What If We Kissed on the Blue Area of the Moon? 01 – What If...? Uncanny X-Men #1

“What if Cyclops has stayed with Madelyne Pryor?” by Gerry Duggan, Jan Bazaldua, Arthur Hesli, and Clayton Cowles

I don’t always dip back into the periodic return of What If...? as I find the modern versions often unsatisfying. When I was a child, I was always fond of the monthly series that was so random in its offering of what bit of Marvel history would be warped. Every issue featured a recap of how it went down courtesy of Uatu the Watcher and, then, how it’s all changed in the issue at question. Part of the charm was in how mundane it all was. How ephemeral and temporary due to the monthly cadence and self-contained nature. If an issue didn’t quite land, well, next month would be something entirely different. Each issue was like a mini-event unto itself. The modern iterations group together to be a mini-event of sorts. They tackle ideas so broad that there isn’t always a coherent point or story to be told.

That’s what I found with the first of the 2026 batch of What If...? issues, focused on exploring how things would have been different had Madelyne Pryor not died in Inferno and been redeemed in the process. Somewhat shockingly, this isn’t territory ever covered by What If...? with the only Inferno­-based stories asking what if the X-Men had lost or what if Wolverine had been lord of the vampires during the event. That this issue is also written by Gerry Duggan, one of the main recent X-Men writers during the Krakoa era suggested something that would probably tie into that era of the title, presumably when Nathan Summers would be coming of age – possibly to supplant the roles of the likes of Nate Grey or Hope Summers. While What If...? doesn’t need to follow such logic, it’s pretty typical to try to play off what actually happened when possible, giving ironic twists of known events. Duggan doesn’t opt for that.

Instead, the issue unfolds with random, haphazard choices. The timeline of events is shuffled randomly from the regular Marvel Universe for reasons unclear and nonsensical. The breaking point is the conclusion of Inferno where, here, Pryor is saved and Jean Grey, in her anger at Scott choosing his wife, takes revenge on Mr. Sinister, wiping his mind of the knowledge of cloning her and the existence of Nathan Summers. This means Nathan is no longer a pawn in the Sinister/Apocalypse conflict, and is never infected with the Techno-Organic Virus. Instead, Scott quits X-Factor to remain a devoted husband and father. It’s not until Nathan’s mutant abilities manifest that the Summers family becomes a little superhero team that participate/help stop such events as Atlantis Attacks and Acts of Vengeance, two events that were published at the same time as/immediately after Inferno, but, here, randomly take place a good decade later... after we also saw Wolverine and Emma Frost in their Morrison/Quitely New X-Men era costumes, which, somehow, preceded the Fantastic Four wearing their Claremont/Larroca era costumes. And, eventually, it all leads into Sinister regaining his memory and launching the Mutant Massacre on the Mansion... despite that story happening before Inferno. There’s a sense of all of Marvel history happening whenever desired despite there being no cause and effect or logic at play. It’s incredibly distracting – and breaks from the logic of What If...? where it’s the Marvel Universe that we know until the point of departure. Then, things unfold differently, but would still have the same broad sense of progression unless there were specific moments that would result in a change. Duggan just lobs out names of stories and events at random.

Also random is the way that Nathan Summers is handled. He gets his powers and wants to be a hero, which is fine. That makes sense. The Summers Family as a hero unit is an idea with legs that isn’t explored at all. For some reason, Nathan still has the codename Cable despite there being no reason for it other than that’s what his future self calls himself in the regular universe. Nathan is largely used only to be threatened in the new Mutant Massacre at the hands of the Marauders alongside other students and Madeline dies (which Cyclops is blinded) to inspire Cyclops to lean heavily into dark ops X-Force style actions to obtain revenge. And that’s largely a detour until the Krakoa era that ends with the conflict with Arakko going poorly for the Krakoa mutants and Earth at large. It’s a bit of a speedrun through X-Men history that doesn’t do anything interesting with how it’s different, aside from Cyclops eliminating Sinister means that Krakoa doesn’t have the Resurrection Protocols. That seems to be the big point of emphasis for Duggan: saving Madelyne means Sinister is eventually eradicated, which means Krakoa is weaker, which means Earth is weaker...

