X-Men (1st series) 96-108 (December 1975 - December 1977)
Writing:
Chris Claremont
XM1 ...-...
(Bill Mantlo co-wrote XM1 106, gave plot assist on XM1 96)
Pencils:
Dave Cockrum
XM1 ...-107
(Bob Brown co-penciled XM1 106)
John Byrne
XM1 108-...
Champions 2-16 (November 1975 - November 1977)
The Champions were a small group co-founded by Angel and Iceman with three others, with Angel as the most common public face of the team.
Writing: Tony Isabella CHM ...-3, 5-7 (only plot on 3) Chris Claremont CHM 4 Bill Mantlo 8-... (14 co-plotted with John Byrne) Pencils: Don Heck ...-2, 5 George Tuska 3-4, 6-7 Bob Hall 8-10, 16 John Byrne 11-15 (also co-plotted 14 with Bill Mantlo)
Captain Britain (UK, weekly) 1-39 (October 13 1976 - July 6 1977) [lead stories only]
Super Spider-Man (UK, weekly) 231-247 (July 13 1977 - November 7 1977) [Cap. Britain stories only]
Captain Britain and his supporting cast end up completely entangled in the x-books by the late 80's, so it makes sense to treat this a something of a retroactive x-title. Note that some issues of Super Spider-Man after 247 contained Captain Britain stories, but they were reprints.
Writing: Chris Claremont CBW 1-10 Gary Friedrich CBW 11-36 (co-writing with Larry Lieber 24-36) Larry Leiber CBW 24-36, SSM 233-241, 243, 245-246 (co-writing with Gary Friedrich on CBR, Jim Lawrence on SSM) Jim Lawrence SSM 231-247 (co-writer except on 242, 244) Bob Budiansky CBW 37-39, SSM 231-232 (co-writing with Jim Lawrence on SSM) Pencils: Herb Trimpe CBW 1-23 John Buscema CBW 24-30 Ron Wilson CBW 31-39, SSM 231-247
With: Classic X-Men 4-15 (December 1986 - November 1987) [2nd stories and extra pages] Chris Claremont (Writer); Dave Cockrum (Pencils: extra pages in 1st stories); John Bolton (Pencils: 2nd stories) And appearances by X-related characters in: Avengers (1st series) 141-166 (November 1975 - December 1977) Steve Englehart (Writer: ...-144, 147-151)
Tony Isabella (Writer: 145-146)
Gerry Conway (Writer: 151-157)
Jim Shooter (Script: 151, 156; Writer: 158-...)
George Perez (Pencils: 141-144, 147-151, 154-155, 160-162)
John Buscema (Pencils: 152-153)
Sal Buscema (Pencils: 156, 158-159)
Don Heck (Pencils: 157)
George Tuska (Pencils: 163)
John Byrne (Pencils: 164-166)
Ms. Marvel (1st series) 1-11 (January 1977 - November 1977) Gerry Conway (Writer: 1-2)
Chris Claremont (Writer: 3-4, 6-..., Script: 5)
Archie Goodwin and Jim Shooter (Plot: 5)
John Buscema (Pencils: 1-3)
Jim Mooney (Pencils: 4-8)
Keith Pollard (Pencils: 9)
Sal Buscema (Pencils: 10-11)
Iron Fist (1st series) 14-15 (August 1977 - September 1977) Chris Claremont (Writer); John Byrne (Pencils)
Captain America (1st series) Annual 4 (1977) Jack Kirby (Writer and Pencils)
Iron Man (1st series) Annual 4 (1977) Bill Mantlo (Writer); George Tuska (Pencils)
Super-Villain Team-Up (October 1977) Bill Mantlo (Writer); Bob Hall (Pencils)
The X-Men
Professor X Charles Xavier ...-97, 99-... Takes open-ended "vacation", but it's cut short. Cyclops Scott Summers ...-... Nightcrawler Kurt Wagner ...-... Wolverine James Howlett ...-... Nicknamed "Logan", unaware of real name at this point. Banshee Sean Cassidy ...-... Storm Ororo Munroe ...-... Colossus Piotr Rasputin ...-... Also answers to "Pete" or "Peter".
The Champions
Angel Warren Worthington, III 4-... Iceman Bobby Drake 4-... Black Widow Natasha Romanov 4-... Hercules Hercules 4-... Ghost Rider Johnny Blaze 4-... Darkstar Laynia Petrovna 10-... Sometimes seems to be more of a "guest" member.
The Brotherhood of Evil Mutants II
Magneto "Erik Magnus Lehnsherr" CAP Annual 4 Deserted team at the end of CAP Annual 4 Peeper Peter Quinn CAP Annual 4 Slither Aaron Salomon CAP Annual 4 Shocker Randall Darby CAP Annual 4 Not to be confused with the Spider-Man villain of the same name Lifter Ned Lathrop CAP Annual 4 Burner Byron Calley CAP Annual 4
Introduction
With this entry, we're really getting into the classic X-Men period. The few issues covered in the previous entry introduced the new team and set the stage, but these issues are where the characters and team become fully defined. As of the first issue in this period, Chris Claremont takes over both plotting and scripting and delves deeply into the characters and their interactions. In these issues we get the first chapters of the Phoenix story which is quite possibly the most important extended story arc in the X-Men's history. We also meet the alien Shi'ar, who are intimately caught up in the history and future of the Phoenix, as well as the space pirates known as the Starjammers, whose captain is closely related to a certain prominent X-Man.
Outside of the so-called "All-New, All-Different" X-Men the team's former members were busy establishing themselves elsewhere in the Marvel universe. Beast applied for membership in the Avengers during the issues covered in the previous entry, and he gains full membership during this period. Likewise, Angel and Iceman's group, the Champions, makes an official go at being a team in their own series. Both of the former X-Men play major roles, but Angel in particular gets a lot of attention.
Finally, two series that don't have any obvious connection with the X-Men at this time introduce characters that later play a large part in the X-universe. Ms. Marvel's title character will have a major impact on Rogue's life, and another member of the Shi'ar royal family is introduced there as well. Captain Britain at this point seems to have no relation to the X-Men aside from writer Chris Claremont, but eventually he and most of his supporting cast play major roles in the X-Men splinter group Excalibur. And even before that his sister Betsy becomes the X-Man Psylocke. Given their future entanglement, it makes sense to go ahead and cover the Captain Britain mythos from the beginning.
The Writing: Plots
Chris Claremont takes over plotting as well as scripting here, fully beginning his long and classic run on the title. With the basic team established, he starts to examine his characters in depth and bring in some supporting cast members. He wastes no time getting into a major plot arc, and even issues that seem to be diversions turn out to be related. The only exception is issue #106 which is an obvious filler (a flashback sequence) mostly written by Bill Mantlo, presumably to cover some sort of missed deadline with regards to the expected story. At the time, this was the standard practice instead of delaying the issue's release until the planned material was completed. While Mantlo manages to work in references to the overall plot, the issue is of noticeably lesser quality than the others and is sufficiently disposable that Classic X-Men skipped it when it reprinted the others.
In terms of story, the main significance of this period is Jean Grey's transformation into Phoenix. At some point, the team becomes stranded on a badly damaged space shuttle in the path of a severe solar storm and Jean is exposed to fatal levels of radiation while trying to save them. At the shuttle crash site in Jamaica Bay (in Long Island Sound near JFK airport) the other X-Men swim free of the wreck in time to see Jean (or what looks like her) burst from the water in a new costume saying "I am fire! And life incarnate! Now and forever, I am Phoenix!" And then she passes out.
This kicks off a long series of events culminating in the classic "Dark Phoenix Saga", which we'll get to in two or three entries. But first, in what's sometimes simply called "The Phoenix Saga", we begin to see the effects of Jean's transformation. As originally written, Phoenix was intended to be Jean, infused with some unknown power that drastically boosted her abilities. She's clearly much more powerful, especially in terms of telekinesis, but she begins to feel more aggressive and to revel in her power in a way that disturbs her after the feelings pass. Jean's also clearly freaked out by having (in her own words) "died and brought [herself] back to life."
This is set against the overall plot arc of the alien Shi'ar trying to gain control of a tremendously destructive cosmic power, and as that story builds to a climax Jean displays cosmic-level power well beyond anything the other X-Men have demonstrated. In the end, Jean is able to contain the destructive force (a "neutron galaxy"), drawing on the strength of the others but essentially providing the raw force herself in a transcendent burst of power. The whole thing not only kicks off the long Phoenix storyline but also introduces the X-Men to a cosmic scale of adventure they'd never previously encountered.
Despite their major role during this period, it takes a while for the Shi'ar to properly appear in the book. A mysterious agent who appears in Cyclops's old Eric the Red disguise keeps turning out to be behind various attacks on Professor X and the team. He's taking orders from the Shi'ar Majestor (Emperor) D'Ken and trying to make sure that the X-Men aren't around to help D'Ken's exiled rebellious sister Lilandra when she reaches Earth. She's heading that way because she felt a psychic bond with Xavier from the moment he channeled the emotions of everyone on Earth to repel the Z'Noxx invasion back in issue #65. This happened while she was escaping D'Ken as her rebellion collapsed, and she's been traveling ever since. As she gets closer, Xavier has more and more intense dreams (and then waking visions) of her, and starts to wonder if he's going mad.
Eventually Lilandra arrives, Eric the Red (actually the Shi'ar Davan Shakari) attacks and distracts Phoenix with a more powerful ally, and the rest of the X-Men arrive too late to prevent him from capturing Lilandra and fleeing through a stargate. In the course of the final battle on the alien world housing the M'Kraan Crystal, a group of space pirates known as the Starjammers led by a human called Corsair help the X-Men win the day. Jean discovers that Corsair is the long-thought-dead father of Cyclops and Havok, although he asks her to keep that discovery to herself for now. As mentioned earlier, Jean saves the day using her newly cosmic-level powers, and D'Ken ends up comatose. Along the way, she's increasingly scared of how she enjoys her new powers, a concern which will continue to build in the future.
The plots that Shakari, as Eric the Red, set against them during the lead-up issues include brainwashing Alex Summers and Lorna Dane (to whom he finally gives a code name, Polaris) and using them to attack the team, plus motivating several of the X-Men's existing enemies to attack them. One enemy we haven't seen before, "Black" Tom Cassidy, is Banshee's cousin and long-time rival. He's befriended the Juggernaut, who still hates his step-brother. The friendship between these two is strangely enduring, and Cain is furious when it looks like Banshee may have killed Tom, saying that Tom was his only friend. After that plan fails, Shakari uses a ray to accelerate Magneto's age back to adulthood (accidentally doing the same for the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants off panel as their cell was behind Magneto in the path of the ray). The returned Magneto is still a ranting supervillain, though, as Claremont won't take his character in new directions until a bit later in his run.
Several other important things happen during the Claremont/Cockrum run and this period establishes several long-running elements of the X-universe. Human geneticist Moira MacTaggert is introduced, initially as an old friend of Xavier's and the X-Men's new housekeeper. It soon becomes clear that she's more than that, and she turns out to have a massive lab / mutant containment center on her land at Muir Island in Scotland. She's holding people like the age-regressed Magneto (from Defenders #16) there, and Cyclops in particular is upset that he knew nothing about the place or her despite his long service as an X-Man.
The one major plot between issues #97 and #105 that is not orchestrated by Davan Shakari is Dr. Stephen Lang's new Sentinel program. The government tries to shut down this program because Lang is taking things too far, but he relocates to an abandoned space station and continues. That space station is how the X-Men end up in a damaged space shuttle, requiring Jean to save them and thereby become Phoenix. Lang's "X-Sentinels", which appear to be the original X-Men, are essentially a gimmick and aren't seen again. They work here because we'd just seen Eric the Red brainwash Havok and Polaris, so it was plausible that he'd gotten to other former teammates, except for things like Beast not being blue and fuzzy and Cyclops wearing an older visor. Lang shows up again a few years down the line, but in a rather wierd way, having "survived" the demise of the satellite by accidentally uploading his mind into the Sentinels' Master Mold robot (I hate it when that happens).
