Kieron Gillen has been keeping secrets all along via three manipulative members of the diverse cast of Uncanny X-Men: Volume 2. Gillen delivers a satifying ending to the Uncanny X-Men series for a second time. The writer masterfully gives us six characters in 3 powerful revelations. Cyclops is imprisoned in a SHIELD facility when Kate Kildare, his superhero PR specialist, pays a visit. Gillen delivers an Ace he’s been holding since the series relaunched and it’s a helluva reveal. Kate’s real identity is a shocker and could lead to a whole new adventure for Scott and perhaps his greatest enemy.
Unit may be my favorite creation (he first appeared in S.W.O.R.D.) of Gillen’s run – I have already pleaded with the writer to use the android against Tony Stark in his upcoming Marvel Now relaunch of Iron Man. Unit and Danger’s final confrontation is beautiful and cruel. Those last panels of Unit are a perfectly chilling sendoff of the creature Gillen called aptly called a hybrid of C3PO and Hannibal Lecter.
Gillen managed to make the most bizarre brother/sister dynamic in comics even more tragic and strange during this Extinction team era. Illyana confronts a brooding Colossus on the ravaged Phoenix farms in Siberia. Magik takes Peter to Limbo for one last act and revelation that leaves him free of the Cyttorak and vowing to kill her. Illyana’s last line is cold and demonstrates the little snowflake has long been burned away. Colossus will turn up again in Cable and X-Force but I would love to see where Gillen would have taken Peter next.
Uncanny X-Men #20 could have packed in Storm, Psylocke, Magneto and Hope but their fates will be featured in other X-books. I was satisfied with the three big reveals. The only missing? Where was Emma Frost?
By Editor