Kamala Khan is now a mutant! Thanks to some time travel shenanigans, she goes back in time to witness the birth of the Uncanny X-Men! Find out what happens in Giant-Size X-Men #1 by Marvel Comics.
GIANT-SIZE X-MEN #1
Writer: Jackson Lanzing and Collin Kelly
Artist: Adam Kubert
Colorist: Laura Martin
Letterer: Clayton Cowles
Editor: Tom Brevoort
Publisher: Marvel Comics
Cover Price: $4.99
Release Date: May 28, 2025
Previously in Giant-Size X-Men: Kamala Khan is the hero known as Ms. Marvel. She received her powers when her latent Inhuman abilities were activated. However, because she was Inhuman, her mutant gene never manifested. Despite this, she has been welcomed into the mutant community.
Giant-Size X-Men #1 begins in a dystopian future where Legion battles guards armed with Cyclops-style eye-beam weapons. This isn’t the David Haller version of Legion, though. It’s something else. And he’s traveling back in time to stop Krakoa.
In the present, Kamala and Bruno are talking. Kamala is struggling with her identity and whether she should reveal her presence to anyone. Bruno has built a time-travel detector, but before they can figure out why it’s going off, Kamala is pulled back in time, landing right in front of Cyclops, moments before the rescue of the original X-Men from Krakoa. Because Cyclops has already been to the future, he recognizes Kamala and introduces her to Professor X. Xavier gives her a new costume and welcomes her into the team.
Kamala knows the X-Men will eventually settle on Krakoa but wants to avoid creating any time paradoxes. However, when the ship is attacked by Legion, we see the first significant time deviation. After a brief battle, Ms. Marvel sends the Uncanny X-Men to follow the original timeline and rescue the team while she stays behind to speak with Krakoa and fight Legion. Speaking in Krakoan, she convinces the island to leave and then punches Legion. Suddenly, her powers fail again, and she’s yanked forward in time, landing right in the middle of the Dark Phoenix Saga!
The issue also includes a short story introducing a mysterious new mutant. One who has even bested Professor X!
I’ve often wondered about the relationship between Krakoa and mutants before the Krakoan era, and this story touches on that in interesting ways. I love Ms. Marvel, and I think the idea of her being a mutant with latent powers has narrative potential, but I’m not sure this was the right direction for her.
While some of the interactions between Kamala and the other X-Men are funny and charming (and I did like that Cyclops remembered her), the plot doesn’t fully click for me. I don’t think Professor X would have accepted her into the team so quickly and easily, and I’m not convinced this version of the X-Men could defeat Legion, even with a minor setback, so effortlessly.
That said, the artwork was engaging. The creative team did a solid job honoring the original comics while incorporating modern visual flair. Most of the panel work and splash pages looked great. Strong work on that front.
There are some compelling ideas in Kamala reliving the X-Men’s most significant moments, but it’s hard for me to accept this story as canon. Maybe I’m not supposed to, but that’s a mental hurdle I haven’t quite cleared. I think the issue needed more pages to fully explore its concept in a satisfying manner. With that in mind, Giant-Size X-Men #1 earns 3.5 out of 5 stars.
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Giant-Size X-Men #1
Giant-Size X-Men #1 has great ideas but does not quite have the page count to pull them off.
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Christopher Rondeau is a storyteller based in Tulsa, OK. Finding himself with little work, he ended up creating a job as a Game Master full time on the internet. Chris spends most of his days reading everything he can, writing bad fiction, and watching old Digimon cartoons with his daughter. Sometimes you can find him Dungeon Mastering a podcast or streaming on twitch. Recently, he has completed his Master's degree with a focus on collaborative storytelling. Find out more at https://rondeaucreator.com