babbling_bookends

X-Men (1963) #3-4 - Stan Lee/Jack Kirby

Issue #3 introduces the Blob. Professor X detects a new mutant with his mental powers - Cerebro is not a thing yet - and sends his students to the city in search of him.

Cyclops is the one to find the Blob. He's in the circus and his act consists of staying in the same place while audience volunteers try to move him. His mutant power is that he can't be moved if he doesn't wish to.

Blob agrees to make a demonstration at the Mansion, but he's not interested in becoming a X-Men or a force for good.

Instead, armed with the knowledge that he is Homo superior, Blob takes over the circus and directs his new underlings to attack the Mansion.

The X-Men mount a defence, while Xavier works on a machine that'll augment his mental powers. This way, he can make everyone forget about the X-Men - early Professor X isn't too concerned about the ethics of telepathy.

In the end, the X-Men succeed and the Blob returns to his regular circus life.

Issue #4 introduces the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants. Brought together by Magneto, they are: Mastermind, who creates hypnotic illusions; Quicksilver, a speedster; Scarlet Witch, a sorceress (well, she points her finger and things happen); and Toad, he… crouches like a toad. He’s also a sycophantic snitch.

While Mastermind and Toad are in the group because they align with Magneto’s take-over-the-world ideals, Wanda is there because she feels she owns Magneto a debt - he rescued her from a mob - and Pietro is only sticking around to look after his sister.

Magneto’s plan consists on stealing a battle ship and stage an invasion of the Central America nation of Santo Marco, using Mastermind’s illusions. Once Magneto is established as the Country’s ruler, he gets a real army and imposes his own tyrannical rule. Also, everyone refers to him as Leader…

Xavier confronts Magneto on the mental plane and reasserts his conviction that they should work together with humans and bring about a golden age. When Magneto, in turn, reasserts that humans are meant to be slaves and are not worthy of sharing dominion of Earth with the mutants, Xavier declares war.

He travels with the X-Men to Santo Marco and sends them to invade Magneto’s headquarters, which X-Man by a different route. They make it inside, after a couple of setbacks, and Magneto decides to set a trap, using two bombs.

The smaller one is meant to destroy the X-Men when they come after him. The bigger one is a nuclear bomb that will destroy the entire country, as the Brotherhood makes their escape. However, Quicksilver can’t let that happen and disarms the bomb, although he still believes his place is with the Brotherhood, calling the X-Men betrayers of Homo Superior.

Unfortunately, Professor X is also out of action - he jumped in front of the smaller bomb to protect his students and the impact deadened his mental powers.

Random Stuff

I think the original uniforms are cute. Except Iceman - he’s just a blob of snow with boots.

Everyone wants to team-up with Jean to go in search of the new mutant (even Professor Xavier 🤮), but she asks Scott to go with her. However, Warren decides to grab her and drives off with Jean.

It’s not exactly clear what’s going on with Cyclops power beam. He wears his glasses all the time and worries about loosing control, but he also uses the beam at full strength one time and exhausts its power.