X-Men in 1965
First appearance of Juggernaut and Ka-Zar here, and… The Stranger? Diminishing returns nearly all around. Juggernaut figures very deeply into the X-Men mythos, but the introduction is more or less treated as boilerplate material. I even read the story a second, and third, time to dig in to what made Cain Marko’s (aka. The Juggernaut’s) first appearance special. It’s not.
Other than the character’s familial relation to Professor Xavier, there’s nothing great about him in these early days. I am willing to suspect that its Claremont’s later characterizations that added a certain charm to the character.
One positive exception for the year, though (yes, X-Men again gets a low score for 1965): the three-part Sentinel story at the end of the year (and beginning of the next) is critical. The one major element that can be identified this early is in the Sentinel origin: their inventor, Bolivar Trask , introduces the “mutant menace” angle among Homo sapiens and submits the concept to television viewers.
The idea that humanity despises and/or mistrusts the mutants is the key element that separates the X-Men from other teams. Without this germ of an idea, X-Men is conceptually pointless or undifferentiated. How strong is the concept? X-Statix would completely flip this idea forty years later and make an excellent run of it.
All in all, Among Us Stalk the Sentinels may represent the strongest story of the X-Men’s earliest years. The story also feeds into quite possibly the greatest story of this first run of X-Men a couple years from now. Still not enough to save this year, though.
Kirby hands the pencils over to Alex Toth and Jay Gavin (actually Werner Roth). The results are interesting, but I prefer the King’s output on this series. I am not by any means a Jack Kirby acolyte, but I think his art (especially in these early days) visually represents a simplicity that befits the “student” aspect of the series. I dunno, that’s just my read anyway.
The characters are growing their powers, certainly, but (until Trask and the Sentinels) there’s no growth in the overall direction of this series. It’s still waist-deep in the concept of good vs. evil mutant recruitment. It’s like mutant sorority hi-jinx.
But the wheels haven’t yet fallen off yet. That’ll come soon.
