X of Swords: Gorgon’s Epic Battle Turns The Tide of the Tournament

Marvel’s ambitious X of Swords crossover continues, bringing together every title from the X-Men line into one major story, is approaching its final issues and frankly things don’t look good for the Champions of Krakoa. Leading into this week’s issues, which included X-Force #14, Hellions #6, and Cable #6, the X-Men were losing the tournament with a score of 5-2, and based on how the rules of the games seem to be changing it looked like they were on a path to defeat. Both X-Force and Cable bring together even more rounds of the story and put the X-Men back toward a way to win, but not after the disparity between the two scores got even wider. Spoilers for this week’s X of Swords comics below!

The tournament continues with a rematch between Pogg Ur-Pogg and Magik, with the X-Men gaining a point after a major revelation of the new fan favorite. From there, things go poorly. Events after this include rounds like “Torture Endurance,” “Battle Beneath the Waves,” “Contest of Letters” (a spelling bee), and “Battle to the Death” (which results in no deaths) with the score sitting at 18-6. The final round seen in the issue is a fight between The White Sword and Gorgon, with the former bending the rules to suit himself, telling Gorgon that they’ll fight only after Gorgon has made his way through all of his other swords (his underlings).

Gorgon quickly begins to dispatch each of the swords, taking out thirteen of them and finally taking the lead at 19-18. At the behest of the other Champions of Arakko, The White Sword stands up and plunges his weapon into Gorgon, killing him, evening out the score, and setting the stage for what is being billed as the “Final Challenge.” That round? Naturally none other than Apocalypse versus his wife, Annihilation.

With three issues remaining in the crossover, it’s frankly unclear what will happen in this challenge. What we know about the rules and changes caused by the Champions even entering Otherworld, it makes resurrection back on Krakoa impossible, so for the time being Gorgon is Gor-Gone.

As we said, X of Swords wraps up completely next week on November 25 with its final three issues, X-Men #15, Excalibur #15, and the final chapter, X of Swords: Destruction #1. You can find the full checklist for the 22 part event below.