Power Pack 45 - Inferno

Julie faces the toughest challenge yet - babysitting!

Power Pack #45

Special guest scripts: Julianna Jones
Special guest pencils: June Brigman
Special guest inker: Hilary Barta
Letters: Joe Rosen
Colors: Glynis Oliver
Edits: Carl Potts
Same old Editor in Chief: Tom DeFalco

Julie has a nightmare in which Carmody the Bogeyman taunts her about how the family will never be the same again and how she's growing up but wakes up and Katie comforts her. Later that day she graduates from her current school and has her 11th birthday party. A neighbour upstairs asks her to babysit their toddler Tommy the following evening and she agrees. She wonders if she's grown up or still a little girl and decides the test will be whether she needs to use her powers or not. Tommy proves a challenge, making messes everywhere and crawling off until she finally gets him to sleep. But with only half an hour before his parents return she calls up her sibling to help clean up with the use of their powers. She decides this means she's not very grown up. Later that night she discusses growing up with her whole family and how she'll always be her parents' little girl.

This issue has "Revenge of the Boogy Man [sic] Epilogue" on the cover and so as it's officially branded as the aftermath of the Power Pack storyline from Inferno I'm looking at it here. The cover shows Julie facing multiple images of Carmody but inside that only really occupies the first three pages reinforcing the idea that there was a sudden change of direction ordered upon the series and so rather than continuing to explore the ramifications of a major status quo changer we get this tale about Julie facing growing up.

Julie was named after co-creator Louise Simonson's daughter Julianna - and this issue is the second she's written (after #38) once again focusing on Julie. I don't know if either of her stories are fictionalised versions of events from her own childhood. And as somebody who's a youngest sibling and has never yet babysat I have no idea just what looking after a toddler for the evening is like either. But it is easy to relate to the experience of reaching the end of one school and facing moving on to another even though here we don't have school graduation ceremonies (or at least didn't when I were a lad), especially when one's birthday falls at the end of the school year. Some start evaluating just where exactly they are. Others start distancing themselves from all their previous likes in an attempt. Others still double down on the familiar. This shows Julie taking the first option which is entirely in character for her and approaching it first by drawing up a list then tackling a routine task.

It's a straightforward little character story which speaks to a very real problem children face. But it's not an aftermath issue in any real sense beyond showing the family dynamic is back to normal. The opening sequence may reference recent events but feels a little contrived to justify the cover. This issue's non-inclusion in Inferno collected editions is fully justified but for those interested it can be found in Power Pack Classic Omnibus Volume 2.

X-Factor 40 - Inferno

Archangel cracks an egg with a voice.

X-Factor #40

Writer: Louise Simonson
Penciler: Rob Liefeld
Inker: Allen Milgrom
Letterer: Joe Rosen
Colorist: Tom Vincent
Editor: Bob Harras
Editor-in-Chief: Tom DeFalco

X-Factor return to Ship from Madelyne Pryor's funeral, observed from afar by Nanny and Orphan Maker. Atop Ship they set about returning the crowd to their various homes and schools. Iceman takes Leech, Artie and Taki back to their school then the other four members of X-Factor gather up the mutant babies to the FBI in Washington. The older X-Terminators have missed too much of summer school to go back until the autumn so they stay on Ship with Jean's parents to babysit Nathan Christopher. As their plane flies into Washington it is attacked by Nanny's ship. Nanny and Orphan Maker board the ship and a battle breaks out until Nanny throws Beast into her ship's control panel and is then badly wounded by Archangel, causing ships to come down in the park. Orphan Maker explains that Nanny is a human mutant who worked for the Right until discovering what her technology would be used for but the Right trapped her the egg. She escaped and started rescuing children before others like Mr Sinister could destroy them. Nanny and Orphan Maker teleport away as Jean finds and releases her nephew and niece Joey and Galen who don't recognise her due to Nanny's "pixie dust" drug. The babies and other children are transferred to the custody of Freedom Force who tell them Rusty Collins has been furloughed and so does not have to go back to jail whilst awaiting trial. X-Factor take Joey and Galen to Ship where they recognise their grandparents. Jean and Scott vow to find her sister eventually.

And so we have the wrapping up of the fates of several of the characters from across the crossover. It always seemed a little strange that Scott and Jean so easily accepted that whatever else she did Nanny would care for the children such that they could focus on saving the babies without even making any attempt to track Nanny for later. It's also unclear where the children were kept during Nanny's appearance in the Avengers issues when a good chunk of her ship was destroyed to cover her escape. Although the origin given here makes some sense to give Nanny a credible backstory and motivation she has still been an irritating character throughout too many appearances over the event.

There's also the breaking up of the X-Terminators with the youngest members returned to their school whilst the older ones are left slightly up in the air with hints that they won't be going back to school at all due to institutional nervousness about "incidents". Although it's only mentioned in a caption box at the end, the X-Terminators went on to formally join the New Mutants in issue #76 of their series, thus putting an end to any prospect of another X-Terminators series exploring young mutants living around ordinary humans. It's a pity as the idea had potential though the wards of a publicly known team were probably not the best characters to explore such a situation.

This issue is a landmark as the first Marvel story to be drawn by Rob Liefeld. And it's not the greatest though compared to some of his later work it's clear at Al Milgrom and Tom Vincent managed to rein in some of the excesses. But even through those filters the art frankly isn't very good. It took me several reads of the page to make sense of the scene where the Beast leaps atop Nanny and she throws him forward so he goes through the hole in the roof of X-Factor's ship and into Nanny's where he crashes into the control panel. Liefeld often omits backgrounds (which Vincent sometimes tries to compensate for with colour only indicating buildings and the like) and it can be very confusing as to what's just happened. There are other trade marks such as characters hovering in mid air, awkward poses, groups of characters altering their position relative to each other between panels, two left arms for Cyclops on one page, huge hair (in some panels Jean's is absolutely enormous) and even a few pouches. It's fairly easy to beat up on Liefeld's art and to make him a scapegoat for everything that went wrong with Marvel or the comics industry as a whole in the 1990s (which isn't fair but he was heavily involved in some pretty key moments) but when it makes the comic hard to read and very odd looking then it invariably gets called out. Why anybody thought this was the way forward is a mystery.

But apart from the art this is otherwise a relatively straightforward issue in wrapping up various threads on the periphery of Inferno and finishing off the Nanny subplot before it drags out for too long. There's a real sense of calm closure at the end with all the main plot points resolved and all five members are now clearly sorted out without any more heavy lifting. This is a satisfying conclusion to the main part of the crossover.

(Don't go away though. There's a few more relevant issues to come.)

X-Factor Annual 4 - Inferno Epilogue

Two FBI agents try to find out what happened in New York.

X-Factor Annual #4

(I'll leave the rest of the annual to another time if/when I look at Atlantis Attacks so this is just the Inferno story.)

