’t like to put that on other people. This issue of X-Men did spark some good vibes in me, so I am enjoying myself.

I am happy to read that you are feeling better! :another hug:

But I got to know you quick enough to see the pattern, so I take no responsibility for the dam just opened. Sinister just isn’t attracted to Jean sexually and the harem of Madelyne would throw anyone off.

Oop...

Tread carefully, dear. You don't know me that well. I contain multitudes.

[Exodus]

I fell in love again with Selene. Why is she not in every X-books every written? She should be the new Wolverine!!!!

[Rev9]

And here we have someone who completely misses the point of the entire discussion

1) The Council doesn’t have advisors on matters of any regard and there is no reason to start now.

2) I will elaborate further on your own counterpoint.

Emma was chosen because she would head the Hellfire Trading Company’s face while Shaw did the dirty dealings. Kitty was chosen for being the mediator between Shaw and Emma as the Red Queen (I.e. Emma’s yes-girl). Mystique was chosen so that Xavier and Magneto can keep a close eye on her and give her something in good faith of an empty promise. Nightcrawler and Jean were the moral compass of the Council. The Council’s members don’t all fulfill the needs of a governor. They fulfill special roles of certain aspects of mutant society. Selene using magic as a big selling point makes perfect sense by the way Krakoa’s Council is chosen and is more relevant when considering that she specifically offers to speed up the resurrection process. Not just, “I do magic tricks. Watch me pull this rabbit out of a hat before I tell you the secret to how I did it.”

3) Again, as you yourself touched on, magic is Selene’s biggest selling point. Not only selling point. While you would be flabbergasted when you yourself acknowledged there is more to Selene than just her magic is beyond me. We don’t need Selene fans to spell out her entire history to make a case for why she would be a good fit. Not unless they’re specifically being asked to, but no one asked.

I love a good villain as much as the next guy and for the drama Selene is a better choice ,BUT after seeing what happened to Moira even among those like Emma who helped in this entire scheme, you'd think the QC learnt their lesson, after what Kate said about Brand and Hank ..one can't just jump into giving the vote to the dark goddess. In many ways Selene is leagues above Apocalypse when it comes to diabolical so it sits well with me at the moment. We have Sinister ready to screw everyone over, then we add Selene to the mix? Absolute catastrophy.

This way it's better, the QC has ruffled a pretty dangerous mutant so the power struggle, vendetta and one-upmanship has only began.

[JamJams]

I thought I was done but Gillan brought me back in for at least this book.

As always he is the best man for the job in writing Sinister with all of the layers of inhumanity and snark that turned him into an A-list antagonist.

Hope getting a Quiet Council seat was needed but at the same time it feels like her and Doug should have a seat on the Council without taking up a seat considering both of their jobs are entirely esssential for the island to work. So the replacement for Magneto should have been Selene and they create two permanent chairs for Doug and Hope.

In another thread I came up with an off-the-cuff idea for how you can 'fix' the Machine Moira problem by having a second Moira appear. And even said that the idea was just a first draft and there could be much better ways to bring Moira back as long as someone working in the X-Brand was willing to put in the effort. It looks like Gillen was the one who wanted to put in the effort. So hopefully one of the captive Moira's from Sinister gets to fill in that role and we have one Moira on each side battling to see if Mutants Always Win or Mutants Always Lose.

[king of hybrids]

It physically pains me to say this, but in a choice between Hope and Selene; the sociopathic soul-eating vampire brings more to the table.

Hope would never follow through on a threat to not resurrect mutants, and the council still has enough personal might to crush a rebellion. Selene, as seen, will follow through on her threats

[PeterParked]

Seems like once the first of these clones dies, we will learn that her powers were not what everyone thought they were.

Also funny for Hope to come in and proclaim that the Five deserve a council spot because of their importance, while the million of civilian mutants still don't have any voice on the council.

Which reminds me to the conclusion of Minbari Grey Council conflict in Babylon 5. Where the worker caste gets the majority of votes because of being the largest group overall and performing all the duties the other two caste require to function.
And then they still don't get any voiced characters or are ever mentioned making any important choices.

Actually the first few pages of the book seems to suggest he may already killed 25 Moiras, also the way he expects to know the outcome of the council vote and how Selene will react confirms he has information on how things will go in the future, and the book also states again how Moira’s power annihilate timelines and bring her back at the moment of her birth.

[Frobisher]

A Moira dying is just like rewinding the tape to the point of her death and pressing record again. The Moira in 10A may well have depowered intentionally, but it didn’t matter as we’re in a branch of that now and Moira 10a’s death would have only reset that timeline, turning it into Moira 11(10A). 10B meanwhile is 26 mini-resets in now and counting.

[BobbysWorld]

Also my first thought after the page where Kate and Kurt are talking about how if they picked either Brand or Hank for the Council seat they felt like the one they didn't pick would assassinate the other one:

Okay, see, this is actually an amazing argument for why the Council should pick Hank.

[king of hybrids]

Gillen did say he was establishing a new omega level charachter in his book and it will he a very welcome surprise Jesus being a mutant definately makes him omega.

Didn’t Dracula once get the crap out of JC?

[Rev9]

Didn’t Dracula once get the crap out of JC?

Turn the other cheek? ..