Finally, a quick plot point from issue #96, which is otherwise a welcome break focusing on characterization, is worth mentioning. Near the end of the issue, a demon known as an N'Garai attacks the mansion, having escaped its dimension through a strange stone obelisk that Cyclops damaged while venting his anger over Thunderbird's death (at the end of the previous issue). The main reason to mention this is that every few years the portal ends up open again and whoever's around the mansion gets attacked by demons. They're never really significant, but they do keep coming back.
The Writing: Themes
There are two main themes running through this period of the X-Men. One is the feeling of being an outcast minority, and how that helps unite a group of people who otherwise have little in common. In some cases (like Wolverine and Colossus), they band together despite personal animosity. In others (like Jean and Ororo), they discover friendships that simply needed that one thing in common to touch off. But as much as their shared mutant status causes them to band together, most of the characters still feel like outsiders even within the group for various reasons- Kurt's appearance, Logan's discomfort with social interactions, Ororo's uninhibited customs, and Piotr's seriousness and uncertainty about modern America.
The other theme is that of fear of increased and uncontrollable power. The most obvious here is Jean's feelings as Phoenix and her worries about how much she enjoys her new abilities and how aggressive she has become. Which also plays into the "everyone is an outsider" theme discussed above. But also the Professor is dealing with his mind, the source of his power, playing tricks on him. His fears of madness aren't quite as based in his powers, but the fear of losing control is similar. And externally, the forces within the M'Kraan crystal represent the ultimate uncontrolled power. They give Phoenix a way to focus her power and show her control winning out over her impulses. At least for now. During the Thomas/Adams run we saw Havok's fear of his own power, and Cyclops's control issues have always been a major part of his character. But the Phoenix Saga takes it to a new level, and one that we will eventually revisit.
The Writing: Style
While Chris Claremont's long run on Uncanny X-Men (as the book will soon be renamed) is justly celebrated, he's become notorious for certain stylistic quirks over the years. As of this writing (2008), it's so easy to spot a Chris Claremont script that that they hardly need to credit it, and sadly that's not a compliment. However, the ticks that are now exaggerated and cliched make only a minor impact during this earlier run. Part of that is simply the context of the time. Many things that stick out as awkward now were common genre conventions in the 70s. And in other cases the quirks are present but just not as severe as they later became.
Probably the biggest complaint about Claremont's writing style is that he over-narrates. A lot. There are lots of narration boxes. If there aren't heroes think to themselves about every little thing they do. To a certain degree, comics always do this to clarify things that might be ambiguous in the art. Claremont, however, regularly narrates events that the artwork clearly conveys. For instance, in a panel in issue #103 where Storm narrowly dodges two laser beams, her thought balloons read: Energy blasters built into the castle's turrets... opening fire at me! If it hadn't been for my hours of training in the danger room, these beams would have burned me to a crisp!
Another of Claremont's quirks is an overuse of thoughts meant to amp up the seriousness of ordinary happenings in fight scenes. Most often, these take the form of thought balloons where the character worries about how to avoid death/injury/whatever and comments that they have "only one chance"... which is to do something common and obvious like use their power or avoid flying into a wall. Granted, he's not the only writer to do this, and sometimes it's a perfectly reasonable thing for the character to say or think, but it's definitely a favorite technique of his.
Finally, while it's not really a representative example of Claremont's stylistic issues, I simply can't refrain from highlighting the following lines spoken by a villain in Captain Britain Weekly #3: For I've received powers, too, this night-- powers far deadlier than yours! And the deadliest among them is the power to kill!
I need say no more.
The Writing: Character Development
Chris Claremont's extensive development of the main characters is a highlight of this run. While the basics were established in the Len Wien-plotted issues, they get tweaked and fleshed out here. Wolverine is a true loner, clearly at a loss as to how to interact with his teammates or deal with his feelings for Jean. He doesn't remember having any friends and doesn't really know how to make them. So he's mostly really abrasive and obnoxious to everyone. He also gets the best expression ever on his face when he "helps" Jean shorten her dress so she can fight better on the space station. His inner thoughts have a less confident tone, though, and the contrast adds much depth to the character. He also expresses frustration at his instinct to go for the kill despite many years of various sorts of treatment and therapy to try to control himself.
Storm is generally calm and collected, and is the only one who can really shut Wolverine up. She rarely feels the need to assert herself, which only adds to the significance when she does. We start learning that she has a more complex history than is obvious, though, with flashbacks to the claustrophobia-inducing death of her parents and her subsequent time as a street thief in Cairo. She also thinks about some sort of vow to herself not to kill, and is concerned that remaining an X-Man will make it difficult to keep that vow. This begins a long-running subplot of Storm worrying about the effect that the team's responsibilities are having on her.
Nightcrawler gets along with everyone, even Wolverine. He's nervous about his appearance, but flamboyant in the disguises he constructs with his image inducer, generally appearing as Errol Flynn. By the end of this period he's ready to throw away the image inducer, though, and in a Classic X-Men backup strip Wolverine dares him to go into town without it, with mostly positive results. By the time of the team's guest appearance in Iron Fist he's refusing to use it at all. All of this is notably different from how Len Wein wrote the character in Giant-Size X-Men #1, where Kurt's demonic aspects were played up as frightening. Claremont instead contrasts them with his easygoing, friendly demeanor.
Colossus is usually gentle and calm, but fiercely protective of his teammates. His slight naivete and anger at Wolverine's verbal slights to Storm (calling her a "broad") cause Wolverine to nickname him "Petey Pureheart". The two have a particularly antagonistic relationship, with Wolverine always trying to see what will make Peter really angry. However, in a fight Peter will defend Logan as much as any other team member. He seems to have a bit of an attraction to Storm, but it never goes anywhere. When the X-Men go into space in the shuttle, Colossus reveals that he had a cosmonaut older brother Mikhail who he believed died during a failed launch at Baikonur. Much later it will be revealed that he actually survived. Piotr's little sister Illyana already had a cameo during his origin sequence in Giant-Size X-Men #1, establishing him as the middle of three siblings widely separated in age.
Of course, Cyclops gets the most grief from Wolverine, and this is probably where Scott's relatively conservative leadership style really gets highlighted. That long-standing evaluation is a bit unfair, as Scott has a much better strategic view of the situation, which Wolverine notably lacks. Cyclops has another notable conflict during these stories: His first real fight with Professor X. The Professor is under a lot of stress because he still worries he's going mad, and Scott refuses to leave Jean's side (after the shuttle crash) until she regains consciousness, even though the Professor wants him to rejoin the team because they're in trouble. Xavier really doesn't take Scott's defiance well (the words "ungrateful cur" are actually used, in reference to Xavier having taken the orphaned Scott in).
Banshee and Moira MacTaggert start to develop a relationship in their own subplot, although it's remains unvoiced until their post-space-battle appearance in Iron Fist #16. Banshee continues to occupy an unusual space in the team. He doesn't tend to jump into leadership roles but his age gives him more experience (Wolverine wasn't thought to be so old at this point) and he does take the lead when the team (minus Professor X and Cyclops) visits his home in Ireland and later Moira's lab in Scotland. It's really important to note that Banshee's not just some middle-aged guy hanging around in the background with Professor X. He actually lasts longer against Magneto than anyone else, partially because his powers aren't particularly susceptible to magnetism, but partially because, as Magneto acknowledges, he knows what he's doing. This is in stark contrast to the generally youth-oriented makeup of most superhero teams where even characters like Captain America who have been around for a long time seem to be young.
One last thing that I never thought about until reading about it recently (sadly I can't remember where) is how Claremont manages to sideline Professor X much of the time without being too obvious about it. This keeps the stories from ending with "... and then Professor X messed with everyone's minds and fixed everything." He spends most of this period questioning his sanity, at one point leaving the team for what was supposed to be an extended vacation. In later issues, Claremont (and Byrne) will have him think team dead for a time, go into space with Lilandra, and otherwise be around more in concept than in person. All of which leaves only Phoenix as a character who can solve things too easily, and during this era, that's a key issue surrounding her character.
Claremont's impressive character work developing both the old and new members of the large cast are largely why he's revered as an X-Men writer despite the occasional stylistic quirk.
The Art
Dave Cockrum continues to provide art here except for the fill-in issue and the final issue of the storyline. His expressive style is a great match for the material, and he excels at capturing the personalities of the characters in their faces and poses. For instance, his Wolverine is as believable a socially awkward loner as he is a barely controlled fighter. While Cockrum usually uses a conventional panel layout, there are some notable exceptions, specifically the double-page reveal in issue 100. This is a fantastic page with a large figure of Stephen Lang in the center and several scenes accompanying his monologue in the background. Some are worked into the larger background as images on videoscreens, while others are inset panels or just drawn as foreground figures. The whole composition pulls together beautifully and is one of the artistic highlights of the run. Other highlights include the psychedelic rendering of Jean's death in the radiation storm in issues #100 and #101, and Jean bursting out of the water in her rebirth as Phoenix.
In addition to all of this Cockrum contributed the visual designs of the Shi'ar, their Imperial Guard and the Starjammers, all characters that continue to appear occasionally today. The Shi'ar are a race with avian characteristics, most notably "hair" that is reminiscent of feathers. The Imperial Guard is drawn from all of the races of the Empire, and bears a deliberate resemblance to DC's Legion of Superheroes, on which Cockrum had an acclaimed run. The Starjammers, as a smaller team with more direct ties to Earth, have been seen more often and in more detail than the Guard. In addition to the human Corsair, Cockrum designed several new alien species to give the team a diverse look. The fight scenes in issue #107 that fully introduce the Guard and the Starjammers have several great splash pages featuring a tremendous number of characters. The complicated fight is very well done and a great way for Cockrum to end his run.
Strangely, the final chapter of this initial Phoenix Saga was not drawn by Cockrum, but rather by incoming artist John Byrne. I'll cover Byrne's work in more detail in the next entry, but it's worth commenting here that he did an excellent job on the scenes inside the M'Kraan Crystal, where he was the first artist to render the iconic Phoenix raptor manifestation.
Elsewhere in the Marvel Universe...
While Marvel Girl, Havok and Polaris get dragged back into X-Men action one way or another, Iceman, Angel and Beast succeed in completely leaving the team. However, Marvel wasn't about to let them fade away when they could be used to capitalize on the revived team's success. Additionally, several characters that later join or become important to the X-Men first appeared or became prominent during this same era.
Beast had already found a potential home with the Avengers, and after several adventures with that team is offered and accepts permanent full-time membership. There are two main developments going on with him during his trial membership in the Avengers. One is the continuation of his rather abrupt change from being an angst-ridden outcast hiding his true form from the world to being a happy-go-lucky publicly known superhero. The other is the re-appearance of Patsy Walker, who extorted an unknown promise from Hank in return for her help during his solo run in Amazing Adventures. She shows up at the Avengers' mansion to collect, and attempts to blackmail him into complying by threatening to reveal his identity. Which of course, doesn't work, because he revealed it himself already. But since he's an honorable guy, he does agree to try to help her become a super-hero, convincing Captain America to let her tag along on a mission. Along the way, she acquires the Cat's old costume and takes the codename Hellcat. She ends up convincing the Avengers to offer her a spot as well, but then accepts departing Avenger Moondragon's offer of training instead.
However, Beast accepts full membership at that time and is welcomed to the team. But towards the end of this period of the Avengers he starts having trouble, as he keeps getting captured or knocked out, and his humor is sometimes viewed as inappropriate. He even finds his scientific talents overlooked on a team that includes other scientists and millionaires who can easily bring in their own specialists. He starts questioning just how good of a superhero he is, especially given that superheroing is all he does.
One last Avengers-related item worthy of note is the appearance of an as-yet-unnamed Henry Peter Gyrich of the F.B.I., who will be a thorn in the side of both the Avengers and the X-Men over the years. We'll cover him in detail when he makes his first full appearance. At this point he's just creeping around the Avengers' mansion looking for some sort of evidence while the team is distracted during a fight.
Angel and Iceman, however, are trying to live normal lives and are completely bored with the whole thing. Angel visits Iceman on campus, and they stumble into forming the Champions with Black Widow, Hercules and Ghost Rider. There's actually a fair amount of important character development involved for both of these ex-X-Men. It's here that Angel inherits his family fortune and becomes rich in his own right. It's also here that as a result of not having any living family, Warren outs himself publicly as Angel. He becomes the public face of the team, although Black Widow becomes the actual field leader. Warren is the one who comes up with the idea of making the Champions "storefront heroes" accessible to the public. Sadly the book never really gets a chance to go too far with that idea.
