The X-Men franchise in the late 1980s and early 1990s was in its creative doldrums with the core X-Men team spending a couple of years missing in action in Australia, Xavier's school was led by Magneto, and X-Factor was... who knows what X-Factor was doing at the time? Excalibur was a shining beacon in this sea of mediocrity, with funny, witty, and entertaining stories by Chris Claremont coupled with some of Alan Davis' finest work.

The England-based mostly mutant team got caught up in a year-long story called The Cross-Time Caper running from issues 12 to 25, which had the team bouncing around from one alternate reality to another as they desperately try to find their way home. The premise is similar to TV series Sliders (which debuted many, many years later) and is an important part of Claremont's current X-series New Exiles.

This issue sees the end of Excalibur's jaunts around the omniverse, when they wind up at Opal Luna Saturnyne's domain, who also happens to be the ruler of the omniverse and is an alternate version of team leader Captain Britain's ex-lover Courtney Ross. Hilarity ensures when Saturnyne's forces attempt to look for Rachel Summers (Phoenix), who is being disguised as Kitty Pryde with a bad wig. Meanwhile back at Earth-616, Kitty Pryde is staying with Courtney Ross who teaches the former on how to dress up and have fun with high society.

This would be Alan Davis' final issue with Claremont, before returning as both writer and artist with issue 42. The issues in between floundered badly with Claremont leaving shortly thereafter, stranding the book with temporary artists and writers who simply could not match the fun and witty genius of the original Claremont/Davis issues.

This issue is collected in the Excalibur Classic vol.4 trade paperback.