In the last issue, Legion made nice with his mother right before she was murdered in front of his eyes. That kind of a thing might mess with someone a little. Now imagine they have 100’s of personalities banging around in their skull and it might mess with them a lot.
With that in mind, Legion decided it was time to deal with the person who killed his father and there was no time like the present. That’s right. Legion is pitting himself up against Scott Summer and the Uncanny X-Men.
Now I’m going to assume that this takes place well before this week’s ‘X-Men: Battle Of The Atom’ #1 as the ‘Uncanny X-Men’ all look to be in one piece right now. Also, there’s no mention that Legion might have a grandson who looks a lot like his dad.
So moving on, we watch as Legion is hunting his prey without any warning. When he finally does find Cyclops in an exposed position he shows up and presses an attack. Cyclops being a master strategist and truly a general of his troops, clearly suspected that this may happen. He orders his team to do as practiced in order to take him down.
It’s a tactic that may have paid off, if Legion wasn’t so focused in his desire for revenge. His clarity allows him to practically mow through Cyclops’s X-Men with Blindfold mainly watching from the sidelines. He burns through the new recruits (with a great comment about role playing games and how Cyclops isn’t the best of people for sending kids in as warriors before engaging him directly.) The one attack that may have been able to phase him by Emma and her mind controlling triplets is stopped with a knockout punch from Blindfold. It’s her one contribution to the fight but her most important one.
As Legion finally takes everyone out, it’s just him and Scott left and he tells him that he wants a fair fight. He makes it clear that he could crush Cyclops like an insect and he couldn’t do anything about it. All he wants is a fair one-on-one fist fight.
Cyclops tries to remind him that he’s a master of the martial arts but Legion insists it’s the only way to go. Scott agrees and the issue comes to a close.
While we didn’t get the confrontation yet that was promised (and I don’t see how Legion could possibly beat Cyclops in a fair fight), this was really a work of art. Watching Legion so skillfully take on and defeat each of the X-Men on Scott’s team was visually amazing. It’s just the right amount of action to keep the story interesting and once more I’m drawn to wanting to know what is going to happen next.
Damn you Simon Spurrier for taking one of my least favorite X-characters and making him one of my favorites. I really am enjoying you having him more involved in the greater mutant portion of the Marvel universe and have no idea what your end game is, but I can’t wait to find out!
X-MEN LEGACY #16
Writer: Simon Spurrier
Artist: Tan Eng Huat
