But what wasn’t obvious until the final page of #152 was that Apocalypse was also… John Sublime, founder of the U-Men! And apparently was so all along. It also stands to reason that he was the mysterious “Dr. Sublime” referred to in the Return to Weapon Plus storyline as the founder of the Weapon Plus program.

It makes sense, given the genetic warfare free-for-all we find ourselves in in this alternate future. Both the U-Men and the Weapon X/Weapon Plus program represent attempts to create new species of life that would foment war between man and mutant. Both are logical means of pursuing Apocalypse’s evolutionary-war, survival-of-the-fittest agenda, particularly when you consider that “the fittest” has traditionally meant “Apocalypse and whatever underlings he’s relying on at the moment” in the Big A’s worldview.

(This also echoes what I understand is going on in that Weapon X series, where Apocalypse protege Mr. Sinister has been revealed to be in charge of the current Weapon X program. I don’t know how tied to continuity the current X-books are, but it seems like Morrison sets the pace and the other books follow, so that could explain this apparent correlation. And hey, John Sublime and Mr. Sinister do look a lot alike… well, we’ll stick with Apocalypse for now.)

Here, though, are a couple of intriguing questions raised by this revelation:

1) Was Apocalypse/En Sabah Nur/Sublime/The Beast involved in the gestation and awakening of Cassandra Nova? She, too, was “a new species of life that would foment war between man and mutant,” and it always seemed like a lackadaisacal bit of plotting for her to just pop up out of the sewer all of a sudden. (Granted, this is a superhero comic, so lackadaisacal plotting is something we’re prepared to accept even in the best such works, but still.) Also, her apparent control of her body at the molecular level directly echoes Apocalypse’s power (and Sinister’s!), if I’m not mistaken.

1) Was Apocalypse, etc. involved in the Magneto/Xorn ruse? Again, Magneto’s secret survival and reemergence helped push forward a genetic war between two species–indeed, unless the reset button is somehow pushed (in the form of the Phoenix, perhaps?), he succeeded in destroying the greatest human city on Earth. Moreover, John Sublime was directly involved with the Chinese prison in which “Xorn” was housed. Also, Beast (the real Beast (we think?)) said in issue 149 or 150 that he understood the link between Sublime/the U-Men and Magneto/Xorn. Was the constant U-Men harassment of the X-Men and the Xavier Institute merely a way to run interference and distract the X-Men from the traitor in their midst? Indeed, the U-Men attack on the Special Class was the turning point in Xorn’s conversion of those kids to Magneto-style militarism. And the camping expedition that led to the attack conveniently removed the Specials from the mansion during the Omega Gang riot, perhaps in order to prevent them from choosing the losing side and thus preserving them to fight on Magneto’s side when he was ready to cast aside the Xorn disguise. Magneto is unlikely to have joined forces with Apocalypse, but was he unwittingly a puppet in Apocalypse/Sublime’s plan all along?