Featuring: X-Men
Release: July 2, 1963
Cover September 1963
12 cents
Written by: Stan Lee
Drawn by: Jack Kirby
Inked by: Paul Reinman
23 pages
Paul Reinman is not a name we’ve seen a lot. The internet tells me we’ve seen him ink Kirby once before in our reading, on Incredible Hulk #1, but he was not credited in that issue. That issue relied heavily on the mood created by night and shadow, so it needed a good inker. This issue requires an entirely different feel, but Reinman again delivers.
So, anyways, hey! It’s the X-Men! That’s a good new addition to our growing cast. They were really big when I started reading comics in the early ’90s. And they’ve had a whole bunch of movies now. So this is pretty exciting. We get to see how it all began.
And did you know the X-Men and the Avengers debuted on the very same day? How wild is that? We’ll cover Avengers #1 shortly.
We learn the X-Men are a team of mutants, really the students at a school for mutants, which also acts as a haven. Professor X is the teacher. He trains his students to use their powers to benefit mankind, and to fight evil mutants, like Magneto.
The word “mutant” is important, but pretty new to us. It’s worth reflecting back on Amazing Adult Fantasy #14, where we first encountered the word in our reading. I’m not sure what Marvel comic was the first to ever use the word, but I know who to ask. In that story, Tad Carter is revealed to be a mutant with telepathic and telekinetic powers, because his father had been exposed to radiation before he was conceived. He receives a telepathic summons and goes to join a secret society of self-described mutants with a variety of powers, who wait in hiding until humanity is ready to accept them, when they can usher in a new golden age.
We heard the word again in two other comics published this very day, July 2, 1963. Namor, the offspring of a human and a Sub-Mariner, with powers beyond either race, self-described as a mutant. And Merlin, wizard of King Arthur’s court, explained his seeming wizardry was actually because he was a mutant with powers of telepathy, teleportation, and levitation.
Here, we learn there are many mutants out there, and more born each year.
We open with a training session for the X-Men. This introduces the characters and their powers. We learn Professor X is their teacher. He can read minds and project thoughts, but a childhood accident has left him unable to walk.
Hank McCoy is the Beast. He has extraordinary acrobatic talents, as well as large hands and feet, and the ability to use his feet for grasping.
Warren Worthington the Third is the Angel. He has wings that allow him to fly.
He uses a harness to help hide them under his clothes. He is not the first Marvel hero with the moniker, but bears no relation to the original 1930s Angel, a masked crimefighter who debuted in Marvel Comics #1. Nevertheless, I will take the opportunity in the next post to review the story of the original Angel.
Bobby Drake is Iceman, 16 years old, about 2 years younger than the rest of the students. He has frosting power. Similar to Jack Frost, but without requiring any equipment; his power is innate.
Slim Summers is Cyclops. We’ve thrice now met mythical Cyclops characters, at least one of which was actually a robot created by aliens as part of a complex invasion scheme. This character shares nothing in common with them but the name. He wears a visor through which he can fire energy beams from his eyes.
They get a new student, Jean Grey, whom the Professor nicknames Marvel Girl.
At this point, the whole line of titles is referred to as the “Marvel Comics Group”. And the company’s history with the word “Marvel” goes back to their very first comic, Marvel Comics #1 from 1939. In the 1950s, they debuted a superhero named Marvel Boy. This might be a good excuse to check out his adventures. We’ll do that after we read the original Angel story. A trend will start here. Many more characters named for the word “Marvel” will follow.
Of course, the name has been popular outside of Marvel as well. The most popular superhero of the early 1940s, and the first comic book hero to reach the big screen, was Captain Marvel, from Fawcett Comics. In Britain, he would be reimagined as the copyright-hassle-avoiding Marvelman.
