The comic is positioned purely as a version of the X-Men: The Animated Series setting, with no suggestion that it's connected to the usual Marvel Universe comic continuity as an Alternate Universe.
Mutants have banded together in an effort for survival on the mutant island nation known as Krakoa, with promises of new medicine. But as the mutants have come together, so have their enemies under the organization known as Orchis. Mutantkind must now face these new threats under the leadership of Professor X and Magneto, who have been hiding a dark secret.
Tropes of XCII
- Adapted Out: Characters who had not debuted at the time of the 1992 cartoon are not included in this series, making things like the roster of the Five vastly different.
- Adaptational Badass: In addition to her usual firework powers, Jubilee also has Moira X’s "Groundhog Day" Loop reincarnation ability and all the wisdom that comes with living multiple lives.
- Adaptational Nice Guy:
- Professor X and the population of Krakoa as a whole are on far less of a Smug Super kick than the stories they're adapting, and Charles commits much less morally shady or just outright terrible actions.
- Apocalypse is slightly more in line with his Krakoa-era personality, rather than the straight up Omnicidal Maniac of the cartoon. Similarly, Genesis is less of a conquering Jerkass Social Darwinist. Once she and Apocalypse are reunited, that's it.
- Adaptational Sexuality: Implied with Iceman, who now has his comic counterpart's post 2010s sexuality, seen hanging out with Northstar while Rogue mentions his relationship with Polaris "didn't work out".
- Adaptation Distillation: The series adapts the Krakoan Age for the '90s cartoon continuity. As such, many details are subject to Broad Strokes to fit what was already established in the cartoon continuity. And even then, it detours a little at times. Deadpool, in his modern Fourth-Wall Observer mode, directly lampshades this in the third issue.
- Adaptational Villainy: Ms. Marvel resumed being a hero, even joining the Avengers, after waking up from her coma, but she hates Rogue so much that she joined Arkon's team (which otherwise consists entirely of villains) in the comic's version of X of Swords just for the opportunity to battle and possibly kill Rogue, apparently not caring that the Krakoans losing the duel would mean that Arkon would maintain control of Arrako and then attempt to conquer Krakoa.
- All Your Powers Combined: The ultimate result of Sinister's super-mutant experiments is the aptly named Chimera, a smorgasbord of a dozen Mutant abilities.
- Ascended Extra: Karma goes from background extra in the show to getting a speaking role as the main voice of the Five.
- Came Back Wrong: As with the original X of Swords, mutants who die on Arakko come back stronger, but also much more aggressive. They're also inconveniently guarded against telepathy.
- The Cameo: Numerous Marvel heroes show up at the Inner Circle Gala, including Spider-Man, Hulk, Ghost Rider, Daredevil, the Avengers, the Fantastic Four and Luke Cage.
- Canon Immigrant: Issue #2 introduces a few:
- In one of the timelines, one of the remaining mutants is Wild Thing, the daughter of Wolverine and Elektra. Another is Genesis (the young clone of Apocalypse).
- ORCHIS' newest weapon is the Tri-Sentinel, perhaps best known for fighting Spider-Man during the Acts of Vengeance event.
- Composite Character:
- In keeping with the animated series' leaving Kitty Pryde out entirely, Rogue takes her place as the captain of the Marauder.
- Jubilee has the abilities of Moira X. She also doubles as Destiny's role as she's someone who should be on Krakoa, but actions prevent her being there.
- Wolverine plays the role of Mystique, seeking to get back a loved one.
- As the Age of Apocalypse never happened in this canon, Beast, who is killed on Arakko, is reborn as the Dark Beast.
- Distaff Counterpart: Genesis is depicted as closer to a female version of Apocalypse here.
- Dude, Where's My Respect?: Adam-X the Extreme makes a cameo appearance in issue #4, raging that he was passed over for X-Men membership over Random.
- Eviler than Thou: Dark Beast effortlessly overpowers and imprisons Sinister, hijacking his research for his own ends.
