After 44 Years, X-Men Fully Explains a God-Tier Mutant Power

Summary Destiny's precognitive abilities are not as foolproof as once believed due to limitations revealed by Mister Sinister.

The power of the Phoenix Force is unpredictable and immune to Destiny's precognitive visions, adding a new layer of complexity to X-Men comics.

The Krakoan Era has given fans a clearer understanding of Destiny's powers and how they function, highlighting her role in the X-Men universe.

As X-Men's 2019-2024 Krakoan Era comes to an end, Marvel is clarifying the limits of one of the franchise's most powerful abilities. Mutant powers come in a huge variety, from enhanced senses to warping reality itself. However, the people who wield them are still just human, adding an extra wild card factor to even the most godlike abilities.

In a preview of X-Men Forever #4, fans learn that's even the case for the franchise's supreme precog, Destiny. First appearing in 1980 and a classic member of the villainous Brotherhood of Mutants, Destiny is able to see the future, steering events to the outcome she desires. Now, as she predicts that the X-Men can't win the world-altering fight before them, Mister Sinister reveals that her power does have some limitations.

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Currently, the X-Men are up against the Enigma - an all-powerful consciousness unbound from time and space. Equal to Marvel's most powerful gods, Enigma is intent on razing the world of all mutant life. Even as Hope Summers attempts to jumpstart the Phoenix Force back to life, Destiny believes there's no path to victory. However, Sinister insists that her limitations put this prediction into question.

X-Men Forever #4 Writer: Kieron Gillen

Artists: Luca Maresca

Colorists: Federico Blee

Letterer: Clayton Cowles

Cover Artist: Mark Brooks

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Sinister's reveal explains many of Destiny and Mystique's more chaotic actions in past stories.

X-Men Confirms 2 Major Loopholes to Destiny's Precognition

The Phoenix Force Is Unpredictable on a Cosmic Level

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In the preview, Destiny talks with longtime rival Mister Sinister, who reveals that he's been studying her power. Sinister reveals that Destiny's love for Mystique causes her to overestimate the chances of her death, obsessing about the timelines where her true love is lost forever. Additionally, Sinister recalls his own attempts to build a prediction engine and how it was foiled by the Phoenix. Sinister reflects that because the Phoenix is the literal embodiment of novelty and creativity in the Marvel Universe, it is immune to precognitive visions, since it is by definition impossible to quantify or predict.

Sinister is referencing the events of Kieron Gillen and Daniel Acuna's Uncanny X-Men #15-17. There, Sinister found a way to siphon the Phoenix's energy into clones of Jean Grey, only for the cosmic god to break free, claiming "the Phoenix is the new. It is novelty in its rawest state. The unprecedented. You cannot predict or chain it with mere science."

This is a huge reveal, as it means that Destiny's iron-clad guarantee that the X-Men can't win could still be false. It also explains many of her more chaotic actions in past stories - Destiny wants the best for mutantkind, but she always prioritizes Mystique's survival. The fact that she overestimates the risk to Mystique means that many of her darkest acts probably weren't even necessary to keep her partner alive.

During the epic Sins of Sinister event, Destiny refused to prevent the creation of a hellish thousand-year timeline simply because it was the version of events where Mystique lived longest, even as the mutants of Krakoa were twisted into galaxy-conquering villains.

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The Krakoan Era Has Given Fans a Clearer Idea of What Destiny Can Do

X-Men's 'Nexus Events' Made Sense of Destiny's Rocky Past

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Destiny's power has long been one of the most difficult abilities to depict in X-Men canon, since Marvel's comics are an ongoing story with no set ending. Every new story is an event that Destiny should logically have seen coming and have planned toward, including her own death (indeed, the character has spent a lot of time dead in the comics, potentially to avoid factoring her powers into every story.)

However, the Krakoan Era has put a lot of focus on what Destiny can do and how her powers actually work. In Immortal X-Men #3 (Kieron Gillen and Lucas Werneck), she explained in detail how she perceives the distant future. Destiny witnesses all potential futures at the same time and can discern the probability and path to each taking place. While this allows her near certainty in events within a few minutes or hours, long-term precognition is a totally different game.

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Destiny reveals that she works according to 'Nexus points' - moments so significant to the timeline that they bend causality towards them. Destiny acts on her visions by making certain Nexus points more likely, sometimes pursuing seemingly pointless goals because they increase the probability of her desired future. She states:

Nexuses are the landmarks which let me navigate, either away or toward. For example, take climate change. Any choice which does not stop the world cooking is a choice that is ultimately irrelevant when playing the long game. A nexus is an event which pulls timelines toward it. Meaning things after it are more predictable, for better for worse. ... They are the waypoints on a journey - or their terminus. Think of me as a chess player - searching for such moments and then pushing history either away from or toward each nexus' gravity well of probability.

This is a smart explanation of Destiny's powers, clarifying why she can never be totally sure what the distant future will hold and also accounting for her and Mystique's actions over the years. Mystique is famously one of X-Men's least consistent characters, constantly betraying allies and carrying out contradictory actions - for instance, attempting to kill her daughter Rogue at some times and protecting her others. While the real-world answer is that Mystique has been used in very different ways by different creative teams, the explanation of her and Destiny playing 4D chess with the laws of causality is a satisfying explanation for why she seems so prone to changing her goals and methods.

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Marvel's upcoming X-Men: The Wedding Special will finally show Destiny and Mystique tying the knot.

Destiny & Mystique's Love Has Defined the Last 5 Years of X-Men Comics

A Once-Forbidden Relationship Now Steers the Franchise

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While Mystique and Destiny were always implied to be a romantic couple, it's only in more modern comics that this has been explicitly acknowledged. Indeed, the last five years of X-Men stories have made their romance a central theme, leading up to their upcoming wedding in X-Men: The Wedding Special. It was the Mystique and Destiny of a prior timeline who caused the creation of Krakoa by threatening Moira X, with Mystique then becoming the focus of the island's political intrigue in an effort to get her wife resurrected. Mystique and Destiny were major figures on the ruling Quiet Council of the mutant nation, with recent retcons establishing them as the biological parents of Nightcrawler (who was previously believed to be the son of Mystique and Azazel.)

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It makes sense that during this era, fans have learned more about the methods and limits of Destiny's power, especially as the Krakoan Era has been particularly ambitious in depicting Destiny's abilities - much of the 'Destiny of X' era saw Destiny competing against the powers of Moira X, whose death causes the timeline to reset, with only Moira keeping her memories (an ability that was weaponized by Mister Sinister.) This kind of existential gamesmanship - Destiny can see the future, but only within the timeline that Moira currently occupies - embraced Destiny's power rather than finding reasons to sideline it.

Thankfully, X-Men Forever reveals that spirit is still alive and well, as Marvel finally explains that despite Destiny's claims to the contrary, there is still a chance for the X-Men to win. At its best, the Krakoan Era has been a meticulously plotted saga that games out the details of X-Men lore to the Nth degree. Fans are hoping it finds a way to stick the landing as the X-Men face the era's 'Final Boss' in Enigma, and this smart way of addressing the limits of Destiny's powers certainly seems like a step in the right direction.

X-Men Forever #4 is coming from Marvel Comics May 15.