#sins of Sinister

[pacing-er]

Charles monologue from the Sins of Sinister prelude in Immortal X-Men! He hadn't gotten an opportunity to really showcase his power for a lot of the Krakoa era so seeing what he was capable of in Sins of Sinister was so cool!!

This extra cocky and confident version of him is really cute 🥰🥰🥰

[artverso]

Marco Turini - Emma Frost in “Sins of Sinister” 

[rei-ismyname]

NIGHTCRAWLERS Highlights

Everything is Sinister in a universe filled with misery and abominations...

... even the Legion of the Night! Chimeras with Nightcrawler as the base, led by Wagnerine. BAMFSNIKT.

At least until Vox Ignus tries the Scream of Change with his back to the wall, freeing them from Sinister's influence.

Unfortunately, being in service to Mother Righteous might be worse. Legion certainly thinks so, and tells her so before ascending to another plane of existence. Sweet ability.

The OG Nightcrawler has strong feelings about it too. It doesn't end well for him, but he wasn't having a great time anyway. Sins of Sinister is fantastically grim, but at least the Nightkin have each other.

One of many heists they pull off - disarming Thor and absconding with Mjolnir just before Asgard is destroyed.

Looks like Loki managed to get away, though his time came. Mojo and his cronies were robbed blind by Auntie Fortune (Domino x Nightcrawler.)

After 1000 years of similar, Doctor Nemesis apparently merged with Ego the Living Planet. The players gather for the Big Ending.

Ghost Rider Galactus is also present, briefly.

Mother Righteous finally gets got and Banshee has seen better days. Wagnerine is still standing only for the universe to reset, obliterating the timeline.

Finally, Sinister Chuck in orbit around the Shi'Ar homeworld - bombarding the civilisation with paranoia until it collapses.

[stillnotyourmusebitch]

Just a thought. . .

So reading Nightcrawlers in the Sins of Sinister arc. Seeing the X23 and Nightcrawler clone I can't help but 1. Laugh at the name Wagnerine but 2. I think that would make a better ship name for Logan and Kurt coz Logurt is so bad (like seriously we can do so much better) ((my phone is always trying to autocorrect it to yoghurt))

What do you think??

[illyanarasputinfan]

Davi Go

[sinistermusings]

Sins of Sinister 1 (2023) by Kieron Gillen & Lucas Werneck

Cover: Marco Checchetto (variant)

Sins of Sinister

[emmafrostcovercollection]

Sins Of Sinister #1 (2023) - Artgerm variant

[dailydamnation]

Illyana Rasputin in Nightcrawlers #2

Look at this, this is just fun, crazy scifi-superhero stuff.

Sins of Sinister is a wild and very entertaining story in the tradition of The Age of Apocalypse, but it suffers from its place in the reading order right after Dark Web. Because in Sins, most of the characters are there to fulfill a function in the story rather than to be explored themselves. Which is fine for the right sort of story, but after Dark Web I’m just in such a need to read an Illyana written with depth and respect for her character and history, and there’s no room for that when you’re possessed by Sinister DNA.

[crisisofinfinitemultiverses]

Immoral X-Men 1 (2023) variant by Marco Turini

[baambastic]

Kate: *Sees a combination of Colossus and Magik*

Also Kate, immediately:

[pacing-er]

Krakoa Era Reading List Cherik Version (part 5)

8. X Lives and X Deaths of Wolverine

A lot of rapid fire plot stuff and time travel fuckery. Centers around Wolverine, Jean, Moira, and Xavier and established some essential stuff for the following volumes. There are no Cherik interactions in this arc at all, but it may be necessary to skim through for plot reasons. Thankfully it's relatively short with only 3 volumes, combined into a single omnibus.

After this point the reading order gets super fucky so I'm trying my best 😭 Yes, there are reading guides that go issue by issue but I'm not keeping like 20 tabs open with all the different titles and switching between them.

9. Legion of X (Issues #1-5)

Mostly just Legion and Nightcrawler hijinks. Charles is in a scene interacting with his brother and David in a way I found pretty funny. Magneto does not appear at all in the first five issues, everything after that point contains major plot developments that are covered in Immortal X-Men, A.X.E Judgement Day, and X-Men Red.

