X-Men #20

Featuring: X-Men
Release: March 3, 1966
Cover: May 1966
12 cents
Expertly edited by: Stan Lee
Skillfully scripted by: Roy Thomas
Perfectly penciled by: Jay Gavin
Ideally inked by: Dick Ayers
Laxly lettered by: Artie Simek
20 pages

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Sgt. Fury #30	Reading order	X-Men #21
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As usual, a mob seldom makes the right decision!

With this issue, Roy Thomas takes over as regular writer on The X-Men, a position he will hold for the next two years. Some sources suggest Stan gave a writing assist on this and the next issue, but Stan is only credited as Editor. (Of course, even as editor, Stan’s credit goes first.)

It begins with fake X-Men, villains seeking to ruin their reputation.

As Mark had previously noted in comments, you can spot the villains by the smoking of cigarettes.

Heroes smoke pipes.

Who are these fake X-Men? One is strong and bulletproof. The other seems to have a force field that makes him… untouchable.

One of them calls himself Blob. I don’t know why he uses his actual name.

Let’s recall who Blob is. He’d been a carnival attraction, when the X-Men tried to recruit him. When he refused their offer of membership, they wantonly attacked him, and then in the end erased his memory and will, so he returned to the carnival. But then he returned! A battle with Magneto awakened his memories and he joined with the Brotherhood against the X-Men. But when Magneto betrayed him, he realized he was better off at the carnival.

So why has he again turned against the X-Men? And who is his untouchable comrade?

Cyclops makes a momentous decision, one that would presage many an X-Men story in the decades to come: Cyclops seeks a cure. Like many a Marvel hero, his power is his curse. He cannot be with Jean if he can’t control his optic blasts. But Jean will be sad he has left.

The X-Men investigate the impostors and deduce the one not dumb enough to say his name is Unus the Untouchable. This makes Beast sad as Unus had promised to be good from now on if they let him go. He pinky swore!

Professor X suspects there is a mastermind behind them both. As I’ve mentioned before, I’m interested in how characters introduced as lead villains in their own right get relegated to “henchman” status.

Professor X thinks through his past foes to deduce who might be behind this. He comes up with: Vanisher, Juggernaut, Magneto, the Sentinels, Mastermind, and the Sub-Mariner. But the name of the true villain eludes him due to a mental block.

This is an early example of Roy Thomas-level research. Stan Lee would never be so thorough as to recall that many past X-Men villains. The list was a pretty comprehensive list of sensible masterminds. It doesn’t include the other Brotherhood members who worked for Magneto, the Swamp Men of the Savage Land, the extraterrestrial Stranger, or the basically decent Mimic.

The one villain not named is the true menace. Who could it be? Could it be the villain on the cover and whose name forms the title of the issue? Could it be Lucifer?

Spoiler: it is the villain on the cover. This leads us to the core problem with this issue.

The problem is that at a very fundamental level, Lucifer is lame. It’s sad that something as significant as the loss of Xavier’s legs gets attributed to him.

Recall when we first met Lucifer. We learned he was responsible for the loss of Professor X’s legs, but no more details on the score. Now Professor X had tracked him down to find his heartbeat tied to a world-destroying bomb. The X-Men and Avengers teamed up to disable the bomb. And then Professor X let Lucifer go free? Why? Because Marvel heroes were always doing that back in the day. They either let the villains go free or wiped out their minds.

Roy Thomas’ mistake in this story is thinking that Lucifer is interesting. Unus and Blob are at least vaguely interesting.

In fairness, it’s possible Thomas doesn’t think Lucifer is interesting. He may just notice his story lacked closure. I can respect bringing closure to stories, even boring ones.

But this issue gets to the core of what Roy Thomas will bring to Marvel. He and his collaborators will show less interest in creating new villains. However, he shows a great awareness of the many villains created by the likes of Kirby and Ditko, and a strong interest in revisiting them.

