Part of the reason I tried to quit reading new comics last
year was because I had a series of burgled packages from Midtown.com (which in
itself might have been prevented had the postal service actually been
performing competently). The one way the
apartment tenants seemed to atone for this was in the random appearance of
ESSENTIAL CLASSIC X-MEN VOL. 2 in one of the periodic we’re-moving-out pile of
boxes to be scavenged by anyone helping to thin out unwanted possessions. I must repeat, this discovery was pretty
random, because when I first moved into those apartments, it was a
pre-retirement community, and only gradually became something else (less
trustworthy).
Anyway, so I got my hands on one of those thick
black-and-white reprint volumes that serve as an inexpensive window into other
comic book eras, and even though I don’t read X-Men comics with anything close
to regularity, I was pretty happy. The
only real question was when I was going to actually start reading it (a regular
concern for me, because I have more reading material than I can keep up with). Well, that day has finally come.
I’ll be providing regular commentary as I make my way
through it. Part of what makes ESSENTIAL
CLASSIC X-MEN VOL. 2 is that it represents the era that almost killed the
franchise, collecting X-MEN #25-53, from the late 1960s. The X-Men were unpopular, but they were liked
enough for Marvel to keep around for the cult audience that grooved to a bunch
of merry mutants. The stories in this
collection are written by Roy Thomas, Gary Friedrich, and Arnold Drake, names
that don’t exactly resound with quite the same significance as Stan Lee, Chris
Claremont, and Grant Morrison (Thomas comes the closest).
So far I’ve read:
X-MEN #s 25-28
This is still within the formative development of the team,
and so features the classic, original looks (in fact, Beast looks definitively
human throughout the collection), even though within these few issues alone new
costumes are already introduced. It
shows that Marvel survived on romance comics before the big superhero boom at
the start of the decade, because one of the central storylines to be found is
the love triangle between Jean Grey (“Marvel Girl”), Cyclops, and Angel. Jean has in fact recently gone off to
college, and is pining after some bloke named Ted Roberts, and Mimic (probably
the archetype for the character of Morph from the classic 1990s cartoon)
happens to be on campus as well, biding his time for another run at the team,
though the circumstances that rapidly bring him into conflict with it quickly
transition him into an unlikely new “deputy leader.” None of the villains in these issues make a
lasting impact, though Banshee debuts as yet another Marvel character to start
out as an antagonist, only to join the good guys (seriously, how many have
there been?).
I wonder if they'll pilfer any of that for yet another X-Men prequel? Or I guess the sequel to the prequel. Something like that.
ReplyDeleteI can sympathize with unscrupulous people at apartment complexes. I lost a whole set of GI JOE DVDs because someone swiped them. (They were also sent to the wrong address but obviously no one bothered returning it to sender or anything.) Another time I lost $80 worth of clothes. It seems some people operate by the "finder's keepers" principle even if what they find has a label for someone else.
I had a neighbor who almost helped me figure out who did it, but I didn't want to press the issue too much, because I didn't want trouble. It royally sucked at the time(s), but I got over it.
ReplyDeleteTony, I can't believe someone would give this away! It was pivotal to the series. BTW, I added this to our weekly link list on our blog.
ReplyDeleteGeek Bits
Yeah. It'll be fun to read through it. I've already noted how the art changes significantly by the end, and that the logo also changes to the modern design, too. Thanks for adding me as a link!
ReplyDelete