10. Immortal X-Men 2022 (Issues #1-4)

The start of Professor X and Magneto's divorce era Krakoa edition 🙃 Magneto became disillusioned with the concept of Krakoa after everything that happened in Trial of Magneto and Inferno. Then a lot of conflicts happen one after the other and everyone's mad at each other. They are separated so not many shippy moments, but the initial breakup is worth reading:

You can read this one up to issue #4, after which I recommend reading all of A.X.E. Judgement Day.

11. Hellfire Gala: Immortal

Charles is in a single panel and that's it. Some pretty big villain!Moira stuff happens but idc so I just skimmed through it. I didn't read it so idk where it sits timeline wise but I think it's skippable.

12. A.X.E. Judgement Day

The entirety of the Judgement Day arc, happy to say that this one is only 6 issues instead of sixteen 🙃 You get a detailed explanation of major developments that are echoed in the rest of Immortal X-Men, Legion of X, and X-Men Red. You can read this one first but you won't get the context for certain things that are mentioned in passing. No Cherik interactions, unfortunately.

13. X-Men Red

Basically what Magneto and Storm have been up to on Arakko after Mag retires from the Krakoa council. Some really badass moments and I found the difference in Arakko and Krakoa culture to be super interesting. You also get to see Magneto's final words to Storm (about Charles), and later on some pretty intense Charles angst as he attempts to cope with Erik's permanent death. Tbh at this point I'm getting pretty tired of going back and forth between different titles so I read this one all the way through. Of the 16 issues only issues #1-11 have Cherik bait, with issue #11 specifically dealing with plot points from Sins of Sinister. I THINK if you want to read in the correct order you can read up to issue #10, read everything Sinister, and then go back and read #11. Everything from that point onwards in X-Men Red is Arakko and Storm-centric.

14. Immortal X-Men (2022) (Issues #5-10)

The conclusion of the Judgement Day arc and the lead up to Sins of Sinister. I really enjoyed the dynamic between Mystique, Destiny, and Sinister. Charles is called annoying a lot and Magneto's death is mentioned multiple times. Then some more unexplained developments are shown which I need to read the other titles to get context for. Great. Don't worry about Dr. Stasis or Nightcrawler's horns just yet, because by issue #10 there's a whole lot more to worry about. After a very cool monologue from Xavier we get a direct lead in to Sins of Sinister.

15. Legion of X (Issues #7-10)

Charles being a bad dad saga continues! Whole lot of twists and mysteries that are not resolved by the end. I think a lot of people will be frustrated by Charles behavior here, but to be fair he is likely being influenced by something/someone as shown in immortal X-Men. I find legion's storyline to be interesting so I didn't skip anything, but there are no Cherik ship bait-y moments aside from Charles generally missing him and being lonely.

Idk where this sits in regard to Sins of Sinister, but seeing as Nightcrawler has horns and Charles doesn't have a diamond on his head, it likely sits somewhere between Immortal X-Men #8-10 on the timeline. Or simultaneously? There's a lot of timeline fuckery happening. I'm honestly so confused.

16. Sins of Sinister

Gotta be honest I didn't expect this one to be such a complicated read. Basically X-Men Red, Legion of X, and Immortal X-Men all build up to this single issue, at which point there's a whole new series of titles to read set in this Sinister-verse. Originally I planned to cover the whole sinister business in this post but it's a lot so I'm gonna cut it here. I think that Sinister is genuinely very funny so I do plan to read it all.

According to this helpful guide on reddit, I seem to be on the right track. There are a LOT of titles going simultaneously for this period in Krakoa history, covering branching plots for Wolverine, the Marauders, Sabertooth, and more. I'm mostly concerned with plots having to do with Charles and Erik, so I'm not going to bother with those (maybe I'll check out Sabertooth idk). The important thing is that I've read all the primary interconnected titles: Immortal X-Men (*only up to issue #10), A.X.E. Judgement Day, X-Men Red, and Legion of X.

Honestly there are a lot of great moments, which makes it even worse that this is such an awfully complicated experience. I wish anyone attempting to read it all good luck and I hope this post is even remotely helpful.

