Uncanny X-Men #113

[iamrman]

Magneto is pottering around in his old base on Asteroid M when he detects something amiss back in Antarctica. Surely the X-Men haven’t escaped already...

Comments

[huntleyhaverstock]

Between this and the old issues of FANTASTIC FOUR I've been reading -- man, when John Byrne was on his game artistically, he was on.

(And when he was off his game...)

[blues32]

The difference between the last battle and this one was shocking. Not all of it is shown here, but they were really kicking Mags's ass.

[iamrman]

Yes, I think the point was that the team were finally learning to work as a team.

[cainofdreaming]

And then, of course, they split the party.

[wizardru]

One of the first comics I ever bought. It easy to forget now that John Byrne used to be one of the hottest talents in the business, but you can see why right here. This is the Byrne/Austen team at the height of their creative powers. The art and layout is so dynamic compared to what came before.

I also see here that Claremont is iterating on Silver Age Magneto here, not quite to his eventual final form. His thoughts here don't really jibe with what would come after, but things like his internal monologue are a level of character development way beyond anything he'd ever had before.

[scorntx]

Yeah, this is Magneto just starting to evolve into his later developments.
Next time we see him is during Proteus, where he's already a lot more introspective, and we learn he had a wife (not to mention a certain pair of kids) and then next is around issue #160.
(Don't know when the backstory with Charles comes in, but it's somewhere around issue #200.)

But he's still got a ways to go. There's still a bit of the bwa-ha-ha in him even here.
And it's quite hard to imagine later Magnetos deciding to just leave the X-Men behind to die (well, maybe Wolverine...), or addressing them as "those Mutants".
Or even calling Nightcrawler 'elf'.

[scorntx]

Magneto's brilliant plan to keep the X-Men captive in his lair forever, thwarted by his inability to predict that Ororo Munroe was abnormally developed for a baby.
And also that she had lockpicks hidden in her tiara.
Rookie mistake, Magneto!

Jean Grey, the Phoenix! Phenomenal cosmic p- no, wait she's fainted and won't be able to tell the X-Men survived. Nevermind.
(So Animated Jean spending most of the Phoenix Saga fainting is actually pretty on-brand then. *rimshot*)
'Ultimate expression of her psionic abilities'... pfft.

[mindsweeper]

Yeah, I guess they had enough of working around uber-powerful Jean and realized that they didn't know how to handle her in a team setting. There are only so many times she can have a power fritz at an inopportune time. Warhawk was someone Marvel Girl could have handled. It felt less like real tension and more like convenience so she can't solve the problem.

Off she goes to the B-story, which becomes the A-story for the entire history of the franchise.

[bruinsfan]

It was *just* before I started reading X-Men in #108, but hadn't Jean handed Firelord his butt a handful of issues before? That's a level of power that makes a regular place in a team book very difficult to justify. Hence why Thor was so often absent from Avengers stories back in the day. (Now they just treat him as a buffoon or conveniently forget that he can potentially do anything Odin could.)

Though I will give Claremont and Byrne credit that what she did inside the M'Krann Crystal would make anyone pause and worry about the ramifications of their power.

[lbd_nytetrayn]

I was wondering how that was resolved. Thanks!

[gnarll]

Sometimes I think back andd I am astonished at how short the Claremont/Byrne/Austen era was and how huge its footsteps was.

[mazway_75]

This book so damn rules. If you haven't, try to find the "Classic X-Men" issues with new pages inserted to flesh things out more, including Magneto's start to the character we know today.

[lbd_nytetrayn]

Kinda funny that Magneto refers to Wolverine as a kid here, even if only by association.

[zylly]

And so starts a long series of missed communications keeping the two groups thinking the other is dead.