An X-man faces a terrifying transformation, and the cure may be worse than the disease. Who or what is Repent, and why are they the last hope of a beloved mutant? Meanwhile, the Louisiana X-Men learn of a dark connection between their recent foes, one that may involve one of the Outliers’ deepest secrets. Uncanny X-Men #35 is written by Gail Simone, drawn by Luciano Vecchio, colored by Matt Wilson and lettered by Clayton Cowles.
Adam Reck: Alright, Austin, it’s our penultimate review of this volume of Uncanny X-Men and the “Wild Ride” continues! Are you excited to see what new hell awaits Rogue and Gambit?
Austin Gorton: Not really! But I am excited to see the other X-Men go about busting up some anti-mutant (metaphorical) monsters!
Adam: Then let’s stop countin’ angels on the heads of pins and get gabbin’!
Bivouac in the Barn
Adam: Last issue we met the very messed up dog-kid-mutant Howler, who had been treated inhumanly by mutant traffickers. No one could quite connect to the poor mutt, but Wolverine does his darnedest here.
Austin: Simone’s characterization of the long-established characters has always been a little hit or miss, but this was the perfect note for Wolverine in this moment, channeling our knowledge of his history — the fact that he was basically in this exact same mental state (if a bit more violent) when the Hudsons found him (after he was essentially tortured by the humans of the Weapon X project) — to underscore his actions toward Howler. This is basically a rehash of what he did with Kid Wendigo in the opening issues of Saladin Ahmed’s Wolverine run, but rather than feeling repetitious, it feels like a logical expression of his character.
Adam: I like how everyone bonds in trying to give Howler a nice place in the barn, complete with extra servings of bacon and a horse hug from Ember.
Austin: What exactly Ember is and how he relates to Calico (and which is the mutant in their partnership) remains a mystery, but one thing we do know for sure is that in this moment, at least, Ember is a Good Boy.
Adam: I am a little at odds with how quickly Wolverine has decided to kill Howler’s captors without knowing anything about what’s going on. Yes, Wolverine is the de facto killer on the X-Men who acts outside the law as a feral antihero. Yes, he’s killed countless times over the course of the X-Men’s history. But I would’ve thought he would have a few other options in his head before jumping directly to murder.
Austin: Yeah, contrary to his earlier ability to relate to Howler, this is a place where Simone is perhaps hitting a piece of Wolverine’s established history a little too hard. As you say, he definitely has a history as the person on the team willing to cross that line, and the whole question of superhero morality in the X-Men has been murky for years (and made especially murky, for good and bad, during the Krakoa era). But I too bumped against just how quickly Wolverine decided to kill everyone responsible. Usually, his push to cross that line comes in the moment, an expression of his inner animalistic side, and is less … premeditated.
I see what Simone is doing: Wolverine connects so deeply to Howler thanks to their shared experiences, and is so enraged by what his captors did (and are doing) that he’s already made the moral judgment and decided their fate. In its way, it’s a bit like the “pump up your new villain by having them take down the earlier villain” routine, which can work, but risks overselling the new threat.
Crashing Calamity
Adam: Because of Howler’s plight, the rest of the team — Monet, Quicksilver, Jubilee and Nightcrawler (with an assist from Mrs. St. Juniors) — devise a plan to take on the traffickers via a ruse in which the Outliers are presented as mock-trafficked mutants. Monet says they won’t like it, and I’ll admit, I don’t love it!
Austin: All else aside, it feels kinda half-assed (which, textually, I suppose it is) — and to that point, it’s quickly established that they’re fooling no one, which is another example of the “pump up the new villain” routine potentially backfiring. We’re meant to infer this group means business because they see through the X-Men’s ruse so quickly, but that risks making the X-Men look like chumps for not being able to better fool some (in the grand scheme of things) random guards.
Adam: And you know I was extra-put-off by Jubilee using Shogo as her pseudonym for this operation. Seriously, we are 35 issues into this book, and Jubilee has made zero attempts to reunite with her son, and yet is casually using his name to fool bad guys? What’s that about?
Austin: When we said we wanted Jubilee to acknowledge Shogo, this isn’t what we meant.
Adam: No, it is not! Anywho, the operation turns out to be the work of the same dorks who Ransom and Wolverine fought a while back in Buenos Aires, Word of Strength. We see one of their leaders, who might as well be Colonel Sanders given his deep southern twang and bolo tie, beating a mutant child with an electrified police baton just to make sure we know these are truly reprehensible bastards.
