This isn't a horror comic either; any horror in this series was probably unintentional and after the fact.

On the Futurama episode "Where No Fan Has Gone Before" Fry tries to remind Leonard Nimoy of Star Trek, describing it as "You know--1966? Seventy-nine episodes? About thirty good ones?" Which is kind of how I've always felt about the series Excalibur, a book I love to death, even if it was like 127 or so issues, maybe 30 good ones? OK, they had more good issues than that, but when it was bad; it was usually just staggeringly mediocre, like it didn't swing hard enough to be bad. Like today's book? Let's see! From 1994, Excalibur #77, "Lowest Common Denominator" (Deep breath here.) Plot by Scott Lobdell and Richard Ashford, script by Chris Cooper, pencils by Robert E. Brown and Ken Lashley, inks by Randy Elliott, Keith Champagne, Don Hudson, and Jason Gorder.

There's a few upsides to this issue: we start with a rare look at Nightcrawler's childhood, where he's a happy-go-lucky, adventurous scamp. Who immediately gets his face rubbed in the dirt, as his best friend Christian tells him they can't be friends anymore, since his dad beat the hell out of him for hanging out with that "gypsy freak." Crying, Kurt tries to make a deal with God (not like that--well, maybe) to try not to be like the devil, if he could have his friend back. His adoptive mom, Margali Szardo's, picks him up again, telling him "love always lasts longer than hate."

Back in the present, Kurt had returned to Germany, at the request of his adopted sister/girlfriend Amanda, to rescue Margali; who was caught up in race riots stirred up by D'spayre. Sure, because there's never racial tension in Germany...D'spayre briefly lets Kurt see him, since he's got all the cards: Margali got her magic power from the Winding Way, which seemed to have terrifying lows, dizzying highs, creamy middles--no, D'spayre's point is, Margali was on top of her game in X-Men Annual #4, now she was too weak to fight him. Kurt then has a brief consult with Amanda, who can't help against D'spayre without getting zapped like her mom, but she would try to tamp down the riots...how exactly? Amanda's magic powers were pretty vague; and I don't recall her as being as blonde as she is today. (I thought she was more reddish-blonde?)

After a few subplot pages with the robot Zero, Nightcrawler catches up to D'spayre in the catacombs, and throws down with a sword against him. D'spayre grabs him, and tries to break him with his own bad memories of his friend Christian. Which fails, since there was a happy twist: grown-up, Christian had reconciled with Kurt, introducing his old friend to his young son. Kurt stabs D'spayre through the heart, which of course doesn't kill him, but drives him off: he ran out of juice, because Amanda had stopped the riots that were feeding him. Somehow. (Yeah, the riots are pretty much just dropped.) D'spayre is not especially well used here; this could've been the Hate Monger, Psycho-Man, just about anybody. Margali also gets a moment with Kurt: she had been worried he would be mad she had hidden his heritage with Mystique, but Kurt is more about forgiveness than most, and embraces the only mom he had ever really known. Which would probably be a high point to go out on, but no, there's two more Zero/Douglock subplot pages. (Aside: I was going to say, I can't believe I have a goddamn Zero action figure, but yes I can. There's so much re-use in that set.) 

Margali is kind and supportive and just seems like a good mom here: don't get used to it! That's about the last time we'll see that out of her. She'd pretty much go full villain in Ellis's run, which features some creepy, creepy bits; some on-panel, some in captions, some described just enough that if you put it together you'll be appalled. Short answer: there's a couple versions or timelines where she took her daughter's place, and considering Amanda and Kurt's relationship...yeah. Margali would also be involved when Amanda was killed/disappeared/written out in Nightcrawler #4, then turned Kurt into a monster in Legion of X so she could pull the "Hopesword" out of him. (That makes at least twice Kurt had a magic sword he could pull out of himself! Two nickels, yeah, but weird.) I was kind of thinking editorial over-corrected and made Margali bad to make Mystique (and/or Destiny) seem good; but no, that had been going for a while.