STORY: "The Puzzle Box" (22 pages)   Investigating Revanche's claims, Gambit, Psylocke and the Beast accompany her to Nyoirin's home, where they find a painting of the Asian Psylocke.

What you need to know:
The X-Men take Revanche's claims very seriously indeed, much to Psylocke's chagrin.  Of course, they can hardly be blamed for that - Psylocke's been acting strangely ever since she changed appearance, Revanche looks right, and neither the sensors nor the telepaths can tell them apart (despite the obvious fact that they look completely different).  On the other hand, as Wolverine points out, Revanche is also displaying martial arts skills, which she shouldn't have if she's simply the real Psylocke.

Xavier explains that he could verify both Psylockes' identity with a deeper psi-probe.  Revanche accepts, which is a bit risky considering that she is an impostor.  Psylocke refuses point blank, which does nothing to help her cause.  She claims to be very sensitive about mental probes given everything that's happened to her before.  Presumably she's telling the truth, because she has nothing else to gain by refusing.

This is as good a point as any to explain what's actually going on here.  The full story is fiddly and cluttered, and suffers from having been given in two conflicting versions (once in issue #22, and a revised one in issue #31), both of which are superimposing new material onto the original story from Uncanny X-Men #256 back in 1989.  When the dust finally settles, however, the basic story is relatively clear.  It goes like this:-

Psylocke's Asian body originally belonged to Kwannon.  Kwannon was an assassin working for the Japanese crimelord Nyoirin.  She was also in love with rival assassin Matsuo Tsurayaba.  Matsuo accepted an assignment to kill Nyoirin and badly injured Kwannon while attempting (unsuccessfully) to complete it.  Kwannon was left on life support.  At that point, Psylocke turns up in his part of the world, as an amnesiac who has just been through the Siege Perilous.  Matsuo hires Spiral to swap minds, so that Kwannon will end up in Psylocke's body.  Spiral, for no apparent reason other than malice, messes around with them both and ends up blurring their personalities and skills together.  Psylocke is basically Betsy Braddock in Kwannon's body, and with some of Kwannon's martial arts skills and personality traits.  The woman who ends up as Revanche is Kwannon, in Betsy Braddock's body, and with some of Betsy's powers and personality traits.  Clear enough?  Well, tough - that's as clear as it's going to get.

By the way, "Kwannon" is the name of a Buddhist bodhisattva associated with compassion.  It's one of the Japanese versions of the name, which started off as Guan Yin, literally meaning "Observes the sounds of the world."  It's a rather odd name for an assassin.  "Revanche" is the French word for "revenge" and makes rather more sense - presumably Kwannon wants revenge for the theft of her body.

Back to the plot.  When Revanche and co arrive at Nyoirin's house, she's suspiciously familiar with the layout.  She claims that this is because she was held prisoner there for months.  Again, this is obviously untrue, so she must be a good actress.  Revanche also insists on referring to Psylocke as "Kwannon", which is vital to the plot but also makes the whole thing even more confusing.

In Nyoirin's study, the X-Men find a portrait of Kwannon entitled "Kwannon In Repose."  Presumably this is just a genuine portrait of Kwannon commissioned by Nyoirin when she was working for him. However, the clear implication is that Revanche is deliberately leading the X-Men to planted evidence.

Shinobi Shaw makes a deal with Nyoirin: if Nyoirin will use Kwannon (ie, Revanche) to kill the X-Men, then Shinobi will support his claim to control of the Clan Yashida crime family (which has been floundering since Mariko Yashida died).

However, matters are more confusing than that.  Later on in the issue, Matsuo Tsurayaba tells Shinobi that the Gamesmaster has given him the exclusive right to kill Psylocke, declaring her off limits for Shinobi and the other Upstarts.  Shinobi isn't best pleased, apparently because he was planning to kill off Psylocke himself and get some points for it.  It's unclear whether Shinobi was particularly gunning for Psylocke (and if so, why) or alternatively whether this is just a nuisance for him because he now has to give orders that Psylocke is to be spared when the rest of the X-Men are killed.