Inferno Aftermath
Story: Mark Gruenwald
Pencils: Jim Fern
Inks: Joe Rubinstein
Letters: Joe Rosen
Colors: Gregory Wright
Editor: Bob Harras
Editor in Chief: Tom DeFalco

FBI agent Jacob Farber narrates how he and his partner Elwood McNulty were sent to investigate exactly what happened in New York to cause so much costly damage. They start by interviewing the dentist who turned demonic then a police officer tips them off about the paranormal investigators who got eaten by the lift in the Empire State Building but woke up in a normal lift and found their instruments showed nothing. At the Daily Bugle newsroom J. Jonah Jameson recounts the attack by the demons but all the photographs turned out blank. They then go to speak to the Avengers but Gilgamesh is no help and Captain America is still in poor relations with Washington. Next they ring X-Factor and Ship tells them the team are out so Jake gives them two hours to call back. X-Factor discuss what to say and agree that telling the truth about demons from the netherworld would be damaging to the public. So they decide to give a cover story that it was fake. After consulting with Reed Richards they say some unclear group used a hynoptic ray beam and they suspect hi-tech terrorists. The story is released and the man in the street accepts it but a lurking demon is more surprised.

This back-up story is an interesting look at how the authorities and the public cope with the bizarre incidents that happen in the Marvel universe with plausible cover stories fed to keep people from having to confront the implications of what happens. Bizarrely for a story by Mark Gruenwald, normally the king of continuity, there are some discontinuities here with the whole event from the first animated objects to the final closure of the portal said to have taken place in a single night when the issues took place over a longer period. The closure of the portal seems to have reverted all the actual magic, with the damage stemming from looting, rioting and battles, whereas other issues showed lasting damage. And the newspaper at the end says Inferno was "two days ago" but is dated "January 30 1989" which just adds to the confusion of when in the year Inferno took place. In addition Gilgamesh lists some of the names he has used in the past including "Heracles", a reminder of the total mess with having the Eternals in the same universe as the various gods.

Also just why are the Blues Brothers working for the FBI? Jake and Elwood had previously appeared in a few of Gruenwald's Captain America issues but only with this issue are they drawn so clearly as the band characters.

Overall this is a tame little piece that focuses upon showing how New York returns to normal, that some of the more prominent one-off characters survived and how the public shrug off the whole event given a convincing explanation and the magic not leaving any lasting effects. It's a good effort that would have worked in 1989 when it came out some months after the event but when collected together with the issues it stands out the more how it doesn't quite match the actual aftermath.

Power Pack 44 - Inferno

Power Pack continue saving lives but can they save their parents?

Power Pack #44

Special guest scripts: Julianna Jones
Special guest pencils: June Brigman
Special guest inker: Hilary Barta
Letters: Joe Rosen
Colors: Glynis Oliver
Edits: Carl Potts
Same old Editor in Chief: Tom DeFalco

Or not quite as the opening splash page is signed "Bogdanove & Heath" which has confused many including some online databases. The above list is what was printed in the issue but is in fact the credits for issue #45 accidentally printed in this issue as well and not the Inferno collections, neither Power Pack Classic Omnibus Volume 2 nor the digital listing online includes a correction. The letters page for a later issue reportedly lists the following as the correct team:

Jon Bogdanove - Writer & penciler
Russ Heath - Inker
...and the rest as above.

As we'll see this credit mistake matters more than most as it offers a very different perspective on what's going on editorially...

The issue opens with Power Pack fighting off demons when the portal reverses and sucks them all back into Limbo. Heading home they find their parents are in a permanent state of shock about the revelation their children are powered superheroes. Eventually Margaret breaks down, crying that she just wants her normal children back. Jim tells the kids to go out and they head off to help with the clear-up operation. Several vehicles are frozen in monstrous form and Alex's attempts to use his powers to rescue people reactivate the animated vehicles. They take a busload of passengers to a hospital which is understaffed and overwhelmed when the New Mutants show up. Mirage uses her powers to create solid images of what the head doctor wants - a small army of health care staff to cope with all the patients and a construction crew to rebuild the hospital. Together with Power Pack and the New Mutants they get the hospital into working order until an army unit shows up. Resting the Powers tell the New Mutants about how their parents now know their secret and can't cope with it. Mirage wishes they could help. Power Pack return home to find their parents in an even worse state with Margaret fantasising over a baby doll and Jim rambling on about not being fit parents good enough for their children. Then the New Mutants come in and tell Jim and Margaret that in order to protect their real children from Carmody the Bogeyman they hid them away and created super powered decoys to stop Carmody but didn't realise the parents would be in danger as well or tell them. Mirage pulls images from Jim and Margaret's mind of their desire - their children as normal. Gosamyr uses her powers to convince them then put them to sleep with the four Power Pack children then taking the place of the images then the New Mutants leave them to sleep and wake up with things back to normal.

To cut to the chase this is one of the worst reset switch stories I have ever read. The mistake with the credits will have convinced many readers that someone in Marvel editorial ordered an immediate undoing of the parents discovering their children's powers and assigned a guest writer to carry out the deed, undoing Jon Bogdanove's work. The discovery that actually this issue is written by Bogdanove complicates things but it still seems that some rapid U-turns have been happening. There was a hint on last issue's cover that the children would soon be going away to Professor Xavier's school and the cover of this issue with the children flying off with a suitcase and the New Mutants alongside them would seem to reinforce that plan, though in the issue itself there's no sign of the suitcase. There's a brief moment near the end where the parents have been put to sleep with the images and the real children assume they've been permanently replaced with duplicates as though that might have been part of the plan but that also doesn't match what's shown on the cover.

It's not clear what caused this change back though one factor may be that the planned new setting was now unavailable. This issue would have been published before the destruction of the mansion in Uncanny X-Men #243 which would leave the fate of the school up in the air. Add in the New Mutants' final loss of confidence in their headmaster Magneto after seeing him conversing with N'astirh in New Mutants #73 and it's likely that the school won't be taking in new pupils any time soon. But also there's a total change in the way Jim and Margaret are reacting to the discovery.

Last issue they were initially shocked and in denial when Carmody forced the children to reveal their powers but the parents soon accepted it and showed strength in dealing with the Bogeyman and the children's reaction to him. It's also worth noting that not only do they live in the Marvel Universe where a lot of strange stuff is public knowledge but by this point they've met aliens and superheroes and often had the child of the Fantastic Four over to stay. It was as though they had come to terms with it until a final panel cliffhanger showed their faces suggesting otherwise. Here they are shown experiencing a nervous breakdown and completely failing to cope with the situation. It's such a sudden shift that really isn't convincing as a motivation for the sudden about turn. Both have been shown as so much stronger than this and deserved better. The revelation had been so heavily debated and so built up to that to just suddenly turn around and unscramble the egg is an atrocious decision that suggests the status quo has to be reset all the time. This is a series of children growing up that has been through status quo changes already (whether moving to New York or swapping the powers around) and would do so again during the rest of its run and once committed to it should have built on the revelation with all the potential it offered. Instead this issue just tries to say it was a bad idea to ever make such a move but in doing so it has to undermine the parents in the process.

