Days of Unique Storytelling

January 24, 2005

X-Men: Days of Future Past Prestige Format
Writers: Chris Claremont, John Byrne
Artist: John Byrne, Terry Austin

By Avi Green

Back in 1980, who would’ve thought that one of the X-Men’s best stories of the time would’ve been a simple two-part story called Days of Future Past, which featured an adult Kitty Pryde travelling back along her own timeline to warn of an enslavement of mutants and other superhuman beings by the Sentinel robots, something like 20 years into the future. It was one of the most enjoyable little time travel stories of its time, and is well regarded even today. This is a compilation of it, published in what is like a prestige format miniseries issue.

The story opens up with Kitty heading towards an enslavement camp in New York City, during this post-apocalyptic era run by the Sentinels, who’re controlling what’s left of the United States, which has been reduced to an utter wasteland during that time. All mutants captured by the Sentinels are hindered by power dampening collars to paralyze their powers, and Kitty is sadly one of them. After being helped by Wolverine, who’s helping out in an effort to stop the Sentinels via resistance in Canada, she heads back to the internment camp to continue working on the breakout with a couple of other mutants, who include Collosus, who in the future becomes her husband, Storm, by then much older but can still pack quite a punch with her weather-influencing powers, and even Franklin Richards, son of Mr. Fantastic and Invisible Woman, who is indeed a mutant himself and is an adult by then too. Kitty’s goal is to travel back in time via her own body and lifeline, and to warn the X-Men in the present about what the future holds in store, in hopes of changing the future for the better.

That hinges on stopping the assassination of Senator Kelly, the Massechusettes senator who’s been trying to call for Capitol Hill to put special restrictions on mutant citizens of the US, and who’s being targeted for death by the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants, which has been regrouped by Mystique, from the time when Magneto was their leader. It even includes Blob, the hefty Texan circus performer who became a crook, Pyro, and Destiny, who can see the future and is a main plotter in the conspiracy.

And most fortunately for everyone, they succeed in stopping the Brotherhood from pulling off their plans. And being quite entertaining as well.

Many of the fun parts here include Collosus using Wolverine’s adamantium skeleton as a way of in turn using Logan as a fulcrum for leverage when prying the Blob off the ground when he tries to stabilize himself there. Or even Storm having to argue with Logan about not using deadly force. And Kitty finds a most fortunate way of stopping Destiny from carrying out her plans.

Overall, it’s all in good fun, and is considered one of the best stories of its time since then. And it all fits quite well into this Prestige-style booklet as part of the Marvel's Finest line.

One of the best time-travel related stories you’re likely to find.

Copyright 2005 Avi Green. All rights reserved.

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