Thoughts

After last issue’s fill-in nature – X-men now starts a run on that has justly gone down in Comic Book history. This is classic stuff, the benchmark to what a great team book can do.

Everything clicks into place with this issue. It’s just so well told – the hook of having the Beast return to a mystery and then trying to find the X-men lets the issue indulge itself in the fun of the X-men as circus performers, all exhibiting interesting new personalities.

Byrne’s art complements Claremont’s writing perfectly, although he’s still being credited as the “penciler”. That’s a title that soon gets an upgrade and given how well the two seem to work together already if his input was already greater than the title “penciler” suggests.

The issue cracks along at a great pace, before reaching a great cliff-hanger. It’s an issue that must have impressed so much back in 1978, but is still astonishingly readable today.

Fun Panel

Circus Jean and Scott are a fun couple concept and there’s a trashy quality to this image that just captures it.

You know if they’d just been left alone, there’s a parallel universe where these two live a happy trashy life together.

Any Googling

The issue teases events in Marvel Team-Up 70, featuring Havok and Spider-man. Looking into it, it seems likely this is actually the story featured in Marvel Team-Up 69, but its all part of what looks like a Claremont/Byrne run on the title that leads to Byrne joining Claremont on the X-men. I’m surprised this isn’t more well-known and its definitely been put on my list of titles to investigate at a later date.

None More Claremont

“The Strain is murderous — the links and shackles forged of the hardest steel money can buy guaranteed unbreakable — yet Wolverine never yields –as images explode against the miasmic fog enshrouding his mind. The Fight has sparked a response deep within him. A Primal, elemental need that’s been at the core of Wolverine’s being all his life. A need to be Free!”

This is a great issue for sharp, snappy dialogue alongside Claremond possessing a great handle on the Beast’s style of internal monologuing. But even within all that, still room for some fantastic text boxes as Wolverine escape.

It was a Product of its Time

Wolverine slapping Phoenix to break her out the trance feels a bit much, although the story does a good job of justifying it