"The Savage Sword of Solarr!" has a ring to it...ooh, maybe not.

I don't usually blog comics that are this recent, but this one does attempt to correct a most egregious error. That and I may be coming around on the whole Krakoa thing...from 2022, X-Men '92: House of XCII #3, written by Steve Foxe, art by Salva Espin.

This was the House/Powers of X stuff, except set in the animated X-Men continuity; so not a one-to-one comparison, but this was reading like an accelerated version. This issue was X of Swords, sort of, as longtime X-antagonist Arkon challenges Apocalypse and the mutants of Krakoa, with Arakko as the stakes. Apocalypse gathers Krakoa's mightiest; mostly X-Men from the series, plus Archangel, Psylocke, Shatterstar, the Silver Samurai, Nightcrawler, and--Solarr!? He's a deep cut, an old Captain America villain, killed off in Power Man & Iron Fist #113; but he had made an appearance in the X-Men cartoon! He's also there strictly to be jobbed; as Arkon has cheated and brought in ringers, including Apocalypse's old Horsemen, Sauron, Erik the Red, Juggernaut, Arcade, and Ms. Marvel! Apocalypse had known Solarr wasn't going to cut it, as it were; but it was a strategic move: sacrifice him, to show the rest not to hold back.

Nightcrawler doesn't get to do a whole bunch (except almost get friendly-fired by Storm!) but at least he's off the bench, since he wasn't tagged in for the regular X of Swords. Deadpool also makes a snarky cameo, piloting an animatronic Brood and wanting to get in before the Jubilee reveal. Beast is killed trying to warn the others: if killed on Polemachus, they resurrected weird; and Apocalypse faces the surprised Arkon, who is immeditately decapitated by Apocalypse's wife, Genesis. While some stay there, thousands of the Arakkii mutants return to Krakoa; and Silver Samurai, Solarr, and Beast are reborn, but off: Beast very strongly resembles the AoA Dark Beast, and seems to know of Jubilee. Professor X and Magneto suspect earth's governments aren't going to warmly embrace the mutant population doubling, but Magneto suggests maybe they should be done with earth...

There are aspects of the Krakoa era that I could care less about--again, why anyone would consider Apocalypse for the romantic lead is beyond me, and I don't know or much care about Arakko society. But it's an ongoing trainwreck: everything the mutants do has unforeseen--or completely predictable--consequences. The humans of the Marvel universe, who by and large spent literal decades spitting on mutants and laughing at their deaths, are now sore that mutants can come back from the dead and won't share. (I thought they couldn't share; but I doubt that distinction matters much.) Mankind also seems to warmly embrace the Eternals, for standing up to those muties; despite the fact the Eternals have not helped humanity noticeably in centuries? There's been a few points in the Krakoa era where mutantkind makes business or strategic moves, in their best interests, screw "humanity" and their hurt feelings; and I am 100% for it.