Thoughts

The last issue ended with a great cliffhanger, and there’s a nice resolution to it here and Claremont brings together all his magical X-characters to the fight with – well – its never really defined.

Claremont has been pushing the darkness in his various Hells. From the rather classical firepits of Belasco to more twisted and nightmarish Hells. Such as this one where some sort of horrible, vague Lovecraftian *thing* emerges and threatens to take over the Earth.

Of course, these takes on Hell are going to continue in the title, and to some extent get even more disturbing in the run-up to Inferno but its interesting to see these early forays into a Hell that isn’t just Belasco in Dante’s Inferno.

Illyana Rasputin turns up, as does Amanda Sefton – and the issue presents us with a nice reveal to Colossus as to what his younger sister actually is now. Boith Illyana and Amanda Sefton seem exciting characters in this – obviously relatable humans with dark/wizarding powers but its hard to see how the title can justify two of them and its no surprise that its Amanda Sefton that’s going to take a backseat going forward.

It’s also a notable issue for bringing forward a couple of key developments that have brewing over the last couple of issues of both this title and New Mutants. Firstly Rachel joins the X-men. And Magneto is rescued from the sea. These are going to be important plot lines for Claremont going forward and you can see how much potential he sees in both.

Arguably the Rachel storyline never quite gets its due going forward, but at this stage in the tale there seems a lot of fun to be had at this Summers child from an alternate future stuck in the present.

And as a sucker for original team shots – I love this one!

Fun Panel

Romita Jr delivers another great issue full of dynamic imagery here – but this trippy little sequence still stands out.