Captain Commander Lucas Bishop lives in the Krakoan paradise where Mutantkind is safer than ever but he also grew up in one of the worst outcomes for mutant kind and wants to make sure that doesn’t happen. So he proposes a War College to train future War Captains of Krakoa with the help of Tempo. In his inaugural class are Karma, Armor, Surge, Cam Long, Aura Charles and the Thresholder known as Amass. Unfortunately Fenris is back and with Orchis.
Tropes include:
- Alternate Universe: In Earth-63, the mutant population appears to be all Black. When Bishop asks that universe's Quiet Council about their version of Tempo (Heather Tucker), they say she is only human, and not a mutant.
- Both Sides Have a Point: Dani Moonstar shows concerns about the war college, and is correct that he is being harsh on the students. But Bishop being from a future where the worst outcome has happened for Mutantkind is right that they need to be ready, especially with the all to real looming threat of Orchis.
- Continuity Nod:
- In issue #3, former Krakoan ally, Moira MacTaggert, convenes with Feilong (from X-Men (2021)) in the Orchis satellite.
- In issue #3, Moira mentions that the Strucker twins are there to find the Krakoan Pit - which was explored in the Sabretooth (2022) mini-series.
- Also in issue #3, alternate universe Tempo operates a facility called Tucker Clinic. This is a subtle nod to an old arc of X-Factor (Vol. 1), where Tempo goes to a Tucker Research Center to warn a Dr. Tucker about an impending attack by her teammates, the Mutant Liberation Front.note
- A Day in the Limelight: The primary focus of the mini-series is Bishop, a Krakoan War Captain, and a bunch of lesser known mutants from the Krakoan Age.note
- Dead Alternate Counterpart: Averted. When Tempo is plunged into Earth-63, she easily replaces the local version of Heather Tucker, but for sentimental reasons: she wants to have more time with a version of her father, who died in the main reality of Earth-616. Earth-63's Heather Tucker is said to be sleeping in her own home.
- Dramatic Irony: One of Orchis' aims for infiltrating Krakoa itself is releasing all the mutants imprisoned in the Pit, primarily Sabretooth, with the mutants who find out about them doing their best to thwart them before they can do so. Neither group realizes that the Pit is already empty.
- Drill Sergeant Nasty: Invoked by Bishop: he tries to push his group of selected recruits (which includes New Mutants' veteran Karma and New X-Men's Surge and Armor) even harder to toughen them up.
- Fantastic Racism: Played with in the reality Bishop ends up in, where being a mutant is paired with being black at the very least, deeply intertwining prejudice against mutants with mundane racism.
- Fish out of Temporal Water: Taken to extremes with Amass who is from Threshold, a mutant civilization from two billion years in the past. Might as well be from a different planet, but Armor tries to help him adjust.
- Foreshadowing: In issue #3, alternate Destiny warns Bishop (the main, Earth-616 version) that a "darkness" is coming to threaten the Krakoa of his home universe.
- Fusion Dance: In issue #2, an accident fuses Amass with feral mutant Cam Long and Andreas Strucker, creating a monstrous, mindless gestalt. In the next issue, Andrea Strucker throws a grenade full of gas to knock the creature out, allowing her to retrieve her twin brother.
- Mama Bear: Dani confronts Bishop pushing her students too far.
- Race Lift: The reality to where Bishop was shunted to at the end of the first issue has black versions of the original X-Men team. The third issue explains that, in that reality, the X-gene is paired with the genes for racial phenotypes, making all known mutants non-white if not black.
- Shout-Out: In the first issue, when Bishop's explains how the tunnels deep below Krakoa might be exploited by an enemy, Surge compares them to the Death Star exhaust port, from Star Wars: A New Hope. Cam thinks it's more like a Dungeon Crawl from Dungeons & Dragons.
- Two Lines, No Waiting: Starting with the very end of issue #1, the mini-series occurs in two parallel plots: Bishop and Tempo stranded in an alternate universe, and the kids dealing with Orchis and the Fenris twins in the main reality.
- What If?: Discussed. Bishop discusses Earth-63, a world where mutants do not seem to suffer discrimination, with his alternate self from that Earth. When he ponders what he could become if he lived in a such a world, the Earth-63 Bishop answers: like him.
