In this review of Cloak or Dagger #1, the mutant couple investigate who is trying to use the X-Virus to humans into mutants. They just can’t do it together.
CLOAK OR DAGGER #1
Writer: JUSTINA IRELAND
Artist: LORENZO TAMMETTA
Main Cover: MIKE MCKONE
Variant Covers: IVÁN TALAVERA, RICKIE YAGAWA, DAVID NAKAYAMA, FANYANG, CORIN HOWELL
Page Count: 32 pages
Release Date: October 29, 2025
This review contains spoilers
In the wake of the events that have led in the “Age of Revelation” event, Cloak or Dagger #1 kicks off as Dagger and a crack team of specialized national guardsmen are dispatched to evacuate refugees in St. Louis who are caught in an attack on the edge of the Revelation zone. Dagger and a pair of super-powered agents Scritch and Flex repel a hippo riding mutant allowing the refugees to escape, but enemy reinforcements arrive. Dagger, somehow melded with Cloak, swaps out her now husband who drops deadly light knives down on the enemies, dispatching them in short order.
Unfortunately, the bus of refugees and their accompanying military envoy are caught by the Fenris twins, who absconded with the vehicle. Cloak and crew teleport to their location, only to find the bus disappeared. Cloak swaps out with Dagger and the team regroups to figure out the mystery disappearance.
On the captured bus, the Fenris twins monologue before unleashing the x-virus on the bus load. Dagger and crew finally get confirmation of the location of the vehicle, totally destroyed, the only survivor being one of the military guys, fully mutated. It’s revealed that in Cloak’s dimension, he and Dagger had a daughter that they share time between. Meanwhile, the Fenris twins plan an even bigger attack on Fort Leonard wood, a human stronghold.
I don’t blame anybody on the creative team on Cloak or Dagger #1 for what’s a mostly dull affair. I know Justina Ireland is a legit, talented prose writer. On a purely technical side, it succeeds as a written comic. Not too much dialogue or captions and I mostly get everything that is supposed to be happening on panel. I just wish it were something interesting or subversive going on. The whole “Cloak and Dagger can’t be in the same place at the same time” concept doesn’t feel as innovative as the book wants me to believe.
While I appreciate this event serves more as a stop-gap as the X-men offices continue to find “the next big thing” for the X-men titles, I’m still confused by the titles chosen for this other, other, dark timeline. Cloak and Dagger’s history with the X-men and mutantdom in general is confusing at the best of times. Their origins have flip-flopped from humans transformed by experimental drugs to latent mutants who’ve had their power unlocked by experimental drugs to mutants like Spider-man or Hulk and there and back again. What’s frustrating is that in an event that is all about a weapon which causes genetic mutation, the mutant connection between C & D isn’t even mentioned.
Instead, the majority of the focus is on Dagger coordinating a team of resistance-millitary types and a pair of new Cloak and Dagger analogues called Flex and Scritch. Cloak or Dagger #1 doesn’t really give me much reason to enjoy these characters beyond them as broad archetypes. Their designs aren’t interesting and they don’t say or do anything of note other than talk about how “cool” C&D are (a sentence nobody has written outside the context of Marvel Rivals). Moreover, Cloak and Dagger were never the characters to work with any body of authority (except Norman Osborn that one time), so I don’t actually buy them working alongside the military to fight mutants.
I do like the reappearance of the Fenris twins solely because they are genuinely despicable, consistent with their appearances throughout canon. Does their plan make any actual sense? Do they have a consistent motivation? No, because they’re incestuous nazi-mutants, they don’t have to be. They’re evil for evil’s sake, and that’s fun. Plus, their new looks are also pretty cool.
Again, while I’ve been critical of Marvel-house-style in the past, I can’t say this is a bad looking book either. Lorenzo Tamatta’s art in Cloak or Dagger #1 is as solid as anything he’s done on Scarlet Witch. His figures are a good mix of dynamic and bubbly. The colouring is a little flat and saturated in my opinion, but the digital effects on Dagger are striking.
Ultimately, there’s not much going on here that you wouldn’t find in any of the other “Age of Revelation” titles. The twist on Cloak and Dagger’s powers isn’t nearly as exciting or tragic as the book would have you believe, especially because as far as I’m concerned, none of this is canon anyways. That being said, the art does look good, albeit not ground breaking.
