What Savage Land

Uncanny X-Men #10 – By Stan Lee and Jack Kirby

After many cross-overs and guest appearances, Stan Lee actually pushes out the borders of the Marvel Universe with this issue of X-Men by introducing Ka-Zar and his pre-historic world. Eventually, this world hidden under the Antarctic ice will be known as the Savage Land, but it is not named in this issue. This “new world” is destined to become an important place in the universe and will be visited by many heroes and villains outside of the X-Men, but they will always have ties here.

The Savage Land, and Ka-Zar himself, are really just Stan Lee’s riffs on the Edgar Rice Burroughs creations of Tarzan and Pellucidar. And of course, Burroughs owes his own inspiration to Jules Verne’s Journey to the Center of the Earth! In Burroughs’ books, Pellucidar is a world inside a hollowed-out earth with a tiny sun at the center and populated by all manner of primitive creatures and dinosaurs. While we’re not given exact descriptions of the Savage Land here, we know that it’s under the Antarctic, has a high enough “ceiling” to allow the Angel to fly and mountain ranges to exist, and has a similar population to that of Pellucidar. Also, Burroughs published his final Pellucidar story, Savage Pellucidar in 1963. I’m guessing Stan Lee was a fan.

Ka-Zar himself exhibits many of the traits of Tarzan as well. From the simple loincloth, to the broken English speech patterns, to the animal companion (this time, a sabertooth tiger), Ka-Zar is definitely the Marvel Universe’s answer to Burrough’s creation. Nothing beyond his name and some of his abilities are revealed in this issue, but there are many more aspects of the Tarzan character that Ka-Zar will adopt in the future. I’ll save those for another day, and focus more on the story and the importance of this expansion of the universe.

For me, this story was a breath of fresh air for the series. We finally see Lee breaking new ground (literally!) here and taking the X-Men beyond evil mutants and establishing their place in the world. This story is a wild romp that does the Burroughs tradition proud – all the staples are in place! Angel gets immediately and unexpectedly attacked by pterodactyls; Marvel Girl gets captured by savages and subsequently offered as a sacrifice (along with Angel) to a Tyrannosaurus Rex; Ka-Zar roars to call up a herd of mastodons to break through a wall; and just the image of the “swamp men” riding feral sorts of Ostriches was a lot of fun!

There’s nothing ground-breaking or original in the story, and we know Lee lifted Ka-Zar and his new world from Burroughs, but by adding this type of place to the universe is very important and opens up all sorts of future adventures for all of Marvel’s heroes. All Marvel characters will end up visiting the Savage Land for one reason or another, and that introduces more readers to the concepts that Burroughs created. While new readers may not have read the Burroughs originals, it exposes them to this type of world and maybe they’ll seek those stories out. I’ve never actually read a Tarzan novel…maybe I’ll pick one up.

What amounts to one short adventure for the X-Men, becomes a significant moment in the growth of the young Marvel Universe.

Note: This issue was reprinted in February, 1995 as X-Men: The Early Years #10. Cover by Lee Weeks.

Professor Xavier and the X-Men #11 – by Jorge Gonzalez and Nick Gnazzo

Again, 90’s audiences were treated to a somewhat lack-luster retelling of the original tale. This time, Gonzalez chose to tell the story from the viewpoint of the Angel. While this really adds nothing to the main story, it plays up the romance in the X-Men by giving Warren Worthington his chance at making a play for the lovely Jean Grey, Marvel Girl.

In the original, the romance is limited to three or four panels – mostly thought balloons from Jean and Scott and how they are attracted to each other, but it’s up to Scott to do something about it. In this version, the romance takes up several pages and includes a moment where Warren attempts to kiss Jean – only to be interrupted by rampaging Ape-men! Warren feels that Scott, through his inaction, is welcoming anyone else to step up and claim Jean’s affections. But by the end of the story, after seeing Scott’s worry and concern when Jean is captured, Warren decides to back off and let Scott realize he’s in love with Jean. He even gets the opportunity to express this to Jean directly in a nice scene at the end of the issue.

I applaud Gonzalez’s use of a main narrator in each issue. I think it does make the story a little more interesting and gives us some insight into that character. He does a nice job making the choice for each story’s “voice” and relates that character well to the stories. This is probably the best part in these re-imaginings. Unfortunately, it often costs some elements from the original story to work this narration, or the additional scenes in.

I’m not as interested in Nick Gnazzo’s artwork. Now I realize I’m comparing him to Jack Kirby and that may be unfair, but Gnazzo must have never looked at Kirby’s original panels. Gnazzo’s art lacks the impact and perspective of Kirby’s and often leaves us with a very plain method of story-telling. His characters are done in the broad 90’s style, but the panel layout is often dull or just a standard third party view of the proceedings. The Kirby stuff is definitely more fun to look at.

Even Ka-Zar and the Savage Land aren’t as interesting here. Ka-Zar is closer to the version we’re familiar with in the 90’s – less broken English, not threatened by the X-Men and ready to help out. The panels depicting the rest of the world down there don’t show anything special or dramatic – in the original, we were treated to dark forests, deep ravines, tall mountains and forbidding primitive cities. Everything here is just ordinary.

If a reader were seeking out Ka-Zar’s first appearance, this would recount that story, but I would highly recommend they seek out a direct reprinting of the Lee/Kirby original.

Up Next: Uncanny X-Men #11 and Professor Xavier and the X-Men #15