The Uncanny X-Men:
The Uncanny X-Men, and itīs multitude of spinoffs, is a monthly comic book published by Marvel Comics. The first issue came out in september 1963 and featured something not previously seen in the comic-book world; mutants.
It was acclaimed creator Stan Lee who first thought up the concept of mutancy as a source of superhuman power. Inspired, if thatīs the word, by the Cuba Crisis and ponderings upon the effect nuclear falllout would have on the human organism, Lee, together with longtime comic-book artist, friend and co-worker Jack Kirby created the comic-book known as the X-Men. The book was originally proposed to be named "the Mutants", but that was rejected on the grounds that nobody would know what a mutant was. One cannnot help but wonder how people was supposed to know what an X-Man was. The name was supposedly derived from the scource of the superhuman powers the wonderous atomic freaks exhibited, i.e the so-called "X"-gene, X standing for the unknown. According to another version, the "X" derived from the "X-tra" powers the X-Men possessed. Yet another theory, this one more obvious but perhaps less romantic, was that the name came from the initial of the last name of the X-Menīs founder who was called Xaiver. The first five X-Men were, in order of apparance and, as it were originally said but later proven false, in order of recruiting into the team; Scott Summers, codenamed Cyclops, the leader, a shy orphan who were cursed with "optic blasts", ruby-red beams of pure concussive force that constantly spurted from his eyes and could be contained only by a ruby-quartz visor that he had to wear night and day. Ice Man, Robert "Bobby" Drake, the youngest member, reported to be sixteen, who could turn into a human snowman. He had the token role of class clown.
Next came the high-flying Angel, Warren Worthington the III, born the son of a rich millionarie, he discovered that he was growing wings that enabled him to fly. The next recruit was Hank McCoy, the Beast, a brilliant young bio-chemist trapped in a brutish body, with immense strengt and acrobatic skill. The last, but as it would later be revealed, really the first, of Xaiverīs recruits were Jean Grey a.k.a Marvel Girl. In the early days she possessed telekinetic powers that enabled her to move object by the power of her mind alone. Later, she was found to be a powerful telepath as well, but an accident in childhood had prevented her from accessing those abilities.
Xaiver himself was also a mutant, confined to wheelchair after a confrontation with a hostile alien who styled himself Lucifer, but posessed of a mind of almost limitless telepathic might.
Their foremost enemy was the egnematic man calling himself Magneto,
master of magnetism. Despite the somewhat ludricus code-name Magneto has soon established himself as the X-Menīs enemy number one, and he were to fight them and later to join them, only to dismiss Xaiverīs way of peaceful integration as a foolīs hope. This is the eternal triangle in the books, with Xaiver trying, and more often than not, failing, to establish peaceful integration between humans and their mutant offspring, while others, both human and mutant, choose to engage in a genetic war for the dominion of the planet. Longtime writer Chris Claremont would later reveal that Magneto, in fact, were Jewish, and had survived the deathcamps at Auschwitz. It was the events in the camp that led Magneto to fight for his new race and allegiance as he could not do for his old one.
This is the basis for the continuing, and ever-expanding and glorious genetic soap-opera that is the X-Men line of books.
Later, many would flock to follow both Xaiverīs and Magnetoīs teachings. The X-Men would go through a multitude of incarnations, but always remaining true to professor Charles Xaiverīs dream.
"Any dream worth having, is a dream worth fighting for."
-Professor Charles Francis Xaiver.
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