Uncanny X-Men #177 (Jan 84): Sanction

Creative Team: Chris Claremont, writer; John Romita, Jr., penciler; John Romita, Sr., Tom Orzechowski, letterer; Glynis Wein, colorist; Eliot Brown, editor; Jim Shooter, editor-in-chief; Virginia Romita, traffic manager

Starting Line Up: Storm, Nightcrawler, Wolverine, Colossus, Sprite, Rogue

Guest Star: Cyclops, Havok

In New Mutants #10: As Amara battles Selene, the New Mutants help Amara's father defeat Gallio; Sunspot learns the truth about his father; the New Mutants rescue Psyche and Amara; and Amara, a mutant, wonders whether she will become like the New Mutants, or like Selene.

In Magik #2: Illyana is trained to fight by Cat. Cat kills Nightcrawler from the alternate timeline.

Synopsis: Mystique walks though a carnival and is attacked by Wolverine. She finds the one way to kill him instantly, she slits his throat. Kitty stumbles upon the fallen Wolverine and checks on him. It's really Mystique and she slices through Kitty. Colossus attacks Mystique in rage. She blinds him with a flash bomb, but she gets blasted by Cyclops. Mystique runs into a hall of mirrors. Colossus follows a does Cyclops. Cyclops thinks he sees Mystique drawing on him and blasts, but it deflects off a mirror and cuts through Colossus. Mystique sneaks up behind Cyke and strangles him with a wire. Storm attacks next, but Mystique causes a feul truck to explode and it takes Storm with it. The explosion also blows Mystique back into the big top, where she's attacked by Rogue. She doesn't want to hurt Rogue, but blasts her anyway and feels bad for it. Finally, Nightcrawler attacks. She gets the advantage, but can't bring herself to kill him. He takes the advantage and knocks her out. Mystique wakes up later with Destiny by her side. She's distraught by the fact she could kill her foster daughter, Rogue, but not Nightcrawler. Arcade enters and congratulates her on such a good showing against his X-robots. Mystique wants to use them again to train the Brotherhood. He agrees as long as the stakes are the same - one of them is programmed to kill. Mystique asks which one is was this time, and Arcade says it was the obvious - Rogue. Mystique then plots to retake Rogue, refusing to believe she left on her own. At dance class, Kitty starts to tell Stevie how worried she is about Storm's transformation, but Storm overhears. Storm tries to talk to her, but Kitty refuses. Aboard the Starjammer, Lilandra says her final goodbye to Xavier while Corsair does the same to his two sons. Their guests leave, then the Starjammers and Lilandra head off to war. In the city, Colossus, Kitty, Nightcrawler, and Amanda Sefton go to see the ballet. Colossus and Kitty go park the car while Nightcrawler and Amanda talk a bit. Nightcrawler wonders where he came from. Amanda tells him what her mother told her - they found him in a roadside shelter beside a dead man, which they assumed was his father. He tells her that Mystique looks curiosly like him and she when he asked about a connection, was told to ask Amanda's mother, Margali. Amanda says they will call her tomorrow. Colossus hears and explosion from a building and rushes to save the people inside. All he finds is the Blob. The Blob knocks him outside where Pyro heats him to an incredible degree. Then Avalanche ruptures a truck of liquid nitrogen to spill over on him. The effect is Colossus becomes a frozen statue. Kitty can't do anything but watch.

Yeah, but is it good? There really wasn't much happening here. Mystique killing the X-Men in the first half of the book obviously isn't for real so there's no sense of suspence. And for the love of God... would Corsair and Lilandra just go back to space already? We've done the "final goodbye" sequence countless times over the past year or so. Just go away. The main point of this issue to build Mystique's connections to both Rogue and Nightcrawler. We know he connection with Rogue - she was Rogue's foster mother and Rogue has run away to find help from Xavier, despite the X-Men's suspisions of her, and Mystique refuses to believe her daughter would leave her. Her conenction with Nightcrawler is still a mystery. Then we get poor Colossus getting his ass kicked and... is he dead? Poor Colossus.

Significata: Mystique has hired Arcade to help her train. Mystique has more of an emotional connection to Nighcrawler than her foster daughter Rogue. Kitty refuses to talk to Storm about her change. Lilandra and the Starjammers finally leave Earth to fight in the new rebellion. Colossus is killed?  ¶ 8:20 PM