WARNING: Spoilers for Hulk #4 ahead!
The latest Multiversal adventure of X-Men, and apparently all mutants, were brutally exterminated by the United States Government in an atomic genocide. The X-Men have always been hated and attacked by humanity, that's kind of their whole point, but to see the US Government so viciously slaughter an entire race of people is tough to digest.
Hulk's latest relaunch by Donny Cates and Ryan Ottley, spinning out out Al Ewing's critically acclaimed Immortal Hulk, has seen Bruce Banner using his Hulk body and psyche in ways never before imagined. Having transformed his Hulk body into a cybernetic "starship," and using the anger of the Hulk psyche as an energy source (who is being forced to fight all of his past enemies in his "Engine Room" mindscape, constantly increasing his anger), Banner has been "piloting" Starship Hulk. Nearing the end of the current Smashtronaut run Bruce finds a world where Gamma monsters rule the planet, and the Hulk was never made, leading to the heartbreaking death of all mutants.
Piloting his new (incredibly weird) Starship Hulk through the Arterial Dimension Between-Space, Bruce finally landed on the gamma-wrecked alternate Earth in Hulk #3 after being pulled there by a mysterious force. Now in Hulk #4 - written by Donny Cates with art by Ryan Ottley, Cliff Rathburn, Frank Martin, and VC's Cory Petit - Banner has met a version of himself who was never turned into the Hulk, revealing that this pivotal moment in time is what has led to the near destruction of the alternate Earth by the evil President Thunderbolt Ross. After Banner's Gamma test was successful, and instead of turning him into Hulk, gave the United States a new source of unlimited power President Ross made the US into a supreme global superpower and set about destroying all possible enemies, including the X-Men.
While looking at historical files saved by the alternate Banner, Bruce is horrified to discover that the US Government designated the X-Men as hostile and in need of extermination, and revealing that in this alternate Earth the mutants were the result of gamma testing, instead of a latent X-Gene like on Earth-616. In a horrifying scene an Iron Man-esque Sentinel robot is seen blowing Cyclops' whole head off with a single blast, leading to his longtime love Jean Grey desperately mourning him while clutching onto his limp corpse. Happening during what looks like the 80s "Phoenix Force" era of the X-Men, the government determined that, "For the safety of the human race... this threat was quietly disposed of before their numbers grew." President Ross ordered an atomic bomb to be dropped on Xavier's School for Gifted Youngsters, immediately obliterating the X-Men, and apparently taking out the entire mutant population as well.
The X-Men have been killed in a lot of brutal ways, but in the newest Krakoan Era any mutant that dies can be resurrected, so to witness an alternate universe where the X-Men, and all mutants, were eradicated by a deranged US president is heartbreaking. In the alternate world where Bruce has found himself not only have the X-Men been killed, but Tony Stark is dead, and the alternate Banner has never heard of other heroes such as Blade, Moon Knight, or Spider-Man, meaning the government either killed them, or they never became powered to begin with. To see more of the new universe Bruce Banner has landed in, and discover if any X-Men somehow did survive, make sure to pick up Hulk #4 when it debuts on February 16th 2022.