Professor X needs a memory-inducing machine in order to remember his forgotten foe. He decides to build one. There’s a good lesson here about communication and collaboration everyone should take to their workplace. Professor X doesn’t need to build a memory inducer. The Avengers have one! He should just ask the Avengers if they can help. They call their machine a subliminal recall inducer, but I’m sure it would help here!

Part of Lucifer’s problem is he looks too much like Magneto in design. And Magneto is way cooler.

Thomas does pay attention to detail here. He recognizes both Blob and Unus had foresworn their grudges against the X-Men. So he explains how they met and agreed to take on the X-Men again, explaining it was Lucifer manipulating their minds to make them unknowing pawns.

“I must heed the call– as long as all mutants are regarded as monsters!” Cyclops is back in action! I’d missed him since he left the X-Men 3 pages earlier.

“As usual, a mob seldom makes the right decision.” Wise words from Cyclops that people on social media today could learn from.

While I don’t approve of prejudice, I admire the gumption of the old lady whacking Beast with an umbrella.

Apparently Professor X penetrating the mental screen was part of Lucifer’s plan all along. Makes me wonder if the mental screen was even necessary. I get you don’t want to seem too easy to find if you’re setting a trap, but making the person you want to find you forget you exist seems like overkill.

Okay, now we get what we all came here for: the story of how Xavier lost the ability to walk!

Let’s first take the moment to review Xavier’s history. We meet him as the professor at Xavier’s School for Gifted Youngsters.

His parents had worked on the first A-Bomb project. In our world, that was the Manhattan Project, begun in 1942. If that exposed his parents to radiation before he was conceived, he would have been at most 19 when he formed the X-Men in 1962 or so. Since he seemed older, we assume the Marvel Universe had an A-Bomb project in the 1930s.

We also learn he is in the wheelchair due to a childhood accident. We later learn Lucifer was responsible. This suggests Xavier first encountered Lucifer as a child.

We learn Charles’ father Brian Xavier was killed in a nuclear explosion in Alamogordo, New Mexico, the site of the Manhattan Project. Xavier appeared to be an older child when this happened, at least 8 or so. His father’s partner Kurt Marko then married his mother Sharon, seized their wealth, and forced Xavier to live with his stepbrother Cain Marko.

Brian Xavier’s death was an accident, but Kurt Marko chose not to try to save him, in order to gain himself his wife and wealth. But Kurt died unselfishly, saving Charles and Cain from an accident.

We see Charles started losing his hair by his teens, and excelled in sports in high school, and that he still had his legs aged 17/18 on the way to college, so it’s not clear what he means when he blames a “childhood accident”. He specifically notes his first encounter with Lucifer was after starting college.

Marko and Xavier both fought in Korea, and after Xavier started (though perhaps didn’t finish) college. In our world, active conflict ended by 1953, so Xavier could have been born no later than 1935. Which means their world either had nuclear bomb research going on sooner, or the Korean War ending later. A 1935 birthday puts him at around 27 for the founding of the X-Men, which makes more sense than a guess of 19. But notably he could still walk when serving in Korea, which again makes it hard to reconcile with the childhood accident that cost him his legs.

We now learn more of Xavier’s story. Xavier, clearly a still-walking adult, likely after his time in Korea, is visiting a mysterious city in or near Tibet. It is ruled by a tyrant with alien machinery who controls the wills of the people in the city. Xavier deduces this tyrant, Lucifer, is an alien.

How many aliens have invaded Earth in just the last couple years? The Skrulls, Toad Men, Stone Men from Saturn, Xartans, Aliens from A-Chiltar III, Lizard Men of Tok, Sneepers, Possessors, Kallusians, Moon-Men, Impossible Man, Tinkerer, Stranger, Galactus, Infant Terrible, Kurrgo, Metal Master, Gargantus, the Creature from Kosmos, Sun-Stealer, Colossus, the Hidden Man… and a few others I’m sure.

That’s before we’ve even learned the secret of Tana Nile.

Lucifer being an alien invader is just one too many for my suspension of disbelief.

