Warning: MAJOR spoilers for Rise of the Powers of X #5!

Summary

• In X-Men's Rise of the Powers of X #5, every mutant unites their powers, creating the most powerful hero in X-Men history.
• To defeat Enigma, Jean Grey unleashes the Phoenix's full power, connecting to every mutant from X-Men's past, present and future.
• Jean destroys Enigma with gigantic claws made of "every mutant who has ever lived in any dimension," defeating the Krakoan Era's ultimate villain.

Marvel's five-year Krakoan Era is essentially over, as the X-Men face and defeat their ultimate threat. And while the ending itself has received mixed reactions from fans, one thing no-one can deny is that it concludes with stunning imagery, as every X-Men hero who ever existed fuses into a single, fiery form to defeat Marvel's most powerful villain.

In Rise of the Powers of X, Jean Grey faces off against Enigma - the final, godlike form of the villainous Nathaniel Essex. Essex has become a Dominion - an AI god too powerful for the laws of time and space - and threatens to extinguish all life on Earth by altering the timeline in millions of deadly ways. Thankfully, the reborn Phoenix manages to track Enigma down, summoning every mutant who ever lived into a single flaming form powerful enough to slay him.

In a perfect nod to X-Men fandom, the new Phoenix form includes iconic heroes like Storm, Iceman, Magneto, Ms. Marvel, Kate Pryde, Nightcrawler, Cyclops, Siren, and many more. It also deals the killing blow to Enigma with three Wolverine-style claws, which the villain's narration confirms are made of "every mutant who has ever lived in any dimension."

The X-Men's united form leaves the evil god Enigma trapped in a moment of eternal pain, scattered across the cosmos.

Phoenix Summons Every X-Men Hero: Past, Present and Future

"Three Blades Made of Every Mutant Who Has Ever Lived"

For the last five years, X-Men comics have been set within the Krakoan Age - a time in which all the world's mutants banded together to form their own nation. Gradually, fans learned this nation was just the first part of a plan spanning hundreds of years - Charles Xavier, Magneto, and Moira X had seen the future, and they knew that a godlike artificial intelligence would drive mutants to extinction. Now, as the Krakoan Age concludes, fans know everything, as it's revealed that the human Nathaniel Essex set in motion a jaw-dropping plot to evolve into a Dominion, becoming the god known as Enigma. Enigma is the ultimate lifeform, and one which was seemingly impossible to defeat, no matter how the X-Men tried.

In this issue, the Phoenix is finally reborn in its most powerful state, linked to Jean Grey and every mutant in Marvel continuity (thanks to the efforts of Hope Summers.) The Phoenix faces down Enigma, who begins to mess with the timeline, making small changes designed to destroy Jean, the X-Men, and eventually all life on Earth. The Phoenix races to fix the changes but is struggling to keep up - that is until Xavier finds a way to connect the two via Moira, allowing the Phoenix to face Enigma one-on-one.

What follows is a staggering show of power, as Jean Grey connects to the White Hot Room - a mystical source of creation at the heart of Marvel's multiverse. Doing so gives her access to every mutant every born, and their combined powers rip Enigma to shreds, leaving the god trapped in an eternal moment of death, strewn across all of time.

While there are still some stories left to tell in Marvel's Krakoan Age, they will seemingly serve as more of an epilogue, since this is the moment the X-Men vanquish their greatest threat, with Storm simultaneously destroying the ultimate Sentinel Nimrod over in Fall of the House of X.

This victory establishes the Phoenix Force as the ultimate form of power within the constraints of time and reality, while the Dominions rule the timeless, indefinable space beyond.

The Phoenix Force Proves Its Power Among Marvel's Gods

Beating Enigma Makes Phoenix Even More Impressive

The story begins with Enigma summoning an army of Dominions to kill the Phoenix - an event which seemed set to confirm the true hierarchy of Marvel's cosmic power. Marvel previously confirmed that Dominions are among the top 4 most powerful beings in existence, fearing only the Phoenix and Galactus - however, that's on an individual basis, and Enigma was confident that a Dominion army could easily kill the Phoenix. Ultimately, the Dominions reveal they have no quarrel with the X-Men - they've ascended beyond pointless aggression, and leave Enigma to his fate against the reborn goddess.

The power level of Marvel's Phoenix Force has long been unclear, since it exists in the very upper tier of Marvel lore. The Phoenix represents the act of creation and the spirit of progress, and has often been used as a metaphor for the creativity that defines Marvel's storytelling. It also exists on multiple planes of reality - every reality has its own Phoenix Force, but they also connect to a singular Phoenix entity that exists beyond the multiversal level.

