It's amazing--but I remember that final unused Jim Lee piece of artwork--because I had a t-shirt with the image on it. There was a matching image done by Whilce Portacio featuring the rest of X-Factor with Colossus and Gambit if I'm not mistaken--with Charles Xavier's head in the background like Magneto's.

Can we have a scan? Or a link?

Thats interesting. But No Jim Lee himself said that in the 90's as we all know was more about bright colors. Just compare Jim Lee X-MEN #1 to Morrisons New X-Men (Where everyone wore Black Leather Uniforms).

Jim Lee also confirmed it by saying that he now draws a much more darker tone in the 2000's then in the 90's; like in Hush etc. He is also more detailed in his drawing now. I too love his older 90's stuff where everything was more cartoony and yes the 90's stuff still stands up until today. But Lee and other artists currently have more hyper realism and darker more detailed looks that is all around better art than the cartoony bright colored big muscled gun carrying 90'S!!!

Not that mind control is a bad story, but Claremont overused it.

A. it was unreadable and B. this was not the title it used to be and these characters have no feeling to me.

I didn't pick the title up again until Morrison came aboard. Except for the Morrison run, the franchise and characters completely ceased to get me to shell out my money. I dumped the entire mutant universe and most of Marvel at that point. Slowly under Quesada I've come back to Marvel but not the mutants. Too much backstory and history that doesn't make sense to me. It saved me tons of money that I redirected to other places, mostly DC, Vertigo and Valiant at the time.

I can go to Ultimate for a dose of mutant action. At least that's self contained like the old days were.

Plus, the issues 201-275, while certainly weaker, along with stories like the Brood Saga, were far more character driven because the X-Men had to decide the course themselves. In the Lobdell era (even for those disgusted by it), the X-Men seemed more adult without Xavier thanks to the Onslaught debacle, and again after he leaves the school in the trusted hands of Scott, Emma and Jean.

Scott Summers is the one who made the dream work. He should be in command. Xavier is his mentor, but his ideas seem proven outclassed.

I remember the following stories after Claremont left with the whole Wolvie-Sabretooth-Maverick as spies thing and the X-Men playing basketball and those were the most commercial, most shallow stories I had ever seen. These seemed more like pin-ups of stupid artists trying to draw "cool things" done like tv commercials. Jim Lee should have been ashamed of himself. No wonder Wildcats was so one dimensional and underwhelming.

The X-Men died when Claremont left.

By the way, Brian, I'm continuing to read your book, but limiting myself to a few pages at a time because I don't want to get through it too quickly. About my only complaint is that you didn't set each new section up with an "urban legend" that you could then refute or confirm. I really think the book would read better if you had (keep that in mind for the sequel!)

That's actually an interesting jumping off point, when you consider the fact that the whole "bring Jean back, have Cyclops run off to join X-Factor, abandoning Maddie in the process" was something Chris has absolutely no influence over, and it completely ran counter to his plans for the characters. The whole "Maddie-as-Jean-clone" seemed to grow out of that just to give her something to do, and make Cyclops seem like slightly less of a dick for walking out on her (and his kid).

As far as I know, that's about the first point I can think of where executive meddling really derailed his plans (other than the Jean-must-die element of the Dark Phoenix Saga, but Chris has definitely embraced that idea after the fact). If he's going to write a book where he retroactively does everything the way he would have done it if he had full power over the characters, it might be interesting to go back to that point and have Cyclops and Maddie (as a normal woman) off in Alaska and never have Jean come back.

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>>> I mean, come on, imagine if you lived with your parents until you were in your 30’s or 40’s and depended on them to be your mentors. How much would that suck?

Realistically, though, except in fairly dysfunctional families, it's not like the parents fall off the face of the Earth or otherwise die as soon as the adult hits their 30's. If anything, there's absolutely a stage where the parents stick around to give advice when necessary and to spoil the grandkids. Sure, they step back from an active role, but they also remain mentor-figures, even if only part-time. So yes, it would suck if the 40-year old is still living at home and relying on mom and dad for everything, but at the same time, the perfect solution isn't for them to move thousands of miles away and never speak to their parents again in a desperate bid for independence.

If we're going to use the average life experience as a metaphor for X-Men history, a better scenario might be one where Xavier ceases to be "the Professor" and becomes more of "the Administrator". Handling sort of the more boring details, devoting more of his time to personal research, political action, maybe even developing something resembling a personal life. Basically, still being part of the school, yet mostly removing himself from day-to-day activities (and the activities of the X-Men), and letting his old students basically mature into their roles as his replacements (as teachers, leaders, and activists). He'd be the Dean of Students that the new class never really sees all that much, and the mentor to his now-adult students who are more than capable of standing on their own, but might occasionally want to ask the old guy for advice. Not leaning on him or absolutely relying on him, but interacting with him on a much more equal basis.

Now, now. Be fair. Image also had clones of Hulk, Avengers, Captain America, and Batman when they started. They weren't all X-men clones.

Theno

It's funny you mention that era where you lost interest, because issue 180 was the first time I remember thinking: "wow, I'm not liking this as much". I remember specifically being annoyed we were getting sidetracked into a New Mutants crossover when I wanted to read about the X-men (not realizing we were at the tip of the crossover iceberg). I still stuck with it all the way through 250, but apart from a few interesting stories, by and large it never had the same magic. Today when I think of my favorite series growing up, the X-men, I think of the "last" issue as the Scott/Maddie wedding.

All of which is to say, no, I don't think you should regret a thing.

Case settled. Xavier's gotta go, and the students then become the teachers, something that Morrison and others have shown quite well.

And, Silo, as for Wolverine, didn't you read the Jason Aaron story in Wolverine #73 entitled "A Day in the LIfe"? It was awesome. Sure, Wolverine's in these different books because he sells books, but this story shows how excellently integrated he has made his roles on teams into his daily schedule. It goes through about a month of his life, with a panel or even a couple in some situations showing a snapshot of what a day in his life is like: one day in NYC fighting with the New Avengers, one day in San Fran with the X-Men, one day taking care of his own business (for his own title), one day maybe taking out some hardcore X-Force business, and mixing up the other two days to overlap into any of those adventures when he's in that part of the country/world. And, of course, every Saturday he picks one of his old-school haunts to get hammered. It was great. Read it.