As for the means by which it's reversed, Mirage's false explanation is an extremely long speech with one of the biggest word to picture ratio ever seen in comics. It's astonishing that anyone would believe a stranger's claim that actually these are artificial duplicates and here are the real children especially as the actual real children's reaction is not in accord with this cover story. It takes a dose of Gosamyr's powers in order to reinforce convincing Jim and Margaret which may be about the only time Gosamyr has been of any use whatsoever but it's in the cause of an awful move to negate such a big development in the series so it does it not excuse the sheer tedium of the awful story that introduced her. A universe were there are many telepaths and magicians offers much easier ways to pull off this sort of reset rather than bizarre explanations and emotional manipulation but finding one with a connection to the Pack at short notice to have this all reversed in a single issue amidst the clearing up after Inferno might have been a bit of a stretch. So instead we get a lousy explanation to implement a lousy reversion.

This is the single worst issue of Power Pack in the book's whole run. Other issues may have silly stories that are best forgotten and the less said about the end of the series the better but this takes a huge development and stops it dead in its tracks through character destruction and a very silly reset method. There's clearly been an element of editorial diktat handed down and it is frustrating when story ideas get vetoed after they've started resulting in these messy U-turns but the result is this mess of an issue.

X-Factor 39 - Inferno

Cyclops's eyes are fully opened.

X-Factor #39

Writer: Louise Simonson
Penciler: Walter Simonson
Inker: Allen Milgrom
Letterer: Joe Rosen
Colorist: Gregory Wright
Editor: Bob Harras
Editor-in-Chief: Tom DeFalco

At the ruins of the mansion the newly arrived Beast and Longshot fight against Mr Sinister and Malice/Polaris whilst the rest of X-Factor and the X-Men recover. Cyclops finds Mr Sinister is blocking his eye power and starts to remember him from his youth, including how he arrived in the hospital where Scott was taken after a plane crash and intervened when the young mutant's force blast blew a hole in the roof, knocking him out for a year. Sinister explains how he discovered Scott when the latter used his powers to reduce the impact of falling from a plane then had him transferred to an orphanage he ran and arranged for his brother Alex to be adopted to keep them apart. However before he could act Scott ended up with Professor Xavier and so Sinister prepared a trap by cloning Jean Grey then using Madelyne to secure a baby with potential. When the real Jean Grey reappeared Sinister set about cutting his losses now he had the child. Havok attacks but Sinister is unaffected and has no interest in the second Summers brother, ordering Malice/Polaris to kill him. Sinister continues to explain how he put blocks on Scott's power and buried his presence so no telepath could detect it but ultimately couldn't control the blasts with mental powers and had to resort to ruby quartz glasses. The others recover and through a telepathic conference they co-ordinate an attack, first knocking out Malice/Polaris then Wolverine disposes of Sabretooth. They release Havok who taunts his brother and fires plasma blasts at him which only have the effect of powering him up. Sinister breaks free and grabs Jean to kiss her. This riles Cyclops who overcomes Sinister's block and blasts him to fragments. Cyclops congratulates Havok on his tactics in powering him up as the X-Men head for home. Cyclops reflects on how he been vaguely aware of what he now knows was Sinister's influence and it drove him to try to be perfect but failed over the years.

And so we get to the final main chapter of Inferno (though there are several epilogue issues to come) with a showdown with Mr Sinister and more retcons to establish him as a longstanding presence in Cyclops's life. Why he has been so interested in one Summers brother but doesn't want the other is not explained beyond a "I could have if I chose" boast. I'm not sure just how much of Scott's childhood from the plane accident to the orphanage had been covered before the run-up to Inferno or just what if any contradictions there were in different accounts of those days that this telling sorts out but the insertion of Mr Sinister as a presence throughout his life is clearly intended to explain some of the awkward characterisation over the years, most obviously his desertion of Madelyne. The script doesn't quite go so far as to have Mr Sinister say that the desertion was directly because of him - indeed he instead blames it on Jean luring Scott to X-Factor - but Archangel voices it. It is as if the villain is intended to be a stand-in for the higher hand of editors over the years who have forced so much upon the titles that has had to be adapted to. But whilst it's possible for readers in the know to blame editors not writers for some of the messes, and there's also the reasonable defence that this development took place before Louise Simonson started writing the title, within the narrative it is still a weakness to resort to a supervillain manipulating everything as an excuse for past terrible characterisation.

There are many alternative ways the situation could have been handled but most of them required doing things differently when the series was created. Perhaps Jean could have been left for dead after all and the fifth female member of X-Factor could have been someone else - perhaps Polaris (a Silver Age member of the X-Men) or Dazzler (as seems to have been the original plan) or even a new character. Maybe Scott could have convinced Madelyne he had to return to his days in the costume and even taken her with him rather than just leaving her the moment the news of Jean's resurrection came. Having both one's wife and ex girlfriend around could have made for some interesting dynamics especially with the complication that Madelyne looked just like Jean. But all this required doing the start of the series differently. Instead first Scott walked out, then a large amount of time passed before he even tried to contact Madelyne and then a big crossover event (the Mutant Massacre) took up multiple issues so by the time a new writer was able to get him to travel back to Alaska it was not credible for his absence to have been a sufficiently short time for an easy reconciliation. The solution of just simply making Madelyne disappear as though she had never been there was tried, with the additional question of whether she had somehow been an amnesiac Jean all along to continue the long running tease, but it was insufficient especially once another writer brought her back. And so ultimately we get a tale of long-term manipulation with this issue adding elements to make Scott look better. It may convince Archangel but it's easy to see why many fans never truly accepted the explanation and Cyclops never fully recovered as a character.

It's also surprising just how major a factor Mr Sinister has been given how few issues he's been in. This is only the seventh comic he's appeared in and six of them have been chapters of Inferno. Although built up as a series unseen force there's something awkward about one-off villains being used to explain major story developments over multiple years. Also of surprise is that Sinister's relationship with Scott at the orphanage is not explained further. The hints all point to this "father" of Madelyne being Nathan (hence the son is named after all three of his "grandfathers"), the boy who tormented Scott and this has since been revealed as the planned origin of the character. However he gets killed off pretty quickly and doesn't return from the dead until later writers were on the title who infused their own ideas. "Mr Sinister" is actually quite a silly name for a villain, the sort of thing a child would come up with and the idea that one actually did is worth exploring more. Over the whole crossover there's been a lot of potential shown for the character and it's easy to see why he went on to become one of the leading X-Men villains not just in the comics themselves but also being an early presence in the toys and 1990s cartoon but he could have used at least one more story with his creator to be refined further. Also killed off surprisingly easy is Sabretooth as Wolverine casually deploys his claws though Sinister's use of cloning technology and the surprise resurrection of other Marauders provides a clear way to revive the character.

This is a surprisingly low key resolution to such a big crossover with just the two teams and three villains on a pile of rubble at the end and only one other character shown in a flashback. But Mr Sinister has not been directly part of the story of demons from Limbo invading Earth and instead has been the driving force behind the creation of Madelyne who got out of everyone's control. This is more of an epilogue to the main event and this probably explains why this issue and Uncanny X-Men #243 were not included on the advert for Inferno back in the summer of 1988. But it's still essential to the overall story as it resolves the role of Mr Sinister and brings closure for both X-Factor and the X-Men.

As an action showdown this is a strong piece. But as a retcon trying to fix one of the biggest problems caused by the creation of the series it's not the best approach, resorting to long-term manipulation by a basically new supervillain. However at this stage, and to be honest probably for the preceding couple of years, there isn't really a way to absolve Cyclops in a fully convincing way. At best one can parody the external influence that created the situation and it's not Simonson's fault that the problem was created. So this issue does as best as it can.