Marvel Girl has the power to move objects with her mind. She refers to this as teleporting. Let’s talk about the word “teleport”. Jean Grey is not the first person to move objects with her mind. But what to call this power? Tad Carter called it telekinesis. That’s what I tend to call it. Merlin called it levitation. Fair. Jean refers to it as teleportation. Merlin referred to his ability to instantly move large distances as teleporation; this is how I tend to use that word. I probably learned the word from Star Trek and their teleporters, but got to know the word well from later issues of X-Men, which feature Nightcrawler, who refers to his ability to instantly move from place to place as teleporting. I recall writing an essay on X-Men in a theology class in college, and I used the word “teleport”. My professor, a very educated man who spoke like 10 languages, including a few extinct ones, had never heard the word and didn’t know what it meant. I think “teleport” means to move instantly across space, not to move objects with one’s mind. But I am wrong. Merriam-Webster agrees with Jean. To teleport is to move objects with one’s mind. My use of the word is described as how it’s used “in fiction”. Huh. (To further confuse the issue I’ve belabored too much, the reprint I scanned for this has changed the word “teleportation” to “telekinesis”. Different reprints use one word or the other. My Marvel Masterworks says “teleportation”. The Marvel.com version says “telekinesis”…)
Jean is the first girl to attend the school, and the other students, as well as the teacher, immediately begin to discuss how attractive she is, and incessant sexual harassment immediately follows.
Only Iceman doesn’t engage in the inappropriate behavior, declaring he has no interest in women. Perhaps unrelated, over 50 years later, it would be revealed that Iceman is gay. Of course, there is a middle ground where you can be interested in women but not harass them.
For all that, Jean is Lee’s best written female character yet. Wasp is written as constantly obsessing over men. Sue is often treated as a team mascot. Jean is as powerful and assertive.
Even though the team is now co-ed, they will still be called “X-Men”. Professor X explains he has named the team the “X-Men” because they have an “eXtra” power. Yeah, right, Professor Xavier, you egomaniac.
We learn the parents of Professor X worked on the first A-bomb project. What? It’s not quite clear what year this is supposed to be. The comic comes out in 1963. So it’s probably around then. Characters have definitely explicitly told us the year, but a lot of those references will contradict each other, so some must be ignored.
Nuclear work in Britain and America began in 1939. If Professor X was conceived after his parents started working on an A-bomb project, he’s at most 23 now. Which is far younger than I think of him. And far younger than he looks with that bald head. I guess it’s at least plausible that he started his own high school right after finishing college. It’s also possible A-bomb experiments in the Marvel Universe started before our own. But, until further evidence presents itself, I’m going to assume Professor X is 23, almost 20 years younger than Mr. Fantastic and Thing.
Professor X self-describes as the first mutant. If he is only 23, then Namor is older than he is. And Merlin definitely is. And they both self-describe as mutants.
The first evil mutant to appear is Magneto.
Magneto has the power to direct waves of pure , irresistible electromagnetic energy. He can use this energy to attract or repel. It affects everything from guns and tanks to people.
He wants to conquer the world and starts by throwing a rocket off course. Merlin just had the exact same plan. I imagine Thor again immediately flew to Asgard to see if Loki was responsible. Magneto proceeds to take over the military base at Cape Citadel.
Magneto refers to mutants as Homo Superior, suggesting they are a different species than Homo Sapien. I tried to research what a “species” was to see if this made any sense, and decided the word was too complex, and gave up.
Speaking of egomaniacs, Magneto refers to himself as “the miraculous Magneto”. Twice. The entire X-Men series will essentially become a duel between the world’s two greatest egos.
For some reason, Professor X decided it was cool to send Jean on a mission on what seemed to be her first day. Jean claims she never saw the professor like this before. She met him today. (Though this issue has also been altered in some reprints, so it’s rather Iceman who notes that.) Professor X also claims the mission’s success justified all the long hours of training. Even though Jean clearly hasn’t had any training and held her own.
There are artistic choices very different from what we have been reading. Note the close-up of Xavier’s eyes, paralleled later by a close-up of Magneto’s eyes. We haven’t seen any framing of a panel quite like that before.
Of course, Magneto’s eyes would be borrowed by Roy Lichtenstein for his painting.
