I love the X-Men!
You might question that after this blog entry, and the previous one, too, but I truly do!
Growing up as I did, in the era of Chris Claremont and John Byrne, "The Uncanny X-Men" was my favorite regular title from Marvel. At least, unless Byrne moved onto "The Fantastic Four," then both alternated for the top spot in my weekly comic book reading. I loved both the original team created by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby, as well as the "new" team created by Len Wein, Roy Thomas, and Dave Cockrum. I first "met" the original team in a reprints (which I believe I chronicled in my earlier blog entry. I started regularly reading the new guys with issue #122, just in time for the build up to the Dark Phoenix Saga.
When the X-Men title was good, it was GREAT! When it was bad, though, it was also the WORST! Mostly the worst stories of the run were during the Silver-Age of comics. It was the period of Roy Thomas's first run on the series, before joining with Neal Adams for some classic X-Men comics. But, boy... Thomas took some time to work uo the steam he let out during his time with Adams.
In fairness, as I understand it, "X-Men" was Thomas's first professional comics assignment. He was learning the ropes, finding his voice. But truth is truth, and that first go round was a pretty horrid run. Not that Arnold Drake came up with masterpieces during his own brief tenure writing the adventures of Marvel's mutants, but Thomas's earlier stories were very wordy, and unnecessarily so.
It was stupid... and corny! I know it's harsh, and I do appreciate the great work Thomas put in with "Conan The Barbarian," "The Avengers," and "Squadron Supreme," and especially the aforementioned work with Neal Adams on X-Men, but there's no other way to put it with the early stuff.
Mechano, The Locust, The Warlock, all were the lame villains in cringe-worthy tales, but I think the very worst of the worst came in a stand alone story where Professor Xavier and his teenage students square off against what appeared to be the legendary Frankenstein monster!
Xavier learns about the discovery of the monster by a group of arctic explorers while he was, as he put it, "engaged in some, uh, mental experiments." Why he said "uh" about his experiments is something that never got addressed. Just what was that about? It was found frozen in a block of ice and brought back to America for study.
Anyway, the professor is certain this is the actual creature that Mary Shelley wrote about in the 19th century novel. He mentions to the team that he had suspected she was writing about a real monster, but that the monster was in reality an android and that its' creator was in all likelihood a mutant! Um... okay. Xavier is convinced that this monster is a vital threat and so he and the X-Men take off for the museum where it's being, so that they may prevent it from doing harm.
As feared, the monster awakens and during the X-Men's ensuing battle with it, we learn the monster is not only inhumanly strong, as described in the novel, but also can shoot eye beams, and has magnetic feet! Not long after the monster tosses a barrage of barrels at our heroes, it is stopped cold by Iceman's freezing power. Apparently, the cold is its' major weakness, and being frozen again causes it to explode this time.
Probing the android's artificial mind during its' final moment of existence, Xavier learns about its' true origin: It was created as an intergalactic ambassador by aliens from a tropical planet who wanted to use it to test the hospitality of humanity. Due to a malfunction, the creature went berserk and was pursued to the polar regions by its creators, where they left it frozen. It particularly was agitated by the X-Men's colorful costumes, as they reminded it of the flamboyant outfits worn by the aliens that created it.
Yeah... so... Brightly garbed aliens from a tropical planet created a monstrous android to make certain we Earthlings would treat it nicely as a condition for making contact with out planet's populace. And somehow Mary Shelley possibly caught wind of this situation and wrote her story loosely based in these "actual" events. Also, it was frozen in ice for years and years in the arctic, but for some reason it['s only when blasted by IceMan's powers that it becomes too cold and explodes.
Yep... stupid. I'm sorry, but what else would you call such a story?
I recently finished reading the entire Silver-Age run with the original X-Men, and so I think I am qualified enough to nominate this as the worst X-Men comic book tale ever! The story had some close competition, let me tell you, but it takes the cake, and the prize! However, like many a B-movie, I would say it is so bad, it's good! It's pure cornball, and silly beyond reason, but you almost can't believe what you're reading was written by a former teacher, an educated, adult man. I don't accept that comics are strictly for kids as a rule, but even that doesn't excuse how inane this story came out.
For a fun, little exercise, I decided to take a poke of rewriting the comic book, adding new text in the captions. I did so intending to make a spoof, but honestly one that probably has a better rationale behind the occurrences that took place in the original version. I write the team as a group of smart asses who have no respect for their leader, and whom in return grants them even less respect. For this reason, I decided to label them as the YZ-GUYS (pronounced "wise" guys, get it? um...).
The monster, in this parody, is written as a true misunderstood victim of circumstances. I won't claim it improves the tale, but I hope that it at least brings a new level of enjoyment from the comic.
So, here is my version, using the original artwork from "X-MEN" #40 (January, 1968):
NOTE: Click to enlarge pictures (on computer, right-click and select either "open in new tab" or "open in new window" to see at full resolution):
X-Men are Copyright 2020 Marvel. The usage of the characters and artwork here is strictly meant for the intent of parody, with ownership neither granted nor implied. The parody script is Copyright 2020 Matthew Hawes.
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