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Marvel July 1965 part 2
Andrew Parker
Colton Bennett
Jordan Russell
Asher Morales
Aaron Garcia
Michael Myers
Chase Parker
Henry Foster
Christian Wood
Dominic Barnes
Aaron Hughes
Austin Flores
Jackson Ramirez
Caleb Cook
Ethan Long
Brody Ross
David Williams
Jonathan Roberts
Jaxson Peterson
Adrian Rodriguez
Noah Wood
Nathan Peterson
Grayson Cook
Dominic Thompson
Hudson Reyes
Logan Taylor
Oliver Garcia
Adrian Hernandez
Aiden Bell
Joseph Parker
Nathaniel Harris
Wyatt Gray
Cooper Collins
Nathaniel King
Jayden Rogers
Carter Ward
Jaxon Hall
Cooper Anderson
Gavin Moore
Jayden Clark
Caleb Bennett
Brayden White
David Nguyen
Julian Reyes
Brandon Gonzalez
Josiah Torres
Leo Long
James Brown
Camden Adams
Nathaniel Rivera
Chase Allen
As always, Silver Age X-Men will be accompanied by commnetary from now-defunct review blog The X-Axis.
David Campbell
>This is quite an important one - not only does it introduce the Juggernaut, who goes on to become an X-Man himself in forty years time, but it sets out a large chunk of Charles Xavier's back story. Deep breath...
Adam Gutierrez
Eli Gray
>Marvel Girl's power is described as "teleportation" again.
>The X-Men fortify the school - from scratch - in five minutes.
Camden Phillips
>This is the first issue to give Xavier's first name. (Thanks to Jason Powell for reminding me about this, after I completely missed it the first time round...)
>Charles Xavier's parents, Brian and Sharon, are introduced. (Well, strictly speaking, we never see Brian. But he's spoken about.) Brian was a scientist working at Alamagordo, New Mexico alongside Kurt Marko. He was killed in an atomic blast, which Kurt conveniently escaped.
>Kurt, clearly a man of taste and decency, seizes on the opportunity of marrying Sharon and getting hold of the Xavier family fortune, and makes a move on her at Brian's funeral. After a few months, Sharon lets him move into the mansion.
Gabriel Mitchell
>Kurt's son Cain shows up as well, after being expelled from boarding school. Cain, of course, is an asshole ("an aura of sheer cruelty and thinly disguised evil", in Silver Age terms), and Kurt is abusive.
>Little Charles Xavier wears a suit around the house.
Mason Russell
Cooper Russell
>Sharon, according to this story, dies broken-hearted. There's a later flashback in issue #309 that suggests she'd turned to drink by this point, which doesn't seem entirely unreasonable.
>Cain tried to blackmail Kurt with the (apparently false) allegaiton that Kurt murdered Brian.
Ayden Ward
>The mansion is set on fire in the ensuing fight, and Kurt is killed while saving Charles and Cain. On his deathbed, Kurt later insists that Brian really did die in an accident; however, Kurt could have saved him, but didn't.
Kurt Marko knew that Charles had superpowers before Charles himself. At the very least, that suggests that somebody had been doing tests on Xavier and had their suspicions.
Cameron Wood
Owen Fisher
>Xavier's powers emerged soon after Kurt died. Xavier attributes his powers to his parents' radiation exposure.
>Xavier was a star quarterback at school. Now there's a miniseries dying to be written...
Tyler Gray
Alexander Clark
Parker Gray
>Xavier survived a car crash by "harnessing my brain power to its fullest extent" and "creating a mental shield around me." That'd be telekinesis, then. Which isn't his power.
Brandon Thompson
Nathaniel Howard
>Xavier and Cain Marko served together in the Korean War. Obviously this now causes chronological difficulties. Recent flashbacks in Chris Claremont's stories seem to be trying to relocate their war service to Vietnam. Moving it any further forward than that would create other problems, because Xavier was drafted into the military (an essential plot point in breaking up his relationship with Moira MacTaggert). At the time this story was published, the Korean War was relatively recent; this part of Xavier's life seems to be receding ever further into the distance with the passage of time.
Cain deserted under fire and Xavier gave chase. They discovered the "sacred lost temple of Cyttorak", where Cain touched the Cyttorak Ruby and became the Juggernaut.
Jordan Bailey
>Not that it did him much good, because the mountain promptly fell on him. Xavier decided to just leave him there. Cain spends the following years trying to dig himself out.
Brayden Fisher
Zachary Edwards
>Cyttorak had been mentioned before (in Strange Tales vol 1 #124), but he doesn't actually show up in person until Dr Strange vol 3 #44.
Jordan Davis
Gabriel Collins
Hudson Harris
>This is one of the first issues to lay down large chunks of back story that actually stuck for decades to come. The background of Xavier's parents and the Alamagordo test site have been tinkered with by later writers, but it really remains much as you see here.
Nathaniel Rogers
>The story's based around alternating between the unseen Juggernaut ploughing through the X-Men's obstacles, and Xavier recapping the history, with a big reveal at the end. Shame they put the Juggernaut on the cover, really, because he looks a lot more impressive there than he does on the final page. Starting with this issue, Jack Kirby only provides breakdown pencils for the rest of his run. The rest of the art on this issue comes from Alex Toth and Vince Colletta, and to be honest, it's not fantastic. It looks rather muddy, not least because of all the contortions they have to go through to avoid showing the Juggernaut clearly for most of the issue.
Cameron Price
>Still, the story does a good job of establishing the Juggernaut as a villain. It hammers the point a bit, but we're certainly left in no doubt that this guy is Very Powerful Indeed.
Well, I'm done for today. More Silver Age tomorrow, knock on wood, as well as the usual stuff.
Carson Miller