Writing: Scott Lobdell
Art: Jim Craig
What Went Down: This issue’s installment focuses on Beast and Storm, who have been sent to Muir Isle to retrieve antivirus software for Cerebro (remember, this is the early 90s, so you can’t just run to Best Buy to pick up some Norton). Moira MacTaggert greets them and gives the X-Men a tour of the complex. Unfortunately, someone has deactivated the Intruder Alert, but one would think that someone would see the screen warning about the deactivation and try to do something about it.
Back at the mansion, Jubilee and Gambit are cleaning up the hanger after it got wrecked in issue number two. This is the part of the story that clumsily recaps both previous issues.
Over on the Isle, Moira has disappeared for the rest of the issue, leaving Storm and Beast to wander the facility. They stumble upon Unuscione, one of the Acolytes who has been captured and is being rehabilitated at the center. They all take the time to debate Magneto and Xavier’s philosophies before Magneto bursts in to rescue her. Magneto flings Beast out of the way, but the X-Man discovers something off panel that will help him defeat the villain. Meanwhile Storm and Magneto trade blasts before Magneto uses his powers to trap Storm in a bubble of metal, causing her claustrophobia to act up.
Beast jumps in with an electro-magnetic disrupter (basically a magic defeat-Magneto gun) and attacks Magneto, freeing Storm in the process. With Magneto on the ropes, Unuscione convinces her master that she is not worth his sacrifice, and that he can rescue her another day. Magneto escapes, and the X-Men fly back to the mansion, once again wondering about the identity of their saboteur. The bald, but shadowed character once again ends the issue by monitoring the team on screens and saying something cryptic.
How It Was: As usual, a pretty mixed bag. Since it’s designed for kids, the writing is still a little shallow, but there are still some cool moments that a fan might appreciate. One of the big problems is that while the first two issues featured X-Men that have a significantly established relationship (Gambit and Rogue, Wolverine and Jubilee), this one just throws together Beast and Storm because the writer has to spotlight every member. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing; it’s just that there is no real chemistry between the characters. Also it is contrived that the Beast ends the issue by inventing a gun that stops Magneto, instead of coming up with a more creative way to defeat the villain. Probably the biggest problem with the story is that each issue is supposed to create an artificially made challenge for the heroes outside of the attacking villain. Since Magneto is the only threat in issue three, this completely contradicts the ending (which I will discuss more next post).
As for the good, the Magneto fight is much better than the Sauron/Sabretooth fight because the characters can actually use their powers without breaking any comics code rules about violence. Magneto is actually very well characterized and in a nice touch, the script acknowledges his tenure as a member of the X-Men. As I said before, this story would have to take place in the middle of Fatal Attractions to fit into continuity, which is highly unlikely, but it could be done. Oh, and once again the guest star (Moira) disappears from the story when the artist decides that he is sick of drawing her and the writer doesn’t feel like coming up with anything for her to do.
While the plot of this issue is nothing special, this is probably the nicest looking fight of the whole series. Craig manages to portray Storm and Magneto flinging impressive amounts of energy back and forth, and his depiction of Magneto escaping in his bubble is really neat with the reds and yellows contrasting. Basically this issue is a really cool fight scene with an abrupt and unnatural ending.
C+
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