Posted in: Comics | Tagged: marvel, x-men, X-ual Healing - The Weekly X-Men Recap Column

Hell Hath No Fury Like a Dragon Scorned in Marauders #16 [XH]

Published Mon, 14 Dec 2020 15:30:16 -0600

Hello folks, and welcome to X-ual Healing, Bleeding Cool's long-running weekly X-Men recap column. We're so close to the end of the hell-year known as 2020 that I can taste it. Just a few more weeks and it will be 2021, and you know what that means: I need to ramp up clickbait production so I can schedule a bunch of articles in advance and take Christmas Day off. Anyone got any leads? Email me or post 'em in the comments. It's for a good cause: me getting literally one day off the entire year. And that means you all get the day off from me, too! A fair trade, I'd say. I can make a 300-word SEO keyword-rich article out of literally anything, so nothing's off-limits. Now, it's time for some recapping, as Marvel published Juggernaut #4, Marauders #16, and SWORD #1 this week.

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. Still, thanks to a corporate merger, a line-wide relaunch, and Jonathan Hickman's giant ego, the X-Men can finally get back to doing what they do best: being objectively the best franchise in all of comics for lovers of soap opera drama.

[MULTINAV]

MARAUDERS #16
OCT200573
(W) Gerry Duggan (A) Stefano Caselli (CA) Russell Dauterman
RED REVENGE !
The Black King did wrong. Now he must pay.
Rated T+
In Shops: Dec 09, 2020
SRP: $3.99

Marauders #16 Recap

After taking a break for the X of Swords crossover, it's time for Marauders to return to its regularly-scheduled storyline so Kate Pryde and Emma Frost can get revenge on Sebastian Shaw. Bishop and Storm meet with each other to reveal that they each know Shaw was behind the murder. Emma and Kate ride up to Shaw's castle on horseback.

They barge in, punch him in the face, and shoot him with a gun to take away his mutant powers. Then Kate knees him in the balls and starts breaking bottles in his rare whiskey collection. Shaw tries to fight back, but he's no match for Kate without his powers.

Emma explains the situation to Shaw. They can bring his treachery to the quiet council, and he can end up in prison with Sabretooth, or they can keep things private and settle it amongst themselves. Shaw chooses neither and jumps out a second-story window, but he survives the fall. Kate drags him back inside. Glob Herman is passing by and sees it happen.

Shaw makes the case that he really helped Kate out by helping figure out if she's really a mutant or not. Kate says she's not the only aggrieved party. Storm shows up with Lockheed. Emma negotiated a settlement with Lockheed. He bites out Shaw's right eyeball.

Kate hands shaw a glass of whiskey. Emma explains that the Black Bishop will be the one to handle delivering drugs to countries that accept Krakoa's treaty. Kate will handle the black market. And also, his real punishment wasn't the eyeball. It's that he just drank the Verendi poison that the group tried to add to Krakoan drugs to sully Krakoa's name. Shaw will either die, and Emma will ensure it takes a long time before they resurrect him, or he'll live catatonic until they decide he's suffered enough and kill him so he can be resurrected.

The next morning, Kate, Emma, and Storm wheel Shaw into the Quiet Council meeting in a wheelchair. Professor X wants to know what happened to him, but they put it to a vote. Shaw, paralyzed from the neck down and the deciding vote, votes not to discuss it, effectively accepting Kate and Emma's terms.

That was a pretty badass issue. Obviously, Shaw had this coming, not just for what he did to Kate, but for being a bastard for decades. I'm sure he's already planning his revenge, but it was nice to see him get his comeuppance in such a nasty way.