Review by Frank Plowright

In Knights of X Betsy Braddock is Captain Britain. She’s trapped on Otherworld, now ruled by a despotic Merlyn whose catspaw Arthur has a visceral hatred of mutants, considered “witchbreed”.

Knights of X is a continuation of Tini Howard’s Excalibur in all but name, following what happened to Betsy once the doorway back to the mutant society of Krakoa and her former team-mates closed permanently. Allied with versions of herself from other realities, she’s concluded that returning the petty Saturnyne to Otherworld’s throne is the lesser of two evils. And, it turns out that the Krakoan gate may be permanently closed, but the way back isn’t an obstacle if you can access magic. It comes with limitations, though, and instead of bringing an army back Betsy must select ten mutants, and each must undertake a gruelling quest.

Ever since The Lord of the Rings The Quest has been the bedrock of fantasy fiction, instantly splitting the potential audience into those considering it the easy path of retreading familiar ground, and those anticipating the revelations about people the method illuminates. The quest is for a transformational maguffin called the Siege Perilous. You’ll know if this is for you.

Introducing fantasy elements to the X-Men was one of Chris Claremont’s many innovations, but didn’t prove his finest hour. Howard is very influenced by Claremont’s writing methods in several respects, not least the cast constantly emoting at great length, filling the panels with too many words and death as cheap shock. Howard also shares Claremont’s love of accents, and in that respect he’s the better writer. Gambit’s exaggerated Cajun is irritating, but Jim Jaspers as a 1930s cockney barrow boy is embarrassing. She’s more adept at integrating two fundamentally different worlds, and returns characters not seen for an awful long time alongside Betsy’s Excalibur allies, the use of one providing a one hell of a surprise.

Bob Quinn is a workmanlike artist who tells the story, but without much glamour for a magical fantasy. He’s not helped by the murky colours supplied by Erick Arciniega.

There are character revelations during the quest, but they’re largely melodramatic rather than insightful, and goodness, they go on and on. Credit to Howard for dropping the ending right at the start, and for once not lingering, but you’ve got to have a deep love of fantasy tropes and the featured characters to take much from Knights of X.