For a series that was never a huge success in the 60's, X-MEN went on to become Marvel's biggest "franchise" in the 80's & 90's. (Probably TOO big for its own good.) But it all started in 1963, oddly enough, the SAME month as THE AVENGERS. (Leave it to Martin Goodman to dump 2 new books on the market at once, instead of just 1.)
I just did a brand-new restoration, of X-MEN #1, and decided this was a good excuse to dig out several others I did a year or more back.
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My first exposure to X-Men was their cameo in F.F. ANNUAL #3. (What a place to come in.) Next, I got X-MEN ANNUAL #2, which reprinted the Roy Thomas-Werner Roth "Count Nefaria" 2-parter with the team of 5 super-villains (all of whom were losers-- heh). Maybe that's a big part of why, after all these years, I feel the Werner Roth X-MEN were the "definitive" version. (Ever notice Famke Jansen was a dead ringer for Roth's Jean Grey?)
I forget what was next-- ANNUAL #2, with the Thomas-Neal Adams Sentinels 3-parter (TOO G** D*** intense for it's own or anybody's else's good!!!) or GIANT #1.
I became a fan of Dave Cockrum because of his work on THE AVENGERS. To this day, I feel THE AVENGERS lost a major talent when Dave decieed to leave the book and do the X-MEN revival instead. Basically, the ONLY reason I ever started buying the new X-MEN was Dave Cockrum. It sure wasn't Len Wein (who, to me, had always been a "joke" of a writer). When Len abruptly jumped ship (so soon after getting the ball rolling!!), I really didn't like Chris Claremont's writing. I'm deadly serious. Because that DAMNED book was too F****ing deadly serious for its own good. The day I first met Chris at a convention, it's funny, we spent over a half-hour talking about artists we liked, and almost never touched the subject of writing, plots, characters, anything. Except when I happened to mention I thought the book had a "Death Wish" feel to it. He INSTANTLY recognized me from a fan letter where I'd said that very thing. What I meant was... every single character seemed to be on the edge of a nervous breakdown ALL THE TIME. It was like a superhero version of SPACE: 1999.
Any hint of "fun" at all during the first couple years, I feel sure, was entirely due to Dave Cockrum's influence. I'd met Dave quite a few times, and he was one of the nicest, friendliest, and most fun people I've ever met in the biz. I once said I thought his art was "serious", which he probably mistinterpreted. What I really meant was, his art was "intense". Dave had a way of making everything seem more serious than it needed to be, which, I suppose, made him a perfect fit for the manic, psychotic tone of Claremont's writing. To me, superhero books were NOT supposed to be like that!!! I just stuck around for Dave's art.
So when Dave left-- ONE ISSUE before the end of a long, long storyline-- I was very disappointed. His replacement did NOT do it for me... for quite some time. I'd been following John Byrne in IRON FIST, and was not the least bit impressed, until Dan Adkins started inking him. I used to think it was inappropriate inks, but many years later, looking back, I just realized that Byrne was not a very good artist. Byrne was a cartoonist, who was trying to pass himself off as Neal Adams. The combination of those 2 influences, to say the least, was freakin' WEIRD. Somehow, the absolute, total CONTRAST of his loose pencils and Terry Austin's RAZOR-SHARP, ULTRA-TIGHT inks (Austin, apparently, had worked as a mechanical detailer), somehow, really worked. The issue where they brought back Magneto, I feel, is where their momentum started to pick up. All the same, I wish Dave had at least finished that "Starjammers" story. And, I wish the book hadn't been so damned INTENSE all the freakin' time.
For awhile, I think Byrne had a much more mediating influence on Claremont than Cockrum had. Maybe it's because Byrne (apparently) has a much more "aggressive" personality. I don't know if they collaborated or if they just spent 3 whole years fighting tooth and nail on how the book should go. The results WERE impressive... at least, until Jim Shooter (talk about an "aggressive" personality) decided to stick his nose in where it WASN'T CALLED FOR. I can't help but think John Byrne decided to leave the book at least partly because Shooter KILLED Jean Grey. Yeah, HE did it personally.
I saw Dave at another store appearance just before his return. He talked with great enthusiasm about coming back to the book. Fans asked, if he couldn't handle a bi-monthly schedule, how was he gonna handle a monthly? His answer, "I didn't have a mortgage then." The book was-- to a degree-- "fun". For awhile. But that Claremont intensity kept building and getting worse all the time. When the "Brood" story began, I was deeply disturbed and almost sickened by the whole thing. HONESTLY. But when Dave LEFT the book, in the middle of a story set in space-- FOR THE 2ND TIME-- I have to think I only kept buying out of habit.
Paul Smith had been announced as taking over DR. STRANGE. He eventually did... but, first, he took over X-MEN. And, apparently, it was purely FOR THE MONEY. The book was selling like CRAZY, and thanks to the bonuses Jim Shooter had managed to set up, Smith made out like a bandit. Personally, I think he did FAR better work on NEXUS years later. But at least it was tolerable. That is, until Mariko left Wolverine at the altar (and after ALL THE HELL he'd gone thru for her!!!!!). And then, Smith being replaced by J.R. Jr. AND Dan Green. My God. I hated that "art"-- and I use that word loosely. To me, the book went completely to HELL at that point. And, incredibly, the stories got WORSE than they had ever been. It was going downhill-- and picking up speed. I should have jumped off that runaway long before I did.