Austin: This I appreciated; we know we’re not dealing with a new threat destined to cement their place in the pantheon of great X-Men villains (despite/because of their connection to the Word of Strength cult), so yeah, just go all out with the cliches and give us an evil Colonel Sanders at the heart of it all. We don’t need to be too cute here.
Adam: Before they can free any kids, they run into a Resident Evil-style abomination called Calamity. I guess they’ll fight this meatwad next issue.
Austin: That was not what I was expecting Calamity to be/look like, so kudos for that reveal (even if the overall design is kinda meh, despite Vecchio’s strong work). For all my quibbles with this section of the issue, I did enjoy seeing the X-Men in proactive action again, working as a team to take down a threat to mutants.
Dance with Another Demon
Adam: We’ve spent the majority of our time here talking about Howler and the raid on his former jailers because despite the cover advertising the new character Repent, the other half of the issue feels very much like the previous two. Rogue and Gambit balk at yet another layer of exorcism — this time involving a demon possessing a feathery mutant — and then they fight said demon.
Austin: Yup, this reads very much like a rehash of the previous two — to the point where it probably would have been better to just skip this Rogue/Gambit material entirely, dedicate this issue to the Howler plot, then return to the exorcism focus next issue. Maybe we’ll find out the focus on Rogue here will play a significant role in the story’s conclusion, making this installment of the plotline feel less repetitive and tacked on?
Adam: To your point, this round does feature some Rogue backstory elements, including references to her Aunt Carrie and Cody Robbins, and both make sense within the context of Rogue canon. How did you feel about the inclusion of these characters, Austin?
Austin: It’s fine. Hitting the Cody button is the easiest way to toss a little Rogue angst into a story, but I appreciate that Simone has Rogue be only so affected by the attempt here, remembering that she received absolution of sorts from Cody before he died in the original Rogue miniseries. Simone is also clearly trying to make this mission/journey ultimately have as much impact on Rogue as it does on Gambit (rather than just have her be the worried spouse who is either relieved or saddened by the ultimate outcome), and that’s not a bad thing.
Adam: Vecchio yet again draws the hell out of every page, especially the Gambit demon fight, which I guess takes place in another plane? I don’t know, but it looks very cool. This arc could easily be much worse if drawn by someone less talented.
Austin: 100%. There are times where I simply don’t care what’s happening just because it looks so good, and it would be the exact opposite if it didn’t look good. So far, this arc (the Rogue/Gambit portions of it) has been highly repetitive: go to an exorcist, fight some demons. Fight some more demons, then go to a different exorcist, fight some demons there. It’s tedious, but it would be downright unbearable if Vecchio (or another artist of his caliber) wasn’t drawing all those demon fights.
Adam: So after all that, Repent is going to help Gambit with something called “The Iron Cathedral,” which does sound pretty metal. What does that mean? We’ll find out in the next issue, with the conclusion of this arc and our coverage of this book!
X-traneous Thoughts
- Rogue’s Aunt Carrie doesn’t have many appearances, but she did show up in a flashback recently in Rogue: The Savage Land #3 by Tim Seeley and Zulema Lavina last year.
- The X-Men’s plan feels even more half-assed given that they’re reasonably public-facing figures at this time (at least in the greater New Orleans area), and it’s pretty safe to assume any mutant child fight ring operation in that vicinity would make it a point to KNOW what they look so that when one of them rolled up trying to Trojan Horse their operation, they’d be ready (which they more or less were).
- Quicksilver’s “Shakespeare-lite” voice still isn’t working.
- Report from this year’s Uncanny Experience (held last weekend): The best cosplay I saw was Nanny, followed by Glob Herman, followed by Maggott. I only saw one Mutina (but Simone wasn’t at this year’s show). And Fabian Nicieza was a delight.
Buy Uncanny X-Men #35 here. (Disclaimer: As an Amazon Associate, ComicsXF may earn from qualifying purchases.)
Adam Reck is the cartoonist behind Bish & Jubez as well as the co-host of Battle Of The Atom. Follow him @adamreck.bsky.social.
Austin Gorton also reviews older issues of X-Men at the Real Gentlemen of Leisure website, co-hosts the A Very Special episode podcast, and likes Star Wars. He lives outside Minneapolis, where sometimes, it is not cold. Follow him @austingorton.bsky.social.