Warren's actions cause Bobby, who is still keeping his identity as Iceman secret, to reconsider the appeal of a normal life. He plans to leave the team until the lovely Soviet defector Darkstar joins and attracts his attention, although she does not return his interest. Bobby spends a lot of time worrying about being the youngest member of the group and being perceived as a weak link because of it. He eventually adopts a full-body blue and white costume in place of just shorts under his ice coating. It isn't a major change when he's iced up, but when he switches back he definitely looks more mature wearing reasonable clothes (for a super-hero).
Finally, Marvel started printing comics targeted at the U.K., assigning X-Men writer Chris Claremont to create Captain Britain, a.k.a. Brian Braddock. Brian's twin sister Betsy and their older brother Jamie also debut during these early issues of his weekly series, but with no hint of super-powers, mutant or otherwise. Betsy, of course, goes on to join the X-Men as Psylocke, while Jamie goes mad and periodically threatens the world with his reality-altering powers. We'll go into them in more detail during Alan Moore and Alan Davis's classic run on the feature. At this point, both of them are mostly bystanders in Brian's adventures, getting captured and held hostage and whatnot.
As for Brian himself, despite not being a mutant he eventually ends up leading a team called Excalibur that features several former X-Men (who often form a majority of the team). But he starts a long series of solo stories here, as a young physics student who is suddenly offered a choice between the Amulet of Right and the Sword of Might. He chooses the Amulet, and becomes a defense-oriented hero, using a staff as a weapon rather than a blade. At this point while he has superhuman strength and whatnot, he can't fly, and he has to use the amulet to change between being Captain Britain and himself. Captain Britain is actually a physically more muscular and imposing version of himself, although much later that distinction disappears.
During this period, his early adventures are standard superhero fare, including guest appearances from Captain America and Nick Fury of S.H.I.E.L.D. But there is an additional twist of Merlin and his daughter Roma testing Captain Britain along the way and unlocking additional powers and weapons. And as sales declined and the strip was folded into Super Spider-Man (which gained the tagline of "and Captain Britain" on the cover), the stories took a supernatural / horror twist as the writers and editors tried to find the approach that worked best. It would not be Captain Britain's last stylistic shift as we'll see in future entries.
New Characters
Moira MacTaggert
Abilities: Baseline human. Leading genetics researcher.
First Appearance: X-Men (1st series) #96
Moira MacTaggert is one of the longest-lasting and most significant human allies of the X-Men. She first appears to take the role of "housekeeper" for Professor X while he goes on his vacation, but is soon revealed to be a leading geneticist studying mutations. Moira states that her research is geared towards "curing" evil mutants of their hatred towards humanity. It's an ethically dodgy statement that isn't followed up on now, but does turn out to have serious implications several years down the line.
Moira has a convoluted history with Professor X, both personally and professionally. All we learn at this point is that they had some sort of past romantic relationship, and while they're both over it, Moira seems to be a bit more over it than Charles. It's later revealed that she broke up with him to marry someone else while he was overseas in the Army. Nonetheless, she worked with him extensively after he came back, and had a lab in the U.S. somewhere near Xavier's estate. For a while Dr. Karl Lykos (who later became Sauron) worked with them. Moira also trained mutant kids there who were too young to be in the X-Men, although Xavier eventually used them to try to rescue his original team from Krakoa, and apparently got them all killed (actually, two of the four survived, but that won't be learned for a long time). Presumably, this act, which was done over Moira's objections, was why she went back to Scotland.
She serves as Xavier's confidante in these issues, and is the only one who really knows the extent of his dreams/visions of Lilandra, as well as his increasing doubts of his own sanity. She also charges into a fight with a machine gun one time when the Mansion is invaded by demons right after she arrives. I've always wondered where she got the gun, but it was a big clue that all was not as it seemed with her. From the start, Banshee was very attracted to her, and makes a point of spending as much time as possible with her. He doesn't tell her quite how much he cares for her yet, but this is the beginning of a long relationship.
Note that the spelling of her name varies, with MacTaggart, in particular, being common.
Amanda Sefton (Jimaine Szardos)
Abilities: Sorceress of the Winding Way, she has various magical abilities which wax and wane over time.
First Appearance: X-Men (1st series) #98
Amanda Sefton makes brief appearances here as Kurt's apparently normal human date. She's an airline stewardess, and she and her friend Betsy often double date Kurt and Piotr. Betsy soon disappears from the book, but Amanda is eventually revealed to be Jimaine Szardos, Nightcrawler's sister by adoption (but, significantly, not at all related by blood). There's a complicated reason why she's hiding under a false name, but we'll get to that when it's all revealed a ways down the line. She's a resourceful and independent woman who is associated with the X-teams in various ways over the years, most notably by joining the British-based team Excalibur and taking the code name Daytripper as a joke on Nightcrawler. She learned her sorcery from her mother, with whom she has a sometimes difficult relationship. During this period, though, there is no hint that she is anything other than a pretty girl who's caught Kurt's fancy but doesn't know what's under the image inducer's hologram.
Misty Knight
Abilities:Right arm is bionic and superhumanly strong. Skilled martial artist.
First Appearance: Marvel Premiere #20
Misty Knight is one half of the Daughters of the Dragon, with Coleen Wing (who will cross the X-Men's path in the next entry). While she's a major supporting character around Power Man and Iron Fist, her main connection with the X-Men is being Jean Grey's roommate in New York City after she leaves the team. She knows about Jean being Phoenix and part of the X-Men, as is elaborated upon in one of the Classic X-Men backstories. In addition to getting caught up in the edges of the Phoenix Saga and other X-Men adventures, Misty and Jean's being roommates gets the X-Men dragged into an accidental fight with Iron Fist who drops by about the same time that the team gets back from the ordeal with the Shi'ar. All's well that ends well as Iron Fist, Misty, Coleen and the X-Men end up having the X-Men's welcome home party after all (although the cake got ruined when Storm got hit in the face with it during the fight).
Sabretooth (Victor Creed)
Abilities: Healing factor, enhanced senses.
First Appearance: Iron Fist (1st series) #14
As with Wolverine, Sabretooth's first appearance is unrelated to the X-Men. Although unlike Wolverine there's not even a mention of him being a mutant. He's just a big mercenary with claws (the nature of which aren't entirely clear as he's wearing gloves). He makes his first appearance in the martial arts series Iron Fist, and Iron Fist notes that Sabretooth's fighting is all about speed and power rather than skill. Sabretooth's mutant nature, healing factor and relationship with Wolverine are all elements that won't be developed until future appearances, although in the next issue of Iron Fist when the title character fights the X-Men he notes and wonders about Sabretooth's similarity to Wolverine. Sabertooth will make several more appearances around the Marvel Universe before showing up in the X-books during the Mutant Massacre crossover about 100 or so issues down the line.
Ms. Marvel (Carol Danvers)
Abilities: Superhuman strength, limited invulnerability, flight, precognative "seventh sense".
First Appearance: Marvel Super-Heroes #13 (as Carol Danvers), Ms. Marvel (1st series) #1 (as Ms. Marvel)
Carol Danvers became Ms. Marvel as the result of exposure to Kree technology that gave her the abilities of a member of that alien race, analagous to the Kree warrior who was at that time calling himself Captain Marvel. While she has a long history in the Marvel Universe, including significant stints with the Avengers, her primary significance to the X-Men is that future X-Man Rogue accidentally absorbs her powers and personality completely. Rogue's only natural mutant power is the power to absorb others, so all of her other abilities during the 80's, 90's and early 00's came from Ms. Marvel.
The Starjammers
Corsair (Christopher Summers)
Abilities: Baseline human.
First Appearance: X-Men (1st series) #104
U.S. Air Force Major Christopher Summers is the father of Scott and Alex Summers (Cyclops and Havok) and also of the as-yet-unknown Gabriel Summers (Vulcan). At the point that he's introduced, we don't know anything about him or why Scott and Alex were orphaned. So it's something of a shock to find him commanding a gang of space pirates in a distant interstellar empire. Much later we'll learn that Christopher, his wife Katherine and both Scott and Alex were flying in a private plane that crashed. Only one parachute survived whatever knocked them out of the sky, and Scott and Alex were both tied to it and shoved out of the plane, assuming their parents died in the crash. In truth, the Shi'ar wanted to learn more about humans and abducted Christopher and Katherine.
As one of the Classic X-Men backup strips explains, Christopher's defiance of their captors led to Katherine's execution by D'Ken. Christopher himself was sent as a slave to a mining planet, where he met a group of prisoners when he tried to aid their escape effort. Their plans succeeded, and they went on to become the Starjammers.
Christopher Summers is an able pilot and commander, but he's tormented by guilt over Katherine's death and the fate of his sons. He had thought they'd died in the plane crash, and is astonished to find them alive, but continues to feel guilty over the whole thing and prefers to stay away from Earth and remain with the Starjammers. This strains his relationships with his sons, especially the duty-minded Scott.
Hepzibah (real name unpronounceable by humans)
Abilities: Baseline Mephitisoid. Compared to humans she has enhanced speed, agility, reflexes and senses, along with claws, and mind-altering pheromones (that last bit according to Wikipedia- I don't remember the pheromones myself).
First Appearance: X-Men (1st series) #107
Mam'selle Hepzibah is a cat-like alien and Corsair's lover (although possibly not yet at the time of their first appearance). While none of the Starjammers have much love for the Shi'ar Empire (at least under D'Ken or Deathbird- they consider Lilandra an ally and she even joined them for a while), Hepzibah has an added general hatred for the Shi'ar race who are historical enemies of the Mephitisoids, playing on the notion of cats not likeing birds. She speaks rather broken English and is an enthusiastic yet practical fighter. Many years later she joins the X-Men after getting separated from the Starjammers. Once she's stuck on Earth with the X-Men she decides to learn proper English after Warpath tells her she sounds like a stereotyped Native sidekick from an old Western. Hepzibah was often drawn with somewhat skunk-like features in her earlier appearances as she was originally intended to be a tribute of sorts to the cartoon character Miss Mam'selle Hepzibah.
Ch'od and Cr+reee
Abilities: Baseline Saurid (Ch'od). Compared to humans he has tremendous strength and can breath underwater through gills.
First Appearance: X-Men (1st series) #104
Ch'od is a massive amphibious/reptillian alien whose intimidating appearance contrasts with his very friendly demeanor. While he is an excellent fighter, it's rather hard to offend him unless you're really trying. This is somewhat unusual in a comic book character as they all usually fight at the drop of a hat. Ch'od is almost always accompianied by Cr+reee, a small furry quadrupedal alien with a long thin nose. Cr+reee is at least somewhat sentient and speaks some sort of language that Ch'od seems to understand. He seems to be somewhere between a pet and a friend. Unlike Hepzibah and Raza, Ch'od speaks fluent modern English.
Raza Longknife
Abilities: Cybernetic parts give him enhanced strength, reflexes and sight beyond what is normal for a Shi'ar.
First Appearance: X-Men (1st series) #107
Raza is a Shi'ar whose left eye, arm and shoulder have been replaced with robotic parts. Even ignoring that, he doesn't look much like the other Shi'ar, sporting a long topknot rather than the feather-like hair characteristic of the race. He speaks in Elizabethan English and plays up the role of "pirate" much more than the other Starjammers. He is an enthusiastic and skilled fighter.
The Shi'ar
Lilandra Neramani
Abilities: Baseline Shi'ar, younger sister of the Emperor.
First Appearance: X-Men (1st series) #97 (face obscured), X-Men (1st series) #105 (full)
As the story opens, Lilandra is a fugitive from her older brother D'Ken, who forced her into leading a rebellion by branding her a traitor when she disagreed with him over his plans for the M'Kraan crystal. While it does not quite happen during this period, most of the time Lilandra ends up being Empress of Shi'ar. Although she periodically loses the throne and has to fight to win it back, frequently with the help of the X-Men and/or the Starjammers. She's tough and generaly fair, and was the Admiral of the Shi'ar fleet before D'Ken proclaimed her a traitor. When Professor X concentrated the emotions of the entire population of Earth to drive off the Z'Noxx invasion (X-Men (1st series) #65), she felt the psychic pulse and felt and instant bond with him. While the effect was not so quick for the Professor, it built until he was plagued with dreams and visions of Lilandra as she escaped D'Ken and fled towards him on Earth.