Those are MY personal memories, anyway. It's been my understanding, from reading countless comments from other ex-X-fans, that I quit LONG before most people felt it had completely gone to hell. Which only makes me glad I did quit when I did. If I couldn't stand it at all any more-- I'd hate to think how it got by the time everybody else thought it went bad.
When the first X-MEN movie came out, I was totally blown away by it. They managed to do something that was better than the book had been in DECADES.
I think the process of how the decision to kill Jean Grey came about has been well-documented in the Marvel publication, titled something like The Death of Phoenix Saga: The Untold Story. It basically has all those involved in the book at the time sitting around a conference table with a recorder running, and them talking about how it went down, why it went down, and what each other did and did not think was being "ordered". I found it interesting, but you can still hear the personalities at play.
I also wasn't a big fan of the early revival, but did enjoy the artwork of John Byrne. Unfortunately, I was in college and walked into the newsstand/bookstore just as #112 (The return of magneto) hit the stands. I should have started buying, but with all my attention focused on studies and my career, and having left comics behind 8 years earlier, I marveled at the realistic artwork, the great hook of finding the x-men as carney workers, and put it back on the shelf.
It was about three years later, just after I graduated, and picked up X-men annual #3 or 4 "Nightcrawler's Inferno" and wasn't very impressed. But when I saw that #141 cover with the huge wanted poster, I bought it, and the next one...
I had just missed the heyday of the X-men and struggled to find comic shops that were selling the back issues as a reasonable price. I worked carefully backwards to issues #94, finding I really didn't care about the Star-jammers and agree that Cockrum should have finished the second half of the wrap up himself.
But I was even more sad to see him return, and Byrne leave. Yes, I agree, I think JB had had enough and his magnum opus "Days of Future Past" was a sneaky way of saying, here, you want to kill Jean...I'll wipe out everyone!
I have to admit that I did enjoy Paul Smith's artwork...and his storyline, starting with the return to earth after the Brood saga ended, not only got me interested in the New Mutants (school) storyline, but also led into the From The Ashes storyline that not only included the Wedding of Logan and the Wolverine mini-series, but built to the great reveal in #175 that they had been manipulated all the time.
I think the change in artwork for the final 8 or so pages of #175 was a travesty, and should never have seen print. The shock in change of art styles totally killed my enjoyment of the story. And though I hung on after that, I too saw a decline... with the dreadful "Secret Wars" sticking its nose into every on-going storyline (interesting concept and well promoted) leading to some dreadful changes in the Kitty/Peter relationship.
I don't recall the issue number, but somewhere about #184, Logan lets Juggernaut whip Peter's butt in an all out bar fight. That was a great issue, and marks just about the end of the good stories in the Uncanny X-men.
I did hear that the turning of Magneto that happens in about X-men #200 had been planned for #150, but it just took awhile to get there. In some ways, the "God Loves, Man Kills" graphic novel that came out features the confrontation between Kitty and Magneto that was to have happened in #150 that would have started his turn to the good side. (Shades of Star Wars and Darth Vader's flip at the end!)
Thanks for the run-down. Saves me ever having to re-read those again!
I was a John Byrne fan for quite a long time, but I always preferred Dave Cockrum's art. Dave said one of the biggest mistakes he ever made was, after he did his FUTURIANS graphic novel (published by Marvel), he took the series to another publisher, which went belly-up, and really screwed any momentum the series might have had.
Of course, Jim Starlin stayed with Marvel, and their creator-owned Epic line... until, according to him, they started being later and later with payments. I always thought it was interesting that he SWITCHED companies, to First (at the time, the most "regular" and dependable of all the smaller "independant" publishers), RIGHT at a tension-filled cliffhanger, as a way of trying to ensure that readers would follow him when he left.Marvel.
"a sneaky way of saying, here, you want to kill Jean...I'll wipe out everyone!"
I never thought of that way, but I can see that. I just read the other day-- I forget who they were talking about-- but someone said that after that story, the entire remainder of X-MEN as a series was just marking time until EVERYBODY would be killed... as if there were no possibility of deviating from that "possible" future. I prefer the thinking in the film TERMINATOR 2, where, about 70% of the way in, the main character realizes that history HAS been changed, and it's up to them to make sure it STAYS that way. (In that case, I just ignore any later sequels... which never should have been made, anyway.)
For the life of me, I just cannot understand why X-MEN has, from the moment Chris Claremont got on it, been so non-stop intense and downbeat. Or why so many other comics decided to follow suit. Or how I ever put up with it that long.
X-MEN #33 / Jun'67 / v.1 by Werner Roth
X-MEN seems to have had more than its share of rejected covers.
X-MEN #33 had 2 different covers rejected. The first was by then-series regular Werner Roth. While I consider Roth's depiction of the characters to be the definitive one (above even Kirby, who created them, and Adams, whose work was a huge inspiration for the 70's revival), he was known more for romance than action.