You can squint and see the logic, but it glosses over doing anything interesting with Nathan, a mutant of immense power. With no Hope Summers, would he have filled the mutant messiah role after M-Day (which isn’t here) or what about Utopia? Or any other of the endless X-events? In fact, part of the hole here is that Krakoa largely seems to exist as normal, except without a key element to its function, the Resurrection Protocols. The original sin of partnering with Sinister is lacking, as is the sense of power that would be at the heart of the nation. It’s glossed over how exactly Krakoa would develop almost identically when missing such a key element – in fact, the primary visual that begins the Krakoa period is the Resurrection Protocols. Moreover, there’s something unsettling that the core idea of this comic is that the bargain with Sinister was the morally correct thing to prevent the destruction of the Earth. The comic winds up being an argument for why it was the right thing to do... rather than one that actually tells an interesting story with the characters at hand.

None of which is necessarily a bad thing or makes for a bad issue of What If...? honestly. Big, broadly glossed over stories are as much a hallmark of the book as tightly plotted character pieces. This one, though, is so uneven with where it decides to focus, particularly in how it ignores the usual flow of events, that it doesn’t do either well.

Them Guys Ain’t Dumb 12 (Immortal X-Men #7, Death to the Mutants #3, AXE: Eternals #1, AXE: Iron Fist #1, Legion of X #6, Captain Marvel #42, Fantastic Four #48, Wolverine #25, and X-Force #32)

Somewhere during the reading of the three Judgment Day tie-ins that Kieron Gillen wrote and were released this week, I was stunned by the complexity of the narrative he is telling. It is absolutely stunning to see the various threads weave in and out of different comics, pulling together all of these characters. Most events have a variety of narrative threads that the writer must hold together, though I find that they’re usually left loose for others to pick up or cast aside when the time comes to focus on a specific, singular endpoint. Somehow, Gillen’s narrative for this event has grown more and more complex as it has gone on – and he hasn’t abandoned any elements, instead keeps adding new ones. I’m still trying to make sense of it all, to be honest.

Since issue five of Judgment Day, we’ve been fooled into thinking that this was a simple, straight forward story, as the tie-ins that take place after that issue focused entirely on the group inside the Progenitor, looking to shut it down. That’s a fairly simple and direct story. Last week also saw the addition of the Starfox one-shot, which didn’t seem like it was adding a lot to the larger narrative, more tying off a loose thread. This week’s issues put that interpretation into question by dramatically expanding the scope of what is occurring in the world outside of the Progenitor. I’ve contemplated trying to lay out the entire plot/put it into some sort of workable order and that seems tedious. It’s rather cool how much is just forming connections in your head based off what order you read the comics in and what stray lines you pick up on. More than past events, I think Judgment Day will reward rereading greatly.

Immortal X-Men #7 stunned me. It was not just the best comic of the event this week, it might stack up with one of my favourite Kieron Gillen-written comics. And it shouldn’t. If you look at it from afar, it is a frantic mess that covers a huge amount of plot ground in a manner that probably only makes complete sense if you’ve read the other comics it references/teleports into briefly. Yet, grounding it in Nightcrawler’s perspective – his determination and fierce humanity – adds a needed throughline to tie it all together. From a structural perspective, it’s fitting that this issue that jumps from Judgment Day #4 to Judgment Day #5 to Death to the Mutants #3, possibly all the way into Judgment Day #6 with stops in between is centred around a teleporter. It’s a nice bit of cohesiveness that you’d expect from Gillen the formalist; as Nightcrawler jumps from place to place, moment to moment, the issue similarly makes jumps.

Yet, what hit me harder was the dedication and determination of Kurt Wagner. If you didn’t think him a top-class superhero before, this is the issue that should push him near the top of your list. He is relentless in his efforts to propel himself and the rest of the planet towards survival – so much so that he dies. Again and again. And again. Oh, and, then, again and again and again. It’s tiring to see what he does in this issue – it’s inspiring that he somehow does it with optimism and joy. While there is an element of necessity to everything he does, that he has to do it or they will fail, there’s also a willingness that comes through; that, if there were several options for survival and him doing what he does was only one of them, he would be happy to volunteer. So big is his heart and his love for... everyone. That doesn’t always come out in happy-go-lucky quips. Sometimes, Nightcrawler is angry and brutal, yet it comes from a place of love and terror.

