Warning: Rise of the Powers of X is a direct sequel to events in Immortal X-Men and other Krakoan Age X-Men stories, including the Fall of X arc, so Late Arrival Spoilers for those previous comics are unmarked on this page.
"Moira once told me, it's not a dream if it's real. But it was never real."
—Xavier, Rise of the Powers of X #2
Rise of the Powers of X is a 2024 comic book limited series from Marvel Comics. It's written by Kieron Gillen, with art by R.B. Silva.
Along with Fall of the House of X, it serves as the conclusion to the wider Fall of X arc and is part of the grand finale of the whole Krakoan Age saga.
In the present, the anti-mutant extremists Orchis have shattered the mutant nation of Krakoa and are purging the last mutants from Earth.
Ten years into the future, the A.I. supremacists behind Orchis are about to destroy the whole world and ascend to digital godhood. Only the last remaining X-Men can stop them.
Behind the scenes, between the timelines, the Dominion Enigma - a world-devouring A.I. god - already exists. Plans laid a century ago have already succeeded.
A small band of mutants are going to try to change the future, save the world and defeat an enemy that can reach through time itself. They're going to need a very good plan.
The first issue was released January 10, 2024.
Rise of the Powers of X contains examples of the following tropes:
- 11th-Hour Superpower: In the Stasis+10 timeline, Shadowtiger is a version of Kate Pryde who's ingested the Celestials' Death Seed. It's transformed her appearance, physically boosted her and supercharged her powers.
- And I Must Scream: At one point in the Stasis timeline, prior to the start of the issue, he worked with the Children of the Vault to assimilate the world's greatest minds into a Supreme Intelligence inspired construct. Their tormented faces show this was not consensual and they are not happy in this state.
- Arc Number:
- As with the original Powers of X series, X is for X-Men, but also for ten. The first issue takes place ten years into the future, with Dr. Stasis's tenth and final attempt at ascension.
- Also returning is number five. The last remaining X-Men in the 10+Stasis timeline are five: the Professor (Synch), Captain Krakoa (Ms. Marvel), Shadowtiger, Iron Man and Wolverine. Xavier's last X-Men also number five: himself, Doug Ramsey, Rasputin IV, Rachel Summers, and Mother Righteous.
- Arc Welding: The Children of the Vault were introduced back in 2006, during Mike Carey's run in X-Men (1991). This mini-series reveals that Dr. Stasis, one of the Sinister clones, was one of the people behind their creation.
- Asshole Victim: On finding out "Cypher" is actually Sinister, Rasptuin runs him through with her Soul Sword, and is ashamed to admit it felt pretty satisfying to do so.
- Bad Future: The first issue shows a dark future where the X-Men failed to regain Earth from Orchis. It looks very similar to Moira's 9th life where she joined up with Apocalypse. This time she is on Nimrod's side. However, it's actually one of the futures explored via Sinister's "Moira Engine" before it was destroyed.
- Batman Grabs a Gun: The failure of Krakoa and the sheer threat of Enigma has pushed Charles beyond the Despair Event Horizon, and made him willing to do anything, including sacrificing his morals, in the name of preserving Mutantkind.
- Brain Uploading:
- The Iron Man of the Stasis+10 timeline is an upload of Tony Stark's personality.
- Doctor Stasis has uploaded Earth's most brilliant minds into a Hive Mind A.I.
- Enigma is the ascended mind of the Victorian scientist Nathaniel Essex.
- Call-Back:
- The ending of Immortal X-Men mentioned a timeline where Stasis ascended after doing something horrible to Earth's sun. In this series we get to see it.
- Doctor Stasis is revealed to be the co-creator of the Children of the Vault.
- Can't Kill You, Still Need You: In the Stasis+10 timeline, Orchis has kept Mr. Sinister alive in captivity since they don't want to risk him having some sort of failsafe in the event of his death. After he proudly admits they were right, Wolverine kills him, triggering the Moira Engine and resetting the timeline.
- Category Traitor: In issue #4, Xavier makes a deal with Nimrod to let the mutants have Krakoa back and leave them alone while they do whatever they want with the humans.
- Chronic Backstabbing Disorder: Doctor Stasis betrays Orchis in the Stasis+10 timeline to advance his own plans for Dominion, then immediately betrays his allies in that scheme, the Children of the Vault.
- Clock Roaches: A variation. The Enigma Dominion has some "Arachno-Sentinels" at the ready, in case Xavier tries to travel back in time to Moira's 13th year and kills her. Enigma is trying to ensure a Stable Time Loop when he has already existed/will exist, since he's out of space and time, and stop any outside interference.
- Colony Drop: Precise details aren't given, but the first issue begins in the aftermath of the X-Men dropping S.W.O.R.D. Station on the Sentinels as a distraction.
