UNCANNY X-MEN #42: If I Should Die...!

Could be anything in here, anything at all.

Originally published March 1968

When we last left off, Cyclops and Beast were preparing to do battle with Grotesk the Sub-Human (aaka Prince Gor-Tok, son of King Kronos and sole surviving member of a race of subterranean He-Man characters.) Grotesk is understandably miffed at the human race who destroyed his entire species with the folly of nuclear weapons testing - and are on the brink of destroying themselves with a bizarre new machine that causes Earth tremors for seemingly no purpose but the destruction of the Earth. Gor-Tok is here to ensure that does indeed happen.

Angel and Iceman, meanwhile, have returned to the mansion to convince Jean to join the battle - unsuccessfully, as they are commanded by Professor X to stay put, the lot of them. Seems like... a questionable tactic, but hey, he's the telepathic mutant genius, not me.

Grotesk is distracted by a mysterious vision and flees the fight, leaving Beast and Cyclops to regroup with the others at the X-Mansion, but again they encounter resistance...

Turns out Professor X was intending to lure the Grotesk into a trap, hoping to take him out alone without endangering the X-Men. (Seems like that's the entire point of having X-Men but again, what do I know?)

Grotesk fights his way through the Professor's Mental Bolts and succeeds in pulling the lever that - given enough time - will build up strong enough tremors to destroy the Earth!

Listen, I find Grotesk to be one of the more sympathetic villains we've seen so far (despite his lack of depth) but I'm strictly a "two wrongs don't make a right" kind of guy here.

The X-Men arrive in time to join the fray and work to shut off the device. In the struggle to re-energize it, Grotesk explodes, and that's that.

Except, well, one thing.

Further Thoughts:

Wow, can you believe that they killed Professor X off only 42 issues into a series that would last over 50 years? How come he's thought of as being such a major part of the franchise if he's spent so much time being dead? I guess it's like the Walking Dead, how Shane stuck around much longer on the show, or in Game of Thrones how Ned Stark is actually still alive in the books and leading the resistance against King Viserys.

But hey, it happened, and it would begin a shake-up that would last all through the rest of the series' 60's run. Without the Prof to lead them, the X-Men are sure to be more vulnerable, which could make for a pretty good bunch of stories.

Aside from the ending, the Grotesk story seems like a fairly generic adventure (and probably could have been done in one part if it weren't for the back-up stories in each issue, which we'll be covering next.) Yes, the fate of the world is at stake, but it's interesting that Professor Xavier's death does not occur in battle with a major foe like Magneto, or the Juggernaut, or even at the conclusion of the Factor Three imbroglio. Much the same way the fate of his legs was parceled with the otherwise-flavourless villain Lucifer, Professor X is killed in action by a one-off monster brute who is never seen again.

Let it be known that while the Prof died while fighting Grotesk, it appears he had actually been ill for some time, and he just wanted to cross "Defeat Grotesk the Sub-Human (Prince Gor-Tok)" off his bucket list. The vague allusions to something being "off" with the Professor actually qualifies as good foreshadowing by the standards of 1960s Marvel Comics, and we'll see - a little ways down the road, but we'll get there - whether there's more to the story than that.