Part of me wants to give Gillen credit for not going heavy-handed with Kurt’s Catholicism. A lot of writers would be tempted, particularly in the way that Judgment Day is very much rooted in conceptions of a judgmental Old Testament-style God and Catholic guilt (the judgments are basically, do you feel guilty for betraying your own ideals?); instead, most of that is pushed aside as Kurt embodies his Christian ideals through his (seemingly) endless sacrifice. He offers up his life numerous times, putting himself in a position of total service for the good of his fellow people of Earth. And he inspires others, truly. His scene with Destiny stands out as a truly touching moment – and demonstrates the effect that a failing judgment has on some, as Destiny seems equally inspired by Kurt and her own failure/fear to proceed in crafting the plan to save the world.

Gillen wouldn’t have a chance of pulling this issue off without Lucas Werneck’s line art. Crisp and evocative, that art holds together the frantic pace of the issue, keeping things clear in time and space. I’ve enjoyed his art on Immortal X-Men to this point and this is the issue that cements his status as one of the best artists in comics. He draws one hell of a Nightcrawler, maintaining that needed look of joy and optimism that sells scenes and makes his words actually seem more than platitudes. The cheeky grin on his face as he falls to the ground with Destiny, followed by the warm smile as he extends his hand to her, offering to walk down the difficult path ahead with her... they’re different looks to convey different emotions and meanings despite being the same smiling face. Werneck shows the difficulty of Kurt’s sacrifices, his tireless work – and how close he is at times to breaking. The smile that never leaves his face in the final attempt to recruit Moira isn’t a show of optimism for anyone, it’s a deserved self-satisfaction with a plan that’s working and the hope that he genuinely feels for the future.

Kurt’s sacrifices and his religious faith in the future are contrasted with the sacrifices of Ikaris and Phastos in Death to the Mutants #3, and Ajak’s trial of faith in AXE: Eternals #1. While we see exactly why Sersi failed her judgment, the continued willingness of Ikaris to sacrifice for others, to try to be better hit me. Did he know that the Resurrection Engines were gone? Does it matter? While Phastos killed his friend to save his friend... it’s a key plot point and a small sacrifice, in a way. It’s also one of the more meaningful deaths I’ve come across in an event and, given the deaths we’ve seen so far, one of the few that may actually stick when all is said and done. The Machine has been our entry point throughout Gillen’s Eternals run, right up through Death to the Mutants and, by restarting The Machine, Phastos effectively kills that mind. The Machine lives on, but The Machine that we’ve known is gone.

The judgment of Ajak didn’t go how I thought it would. AXE: Eternals #1 is the final of three one-shots bridging the gap between issues five and six of Judgment Day, following the group that is inside the Progenitor. So far, we’ve seen Tony Stark pass judgment and realise that the trial didn’t actually end, while Jean Grey failed. In both cases, the judgment (as it has for the others written by Gillen) hinged upon how much they live up to their own morality, their own code of conduct. What are their ideals and their goals – do they actually stand by them or do they betray them? Do they feel guilt for lying to themselves? That is the only measure of objectivity that the Progenitor seems to possess and it’s been interesting to see it applied to different characters.

Just over halfway through the issue, the judgment hits a moment that should solidify how the rest of the issue (and judgment) plays out: Ajak, having killed every human whose life was taken to resurrect her, battles against the ghost of the Progenitor while justifying herself and her actions, ending by stating “I am many things, my god. But I am not a hypocrite.” The Progenitor-as-Makkari responds “Yes...” acknowledging that Ajak lives a life completely adhering to her personal beliefs, morals, goals, what have you. Unlike Makkari, she does not regret creating the Progenitor and, in adherence to her goals, she continues to seek to make it into the god that she believes it can and should be. By all rights, she should pass judgment.

