X-Men: Book Of Revelation #3: Off To Never-Never Land…

In this final chapter before everything comes to a screeching halt on the Age of Revelation, Jed MacKay and Netho Diaz sets the stage for the crescendo of epic proportions! Will Elbecca complete her mission to assassinate Revelation? Will she be found out? How will the events from this issue lead into the final reckoning?! What’s Apocalypse’s endgame, and what’s it going to mean for those affected by the mutant virus? Read along, my fellow X-ophiles!

As we conclude this final chapter of this mini, we see Revelation’s court, his inner circle, is full of chaos. The snakes are coming out, and they’ve come to draw blood. Elbecca exposes her hand as she attempts to thwart Doug’s final goal, but is unsuccessful. As she’s trapped Doug gives her his end goal, and it’s much bigger than what it was that I expected. See, Doug became obsessed with the cosmic entity, Ego, the Living Planet.

He’s not the id, he’s the EGO

If you’re unaware who Ego is, he’s a planet that controls everything on his surface, from the lowest of the biological organisms, to its largest. Everything is Ego, and Ego is everything. Having Ego It’s quite ingenious, since Ego’s not a name you’d associate with the X-Men, despite seeing the similarities between Ego and Krakoa and Arakko, but seeing this being the end goal for Doug.

Another boon for this mini is the level of political intrigue that’s been shown through the series. It’s giving us some very cloak and dagger (not related to the AoR mini) shenanigans, making this mini being one of the better tie-ins. Mackay’s use of subterfuge and deceit works really well in this mini. One of the biggest plot points was the discovery that Warlock was one of the proponents of the mutant virus, and he sacrificed himself in order for it to make the virus more effective and dangerous, but we’re left with questions, like did Doug force Warlock to sacrifice himself? Or was it given freely? Or did Doug force Bei to sacrifice herself in order to help Doug proceed? So many questions we still need answered.

Netho Diaz’s work here is just next level. From the panel layouts, to the characters designs. His storytelling technique gets better with each new project he’s on. I can see why Marvel’s named him one of this years Stormbreakers class. His work is dynamic and expressive. The panel layouts here are interesting, and makes following along almost like it’s a puzzle. His style here really reminds me of Ryan Stegman’s style, which really suited his work on the main X-Men book before the mini started, and moving him here was an excellent choice. I’m not sure where he’s moving on from here, but I can’t wait to see what else he has to bring to the table.