- Faking the Dead: Jubilee was supposedly killed by a Sentinel attack before there were Cerebro back ups, making her resurrection impossible. Wolverine takes this the hardest. Turns out she used a teleporter to fake her death.
- The Friend Nobody Likes: Even the other members of Orchis think Cameron Hodge is a creepy weirdo.
- Gold-Colored Superiority: When the Silver Samurai is resurrected after dying on Arakko, his armor is now gold colored.
- Half the Man He Used to Be:
- In issue 5, Wolverine gets fed up of Sabretooth and slices him in half at the waist.
- During his rampage through Krakoa, Nimrod blasts Sienna Blaze in half.
- I Choose to Stay: Much like the end of X of Swords, Apocalypse chooses to stay with Genesis on Polemachus. Archangel joins him as well.
- Killed Mid-Sentence: Beast, piloting the Blackbird, gets fatally swatted by the Master Mold halfway through his speech.
- Lampshade Hanging: Deadpool's cameo is, quite naturally, nothing but this, including pointing out he's a cameo, and that if they were being truly accurate to the 90s comics, he wouldn't actually be doing the "no fourth wall" thing, before adding they're so out-of-continuity it doesn't really matter.
- Legion of Doom: Orchis is composed (mostly) of human villains from the animated series; Henry Gyrich, Bolivar Trask, Lady Deathstrike, Cameron Hodge, and Donald Pierce. Eventually Trask gets fed up and kills them all.
- Magic Pants: Instead of being naked and censored by goo, resurrected Krakoans emerge fully clothed. When they're altered from dying on Arakko, their clothing is also thematically modified.
- Mythology Gag:
- Psylocke has a prominent role in issue 1, and true to her depiction in the animated series proper, is only addressed as Psylocke, not Betsy.
- G.W. Bridge's profile mentions he hates Cable for undisclosed reasons. In the comics, they used to work together, until Cable's attitude ruined things.
- Wolverine killing Lady Deathstrike is an homage to Bullseye killing Elektra, complete with the artist's signature beneath them noting it's styled "after Miller".
- The fake gossip magazine cover has a few, such as Polaris mentioning she used to go by "Magnetrix" (an Atrocious Alias she had for a few minutes in X-Men: The Hidden Years), and Sunfire apparently having his regular counterpart's habit of joining and quitting teams on a dime.
- Quite a few in issue #4:
- The Marvel Super Heroes who show up at the Inner Circle Gala are all designed like if they were still in the 90's (the Hulk is in his Professor form, Thor resembles his Eric Masterson design, the Vision is in his White Vision look, Luke Cage is wearing his Cage outfit, Thing is wearing the helmet he wore after his tumble with Wolverine, etc.)
- When Hulk and Wolverine trade jabs at each other, Spider-Man and Ghost Rider are with them, a nod to the All-New Fantastic Four.
- Both Forge and Black Panther ask Storm for a dance.
- When Firestar laments losing joining the X-Men, Spidey and Iceman, her Spider-Man and His Amazing Friends co-stars, reassure her.
- On seeing Chimera, Storm calls him a "Combination Man", after the character he's visually based on.
- Threatening Beast, Ororo drops the line she used on a Sentinel way back in the show's first episode.
- Noodle Incident: For some reason, one of Jubilee's lives involved her being turned into a vampire (again).
- Off with His Head!: Genesis deals with Arkon by decapitating him from behind.
- Paint It Black: One of the changes from being resurrected after dying on Arakko is usually a darker color scheme. Solarr gets lunar motifs and Beast gets the same palette as Dark Beast.
- Remember the New Guy?: Valerie Cooper appears in a data page mentioning she was affiliated with X-Factor, despite not appearing or getting a mention in the animated show.
- Reset Button: Between risking Nimrod destroying Krakoa and resetting all of their progress, Jubilee asks Jean to give her the Phoenix so she can stop Nimrod. Doing so kills her and returns everything to normal, but unlike the previous resets, Jubilee has forgotten all of her past lives, meaning this reset puts her back into the normal animated continuity.
