Posted in: Comics, Marvel Comics, Review | Tagged: Dawn Of X, excalibur, x-force, x-men, X-ual Healing - The Weekly X-Men Recap Column

Everybody Loves Apocalypse in Excalibur #7 [X-ual Healing 2-12-20]

Published Tue, 18 Feb 2020 18:30:00 -0600

by Jude Terror

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Three X-books were published last week, and we're running out of time to recap them all! Damn you, Presidents Day! This week we recap X-Men #6, X-Force #7, and Excalibur #7. Were they any good? And which was best? Read on to find out!

Sworn to sell comics for Marvel executives who feared and hated the fact that Fox owned their movie rights, The Uncanny X-Men suffered great indignities, but thanks to a corporate merger and a line-wide relaunch, the X-Men can finally get back to doing what they do best: being objectively the best franchise in all of comics.

EXCALIBUR #7 DX
DEC190784
(W) Tini Howard (A) Wilton Santos (CA) Mahmud Asrar
THE HUNTSMEN AND THE WARWOLVES!
Excalibur faces an old foe – this time as the hunters rather than the game.
Rated T+
In Shops: Feb 12, 2020
SRP: $3.99

What happened in Excalibur #7?

After burying the sword of might as Brian Braddock asked her to last issue, Captain Britain goes to visit her brother Jamie, the king of Avalon in Otherworld. She wants to see Apocalypse, but first they engage in some verbal sparring. After Jaimie opens a hole in the floor for Betsy to fall through into Apocalypse's lab, she finds him working on his magic with Exodus there to assist. Captain Britain warns Apocalypse that she's keeping an eye on him, but Apocalypse is offended. Aren't they allies now? To build trust, he provides Captain Britain with pages from his grimoire. He reuires magical foci as an ingredient for his plans that can serve as a "homing beacon between realms." These components are warwolves, and there are some located in the London zoo. Apocalypse wants their skulls. He needs their skulls. He wants their skuuuulllls. He needs their… sorry.

Captain Britain heads outside to meet with Jubilee and Shogo, in his dragon form her in Otherworld. Betsy suggests Jubile have Meggan babysit so they can go warwolf hunting. We get a wikipedia entry on Warwolves from Apocalypse's grimoire. Captain Britain, Jubilee, and Pete Wisdom head to the zoo where they learn someone bought the warwolves. Captain Britain discernes the buyer from an anti-mutant bigot zoo employee and they head to a local karaoke bar to meet with Cullen Bloodstone, who purchased the warwolves to hunt them at his lodge for sport.

Excalibur heads to the Bloodstone Summer Lodge to join in the hunt, which is the only way Bloodstone will allow them to pick up wolf skulls and talk about how trustworth Apocalypse is (Gambit is the only one who remains completely skeptical). They manage to get two warwolf skulls before Bloodstone gets mad at them for cheating by using their powers. He decides that while they're hunting Warwolves, he will hunt mutants. Then he goes all Glartrox. The issue ends there.

Was it any good?

This issue falls more on the building side than the payoff side, but building is a necessary component. It's interesting to see Apocalypse gaining the trust of everyone except Gambit. Gambit is going to turn out to be right, of course. I'm sure Excalibur will dispatch with Cullen Bloodstone next issue. This issue captured some of the classic Excalibur feel as well.