Uncanny X-Men 243 - Inferno

There's a sinister presence in both Jean's mind and the mansion.

Uncanny X-Men #243

Writer: Chris Claremont
Penciler: Marc Silvestri
Guest Inker: Hilary Barta
Letterer: Joe Rosen
Colorist: Glynis Oliver
Editor: Bob Harras
Editor in Chief: Tom DeFalco

In the aftermath of the Inferno Jean suddenly cries out in pain and erects a force globe. To help her Psylocke takes Cyclops, Wolverine and Storm into her mind where they find Jean's memories interspersed with Phoenix's and Madelyne's with Mr Sinister steadily destroying Phoenix's memories. It becomes clear that Jean and Madelyne's essences are merging but Mr Sinister will destroy them if not stopped. The Madelyne portion initially refuses to help, preferring to see them destroyed but after appeals by Wolverine and Storm and the appearance of Mr Sinister a united Jean erupts with power and expels Sinister from her mind. Jean discovered Sinister was coming from Professor Xavier's mansion and so most of the two teams head there in two groups, one flying and the other through the Morlock tunnel link, whilst the Beast and Longshot take Jean's parents and Nathan Christopher Charles to the surface of Ship for safety. There Longshot and the Beast argue over who should go to join the others. The group heading through the tunnel encounter the Marauder Blockbuster, still transformed into a demonic form and not reverted despite the end of the Limbo magic. Most are overwhelmed but Havok blasts him down and admits he's changed to now do what is necessary with his power. In the mansion's hanger Sabretooth attacks Psylocke and Rogue but the former mind blasts him down. The others find the mansion ransacked and are attacked by Malice/Polaris who is quickly taken down but proclaims that the two have merged into a gestalt and will be killed before being separated. Storm threatens her/them unless she/they talk when suddenly a huge explosion destroys the mansion. Mr Sinister appears and pulls Jean from the rubble then orders Malice/Polaris to kill the unconscious rest only for Longshot to arrive to defend them.

This is the issue that proclaims itself to be both "The 25th Anniversary Issue of the Uncanny X-Men and 150th Issue of the New X-Men". Although slightly late for the former it does nevertheless bring a lot of elements from the past. With the presence of Polaris all seven of the Silver Age X-Men are now present (and even Professor Xavier gets a cameo in the form of a shard of Jean's memory). There's a flashback to the most famous story in the book's history, the Dark Phoenix Saga, as well as a call-back to one of the most memorable from more recent times, the battle between Psylocke and Sabretooth. And there's a return to where it all began at the X-Men's mansion. We even get to see all of the different costumes the various versions of Jean have worn over the years. But this is no wallowing in nostalgia with continued clear signs of how the X-Men have been permanently changed by the magic of Inferno such that even their psychic forms are different. Havok has come to terms with using his power to kill when necessary. Storm is ruthless with Malice/Polaris, willing to risk killing her to obtain information. Psylocke quickly takes down Sabretooth showing how far she has come since their earlier conflict. Longshot realises what he became under the influence of the magic and worries he is still a "nastyman" who could betray his teammates. And the changes are not confined to the X-Men with Jean also transformed.

By effectively merging the memories of Jean, Jean-Phoenix and Madelyne the resulting composite is able to fully take the place of the Jean who was killed off over a hundred issues ago and easily interact with characters who don't know they were two different people. This seemingly includes the X-Men who still haven't been told how Jean was found alive and that the woman they saw die was the Phoenix force impersonating her. Along with the restoration of her telepathic powers it's a step towards fixing some of the remaining confusion caused by the requirements first to kill her off and then to bring her back that have caused so many of the problems that this whole crossover has sought to resolve. Jean is now vengeful, fully understanding Madelyne's pain and anger at being an artificial lifeform created, used and discarded by Sinister, and is determined to stop him for good. Cyclops is shocked by the implications but the X-Men do not dispute Jean's assertion that this is true to Xavier's dream that led him to found the school in the first place.

The ruthless destructive nature can be found on both sides with the mansion completely destroyed by Sinister. It's not the first time the mansion has been destroyed and won't be the last but it reflects the way that throughout much of Chris Claremont's run this has been a series about change and moving forwards, not resting on its laurels in a perpetual status quo. But it also avoids predictability by showing that not all the changes of Inferno are permanent with Longshot's fears seemingly groundless when the cliffhanger shows him standing up to Mr Sinister and Malice/Polaris in defence of his teammates.

Mr Sinister has been a presence at the edge of the X-Men's life for some time now, with the character first mentioned during the Mutant Massacre two years earlier and then first appearing in issue #221 but only fully confronting the team for the first time in this issue. It's been a steady build-up that has kept the character as a mysterious force to be reckoned with but also gives this anniversary issue another sense of moving forwards rather than back by using a significant villain for effectively the first time. The casual way in which he uses and discards others and even calmly tells Malice/Polaris this when she is trying to assert herself all add to the menace.

This presents itself as a double anniversary issue and does a lot to live up to that without becoming the sort of inconsequential wallowing in nostalgia and reunions that some anniversary issues have been. Instead it takes many elements from the series's past and fuses them together to push things on and show this is a book clearly going forwards not back.

X-Factor 38 - Inferno

The many versions of Jean Grey come together.

X-Factor #38

Writer: Louise Simonson
Penciler: Walter Simonson
Inker: Al Milgrom
Letterer: Joe Rosen
Colorist: Tom Vincent
Editor: Bob Harras
Editor-in-Chief: Tom DeFalco

Madelyne Pryor prepares to sacrifice her baby son Nathan Christopher Charles and tells the combined X-Factor and X-Men how she will gain power and have revenge upon them all. There are still demons around that are loyal to her and she sets them upon the two teams whilst also influencing them. The X-Men become more demonic and attack X-Factor, calling them "mutant hunters" which Cyclops explains was a now abandoned cover but Storm says they have seen no news of any change. She then remembers Madelyne is the one who collected the news for them and realises the teams have been manipulated to keep them apart. Madelyne tells Jean how she subconsciously used her powers to make Cyclops lose a previous fight with Storm that gave her the leadership and led to him quitting the team. She then offers Death/Angel power for revenge on all who have hurt him and he starts to succumb. The fight is complicated further when Dazzler and Longshot, both now incredibly vain and seeking the spotlight, start turning on other X-Men who they see upstaging them. Death/Angel frees Jean from her bonds but then Madelyne creates a forcefield around her, Jean and the baby. Madelyne tells how she was a clone created by Mr Sinister and Jean realises that just as with Phoenix she has again been duplicated with her duplicate unleashing dark power. Madelyne continues with how she has some of Jean's memories and the two realise that when Phoenix died and tried to return the portion of Jean to the original but in suspended animation she rejected the images of destruction and so the force found the genetically identical Madelyne instead making her everything that Jean rejected. With Madelyne's influence on the X-Men now fading they start coming back to normal and along with X-Factor they try to find a way to break through the forcefield. Wolverine convinces Havok to help who agrees but tells Cyclops he still doesn't approve of his actions and his brother admits he isn't proud either. Madelyne continues with how Mr Sinister arranged for her and Cyclops to get together and then once the baby was born and Jean returned he took steps to erase all trace of her ever having existed but the X-Men prevented the Marauders from killing her. Psylocke works on Longshot and gets him to find the weak spot in the forcefield which the others all blast. Madelyne explains how she censored news to manipulate the X-Men to stay apart from X-Factor. Then came S'ym and N'astirh driving her over to the darkness. She now prepares to destroy herself despite Jean's pleas. The forcefield is breached and Cyclops rescues his son so Madelyne unleashes an explosion of energy but fails to kill the boy. Mind locked with Jean she dies and tries to take Jean with her but the piece of the Phoenix force within her emerges and returns everything to Jean who now accepts it and absorbs them all. The demons vanish and the Empire State Building is restored. Death/Angel reflects and takes the name Archangel. Both teams reflect on what they've been through - and the need to confront Mr Sinister.

