Writing: Mark Waid
Art: Andy Kubert
Note: See X-Men Unlimited #11 next
What Went Down: Jean Grey is out shopping for clothes. She seems to be having difficulty keeping people’s thoughts out of her mind when she is telepathically forced to the astral plane by Onslaught, who now has an actual character design. Onslaught claims that he’s ushering in a flashpoint in human-mutant relations and shows Jean that her body has also disappeared from the store. Many of the people have unflattering thoughts about her. Onslaught appears to destroy the store, but reveals it as an illusion in the next panel.
In New Jersey, the real Beast is being held in a dungeon by the Dark Beast. Beast accidentally breaks his water source, but this reveals a trap door in the floor. Onslaught takes Jean to Graydon Creed’s campaign headquarters to reveal the hypocrisy of humanity. We discover that Creed’s campaign manager doesn’t really care about the anti-mutant cause, but that he is willing to persecute the mutant race just for a chance to get to the White House. Jean tells Onslaught she’s aware of people like this, which is why she surrounds herself with people she can trust.
In Colorado, Psylocke is in bed, still screaming as a result of the shadows around her. From the shadows, the Juggernaut emerges (I believe this is his return from the Malibu Exiles’ universe). Juggy wonders where he is. Strangely, Betsy says she scanned his mind even though his helmet is still on. Juggernaut announces that he knows an important secret, but he can’t remember it, so he destroys the cabin instead. Then he begins his journey to Westchester because he says he can only trust one person with his mind.
Onslaught takes Jean to the X-mansion, where they journey inside Xavier’s mind effortlessly. Onslaught accuses Xavier of being just as big a hypocrite as the rest of the humans. Jean claims they have a special bond, citing the instance in the sixties where Xavier faked his death, but shared his secret with only her. Onslaught shakes her image of Xavier by showing her Xavier’s thoughts from Uncanny X-Men #3 (1963), where a thought balloon actually did mention that Xavier was in love with Jean. Onslaught infers that Xavier just repressed this feeling like every other negative emotion he has. On the astral plane, Onslaught covers Jean in green slime to symbolize all of Xavier’s fears and negative feelings.
Over in South Carolina, Joseph—the de-aged, former Magneto, has stumbled upon a community picnic outside. They seem friendly, but there is a sinister undertone to the whole scene.
Back on the astral plane, Onslaught compares himself to the Phoenix Force and asks Jean to join him. Jean refuses, and they fight. Jean asks who he is, but he tells her that she already knows before soundly defeating her. She reappears in the dressing room at the store, and the final page has an effect of Onslaught’s name being burned onto her head, but this isn’t supposed to be literal.
How It Was: This is our first real look at Onslaught, since the X-staff finally decided on what the heck he actually is. It’s a pretty cool design, and Waid succeeds in making Onslaught appear menacing and calculating. At this point, the villain still feels like he actually has a purpose beyond being evil. Here he’s someone I want to read more about.
Jean Grey is a good choice for him to reveal himself to because she hasn’t really had that much to do since before Age of Apocalypse. This issue is solid, although there are some inconsistencies in the story: we never find out why Jean’s body disappears when she goes to the astral plane, and we don’t know why the racist blond cashier knows that Jean is from the Xavier Institute. Still Onslaught does make an interesting case for the weakness of people by bringing up how what they do and how they feel are often in direct conflict with one and other. Not all his examples are super—I feel like the employees are allowed to assume Jean is a shoplifter if she disappears from the store, but the theme of the story is still solid. Also, I’m not sure what is up with Onslaught’s name being burned into Jean’s head; I think it’s a figurative way of showing how Onslaught messed with her head, possibly also explaining how she starts to forget events later.
And Onslaught also has a good point in bringing up that Xavier is as fallible as anyone else, despite being placed on a pedestal by the X-Men. Once again, while the main idea is intriguing, the examples given are kind of weak. Jean seems convinced that since Xavier told her about his fake death, it doesn’t make him a hypocrite, when really it makes both of them hypocrites for hiding this fact from the rest of their teammates. Waid also digs up an obscure quote from 1963 that paints Xavier in a more lecherous light. Yes, it did happen, but it’s obvious that Stan Lee dropped the concept shortly after because even he realized that it was a little creepy. Plus there are more contemporary examples that could’ve been used instead of dragging out this oddity that really has no bearing on the Professor’s character at all.
The Psylocke/Archangel thread is still a mess, but at least something happens. Juggernaut shows up, appearing from shadows for some reason, and trashes Warren’s cabin for the heck of it, in spite of the fact that he wants help from the X-Men. Worst of all, Warren’s cabin appears perfectly fine in the next issue of Uncanny, even though the entire cabin is clearly totaled in this comic. This whole part really makes no sense whatsoever. As for the Beast, it’s nice to see him alive, but he doesn’t get a whole lot to do other than stumble onto a way out that goes nowhere (plotwise). Joseph shows up just long enough to tease his appearance in X-Men Unlimited, where, in a heck of a coincidence, he meets up with Rogue, who just happens to be in the same small town in South Carolina as he is.
The main ideas in this issue work really well, and Onslaught is just new enough to seem novel. It’s just in the little details and subplots where the issue drops the ball. It’s nice that Waid is trying to make use of continuity, but by picking something that so few writers have chosen to acknowledge, the reveal doesn’t really carry as much weight; his experiences with Amelia Voght would have fit in nicely. Still, this is the best that Onslaught ever comes off, so that is an accomplishment in it of itself.
B
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