Lucifer causes a stone slab to fall upon Xavier, removing the use of his legs. This was a reason Professor X founded the X-Men, specifically to battle Lucifer. And yet, when they beat Lucifer last time, Professor X just let him go for no particular reason.

Now the X-Men are ready to face Lucifer again, but Lucifer is muttering something ominous about Dominus.

Earlier this issue, Cyclops had left and Jean was sad. Now he’s back and snapping things like “Quiet, Jean!” and she’s sad again. Women, eh?

Professor X had purchased a jet. This is not the famous Blackbird, but it’s the first jet of the X-Men.

Rating: ★★★☆☆, 52/100
Significance: ★★★☆☆

I read this story in Marvel Masterworks: The X-Men vol. 2.

Most significant thing is the story of Xavier losing the ability to walk. Not quite worth the extra significance star, especially as we already knew the key bit, that Lucifer was responsible.

Characters:

• Fake X-Man/Blob
• Other Fake X-Man/Unus
• Mr. Philbert (bank manager)
• Cyclops
• Angel/Warren
• Marvel Girl/Jean “Jeanie”
• Iceman
• Beast
• Professor X
• Lucifer/Agent One
• Supreme One

Minor characters:

• Herman (anti-mutant person in crowd)
• Mabel (other crowdperson jeering the X-Men)

Story notes:

• News reveals X-Men behind bank robbery. Reactions: one recognizes these are new X-Men; one confirms her prejudices about mutants.
• Cyclops leaves to find doctor who can rid him of menace of beams, so that he can be with Jean.
• Professor X can telepathically monitor news.
• Professor X installs new Cerebro after Magneto destroyed it in #18.
• Radar-image beam shows other mutants in area. One is Blob, the other Unus.
• Beast mad because Unus had promised to reform, but notes they still have ray gun that worked before. But Professor X notes Unus may be able to counter it.
• Professor X attempts to search memory for villain, but finds mental screen.
• Professor X needs mechanical memory inducer.
• Blob and Unus met wrestling. Unus made a fat joke. They call the wrestling match a draw. Lucifer had planted the suggestion in their minds to meet again.
• Blob and Unus both have grudges against the X-Men. They agree to frame the X-Men for robberies.
• Cyclops recognizes Unus and Blob right away.
• Cyclops confronts phonies; mob unconvinced and turns on Cyclops.
• Unus now immune to ray thanks to Lucifer.
• Cyclops blasts hole through ground to deal with two adversaries, who get away atop subway train.
• Lucifer’s Mento-wave receiver indicates Professor X has penetrated his mental screen.
• Lucifer mentally attacks Xavier rendering him completely still, but still able to think; he tells Jean to use the Mental-wave Amplifier.
• Xavier relates the tale of his first battle with Lucifer.
• Years ago, fascinated by tales of a mysterious walled city in the shadow of the Himalayas, Xavier traveled through Tibet.
• Xavier finds a people in fear of a tyrant in the citadel they never see.
• Xavier realizes the tyrant’s machinery, and so the tyrant himself, are extraterrestrial.
• Xavier finds Lucifer controls some minds and uses them to enforce his will.
• Xavier leads a small rebellion.
• Supreme One orders Lucifer to abandon Sector “A” and proceed to the new sanctuary in Sector “B”.
• Lucifer drops a slab on top of Xavier.
• Xavier deduces Lucifer is the herald of a greater menace from the stars.
• Lucifer’s new base beneath Southwestern desert.
• Lucifer now able to extend his influence over longer distances, not just a city.
• Conquering Earth is a stepping stone to galaxies and universes which dwarf Earth.
• Lucifer tells Supreme One it is time for Dominus.
• Professor X left directions for a Beam Distorter for Beast to build.
• Xavier recovers with Beam Distorter around his head.
• Xavier able to pinpoint source of Lucifer’s beam.
• Xavier had purchased plane several weeks ago. They’d been too busy to use it.
• Implication is that battle with Sentinels, and thus the wedding of Reed and Sue, was weeks ago.

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Sgt. Fury #30	Reading order	X-Men #21
X-Men #19	X-Men	X-Men #21