In this issue, Jean taps into the Phoenix in its purest form, experiencing its cosmological moment of creation - a major moment in Marvel's timeline called "the Ignition of the White Hot Room." This is the Phoenix at its most potent, which claims:

Every mutant soul burns eternally in me, feathers in wings beyond comprehension, our talons the focused totality of mutantkind. I am every mutant. Now and forever.

The issue is clear that the Phoenix still has some limits, since it only lives within the confines of what exists, and Jean wouldn't have been able to find or defeat Enigma without Xavier creating a connection between the two. Indeed, this is the reason that the Dominions give for feeling no animosity towards it, saying, "You are now and forever. We are outside that. There is no overlap." This essentially establishes the Phoenix Force as the ultimate form of power within the constraints of time and reality, while the Dominions rule the timeless, indefinable space beyond.

X-Men's idea of 'mutant technology' achieves its ultimate form in the Phoenix's godlike manifestation of every mutant, unifying their powers into claws that can kill a god.

The X-Men's Combined Form Is the Ultimate Form of 'Mutant Technology'

The Krakoan Era Ends With Its Biggest Invention

One of the Krakoan Era's main focuses has been the idea of 'mutant technology,' i.e. mutants combining their powers to do what none of the constituent heroes could do alone. The original example is Wolverine and Colossus' Fastball Special attack, where Colossus hurls Wolverine heights and distances he couldn't cover alone. However, the Krakoan Era evolved this idea beyond what seemed possible, with the most famous mutant circuit - known as the Five - essentially gifting mutantkind immortality by resurrecting anyone who died in a new body.

That capability is gone now, and the Krakoan Era ends with the bittersweet reveal that most of the mutants of Krakoa will now live forever within the White Hot Room, safe and united, but cut off from Earth and their former lives. However, the idea that the Five embodied achieves its ultimate form in the Phoenix's godlike manifestation of every mutant, unifying their powers into claws that can kill a god. Jean's choice of claws appears to be a nod to her deep love for Wolverine, who has traditionally been the one to strike the killing blow on mutantkind's behalf.

Fans knew from creator hints that Jean Grey would play a major part in the closing chapter of the Krakoan Era, titled 'Fall of X.' Indeed, Mark Brooks and Richard Isanove's promotional art for the chapter (above) shows Jean and Cyclops sitting on a throne amidst their friends and allies. Not only does the X-Men's ultimate form make good on that imagery. but it also sets up mutantkind's next chapter.

In a universe where the story never ends, Rise of the Powers of X does an irable job of making the Krakoan project a lasting success

Jean Grey Saves Mutantkind, Setting Up a New X-Men Status Quo

The Krakoan Era Is Almost Over & Everything Is Changing

While X-men #35 will officially wrap up the Krakoan Era on June 5 (from a huge roster of writers and artists), the peril of the story is concluded in Rise of the Powers of X and Fall of the House X, which both ended their runs this month. In July, this will be followed by a new era, as the entire X-Men line is relaunched for 'From the Ashes.' New creative teams will helm projects including X-Factor, X-Force, Storm, Wolverine, NYX and more, with X-Men, Uncanny X-Men, and Exceptional X-Men acting as the three flagship titles of the new From the Ashes era.

Fans had worried that 'From the Ashes' would essentially revert the X-Men to their prior status quo, working out of Xavier's school in a world that hates and fears them as a secretive minority living among humans. While some aspects of that appear to be true, it's also clear that the stories will pick up threads left from the end of the Krakoan Era. The Phoenix series from Stephanie Phillips and Alessandro Miracolo will see Jean become a cosmic hero thanks to her new power level, while Storm's defeat of Nimrod will parlay into her ing the Avengers in Avengers #17, from Jed MacKay and Valerio Schiti.

It's likely that future Marvel stories will find fertile ground in Phoenix and Enigma's battle through time - a godlike villain rewriting the timeline is the kind of event that creates paradoxes, even if the Phoenix set most of the damage right. It's also likely that fans will see the mutants left in the White Hot Room again, as the nation of 'New Krakoa' is formed and must find a way to thrive in such a bizarre environment.

While some readers have felt that the execution of 'Fall of X' was rushed, failing to capture the grandeur and intricate planning present elsewhere in the Krakoan Era, the ideas behind the chapter do bring the major themes of the epic story together. Mutant unity, villains beyond time and space, and the meaningful progress of a nation where homo superior can be safe and prosperous are front and center.

Indeed, in a universe where the story never ends, Rise of the Powers of X does an irable job of making the Krakoan project a lasting success - the X-Men may not get to live out their dream, but the hundreds of thousands of mutants of New Krakoa do, all thanks to their ability to come together and slay a seemingly unbeatable foe through the power of mutant solidarity (and gigantic fiery claws.)

Rise of the Powers of X #5 is available now from Marvel Comics.