Yet...

It seems like the Progenitor is ready to fail Ajak, citing the consequences of her strict, fanatical faith. She created a god that will destroy everything, including her. Even it can see that that was a mistake and says, “There is faith... and there is too much faith.” To this point, the Progenitor didn’t judge the subjective morality of anyone, only how closely they lived up to their own closely held ideals. We know that the trial has not ended, that the Celestial still judges the planet, and that there is a larger plan in play that we don’t have the details of yet, so this could merely be an element of that – another deferral of judgment after we’ve seen it defer many before. Not at odds with that interpretation is that this is the beginning of the further growth of the Progenitor into the sort of god that Ajak believes it can become. It moves past its singular form of judgment to a more nuanced one when forced to finally judge its primary creator. This is a god that we know was created through an act of belief and that belief continues to shape it, mould it subtly and gradually. Thus far, this new god has been mostly viewed as a static creation, one set in stone – but some of its narration has suggested growth and change throughout the event – and few gods remain in a single place.

The primary question remains as we head towards issue six: what sort of god will the Progenitor be at the end of Judgment Day?

*

In this week’s glut of tie-ins, I found myself increasingly disappointed with the writers of them. The quality of the individual comics varied, but quality wasn’t what I found myself focusing on. No, what bothered me is how Kieron Gillen is the only writer to have the Progenitor fail a hero/protagonist of his comics. In fact, aside from one instance of a villain being failed in one tie-in, no writer explicitly failed any of their characters. To me, that’s a big failure to actively engage with this event in a truly meaningful way.

Let’s go back and look at the actual judgments, shall we? I’m skipping anything that didn’t have a definitive or deferred judgment or was written by Gillen, with one exception.

X-Men #14: Cyclops passes.

Avengers #60: Hawkeye passes.

Amazing Spider-Man #10: Spider-Man passes.

Fantastic Four #47-48: This is maybe the only contentious one as the end of issue 48 shows a thumbs up, possibly just for Reed Richards (it seems almost symbolic for the whole world, to be honest) and issue 47 has Reed narrate “So, if my family – my ordinary, extraordinary family – could be judged and come up wanting?” which could be read as either a hypothetical by Reed or a statement that the other three have already all failed. Given that the other three seem pretty unbothered by the whole Celestial judgment thing, treating it like any other world-ending threat, I’m interpreting it as they hadn’t yet received judgment and Reed was talking out his problem, proceeding on the idea that Earth would need to be saved from a being that could fail his family. The judgment at the end of issue 48 is also vague and not entirely consistent with the rest of the event. But, there are no definitive failures.

AXE: Iron Fist #1: Iron Fist and Loki both pass, while Iron Fist’s brother fails. We are not given enough context for Lin Feng’s failure. The two passes make sense as both characters show a lack of hypocrisy consistent with the judgments we’ve seen elsewhere, while the failure lacks any real context.

Captain Marvel #42: Captain Marvel, Lauri-Ell, and Chewie the cat all pass. This is a fine enough issue and has a bit of a clever conceit in following the cat around. The only moment that struck me as out of place with the event was when Chewie catches a mouse and the Progenitor-as-Carol following it around briefly gives it a thumbs down until it lets the mouse go.

Wolverine #24-25: Wolverine passes, other judgments are deferred/not shown.

Legion of X #6: Legion passes.

Marauders #6: We don’t know who passes or fails. Steve Orlando chose to engage with the process of healing and justification rather than the end result, which seems like a fair way to engage with the event. Although, Psylocke does explicitly get mentioned as passing, while Daiken theorises that he failed without it being confirmed.

The X-Men Red tie-ins featured no judgments except overlapping with Magneto’s passing in Judgment Day #4, while X-Force’s tie-ins haven’t had any judgments yet either, but still may next week.

Now, let’s contrast that with the various judgments that have occurred in Gillen’s titles:

Pass: Kro and the entire Deviant race, Phastos, Kitty Pryde, Thor, Ms. Marvel, Starbrand, Daniela, Dr. Doom, Jada, Miles Morales, Magneto, Ikaris, Iron Man, and (possibly) Ajak.