[current-comix]

Nathan Szerdy

[rei-ismyname]

Mr Sinister should be experiencing profound existential despair

*Yes, I'm aware that he's not really capable of those kinds of feelings, but even from a character perspective the guy has lost his reason for existing. Huge spoilers for the entire Krakoan age, plus Heir of Apocalypse #1-3. We're talking about this guy.

One of the revelations of Krakoa was that Mr Sinister is not Nathaniel Essex, the 19th century Victorian eugenicist and scientist (now space god trapped experiencing the moment of death for eternity.) He's a clone *created* by Essex to achieve Domionhood (the highest form of non-linear gestalt machine entity - traditionally formed by joining singularities of machine intelligence together with so much processing power they are functionally Gods) through the study and utilisation of mutant power.

What a paragraph!

Here he is in 1924, threatening Destiny after killing Sinister.

He thought he was seeking Dominion for himself, not knowing he was a clone or that when he achieved Dominion his progress would be harvested by Essex. Essex created 3 other clones/variations for the same purpose but through different means -

Dr Stasis through post/humanity and Orbis Stellaris through the 'cosmic powers' (dude took over the Progenitor 's Worldfarm - a staggeringly impressive achievement for a 19th century clone from Earth)

These two dickwads

Finally, Mother Righteous through Magic (physically a clone of Essex's dead wife Rebecca, but just as much of a callous existential colonialist and monster as any Essex spawn.)

There she is, having a tanty after Enigma stole her Dominion success.

Each was created without knowledge of the other, and had mental blocks in place to prevent them learning about it. They ALL succeeded in various timelines and their efforts were harvested by the real Nathaniel Essex - Enigma, leaving the clones with nothing. Less than nothing. Alive but very dejected.

Making a huge unforced error

Instead of enjoying his godhood he chose to fight the X-Men and thanks to Jeanix, Xavier and Moira he's now a smear across infinity - defeated and broken but trapped at the moment of death forever.

Get Phoenix'd idiot!

Mr Sinister knows all of this, he even participated in the fight. Dr Stasis and Mother Righteous are dead, though Orbis Stellaris is still out there. His brain was only able to comprehend this stuff properly very recently. Even when working against Enigma there were still blocks in place.

Any one of these truth bombs would mess his head up, but all of them at once should ruin him. He doesn't have a sense of ethics but he does need purpose. Consider how bummed he was when the Progenitor ignored him on Judgement Day. He's not a real boy like other clones are.

- He's a clone with all sorts of fake memories

- Created with the compulsion to fulfill someone else's endgame

- Everything he's done for the last 200 years has been in service of Enigma's plan. Even the stuff that makes no sense. Especially the stuff that makes no sense.

- He has no other reason for being.

- Enigma smote him at least once.

- Enigma is dead, like super dead.

- Everyone else knows this as well

What the hell does he do now?

*Sigh*, he'll probably just be treated as Nathaniel Essex again, given Brevoort 's transparent policy of overwriting Krakoan lore. He could just clone himself with a new purpose/hard reboot as we've seen him do in Immortal X-Men, but how would he even decide? Also, he's the mutant devil - anyone who knows about him should want him dead, including some very powerful people. Two of the things I found insulting about Heir of Apocalypse was Exodus being next to Sinister and not eviscerating him AND Mr Sinister just acting like his old self as if nothing had changed. At the very least it should be explained - it's really not that hard either.

Mr Sinister is a system not a person, so he can make whatever changes he wants. It's not a very compelling villain if we don't know his motives though, and he's been there before.

Once that door is opened you can't ignore it. It'd be a shame to throw away the development he received, while ignoring potential for interesting new stories.

[xmencovered]

Sins of Sinister Event / Published: January 2023 - April 2023 / Artist: Leinil Francis Yu

[illyanarasputinfan]

Rise of the Powers of X #1 (2024) MARVEL

Variant Covers by Davi Go & Ben Harvey

[sinistermusings]

Immoral X-Men 1 (2023) by Kieron Gillen & Paco Medina 

Cover: Mark Brooks (variant)

Sins of Sinister