Imagine the shock of being barred from your own sanctuary, your home base, simply because the front door doesn't recognize you – that's the bewildering predicament faced by one of the X-Men's most beloved heroes on the mutant utopia of Krakoa! As a senior staff writer at CBR with over 15 years of experience dissecting comic book lore through my 'Comics Should Be Good' columns and books like 'Was Superman a Spy? And Other Comic Book Legends Revealed' and '100 Things X-Men Fans Should Know & Do Before They Die,' I've explored countless myths. My work has appeared in places like ESPN.com, the Los Angeles Times, and Vulture, and you can catch more entertainment and sports legends on my sites Legends Revealed (https://www.legendsrevealed.com/entertainment) and Pop Culture References (https://popculturereferences.com/). Follow me on Twitter at @BrianCronin (https://www.twitter.com/BrianCronin), or shoot me an email at brianc@cbr.com with ideas for future comic tales to unravel.
Welcome to the 958th edition of Comic Book Legends Revealed (https://www.cbr.com/tag/comic-book-legends-revealed), where we dive into three comic book (https://screenrant.com/comics/) rumors, myths, and legends to verify or debunk them. In this special all-Kitty Pryde episode, we're tackling the third legend: the mystery behind why Kitty Pryde was unable to step through Krakoa's gates.
The Krakoa era stands out as one of the X-Men's most defining chapters, spanning about five years where the team called this mutant island nation their base. This wasn't just another 'everyone lives on an island' scenario – remember those earlier attempts like Utopia or Asteroid M? (It's oddly intriguing how that plot point keeps resurfacing, almost like finding two nickels in your pocket – not much, but bizarrely coincidental.) What made Krakoa revolutionary was that it elevated the X-Men to a genuine global powerhouse. They developed and marketed a miraculous cure-all drug that the world became dependent on, granting them real economic clout, not to mention their formidable military might from a population of super-powered individuals.
Central to this period were the Krakoan gateways – advanced teleportation portals that only mutants could activate directly to reach the island from matching gates worldwide (and eventually on Mars after they expanded there). Humans? They could tag along, but only with a mutant escort and explicit permission from Krakoa itself, since the island was alive and sentient. But here's where it gets controversial – even a prominent X-Men member was blocked from these gates! That hero was Kitty Pryde, and the rumor mill suggested it might reveal she wasn't a mutant at all. What was really going on?
How did fans first discover Kitty Pryde's gateway glitch?
[Image via Marvel]
The reveal hit in Marauders #1 (crafted by Gerry Duggan, Matteo Lolli, and Federico Blee), where Kitty was so astonished that she nearly cracked her nose in disbelief! From then on, she resorted to alternative travel, often by boat, kicking off her 'pirate Kitty' phase. This led her to champion mutants stranded in nations that restricted gate access, and later, those countries outright banning their citizens from Krakoa.
And this is the part most people miss – when Orchis seized control of the gates during the Fall of X, they shut them to mutants, yet Kitty suddenly became the sole mutant capable of using them! As depicted in X-Men #25 (by Gerry Duggan, Stefano Casseli, and Marte Gracia)...
[Image via Marvel]
This twist naturally fueled speculation that Kitty might not be a mutant, a topic I explored in a previous Comic Book Legends Revealed column (https://www.cbr.com/iconic-member-xmen-not-mutant/).
X-Men editor Jordan White admitted considering the idea, but it never became a serious plan:
'But I was pitching it should be Kitty Pryde. Kitty should find out she’s not a mutant. And the reason I thought that was an interesting idea was because so much of her story has been about learning that she’s a mutant and what that means. I thought it would be an interesting twist on her story to say, what if she learned she wasn’t a mutant, and then she can learn that it doesn’t matter. She is still who she is, she believes what she believes, she’s still an X-Man, and she still stands for everything she’s always stood for — whether she was born mutant or not. I mentioned that to Gerry and Jonathan later, but I wasn’t going, “Hey, what if we did this?” I was going, “Oh, this is a thing I had been thinking for a minute that we might do. Does anybody want to do anything with this?” And nobody picked it up.'
Yet, White clarified the gateway issue directly.
What truly explained Kitty Pryde's gateway troubles?
In a stellar 'farewell' chat with Chris Hassan at AIPT (https://aiptcomics.com/2024/06/10/x-men-monday-255-jordan-d-white-exit/), White broke it down:
'No. Gerry wanted to write about Kate from the start of Marauders. And like I said, to many people’s dissatisfaction a couple weeks ago, in our minds, it wasn’t that mysterious. We were really just like, it’s weird Krakoan technology and she messes up technology. So we were more surprised by people’s reactions. It seems fairly natural that her powers would interact with the gates poorly.'
Indeed, Kitty's abilities have disrupted gadgets since her debut in X-Men #131 (by John Byrne, Chris Claremont, and Terry Austin)...
[Image via Marvel]
Though it wasn't overtly spelled out until Uncanny X-Men #149 (by Claremont, Dave Cockrum, and Joe Rubinstein)...
[Image via Marvel]
Regardless of whether you buy into this reasoning – and hey, opinions on plot twists can divide fans fiercely – it's evident this was the creators' intention. Kitty's gate woes had zero to do with her mutant status; it was all about her tech-jamming powers clashing with Krakoa's advanced systems. For newcomers to X-Men lore, think of it like how some people with electromagnetic sensitivities might short-circuit electronics – Kitty's phasing ability, which lets her walk through walls by shifting matter, accidentally interferes with sophisticated machinery, including those gates.
[Image created by CBR]
In the latest TV Legends Revealed - Was Peggy Scott on The Gilded Age originally going to be a much different character? (https://www.cbr.com/gilded-ages-best-character-was-almost-completely-different/)
That's a wrap for Comic Book Legends Revealed #958! Stay tuned for the next one. Don't forget to explore my Entertainment Legends Revealed (http://legendsrevealed.com/entertainment/) for film and TV myths, and check out fresh Entertainment and Sports Legends Revealed on Pop Culture References (https://popculturereferences.com/category/legends-revealed/)!
Got ideas for future comic legends? Drop them my way at cronb01@aol.com or brianc@cbr.com. And here's a thought to ponder: Do you agree Kitty's powers make for a solid explanation, or do you wish her story had taken that 'not a mutant' twist? Is this a clever plot device or a missed chance for deeper character development? Share your takes in the comments – I'd love to hear where you stand!