Fail: Captain America, Emma Frost, Destiny, Mystique, the Delphan Brothers, Makkari, Sally, Sebastian Shaw, Tom, Luke Cage, Katrina, Charles Xavier, Daredevil, Sersi, Eros/the world(?), and Jean Grey.

Plus many deferrals/non-judgments that also say something, I suppose. But, looking at those two lists, it’s a healthy mix of heroes, villains, civilians, and characters that feature heavily in the two regular titles that Gillen writes, Eternals and Immortal X-Men.

What makes the choices to pass all of the characters so frustrating is that the majority of the tie-ins by writers other than Gillen and Al Ewing take place between issues three and four of Judgment Day, focusing on that period of Celestial judgment. Some handle that judgment well, some less than well, some not at all... yet, overwhelmingly, whether the comic is good or bad, consistent with the Progenitor in Gillen’s books or not, the result is the same: everyone passes. We get one singular explicit failure of a character that’s meant to be the bad guy but lacks further context, one possible suggestion that three quarters of the Fantastic Four failed before maybe they all passed, and an issue that engages with the idea of the event by not delivering definitive judgments. There is a concerted effort throughout the tie-ins to engage with the Celestial judgment and the way that most use it is to blandly give a thumbs up to their characters. If you focus in on individual issues, the results seem justified and not a problem, but, taken as a whole, it points to the lack of editorial cohesion and overview that is needed to create a balance, unified event. The result, as a whole, is to further separate Gillen and his work from that of his peers – to further emphasis that, with a few exceptions, this event and its strengths are carried by him and his artistic collaborators with others either unwilling or unable to actually engage honestly with the true premise of the event.

How could no one want to tell the story of a character that fails and what that means aside from Gillen?

Soon after issue three, I had an idea that, at the end of the event, I’d go through and give every issue involved a pass/fail to see if the event, as a whole, passes. Since then, I’ve seen such a gulf expand between what Gillen and Ewing have been doing consistently throughout and what nearly every other writer involved has produced that it doesn’t seem fair. The event is a great one and happens to feature a host of bland, skippable tie-ins that add virtually nothing to it, like so many events of the past (and future). What tips things in favour of the good is that, along with the main series, Gillen wrote a large number of tie-ins, making it so he wrote nearly half of the total event himself. It’s easy to toss out the forgettable tie-ins when over half of the total event is incredibly high quality that actively adds to the story and themes.

If that sounds harsh, that’s because it’s meant to. Thanks to the quirks of scheduling, this week had nine Judgment Day tie-ins come out for a total of $37.91 USD (more in Canada!) and what became incredibly apparent is that, after reading the three written by Gillen and Legion of X #6, the remaining five were barely worth the time and money. I could have stopped there and gained the same amount of insight into Judgment Day as I did after reading the remaining five comics. More than half were completely skippable and... I don’t get it. I truly don’t understand the process that leads to this. Which is why I am dismissive and chalk it all up to efforts to get money for nothing, piggybacking off the event for a sales bump, and delivering little of consequence.

And I don’t mean in a plot sense. Legion of X #6 didn’t actually add a whole lot to the main event story. It mostly contributed some surrounding details for the plots of X-Men Red #5-7, which itself carved out a nice little slice of the main event for itself. These are comics whose primary focus is their own characters and advancing their own stories using the event and, in the process, manage to enrich and deepen the event. It’s not just “Hey, what happened on Arakko?” Legion of X #6 adds extra depth to the efforts of Nightcrawler in Immortal X-Men #7 without directly commenting upon them. The X-Men Red issues, yes, expand upon Uranos’s attack, but quickly sidestep that to focus on its own characters and the fallout of that attack, positioning Magneto and Storm into their position to act in Judgment Day #4 and, then, deal with those consequences. These comics engage with the event, both in how they can affect it, but also in how it affects them. X-Men Red, in particular, veers in an out of connecting actively with Judgment Day, almost like a line on a graph that moves towards, away, and overlaps with the mean. Marauders #6 also felt like a tie-in that tried to genuinely apply the ideas of Judgment Day to itself and how that could impact its characters and story going forward.