- The Constant: In the Stasis +10 timeline, while everyone else of the surviving mutants has obvious distinctions from their present day selves, Wolverine looks no different at all.
- Continuity Nod:
- Dr. Stasis mentions helping "Bella" with her early work, referring to Dr. Bella Pagan, one of the scientific team who helped create the Children of the Vault (and in her case specifically the temporal manipulation tech), as was established in X-Men #191.
- An involved one happens moments later; as he betrays the Children, Dr. Stasis dons a helmet which resembles that typically worn by the Maker, the evil Reed Richards from Ultimate Marvel. Hickman's X-Men run had established the Children of the Vault were the Earth-616 counterpart to the Maker's similar creation, the Children of Tomorrow.
- Synch's choice of Mutant power for facing Nimrod is Apocalypse, shown back in Powers of X as being about the only Mutant who could get into a fist-fight with it and hold their own.
- Continuity Overlap: Issue #2 happens concurrently with Dead X-Men #1, while Enigma looks in on the events over in Fall of the House of X.
- Conveniently Interrupted Document: As with other text pages from Krakoan era books, some elements are blanked out as Classified Information. In issue one that includes the identities of the other two of Xavier's team, details of what happened to Cypher and information about Orbis Stellaris' most successful attempt at ascension (which Immortal X-Men says involved some combination of mysterium and the M'Kraan Crystal).
- Creative Sterility: Dr. Stasis notes that AI is incapable of truly innovating something new, only recreating what already exists. Of course, Dr. Stasis has only gotten where he has by piggybacking on or just stealing other people's inventions.
- Death of Personality: Per Enigma's talking to Moira X in issue #3, if Nimrod and Omega Sentinel join the Dominion, they will be nothing but neurons floating around his system.
- Desecrating the Dead: In the first issue, in the Stasis +10 timeline, Nimrod cheerfully kicks a dead Emma Frost's severed hand into the fire.
- Dwindling Party:
- The X-Men of the Stasis timeline, in true Bad Future fashion, die one by one. By the time the issue starts, Emma Frost and Jon Ironfire have just died. Gambit and Mystique soon follow them, Iron Man is fried by Orchis defenses, and Synch can only use his powers once.
- In issue #3, Xavier's No-Place X-Men are reduced to three: Rasputin IV kills the Cypher-Sinister and Xavier shoots Rachel, then frees Mother Righteous to help him kill Rasputin so he can enact his plan.
- Evil Only Has to Win Once: As was previously established through Immortal X-Men, once the Dominion ascends, that's it for everyone. The X-Men in the No-Place have thwarted nine previous attempts by Stasis to ascend, but they fail to hit number 10 in time, which it uses as fuel.
- Fisher King: Jean had been mortally wounded by Mother Righteous to power her ascension to dominionhood with a blood sacrifice of the Phoenix. As Elixir desperately tries to keep her alive, the White Hot Room is dimming.
- Flower Motifs:
- Continuing the Arc Symbol, from the outside No-Place X looks like a giant flower bloom.
- In issue #4, as Apocalypse is ferrying Krakoa's core back to the island, flowerbuds spring on the Atlantic Krakoa to teleport everyone from the White Hot Room back to Earth.
- Hijacking Cthulhu: Stasis' plan in the +10 timeline is developing a device that turns the sun into a weapon that deletes the mind of the Dominion Intellect called into the solar system by the Machine Ascendancy, so he can upload his own consciousness into the god-level processors.
- Hope Spot: The end of issue #3. Rachel and Rasputin manage to talk Charles down from killing Moira as a child, and Rasputin kills Sinister to prevent him influencing things any further... and then Charles shoots Rachel in the back.
- Hostile Terraforming: Omega Sentinel's grand plan for the Stasis+10 timeline was to terraform Mars into a lure for the Dominion.
- Humans Are Bastards: In the Stasis timeline, Stasis has people rounding up any Mutant stragglers. Nimrod considers this one more reason to despise them.
- I Fight for the Strongest Side!: In the Stasis+10 timeline, Moira comments with Omega Sentinel and Nimrod that "all she ever wanted" was to stay on the winning side.
- It's All About Me: Not as egotistical as other examples, but in issue #3 a child Moira does admit she wants to be freed from being trapped from the ten-life loops. An adult Xavier, time-travelling to that moment, chastises her for thinking only about herself and dragging him and mutantkind into her plans.
- La Résistance: In the first issue's Bad Future (the Stasis+10 timeline), the X-Men are the resistance against The Empire that is Orchis. They consist of Synch, Wolverine, Shadowtiger, Iron Man and Captain Krakoa.
- Laser-Guided Amnesia: Enigma ensures that Sinister doesn't remember timelines in which the other Essex clones successfully reached the point of Dominion.
