Immortal X-Men #15 annotations
As always, this post contains spoilers, and page numbers go by the digital edition.
IMMORTAL X-MEN #15
“Thirst Things First”
Writer: Kieron Gillen
Artist: Paco Medina
Colour artist: David Curiel
Letterer: Clayton Cowles
Design: Tom Muller & Jay Bowen
Editor: Jordan D White
COVER / PAGE 1. A zombie Wolverine attacks.
PAGES 2-4. Selene eats Shaw’s soldiers.
Selene is our designated narrator for this issue, even though she isn’t in the desert scenes. She was voted onto the Quiet Council in issue #12 and hasn’t had her spotlight issue yet.
The soldiers are apparently the same ones that Professor X repelled from Krakoa at the end of the previous issue. Although they’re at an Orchis base, they don’t seem to be wearing Orchis logos on their uniforms, as with the previous issue. There were four of them last issue, and there seem to be only three here, but I doubt that’s meant to be significant.
Selene’s captions get a black chess queen logo. Shaw had a similar black king logo on his captions in issue #6, although Selene is a former Black Queen.
PAGE 5. Recap and credits.
PAGES 6-7. Shaw and Selene return to Krakoa with psi-blockers.
Selene is surprised that Shaw was able to build effective psi-blockers. His back story does involve him being an engineering genius, but it’s rarely a focus of this stories, and she’s right that Shaw would normally delegate this to someone else. We saw last issue, though, that Shaw seems to have realised that he needs to look out for himself rather than relying on his allies.
The External Gate was created in Excalibur #12 when Apocalypse sacrificed several of Selene’s fellow Externals in order to create a portal to Otherworld. Despite their supposed immortality, none of them have returned. Selene clearly attaches real importance to the External Gate, even though she frames its importance here in terms of her personal glory. Later, on page 18, her narration tells us that she has always wanted to free her fellow Externals but couldn’t have done so while Krakoa was still in operation. This seems to be a big part of her motivation for bringing Krakoa down (together with being spurned as a Quiet Council member in issues #1-2).
“Xavier … has some telekinetic powers now.” Professor X seemed to have low level telekinesis in House of X #1. In X-Men #15, he said that his telekinetic powers were getting stronger with each resurrection. Previously, he’s only been shown moving small objects around – pouring a drink, that sort of thing.
“A grieving Xavier alone on the island… very Ozymandias.” Referring to the poem by Shelley, describing ruins: “And on the pedestal these words appear: / ‘My name is Ozymandias, king of kings: / Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!’ / Nothing beside remains…”
Selene’s narration at the bottom of page 7 confirms that Orchis really did intend to send all the mutants to Mars in X-Men: Hellfire Gala 2023, and had nothing to do with them being diverted to the desert and elsewhere. Orchis are well aware that the mutants did not wind up on Mars, but publicly they’re pretending that everything is going according to plan. Presumably, Orchis will be considering the possibility that the mutants somehow escaped.
PAGES 8-9. Exodus leads the Krakoan diaspora.
Exodus seems to be a doing a good job of keeping the public inspired, and of using their powers to keep everyone alive. On the other hand, he seems to have told the Krakoans that they’re heading towards a promised land of which he has only “arguably” had a vision. Exodus seems to mean that he really has had some sort of vision, but that he’s well aware that it might not mean anything at all – he chooses to believe, but even he understands what he’s doing there. Hope is on board with this for now, for purely pragmatic reasons of keeping the Krakoan public on side.
PAGE 10. Data page. Destiny is keeping a diary of the trek through the desert. Diaries are part of Destiny’s iconography. She wrote several volumes of them as a teenager, based on her first wave of visions. X-Treme X-Men was largely based around people trying to find them. It’s not clear where Destiny got a book to write in, but she doesn’t seem to be writing this with hindsight.
Destiny confirms that Jumbo Carnation is among the desert exiles, although we haven’t seen him. Despite being mainly a fashionista, he has practical skills he can bring to bear here.
