X-MEN #s 46-53
The final issues in this volume are pretty random but they
have a few treasures buried in them! But
first, we have another pretty meaningless visit from Juggernaut, in the midst
of Foggy Nelson reading the last will and testament of Charles Xavier and
F.B.I. agent Amos Duncan requesting for their own safety that the X-Men break
up!
That’s from Gary Friedrich, completing his final solo
adventure before helping Arnold Drake establish himself with another pretty
random Merlin adventure, where the one-time Warlock becomes the Maha Yogi in
order to brainwash some worthless support in his continuing plans for world
domination, with Beast and Iceman able to take care of him. Cyclops and Marvel Girl are featured in Drake’s
first solo adventure, featuring another random historical legacy in Quasimodo.
Lorna Dane, the eventual Polaris, makes her first appearance
in #49, part of a wave of formerly dormant, newly activated mutants Angel gets
tangled with, part of a larger plot on the part of Magneto in his continuing
hapless quest to do something meaningful, though he does manage to bring the
X-Men back together after an absurdly brief period made all the more
melodramatic in Jean Grey’s typical thought balloons, wondering what will
happen to her budding relationship with Scott Summers a few issues earlier,
even though they were still paired together…
Anyway, so Lorna Dane is tricked into believing that she’s
Magneto’s daughter, which really only entitles her to being cut into the
megalomaniac’s plans as an equal partner (something only Quicksilver and
Scarlet Witch were privy to earlier…is that why someone figured out they might
as well be revealed as his kids?), until the X-Men convince her that Magneto is
crazy. Which isn’t hard, because in this
incarnation he is! The fiftieth issue
sports art from Jim Steranko, by the way!
The story drags on with a meaningless inclusion of some
villain named Erik the Red, and then another pretty random threat named
Blastaar in #53, featuring art from Barry Windsor-Smith, which looks
suspiciously like Jack Kirby. It should
be noted that the origins backup tales continue, but they’re increasingly
worthless. Beast is depicted as having
been the product of his father’s accident with radiation!
It’s a shame that the series is treated so frivolously, with
one creator caring very little for what the creator before him was doing. Whatever happened to Ted Roberts, for
instance, or Jean Grey’s college education?
She becomes a bikini model during the team’s brief exile. I kid you not. I suppose it’s not so different from how most
X-Men creators in most eras not written by Chris Claremont or Grant Morrison or
featuring Hope tend to be, random and meaningless and having nothing to do with
the “mutant problem” so much as villains with generic goals and defeated less
by the X-Men than by themselves. It’s
not a surprise that the book wasn’t popular, because it featured a bunch of
outsiders desperate to be cool even though they weren’t (the one with the
biggest personality was a total square, after all). I seriously want someone to rewrite these
adventures knowing exactly what they were.
That’s what reading something like this demands. Vindication!
But it was certainly interesting, informative, enlightening. But exciting?
Only in the most exacerbated sense!
It's a wonder the series managed to survive long enough to ever become popular and spawn numerous movie adaptations.
ReplyDeleteIt didn't survive. It went into reprints, went away and then was totally reimagined in Giant-Size X-Men #1 (apparently the third appearance of Wolverine).
DeleteAh, well, that makes sense.
ReplyDeleteThough I suppose I could revise my first comment to say it's a wonder anyone thought of rebooting the series in the first place.
ReplyDeleteIt's not surprising. They kept it in reprint for years. They loved it, but couldn't figure out how to make it a success. And then someone did and it became their biggest success. X-Men is the Marvel philosophy through and through. If anyone was smart enough, the X-Men would actually be the core of the Marvel universe, much as Green Lantern is the core of the DC universe.
Delete