Read our review of Rise Of The Powers Of X #1 from Marvel Comics, written by Kieron Gillen with art by R.B. Silva.
We reviewed the book on the Stack podcast. But in the interest of highlighting more about the title, here’s a summary of the conversation with our thoughts. And if you prefer the longer audio version, that’s below as well!
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Rise Of The Powers Of X #1 Review:
10 years after Fall of the House of X, the X-Men have lost. Omega Sentinel and Nimrod are ready to summon the Dominion, a machine god who will consume the universe. Only problem? The X-Men don’t give up that easily.
Kicking things off, while host Alex Zalben is loving this storyline and enjoyed this comic, he expressed confusion about the overall arc of Moira McTaggert in particular. She started as the central figure of the Krakoa era, eventually became mostly a machine, and now is on the side of the bad guys.
That said, with Gillen tying very specifically back through text pages to the House of X/Powers of X kick-off to Krakoa, and weaving stories from his Sins of Sinister crossover, Zalben added, “This gave the pleasant vibes of the beginning of that era, which I know not everybody felt this way. But that was the most excited I’ve been about X-Men in a while, and the idea of what Jonathan Hickman was doing with these text pages, it reminded me of when he revealed the timelines of Moira McTaggart, that issue, was all I talked about for a week with multiple people. So on that level, this is really working for me and I’m very happy with the issue.”
Justin Tyler was even more positive, saying, “I thought this was fantastic… I love seeing a dystopian X-Men team. And I love all the players they establish here.”
Zalben was also excited about the broken line-up of X-Men fighting back, as well as a nice payoff for what happened with Professor X and Rasputin IV in Fall of the House of X #1. And with something going on with Cypher, and a mystery about two other team members, “I’m very excited about this… It’s a bummer that Jonathan Hickman didn’t come back. But if you’re not going to have him come back, Kieron Gillen isn’t even the next best thing. He’s just a good thing to have on your roster because he understands that kind of complicated storytelling.”
Jumping off that, Tyler expressed a worry “about the complexity because there’s definitely a way this could tip into being, what exactly are you talking about? The Nathaniel Essex and Sinister of it all, it’s too complicated with the four of them.” Tyler also added a similar worry with the complexity of Moira McTaggert and her resetting timelines.
However, Zalben explained it as a “Baby Hitler” problem, that if you could time travel and kill Hitler as a baby, would you do that? That’s essentially the plan the X-Men have with Moira, to kill her before her mutation would reset the timeline, wiping out the whole Krakoa era to begin with. “I think there’s going to be more twists to come,” added Zalben. “But that definitely seems like the way to get out of this.”
Rise Of The Powers Of X #1 Official Synopsis:
THE FIGHT FOR KRAKOA HAS BEEN LOST! Ten years ago, the mutants returned from their exile to try and reclaim the Earth from the forces of Orchis. They failed. Now, within the victorious Orchis with their gauntlet choking the world, Nimrod and Omega Sentinel put their plan within a plan into action. They are to summon their binary god to consume everything in their accession. All that stands between them is the X-Men. What can they do? They’re the X-Men. They’ll find a way. That’s their power. So begins a story beyond time and space, with the rise of powers beyond our petty human intelligence. From writer Kieron Gillen (IMMORTAL X-MEN, UNCANNY X-MEN) and artist R.B. Silva (POWERS OF X, CAPTAIN AMERICA: SYMBOL OF TRUTH) comes half of the story that will bring the Krakoa Age to its conclusion!
