Welcome to the Dark X-Men… hope the world survives the experience!
Dark X-Men is a 2023 comic book limited series from Marvel Comics, released as part of the Fall of X storyline in the larger Krakoan Age of X-Men. It is written by Steve Foxe and drawn by Jonas Scharf.
After the events in Krakoa’s third Hellfire Gala, Madelyne Pryor realizes that the X-Men are needed more than ever, so she and Havok take matters into their own hands. But with a roster including Gambit, Archangel, Maggott, Emplate, Zero, Azazel and Albert, what could possibly go wrong?
Dark X-Men contains the following tropes:
- Anti-Hero Substitute: The premise of the book is Madelyne — of Inferno (1988) and Dark Web infamy — realizing the world needs the X-Men and deciding to make her own team with Alex, who has had history of being Brainwashed and Crazy. Whom do they recruit for their team? Monet’s psychotic bone-marrow-eating brother Emplate, Nightcrawler’s demon-lord "father" Azazel, android-Evil Knockoff-of-Wolverine Albert, and Mad Artist AKIRA-Expy Zero, with X-Men members Archangel, Gambit, and Maggot roped along for the ride.
- Bittersweet Ending: Orchis is driven out of the Limbo Embassy, but Maddie's team is disbanded — Archangel and Azazel are killed, Emplate runs off for parts unknown, Albert is reunited with Elsie Dee, and Gambit returns to the X-Men with Carmen joining.
- Body of Bodies: Zero merges himself with Albert into a two-headed monstrosity, then Orchis brings Elsie Dee to use as a weapon inside the Embassy, only for Zero and Albert to also assimilate her and so briefly becomes a three-headed one.
- The Bus Came Back:
- Albert and Emplate return in the first issue, each making their first appearance in three years.
- Azazel returns for the first time since a cameo in 2019's House of X.
- Phantazia appears for the first time since she was last seen in a psych ward shortly after 2005's M-Day.
- Infectia appears since her death during the Legacy Virus arc.
- The Goblin Queen variant and her pet demon Bamfy from Battleworld return since last appearing in X-Men: Blue in 2017.
- Abyss, who last appeared after being depowered by M-Day, is used as a Trojan Horse by Orchis, then killed by his father, Azazel.
- Chekhov's Gun: Two of these here; Madelyne Pryor's Mercy Crown, and Havok's photo of her from during their Outback Era. The alt-Goblin Queen wants to seize the Crown and weaponize it. Carmen takes Maddie's look from the photo when dissuading her from joining in her variant's plans.
- Continuity Nod:
- Pryor mentions Cassandra Nova's genocide of Genosha back in E Is For Extinction, also that she was dead (again) at the time.
- S'ym is using Belasco as his slave, which happened in Mary Jane & Black Cat.
- The Mastermind Sisters make a social visit on Pryor, as they all teamed up during her short-lived Red Queen of the "Sisterhood of Mutants" phase.
- Havok speaks over the phone with Luke Cage, the current New York mayor in the Marvel Universe. Also, She-Hulk is the Embassy's hired attorney.
- A data page in Issue #2 notes that Krol probably killed a lot of robots during the AI uprising and that Vallens likely became a magical assassin in the aftermath of The Death of Doctor Strange.
- Battleworld's Goblin Queen and her Bamf Dragon kill Snot and Infestation, who took refuge in the Embassy in Marvel's Voices: Pride #1 (2023).
- Desperately Looking for a Purpose in Life:
- Havok is with Maddie both to support her and to try and gain something stable in his life. The narration of the first issue implies she's fully aware of this and possibly exploiting it to gain his assistance.
- Carmen Cruz, codename Feint (formerly Gimmick), the only real mutant from the Children of the Atom group, is rescued from Orchis and is reluctantly with the Dark X-Men for protection and to try to help save other mutants.
- Didn't See That Coming: Orchis didn't expect Chasm to just turn down their offer, but they don't let it bother them somehow.
- Everyone Has Standards: Orchis breaks Chasm out of his confinement in the Limbo embassy in hopes of recruiting him as an ally. His response is to beat up a few mooks, tell them that just because he hates Maddie doesn't make him a bigot who hates all mutants, and walk back into his cell to wait out the chaos.
- History Repeats: Each encounter Warren has with Callisto and the Morlocks goes badly for both parties. During Callisto and the Morlocks debut in 1983, Callisto tried to make Angel her slave, and she got nonfatally knifed by Storm for it. During the Mutant Massacre, trying to help the Morlocks against Sinister's Marauders lost Angel his wings which led to him being changed into Archangel. Now Archangel's been turned into "Death Angel" by Orchis, slashed Callisto (nonfatally) and killed other Morlocks, so Gambit has to kill Warren.
- Hoist by His Own Petard: Krol puts Albert and Elsie Dee to use as weapons for Orchis. When the androids are reunited they turn on and slaughter Krol.
- I Take Offense to That Last One: Pryor expresses this at Gambit when he calls her "Red"; likely because her ex-husband sometimes called her that.note Madelyne: Call me that again, and you'll wish I left you for the Sentinels.
- Karmic Death: Soon after casually killing his son Abyss, then Azazel is killed by the Bamf Dragon, the alternate universe version of his other "son", Nightcrawler.
- Left Hanging: Each character prominent in the series have their parts in it concluded by the ending, except for Havok and Chasm.
- Magitek: Maddie has her own method of mutant detection, the Mercy Crown, that mystically scans for mutant souls instead of psychically scanning for mutant minds.
- Morality Pet: Carmen becomes Pryor's.
- Recycled Title: There was a previous Dark X-Men series as part of Marvel's Dark Reign arc.
- Screw This, I'm Out of Here!:
- After only two missions alongside Pryor's group both go sideways and costs the life of Archangel, Maggott quits and goes elsewhere.
- Emplate runs off, proclaiming his debt fulfilled and his hatred of everyone else leaving him no reason to stick around and help, after Azazel is killed by the Bamf dragon.
- Snub by Omission: Inverted case; Gambit, Maddie, and Alex seem concerned about only Carmen's safety instead of any of the other mutants sheltering in the Embassy when Orchis and the alt-Goblin Queen invade and are killing everyone they find inside.
- Spin-Off: While Dark X-Men technically spins out of the pages of the third Helfire Gala, to some extent it's also spinning out of Dark Web, as it picks up Alex Summers and Madelyne Pryor's storylines following the event.
- Stealth Pun: When the android Albert gets twisted like a pretzel by Madelyne's power, the sound effect is written as, "... pop snap crackle ..."
- Storming the Castle: In issue #4, Orchis pulls this off by booby-trapping Abyss by triggering his power when the Battleworld Goblin Queen is near, trapping Maddie and her team inside.
- Student–Master Team: Carmen/Feint forms this with both Pryor and Gambit separately.
- Superman Stays Out of Gotham: All other X-Men-connected heroes still currently in action avoid both the Embassy and the Dark X-Men, except for Rogue having a rendezvous with Gambit just outside, and later Talon and Synch to receive Gambit and Feint when they part ways from Maddie.
- Surprisingly Realistic Outcome: Because of her past actions, the X-Men don't trust Madelyne at all, and only work with or even tolerate her out of necessity.
- Tele-Frag: Azazel kills Vallens this way by teleporting her halfway into a wall.