Gil Kane, a longtime DC mainstay, wound up doing several Marvel covers around this time. AVENGERS #37 (Feb'67) & X-MEN #33 (Jun'67), both books written by Roy Thomas, had Kane's work replacing already-drawn pieces by each book's regular artist (Don Heck & Werner Roth, respectively).
(to be continued)
X-MEN #33 / Jun'67 / v2. by GIL KANE
Kane's X-MEN cover ran into problems. First, several changes were made, including the positions of both hands on both Marvel Girl and Cyclops, Cyclops' eye-beams were added, and a lot of minor rendering lines were added or redrawn on the main figure's hands.
But then, the Comics Code apparently thought the main figure of "The Outcast" was too frightening. So The Outcast was replaced by The Juggernaut (who had been on Roth's cover in the first place). Juggernaut's hands were left unchanged from the previous version. The figures of Marvel Girl & Cyclops were replaced with Iceman and Angel, and their floating heads were replaced with the faces of Cyclops and Marvel Girl-- taken directly from Roth's cover!
Thomas & Kane would go on to collaborate on a wide variety of books, including the creation IRON FIST.
With the Werner Roth cover, I colored the figures first, then, by trial-and-error, designed the background colors for contrast and dynamic effect. I like how the color scheme wound up looking so "pleasant" and "traditional", which was a perfect fit for Roth's art.
For Gil Kane's cover, I started out the same way, but for contrast, my choice of colors, first on "The Outcast" and then on the background, was designed to highlight their otherworldliness and evil, as well as reflect the manic intensity of Kane's art. I didn't even bother trying to make it similar to the published version, and I specifically wanted it to be as "wild" and "demented" as possible. I feel this manages to capture the look of the era (1967 was the "summer of love" and "psychedelia" after all) but also comes close to almost looking like a "black light" poster.
X-MEN #25 / v.1 / by Werner Roth & Dick Ayers
Legend has it editor Stan Lee didn't like covers with heroes facing away from the readers. More recently I've read that he really didn't like heroes whose behinds were facing him... but never mind that.
For this one, I decided to go with the gray background of the published cover, but for the glowing light, I wanted something other than just white & yellow, so I went with yellow & orange instead. While I do think Jack Kirby's published cover was more exciting than this one, it seems a shame for a book's regular artist to get shoved aside for something so trivial. The trend, unfortunately, continued, as over the next couple years Werner Roth would be REPEATEDLY replaced by other artists on the book's interiors, including Jack Sparling, Dan Adkins, Ross Andru, Don Heck, George Tuska, Jim Steranko, Barry Smith, and, untimately, Neal Adams.
It's a hell of a thing when an artist is reduced to being a guest-star on his own book.
X-MEN #10 / v.1 / by Jack Kirby & Chic Stone
Tarzan knock-off were a dime a dozen in the 30's & 40's, even as Superman knock-offs were. Timely / Marvel had their own-- KA-ZAR-- first as a a pulp magazine character, then translated into the comics. 25 years later, a brand-new, totally-unrelated version cropped up in the new "Marvel Universe". Did Martin Goodman request it, to revive and/or protect the name? It seems possible. One thing's for certain, the new character sure seemed more brain-damaged than Johnny Weismuller ever was in his TARZAN movies.
Not sure why this cover was rejected, although perhaps it was a lack of focus. The published version had a much bigger close-up of Ka-Zar, lunging at The Beast while Cyclops once again fired those annoying eye-beams at him.
I really didn't like the gray plants & white sky in the original, so I let my own instincts dictate the color scheme.
This cover, I'm pretty sure, had already turned up on an issue of Chrissie Harper's JACK KIRBY QUARTERLY magazine some years ago. I didn't dig that out for reference, either.
X-MEN 10 / rejected cover / "Ralph Bakshi-Gray Morrow" tribute version
I don't think I've seen that rejected cover before. It's hard to see that it would not have been serviceable. I'd guess Marvel was thinking it might put Ka-Zar into his own feature quickly, Tarzan types being still popular in the period, and wanted a particularly strong cover to give him a good launch. (But in that case, why introduce him in X-Men instead of Fantastic Four? The answer could be that at this stage he was supposed to be a young jungle lord-type, and they were about his age.) An alternative explanation is that Lee was beginning to prefer covers with larger central figures.
On the unused cover the characters aren't fighting effectively; Ka-Zar seems to be swinging past the X-Men and isn't looking at them, Cyclops is apparently trying to blast the vine Ka-Zar is swinging from but has hit it below the hand, the Beast looks like he's fallen over in front of Zabu (although actually he's skimming along on all fours), Iceman hasn't yet thrown his ice chunk, and the Angel isn't flying. On the final cover the characters are clearly focused on each other, and the Ka-Zar figure is larger, dramatically foreshortened and engaged in a more dynamic action (which last may have been what was most wanted). But to my mind the unused cover actually gives you a better idea of who he is.
The "Ralph-Bakshi-Gray Morrow" background effect works quite well. It makes the scene seem more dramatic, and since I know they're supposed to be in Antarctica my eye interprets it as an aurora australis effect.
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