X-MEN #91& '99 Annual – August 1999

X-Men #91

Technical Difficulties

Credits: Alan Davis (plot), Terry Kavanagh (script), Andrew Robinson & Dan Panosian (art), Marie Javins (colors), Comicraft (letters)

Summary: Major Sole unveils a new Deathlok, despite Nick Fury’s objections. Meanwhile, Shadowcat, Nightcrawler, and Colossus follow Douglock’s trail to the nearby SHIELD helicarrier. Douglock overtakes the craft by mentally controlling the crew. Nick Fury goes into hiding and plots a way to fight back. Later, Douglock tries to resist the Red Skull, who is controlling his body.

Review: Most of this is M-Tech setup, so it’s not particularly engaging. Davis keeps the action scenes on Muir Island, while the rest of the cast has some downtime at the mansion. Rogue (who wasn’t with the team when Ejulp kidnapped them) is just returning from the Magneto Rex miniseries. She apparently feels guilty about “chasing after the Magneto she remembered” (I’m paraphrasing because I don’t feel like retyping her phonetically spelled accent), and wants to make it up to Gambit with a night out. Instead, she gets stuck listening to recaps of the past few issues of this storyline, and then runs away when Wolverine demands she tell him what’s going on in Genosha. The story toys with the idea that Rogue’s jealous of Gambit’s new relationship with Marrow, but nothing really comes of it. This is the only real character work in this issue, and it only works if you buy the meeker interpretation of Rogue, the girl who just can’t quit that rascal Gambit. This issue is probably most notable for the bizarre fill-in art. Andrew Robinson has an extremely cartoony style, which results in some facial expressions that are better suited for Saturday morning television than a superhero comic. He pulls off a few nice Rick Leonardi-style panels, but most of his pages are just distracting. Dan Panosian apparently drew the last few pages of the story, and his sketchy, more angular style doesn’t match Robinson’s look, although I guess both artists could be labeled “cartoony”.

X-Men Annual ‘99

Metal Works

Credits: Alan Davis (plot), Terry Kavanagh (script), Rick Leonardi (penciler), Bob Wiacek (inker), Joe Rosas (colors), Bullpen/D.S. & P.T. (letters)

Summary: Nightcrawler, Shadowcat, Colossus and Nick Fury develop a plan to stop the Red Skull. Meanwhile, the Red Skull forces Major Sole to develop neural implants similar to the ones Douglock has created, which will enable him to command an army. Douglock, unable to free himself from the Red Skull’s control, commands Deathlok to kill him. Shadowcat arrives and tries to talk Douglock out of suicide. Elsewhere, Colossus and Machine Man free the imprisoned SHIELD agents, while Nightcrawler and Nick Fury confront the Red Skull. When Nightcrawler teleports the Red Skull’s techno-organic hand away, his hold over Douglock disappears. The remaining X-Men arrive and help most of the crew escape. However, Red Skull manages to escape with a few SHIELD agents under his command.

Continuity Notes: This story takes place after Captain America (vol. 3) #19. The Red Skull’s final wish from the Cosmic Cube was to be taken “somewhere safe…far away from people…to find a power that can control the world”. He was sent to Muir Island, where he was discovered by Douglock. After touching him, the Red Skull’s left hand became techno-organic, and he was granted control over Douglock. I have no idea if this specific storyline, which has him escaping in the SHIELD helicarrier, was ever resolved.

Commercial Break: This issue has ads for both the R-rated American Pie movie, and the Disney Channel original movie Smart House. There’s also a Kool-Aid on the back that declares “Grown-ups have to pay for stuff…but kids have the Kool-Aid ticket to fun”. Pre-Quesada, Marvel’s entire line consisted of all-ages material, even though the majority of its audience was probably over eighteen. I’m not sure if Kool-Aid or the Disney Channel actually knew this, but it’s interesting that Marvel was able to get away with advertising adult material and kids products at the same time. You would think having a broad appeal to advertisers would’ve been attractive to Marvel, but they’ve made a decision to target most of their titles towards older fans and move the all-ages material over to its own separate line.

Review: And now the M-Tech material is almost unbearable. With the exception of Shadowcat’s brief attempt at talking Douglock out of suicide, there’s really no characterization here, so you’re left with a fairly generic action story with the X-Men plugged inside. The Red Skull does have potential as an X-Men villain, since it’s logical that he would hate mutants as much as any other minority group, but the story doesn’t use him very effectively. Leonardi’s art is fine, and the plot is more bland than truly objectionable, yet the final product is just a chore to finish. Kavanagh’s script is so wordy, packed with unnecessary exposition and techno-babble, that it’s absolutely no fun to read. To make matters worse, for some reason this issue was lettered internally at Marvel’s Bullpen. It’s a rather crude attempt at computer lettering, which often has letters within the same word spaced far apart from one another. A text-heavy comic with ugly text is just inexcusable, period. If the goal of this storyline was to build up excitement for the M-Tech line, I’m afraid it might’ve had the opposite effect.

X-MEN #90 & UXM #371, July 1999 – August 1999

X-Men #90

Eve of Destruction

Credits: Alan Davis (plot & pencils), Terry Kavanagh (scripter), Mark Farmer (inker), Gloria Vasquez & Marie Javins (colors), Richard Starkings & Comicraft (letters)

Summary: Xavier enters his psi-form and tries to dissuade Galactus from consuming the Skrull’s planet. Meanwhile, Shadowcat rescues Wolverine from a Skrull army, with the help of her new allies, the Skrull versions of Thunderbird, Adam Warlock, and Captain Marvel. Nearby, Marrow emerges from her healing pod, and is now beautiful and in control of her powers. The team reunites, as Galactus sends Xavier’s consciousness back into his body. While Galactus consumes the planet, the team escapes in a spaceship. Shadowcat places the X-Men in suspended animation as they travel home. They arrive outside of Earth a few days in the past, as Magneto is creating an electro-magnetic pulse. A disruption knocks their ship off-course.