“One mutant fed 5,000 two millennia ago.” Exodus’s belief that Jesus was a mutant has been referenced multiple times in this series.
Mystique is, as always, a key concern for Destiny. We saw last issue that told Professor X to make sure to get Mystique out of the way if anything happened at the Gala, but the Professor wasn’t able to achieve that. Mystique seemingly fell to her death in X-Men: Hellfire Gala 2023, but this is comics, and the word “seemingly” is doing a lot of work there.
PAGES 11-15. The exiles encounter a group of Wolverines.
Kafka is a pre-existing character – he debuted in Giant-Size X-Men: Jean Grey & Emma Frost and can be seen as a background character in several issues of this series. He was also being trained by Bishop in the epilogue to Bishop: War College.
PAGES 16-17. Mother Righteous joins the exiled Krakoans.
Mother Righteous claims to have been exiled to the desert along with everyone else, after being marched through the gates by Professor X. She also claims that the Wolverines just randomly attacked her and that she knows nothing about them. None of this is true. Mother Righteous appears in Hellfire Gala 2023while all the other mutants are being marched through the gates, entirely unaffected by the whole thing. In that scene, she quietly appropriates Krakoa’s Atlantic offshoot for herself, and traps it inside one of her “lanterns”.
The Scarlet Witch was a hate figure on Krakoa, due to her role in removing almost all mutant powers in House of M, until she redeemed herself by creating the Waiting Room in Trial of Magneto.
PAGES 18-20. Professor X kills the latest landing crew.
He seems to have literally torn them apart.
PAGES 21-23. Mother Righteous leads the exiles to the Atlantic Krakoa.
Again, she’s absolutely lying about having just found it here.
Exodus is rightly suspicious. As a magician, Mother Righteous works in terms of stories. She made this point to Shaw last issue: he was outwitted by her because he wasn’t thinking in story logic. Exodus, however, absolutely sees this desert trek in terms of a metaphorical religious story. What’s more, it’s a story that he probably knows better than she does…
Exodus seems to interpret the Wolverines as symbolic. Again, given Mother Righteous’s general approach, he’s very likely to be right. Versions of Apocalypse and Phoenix are also apparently out there, and quite clearly not the originals.
“Logan stabbed me once back when the Avengers and X-Men were at war.” Avengers vs X-Men #2, I think.
PAGE 24. Trailers. The Krakoan reads RISE AGAIN.
Note that Mother Righteous claims to be a mutant and Hope senses different mutant powers within her. This is probably because multiple mutants have thanked her and when people thank Mother Righteous she gains control over them.
If Xavier has enough control over his telekinesis to stop the psi-shielded goons here then why didn’t he use his telekinesis to save the humans at the Gala?
Mother Righteous’s plan is probably to get all 250000 mutants to thank her, which will make her vastly powerful and possibly turn her into a Dominion.
Note that this issue confirms that Orchis planned to send the mutants to Mars and Mother Righteous redirected them.
Paul > Exodus seems to mean that he really has had some sort of vision
In the last issue, Exodus said “Trust me. I have seen this in a vision, long, long ago.” I think the vision he’s referring to is when he saw the Phoenix manifest in the Egyptian desert when he was young. (Immortal X-Men 5) We didn’t get the full details of that encounter but this was his Burning Bush episode.
Most of the elements present within Mother Righteous’ lantern are callbacks to Exodus’s own perception of his backstory shown in IXM 5. The desert is the Crucible, a place of testing. Jean Grey/Phoenix is God, who sent the vision to a lost Bennet, turning him from a “man of faith” to a “mutant of faith”. Apocalypse is the Devil, who tried to tempt Exodus into a path of “evil” but failed. The zombie Wolverines are the wolves of the desert that hunt the chosen people.
I think I really would enjoy Exodus out-storying Mother Righteous, if that’s where it’s going.
“If Xavier has enough control over his telekinesis to stop the psi-shielded goons here then why didn’t he use his telekinesis to save the humans at the Gala?”
