Warning! Spoilers for X-Men #20 ahead!
Many villains of the X-Men have found redemption on Krakoa, but Mystique’s destructive motivations are now more valid than ever before. For a mutant who has been a traitor on several occasions, her latest opportunity for betrayal finally feels justified.
The founding of a mutant nation on Krakoa is a grand and ambitious undertaking that comes with incredibly high stakes. Moira MacTaggert’s mutant ability of resurrection allowed her to live out multiple lifetimes and experience repeated attempts by mutants to prosper and flourish. However, she has discovered that mutants fail on every occasion. That knowledge is a secret that she, Charles Xavier, and Magneto have kept to themselves as they embark on the dream of Krakoa. However, this means that mutants with precognitive abilities are banned from Krakoa to protect that secret. This includes Destiny, who foresaw her own death, and in X-Men #6, warned her wife Mystique that the founders of Krakoa would lead her on and refuse to resurrect Destiny. She also instructed Mystique to burn it all down if her prophecies came true.
For years Mystique’s role as a character has been to betray the X-Men, but the situation in Krakoa has once again made this dynamic interesting and suspenseful. X-Men #20 by Jonathan Hickman, Francesco Mobili, Sunny Gho and Clayton Cowles picks up the thread of Krakoa’s mutants trying to sabotage human efforts to create Nimrod, an advanced sentinel that will one day be the end of mutants if allowed to exist. Mystique is dispatched to the Orchis facility orbiting the sun to destroy the Nimrod prototype being assembled, with yet another promise that if the mission is successful, Destiny will be resurrected. Mystique's mission to stop Nimrod from being brought online is a failure, and once she is back on Krakoa, Xavier and Magneto once again coldly refuse to bring Destiny back. Mystique looks back at them seething with rage, and recalls the words of her wife, “Bring me back... if they will not... then burn that place to the ground.”
Given the circumstances, whatever actions Mystique takes next will seem more justified than her actions as a “traitor” in the past. Xavier and Magneto were not likely to bring Destiny back, even if the Nimrod mission had been a success. In this case, it is actually Mystique who has been betrayed, as the founders of Krakoa have manipulated and used her to accomplish their agenda. Even if she does move against Krakoa in some way, having Mystique seek retribution for being wronged is so much more compelling than another story where she stabs the X-Men in the back for selfish reasons. She is also in a position to cause very significant damage, and with Nimrod’s activation and the high profile Hellfire Gala, now is a dangerous time to make an enemy of a mutant as cunning and capable as Mystique.
Raven Darkholme is one of the greatest characters in the X-Men roster, and part of that is her unpredictability and ability to destabilize any situation she’s involved in. The founders of Krakoa have just put a target on their backs, and for once, the most notorious mutant shapeshifter seems to have a righteous cause to drive her. Marvel may have finally fixed Mystique, but she may be the one to break the X-Men.