Since her debut in Uncanny X-Men #129, Kitty Pryde has been a signature member of the X-Men, and often serves as an audience insert character that allows the readers someone that they can relate to and identify themselves with in the books. Kitty joins the X-Men as a 13 year-old girl from Deerfield, Illinois, who is learning about her identity as a mutant for the first time. Kitty has been a student, a teacher, and a leader, and in Exceptional X-Men, Kitty once again finds herself as a mentor to three young mutants, despite trying to put her past as an X-Man behind her following the losses suffered by the mutant community during the fall of Krakoa.
SPOILERS AHEAD for Exceptional X-Men #13!
Following the events of Exceptional X-Men #12, adult Kitty Pryde finds herself trapped in the past after falling through a portal created by a young mutant named Reggie. Where Kitty ended up is back when she was a teenager, before she was recruited by Charles Xavier and before her phasing ability manifested. While adult Kitty is stuck in the past, her students, Axo, Bronze, and Melee, find themselves watching over “baby” Kitty Pryde, as Emma Frost affectionately calls her, and try to prevent adult Kitty Pryde and her younger self from meeting and disrupting the timeline. Meanwhile, back in the present, Emma Frost helps Reggie regain full control of his mutant ability, allowing him to create another portal and bring Kitty and the kids back to their correct timeline.
Marvel Comics
When Sentinel robots attack the kids, Bronze leaps into action to defend young Kitty Pryde and her teammates from harm. In response to a Sentinel robot making a lunge for her, young Kitty instinctively phases to protect herself and uses her mutant ability for the first time. This is a monumental moment in Kitty’s life, and contradicts the canonical first use of Kitty’s phasing ability seen in the original run of Uncanny X-Men. While this is a minor change to Kitty’s character history, it is not addressed in the issue.
During the issue, Bronze comes across adult Kitty sitting alone at a swing set. Bronze recalls Kitty expressing regret concerning her life as an X-Man, and if given the chance, would do her life all over again and undo her time with the X-Men. In a tense argument that took place in Exceptional X-Men #11, Kitty speaks very frankly about how she views her time as a member of the X-Men, saying to Bobby Drake, “When we were their age, it was bad! It was a mistake! None of it should have happened”. Bronze tells Kitty that now that she is back in the past, she has the opportunity to change her past and her future by preventing her younger self from joining Charles Xavier and his school for mutants. Many of her feelings of regrets might be stemming from Kitty being forced to kill Orchis’s goons after the Hellfire Gala massacre (see X-Men #25 for more details).
Ultimately, Kitty decides not to rewrite her past and change her history, choosing instead to accept the life that she has, and both the good and the bad that comes with it. In this issue, Kitty realizes that she has a life that she wouldn’t change for the world, especially if it would mean giving up the friendships and adventures she’s made during her time with the X-Men. Exceptional X-Men #13 is a significant turning point for Kitty in the “From the Ashes” era, as for the first time, Kitty is coming to terms with what she experienced during the fall of Krakoa, as we see her with a renewed sense of purpose as she looks forward to the future and the next chapter in her life.
Overall, Exceptional X-Men #13 is a trip back to a nostalgic time in the X-Men’s publication history as one of its most central characters, Kitty Pryde, finally comes to terms with traumatic events that have had a profound impact on her and her outlook in life. The issue culminates with Kitty Pryde embracing all aspects of life as an X-Man, realizing that she must take the bad with the good in order to fully appreciate her time with the X-Men. This resolution of the issue is significant because it allows Kitty the opportunity to finally put her past behind her and put to rest her feelings of regret in order to fully embrace what the future has in store for her.
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