Ahh, Brotherhood

Uncanny X-Men #4 - By Stan Lee and Jack Kirby

First off, I LOVE the splash page of this issue! I was excited just by that alone. It's a great Kirby image of the Danger Room in full action. The Beast is bounding through pneumatic boxing gloves while dodging arrows over bursts of flame and other obstacles on the ground below! And the other students and Professor X hover in the background watching. Priceless! I look forward to the Danger Room sequences each issue. Makes me sorry they went away from that formula sometimes. Of course, by the time they change, I might be sick of it too, but usually there are better uses of powers there then in the main story!

The sequence goes on as other students have a try at the obstacles and ends with Professor X presenting the kids with a cake celebrating one year of school. Wow how time flies! Cyclops even uses his eye-beams to cut Jean a nice big piece of cake. No need to worry where his hands have been!

The story then switches over to the antagonists and the first time we see the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants, whose esteemed members include Toad, Mastermind, Quicksilver and the Scarlet Witch (dressed in green on the cover for some reason). These guys are NOT the nice, wholesome family that the X-Men are. The in-fighting and one-upsmanship are the order of the day for Toad and Mastermind, and the Scarlet Witch is being forced into the organization. When Magneto arrives, he reveals that he rescued the Witch from pitchfork wielding locals, so she owes him her life. A debt he will not let her escape.

I never knew the Scarlet Witch's name actually had a meaning. I just figured she had "hex" powers and dressed in red - good enough, right? The truth is revealed in the flashback sequence. She was going to be hung as a witch by ignorant villagers, and she was called "scarlet" as in a woman of questionable morals. Apparently, she has taken the name to remind her why she is who and where she is now and she wears it like Hester from The Scarlet Letter. I never realized there was a connection to the literary piece. Stan Lee continues to impress me.

The Toad really amused me in this issue - he's just such a "toadie." When arguing with Mastermind he uses the threat of Magneto to defend himself, and once Magneto returns, the Toad just tells on everyone else like a third grade Hall Monitor. There's a lot of Renfield and Peter Lorre in him. Definitely my favorite character in this issue.

The future for Quicksilver and the Scarlet Witch is really telegraphed. When Magneto announces he's going to escape his captured nation of Santa Marco and leave behind a nuclear bomb to destroy the country, neither sibling is happy. The Scarlet Witch resigns herself to the fate of the nation, but Quicksilver decides he can't let it happen and rushes back to defuse the bomb before even the X-Men can get to it. As a reader, I began to wonder how long the two could stay part of this organization.

Not a lot of development for our heroes in this issue. It's actually a pretty standard story in which the X-Men are mostly defeated by the villains. Magneto and the Brotherhood escape as Professor Xavier is caught in the blast of a smaller bomb meant to eliminate him and his team. At the end of the story, the Professor is left power-less after the blast and the X-Men are faced with the possibility of facing their mission without the Professor's power to back them up. This becomes the first real "cliffhanger" of the series.

This issue was interesting more for characters and characterization then actual plot line. The new Brotherhood of Evil Mutants were fun characters who had interesting interactions with each other and the X-Men. Very nice to see the villains getting some character and becoming fleshed-out like the heroes. It will be interesting to see where Magneto and his posse go next.

But story wasn't the only strong point here. I also have to say there are a few panels - including the splash page - where Kirby's art really shines here. Lots of the typical Kirby-esque technology, a great couple of panels featuring the mental projections of Xavier and Magneto and an entire page of Cyclops using his powers against the Brotherhood. It's really nice to see Kirby cut loose like that and just show us the power of his imagery.

Note: This issue was reprinted in August, 1994 as X-Men: The Early Years #4. Cover by Ken Lashley.

Professor Xavier and the X-Men #4 - By Fabian Nicieza and Jan Duursema

It can only be said that this story hardly resembles the original. It focuses mostly on Quicksilver and the Scarlet Witch and adds quite a bit to their story, but also adds pieces in for Xavier and Magneto. In fact, the X-Men don't even really appear at all, except for Jean Gray at the very end.

The story opens at an unknown point in the past where Professor Xavier offered Quicksilver and the Scarlet Witch a place at his school. He gives them a brief explanation of mutants and the purpose of his school. Quicksilver - always the arrogant one - denies his need for more training as he zips off in mid-conversation to rescue the most accident-prone girl in all Europe (she has to be rescued again later and it's implied she needs to be rescued constantly - a nice piece of humor in a rather dark issue. Pietro (Quicksilver) turns Xavier down on both their behalf, and Xavier leaves disappointed.

The next scene brings Xavier to the facility run by Moira MacTaggert - Muir Island. I realize that Moira should be part of Xavier's life at this time and before, but this is really a nod to fans from the 90's who were reading these books instead of really adding anything to the story. She provides a nice sounding board for Xavier to air his concerns about missing out on the Maximoffs and his concern they will be recruited by Magneto. In the current state of the original series, Xavier doesn't have this type of a confidante so it was a clever way to provide this based on X-Men history. As part of their discussion, they bring up other mutants from around the world who happen to be Colossus, Nightcrawler and Storm. Really just more fodder for the "modern" fans.

In this issue, we see the events that led Quicksilver and the Scarlet Witch to Magneto. This time again, they save the little girl , and Wanda uses her powers and the village calls her a witch. They call her 'scarlet' this time based on the color of her hair, and Quicksilver does most of the rescuing. Magneto steps in at the end and literally drives off the townsfolk using his powers. His appearance is a full-page splash done very well by Duursema.

We do finally get to meet the Toad and Mastermind, but again, their scenes are very reduced in favor of the drama surrounding Quicksilver and the Scarlett Witch. Duursema draws a great Toad, but Nicieza writes him more slimy and lascivious then the original interpretation.

One of the biggest surprises is that we get a pseudo-origin of Magneto in this issue. After his telepathic conversation with Xavier, Quicksilver overhears part of it as it was spoken aloud. Magneto tells him a story of how he was unable to save his young daughter from a fire. While cradling her dead body in his arms, he says his magnetic powers "exploded out of him" and caused further devastation - so much that his wife, Magda, left him.

I never heard any part of this story before. This might all be part of the 90s history stuff that I missed, or is it simply a misdirection so as not to reveal that Pietro and Wanda are his children? The latter fact is implied many times throughout the issue, but its never confirmed. Now, I'm curious to see where this story goes and how it will fit in other issues down the line.

This issue actually ends with Magneto and the Brotherhood attacking San Marco - which was a major focus of the original story. The events never actually are shown in this issue and the Professor does NOT end up powerless at the end. So, it seems these two series are diverging a little at this point. I'll have to see how it works out in the next issue.

Overall, I actually enjoyed this issue. I found the things Nicieza did were interesting and a nice look at Xavier's tactics vs. Magneto's, and it gave us a nice understanding of the young Quicksilver and Scarlet Witch. I'm very curious about how Magneto's revelations will play out in the future.

Up Next: Professor Xavier and the X-Men #5