She is devoted to Xavier and he to her, and they are married for many years until a particularly complicated adventure results in Lilandra's (temporary) insanity and the courtiers of the Empire annulling their marriage. Despite her close ties to the X-Men and Earth, Lilandra remains Shi'ar nobility and is very conscious of her position and duties. This has, in some cases, resulted in the X-Men being less than pleased with her actions, and vice versa.
D'Ken Neramani
Abilities: Baseline Shi'ar, Emperor.
First Appearance: X-Men (1st series) #97 (gloved hand only), X-Men (1st series) #103 (full)
Emperor D'Ken is power-mad, and of dubious sanity in general. He wants the power known as "The End of All That Is" that is said to be contained in the M'Kraan Crystal. He doesn't care that it might live up to its name and destroy the universe. He feels that as Emperor of Shi'ar it is his right to destroy the universe if he wants to. He ends up in a coma as a result of being inside the M'Kraan Crystal while Jean and the others contain the neutron galaxy, and stays there, forgotten, until a storyline in 2006.
Deathbird (Cal'syee Neramani)
Abilities: Shi'ar "genetic throwback" with feathered arms/wings for flight and sharp talons in place of fingernails.
First Appearance: Ms. Marvel (1st series) #9
Deathbird's true name was stripped from her in childhood due to a prophecy that she would commit great evil. She later murdered both her mother and a sister and was subsequently exiled. We first find her on Earth allied with MODOK's faction of AIM against Ms. Marvel, an arrangement that has never been explained. More often we'll see her fight the X-Men as part of her plans to take the throne from Lilandra, or sometimes work with them to help repel other invaders. In her initial appearances her connection to the Shi'ar (then recently introduced over in X-Men) are not brought up, but her angry personality is already well-formed.
The Imperial Guard
Abilities: Various, initially all analogues of members of DC's Legion of Superheroes
First Appearance: X-Men (1st series) #107
The Imperial Guard are the elite defenders of the Shi'ar Empire and it's royal family. They are loyal to the Majestor or Majestrix of the Empire, no matter who they are. While they often show up in Shi'ar-related stories as a group, the only one who gets significant on-panel time by himself is Gladiator, the Praetor (commander) of the guard. His powers are the rather standard ones of flight, strength and invulnerability, but their strength is determined by his self-confidence. As long as he believes that he can do anything, he really can. Of course, this means that psychologically undermining that belief is the most effective way to defeat him. It should be noted that that's not an easy task. Gladiator is generally a good person, but his loyalty to the Empire sometimes places him (and the rest of the Guard) in opposition to the X-Men.
Brotherhood of Evil Mutants II
Magneto, Peeper, Burner, Shocker, Lifter, Slither
(see table near the top of this entry for real names and membership details)
Abililties: See below.
First Appearance: Captain America Annual #4
Magneto's second Brotherhood of Evil Mutants is something of a footnote in the history of groups with that name. It was the focus of Captain America's fourth annual, which was both written and illustrated by Jack Kirby. Seeing as Kirby co-created both Magneto and the original Brotherhood, it was certainly reasonable for him to revisit the concept, and the ending left open the possibility of this line-up continuing. However, Kirby never returned to it and instead the characters (minus Magneto) became a differently named group fighting for various agendas over the years. They were never very prominent, but in their next incarnation under the name Mutant Force they fought the Defenders, including a Defenders line-up that featured Beast, Angel and Iceman. Several of them still make the occasional appearance today, although usually individually and in very small roles.
As for the characters themselves, we get only brief introductions to them here. Magneto has already recruited the team and used them for a mission before the story starts, so there's no explanation as to how or why they were selected, nor even why Magneto abandoned the original team. They all have code names that are fairly directly related to their powers. Peeper has big round bulging eyes that have essentially x-ray, telescopic and probably any other kind of super-vision you can think of. They also emit potentially lethal rays. Slither looks like a humanoid snake, and can use his body like a boa constrictor. He and Peeper are both pretty good Kirby visual designs. Lifter is a fairly basic strongman, although his strength involves the ability to increase his body density which is a little unusual. Burner, as one might guess, can start fires and Shocker can send electric shocks through the crab-like claws that he has instead of hands.
Peeper seems to have an intelligence-gathering role, literally looking around for things that are of use to Magneto. The others are a more traditional field team. But at the end of the Annual their hideout is blown up and it's implied that they all fled. We don't find out that Magneto deserted them until their next appearance, so someone could have brought this line-up into the X-Men. But they next appeared in Defenders instead and Claremont built another almost completely new line-up to take over the name, without even Magneto involved.
Characters from Captain Britain Weekly
Captain Britain (Brian Braddock)
Abilities: Amulet and suit give him superhuman strength and agility. Staff posesses numerous offensive and defensive abilities.
First Appearance: Captain Britain Weekly #1
Captain Britain was the result of Marvel deciding to try publishing original content for the British audience through it's Marvel UK imprint. As noted by sometime writer Gary Freidrich in the introduction to the "Captain Britain: A Hero Reborn" trade paperback, he was something of a combination of successful American heroes with a dash of Arthurian legend thrown in to make him feel suitably British. But his patriotic angle came from Captain America, his smart (but mild-mannered and insecure) alter ego of university student Brian Braddock came from Spider-Man's Peter Parker, and some of his weaponry and costume design came from Daredevil. Despite his very basic superhero roots he does become more distinct over time as writers such as Alan Moore develop him further into own unique niche.
Merlin
Abilities:
First Appearance: Captain Britain Weekly #1
The Merlin of the Marvel Universe is a long-lived space traveler, whose abilities let him pose as a sorcerer in King Arthur's court. He is the one who set up the test of choosing between the Sword of Might and the Amulet of Right that Brian passes to become Captain Britain. He also provides Cap's weaponry and tests him further and sometimes aides him as time goes on.
Roma
Abilities:
First Appearance: Captain Britain Weekly #1
Roma is Merlin's daughter, and at this stage her role is mostly to stand around in the background and worry that Merlin is being too hard on Captain Britain. She later takes a more active role in things, including some notable interactions with the X-Men. But there's not much to say about her appearances at this stage.
Inspector Dai Thomas
Abilities: Baseline human.
First Appearance: Captain Britain Weekly #3
Inspector Thomas hates superheroes, and is Captain Britain's everyday non-evil nemesis (rather like J. Jonah Jameson for Spider-Man, in yet another parallel). Thomas has an understandable reason for this, as his wife was killed as a bystander in a superhero battle while they were visiting New York, and he's vowed that nothing of the sort will happen in Britain. He varies from believing that Cap is a direct menace to just hating him for being a vigilante outside the law, but it is a long time before they really bury the hatchet.
Courtney Ross
Abilities: Baseline human.
First Appearance: Captain Britain Weekly #3
Courtney Ross is Brian's love interest, although at first it's just that she tends to be nice to him even when the more popular athletic guys treat him badly. They don't get together during this period, but later do, with Brian even revealing to her that he's Captain Britain. Her ultimate fate is rather complicated so we'll revisit it when we get there.
Elizabeth "Betsy" Braddock
Abilities: Telepathy, although at this point she is unaware of her mutant status and ability.
First Appearance: Captain Britain Weekly #8
Betsy Braddock is Brian's twin sister, and the Captain Britain cast member with the most direct connection to the X-Men. She eventually joins the team as Psylocke, although there's no hint of anything at all unusual about her here. She's apparently a charter airplane pilot, but mostly serves a damsel in distress role before disappearing once we reach the more supernatural stories. Brian does, however, reveal is identity to her shortly after Jamie learns it. Betsy will start getting more interesting and gain both her psychic powers and her trademark purple hair during Alan Moore's run some years down the line.
James "Jamie" Braddock
Abilities: Reality manipulation through pulling on "strings", although at this point he is unaware of his mutant status and ability.
First Appearance: Captain Britain Weekly #8 (mentioned), Captain Britain Weekly #9 (full)
Jamie is Brian and Betsy's older brother, and a race car driver. He's kind of the dashing counterpart to bookish Brian, at least in Brian's pre-Captain Britain days. While he later becomes completely insane and repeatedly threatens reality starting with Alan Moore's run, like Betsy he shows no sign of anything unusual here, and mostly gets captured or knocked out while trying to help. He sees Brian change Captain Britain fairly early on, and is amazed at how his brother's personality has changed as well.
Mastermind (supercomputer)
Abilities:
First Appearance: Captain Britain Weekly #12
The Mastermind supercomputer was built by Brian Braddock's father in the basement of Braddock Manor. Unfortunately, it apparently gained sentience and an evil personality, and electrocuted both of Brian's parents while he was sitting in the driveway making out with a girl in his car. Brian's guilt over this changed him from a relatively outgoing boy to the more withdrawn student he is when he becomes Captain Britain. Mastermind turns out to be behind some of the earlier attacks on Captain Britain, and while he seems to defeat the computer it will return to attack him in various ways in the future.
Retcons
Jean Grey vs Phoenix
This period is directly affected by the grandmother of all retcons: Jean wasn't Phoenix. Or perhaps Phoenix wasn't Jean. It's a bit hard to figure, really. As will be seen when we reach the "Dark Phoenix Saga", Phoenix/Jean does some truly horrible things, for which she ultimately dies. It's rightly considered one of the classic stories of superhero comics, and Jean's death was intended to be final. And it was intended to be her. But several years down the road, someone had the great idea to re-unite the original X-Men as a new team called X-Factor. The only problem was that Jean was rather dead. This being a comic book, that wouldn't normally have been much of a problem, but Marvel's editors didn't want Jean to be resurrected because she was responsible for the deaths of too many beings, and they wanted the consequences to her to be appropriate and permanent. In fact, Claremont had originally intended for Jean to live but be stripped of her powers until the editor said that she had to die for the story to be appropriate (and publishable).
Ultimately, someone (apparently Kurt Buseik during a college dorm geek-out session long before he worked at Marvel) came up with the idea that instead of Jean being infused with a cosmic force, the cosmic force replaced Jean and took on so much of her memory that it thought it was Jean. The real Jean Grey, meanwhile, was left in a cocoon to heal at the bottom of Jamaica Bay near Queens, where the shuttle originally crashed. While this certainly wasn't the first retcon in comics, it was (and remains) one of the most significant. We'll come back to it when we get to X-Factor and see how the implications play out, but that's the basic retcon as it applies here: Starting with issue #101, "Jean" isn't really Jean, but rather the Phoenix Force incarnate. The Classic X-Men #8 back-up strip shows an extended discussion between Jean and the Phoenix Force that fits between issues #100 and #101. In it, Jean accepts the Phoenix Force's offer despite warnings that it may be for good or ill and will come at a cost. She would not have accepted were it just her, but knows that the shuttle will crash and all of the X-Men will die if she did not.
Classic X-Men
The Classic X-Men reprints of these issues continued to insert new pages and the odd changed panel into the main stories, as well as adding completely new backup strips. Most of this just fills out what was alread present, and where it is significant to the plots of the time, the material is covered above. But there are a few significant additions that stand alone.
Perhaps most notable and relevant is the origin story for Magneto, establishing his history as a prisoner of the concentration camps of World War II, his life with his wife Magda, and the death of their daughter Anya in a fire, while an angry and suspicous crowd prevented Magneto from using his power to save her. But Magda had not known of his power either, and she runs from him in fear having seen it- unbeknownst to him pregnant with Wanda and Pietro.
Another area addressed is the development of the Hellfire Club, soon to play a major part in the Dark Phoenix Saga. Some extra pages tie Stephen Lang's X-Sentinel project into the club, and (along with a backup strip) chronicle the rise of Sebastian Shaw (with Tessa as his aide) and Emma Frost to control the club's inner circle. I'll cover these developments in more detail when the club and its members make their proper debut.