Lichtenstein gained notoriety for his drawings, which approximated blown-up panels of printed comic book art. He made a lot of money off this, without every properly crediting or compensating the artists he stood on the shoulders of. Before he passed away, Russ Heath made a comic about his thoughts on Lichtenstein’s work that promotes the work of the Hero Initiative, an organization that helps retired comics creators who had often not been well-compensated for their great contributions.
Bringing up Russ Heath gives me a second segue into a Marvel Boy prelude post, as Marvel Boy is a creation of the late Russ Heath.
As I talked about when we read Tad Carter’s story, X-Men has one of my favorite story tropes, a group of super-powered beings gathered together. Brian Cronin does a good job breaking down the history of the genre in graphicless novels that predate X-Men.
However, a group of misfits living together, gathered by a wheelchair-bound leader certainly sounds like a pretty original concept to me. Though, three months earlier, at the Distinguished Competition…
Team of misfits… wheelchair-bound leader… huh.
Rating: ★★★★☆, 72/100
Significance: ★★★★★
This is a well-structured comic, exciting new characters to meet, and featuring Kirby’s best super-villain design since Dr. Doom.
I read this story in Marvel Masterworks: The X-Men vol. 1.
The scans above are taken from a reprint in Marvel Milestone Edition: X-Men #1.
You can also find this story in X-Men Epic Collection vol. 1: Children of the Atom. Or on Kindle.
Characters:
- Professor Xavier/Professor X
- Slim Summers/Cyclops
- Warren Worthington the Third/The Angel
- Bobby Drake/Iceman
- Hank McCoy/The Beast
- Miss Jean Grey/Marvel Girl
- Magneto
Story notes:
- Xavier runs a private school in Westchester County, New York.
- Angel is not the first Marvel hero with that name; we have also met other Cyclopses.
- X-Men described as “students” in “class”.
- X-Men all trained to read Professor X’s thoughts.
- Iceman has frosting power; creates ice shield.
- The Beast has feet that can grasp like hands; he can spin himself really fast and balance very well.
- Angel describes themselves as not “homo sapiens”, an implicit reference to evolution and speciation.
- Iceman described as a “couple years younger than the others”. Iceman is 16, suggesting the others are around 18.
- Cyclops has small lever at side of head shield which allows visor to open; an energy ray then fires from his eyes.
- Professor X describes his new student Jean as “attractive”.
- Iceman is the only one who shows no interest in the new girl’s looks.
- All X-Men are mutants. They are called the X-Men because they have an “eXtra” power, according to Charles Xavier.
- Jean can move objects with her thoughts; she calls this “teleportation”; Tad Carter called it telekinesis; Merlin called it levitation and used teleportation to mean instantaneous long-distance travel.
- Xavier’s parents worked on the first A-Bomb project. This suggests he is around 23.
- Xavier thinks he’s the first mutant; Namor and Merlin are older than he.
- Professor X can read minds and project his thoughts.
- Professor X built a haven and school because he was feared and distrusted. He teaches mutants in secret to use their powers to benefit mankind. Also to battle evil mutants, those who seek to destroy or rule humanity
- Professor X is confined to a chair by a childhood accident. He has a master control panel.
- There are many mutants on earth; more born each year.
- Magneto refers to mutants as “Homo Superior”.
- Magneto directs waves of pure, irresistible electromagnetic energy; he makes machine guns and tanks move and fire.
- Magneto’s goal it to make it so mutants rule the earth and humans are their subjects.
- Cape Citadel goes to “Condition Red”.
- Magneto uses dust particles to spell message.
- If Magneto directs magnetic impulses through his energizer, his power increases.
- Magneto’s magnetic waves can be positive (attracting) or negative (repelling), but they clearly affect humans.
- Magneto panel famously swiped by Roy Lichtenstein.
- Angel wears harness to keep his wings tucked.
- Professor X has custom Rolls-Royce.
- Professor X has remote-control private jet that can fly near the speed of sound
#99 story in reading order
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