The other tie-ins took a superficial element of the story, did an issue or two featuring it, and it feels like it meant nothing. Not really. They were issue(s)-long versions of single panels from Judgment Day #4, except less consistent or intellectually curious.

And we still have one tie-in left to go before we get to the finale of this event.

Them Guys Ain’t Dumb 06 (X-Men #14 and X-Force #31)

The last time we had an X-Force tie-in issue for Judgment Day, it had nothing to do with the event. No mention of Celestials or Eternals or attacks on Krakoa, just another issue of X-Force. It came out the same week as X-Men #13, which was very much about the event, expanding on both Judgment Day #2 and Death to the Mutants #1 (itself an expansion on Judgment Day #2 and out the same week as the two X-titles). Skip ahead two weeks and we’ve got X-Force and X-Men again, and I figured I could almost copy and paste in what I wrote then for now...

Well, you know what they say about god and plans and assumptions and Celestials, right?

Neither of these issue are much of a tie-in. Between the two of them, I’d argue that there are eight pages related to the event with the rest having nothing to do with the Judgment Day beyond the odd reference or allusion that makes no difference. Both of these comics function as just your average issue of each title with a scene plugged into each involving the Progenitor that could be excised completely and have no impact whatsoever.

No, I can’t copy and paste what I wrote two weeks ago, because this is a whole different sort of pointless cashgrab tie-in approach. This is the “technically it did feature something about the event” tie-in meant to silence anyone complaining that the banner on the front was false advertising. Because it’s not. Because these comics each feature scenes with the Progenitor. So it’s about Judgment Day, really. 18.18% is about Judgment Day to be a bit more exact. Shame I couldn’t have just paid $1.45 for the parts that I wanted, right? It was still $7.98 (more in Canada).

I don’t want to harp on about money and get back into that “riding the gravy train” stuff. I’d much rather continue discussing the Progenitor and the Eternals and the mutants and all of the things that I’m loving about this event. That’s not what events are about, though. They’re about giving you enough of that other stuff to get you excited and wanting more, so you begin buying anything with the banner on the cover, because you love the story so much! You see a cover with Cyclops in what looks to be Celestial-esque bonds, hood over his head, and you think that you’re going to get yourself an issue of Cyclops facing down his judgment with the Progenitor.

You get three pages that feel like an afterthought to the other 19.

None of this is about the quality of the comics themselves or even the creators involved necessarily. I don’t have the knowledge to know why they made the decisions they made, why editorial made the decisions they made, or why the event banner is on the cover of comics that have little to do with the event. All I can talk about is what it feels like when you pay your money with certain expectations and get comics that do the absolute bare minimum to fulfill those expectations. It feels like a cynical cash crab. It feels like everyone involved is happy to take your money by lying.

It doesn’t have to be that way. If you go back ten years, Wolverine & The X-Men took an issue off from Avengers vs. X-Men in the middle of a run of tie-ins to do a Doop issue. No AvX branding or anything. Just took an issue off from the event, because they felt like it. That’s what X-Men #14 seemed like it wanted to do. And I get it. We went from the Hellfire Gala when the new X-Men roster was set right into a big line-spanning event and maybe everyone involved just wanted to do an issue involving this new team doing some X-Men shit. Then go for it. Take an issue off from the event. No one will mind.

I mean, me, personally, I knew what I was getting into when I signed up to buy about every comic getting released with this event and write about them every week. Every event has bullshit like this. Comics that say that they tie into the event when they don’t; pointless mini-series and one-shots that add nothing; creators gritting through their teeth as they shoehorn in event details without derailing their ongoing plots... that’s the name of the game, right? Money for nothing.

