I know it's already passed for some of you, but if you celebrate, Merry Christmas. Or a pleasant and/or unobtrusive December 25th. I was hoping to pick up both comics from last week on the way to my dad's, but only managed one.
The captured Nightcrawler is, to the surprise of no one other than ORCHIS, actually Mystique. Nightcrawler is pretending to be the mutantphobe on Silver's team. Kurt, his mom, and his girlfriend fight it out with a techno-organic'ed up Vulture and the Hounds. It's not going well until Kurt and the Bamf ghost free Warlock, who can at least cure the Hounds. Vulture's more of a problem, but Kurt's magic sword takes care of that.
Buonfantino takes over the art chores right after Kurt defeats the Vulture, so at least they waited until we're into the wrap-up. Everyone's a bit sharper-edged, bigger eyes. For Garbett's part, either he or Milla obscure or blur his linework on Warlock, especially when he's first freed. Makes him a bit seem malleable, suggesting he's not really holding a distinct shape in that moment. Things are shifting and rearranging.
After, Kurt decides he's got to get back into fighting for mutants, but Spidey lets him keep the suit. And the Bamf ghost is a part of Legion, while the rest of him hides. . .somewhere. I'm assuming the part about hiding with Kurt's heart and hope was metaphorical.
So, what do we got now that this is done? Kurt's rediscovered his resolve after having his self tampered with and manipulated. He's willing to get back in the fight. The specifics of Nightcrawler's birth have been retconned for at least the third time, with at least partially the goal of making Mystique less of a shit parent, and I guess codifying something Claremont says he always intended or wanted to do.
You could argue ORCHIS was dealt a loss, but the X-writers seem so unclear about how ORCHIS was planning to go about their goals (or even what their goals are, since the machines would ostensibly have a different goal than the "humanity defenders") that's difficult to square. How big a deal was infecting mutants with the techno-organic virus to make them mutant hunters to ORCHIS? How much does losing that actually hurt them?
My impression of the current situation is there are a bunch of different forces fighting a bunch of different parts of ORCHIS all over the place, with very little coordination on either side. Which could be the heroes dealing with problems as they arise, as has historically been the case in superhero comics, while ORCHIS is some kitchen nightmare scenario, with a dozen cooks all running in a dozen contradictory directions. So nobody's really making any progress in any direction.
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