And so we have the final showdown with Madelyne Pryor amidst a major infodump issue that seeks to retcon a lot of the events of the last few years. Many readers were not happy with the way Cyclops was written through them whether it was losing a duel and thus the leadership of the X-Men to a depowered Storm or leaving Madelyne the moment he heard Jean had returned from the dead or failing to search for her afterwards until she had completely disappeared. In addition the length of time it took for the two teams to meet had become far too long. Although Louise Simonson's script has Scott admitting he is not proud of his actions, much of the blame is removed from him through the destruction of Madelyne as a character. Instead of having simply been corrupted by the influence of demons it's now revealed that through her creation and the intervention of the Phoenix force she was using her power to undermine Scott much earlier and then using her position to keep the two teams apart whilst Mr Sinister intervened to keep her apart from Scott. It's written in such a way to make it seem as though it was all planned and does its best to redeem Scott without going the whole hog and just having him mentally manipulated for years. It also makes a lot more sense of some of the more problematic elements caused by the creation of X-Factor. But in doing so it's making Madelyne a far worse character than a woman corrupted by outside influences.

With the Phoenix revelation Inferno effectively becomes an explicit sequel to the Dark Phoenix Saga as now seen through the lens of other retcons. Both stories involved a duplicate of Jean Grey being manipulated by others, ultimately succumbing to the power within her and turning dark (even down to the similar names and costumes for the Black Queen and the Goblin Queen), bringing down great destruction and finally committing suicide. Given the anniversary nature of the event it's perhaps unsurprising that the X-Men titles would return to their most famous story. And it's also clear that editorial demands wanted Madelyne removed completely with earlier attempts not succeeding. Having a little seen sinister force manipulating events doubtless reflects the editorial interference in the titles over the previous few years. But it can't take away from the fact that Madelyne had been built up as a character in her own right beyond someone who happened to be the spitting image of Jean and had shown herself to be a strong independent female character. Now she's been turned into literally a manipulative witch, used and sacrificed to satisfy the demands of others. It's hard to see how one spouse could have been so heavily absolved without such character assassination of the other but it doesn't sit easily. The reactions of others such as Havok's outrage at how his brother treated his sister-in-law or Jean's reaction to a duplicate of her becoming destructive again do feel credible.

But there's also redemption in these issues with Warren finally coming to terms with his own corruption at the hands of Apocalypse and resisting Madelyne's attempts to bring it out. In adopting the name "Archangel" he makes a clear rejection of all that others have done to him and can now fly tall. However it's surprising that he takes so many years to get rid of the costume Apocalypse gave him - had someone in Marvel signed a licensing agreement that locked him into that look? (He was in the first line of Toy Biz figures in 1991 but that agreement wasn't signed until 1990.) It's a final step up in empowering the character beyond the rich guy who could fly that he had been for so many years.

As a retcon heavy issue much of the action is limited with the further fight between the two teams largely serving to delay them from going after Madelyne but it does also allow for X-Factor to explain once more about how their initial set-up cover got out of control due to the manipulation of another and for the X-Men to realise how they too have been manipulated. The uneasiness between the two teams remains and shows you can't just remove a single point of disagreement and have everyone happy with each other. But all this is the sideshow to a very dramatic ending for Madelyne as she and the writers bring destruction down upon her. It's a well written issue and it solves the problem of Madelyne in the narrative once and for all but as was often the case with X-Factor a lot of heavy lifting was required to get the team to where editorial wanted it to be and this is perhaps the biggest lifting of all through destroying her character completely.

New Mutants 73 - Inferno

Illyana goes back to where it all started.

New Mutants #73

Writer: Louise Simonson
Penciler: Bret Blevins
Inker: Al Williamson & Mike Manley
Letterer: Joe Rosen
Colorist: Glynis Oliver
Editor: Bob Harras
Editor in Chief: Tom DeFalco

Illyana battles S'ym knowing that she could destroy him but at a terrible cost. Meanwhile others search for her. Sam (Cannonball), Rahne (Wolfsbane), Bobby (Sunspot), Warlock, Boom Boom and Rictor are delayed by a street that comes to life and won't let them pass. Colossus strides through New York alone and forces demons to take him to S'ym. Magneto and the rest of the Inner Circle of the Hellfire Club are confronted by N'astirh who tries to make a deal with them; Wolfsbane hears part of the conversation and she and the others are soured on their headmaster further. First Colossus and then the New Mutants reach S'ym and discover that Illyana is now entirely encased within a suit of armour. Ashamed she flees into Limbo with the New Mutants following whilst Colossus battles S'ym. Within Limbo Illyana declares she must stay there to rule it as the Darkchilde, rejecting her human side, and that her whole life has led to this moment. Things get worse on Earth with demons attacking the church where Dani (Mirage), Rusty and Skids put up a spirited defence despite their wounds. Rahne realises that because time doesn't exist in Limbo they can save Illyana's younger self from going down this path. Searching through multiple portals they find the six year old girl who first came to the realm but are then confronted by her older self who wants to kill her. Rahne tells Illyana that contrary to what N'astirh claimed there is a choice and she can save her younger self. Returning everyone to New York the older Illyana sucks most of the demons, including S'ym, back through the portal then throws away her Soul Sword. Colossus and the New Mutants find the armour with a voice crying out - inside is the younger Illyana freed from her dark path with the older self having sacrificed herself to save the day. But N'astirh is still on Earth with plans.

This is the final New Mutants issue of Inferno, a special double-sized issue that brings the title's contribution to the crossover to a conclusion. In doing so we also get a very definitive conclusion to the story of Illyana. In addition the regulars get their first encounter with any of the X-Men since the latter's apparent deaths as Colossus shows up to help his sister. Though Illyana herself gets a scene of coming to terms with the realisation that this is indeed her brother, the reaction of the others is limited to Bobby commenting that they though Colossus was dead and Magneto glimpsing from afar the X-Man being carried by two demons and deciding that it can't be him. But it's an appropriate guest appearance for a highly personal tale.

The themes of child abuse and corruption have long been central to Illyana's story as her childhood was stolen and she was brought up around men who used and abused her. One of her abusers was S'ym and now she is stronger and more powerful to fight back - but he is also more powerful than before. She cannot bring redemption through confronting her abusers and instead seems fated to forever be the corrupted being who was once an innocent little girl. Convinced she has no choice in the matter any more there seems nothing her friends can do to help her. The metaphor is strong and effective. The solution less so.