And, damn, if that doesn’t sound dismissive and harsh about the hard work that went into these comics. They’re fine enough comics, I suppose. Hell, the X-Force arc could still turn itself around given we have two more issues coming out. But, these two comics are what they are, and I’m going to treat them as such. So, here’s 18.18% approximately about the pages that relate to the event:

The X-Force scene where Kraven faces the Progenitor naked, wanting some sort of acknowledgment tell us nothing. It’s about Kraven and the lack of response from the Celestial doesn’t tell us anything of any value. Was it ignoring him? Was it still judging him? Was it even aware he was there? Dunno.

The Cyclops scene has a little more meat to it, though not by much. It works best if you know a little bit of the history between Cyclops and Celestials. Along with Jean Grey and some aliens, he managed to blow Arishem’s hand off once; and, then, later, he told a whole group of them off in a manner that got them to leave Earth alone. Cyclops is nonplussed when it comes to the judgmental space gods. His unwillingness to be judged except by his wife, someone who knows him and his goals, successes, failures, etc. intimately falls in line with each judgment being subjective to an extent. Cyclops is living his life as best he can these days and generally succeeding at what he sets as his goals. His recent disclosure of the resurrection protocols was a definite doing what he thought was right no matter how it looked. Of course he gets the pass. Krakoa Cyclops is very much living his best life and doing it up to his own standards.

I wish I could say that these are the last issues I’ll be buying for the event that will feel like wastes of my time and money (at least in how it relates to Judgment Day). I doubt it, unfortunately. As I said, it’s how these things go and, looking over what’s coming, it’s hard not to spot a few questionable comics. It bugs me not just because of the money it costs me; I’ve really been enjoying this event and am excited by the potential stories left on the table by the main series for others to pick up and run with. Instead, we get brand issues that engage minimally with the event, and it’s hard to not jump to conclusions as to why.

Next week is a rather large week with Death to the Mutants #2, Immortal X-Men #6, Marauders #6, and Wolverine #24. With two of those written by Kieron Gillen, we are assured two issues about the event. That I feel the need to jump to the solicitations in order to prepare myself for the other two is sad. The “this issue takes place concurrently with Wolverine #24” note in X-Force #31 doesn’t warm my heart.

Them Guys Ain’t Dumb 04 (Death to the Mutants #1, X-Men #13, and X-Force #30)

Judgment Day is now official a proper event.

Up until this week, we had several lead-in issues mostly written by Kieron Gillen, the writer of the main series, two issues of the main series, and two ties-ins, one of which was written by Gillen and the other very closely hewed to the first issue of Judgment Day, filling in a big unseen scene from that book. It’s been a very tight, very Gillen-centric sort of event (and with him writing nearly 50% of the total comics being released under the Judgment Day banner, I imagine it will remain as such) and, while that makes for a cohesive and focused story, it’s not exactly how events tend to play out in full.

So, welcome X-Force #30 to the party with its Judgment Day branding and spot on the list of tie-ins and its complete and utter lack of even the briefest of allusions to the event that it is supposedly a part of.

No, X-Force #30 kicks off a storyarc that will see Kraven the Hunter come to Krakoa titled “The Hunt for X” and why it carries the Judgment Day banner is anyone’s guess. The recap page doesn’t even make mention of the event that it supposedly ties into, which is always a good clue of how much it really will. Now, perhaps I am being hasty and quick to, er, judgment. X-Force #30-33 are all listed as tie-ins to Judgment Day and it is certainly possible that, by the time we reach that fourth issue, forking over $15.96 in the process (more in Canada!), it will stand revealed to have a marginal connection to the event. But, you’ll have to pay to find out.

Every event has these sort of cheap, money for nothing tie-ins. The kind that sucker in completists and dumb critics, while causing loyal readers of the title to fret if their favourite comic is suddenly going to get derailed by an external story that they have no interest in. It’s part of doing business, as it were. I imagine if you ask most people involved and they would rather not slap a Judgment Day banner on the cover of a comic that has literally nothing to do with the event whatsoever, lying to everyone for the sake of selling some extra copies. But, it works. Branding a book as part of an event does increase sales. I’m not usually the sort to pay attention to that, but, when I was writing about War of the Realms, I went back to see the effect on sales and, yes, titles like Squirrel Girl and Asgardians of the Galaxy did see significant increases on the charts when they became involved with the event (though, those books actually, you know, had stories related to the event). It’s a shrewd, short-term business move that may work in the long-term if it gets some eyeballs on the book and people like what they see, if they’re not completely turned off by the lie that got them to buy it.