- Load-Bearing Boss: As with previous stories using the Moira Engine, in the Stasis +10 timeline, Sinister's death will kill Moira's clone and reset the timeline.
- Locked Out of the Loop: Rachel is part of the No-Place Team, but Professor X is keeping her out of the plan to go back and kill Moira.
- Mind-Reformat Death: In the Stasis+10 timeline Doctor Stasis uses the sun as fuel to erase the mind of the world-destroying Dominion A.I. summoned by Orchis, derailing their ascension and paving the way for his own if Enigma didn't also hijack him.
- Not Himself: Cypher is a lot more short-tempered than usual, horrific circumstances notwithstanding. Because he's actually a Sinisterized clone of Doug, and Essex's nastiness keeps peeking through.
- Nothing Can Stop Us Now!: In the Stasis +10 timeline,Nimrod is confident in the victory of the machines, though Omega Sentinel warns him not to be overconfident before they actually join their AI god, as the mutants still have time to interfere. Moira feels that she is finally free and is finally on the winning side. They end up being destroyed by the Enigma instead.
- Pet the Dog: It's a sign of just how bad things are that Mystique's last words to Gambit, who she has historically despised, are that he's a good son in-law.
- Place Beyond Time: The resistance against Enigma has modified Moira's No-Place into No-Place X, placed outside of the space-time continuum to be beyond its sight.
- Plea of Personal Necessity: Professor X initially tries getting Rasputin to spare Sinister on the grounds they "need" him, but Rasputin shuts him down by pointing out how that's worked out previously.
- Power at a Price: Synch's powers are greater than ever in the Stasis+10 timeline, but they are tearing his body to shreds. He uses his powers one final time to give the rest of the team a distraction.
- Properly Paranoid: In the Stasis timeline, Orchis captured Sinister, but merely kept him contained, since they were concerned he'd have some sort of contingency set to go off in the event of his death. Which he does.
- Ret-Gone: Pushed to desperation by Enigma, Professor X hits on a dangerous plan; go back to before Moira's powers first activated and kill her, preventing the Moira Engine from being made, but also by extension erasing Krakoa itself.
- The Reveal: Back in Inferno, Omega Sentinel revealed she'd been sent back through time by the "trickster Titan" just before the X-Men of that timeline fully wiped out all the Titans and Dominions around. Enigma reveals it was the one who did that, having been pretending to be a Titan to manipulate things.
- Rule of Symbolism: In the White Hot Room, where symbolism is a bit more literal than in regular space, everything's growing dark around Krakoa, with a single pillar of light shooting into the sky.
- Shout-Out: Nimrod refers to the machines' imminent ascension and destruction of all organic life in the Stasis +10 timeline as if Terminator had a happy ending.
- Space Master: The Death Seed enhanced Kate, now known as Shadowtiger, has her phasing powers enhanced to work at range, allowing her to phase shift and fold pockets of space for translocation.
- Teeth-Clenched Teamwork:
- Omega Sentinel and Nimrod despise Dr. Stasis, on account of being a human, but are perfectly content to wait out the clock rather than just get rid of him like their other human collaborator, Feilong.
- Mother Righteous is part of the No-Place team, but Cypher openly despises her on account of her selfishness and Chronic Backstabbing Disorder (though the fact he's also a Sinister means there are other reasons). The X-Men stuck in the White Hot Room are dealing with her remote-controlled clone, and it's pretty clear Hope would very, very much like to just kill her.
- Textplosion: As with many other Krakoan Age comics, text pages are used as part of the story. For the first issue, one page details Xavier's No-Place X team; a double-page spread then maps out the various timelines that serve as a battlefield. Both have Classified Information redacted.
- Ungrateful Bastard: Enigma is the one who sent Omega Sentinel's consciousness through time, thereby causing the very situation that allows it to even exist, but like every other Sinister it has no gratitude whatsoever, and plans on destroying her consciousness.
- Unwitting Pawn: Mother Righteous's ascension attempt in Immortal X-Men was the final push Enigma needed to come into existence. More generally, all four of the Essex clones were created to believe they were seeking godhood for themselves, but were actually paving the way for Enigma. Enigma actively stopped Sinister realising that Orbis Stellaris and Doctor Stasis had already tried and failed to ascend, in case he realised what was happening.
- Villain Override: Since Doctor Stasis was there at the creation of the Children, he engineered a backdoor trigger that incapacitates them while he hijacks their plan to mindjack a Dominion intelligence. To his horror, he discovers Enigma doing the same to his attempt, along with the Machine Ascendancy.
- You Will Be Spared: Enigma's offer to Moira in issue 3; if she joins it, it'll make sure her individual consciousness is preserved rather than absorbed into it. Of course, whether it's actually telling the truth is highly suspect at best.
"They really thought they could win."
—Nimrod, Rise of the Powers of X #1