The Silver Samurai turns up at the end working for Nyoirin.  He says that he's been given the opportunity to regain Clan Yashida's lost "place of honour."  This is slightly elaborated on next issue - basically, if the Samurai helps Nyoirin out, Nyoirin will see that the Clan regains its recognition in the Japanese underworld, though presumably under Nyoirin's rule.  However, the details aren't too important - the Samurai is really just here as a henchman figure.

On to the subplots.  Scott arrives in Alaska and announces that he's going to tell his grandparents what happened to Madelyne and Nathan.  (Remember, at this point Nathan was supposed to have grown up to become Stryfe, rather than Cable.)

The Dark Riders try to kill off Mesmero.  Well, in the published version of this story, they actually do kill off Mesmero.  But Alpha Flight vol 2 #4 retconned all that away, establishing that Mesmero simply tricked them into thinking that he was dead.

The Riders decide that Psynapse is letting the side down (believing that he was the only one of them affected by Mesmero's power), so they kill him too.  Psynapse isn't well, and the obvious implication is that he's got the Legacy Virus.

Wolverine and Rogue don't join the mission to Japan.  Instead, they head off to the Savage Land with Jubilee, as seen in Wolverine vol 2 #69-71.

Comments:
Things are now getting confusing.  With multiple Psylockes, multiple names, a deluge of disinformation, and some of the information which was apparently intended to stick getting retconned a few months down the line, this was a desperately hard slog the first time round.  To be fair, it reads somewhat better in retrospect, now that we know who's lying to who and (up to a point) why. 

But it's still an extremely dense piece of plotting.  And if the Psylocke/Revanche stuff wasn't confusing enough, there's also a whole conspiracy subplot with Matsuo and Shinobi that complicates matters even further, though it never really heads anywhere.  To be honest, I'm still not exactly sure what Matsuo's hoping to get out of all this.

There's some interesting material in this storyline with Shinobi Shaw, who shows flickerings of a multi-dimensional personality for once.  Rather than make him a generically cool new villain, Nicieza takes the "Upstarts" name literally.  This version of Shinobi is a drunken hack with negligible subtlety and diplomacy, who gets by on a combination of inherited influence, a dash of talent, and an even bigger dash of blind luck.  Other villains deal with him because he has things to offer them (which he inherited from dad), but they clearly don't have much time for him otherwise.  Actually, reading Shinobi in issues #21-22, it's a bit of a shame he dwindled into obscurity, because he could have been a promising villain with this approach.

Brandon Peterson provides guest art, and the layouts are certainly a lot clearer than Andy Kubert was usually providing.  On the other hand, after a lovely opening page, some very sketchy inking from Dan Panosian sets in, full of the sort of scratchy lines that were so fashionable in the mid-nineties.  (Page 4 panel 4 has Psylocke looking like she's been assaulted in her sleep with an eyebrow pencil.)  It's also, frankly, impossible to tell Shinobi and Matsuo apart in their scene together.  Still, most of the issue is readable enough, and he does do a nice job with the Kwannon portrait.

FEATURE CHARACTERS
Professor X (next in issue #23)
The Beast, Cyclops, Gambit and Psylocke
Rogue and Wolverine (both next in Wolverine vol 2 #69-71, then in issue #23)
Jean Grey (next in Uncanny X-Men Annual #17, then in the Infinity Crusade crossover, then in Uncanny X-Men #302-303, then in issue #24)
Storm (next in Uncanny X-Men Annual #17, then in X-Men Unlimited vol 1 #1, then in Uncanny X-Men #301-304, then in Gambit vol 1 #1, then in Uncanny X-Men #305-306, then in issue #25)

SUPPORTING CHARACTERS
Revanche
Jubilee (next in Wolverine vol 2 #69)
Deborah Summers and Philip Summers (both last in X-Factor vol 1 #13)

VILLAINS
Shinobi Shaw (last in Uncanny X-Men #299)
Lord Nyoirin and Matsuo Tsurayaba (both last in issue #18)
The Silver Samurai (last in Cable #2)
Mesmero (between flashbacks in Alpha Flight vol 2 #4)
The Dark Riders: Barrage, Foxbat, Gauntlet, Tusk (all next in issue #23) and Psynapse (dies; all last in issue #16)
The Gamesmaster (behind the scenes; last in the second story in Uncanny X-Men #300)
Nyoirin's henchmen

Written: 8 September 2004

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