STORY: "Testament" (22 pages)  Gambit and Joseph come to blows after Joseph tries to help cure Rogue.

What you need to know:
It's the anniversary of the Morlock Massacre, and when Storm visits the tunnels to pay her respects, she finds Gambit already there - even though he wasn't on the team at the time.  This is, of course, all leading up to the eventual revelation in Uncanny X-Men #350 that Gambit was involved in the Morlock Massacre (albeit peripherally), and feels very guilty about it.

Joseph is working on a device to control Rogue's powers, and he's being a bit pushy about getting her to try it out.  Gambit apparently misinterprets Joseph's attentions, which is the immediate reason for their fight.  Rogue breaks up the fight, and they make up.

Bizarrely, the Morlock tunnels have an underground graveyard - complete with lawn - where all the victims of the Massacre are apparently buried.  This begs the obvious questions of who's tending the grass, and how it can possibly be growing in an underground chamber anyway.  Still, it's a nice image.

Iceman and Cannonball are now undercover with the Graydon Creed campaign, and are already trusted aides of Creed.  Which, let's be honest, strains credibility more than a touch.  Especially considering that they're using the pseudonyms of "Drake Roberts" and "Samson Guthry."

William Drake, Iceman's father, turns up at one of Creed's public appearances and heckles him, having apparently had a change of heart about mutants.  This all leads into a brief subplot about Iceman's relationship with his father.

Bishop is brooding about the fact that his timeline was averted in Onslaught: X-Men (when Onslaught failed to kill Jean Grey), meaning that his original mission has been resolved.  Wolverine encourages him to live for today.  It's a bit of a throwaway acknowledgement, considering that this was Bishop's primary plotline for so many years.

J Jonah Jameson is still investigating the Creed campaign, and Havok is hanging around planning to kill him.  This closing scene is really just a trailer for Uncanny X-Men #339.

Comments:
Basically an exercise in advancing some of the subplots, even though not a great deal really happens.  Gambit's secret is moved to the foreground, and there's a neat subtext in playing him off against Joseph.  Ultimately, Rogue has nothing to do with the fight in this issue.  At this point, Joseph is still meant to be a version of Magneto who's had the slate wiped clean, and who's apparently being allowed to put his past sins behind him.  You can see why this might get on Gambit's nerves.  This is actually quite a neat little idea, and it's a good use of Joseph to further Gambit's plot.

The other major plot development is that Sam and Bobby have gone undercover with the Creed campaign, a storyline which never really goes anywhere, and is fundamentally ridiculous to boot.  We're expected to accept Creed as a genuinely threatening villain, and yet he's apparently such a moron that he can't spot two of the X-Men, using extremely thinly disguised names, when they're standing right in front of him.  For that matter, we're also supposed to accept that the X-Men would be too lazy to come up with a better cover identity.  It's all just too silly for words.  The subplot with Iceman's dad has some good bits in later issues, but in this one it's written rather clunkily.

Guest art comes from Bernard Chang, whose work thankfully looks nothing like the horribly mid-nineties cover.  He's not really the sort of artist who was fashionable at this time, with an emphasis on storytelling rather than fiddly lines.  Some of his work in this issue is actually very striking.  Some of it's a bit average and feels slightly rushed.  Still, when the whole issue hovers between "ok" and "rather good", you can't complain.

FEATURE CHARACTERS
Cannonball (last in Uncanny X-Men #338)
Joseph (between Uncanny X-Men #338-339)
Iceman, Wolverine (both last in Uncanny X-Men #338) and Bishop (last in XSE #4; all next in the X-Men story in Marvel Holiday Special 1996, then Wolverine in Venom: Tooth & Claw #1-3, then all in Uncanny X-Men #339)
Storm (last in Uncanny X-Men #338; next in the X-Men story in Marvel Holiday Special 1996, then in Uncanny X-Men #339-340, then in DC/Marvel: All Access #3-4, then in X-Men '96)
Gambit (last in Uncanny X-Men #338; next in Uncanny X-Men #340, then in DC/Marvel: All Access #2, then in X-Men '96)
Rogue (last in Magneto #4; next in X-Men '96)

SUPPORTING CHARACTERS
Trish Tilby (next in the second story in Incredible Hulk '97)
William Drake (last in Uncanny X-Men #319)

VILLAINS
Graydon Creed (next in Uncanny X-Men #339)
Carly Alvarez (last in Uncanny X-Men #338)
Havok (between X-Factor vol 1 #126 and Uncanny X-Men #339)

GUEST APPEARANCES
J Jonah Jameson (between Uncanny X-Men #338-339)
Marla Jameson (last behind the scenes in Amazing Spider-Man #415; next in Spider-Man: Revelations)

Written: 21 July 2005

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