Limbo has been established as a realm where the rules of time work differently from Earth. This is reinforced early in the issue as demons remind Colossus that, "Time different in Limbo. ... One time is all time in Limbo... is part of Limbo's special magic." It's sufficient to prepare for the moment whereby the older Illyana is effectively negated when her younger self is rescued from the realm just after her arrival with the realm's magic able to overcome the logical rules of time travel and altering a character's history making it work in the narrative. But it also feels unsatisfactory given the metaphors. Real life abuse victims cannot just make their torment have not happened. At most they can suppress the memory but it is not easy to simply lock away a bad memory and never think it again. They can help save others from being abused but not turn the clock back. Thus Illyana's end is not so much overcoming the effect of the abuse to live as committing suicide. For the rest of the New Mutants may have saved her from the whole experience and triumphed but for her it's not the best outcome to a story that's been running ever since she first entered Limbo many issues earlier.

The art on this issue manages to capture the themes of darkness and salvation well. One of the main problems throughout the crossover has been the rather silly look of S'ym. Here we get him drawn in demonic poses and coloured especially darkly which makes the character look credible but he really needs to lose the cigar. Otherwise the key moments are well drawn especially Illyana's final transformation and action.

Overall this is an ending that both does and doesn't work. As a story of the New Mutants ending the threat of the demons and saving Illyana it's a viable ending. But as a conclusion to a very personal saga that has long served as a metaphor for child abuse it's utterly unsatisfactory.

Fantastic Four 324 - Inferno

More foes step in to complicate Mantis's quest.

Fantastic Four #324

Story: S.F.X. Englehart
Pencils: Keith Pollard
Inks: Romeo Tanghal
Letters: Joe Rosen
Colors: George Roussos
Editor: Ralph Macchio
Editor in Chief: Tom DeFalco

(There's no "Inferno continues" triangle on the cover but it's not clear why as other Inferno crossovers had it that month and there were even a few stragglers the following month. Anyway this issue is clearly set during Inferno and has been included in all collected editions that contain the crossovers.)

The Human Torch's flame is out of control and nothing will turn it off. Meanwhile Mantis has disappeared from the cell on Kang's ship. Everyone returns to New York to find the sorcerer Necrodamus has escaped from Limbo and taken Mantis to sacrifice her at a point when the planets align to secure great power. The Three and Kang find themselves having to work together with Ms Marvel coming up with a plan. Kang and the Human Torch take off for space where they manage to shift Mercury from its orbit long enough to prevent the alignment. Necrodamus fades back into Limbo. Kang abandons Johnny in space but the movement of the planets attracts the attention of the Silver Surfer.

The story credit is a reflection of the continued breakdown in relations between Steve Englehart and Marvel editorial as he felt he was now just scripting plots totally rewritten by his editors - or just supplying sound effects. Perhaps that's why this issue feels so quick and plot light. Alternatively it may have been an intentional filler interlude in the story to mark time before issue #325 came after the end of the Inferno crossover. Whatever the reason the result is an extremely poor issue. In her brief dialogue it seems as though Mantis is expressing his frustration as bemoans how she has been "Abused, humiliated wherever she turns! ... This one would fight back! ... she has come to feel, in her very bones she will never get back to the stars!" It is as if the writer or scripter feels he will never be able to complete the character's story as he wished.

This continues the practice of using assorted villains mainly associated with the Avengers. Although Necrodamus had been introduced by Englehart in his early 1970s run on Defenders the sorcerer's main appearances since had been in conflict with the Scarlet Witch. Thus it would make sense for him to have returned in West Coast Avengers but with Englehart having just left that book it was clear he was transferring his plans over even when they no longer made sense. The result is a sorcerer who's around for half an issue with a crude plan that is quickly thwarted and he fades away without ever having felt like the significant menace required at this stage of the story. N'astirh briefly appears to warn against distractions with Necrodamus pledging he will use the power to help but as scripted it seems most likely that N'astirh leaves after determining Necrodamus will be no menace to his plans.

One of the inadvertent confusions raised by this issue is that there are actually at least two dimensions in Marvel called Limbo - the magical realm from which Inferno stems and the more science fiction dimension that time travellers pass through and which is ruled over by Kang's future incarnation Immortus. This issue makes no attempt to sort out the confusion between the two even though Kang appears to pass through the latter whilst Necrodamus has been trapped in the former. Kang continues to distance himself from the Kangs appearing over in Avengers in an attempt to clear up the mess. He's also got a weapon on his time ship that makes the noise "Tardis!"

Johnny's flame going out of control is not really developed here and apart from a few comments by the Thing and Ms Marvel about keeping their distance there is just no sign of any affect the permanent flame is having on anything beyond his inability to turn it off. Meanwhile a conversation about whether Ms Marvel could revert to human form if she wished to and whether she does so is started but cuts away before a critical reply, again giving away the editorial interference.

Overall this issue is just dire. It cannot disguise the utter pointlessness of the whole interlude with Necrodamus and there's a general sense of starting but not finishing that is not confined to Mantis's/Englehart's frustrations. Perhaps the cover lacks the "Inferno continues" triangle as a contemporary attempt to discourage readers from picking it up, whether out of dissatisfaction with it or a royalty sabotaging strategy. The behind the scenes conflict is all to clear and the result is this mess.

X-Factor 37 - Inferno

The team find themselves caught up in a rather messy divorce.

X-Factor #37

Writer: Louise Simonson
Penciler: Walter Simonson
Inker: Bob Wiacek
Letterer: Joe Rosen
Colorist: Petra Scotese
Editor: Bob Harras
Editor-in-Chief: Tom DeFalco

Fighting through the demons X-Factor are confronted first by N'astirh, reformed through the transmode virus and now far more powerful, carrying Nathan Christopher Charles Summers. Then appears Madelyne Pryor to confront her husband for the first time since he left her and her rival. The confrontation is explosive with the baby (called Christopher by his father and Nathan by his mother) distressed and threatened for sacrifice whilst N'astirh finds that Madelyne has gotten out of his control and can now only manipulate her through suggestions. The rest of X-Factor advise Cyclops that they must take tougher measures and he reluctantly agrees but Madelyne is extremely powerful.

Looking back it's astonishing that it took a whole three years for this encounter to happen. As discussed in previous posts the whole Scott and Madelyne situation came about because of a clash of visions with Scott having been given a retirement happy ending when suddenly an editorial order came down to reunite the original X-Men causing Madelyne and their child to be casually abandoned both by Scott and the creative team. Madelyne then became an awkward element to tidy away and demonstrated how difficult it can be to undo a superhero marriage when external demands change. Worse still came when one writer had her disappear with all records as though she had never existed but another brought her back into the frame. And in all that time there was no direct confrontation between her and either Scott or Jean.