Up Next: The classic Claremont/Byrne period goes into full swing with a long run of solid stories featuring Magneto, the Savage Land, Alpha Flight, and a tragic element of Moira's past.
Champions 2-16 (November 1975 - November 1977)
The Champions were a small group co-founded by Angel and Iceman with three others, with Angel as the most common public face of the team.
Writing: Tony Isabella CHM ...-3, 5-7 (only plot on 3) Chris Claremont CHM 4 Bill Mantlo 8-... (14 co-plotted with John Byrne) Pencils: Don Heck ...-2, 5 George Tuska 3-4, 6-7 Bob Hall 8-10, 16 John Byrne 11-15 (also co-plotted 14 with Bill Mantlo)
Captain Britain (UK, weekly) 1-39 (October 13 1976 - July 6 1977) [lead stories only]
Super Spider-Man (UK, weekly) 231-247 (July 13 1977 - November 7 1977) [Cap. Britain stories only]
Captain Britain and his supporting cast end up completely entangled in the x-books by the late 80's, so it makes sense to treat this a something of a retroactive x-title. Note that some issues of Super Spider-Man after 247 contained Captain Britain stories, but they were reprints.
Writing: Chris Claremont CBW 1-10 Gary Friedrich CBW 11-36 (co-writing with Larry Lieber 24-36) Larry Leiber CBW 24-36, SSM 233-241, 243, 245-246 (co-writing with Gary Friedrich on CBR, Jim Lawrence on SSM) Jim Lawrence SSM 231-247 (co-writer except on 242, 244) Bob Budiansky CBW 37-39, SSM 231-232 (co-writing with Jim Lawrence on SSM) Pencils: Herb Trimpe CBW 1-23 John Buscema CBW 24-30 Ron Wilson CBW 31-39, SSM 231-247
With: Classic X-Men 4-15 (December 1986 - November 1987) [2nd stories and extra pages] Chris Claremont (Writer); Dave Cockrum (Pencils: extra pages in 1st stories); John Bolton (Pencils: 2nd stories) And appearances by X-related characters in: Avengers (1st series) 141-166 (November 1975 - December 1977) Steve Englehart (Writer: ...-144, 147-151)
Tony Isabella (Writer: 145-146)
Gerry Conway (Writer: 151-157)
Jim Shooter (Script: 151, 156; Writer: 158-...)
George Perez (Pencils: 141-144, 147-151, 154-155, 160-162)
John Buscema (Pencils: 152-153)
Sal Buscema (Pencils: 156, 158-159)
Don Heck (Pencils: 157)
George Tuska (Pencils: 163)
John Byrne (Pencils: 164-166)
Ms. Marvel (1st series) 1-11 (January 1977 - November 1977) Gerry Conway (Writer: 1-2)
Chris Claremont (Writer: 3-4, 6-..., Script: 5)
Archie Goodwin and Jim Shooter (Plot: 5)
John Buscema (Pencils: 1-3)
Jim Mooney (Pencils: 4-8)
Keith Pollard (Pencils: 9)
Sal Buscema (Pencils: 10-11)
Iron Fist (1st series) 14-15 (August 1977 - September 1977) Chris Claremont (Writer); John Byrne (Pencils)
Captain America (1st series) Annual 4 (1977) Jack Kirby (Writer and Pencils)
Iron Man (1st series) Annual 4 (1977) Bill Mantlo (Writer); George Tuska (Pencils)
Super-Villain Team-Up (October 1977) Bill Mantlo (Writer); Bob Hall (Pencils)
The X-Men
Professor X Charles Xavier ...-97, 99-... Takes open-ended "vacation", but it's cut short. Cyclops Scott Summers ...-... Nightcrawler Kurt Wagner ...-... Wolverine James Howlett ...-... Nicknamed "Logan", unaware of real name at this point. Banshee Sean Cassidy ...-... Storm Ororo Munroe ...-... Colossus Piotr Rasputin ...-... Also answers to "Pete" or "Peter".
The Champions
Angel Warren Worthington, III 4-... Iceman Bobby Drake 4-... Black Widow Natasha Romanov 4-... Hercules Hercules 4-... Ghost Rider Johnny Blaze 4-... Darkstar Laynia Petrovna 10-... Sometimes seems to be more of a "guest" member.
The Brotherhood of Evil Mutants II
Magneto "Erik Magnus Lehnsherr" CAP Annual 4 Deserted team at the end of CAP Annual 4 Peeper Peter Quinn CAP Annual 4 Slither Aaron Salomon CAP Annual 4 Shocker Randall Darby CAP Annual 4 Not to be confused with the Spider-Man villain of the same name Lifter Ned Lathrop CAP Annual 4 Burner Byron Calley CAP Annual 4
Introduction
With this entry, we're really getting into the classic X-Men period. The few issues covered in the previous entry introduced the new team and set the stage, but these issues are where the characters and team become fully defined. As of the first issue in this period, Chris Claremont takes over both plotting and scripting and delves deeply into the characters and their interactions. In these issues we get the first chapters of the Phoenix story which is quite possibly the most important extended story arc in the X-Men's history. We also meet the alien Shi'ar, who are intimately caught up in the history and future of the Phoenix, as well as the space pirates known as the Starjammers, whose captain is closely related to a certain prominent X-Man.
Outside of the so-called "All-New, All-Different" X-Men the team's former members were busy establishing themselves elsewhere in the Marvel universe. Beast applied for membership in the Avengers during the issues covered in the previous entry, and he gains full membership during this period. Likewise, Angel and Iceman's group, the Champions, makes an official go at being a team in their own series. Both of the former X-Men play major roles, but Angel in particular gets a lot of attention.
Finally, two series that don't have any obvious connection with the X-Men at this time introduce characters that later play a large part in the X-universe. Ms. Marvel's title character will have a major impact on Rogue's life, and another member of the Shi'ar royal family is introduced there as well. Captain Britain at this point seems to have no relation to the X-Men aside from writer Chris Claremont, but eventually he and most of his supporting cast play major roles in the X-Men splinter group Excalibur. And even before that his sister Betsy becomes the X-Man Psylocke. Given their future entanglement, it makes sense to go ahead and cover the Captain Britain mythos from the beginning.
The Writing: Plots
Chris Claremont takes over plotting as well as scripting here, fully beginning his long and classic run on the title. With the basic team established, he starts to examine his characters in depth and bring in some supporting cast members. He wastes no time getting into a major plot arc, and even issues that seem to be diversions turn out to be related. The only exception is issue #106 which is an obvious filler (a flashback sequence) mostly written by Bill Mantlo, presumably to cover some sort of missed deadline with regards to the expected story. At the time, this was the standard practice instead of delaying the issue's release until the planned material was completed. While Mantlo manages to work in references to the overall plot, the issue is of noticeably lesser quality than the others and is sufficiently disposable that Classic X-Men skipped it when it reprinted the others.
In terms of story, the main significance of this period is Jean Grey's transformation into Phoenix. At some point, the team becomes stranded on a badly damaged space shuttle in the path of a severe solar storm and Jean is exposed to fatal levels of radiation while trying to save them. At the shuttle crash site in Jamaica Bay (in Long Island Sound near JFK airport) the other X-Men swim free of the wreck in time to see Jean (or what looks like her) burst from the water in a new costume saying "I am fire! And life incarnate! Now and forever, I am Phoenix!" And then she passes out.
This kicks off a long series of events culminating in the classic "Dark Phoenix Saga", which we'll get to in two or three entries. But first, in what's sometimes simply called "The Phoenix Saga", we begin to see the effects of Jean's transformation. As originally written, Phoenix was intended to be Jean, infused with some unknown power that drastically boosted her abilities. She's clearly much more powerful, especially in terms of telekinesis, but she begins to feel more aggressive and to revel in her power in a way that disturbs her after the feelings pass. Jean's also clearly freaked out by having (in her own words) "died and brought [herself] back to life."
This is set against the overall plot arc of the alien Shi'ar trying to gain control of a tremendously destructive cosmic power, and as that story builds to a climax Jean displays cosmic-level power well beyond anything the other X-Men have demonstrated. In the end, Jean is able to contain the destructive force (a "neutron galaxy"), drawing on the strength of the others but essentially providing the raw force herself in a transcendent burst of power. The whole thing not only kicks off the long Phoenix storyline but also introduces the X-Men to a cosmic scale of adventure they'd never previously encountered.
Despite their major role during this period, it takes a while for the Shi'ar to properly appear in the book. A mysterious agent who appears in Cyclops's old Eric the Red disguise keeps turning out to be behind various attacks on Professor X and the team. He's taking orders from the Shi'ar Majestor (Emperor) D'Ken and trying to make sure that the X-Men aren't around to help D'Ken's exiled rebellious sister Lilandra when she reaches Earth. She's heading that way because she felt a psychic bond with Xavier from the moment he channeled the emotions of everyone on Earth to repel the Z'Noxx invasion back in issue #65. This happened while she was escaping D'Ken as her rebellion collapsed, and she's been traveling ever since. As she gets closer, Xavier has more and more intense dreams (and then waking visions) of her, and starts to wonder if he's going mad.
Eventually Lilandra arrives, Eric the Red (actually the Shi'ar Davan Shakari) attacks and distracts Phoenix with a more powerful ally, and the rest of the X-Men arrive too late to prevent him from capturing Lilandra and fleeing through a stargate. In the course of the final battle on the alien world housing the M'Kraan Crystal, a group of space pirates known as the Starjammers led by a human called Corsair help the X-Men win the day. Jean discovers that Corsair is the long-thought-dead father of Cyclops and Havok, although he asks her to keep that discovery to herself for now. As mentioned earlier, Jean saves the day using her newly cosmic-level powers, and D'Ken ends up comatose. Along the way, she's increasingly scared of how she enjoys her new powers, a concern which will continue to build in the future.
The plots that Shakari, as Eric the Red, set against them during the lead-up issues include brainwashing Alex Summers and Lorna Dane (to whom he finally gives a code name, Polaris) and using them to attack the team, plus motivating several of the X-Men's existing enemies to attack them. One enemy we haven't seen before, "Black" Tom Cassidy, is Banshee's cousin and long-time rival. He's befriended the Juggernaut, who still hates his step-brother. The friendship between these two is strangely enduring, and Cain is furious when it looks like Banshee may have killed Tom, saying that Tom was his only friend. After that plan fails, Shakari uses a ray to accelerate Magneto's age back to adulthood (accidentally doing the same for the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants off panel as their cell was behind Magneto in the path of the ray). The returned Magneto is still a ranting supervillain, though, as Claremont won't take his character in new directions until a bit later in his run.
Several other important things happen during the Claremont/Cockrum run and this period establishes several long-running elements of the X-universe. Human geneticist Moira MacTaggert is introduced, initially as an old friend of Xavier's and the X-Men's new housekeeper. It soon becomes clear that she's more than that, and she turns out to have a massive lab / mutant containment center on her land at Muir Island in Scotland. She's holding people like the age-regressed Magneto (from Defenders #16) there, and Cyclops in particular is upset that he knew nothing about the place or her despite his long service as an X-Man.
The one major plot between issues #97 and #105 that is not orchestrated by Davan Shakari is Dr. Stephen Lang's new Sentinel program. The government tries to shut down this program because Lang is taking things too far, but he relocates to an abandoned space station and continues. That space station is how the X-Men end up in a damaged space shuttle, requiring Jean to save them and thereby become Phoenix. Lang's "X-Sentinels", which appear to be the original X-Men, are essentially a gimmick and aren't seen again. They work here because we'd just seen Eric the Red brainwash Havok and Polaris, so it was plausible that he'd gotten to other former teammates, except for things like Beast not being blue and fuzzy and Cyclops wearing an older visor. Lang shows up again a few years down the line, but in a rather wierd way, having "survived" the demise of the satellite by accidentally uploading his mind into the Sentinels' Master Mold robot (I hate it when that happens).
Finally, a quick plot point from issue #96, which is otherwise a welcome break focusing on characterization, is worth mentioning. Near the end of the issue, a demon known as an N'Garai attacks the mansion, having escaped its dimension through a strange stone obelisk that Cyclops damaged while venting his anger over Thunderbird's death (at the end of the previous issue). The main reason to mention this is that every few years the portal ends up open again and whoever's around the mansion gets attacked by demons. They're never really significant, but they do keep coming back.
