Best of this Week: House of X #4 – Jonathan Hickman, Pepe Larraz, Marte Gracia and Clayton Cowles

No More.

Mutants have been made to suffer time after time after time because humans fear change and their inevitable obsolescence. Two of the greatest mutant extinction events have been the result of either human fear or absolute ignorance. In New X-Men (2001) we saw the utter destruction of Genosha by Bolivar Trask’s Sentinels, a massacre that resulted in the deaths of sixteen million mutants over the course of a single day. This left only a little under one million mutants left until House of M (2005) after which Wanda Maximoff decimated the mutant population, leaving only one hundred and ninety-eight left.

Thanks to the work of Moira MacTaggert and Charles Xavier with Krakoa, the mutant population is returning to normal levels and is looking to absolutely eclipse humanity in a short time span. Of course, humanity doesn’t take this too well, causing the Orchis Organization to activate itself, so it’s up to Cyclops and his band of Mutants to cast the enormous Mother Mold (a sentient machine that would create Master Molds to create Sentinels) into the blasted sun.

This issue was nothing short of heartbreaking.

Jonathan Hickman is doing something amazing with this book by showing just how strong the need for preservation is between both sides. In the last issue, one of the security team members for the Orchis station blew himself up in an effort to preserve a future where humans would be the dominant species. He wasn’t thinking about himself or his future with his wife, Dr. Gregor, the head of the station. He only wanted to ensure that The X-Men couldn’t stop the Mother Mold from being activated.

Scott’s team, now only consisting of Marvel Girl, Monet, Wolverine, Nightcrawler and Mystique soldier on after Husk and Archangel are killed in the explosion. Nothing was going to stop them from completing the mission and they absolutely did, but not without each of them being killed in the process. I don’t feel the need to place a spoiler tag here because I have no doubt that either, some of the first issue of House of X takes place in the future and that they will all be reborn or that somehow they will be brought back to life as they will appear in other upcoming X-Series. 

Pepe Larraz absolutely killed this issue with his art alongside Marte Gracia and Clayton Cowles. Every single page has the feeling of large scale epicness to them from the vast emptiness of Krakoa’s Observation room to the different locales of the Mother Mold Base. When Mother mold itself floats into the Sun, quoting it’s own version of the Prometheus myth, it looks enormous at first and slowly descends into the much larger and grander sun. Gracia’s colors are absolutely beautiful as almost everything is bathed in the beautiful glow of the sun. Monet’s red skin shines even brighter as the cuts her way through Orchis security, Nightcrawler and Wolverine’s burning bodies create the perfect ash contrasted by the glowing blue eyes of Mother Mold as Wolverine cuts away the last anchor keeping it on the station and Karimas shining silver arms stand above Cyclops, coated in purple nanobot defeat, as the last thing we see from his visor’s reflection is Dr. Gregor aiming her gun in his face. 

Gracia’s colors are vibrant and help to make Larraz’s lines even more beautiful. They make excellent use of cool blue tones for the few scenes that take place in Krakoa, establishing the still peaceful nature of that location. The space station, however, is awash in heavy yellows and oranges that only set the tone for the book and its high tension, but also works to show us just how dire everything is for either side. It’s high pressure and high stakes. Gracia did a great job of giving things the proper amount of emotional weight through color where Larraz did through excellent facial expression and action.

Normally the brightness of the sun is supposed to represent a better future, but it’s hard to tell who this brighter future is for. The X-Men, ultimately, do win in this war for survival, but it’s a Pyrrhic victory. Karima, who we’ve seen standing beside Nimrod in the future, and Dr. Gregor stand in victory for this battle. Granted, we now that the future where Nimrod reigns has been nullified after Moira’s 10th death, it’s hard not to be afraid by Mother Mold’s ending proclamation and Gregor’s newfound bitter resolve.

Charles and the rest of Mutantkind can rest easy, but can they also live with the cost of what they’ve done if our predictions just so happen to be false? The purpose of Krakoa was to ensure that there would be no more needless mutant death, but in the wake of human fear, more have died. This isn’t like any other time where mutants have been killed and brought back to life years later. For some reason – it just feels heavier. Charles’ tear at the end, with Cowles amazing placement of a “No more” caption feels like a resolution. Charles Xavier is having no more death, not for any of his people and it is powerful.

House of X continues to be one of my most anticipated releases as the weeks go by. This story of death and rebirth keeps achieving new heights of amazing storytelling and even better art. Jonathan Hickman was the perfect choice to breathe new life into the X-Franchise as I don’t have any semblance of a clue what will be in store for the future of the X-Men. What do the end pages of this issue mean? What will be the big fallout from the revelation of Powers of X #3? Will Pepe Larraz continue to be godlike in his presentation? We’ll find out next week in Powers of X #4.