I think that he’s being deliberately powered up through his ordeal. Xavier’s going through his own parallel arc to everyone else. They’re together in somewhere unknown, he’s alone in a familiar place. Both are being tested by weaker attackers with something worse waiting. And the end result of the testing is to either break or come out stronger on the other side.
From an in-universe perspective, maybe more practice using his telekinesis to get around the empty Krakoa, feed himself, keep himself busy? His willpower being refocused after he was humbled, and better able to use his talents? The realization that since Kevin McCallister isn’t there to defend Krakoa with booby traps, he has to step up again?
I also get the feeling given his final line that this is Xavier after having the last straw broken. As manipulative as he’s been during the Krakoa he’s still never outright killed anyone because presumably he still has moral qualms about doing so.
I feel the heavy influence of the Cerebro podcast in how cartoonishly evil Selene seems here. She’s bit quite thin in terms of nuance in all her appearances so there’s never been much to draw on, yet.
Also please no for Xavier and telekinetic powers 🙁
I think Gillen is using Selene to make two points-(a) The idea that every villain would be rehabilitated by amnesty in Krakoa was stupid because some villains are just sociopathic and (b)Selene is a monster but the Krakoans DID betray her fellow Externals by letting Apocalypse kill them without consequence.
Roy Thomas gave Professor X some TK in his origins back-up stories.
So Gillen spent the last year and a half building up Sinister and the other Sinisters, and now it feels like that plotline has been completely railroaded by whatever “Fall of X” is trying to be.
@Evilgus: agree on Cerebro’s influence on Selene’s characterization. I’m all for it, as I didn’t like Selene at all until listening to that podcast.
@Jenny: agree. I think Gillen and Medina did a much better job selling Xavier’s change in morality than Duggan and co did with Kate. I believe the escalating stakes push Xavier to murder, and not showing him savagely destroy the soldiers was a lot more effective than the overdone neck-snapping in X-Men.
I’m intrigued by the questions raised in this series- what’s Mother Righteous’s endgame? What will happen to Charles? Can Exodus fulfill the destiny he sees for himself? Even if the Duggan titles fizzle, Immortal X-Men is making the Fall of X set-up interesting.
Stan also gave Xavier telekinesis when he screwed up some dialogue.
“So Gillen spent the last year and a half building up Sinister and the other Sinisters, and now it feels like that plotline has been completely railroaded by whatever “Fall of X” is trying to be.”
Man what the fuck are you even talking about we literally already got the payoff to the Sinister build up and now we’re onto a new plotline. Why the fuck do you even read these books if all you do is show up in here and bitch about them?
Before we got the ending with an Apocalypse and a Phoenix as well, I was wondering if Righteous had stolen a bunch of Wolverines off of Beast to use as NPCs.
Xavier had telekinesis when Hickman was writing him in Inferno. During his and Magneto’s fight against Nimrod and Omega Sentinel, Xavier ripped open Nimrod’s head with TK.
It’s already been well established that Beast has been careless with Wolverine clones for quite a while now, so I assumed that, directly or indirectly, they came from Beast. That said, I found it a bit odd that no one in the text really seemed interested in where they came from.