The Writing: Themes
There are two main themes running through this period of the X-Men. One is the feeling of being an outcast minority, and how that helps unite a group of people who otherwise have little in common. In some cases (like Wolverine and Colossus), they band together despite personal animosity. In others (like Jean and Ororo), they discover friendships that simply needed that one thing in common to touch off. But as much as their shared mutant status causes them to band together, most of the characters still feel like outsiders even within the group for various reasons- Kurt's appearance, Logan's discomfort with social interactions, Ororo's uninhibited customs, and Piotr's seriousness and uncertainty about modern America.
The other theme is that of fear of increased and uncontrollable power. The most obvious here is Jean's feelings as Phoenix and her worries about how much she enjoys her new abilities and how aggressive she has become. Which also plays into the "everyone is an outsider" theme discussed above. But also the Professor is dealing with his mind, the source of his power, playing tricks on him. His fears of madness aren't quite as based in his powers, but the fear of losing control is similar. And externally, the forces within the M'Kraan crystal represent the ultimate uncontrolled power. They give Phoenix a way to focus her power and show her control winning out over her impulses. At least for now. During the Thomas/Adams run we saw Havok's fear of his own power, and Cyclops's control issues have always been a major part of his character. But the Phoenix Saga takes it to a new level, and one that we will eventually revisit.
The Writing: Style
While Chris Claremont's long run on Uncanny X-Men (as the book will soon be renamed) is justly celebrated, he's become notorious for certain stylistic quirks over the years. As of this writing (2008), it's so easy to spot a Chris Claremont script that that they hardly need to credit it, and sadly that's not a compliment. However, the ticks that are now exaggerated and cliched make only a minor impact during this earlier run. Part of that is simply the context of the time. Many things that stick out as awkward now were common genre conventions in the 70s. And in other cases the quirks are present but just not as severe as they later became.
Probably the biggest complaint about Claremont's writing style is that he over-narrates. A lot. There are lots of narration boxes. If there aren't heroes think to themselves about every little thing they do. To a certain degree, comics always do this to clarify things that might be ambiguous in the art. Claremont, however, regularly narrates events that the artwork clearly conveys. For instance, in a panel in issue #103 where Storm narrowly dodges two laser beams, her thought balloons read: Energy blasters built into the castle's turrets... opening fire at me! If it hadn't been for my hours of training in the danger room, these beams would have burned me to a crisp!
Another of Claremont's quirks is an overuse of thoughts meant to amp up the seriousness of ordinary happenings in fight scenes. Most often, these take the form of thought balloons where the character worries about how to avoid death/injury/whatever and comments that they have "only one chance"... which is to do something common and obvious like use their power or avoid flying into a wall. Granted, he's not the only writer to do this, and sometimes it's a perfectly reasonable thing for the character to say or think, but it's definitely a favorite technique of his.
Finally, while it's not really a representative example of Claremont's stylistic issues, I simply can't refrain from highlighting the following lines spoken by a villain in Captain Britain Weekly #3: For I've received powers, too, this night-- powers far deadlier than yours! And the deadliest among them is the power to kill!
I need say no more.
The Writing: Character Development
Chris Claremont's extensive development of the main characters is a highlight of this run. While the basics were established in the Len Wien-plotted issues, they get tweaked and fleshed out here. Wolverine is a true loner, clearly at a loss as to how to interact with his teammates or deal with his feelings for Jean. He doesn't remember having any friends and doesn't really know how to make them. So he's mostly really abrasive and obnoxious to everyone. He also gets the best expression ever on his face when he "helps" Jean shorten her dress so she can fight better on the space station. His inner thoughts have a less confident tone, though, and the contrast adds much depth to the character. He also expresses frustration at his instinct to go for the kill despite many years of various sorts of treatment and therapy to try to control himself.
Storm is generally calm and collected, and is the only one who can really shut Wolverine up. She rarely feels the need to assert herself, which only adds to the significance when she does. We start learning that she has a more complex history than is obvious, though, with flashbacks to the claustrophobia-inducing death of her parents and her subsequent time as a street thief in Cairo. She also thinks about some sort of vow to herself not to kill, and is concerned that remaining an X-Man will make it difficult to keep that vow. This begins a long-running subplot of Storm worrying about the effect that the team's responsibilities are having on her.
Nightcrawler gets along with everyone, even Wolverine. He's nervous about his appearance, but flamboyant in the disguises he constructs with his image inducer, generally appearing as Errol Flynn. By the end of this period he's ready to throw away the image inducer, though, and in a Classic X-Men backup strip Wolverine dares him to go into town without it, with mostly positive results. By the time of the team's guest appearance in Iron Fist he's refusing to use it at all. All of this is notably different from how Len Wein wrote the character in Giant-Size X-Men #1, where Kurt's demonic aspects were played up as frightening. Claremont instead contrasts them with his easygoing, friendly demeanor.
Colossus is usually gentle and calm, but fiercely protective of his teammates. His slight naivete and anger at Wolverine's verbal slights to Storm (calling her a "broad") cause Wolverine to nickname him "Petey Pureheart". The two have a particularly antagonistic relationship, with Wolverine always trying to see what will make Peter really angry. However, in a fight Peter will defend Logan as much as any other team member. He seems to have a bit of an attraction to Storm, but it never goes anywhere. When the X-Men go into space in the shuttle, Colossus reveals that he had a cosmonaut older brother Mikhail who he believed died during a failed launch at Baikonur. Much later it will be revealed that he actually survived. Piotr's little sister Illyana already had a cameo during his origin sequence in Giant-Size X-Men #1, establishing him as the middle of three siblings widely separated in age.
Of course, Cyclops gets the most grief from Wolverine, and this is probably where Scott's relatively conservative leadership style really gets highlighted. That long-standing evaluation is a bit unfair, as Scott has a much better strategic view of the situation, which Wolverine notably lacks. Cyclops has another notable conflict during these stories: His first real fight with Professor X. The Professor is under a lot of stress because he still worries he's going mad, and Scott refuses to leave Jean's side (after the shuttle crash) until she regains consciousness, even though the Professor wants him to rejoin the team because they're in trouble. Xavier really doesn't take Scott's defiance well (the words "ungrateful cur" are actually used, in reference to Xavier having taken the orphaned Scott in).
Banshee and Moira MacTaggert start to develop a relationship in their own subplot, although it's remains unvoiced until their post-space-battle appearance in Iron Fist #16. Banshee continues to occupy an unusual space in the team. He doesn't tend to jump into leadership roles but his age gives him more experience (Wolverine wasn't thought to be so old at this point) and he does take the lead when the team (minus Professor X and Cyclops) visits his home in Ireland and later Moira's lab in Scotland. It's really important to note that Banshee's not just some middle-aged guy hanging around in the background with Professor X. He actually lasts longer against Magneto than anyone else, partially because his powers aren't particularly susceptible to magnetism, but partially because, as Magneto acknowledges, he knows what he's doing. This is in stark contrast to the generally youth-oriented makeup of most superhero teams where even characters like Captain America who have been around for a long time seem to be young.
One last thing that I never thought about until reading about it recently (sadly I can't remember where) is how Claremont manages to sideline Professor X much of the time without being too obvious about it. This keeps the stories from ending with "... and then Professor X messed with everyone's minds and fixed everything." He spends most of this period questioning his sanity, at one point leaving the team for what was supposed to be an extended vacation. In later issues, Claremont (and Byrne) will have him think team dead for a time, go into space with Lilandra, and otherwise be around more in concept than in person. All of which leaves only Phoenix as a character who can solve things too easily, and during this era, that's a key issue surrounding her character.
Claremont's impressive character work developing both the old and new members of the large cast are largely why he's revered as an X-Men writer despite the occasional stylistic quirk.
The Art
Dave Cockrum continues to provide art here except for the fill-in issue and the final issue of the storyline. His expressive style is a great match for the material, and he excels at capturing the personalities of the characters in their faces and poses. For instance, his Wolverine is as believable a socially awkward loner as he is a barely controlled fighter. While Cockrum usually uses a conventional panel layout, there are some notable exceptions, specifically the double-page reveal in issue 100. This is a fantastic page with a large figure of Stephen Lang in the center and several scenes accompanying his monologue in the background. Some are worked into the larger background as images on videoscreens, while others are inset panels or just drawn as foreground figures. The whole composition pulls together beautifully and is one of the artistic highlights of the run. Other highlights include the psychedelic rendering of Jean's death in the radiation storm in issues #100 and #101, and Jean bursting out of the water in her rebirth as Phoenix.
In addition to all of this Cockrum contributed the visual designs of the Shi'ar, their Imperial Guard and the Starjammers, all characters that continue to appear occasionally today. The Shi'ar are a race with avian characteristics, most notably "hair" that is reminiscent of feathers. The Imperial Guard is drawn from all of the races of the Empire, and bears a deliberate resemblance to DC's Legion of Superheroes, on which Cockrum had an acclaimed run. The Starjammers, as a smaller team with more direct ties to Earth, have been seen more often and in more detail than the Guard. In addition to the human Corsair, Cockrum designed several new alien species to give the team a diverse look. The fight scenes in issue #107 that fully introduce the Guard and the Starjammers have several great splash pages featuring a tremendous number of characters. The complicated fight is very well done and a great way for Cockrum to end his run.
Strangely, the final chapter of this initial Phoenix Saga was not drawn by Cockrum, but rather by incoming artist John Byrne. I'll cover Byrne's work in more detail in the next entry, but it's worth commenting here that he did an excellent job on the scenes inside the M'Kraan Crystal, where he was the first artist to render the iconic Phoenix raptor manifestation.
Elsewhere in the Marvel Universe...
While Marvel Girl, Havok and Polaris get dragged back into X-Men action one way or another, Iceman, Angel and Beast succeed in completely leaving the team. However, Marvel wasn't about to let them fade away when they could be used to capitalize on the revived team's success. Additionally, several characters that later join or become important to the X-Men first appeared or became prominent during this same era.
Beast had already found a potential home with the Avengers, and after several adventures with that team is offered and accepts permanent full-time membership. There are two main developments going on with him during his trial membership in the Avengers. One is the continuation of his rather abrupt change from being an angst-ridden outcast hiding his true form from the world to being a happy-go-lucky publicly known superhero. The other is the re-appearance of Patsy Walker, who extorted an unknown promise from Hank in return for her help during his solo run in Amazing Adventures. She shows up at the Avengers' mansion to collect, and attempts to blackmail him into complying by threatening to reveal his identity. Which of course, doesn't work, because he revealed it himself already. But since he's an honorable guy, he does agree to try to help her become a super-hero, convincing Captain America to let her tag along on a mission. Along the way, she acquires the Cat's old costume and takes the codename Hellcat. She ends up convincing the Avengers to offer her a spot as well, but then accepts departing Avenger Moondragon's offer of training instead.
However, Beast accepts full membership at that time and is welcomed to the team. But towards the end of this period of the Avengers he starts having trouble, as he keeps getting captured or knocked out, and his humor is sometimes viewed as inappropriate. He even finds his scientific talents overlooked on a team that includes other scientists and millionaires who can easily bring in their own specialists. He starts questioning just how good of a superhero he is, especially given that superheroing is all he does.
One last Avengers-related item worthy of note is the appearance of an as-yet-unnamed Henry Peter Gyrich of the F.B.I., who will be a thorn in the side of both the Avengers and the X-Men over the years. We'll cover him in detail when he makes his first full appearance. At this point he's just creeping around the Avengers' mansion looking for some sort of evidence while the team is distracted during a fight.
Angel and Iceman, however, are trying to live normal lives and are completely bored with the whole thing. Angel visits Iceman on campus, and they stumble into forming the Champions with Black Widow, Hercules and Ghost Rider. There's actually a fair amount of important character development involved for both of these ex-X-Men. It's here that Angel inherits his family fortune and becomes rich in his own right. It's also here that as a result of not having any living family, Warren outs himself publicly as Angel. He becomes the public face of the team, although Black Widow becomes the actual field leader. Warren is the one who comes up with the idea of making the Champions "storefront heroes" accessible to the public. Sadly the book never really gets a chance to go too far with that idea.
