X-Men Classic

A return to the readthrough and to Classic X-Men! This time, a story from Banshee's past.

( Dearest Friend )

( Thoughts )



I made icons of this one!

No pictures today--my scanner wasn't cooperating; all of the scans I took had large blurry edges. From now on I may be at the mercy of Marvel Unlimited.

In this one, Misty Knight guest stars. She punches a shark!

( Lifesigns )

Sorry in advance for the lack of images and poll this time around.

( Hope )

Next Thursday: The X-Men face off against an angry purveyor of rented hovercraft, and also Magneto.
Next Sunday: Magneto's backstory.

Today we leave our heroes (in dire peril, of course) for a villainous interlude at the Hellfire Club.

( Out With the Old )

Two members of the later Hellfire Club are conspicuous by their absence in this story. Jason Wyngarde presumably hasn't joined yet, but what about the other one?



And any other thoughts on this story?

Next Thursday: A very different sacrifice.
Next Sunday: An attempt to reconcile a retcon with what came before.

Today: Colossus's complicated feelings about leaving his homeland, and a doomed romance.

( Prison of the Heart )



What did you think about this story?

Alternately, any thoughts on Colossus in this era?

In this issue, the X-Men return Thunderbird's body to his family, and mourn him. Along the way, both they and the reader learn a little more about John Proudstar, and why he made the choices he did.

This is the story that made me care about John Proudstar. I still think it’s one of the best of the Classic backups.

(Apologies in advance—some of my scans have a blurry edge, on account of being taken from a large and not entirely cooperative hardcover.)

( Mourning )

I adored this story as a teenager; it made me care about (and yes, mourn) John Proudstar, when before all I'd felt was that it was a shame he'd died before getting fleshed out at all.

I’m fairly sure that this was published after James Proudstar made his first appearances in New Mutants and X-Men; that surprised me, as this story read like foreshadowing, and as a teenager I assumed it really had been his first appearance. And James’s furious speech in the end is by far the weakest part of the story, for me. I’m afraid it put me off of the character for years; I thought of him as the ‘boring’ brother even though he’s had much more characterization, simply because he’s so much less nuanced in this story.



What did you think?

Next Thursday: Cyclops mourns, and also quarrels with the narrator, with catastrophic results.

Next Sunday: Wolverine and Nightcrawler bond.

Classic X-Men reprinted the early Claremont run a few years after the fact—but with a lot of edits and new material. Ads were removed and replaced with new pages and panels of story; dialogue was edited to bring it into line with later continuity or characterization (e.g. Ororo would not say ‘Good Lord’ in a moment of stress, so in the reprints she says “Goddess!” instead; Kurt can’t teleport blind). There was new cover art, fancy frontispieces (some of those are pretty cool) and most importantly, a new short story in each issue.

Most of the new stories were character-focused standalones. The best of them are some of my favorite X-Men stories ever.

The first issue was a bit of an odd case. Giant-Size X-Men #1 was huge; there wasn’t room to stick in a backup story. So, they cut a lot out to make room. Classic X-Men #1 kept the character introduction scenes from Giant-Size, and nothing else. It opens with a new version of Cyclops staggering home from Krakoa (costume in tatters, of course) and Professor X deciding to recruit a new team. (Remember when I said that I always misremember the order of events in Giant-Size? I'm pretty sure that this story is why.) Cyclops gets to angst a bit about the return of his powers, which he’d briefly hoped were gone for good; the Professor advises against self-pity, but sympathizes more with Scott’s worries about losing his friends. Then it segues to the original intros, and then quickly summarizes the actual fight against Krakoa before settling in to tell a new story about the combined team at the mansion, the evening before half of them decide to leave. That's the bulk of the story, and my favorite part of the issue.

It’s a bit of a mission statement for what Classic would be at its best: character studies and slice of life.

( First Night )