Immortal is still the only core book I’m enjoying, mainly because of Gillen’s character work, but I’m starting to get a little worried about pace. The clock is ticking towards the end of his run, and it feels like there’s too much on the table to resolve in an arc or two…
Xavier Telekinesis sightings:
X-Men vol. 1 #12 — saves himself and Juggernaut from a car wreck
X-Men vol. 1 #14 — mind-blasts a Sentinel
X-Men vol. 1 #40 — restrains a Frankenstein
X-Men vol. 1 #41 — levitates faling rubble
X-Men vol. 1 #53 — short-circuits a doomsday machine
X-Men vol. 1 #98 — mind-blasts a Sentinel
Uncanny X-Men vol. 1 #117 — restrains young Ororo when she pickpockets him
Cable & Deadpool #3 — levitates himself
Powers of X #1 — levitates a USB stick
Inferno #4 — mind-blasts a Nimrod
Actually Candra already came back in Marvel Voices : X-Men 2023 , where she revealed that she’s apparently bisexual as she agreed to a booty-call hook-up with Felicia “Black Cat” Hardy of all people , as FH revealed that she’s long been a fangirl groupie of the “Goddess of Thieves” (Candra is the patron of the New Orleans Guilds of both the Thieves and the Assassins who supplies them with the age-defying Elixir of Life in exchange for them being her retainers)
@April, very nice list, but two questions: 1) were issues 40, 41, and 53 Xavier or were they retconned into being The Changeling impersonating Xavier while he prepared for the Z’Nox invasion? Xavier discovered Changeling had latent telepathy, maybe he had TK as well. 2) Did restraining Ororo take telekinesis? I thought he just yelled “STOP” in her brain and she froze.
@Jdsm24, has Candra been definitively classified as an External? I know she often hung out with Externals, especially Gideon, but she seemed much more mystical in nature, moreover even than Selene. Keeping her life force in two gems, for instance, isn’t something we usually see mutants do.
@April
I also feel that #117 had Xavier use telepathy, not telekinesis.
There is also Uncanny X-Men Annual #4 (the first appearance of Margali and the reveal of Amanda Sefton being Jimaine Szardos). When Xavier is attempting to keep his grip on Ororo to keep her from being grabbed by some sort of Margali creation, he has a thought baloon about using his mental powers to “augment his physical strength”, but at strain that immediately becomes “unbearable”.
Whether that is TK or just focus to ignore pain, I don’t know and I think was meant to be ambiguous.
With Quentin Quire’s battle with Nimrod in Inferno, Hickman seemed to be setting up that telepathy can affect digital as well as organic minds. Duggan retconned it into having telekinesis. The OHOTMU flat out stated that Xavier didn’t have tk and previous depictions of him using it were coincidences.
Lee/Kirby also depicted Magneto as a telepath several times. I think their versions of older mutants included powers that were later ignored or retconned away once the rules of mutation were better defined.
On the other hand, telepaths in the Marvel Universe do tend to have control over “psionic blasts,” which are pretty ambiguous in nature. Sure, they make sense for Jean, but Charles or Emma? Maybe telepaths are all a little telekinetic.
Wait, so why isn’t Selene on the cover?
@Josie the Mother Righteous plot is still central, as this issue demonstrates, while Dr Stasis is the villain over in Duggan’s book(s) [he’s currently holding Cyclops captive), and Orbis Stellaris will no doubt reappear soon enough, likely in Red following the Genesis War. Sinister, of course, will be back eventually, once this Dominion plot resolves (at the end of Gillen’s run, most likely).
“we literally already got the payoff to the Sinister build up”
We didn’t, though. The other Sinisters are all running around doing their thing, and the Sins of Sinister led to the dissolution of the quiet council, the aftermath of which was immediately railroaded by the Duggan Fall of X books.
I always took Xavier mentally shutting down machines in NORAD in X-Men (v1) 95 as demonstrating power above and beyond telepathy.
I know it’s another universe, but I liked that Ultimate Xavier had telekinetic powers, but they were not strong enough to be very useful.
Personally, I have no problem with Xavier developing tk. I can go along with the idea that recent events amplified the ability. I wouldn’t be surprised if Krakoa feeding on mutant energy didn’t do something to alter Xavier’ or other mutants’ abilities. In Giant-Sized X-Men 1, Cyclops returns to the mansion without powers. When they return, his optic blasts go out of control. I could have sworn there was a line about them returning more powerful or difficulty to control than before, but that could just be my imperfect memory.
@Thom H
I assume the intent was to explain why Xavier never stops Magneto telephatically.
