"Tool."

Despite the mohawk, Gladiator is in many ways Superboy: his Imperial Guard was a riff on the Legion of Super-Heroes. And famously, Dave Cockrum pitched Nightcrawler when he was doing Legion, but was told he was "too weird." And I bet neither of them got the flight belt Legion rejects traditionally received as a parting gift...I don't think Kurt sees Gladiator as an enemy; not quite anyway. But probably not someone he's ever going to be thrilled to run into.


Twelve years ago (!) I blogged this panel from Uncanny X-Men #479, written by Ed Brubaker, pencils by Billy Tan, inks by Danny Miki and Allen Martinez. Havok, Polaris, Nightcrawler, Rachel, and Thunderbird were going into space; while Vulcan was taking over the Shi'ar empire. I have only the vaguest recollection of what happened during that like twelve issue stretch...


If you've never seen it, Seven Samurai is a no-fooling, honest-to-goodness classic. Super influential. If you don't like samurai (GET. OUT.) or don't have three-and-a-half hours to spare, the 1960 The Magnificent Seven is a vastly watchable western and a good hour and change shorter. 1980's Battle Beyond the Stars has the same basic plot (and Robert Vaughn in largely the same role he played in the Magnificent Seven!) and is a big, cheerful bowl of cheese. The 2016 Magnificent Seven remake wastes a good cast and is bland as hell: there's a CGI shot of a tombstone at the end that just kills me. It would've been cheaper, and looked better, to carve a real one. We'll be discussing them more later.