Adam X “the Extreme”? Dude, Do the Dew.

As for the Gambit relation to the Summers family, in the “X-Men the End” alternate reality he wasn’t technically their brother, he was a clone of Sinister spliced with Summers DNA (like the South Park where they splice an elephant with a pig, or tried to…) Also, unless they have retconned or given new specifics I am unaware of, Gambit has been revealed to be the product of a yet another top-secret genetic-engineering project in which Sinister played some role, so the Gambit origin given in “The End” could be valid in the 616 reality as well, although I’m sure something much more convoluted will come along. Yet the Gambit Summers connection makes some sense, as he and Cyclops have the same eyes (most of the time, as far as I recall, Cyclops’ eyes are drawn as black with red pupils) and his powers are similar to to those of the 3 confirmed Summers brothers.

And just because they get so much bad press… the EARLY 90s X-Men books were awesome. Uncanny X-Men 273-277 is still one of my all time favorite super hero stories EVER and at least shouldn’t be lumped in with the (much deserved) ire for the literary abortions that came in the later part of the decade. The period between X-Tinction Agenda and X-cutioners Song was what hooked me on comics so I’m biased, but still think a majority of the X-books from then were a lot of fun. I will admit that things got so bad after the Age of Apocalypse story that I quit super hero comics for several years and didn’t come back until around the Grant Morrison run, but hey, it got me to read Vertigo and the Sandman series so I guess it was for the best.

While it may not have been in the Comics Code, it would make sense if writers were gently discouraged from using “Clint” or “flick” just to be safe.

A few years ago on Scans Daily, someone posted a panel where Captain America greets Hawkeye, saying “Clint! Nice belt buckle!” and the computer lettering was a little too condensed…

I know I’m coming to this conversation late, but that was actually the Shi’ar villain Eric the Red (well, one of the several characters who used that name/identity) that X-Treme was fighting, and I believe that battle actually happened (later) in the Captain Marvel miniseries mentioned in this column. I’m a big Fabian Nicieza fan, but I’ve only tracked down a couple of the Captain Marvel issues, so I’m not POSITIVE the Adam-X/Eric the Red fight happened there, but since both characters are in the series, it seems like a safe assumption. Anybody out there know for sure?

I just looked all of those issues up on the Grand Comic-Book Database, and it looks like the Captain Marvel series (late ’95/early ’96) came out almost a year after “Legion Quest” (late ’94/early ’95), but given that Nicieza wrote both books (well, the adjectiveless X-Men issues of “Legion Quest,” at least), I guess Nicieza was just giving us a preview of something he was planning on writing later. (And it looks like the X-Treme/Eric the Red battle probably happened in Captain Marvel #3.)

And since the Adam-X/Phillips Summers issue of X-Men (#39) was in the issue right before “Legion Quest” (X-Men #40 & #41, etc.), I guess it makes some kind of sense that they would show us where Adam-X was at that point—especially if Nicieza was planning on making him a major player in the X-universe (which is what it looks like the plan was). Too bad Nicieza got kicked off of both X-Force and X-Men pretty quickly thereafter. Oh, the horrors that were Loeb’s X-Force run and then Lobdell X-Men twice a month . . .

Adam X the Xtreme, I actually thought he was cool at that time…. man, was I young and stupid.

1) Peter David wrote about the “flick/Clint” thing in his BUT I DIGRESS column (from May 22, 1992):

http://www.peterdavid.net/index.php/2009/05/01/bleepin-comics/#more-2590

This was the first I heard about it. The fact that DC almost simultaneous came out with comics featuring a new Green Lantern villain named Flicker was rather amusing.

2) Hawkeye not revealing his identity: To the best of my recollection, he was not captured following his three fights with Iron Man in TALES OF SUSPENSE. As far as his identity goes – Iron Man and Thor’s identities (Thor was Don Blake at the time, as he is again now) were not revealed to the team until sometime around AVENGERS #214. Even then, the revelation wasn’t voluntary.

I snickered, but it certainly doesn’t seem to have been policy at early Marvel to avoid “FLICK”.

It’s been a looooooong time since I read those particular issues and I don’t have the Essential collection to refer to on hand, but I believe that Iron Man vouchsafed for Hawkeye/Goliath and that convinced Cap to let him in without him having to give his real name. If I am wrong, please feel free to correct me.

Btw, I did a little searching, and the panel of the Avengers comic above comes from issue #64 of the original series. which would be in Essential Avengers Vol. 3, if anyone cares to know.

In fact, ten years or so ago, Carmine Infantino did an interview for COMIC BOOK ARTIST (I believe it was) in which he recalled Dick Giordano, newly-installed as an editor at DC in the late 60s, making a special point of using FLICK in one of his stories. Infantino, then the Editorial Director, believed that Giordano did this intentionally, knowing that the print would doubtless blur together just enough to ‘inadvertantly’ be a Code violation, and give readers a little snicker. Indeed, based on what Carmine said in the interview, this seemed to be one of the incidents which soured the relationship between the two men, and led to Giordano leaving his editorial position and working as a freelance artist for a number of years.

Especially considering the connection between corn and, well, you know…

The Peter David column about Clint Flicker is online. By a weird coincidence, I just read it last week. Just type ‘Peter David But I Digress’ into the search.

I had to read it a few times over to realize he didn’t say “And why that corny Spider-Man sh*t?”

Vol. 7.

Thanks!

I’ll check it out!

The fact that Clint Barton (Hwakeye) had a criminal past was probably one reason why he didn’t want to reveal his name to the other Avengers. I believe there was a lot of mistrust regarding that version of the Avengers to begin with, so the issue of sharing real (civilian identity) names probably never came up…

I understand why HAWKEYE wouldn’t want to bring it up, what I don’t get is why Cap and the others would accept that. I’d think his criminal past would demand an extra act of good faith like revealing his identity or there’d be no deal.

Well, I’m not sure what kind of incestuous gay relationship that would’ve implied in your mind, considering the panel shown above, but I don’t think anyone wants to re-open that can of worms.

If you think Clint’s name-reval delay was bad, Rogue’s real name was unknown for over 20 years!

That’s the Claremont X-Men though, that doesn’t count. When it comes on to holding onto secrets outrageously past their shelf life there’s nothing like Claremont’s X-Men!

Vol. 7.