The one clear stance of mention of Magneto’s mental abilities I remember is during the original Secret Wars series, when the two of them are attempting to contact the Beyonder. Xavier asks to borrow Magneto’s “latent mental abilities”. Despite that, a few short panels later Magneto is really pissed off that Beyonder is still not acknowledging them and somehow muscles in mentally.
@Mike Loughlin
There is indeed such a line in Giant-Size X-Men #1. It happens at the trailing end of Cyclops telling the new recruits how he returned powerless to tell Professor X what happened in Krakoa.
Odd how easy it is to forget that the direct implication is that Krakoa has the ability to influence Cyclop’s powers. If it can do that, why would it not be capable of influencing other people’s powers as well?
It was Galactus they were trying to contact in Secret Wars, not the Beyonder. Not that it makes a difference to your point, just being pedantic.
Xavier manifests telekinesis as an indication that he’s been corrupted by the “Sinisterization” process. So when he’s finally cleansed of that (in a post-Krakoa book, naturally), he’ll lose his TK. And probably his ability to walk because everything old will be new again.
How’s that for a cynical No-Prize explanation?
Sounds good.
What would be the “tells” for the other Sinisterized council members then?
Why is Selene caring about the Externals but not normal mutants ?
It’s mentioned in the issue – being thousands of years old, she has a certain affinity for the few faces that stick around.
Xavier also used some telekinesis in Morrison’s New X-Men, but I think it was just to lift a coffee mug or something like that.
I like the theory that Exodus will out-story Righteous. Desert as crucible stories have golden calves and devilish temptations. He should be on the lookout for false saviors.
“It’s mentioned in the issue – being thousands of years old, she has a certain affinity for the few faces that stick around.”
That seems random like “
I care about these select people that i have a history with but not the other people that i have a shorter history with”
Like be an ice cold non feeling mutant vampire or not but being wishy washy when Orchis is trying to annihilate a whole race makes no sense.
It’s the equivalent of the near-stranger you meet for five minutes and the person you see every few days. Who are you more connected to, emotionally?
For Selene, relative to her life, a normal human lifespan is five minutes. But the person she’s seen on and off for thousands of years? That’s every few days.
The other immortals as the permanent fixtures in her life, and so much more “real” to her.
Her psychic vampirism probably makes non-immortal/External folks even less “real” and more disposable and interchangeable to her.
Of course, Selene cared about the Externals so much that she drained the lifeforce of most of them in X-Force (issues 53 and 54).
As for the other “tells” of being Sinisterized, I’ll go with acting wildly out of character, so any appearance may be given the equivalent of “it was a Doombot” excuse.
Okay, that was tongue in cheek. Some of the below may be tongue in cheek as well.
For Hope, any time she says “headshot” and acts like she’s playing a FPS while on crystal meth.
For Emma Frost, any time she talks like she has a British accent (when she talks like a Boston Brahmin, it’s the real Emma).
For Exodus, any time he forgets that he’s an incredibly powerful telepath.
For Warlock, any time he doesn’t use the word “selfriends”, though I think whenever he isn’t drawn by Bill Sienkiewicz fits too.
For Beast, any time he acts like a sociopath and does blatantly evil things.
For Magneto, any time he tells you that the heretofore unrevealed civilian name he just said is his *real* name.
For Storm, any time after she married T’Challa.
For Wolverine, no, I just don’t care about Wolverine.
For Jean Grey, she’s 100% completely terrible on her own; Sinisterization would make her a better person.
My problem with Xavier and TK (acknowledging there’s lots of little nods and hints in early appearances) is the mission creep of it all. In a few issues he’ll go from lifting cups to blowing up buildings. That, and I find TK quite boring as a “do anything!” power. Place limits on your heroes!
@Sam
“For Jean Grey, she’s 100% completely terrible on her own; Sinisterization would make her a better person”
if the emojis don’t post: I love this! Haha
Yes , it was confirmed during Tini Howards Excalibur series that Candra is indeed an External , as is Apocalypse .