Continuity Notes: The Adam Warlock Skrull was “engineered to be a telepath”, which is an attempt to get around the idea that Skrulls can’t actually mimic powers. Shadowcat explains that Adam Warlock’s Skrull telepathically read her mind and realized she was telling the truth, explaining why these Skrulls changed sides in-between issues. Adam Warlock’s duplicate is critically injured in the fighting, but he telepathically teaches Shadowcat how to fly a Skrull spaceship before dying.

Creative Differences: Alan Davis’ redesign of Marrow debuts this issue. It looks as if her outfit was supposed to be a two-piece bone bikini (you can even see her navel), but editorial added a blue bodysuit for modesty.

Review: And here’s another thing that made people mad -- the debut of Marrow’s new look. I can see two reasons why Davis might’ve gone in this direction: one, just to see how Marrow would react if she got to be as pretty as the “beautiful people” she disdains; and two, as a meta-commentary on how female characters always grow more attractive over the years. Marrow was introduced as a hideously ugly villain, but already had a makeover when Marvel decided to add her to the X-Men (and no one seemed to notice). Now, her attractiveness is something the characters can’t just ignore, so it has to be a plot point. In hindsight, neither idea really came through in the stories, so I could be totally wrong about Davis’ motivations (assuming this wasn’t another editorial decision anyway). I almost wonder if she was made more attractive as a part of her “growing closer to Gambit” subplot. Was she supposed to be a potential love interest for Gambit? I’ll admit that it’s unlikely, and hopefully no one working on the books was shallow enough to think Marrow had to be made even prettier to be a viable love interest.

As for the main story, it’s another issue of misadventures in the Skrull world. Davis’ art is perfectly suited for this story, as he produces page after page of slick-looking Marvel heroes in their iconic costumes. The Skrulls’ imminent doom adds some drama to the story, and there’s some nice material with their internal battles over spaceships and the redemption of Shadowcat’s Skrull allies. Galactus gets to reiterate his role as a cosmic force that’s “beyond good or evil” as Xavier tries to talk him out of doing what he knows he has to do. There’s not a lot of attention paid to this plot point, but Galactus actually saves Xavier (who he knows shouldn’t be in this time period) by sending him back to his body, giving him enough time to escape. The scene reinforces the idea that Galactus doesn’t act out of maliciousness, which is one of the character’s unique traits I’ve always liked. I wish the script could’ve gone deeper into these ideas, but Kavanagh mainly seems interested in recapping story points and re-explaining the X-Men’s powers. His dialogue isn’t as clunky here as it has been in the past, but the majority of the script is just dull.

Uncanny X-Men #371

Crossed Wires

Credits: Alan Davis (plot), Terry Kavanagh (script), Jimmy Cheung (penciler), Mark Morales (inker), Liquid! (colors), Comicraft (letters)

Summary: Xavier dreams he is surrounded by the bodies of his dead students. He awakens with a scream, and learns from Shadowcat that the Skrull’s ship placed the team in cryo-stasis for eight days to protect them from Magneto’s electro-magnetic pulse. Meanwhile, SHIELD agents abduct Machine Man and use his technology to create a new body for an injured agent. Nick Fury is angered that Major Sole ordered the project without his permission. Sole has also ordered agents to investigate a strange occurrence on Muir Island. The X-Men park their Skrull craft on Muir Island, and leave behind Colossus, Shadowcat, and Nightcrawler, who want to visit Douglock. They soon discover Douglock, his powers out of control, attacking a pair of SHIELD agents.

Continuity Notes: It’s revealed months later that the Wolverine who returns home with the X-Men is actually a Skrull. There aren’t any overt hints at this point, though.

Xavier is now acting cold and snappish with his students again. He initially doesn’t want Colossus, Shadowcat, and Nightcrawler to stay behind on Muir Island, but Storm talks him into it. Wolverine comments that Xavier is losing his mind. These are teases for the next few issues (and they’re actually paid off!).

Review: This is the first part of “Rage Against the Machine”, a crossover designed to set up the ill-fated M-Tech line of books. Marvel wasn’t shy about admitting that the X-books were used to set the line up because they felt they offered the best chance for commercial success, but the days of fans blindly following anything X-related were long gone by this point. Douglock received his own title as Warlock, so working him into the storyline isn’t much of a stretch. However, new books for Machine Man and Deathlock also had to be set up, which isn’t the easiest fit. Davis does his best with the situation, though, and uses the M-Tech material as the superhero action for a few issues while the character subplots continue. Marrow reacts to her new look, Gambit continues to feel guilty about hurting her, Xavier behaves strangely, and Wolverine begins to cast doubts about Xavier. Davis manages to weave it all in comfortably, so the M-Tech setups aren’t as distracting as you would expect them to be. Jimmy Cheung, who was doing X-Force at the time, shows up as guest penciler and does a very nice job. His style fits in with Kubert’s cartoonier look, and he manages to handle the multiple figures and complicated technology very well. I’m surprised he didn’t do more issues during this era.