This issue gives us that confrontation and it's brutal. The ex-couple cannot even agree on what their child is called. Scott seeks to justify his recent behaviour by his belief that Madelyne was dead. Madelyne blames the demons for distorting her through their influence but N'astirh thinks about how the manipulation of Madelyne has gone wrong, as though there's something deeper to her. Although both spouses' sins are touched on and given depth there's a sense that there's something deeper in Madelyne that has made her so willing, as though she bears more guilt for her actions than just the influence of others. There's even a hint that when Scott lost a dual for the leadership of the X-Men to a depowered Storm and opted to leave the team it was because of Madelyne somehow influencing it. Her encounter with Jean is less direct, reacting in anger at her rival trying to comfort her son and siccing demons on her, including her own distorted parents, then declaring her hatred. Madelyne's power is intense and there's something more to it than a mere tool of demons.

There are some other good moments in the issue with one of the more subtle fixes as the Beast literally shreds his uniform and restores his more traditional bare chested look whilst the re-emergence of N'astirh with enhanced powers is handled well to make the demon more credible as the stakes increase. But overall this is very much the eventual meeting of Scott, Madelyne and Jean that we've been long awaiting and it does so in brutal form.

Power Pack 43 - Inferno

The Bogeyman has captured the Pack's parents and seemingly destroyed the family forever.

Power Pack #43

Jon Bogdanove wrote without distraction
Jon Bogdanove, Sal Velluto penciled to good reaction
Stan Drake, Al Williamson and Company inked in fractions
Joe Rosen lettered-in the captions
Glynis Oliver colored this attraction
Carl Potts can't get no satisfaction
Tom DeFalco Chief of Hoo-Haa Action

Carmody the Bogeyman has captured the Pack's parents and forced the children to reveal their secret powers. He takes off across New York with the four Powers in pursuit but anger and an inability to wait to work together works against them. They come across demons attacking people and pause to deal with them. Meanwhile in space Kofi learns the Kymellians have rebuilt Friday the living smartship but the ship's essence is fading away and nobody can understand why. The Bogeyman climbs the Chrysler Building and taunts Power Pack as they approach and attack. They save their parents but are left uncertain what to do with the Bogeyman who will just keep coming back. In anger Alex determines to kill him but the parents talk the children down and tell them they love them still. The Bogeyman is outraged at this display of familial affection and charges at them but goes over the edge, falling into a raging fire. The children take their parents home as the city seems to be returning to normal.

This issue starts with one of the biggest moments in the entire series - the Powers' parents discovering their children have powers and are using them. Much debated both in the series itself and on the letters page the matter has been forced by the intervention of their revenge seeking archenemy, raising the stakes. Inferno supplies the backdrop to the changes in Carmody and also demons who provide a distraction in the chase but this is a highly personal tale focused on their true worst nightmare.

It's a story of discovery with both Alex and Julie finding new ways to use their powers - Alex can now fire multiple smaller powerballs at the same time and Julie can generate a molecular density field of condensed air - along with the family as a whole discovering about each other. At first Jim and Maggie react in disbelief but when they see their children acting to defend the family they remind them they are still their children and loved no matter what with Maggie even reminding Julie of a past conversation when she said she'd love her even if she could fly. Jim and Maggie have been put through quite a bit over the course of the series without knowing why things keep happening to their family so it makes sense they can understand what's happening and not much of a further stretch that they can accept it. However some will find it far too lubby dubby and can sympathise with the outrage of Carmody as he reacts in disgust, recalls his own harsh childhood and then cannot come to terms with the monster he has become.

However the very end of the issue suggests a different track as the children head out to help with the clear-up operation and the final panel shows their parents in total shock. Was a change forced upon this story that we'll see in the next issue? The cover to this one has a scrap of paper on it with "An introduction to Xavier's Sch... Gifted You..." and the cover to the next issue previewed at the end here shows the four children flying away from their parents with a suitcase and crying with some of the New Mutants in the background. Was there a plan to send them off to Xavier's school and overlap with the New Mutants more often?

At its heart Power Pack is a series about family and this issue challenges the dynamic like nothing before it. The dark world around them is as nothing to the darkness that has invaded their family and it's understandable how the children react in fury rather than thinking calmly, whether it's Katie charging off without the others or Alex determining to kill Carmody. And this is that rare issue that truly changes everything, doing so in spectacular style.

New Mutants 72 - Inferno

Illyana's transformation is completed.

New Mutants #72

Writer: Louise Simonson
Penciler: Bret Blevins
Inker: Al Williamson
Letterer: Joe Rosen
Colorist: Glynis Oliver
Editor: Bob Harras
Editor-in-Chief: Tom DeFalco

The demons descend upon New York as N'astirh encourages Illyana to embrace her dark side completely. S'ym shows up and the two leading demons battle whilst Illyana flees. The rest of the New Mutants see the X-Terminators in the sky fighting to destroy the pentagram and take off to help them. They succeed but with several wounded. The surviving members of both teams join together. Illyana finds herself teleporting into surreal distorted versions of life in New York with the twisted demonic forms overwhelming her and taunting her to use the Soul Sword. Eventually she does so as the demonic magics increase due to N'astirh having absorbed the transmode techno organic virus and now having magic in all his circuits. He survives an explosion and confronts Illyana, telling her there is no path of redemption. She uses the Soul Sword again on him and her armour now fully forms, encasing her completely.

This issue demonstrates a major problem with the crossover structure of Inferno. Rather than having separate issues of different series tell distinct chapters that flow smoothly from one to the next it instead has a lot of overlapping issues with characters jumping from one set of pages to another and back. This is why there are so many different orders in circulation for the event though they tend to at least line up around key moments such as the opening of the portal bringing the demons into New York. Sometimes the overlap is especially great the whole narrative jumping between titles. This happens here.

With the exception of Illyana's part of the issue it is very hard to follow in isolation. It overlaps heavily with the final issue of X-Terminators to the point that the battle between N'astirh and S'ym is only fully understandable when the two issues are read in close proximity. The team-up between the two teams is mostly covered in the limited series but here we get more of the rescue of the babies and an extension to the scene of the two teams resting at the end. The two teams are effectively fused in this issue with a redivision based on wounds rather than existing affiliations and this looks like it could lead to a future expansion.

However Illyana's story is mercifully told in a single series. Here we see her descent continue as she becomes ever more a pawn of the demons. Some proclaim to worship her but others are more overt in simply using her. The scene at the end as she sees what she has become and N'astirh tells her that there was never a right path for her once she entered Limbo and everything ultimately led her to this moment is truly chilling. Her continued destruction has driven so much and left her vulnerable to abuse and manipulation, making for a very dark cliffhanger as her only source of help seems to be S'ym (who is drawn and coloured to look more menacing here than usual).

This issue is very much in two pieces. One side is a mess because it overlaps upon another part of the crossover so heavily that it doesn't work well in isolation and even read together it feels jumpy and slightly repetitive. The other side is self-contained and shows a terrifying final descent for Illyana as she truly becomes the Darkchilde with seemingly no escape. The stakes are rising but this issue could have been better structured to get there.

Power Pack 42 - Inferno

Power Pack face their worst nightmare as they discover the Bogeyman really is under the bed.

Power Pack #42

Jon Bogdanove who both wrote and penciled lightly
Stan Drake who finished in ink tightly
Don Hudson inking the backgrounds slightly
Glynis Oliver who still colors brightly
Carl Potts editing nightly
Tom DeFalco Editor in Chief Politely
[And Joe Rosen lettering with credit overlooked unknightly]

(In case you're wondering about issue #41 it was an unrelated issue by a different team that saw the Pack dealing with a landlord committing arson so as to use the insurance to clear his debts.)