Warren's actions cause Bobby, who is still keeping his identity as Iceman secret, to reconsider the appeal of a normal life. He plans to leave the team until the lovely Soviet defector Darkstar joins and attracts his attention, although she does not return his interest. Bobby spends a lot of time worrying about being the youngest member of the group and being perceived as a weak link because of it. He eventually adopts a full-body blue and white costume in place of just shorts under his ice coating. It isn't a major change when he's iced up, but when he switches back he definitely looks more mature wearing reasonable clothes (for a super-hero).
Finally, Marvel started printing comics targeted at the U.K., assigning X-Men writer Chris Claremont to create Captain Britain, a.k.a. Brian Braddock. Brian's twin sister Betsy and their older brother Jamie also debut during these early issues of his weekly series, but with no hint of super-powers, mutant or otherwise. Betsy, of course, goes on to join the X-Men as Psylocke, while Jamie goes mad and periodically threatens the world with his reality-altering powers. We'll go into them in more detail during Alan Moore and Alan Davis's classic run on the feature. At this point, both of them are mostly bystanders in Brian's adventures, getting captured and held hostage and whatnot.
As for Brian himself, despite not being a mutant he eventually ends up leading a team called Excalibur that features several former X-Men (who often form a majority of the team). But he starts a long series of solo stories here, as a young physics student who is suddenly offered a choice between the Amulet of Right and the Sword of Might. He chooses the Amulet, and becomes a defense-oriented hero, using a staff as a weapon rather than a blade. At this point while he has superhuman strength and whatnot, he can't fly, and he has to use the amulet to change between being Captain Britain and himself. Captain Britain is actually a physically more muscular and imposing version of himself, although much later that distinction disappears.
During this period, his early adventures are standard superhero fare, including guest appearances from Captain America and Nick Fury of S.H.I.E.L.D. But there is an additional twist of Merlin and his daughter Roma testing Captain Britain along the way and unlocking additional powers and weapons. And as sales declined and the strip was folded into Super Spider-Man (which gained the tagline of "and Captain Britain" on the cover), the stories took a supernatural / horror twist as the writers and editors tried to find the approach that worked best. It would not be Captain Britain's last stylistic shift as we'll see in future entries.
New Characters
Moira MacTaggert
Abilities: Baseline human. Leading genetics researcher.
First Appearance: X-Men (1st series) #96
Moira MacTaggert is one of the longest-lasting and most significant human allies of the X-Men. She first appears to take the role of "housekeeper" for Professor X while he goes on his vacation, but is soon revealed to be a leading geneticist studying mutations. Moira states that her research is geared towards "curing" evil mutants of their hatred towards humanity. It's an ethically dodgy statement that isn't followed up on now, but does turn out to have serious implications several years down the line.
Moira has a convoluted history with Professor X, both personally and professionally. All we learn at this point is that they had some sort of past romantic relationship, and while they're both over it, Moira seems to be a bit more over it than Charles. It's later revealed that she broke up with him to marry someone else while he was overseas in the Army. Nonetheless, she worked with him extensively after he came back, and had a lab in the U.S. somewhere near Xavier's estate. For a while Dr. Karl Lykos (who later became Sauron) worked with them. Moira also trained mutant kids there who were too young to be in the X-Men, although Xavier eventually used them to try to rescue his original team from Krakoa, and apparently got them all killed (actually, two of the four survived, but that won't be learned for a long time). Presumably, this act, which was done over Moira's objections, was why she went back to Scotland.
She serves as Xavier's confidante in these issues, and is the only one who really knows the extent of his dreams/visions of Lilandra, as well as his increasing doubts of his own sanity. She also charges into a fight with a machine gun one time when the Mansion is invaded by demons right after she arrives. I've always wondered where she got the gun, but it was a big clue that all was not as it seemed with her. From the start, Banshee was very attracted to her, and makes a point of spending as much time as possible with her. He doesn't tell her quite how much he cares for her yet, but this is the beginning of a long relationship.
Note that the spelling of her name varies, with MacTaggart, in particular, being common.
Amanda Sefton (Jimaine Szardos)
Abilities: Sorceress of the Winding Way, she has various magical abilities which wax and wane over time.
First Appearance: X-Men (1st series) #98
Amanda Sefton makes brief appearances here as Kurt's apparently normal human date. She's an airline stewardess, and she and her friend Betsy often double date Kurt and Piotr. Betsy soon disappears from the book, but Amanda is eventually revealed to be Jimaine Szardos, Nightcrawler's sister by adoption (but, significantly, not at all related by blood). There's a complicated reason why she's hiding under a false name, but we'll get to that when it's all revealed a ways down the line. She's a resourceful and independent woman who is associated with the X-teams in various ways over the years, most notably by joining the British-based team Excalibur and taking the code name Daytripper as a joke on Nightcrawler. She learned her sorcery from her mother, with whom she has a sometimes difficult relationship. During this period, though, there is no hint that she is anything other than a pretty girl who's caught Kurt's fancy but doesn't know what's under the image inducer's hologram.
Misty Knight
Abilities:Right arm is bionic and superhumanly strong. Skilled martial artist.
First Appearance: Marvel Premiere #20
Misty Knight is one half of the Daughters of the Dragon, with Coleen Wing (who will cross the X-Men's path in the next entry). While she's a major supporting character around Power Man and Iron Fist, her main connection with the X-Men is being Jean Grey's roommate in New York City after she leaves the team. She knows about Jean being Phoenix and part of the X-Men, as is elaborated upon in one of the Classic X-Men backstories. In addition to getting caught up in the edges of the Phoenix Saga and other X-Men adventures, Misty and Jean's being roommates gets the X-Men dragged into an accidental fight with Iron Fist who drops by about the same time that the team gets back from the ordeal with the Shi'ar. All's well that ends well as Iron Fist, Misty, Coleen and the X-Men end up having the X-Men's welcome home party after all (although the cake got ruined when Storm got hit in the face with it during the fight).
Sabretooth (Victor Creed)
Abilities: Healing factor, enhanced senses.
First Appearance: Iron Fist (1st series) #14
As with Wolverine, Sabretooth's first appearance is unrelated to the X-Men. Although unlike Wolverine there's not even a mention of him being a mutant. He's just a big mercenary with claws (the nature of which aren't entirely clear as he's wearing gloves). He makes his first appearance in the martial arts series Iron Fist, and Iron Fist notes that Sabretooth's fighting is all about speed and power rather than skill. Sabretooth's mutant nature, healing factor and relationship with Wolverine are all elements that won't be developed until future appearances, although in the next issue of Iron Fist when the title character fights the X-Men he notes and wonders about Sabretooth's similarity to Wolverine. Sabertooth will make several more appearances around the Marvel Universe before showing up in the X-books during the Mutant Massacre crossover about 100 or so issues down the line.
Ms. Marvel (Carol Danvers)
Abilities: Superhuman strength, limited invulnerability, flight, precognative "seventh sense".
First Appearance: Marvel Super-Heroes #13 (as Carol Danvers), Ms. Marvel (1st series) #1 (as Ms. Marvel)
Carol Danvers became Ms. Marvel as the result of exposure to Kree technology that gave her the abilities of a member of that alien race, analagous to the Kree warrior who was at that time calling himself Captain Marvel. While she has a long history in the Marvel Universe, including significant stints with the Avengers, her primary significance to the X-Men is that future X-Man Rogue accidentally absorbs her powers and personality completely. Rogue's only natural mutant power is the power to absorb others, so all of her other abilities during the 80's, 90's and early 00's came from Ms. Marvel.
The Starjammers
Corsair (Christopher Summers)
Abilities: Baseline human.
First Appearance: X-Men (1st series) #104
U.S. Air Force Major Christopher Summers is the father of Scott and Alex Summers (Cyclops and Havok) and also of the as-yet-unknown Gabriel Summers (Vulcan). At the point that he's introduced, we don't know anything about him or why Scott and Alex were orphaned. So it's something of a shock to find him commanding a gang of space pirates in a distant interstellar empire. Much later we'll learn that Christopher, his wife Katherine and both Scott and Alex were flying in a private plane that crashed. Only one parachute survived whatever knocked them out of the sky, and Scott and Alex were both tied to it and shoved out of the plane, assuming their parents died in the crash. In truth, the Shi'ar wanted to learn more about humans and abducted Christopher and Katherine.
As one of the Classic X-Men backup strips explains, Christopher's defiance of their captors led to Katherine's execution by D'Ken. Christopher himself was sent as a slave to a mining planet, where he met a group of prisoners when he tried to aid their escape effort. Their plans succeeded, and they went on to become the Starjammers.
Christopher Summers is an able pilot and commander, but he's tormented by guilt over Katherine's death and the fate of his sons. He had thought they'd died in the plane crash, and is astonished to find them alive, but continues to feel guilty over the whole thing and prefers to stay away from Earth and remain with the Starjammers. This strains his relationships with his sons, especially the duty-minded Scott.
Hepzibah (real name unpronounceable by humans)
Abilities: Baseline Mephitisoid. Compared to humans she has enhanced speed, agility, reflexes and senses, along with claws, and mind-altering pheromones (that last bit according to Wikipedia- I don't remember the pheromones myself).
First Appearance: X-Men (1st series) #107
Mam'selle Hepzibah is a cat-like alien and Corsair's lover (although possibly not yet at the time of their first appearance). While none of the Starjammers have much love for the Shi'ar Empire (at least under D'Ken or Deathbird- they consider Lilandra an ally and she even joined them for a while), Hepzibah has an added general hatred for the Shi'ar race who are historical enemies of the Mephitisoids, playing on the notion of cats not likeing birds. She speaks rather broken English and is an enthusiastic yet practical fighter. Many years later she joins the X-Men after getting separated from the Starjammers. Once she's stuck on Earth with the X-Men she decides to learn proper English after Warpath tells her she sounds like a stereotyped Native sidekick from an old Western. Hepzibah was often drawn with somewhat skunk-like features in her earlier appearances as she was originally intended to be a tribute of sorts to the cartoon character Miss Mam'selle Hepzibah.
Ch'od and Cr+reee
Abilities: Baseline Saurid (Ch'od). Compared to humans he has tremendous strength and can breath underwater through gills.
First Appearance: X-Men (1st series) #104
Ch'od is a massive amphibious/reptillian alien whose intimidating appearance contrasts with his very friendly demeanor. While he is an excellent fighter, it's rather hard to offend him unless you're really trying. This is somewhat unusual in a comic book character as they all usually fight at the drop of a hat. Ch'od is almost always accompianied by Cr+reee, a small furry quadrupedal alien with a long thin nose. Cr+reee is at least somewhat sentient and speaks some sort of language that Ch'od seems to understand. He seems to be somewhere between a pet and a friend. Unlike Hepzibah and Raza, Ch'od speaks fluent modern English.
Raza Longknife
Abilities: Cybernetic parts give him enhanced strength, reflexes and sight beyond what is normal for a Shi'ar.
First Appearance: X-Men (1st series) #107
Raza is a Shi'ar whose left eye, arm and shoulder have been replaced with robotic parts. Even ignoring that, he doesn't look much like the other Shi'ar, sporting a long topknot rather than the feather-like hair characteristic of the race. He speaks in Elizabethan English and plays up the role of "pirate" much more than the other Starjammers. He is an enthusiastic and skilled fighter.
The Shi'ar
Lilandra Neramani
Abilities: Baseline Shi'ar, younger sister of the Emperor.
First Appearance: X-Men (1st series) #97 (face obscured), X-Men (1st series) #105 (full)
As the story opens, Lilandra is a fugitive from her older brother D'Ken, who forced her into leading a rebellion by branding her a traitor when she disagreed with him over his plans for the M'Kraan crystal. While it does not quite happen during this period, most of the time Lilandra ends up being Empress of Shi'ar. Although she periodically loses the throne and has to fight to win it back, frequently with the help of the X-Men and/or the Starjammers. She's tough and generaly fair, and was the Admiral of the Shi'ar fleet before D'Ken proclaimed her a traitor. When Professor X concentrated the emotions of the entire population of Earth to drive off the Z'Noxx invasion (X-Men (1st series) #65), she felt the psychic pulse and felt and instant bond with him. While the effect was not so quick for the Professor, it built until he was plagued with dreams and visions of Lilandra as she escaped D'Ken and fled towards him on Earth.
