X-MEN #39: Birds of a Feather

And now for something completely x-treme.

Originally Published December 1994

We begin with some high flyin' WWII action in the Mighty Marvel Manner! as Philip Summers relives his glory days of shooting down Nazis and dropping bombs on Dresden as a way of building up to today, where he has crashed his plane somewhere in the Yukon wilderness.

In aviation terms, that's called an Oopsie

Luckily, while Phil has crashed in the middle of nowhere, there is one person around to assist-- a mysterious figure who gives no indication how he came to be in the wilderness with no transportation, no supplies, and only Luke from Gilmore Girls' hat to protect him.

As you no doubt know, or have heard, this is Adam: a man who may or may not be X-Treme, but was definitely created by Fabian Nicieza with Greg Capullo and Jeff Johnson so please refer to him accordingly. Adam pulls Phil from the wreckage and begins to carry him through the hinterlands, but one gets the feeling that, given they are miles from anywhere with no particular direction of travel, death in a fiery wreck might have been preferable.

In Westchester the next morning, Beast is joyfully dishing all the hot goss to Jean, including allusions to what you, dear reader, may find for yourself if you stop holding out and succumb to your temptation to read the Rogue miniseries on sale now. Jean is a little distracted, more in the mood to mourn for her sister Sara, who died at the hands of the Phalanx Covenant.

Oh, right!

In the boathouse that they are making into a boathome, Scott receives a call from his gran'ma that Grampa Phil has gone missing, having gone out for a jaunt without even leaving a flightplan. Scott and Jean leap to the rescue, with Jean also noting that since Sinister has been surveilling the Summerses, Scott had asked his grandparents to leave the comfort of their Alaskan home and try roughing it in upstate New York where he can look after them, and they rudely said no.

Back in Alaska, Phil awakens to greet his unexpected benefactor, who describes himself as a traveler searching for his home. Phil confesses that his eyesight is going but he just had to get up in the air one last time.

While Adam builds a fire, they bond -- Adam is an outcast wherever he goes, and that sounds a lot like certain members of Phil's family too. We get the sense that perhaps when Adam says he's not from around here he doesn't just mean the Pacific Northwest.

Only Shi'ar have their eyeliner wings that on-point

Elsewhere in Israel, the "healed and whole" David Haller -- Legion -- is ready to pursue his destiny.

Yes, I will put on a concert

And I mean that literally, since visions of Irene Adler, aka Destiny, the woman he killed sometime ago, have been pushing him to make something of himself.

More importantly, in New Orleans, some stupid nonsense is happening with the Assassin's Guild, which is now headed by the decidedly non-dead Belladonna.

Yay.........

Back in Alaska, as death closes in on Philip, Adam reveals that he is a visitor from the stars. Phil says "That's cool, I guess I'm not surprised" and asks Adam to point out where he comes from. Adam points to a star near Orion's belt. Of course, as you and I both know, as a member of the Shi'ar he would actually be from a different galaxy altogether which is not visible to the naked eye. (Why read every X-Men comic if things like that aren't going to stick?)

The implication that there actually aren't any stars and Phil is just seeing snow, but Adam is doing him a kindness, is actually quite sweet.

Phil loses consciousness as he appears to succumb to the embrace of death, but Adam won't have it -- Phil has kind of become like a grandfather or something to him in their short time together. So he uses his mutant power, which is to, uh, prevent hypothermia I guess. Pretty handy.

In the morning, Phil is discovered, but Adam makes a getaway before anyone can find him. He does, however, sneak back into the hospital room to see him when everyone is down at the cafeteria, only for Jean to telepathically sense him there.

Jean has absolutely no questions about who this young man is, or why he has such stupendous powers, or what his connection to Philip might be, or what he's doing here or why he wears his hair like a bargain basement son of Legolas and Poochie or what's the deal with the hat, but she does team up with him to give Phil a psychic vision of some fantastic space battles, to soothe the old aviator's soul.

Having saved the man's life and bolstered his spirits, Adam leaves before anyone else can see him. He has also been profoundly touched by the experience, feeling closer than ever to finding whatever it is he's been looking for on Earth.

Scott arrives and they have a wordless exchange of warm smiles as they reflect on how much closer the tragedy has brought the family, but unaware that all the while they are being watched... and that the person watching them is also being watched! It's a classic double-watching cliffhanger!

To Not-Immediately Be Continued!!

Further Thoughts:

No, I don't think that Adam X, the X-Treme, created by Fabian Nicieza with Greg Capullo and Jeff Johnson is the sensational "can't miss" character find of the 90's, despite his backwards cap clearly resonating with the youths of the day. This made for a nice, wholesome story but it's not overly exciting and doesn't stoke my curiosity about who this guy is and what he can do when he starts mixing it up with the heroes -- if ever. In a vacuum, it's good writing, but in context, well, don't forget to put the X-Men in your X-Men comic. With three pages of WWII flashbacks and a lot of walking in the woods, it feels like the main story could have been cut down and interspersed with something that more actively involves the heroes we put down our allowance to see. 

With a plethora of mini-series and spinoffs, it seems a bit like the main X-Men title(s) are getting a bit too comfortable with a languid pace and not actively servicing the main characters. There are ways to accomplish everything in this issue -- developing the mystery of Adam and teasing us with what is to come in the future -- while still doing everything you can to be an X-Men comic, and I think that balance has been lost over the years. It doesn't have to be either/or.

That said, I will always enjoy that the X-Men series does stories like this, taking a break from the usual proceedings to explore humanity and give a lot of space to characters. Even if we are spending a lot of time with characters we don't know well, there's something to be said in a medium that has a stereotype for only providing action beats and never getting deep, to let a store breathe and show the paces. I think Fabian Nicieza did a good job writing the story he set out to write, foregrounding the new creation and digging into his heart, even if I think lavishing so much attention on him is a bit misguided.

Terry Dodson drew this issue. He's a great artist -- or will be by the 2000's -- and is uniquely suited to drawing grounded, human stories (the assignment surely suits his style a lot more than Andy Kubert's) but it's proof that comic art is a team effort. The pencils get a relatively generic treatment from the ink and color team, serviceable and plain, and when the time comes to depict some exciting space-battles I feel the depictions are a little flat: this is effectively the climax of the issue, a big potential showcase for artwork and is meant to fill us with awe, but just seems like "here are what the Shi'ar spaceships look like."