- Retcon: Pyro is suddenly Australian, when his animated counterpart was unmistakably British (as he was in the comics at the time).
- Retraux: Fitting the time period, Hickman's data pages are adapted to match media fixtures of the 90's. Arkon gets one that's designed like an entry out of a Dungeons and Dragons guidebook, the match up between the Krakoans and Arakkii is illustrated as a character select screen from an arcade fighting game, and the Hellfire Gala (called the Inner Circle Gala here) is presented as the cover of a celebrity news magazine.
- Roaring Rampage of Revenge: Trask's attack on Krakoa is partly because he's joined the side of machines, but also because Wolverine killed his lover, Lady Deathstrike.
- Schmuck Bait: Arclight and Forearm were lured to Arakko where the latter died by a gateway conveniently appearing to them on the getaway from a heist.
- Shout-Out: Jubilee describes the life where she went after the makers of Sentinels as going "all Linda Hamilton on them", after the actress' role as Sarah Conner in Terminator 2: Judgment Day.
- Solar and Lunar: Solarr joins the fight against Arkon for Arakko, and is the first to die in battle. When he's resurrected afterwards, his color scheme is far darker, and his sun insignia is now a crescent moon.
- Take That!: In issue #4, Xavier goes to approach the Fantastic Four wanting to talk about Franklin. Reed immediately holds his hand out to cut him off, a jab at the events spanning from Fantastic Four (2018).
- Team Member in the Adaptation:
- Hope, Tempus, Egg, and Elixir of the Five, who use Ability Mixing to resurrect dead mutants, are replaced by Fabian Cortez, Tempo, Karma and Healer, with Proteus the only member who plays the same role in the Earth-616 version of the story.
- Bolivar Trask, Donald Pierce, and Lady Deathstrike are members of Orchis, whereas in X-Men (2021) it's revealed that the Earth-616 Deathstrike is a prisoner of Orchis, not a member.
- While The Inner Circle (this story’s version of the Quiet Council) still has Charles, Magneto, Apocalypse, Mister Sinister, Mystique, Storm, Jean Grey and Emma Frost as members, Nightcrawler, Kate Pryde, Sebastian Shaw and Exodus are not members. Cyclops replaces Nightcrawler on the Summer seat, Archangel and Callisto replace Kate & Shaw on the Spring seats and Omega Red takes Exodus's Winter seat. When Cyclops and Jean Grey step down to lead the X-Men, Sunspot and Mirage replace them, Madame Web replaces Apocalypse and Beast (now Dark Beast) replaces Archangel.
- The Dark Riders here are comprised of Dark Beast, Forearm, Solarr, Silver Samurai and Sabretooth.
- Random and Feral join the X-Men and not only were they not elected in the Hellfire Gala in the comics, they’ve never been X-Men at all.
- Throw It Into The Sun: Chimera tries teleporting Nimrod into the sun to kill him, but it only gets rid of him for a few minutes. He returns battered, but still capable of killing everyone.
- Too Dumb to Live: In issue #1 Gambit gets himself and Rogue killed by blowing up a Sentinel, while they're on a space station.
- What the Hell, Hero?: Wolverine is not happy that Jean has rebonded with the Phoenix, slugging Cyclops in the stomach for it, thinking he put her up to it.
- Wicked Cultured: Even after his resurrection, Beast retains his fondness for quoting classical literature and poetry, just with a more sinister bent.
- You Are Too Late: Dark Beast tells everyone about his plan to replace world leaders with Mutant shapeshifters he's created, then informs them he actually already did so several days ago.
- You Have Outlived Your Usefulness: Tired of ORCHIS' failures and the death of Lady Deathstrike, Trask realizes that ORCHIS itself is a failure and that mutants will be superior to humans. Thus, he murders the entire circle and decides machines must rule.
