X-Men (2021) #16 - Page 14

11x17 bristol board, pencil and inks

Cyclops, Jean Grey, Havok, and Iceman hold down Perro, one of the Children of the Vault, long enough for Magik to jam a vine... cable... thing? right into his ear. That's how cables (not Cable™) work, right? I'm pretty sure that's how they work. The posthuman Children were a big part of Mike Carey's underrated X-Men run so having them reappear and cause trouble in the Krakoan reboot has been a lot of fun.

The oversized top panel is a good one for me since it features a big chunk of the Summers clan, my favourite dysfunctional and excessively convoluted mutant family unit. Josh Cassara has a habit of chaotically extending the height of Havok's dumb eggbeater head prongs as far as he can without having an editor yell at him and they're quickly approaching critical mass here. I keep imagining that they get caught on tree branches and coat racks and he's gotta stand there helplessly until someone else on the team (probably Firestar) untangles him. A related anecdote: at SDCC '23, Josh had a head sketch of Havok where his antlers took up most of the size of the paper and it sold, like, immediately. So there you have it: don't let your memes be dreams.

Speaking of head prongs, the remaining panels are a great example of Illyana doing what she does best: solving a problem with violence because sometimes violence is the answer.