She is devoted to Xavier and he to her, and they are married for many years until a particularly complicated adventure results in Lilandra's (temporary) insanity and the courtiers of the Empire annulling their marriage. Despite her close ties to the X-Men and Earth, Lilandra remains Shi'ar nobility and is very conscious of her position and duties. This has, in some cases, resulted in the X-Men being less than pleased with her actions, and vice versa.
D'Ken Neramani
Abilities: Baseline Shi'ar, Emperor.
First Appearance: X-Men (1st series) #97 (gloved hand only), X-Men (1st series) #103 (full)
Emperor D'Ken is power-mad, and of dubious sanity in general. He wants the power known as "The End of All That Is" that is said to be contained in the M'Kraan Crystal. He doesn't care that it might live up to its name and destroy the universe. He feels that as Emperor of Shi'ar it is his right to destroy the universe if he wants to. He ends up in a coma as a result of being inside the M'Kraan Crystal while Jean and the others contain the neutron galaxy, and stays there, forgotten, until a storyline in 2006.
Deathbird (Cal'syee Neramani)
Abilities: Shi'ar "genetic throwback" with feathered arms/wings for flight and sharp talons in place of fingernails.
First Appearance: Ms. Marvel (1st series) #9
Deathbird's true name was stripped from her in childhood due to a prophecy that she would commit great evil. She later murdered both her mother and a sister and was subsequently exiled. We first find her on Earth allied with MODOK's faction of AIM against Ms. Marvel, an arrangement that has never been explained. More often we'll see her fight the X-Men as part of her plans to take the throne from Lilandra, or sometimes work with them to help repel other invaders. In her initial appearances her connection to the Shi'ar (then recently introduced over in X-Men) are not brought up, but her angry personality is already well-formed.
The Imperial Guard
Abilities: Various, initially all analogues of members of DC's Legion of Superheroes
First Appearance: X-Men (1st series) #107
The Imperial Guard are the elite defenders of the Shi'ar Empire and it's royal family. They are loyal to the Majestor or Majestrix of the Empire, no matter who they are. While they often show up in Shi'ar-related stories as a group, the only one who gets significant on-panel time by himself is Gladiator, the Praetor (commander) of the guard. His powers are the rather standard ones of flight, strength and invulnerability, but their strength is determined by his self-confidence. As long as he believes that he can do anything, he really can. Of course, this means that psychologically undermining that belief is the most effective way to defeat him. It should be noted that that's not an easy task. Gladiator is generally a good person, but his loyalty to the Empire sometimes places him (and the rest of the Guard) in opposition to the X-Men.
Brotherhood of Evil Mutants II
Magneto, Peeper, Burner, Shocker, Lifter, Slither
(see table near the top of this entry for real names and membership details)
Abililties: See below.
First Appearance: Captain America Annual #4
Magneto's second Brotherhood of Evil Mutants is something of a footnote in the history of groups with that name. It was the focus of Captain America's fourth annual, which was both written and illustrated by Jack Kirby. Seeing as Kirby co-created both Magneto and the original Brotherhood, it was certainly reasonable for him to revisit the concept, and the ending left open the possibility of this line-up continuing. However, Kirby never returned to it and instead the characters (minus Magneto) became a differently named group fighting for various agendas over the years. They were never very prominent, but in their next incarnation under the name Mutant Force they fought the Defenders, including a Defenders line-up that featured Beast, Angel and Iceman. Several of them still make the occasional appearance today, although usually individually and in very small roles.
As for the characters themselves, we get only brief introductions to them here. Magneto has already recruited the team and used them for a mission before the story starts, so there's no explanation as to how or why they were selected, nor even why Magneto abandoned the original team. They all have code names that are fairly directly related to their powers. Peeper has big round bulging eyes that have essentially x-ray, telescopic and probably any other kind of super-vision you can think of. They also emit potentially lethal rays. Slither looks like a humanoid snake, and can use his body like a boa constrictor. He and Peeper are both pretty good Kirby visual designs. Lifter is a fairly basic strongman, although his strength involves the ability to increase his body density which is a little unusual. Burner, as one might guess, can start fires and Shocker can send electric shocks through the crab-like claws that he has instead of hands.
Peeper seems to have an intelligence-gathering role, literally looking around for things that are of use to Magneto. The others are a more traditional field team. But at the end of the Annual their hideout is blown up and it's implied that they all fled. We don't find out that Magneto deserted them until their next appearance, so someone could have brought this line-up into the X-Men. But they next appeared in Defenders instead and Claremont built another almost completely new line-up to take over the name, without even Magneto involved.
Characters from Captain Britain Weekly
Captain Britain (Brian Braddock)
Abilities: Amulet and suit give him superhuman strength and agility. Staff posesses numerous offensive and defensive abilities.
First Appearance: Captain Britain Weekly #1
Captain Britain was the result of Marvel deciding to try publishing original content for the British audience through it's Marvel UK imprint. As noted by sometime writer Gary Freidrich in the introduction to the "Captain Britain: A Hero Reborn" trade paperback, he was something of a combination of successful American heroes with a dash of Arthurian legend thrown in to make him feel suitably British. But his patriotic angle came from Captain America, his smart (but mild-mannered and insecure) alter ego of university student Brian Braddock came from Spider-Man's Peter Parker, and some of his weaponry and costume design came from Daredevil. Despite his very basic superhero roots he does become more distinct over time as writers such as Alan Moore develop him further into own unique niche.
Merlin
Abilities:
First Appearance: Captain Britain Weekly #1
The Merlin of the Marvel Universe is a long-lived space traveler, whose abilities let him pose as a sorcerer in King Arthur's court. He is the one who set up the test of choosing between the Sword of Might and the Amulet of Right that Brian passes to become Captain Britain. He also provides Cap's weaponry and tests him further and sometimes aides him as time goes on.
Roma
Abilities:
First Appearance: Captain Britain Weekly #1
Roma is Merlin's daughter, and at this stage her role is mostly to stand around in the background and worry that Merlin is being too hard on Captain Britain. She later takes a more active role in things, including some notable interactions with the X-Men. But there's not much to say about her appearances at this stage.
Inspector Dai Thomas
Abilities: Baseline human.
First Appearance: Captain Britain Weekly #3
Inspector Thomas hates superheroes, and is Captain Britain's everyday non-evil nemesis (rather like J. Jonah Jameson for Spider-Man, in yet another parallel). Thomas has an understandable reason for this, as his wife was killed as a bystander in a superhero battle while they were visiting New York, and he's vowed that nothing of the sort will happen in Britain. He varies from believing that Cap is a direct menace to just hating him for being a vigilante outside the law, but it is a long time before they really bury the hatchet.
Courtney Ross
Abilities: Baseline human.
First Appearance: Captain Britain Weekly #3
Courtney Ross is Brian's love interest, although at first it's just that she tends to be nice to him even when the more popular athletic guys treat him badly. They don't get together during this period, but later do, with Brian even revealing to her that he's Captain Britain. Her ultimate fate is rather complicated so we'll revisit it when we get there.
Elizabeth "Betsy" Braddock
Abilities: Telepathy, although at this point she is unaware of her mutant status and ability.
First Appearance: Captain Britain Weekly #8
Betsy Braddock is Brian's twin sister, and the Captain Britain cast member with the most direct connection to the X-Men. She eventually joins the team as Psylocke, although there's no hint of anything at all unusual about her here. She's apparently a charter airplane pilot, but mostly serves a damsel in distress role before disappearing once we reach the more supernatural stories. Brian does, however, reveal is identity to her shortly after Jamie learns it. Betsy will start getting more interesting and gain both her psychic powers and her trademark purple hair during Alan Moore's run some years down the line.
James "Jamie" Braddock
Abilities: Reality manipulation through pulling on "strings", although at this point he is unaware of his mutant status and ability.
First Appearance: Captain Britain Weekly #8 (mentioned), Captain Britain Weekly #9 (full)
Jamie is Brian and Betsy's older brother, and a race car driver. He's kind of the dashing counterpart to bookish Brian, at least in Brian's pre-Captain Britain days. While he later becomes completely insane and repeatedly threatens reality starting with Alan Moore's run, like Betsy he shows no sign of anything unusual here, and mostly gets captured or knocked out while trying to help. He sees Brian change Captain Britain fairly early on, and is amazed at how his brother's personality has changed as well.
Mastermind (supercomputer)
Abilities:
First Appearance: Captain Britain Weekly #12
The Mastermind supercomputer was built by Brian Braddock's father in the basement of Braddock Manor. Unfortunately, it apparently gained sentience and an evil personality, and electrocuted both of Brian's parents while he was sitting in the driveway making out with a girl in his car. Brian's guilt over this changed him from a relatively outgoing boy to the more withdrawn student he is when he becomes Captain Britain. Mastermind turns out to be behind some of the earlier attacks on Captain Britain, and while he seems to defeat the computer it will return to attack him in various ways in the future.
Retcons
Jean Grey vs Phoenix
This period is directly affected by the grandmother of all retcons: Jean wasn't Phoenix. Or perhaps Phoenix wasn't Jean. It's a bit hard to figure, really. As will be seen when we reach the "Dark Phoenix Saga", Phoenix/Jean does some truly horrible things, for which she ultimately dies. It's rightly considered one of the classic stories of superhero comics, and Jean's death was intended to be final. And it was intended to be her. But several years down the road, someone had the great idea to re-unite the original X-Men as a new team called X-Factor. The only problem was that Jean was rather dead. This being a comic book, that wouldn't normally have been much of a problem, but Marvel's editors didn't want Jean to be resurrected because she was responsible for the deaths of too many beings, and they wanted the consequences to her to be appropriate and permanent. In fact, Claremont had originally intended for Jean to live but be stripped of her powers until the editor said that she had to die for the story to be appropriate (and publishable).
Ultimately, someone (apparently Kurt Buseik during a college dorm geek-out session long before he worked at Marvel) came up with the idea that instead of Jean being infused with a cosmic force, the cosmic force replaced Jean and took on so much of her memory that it thought it was Jean. The real Jean Grey, meanwhile, was left in a cocoon to heal at the bottom of Jamaica Bay near Queens, where the shuttle originally crashed. While this certainly wasn't the first retcon in comics, it was (and remains) one of the most significant. We'll come back to it when we get to X-Factor and see how the implications play out, but that's the basic retcon as it applies here: Starting with issue #101, "Jean" isn't really Jean, but rather the Phoenix Force incarnate. The Classic X-Men #8 back-up strip shows an extended discussion between Jean and the Phoenix Force that fits between issues #100 and #101. In it, Jean accepts the Phoenix Force's offer despite warnings that it may be for good or ill and will come at a cost. She would not have accepted were it just her, but knows that the shuttle will crash and all of the X-Men will die if she did not.
Classic X-Men
The Classic X-Men reprints of these issues continued to insert new pages and the odd changed panel into the main stories, as well as adding completely new backup strips. Most of this just fills out what was alread present, and where it is significant to the plots of the time, the material is covered above. But there are a few significant additions that stand alone.
Perhaps most notable and relevant is the origin story for Magneto, establishing his history as a prisoner of the concentration camps of World War II, his life with his wife Magda, and the death of their daughter Anya in a fire, while an angry and suspicous crowd prevented Magneto from using his power to save her. But Magda had not known of his power either, and she runs from him in fear having seen it- unbeknownst to him pregnant with Wanda and Pietro.
Another area addressed is the development of the Hellfire Club, soon to play a major part in the Dark Phoenix Saga. Some extra pages tie Stephen Lang's X-Sentinel project into the club, and (along with a backup strip) chronicle the rise of Sebastian Shaw (with Tessa as his aide) and Emma Frost to control the club's inner circle. I'll cover these developments in more detail when the club and its members make their proper debut.
Up Next: The classic Claremont/Byrne period goes into full swing with a long run of solid stories featuring Magneto, the Savage Land, Alpha Flight, and a tragic element of Moira's past.