In Limbo Douglas Carmody gets changed by N'astirh and sent to Earth. The heatwave in New York coincides with all four Power children coming down with a fever and being unable to join together to use their healing powers to cure themselves as their parents are constantly around. The flat experiences more of the weirdness as living sewage and mildew invade whilst out on the streets Carmody and other demons make their presence felt. The Powers plan to leave the flat to stay at a relative's who has a water supply but Carmody sneaks into the building and confronts them in the lift. Grabbing the parents he demand the children reveal their secret.

Many of the foes thrown into Limbo in various issues have been transformed by the magic there into something far more demonic and dangerous and so it's natural to give Carmody a power upgrade beyond a simplistic man using technology into something far more powerful and dangerous. His demonic form retains his obsession with decency, attacking gangs in the street and then picking on a loud obnoxious fat man and stealing his suit to create a suitably comic appearance for this monstrous foe.

Much of the issue focuses on a seemingly ordinary family trying to survive in the madness caused by illness, the heatwave and now reports of the demons invading New York with the complication that the children could easily cure their illness and deal with many of the immediate problems but it would require them to give away their secret. Meanwhile their parents are suffering the effects of the madness with Jim worn down by the heat and long walk home through streets overflowing with rubbish when public transport packs up whilst Maggie is showing signs of collapsing under the strain.

And then the Bogeyman attacks and forces the children to reveal their identities to their parents.

The debate about whether to tell them or not had been running for a good while both in the stories themselves and on the letters page but seemingly resolved with a decision to not do so. However the cliffhanger to this issue blows so much open and offers a real prospect that a major lasting change is being made here.

This makes the slower pace of the issue feel natural. It's all building up to the key moment at the end so it helps to give us a final look at what life has been like for the parents before the bombshell. Making such a bold move is a shock but also offers true change going forward.

X-Terminators 4 - Inferno

The X-Terminators and the New Mutants team up to try to close the portal and save the babies.

X-Terminators #4

Writer: Louise Simonson
Penciler: Jon Bogdanove
Inker: Al Milgrom
Letterer: Joe Rosen
Colorist: Petra Scotese
Editor: Bob Harras
Editor-in-Chief: Tom DeFalco

With demons flowing through the portal Taki realises he's been tricked and tries to shut down the computer but N'astirh and Crotus stop him and more demons come to guard the computer. The other X-Terminators have been freed and Taki creates planes for them to take to the sky to take on the demons and rescue the babies. They are joined by the New Mutants who have also come through the portal whilst N'astirh confront S'ym. N'astirh cannot touch the computer himself without shorting it out so opts to be transformed by the techno-organic transmode virus to allow him to interface with it. As he does so Taki uses his own power to revert the computer to its components causing it to explode, taking N'astirh and the portal with it.

This issue brings the limited series to a conclusion and really exposes the problem with it - there's too much Taki. The character has been on an arc of self-discovery as he evolves from the embittered self-centred kid seen in the first issue to the brave and cunning child who pulls himself to the computer and is willing to give his life to destroy it. But ultimately it cannot disguise that he's an entirely new character to the series that combines a host of unfortunate stereotypes about east Asian Americans and the disabled and he's ultimately taken much of the focus away from the existing characters who are the main attraction of the series.

Although Leech and Artie do little more than pull out the power cord on the computer (which Crotus soon replaces), the other four do get some good moments in the battle as they each deploy their powers and show skills. But there's a strong hint of just where the team is going as the New Mutants fly up to join them with a strong hint that the two groups will soon be merged. As a result this limited series has ultimately been less of a solo showcase for the X-Factor kids and more an additional Inferno story that doubles as a way to bring the two groups together with the addition of a character who is best either totally forgotten or radically overhauled. It reinforces the idea that what was planned as a series based around five of them being at neighbouring boarding schools whilst Rusty started off in jail was hurriedly co-opted to instead serve as the main official build-up for the crossover. This explains the rather limited plot that isn't sufficient to sustain four over sized issues or even give a full conclusion to the saga.

The art is especially cartoony here and doesn't feel the most appropriate for a tale of demons invading Earth. In contrast to the first issue S'ym is now drawn in a more traditional comical form that continues to undermine the character given his role in the story. By contrast N'astirh retains a credible look as a dangerous force and this is even more so after he absorbs the transmode virus.

This issue invariably feels anti-climactic. It's clear that things have only been temporarily stopped for now because there's still so much of the crossover to come. It also feels like the series as a whole has gone in a completely different direction from planned. If there was any plan to give the X-Terminators their own ongoing series then this is not a good sample as to what it would be about. The whole thing would probably have been better done in a single special edition issue rather than bring dragged out like this.

Daredevil 265 - Inferno

Daredevil wanders through New York dealing with the madness, not all of which is caused by Inferno.

(In case you're wondering what happened to issue #264, it is a fill-in that has nothing to do with Inferno. A box at the top of the first page is surprisingly open about how John Romita Jr's wedding meant he was unable to pencil the issue in time so they put the story on hold for a month and came up with "a special off-beat issue" set "sometime in the very recent past" with Steve Ditko drawing a tale of the Owl, drugs, bombs and a baby. It's a surprisingly honest approach to explaining the presence of a fill-in rather than having Daredevil or some other character suddenly pausing mid story to remember the full details of a previous adventure including scenes he wasn't present for.)

Daredevil #265

Writer: Ann Nocenti
Penciler: John Romita Jr
Inker: Al Williamson
Letters: Joe Rosen
Colors: Max Scheele
Editor: Ralph Macchio
Editor in Chief: Tom DeFalco

There are many problems in the city that the magic and demons are amplifying. A dentist is attacked by his machines and turned into a possessed cyborg that goes out attacking others. A lorry causes huge pollution with the drivers not caring until Daredevil jams their exhaust pipes. The buses aren't moving because demons are attacking the drivers until Daredevil intervenes. A resident of a flat is woken by demons doing construction work early in the morning and finds his flat has been burgled. He determines to leave the city but his car is looted then destroyed in a crash. He tries a taxi but gets taken for a ride. Eventually he takes a tour helicopter to get out of the city if only for ten minutes. The dentist is now a corrupt police officer choosing who to arrest for whatever minor violation he feels like and ignoring laws he dislikes. In an alleyway a couple are mugged until Daredevil fights off the demons. Ol' Hornhead then fights the dentist/police officer and beats him before leading citizens in picking up litter.

This is a very plot light issue and Daredevil (now back in his full costume over his bandages) never says a word in it. Instead it's very much a parade of problems with urban living and seems to in part be preparing to take the hero out of the city for an extended time. Much of the issue feels like a rant about problems living in New York but it also highlights that there are good people and those who can't live without it.

It's an odd issue that feels more a polemic than a story. Ann Nocenti's take on the series is famed for this and in the wider context an issue like this makes a lot of sense. But as a part of a crossover it feels rather less substantial as though it's just taking the elements that have to be incorporated but not making the best concession to visiting readers or producing an especially memorable tale. This is a disappointing end especially given how strong John Romita Jr's artwork is here.