* it wasnt confirmed there that Sam is an External , but considering that all of the other male Externals aside from Apocalypse have already confirmed that he is all the way back in Nicieza’s XForce , along with essentially Cecilia Reyes and Henry McCoy during Yost&Kyle’s New X-Men, i’ll take the express confirmation of Gideon + Saul + Absolom + Burke + Crule + Nicodemus > the implied insinuations of Selene who to me was obviously trying to get Tabitha to drop her guard by pretendinf not to be interested in draining Sam
Speaking of draining, it was already canonically confirmed in Brisson’s Cable that the Externals are Marvel-616’s counterpart to the Immortals from the infamous Highlander franchise : when one dies , especially If killed by a fellow External, their lifeforce is simply absorbed by the others , but will return to its owner when they eventually resurrect, so the Externals consider themselves to be spiritual siblings to each other , which explains why Selene considers them to be the closest thing to her own family (yes , Magma is -already confirmed to be her direct descendant but Selene clearly DGAF for the most part)
** In my headcanon, the Externals are all secretly actual blood relatives of each other who are direct descendants of the OG Forever Man (introduced in Avengers during the 1980s or 1990s) , whose own obviously-Omega X-gene mutant power is to spend eternity “reincarnating” ala Dr Who , by physically de-aging himself to an amnesiac tween boy, But of A Different Human Race, everytime he dies (apparently his body fully repairs itself when this happens) , and he’s already been around supposedly for the entirety of the history of homo-sapiens (which may be literally millions of years depending on Aaron’s & Gillen’s timewarp paradoxes retcons revelations , which I No-Prize headcanon presumably caused by the battle between the 3 Eternal skyfathers that broke the timespace continuum immediately on/in/around the planet Earth)
And speaking of the Externals , if I am to be indulged here , noticed that theres a serendipituous symmetry to them that IDK that Nicieza actually intended (if not , it can only be cosmic conincidence): they can be divided into 2 batches of 3 males + 1 female , one before Apocalypse , older than him by maybe at least 4000 years (Selene, Crule , Nicodemus , Saul, thought the birth order of the guys is unknown) , one after Apocalypse , younger than him by at least 4000 years (Candra – 1000’s, Gideon -1400s, Burke – 1600s, Absolom – 1800s , canonically all born in that sequential order*) this could explain why Sam is considered “special” , because like Apocalypse , he is the External that comes in between batches* , while Dazzler , if she is indeed also an External too (to explain her mysterious secondary mutation of literally physically resurrecting herself, as established by Claremont’s New Excalibur and later continued by Thompson’s A-Force) , is the External that starts a new batch
* I noticed that the 2nd batch of Externals had a pattern of a) emerging every couple of centuries , which such patten inevitably implying b) a missing External in the 1200s, after Candra but before Gideon* , and if this pattern can be applied to the 1st batch of Externals, but extending it to every couple of millennia instead of centuries* , then that would give a gap of 4000 years both before and after the birth of Apocalypse for other externals to be born , breaking the normal rule for couple millennia/centuries between the other Extenals , and thus making Apocalypse “special” among them for being one of them but not belonging to a “batch”. And Sam , could be Apocalypse’s sequential/thematic counterpart among the Externals , as he would have a similar pattern-breaking gap between him and Absolom , his immediate predecessor External , as the sliding timescale means that Sam is not fixed to the 2000s , as he was not fixed to the 1900s, and thus the gap between him and Absolom would be ever-expanding and so Sam , like Apocalypse, but not belong to a “batch”
