X-Obsessed

Issue Summary: We once again find the X-Men in the Danger Room training, training, training. The all work and no play must be part of what made Scott a dull boy. But they wouldn’t be the astonishing and UNCANNY X-Men we know today without all that training. But it won’t be all work today. Part of Marvel Girl’s training was to lift an unknown object out of a box, and lo and behold, it’s a birthday cake to celebrate one year of the X-Men. Booya. Personally, I’m not sure which image is funnier: Bobby eating his cake half naked or Cyclops using his laser eyes to cut the cake.

Meanwhile…

A group of four mutants consisting of Toad, Quicksilver, Scarlet Witch, and Mastermind, sits down to eat, but they do not seem to get along nearly as well.  Scarlet Witch picks a fight with Mastermind, and when he turns on her, she calls for her brother, Quicksilver, to come to her aid like Timmy whistles for Lassie. Toad cheers them on to destroy one another so that he will be alone with their Leader! Mastermind suddenly no longer wants to destroy the Wonder Twins, and while Toad wonders where the Leader is, we change scenes again to see Magneto stealing a convoy freighter by himself. His powers of magnetism can even operate an entire warship. I sense that will go on his resume.

But the ship sailing out to sea with no crew doesn’t entirely go unnoticed. Angel spies it while on his daily flight patrol. He assumes that it’s a test ship run by remote control and leaves it where it is. Professor X, though, isn’t as convinced.  He’s certain that it has something to do with “THE EVIL MUTANTS!!” Because really, there is no distinction between types of evil mutants. There are only THE evil mutants.

But he is right. Magneto is using the ship to conquer one country at a time RISK-style. He first defeats the small country of Santo Marco in South America and even gets all of those citizens to call him the Leader. Shortly after he takes the throne, Professor X and X-Men are in the country posing as students on a field trip. Magneto senses their presence and orders his Brotherhood to prepare for attack. And attack both sides do. We now know all of the Brotherhood’s powers, although the Scarlet Witch’s powers are less than specific. Apparently she just points in a direction and something impossible happens. Sounds a little difficult to plan a strategy around, but I’m no military strategist (or comic book writer!) so what do I know?

The X-Men of course beat the Brotherhood back, so THE EVIL MUTANTS are forced to flee. But as parting gifts, Magneto sets one bomb as a trap for the X-Men and sets another nuclear bomb to destroy the entire country. Professor X senses the first bomb before the X-Men do and hurls himself in front of them to stop them from opening a door and triggering the bomb. The door explodes, blowing the Professor back, but he looks rather intact for just being in the middle of an explosion. Quicksilver refuses to let Magneto kill thousands of innocent people, homo sapiens or not, so he defuses the nuclear bomb behind Magneto’s back. He still escapes the X-Men, promising to defeat them the next time they meet.

The people of Santo Marco may have been saved, but it looks like Professor X is down for the count. He claims that the explosion “deadened” his telepathy. He can no longer lead the X-Men in their cause. Can the X-Men fight without him?

Commentary: Can’t help but notice right away that Iceman is starting to develop some facial features and therefore, facial expressions. Looks like I’ll have to hold on to my button and coal.  I’d hold on to the corncob pipe, but Professor X took it. He does look as silly as it sounds. Beast has gone a bit of a makeover of his own. His personality as a genius is starting to take shape. There are scenes of him reading a book and writing complex equations on a chalkboard with his feet, and his vocabulary has had a good thesaurus soaking.

Did anyone else get flashbacks of the Simpsons episode about Homer and the town of Springfield giving up their money and lives for the Leader? I swear I could even hear Homer’s Leader song in the background while I read this issue.

I have to comment on Iceman using ice to revive Cyclops after he collapses from overexertion. While I don’t doubt that ice can help revive someone, I doubt that applying clumps of ice and snow to someone’s face that resembles suffocation by sno-cone will.

I don’t really have a favorite quote this time, but I do have a favorite panel. I need to scan this one in, because I know my description will not do it justice. The Wonder Twins are having a flashback to when Magneto saved Wanda from a Salem reenactment. When Magneto grabs her, he holds out his other hand in warning and yells, “COME NO FURTHER, HOMO SAPIENS!!” It’s his face in that panel that is absolutely priceless. It’s so elongated with his look of horror and foreboding doom that he looks like he’s either from a Salvador Dali painting or he’s auditioning for a ghost on Scooby-Doo.

Published on March 1, 1964

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