X-Force #30 is a fine enough comic on its own. It has nothing to do with Judgment Day, however. But, that’s the way you do it when you’re putting out a bigtime superhero comic book event.

And, it’s a shame, because the other two comics released this week, Death to the Mutants #1 and X-Men #13, are the exact sort of tie-in issues that you want. In his newsletter last week, Gillen called Death to the Mutants #1 “aka Eternals #14 aka Eternals #17 if you’re inserting the specials” (Eve of Judgment #1 was Eternals #13) and he’s not wrong. Narrated by the Machine, it’s basically if the ongoing Eternals series had a tie-in issue, showing us what Ikaris and the rest of the exile Eternals are doing, covering the events of both issues of Judgment Day in the process. Meanwhile, X-Men #13 skirts doesn’t just expand upon the Hex/Krakoans fight from Judgment Day #2, it expands upon/ties into scenes from Death to the Mutants.

What I found interesting is that two contradictory ideas espoused by Ikaris are raised in the issue. Or, rather, they seem contradictory on the surface and look like they may, in fact, an evolution of the same idea, a realisation of a higher truth. In X-Men #13, when Ikaris approaches Jean Grey to indicate that he will create a way for them to attack the Eternals’ armoury and cut off supply to the Hex, he tells her his one rule: “Kill no Eternals.” This instruction is wonderful in the way that its two different meanings exist depending on your knowledge.

For Jean Grey, it seems like the instruction of a torn man. Ikaris is betraying his people because he disagrees with their war, but he only wants their efforts to make war on the mutants stopped. They are still his people and, in stopping their actions, he can’t bear to see them killed. There are certain lines that he won’t cross and, should the mutants cross that line, he may be forced to stand alongside his people even as they do something that he disagrees with. And, from her perspective, this is a perfectly valid reading of this instruction.

We know more than that.

We know that Eternals can’t ever really die, not forever. When an Eternal dies, the Machine resurrects it, but does so by taking the life essence of a human, killing that human. Ikaris along with some other Eternals, upon learning this fact, have left Eternals society and are trying to find a new way to live that doesn’t involve killing innocents so that they may live. When he tells Jean “kill no Eternals,” what he’s really saying is “kill no humans.” And to add another layer to this multi-layered instruction, Ikaris’s instruction is, unknowingly, allowing the mutants to avoid unknowingly breaking one of their own laws: “Murder no man.”

How this idea evolves, though, is interesting and comes from the intervention of the new Celestial adding a fourth principle for the Eternals: “You have 24 hours to justify yourselves.” While framed at the end of Judgment Day #2 as a statement for the entirety of world, it also acts as new essential Principle for Eternals, it seems. We don’t see too much of how that affects the Eternals (Druig stalls, for example – how can he justify himself, really?), but the final two pages of Death to the Mutants #1 has Gilgamesh and Ikaris address this new principle, briefly, with the former saying, “This world bleeds because of our arrogance. We hurt humans by existing. Even I, who tried to protect them, killed them indirectly. We die, they die. The Principles have always been riddles. I know the answer to this one.” To which Ikaris replies, “...I think I do too,” which we see him using his eye beams. The final page reveals his answer to this new Principle and the evolution of his thinking it has caused:

DEATH TO THE ETERNALS.

What exactly this means is anyone’s guess at this point. It’s a subtle evolution from “kill no Eternals” to “death to the Eternals,” and, yet, still comes from the same impulse. The idea that Eternals live at the expense of human lives disgusts Ikaris and some of the others – so much so that they seek out the Deviants as part of their efforts to find a new path forward. With this new Principle forcing the Eternals to justify themselves, the answer for Ikaris is obvious: there is no justification for an existence that comes at the expense of others. The only way he can justify his existence is to find a way to eliminate the Eternals. It’s a chilling final page that, for me, blows the event wide open in a bigger way than the end of Judgment Day #2.