Legion of X #7 pg 16 (Diaz pencils, Spurrier story) - Nimrod hitching a ride on Warlock’s back into Krakoa

NIMROD Hitching a Ride on WARLOCK’s Back as He Re-enters KRAKOA

With the Fall of Krakoa imminent, this page planted the seed to its very recent destruction. In the middle two panels we see a form attach itself onto Warlock and it’s some of the NIMROD infected techno organic material of the Phalanx that Warlock came to Legion’s mindscape dream dimension (the Altar) to help collect and save.

I really enjoyed Netho Diaz and Simon Spurrier’s work on this LEGION OF X series (along with Sean Parson’s inking, Clayton Cowles lettering and Federico Blee’s color). This series set up a lot of action and consequences for the upcoming fall of Krakoa. Mother Righteous (clone of Sinister’s wife Rebecca) was introduced, Warlocks’s kidnapping, Banshee’s transition to Vox Ignis, the monstrous incarnation of certain X characters by a spell from Nightcrawler’s adopted mom Margali Szardos, the return of Blindfold, the remnants of the Phalanx living in the Legion’s dreamscape dimension, the father and son story between Prof X and Legion, amongst other stories in this 10 issue mini-series.

This page features some of the Mother Righteous character (fairly early appearance of her) as she, in her goddess-like form watches an entity attach itself to Warlock’s form, with Vox Ignis at her side loyal to her cause. Warlock states in upper left panel “Impossible to carry future on lonely shoulders.” Doug replies “Trick is not to try.” Warlock not realizing what he is helping to do in the near future with some massive consequences, giving NIMROD access to the Krakoa. Mother Righteous replies “Wel, that’s more like it. Couldn’t have said it better myself”, as she notices the hitchhiker. Sadly with that future to unfold in hard ways for mutant-kind. See the color published page for more details. In the art you can see faint outlines of a NIMROD shape in the pencils, but much more clearly in the published colored art.

The design from Netho Diaz (possibly with Tom Muller and Jay Bowen assisting) for both Legion’s dreamscape and Mother Righteous’s dimension are so well done. The perspective and angles we get are really wonderful to the stream of consciousness storytelling that we get in these books. It’s both cinematic and edgy for the parts in these realms, and very different from the more structured storytelling and art that we see when not in these other worldly places. I really enjoyed that ideas were planted earlier in these series and led to some big payoffs in others.