Selene – 15000 BC/17000 years ago canonically in Kyle & Yost’s XForce and sequential/thematic counterpart to her fellow sole female External Candra , the canonical 1st of the 2nd batch; whoever is the counterpart to the “missing” 2nd of the 2nd batch – 13000 BC ; Crule or Saul – 11000 BC , as both of them were suggested on different occasions to possibly be the next oldest after Selene and both with enough parallels to be the counterpart of Gideon , the 3rd of the 2nd batch ; Nicodemus – 9000 BC , canonically supposedly as “old as the Swiss Alps”, which if conitnue to include the REH Hyboream Age for Marvel-616 as was the case in the 1990’s , would be around this time , the counterpart to Burke , the 4th of the 2nd batch (they both died of the Legacy Virus after all) ; Crule or Saul – 7000 BC , whoever was not actually the 3rd would thus then actually be the 5th , and again , both with enough parallels to be the counterpart of Absolom , the 5th of the 2nd batch
* the missing 2nd of the 2nd batch could be “Lazlo” aka “Locomotive Breath”, the 1990s Slorenian/Eastern European foe of War Machine with Forge/ScalpHunter-style intutive-inventor powers (who even looked like them) who claimed that he was “stuck” being physically immortal and thus became so bored enough with life to thus form/join his own Upstarts-style willing-to-kill-and-be-killed suicide-squad club of hired-thrillkillers-for-fun-and-profit, which could explain why he never bothered to join the rest of the Externals in their appearances in the modern era
* the missing 2nd of the 1st batch could be , in my own personal headcanon , maybe Gateway , because a) he’s canonically really physically short , yet is NOT physically a midget or dwarf (IDK if Australian Aborigines even them) as he has normal proportions , which could only mean that he must thus be an Ancient human , as normal-proportioned people were smaller in scale in past millennia / centuries , b) there must be at least one External with teleportation mutation LOL , c) it would fit another pattern I noticed , this time with the 1 batch , who all come from central parts of different Old World continents : Selene – canonically Central Europe , Saul – canonically Central Asia , Crule – canonically Africa , supposedly “North Africa” , but design-wise looks so much closer to warriors from Central Africa , Nicodemus – clearly looks like an older Magneto , who is Jewish , so must be from “Middle” East LOL (which physically connects Europe to Asia to Africa anyway) , so Gateway would fit the pattern if he came from Central Australia
* even more serendipituous symmetry / cosmic coincidences :p : 1) each batch of Externals , 5 , with 1 female (center) + 4 males (sides) form an X , and you need 2 X’s to form a comple circle (8 directions) with a Yin-Yang in the Center (Black & Blonde , as Loeb would say) , and XX is the chromosome code for natural-born females , so that explains why there are only 2 female Externals
2) based on the patterns , it is the 2nd and 7th Externals (both male) who are MIA , and the numbers 2+7 = 27 , the age at which popular-culture celebrities , especially male , are most likely to die LOL
Another clue that Charles Francis always had TK is the fact that his twin sister Cassandra Nova , whose physical body was cloned from his in the womb by her Revenant soul , has TK as part of her own X-gene mutation
Emma faking a British accent is one thing, but it somehow bothers me when she throws in British slang and syntax as well. Like in this week’s X-Men, when she says “we’re sorted”. Why are you speaking like that? Don’t most of the X-Men already know you grew up in Massachusetts?
Did Hickan have Xavier use his TK before his first resurrection? If so, then it wouldn’t be related to Sinister corrupting him.
Candra and Apocalypse were confirmed as Externals in the 90s. Also as a concept the Externals are not that deep.
If Cassandra was cloned from Xavier then she would be his clone, not his twin sister.
In my head “external” is just a type of secondary mutation. Some mutations recur in a very similar way in different people. Telepathy. Super strength. Blue skin. Why not a rarer strain, where one’s body recreates itself upon death, using hard quarks or whatever. They think they’re magical and special, because most of them were born before the Enlightenment.
Maybe Moira was an omega external.
@Si: I like that theory on externals just being an immortal secondary mutation. Aren’t mutants also meant to be longer lived, recover quicker from injury just as a general physical thing? So it’s not too much of a leap.
Cannonball (if he ever was an external!) would have just been the latest.
If the Externals are Marvel’s Highlander rip-offs, then poor old Black Axe is out of a job.
@Jdsm24: Cassandra Nova has the ability to unlock the potential of any genome, including abilities that haven’t been expressed.
Yes she does , but of course not all genomes have the potential for TK