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.

Daredevil 263 - Inferno

There's more than one devil travelling to and from a hell.

Daredevil #263

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

Daredevil is recovering in hospital but Typhoid Mary visits and tells Karen Paige about her affair with Matt, sending Karen fleeing. Demons have broken through into New York but the Kingpin is so obsessed that he doesn't care about them. However he is visited by an unnamed demon who declares he sold his sole long ago and has been working for the demon ever since. Meanwhile Daredevil rises from his hospital bed and sets out to confront the demons, finding a demonically possessed subway train on a journey "down town". Eventually he stops the train and finds the demon's weak point, slaying it.

Daredevil may be one of the most down to earth series to take part in Inferno but it's also a series starring a men who dresses as a devil (even though he's heavily bandaged in this issue) who lives in a place known as Hell's Kitchen. Where better to explore the idea of "Hell on Earth" which was the original proposed name for the crossover? Although he's not named there's a strong implication that the demon who makes a deal with Typhoid Mary and then visits the Kingpin with her is Mephisto or the Devil - the precise relationship between those two has always varied a bit over the years. It makes for some striking imagery.

This is a mostly descriptive issue with some striking imagery of the demons and possession and the reaction of the characters. Typhoid Mary seems to take it all in her stride. Karen is horrified to learn of Matt's affair and then finds herself being bombarded by images of syringes then addicts and demons. The Kingpin is staying calm but clearly moved by the idea that he is not the ultimate boss of the city but is instead working for another. And Daredevil rises, treating this living hell as the thing he's spent his life preparing for. The scene as he confronts the subway train is far more than a metaphor as it journeys down with Matt fighting against it both physically and spiritually as his goodness struggles to bring redemption for the passengers.

If there's one thing odd about this issue it's the secret identity. Karen states that the hospital doctors have agreed to protect Daredevil's secret yet when Mary shows up and calls him "Matt" Karen immediately declares that it's Daredevil in the bed effectively confirming it if needs be. And at the end the kid Butch declares his hatred for Matt for his treatment of Karen and disappearing when Daredevil's hair is fully on display and his bandages do nothing to conceal his identity. How can Butch not know who this is?

But for these odd moments this issue works well with strong artwork and depressing commentary really going to town with the idea of Hell on Earth. It's a dark journey that shows how it is possible to use Daredevil in wider events with such fantastic elements to maximum effect.

Daredevil 262 - Inferno

Daredevil is molested by a vacuum cleaner whilst the Black Widow fights a lift.

Daredevil #262

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

Daredevil is missing, lying near death after a battle with Typhoid Mary. A vacuum cleaner comes to life and starts attacking his body. Inside his head a dream of his mentor Stick berates him to fight back and live. Meanwhile Karen, the Black Widow, and two of the skateboarding kids' gang the Fatboys, Butch and Darla, search New York amidst inanimate objects coming to life and attacking them. They cannot get police help and so return to the Free Law Clinic which has been smashed up. It soon becomes clear more objects have come to life with a lift trying to consume Butch and Darla until the Black Widow frees them. Elsewhere Typhoid Mary struggles with her different personas. Daredevil comes too and smashes the vacuum cleaner only to realise Typhoid Mary has returned.

This is a series that's in the middle of an ongoing big storyline running headlong into a wider crossover event and it can sometimes be hard to reconcile the needs of the two. The introduction of Typhoid Mary was one of the biggest developments in Ann Nocenti's run and a bold move was made to not have Daredevil recover straight after a battle in issue #260. Instead our hero has been lying unconscious for two issues with the focus being on the search for him.

Inferno brings some weirdness into the scenario with the result that this issue is best known for the vacuum cleaner. Oddly the machine starts looking normal but seems to change into a vaguely scorpion like creature. As it changes it's also drawn and coloured as though it's Warlock from New Mutants (though the cover colours it differently). But it's actually only fairly minor to the sequence which is really about Daredevil finding the inner strength to recover as an image of Stick berates him and for this any animal or passing mugger could have performed the same role. The main signs of the demons come as the others venture though the city with sone gargoyles dropping down on them, subway train doors suddenly closing on them, the equipment in the law clinic going wild and then finally the lift tries to consume the two children. It's all fairly low key stuff but Daredevil is usually a street level series that has often struggled to accommodate some of the wilder elements of the wider Marvel universe.

There are some good character moments for all of Daredevil, Typhoid Mary and Karen as each in their way confronts elements of their past and overcomes them. Mary does so in conversation with herself, Daredevil through a dream struggle and Karen through a real life encounter with prostitutes she used to work alongside.

As an advert for Daredevil at this time this is a rather awkward issue being midway through its own developments and so not giving visiting readers from the crossover the greatest sense of what the book is like. As an issue of its own series it's a stronger character piece with typically good art from John Romita Jr that manages to take the odd situation all around and work it well into the narrative flow.

Daredevil 276 - Acts of Vengeance

This issue concludes the story of Daredevil's battle with Ultron. It continues the android's programming chaos as he struggles with the conflicting programming of his different incarnations and turns to a pagan religion, setting up a bizarre ritual with hundreds of his heads laid out to mark a pathway up a mound as he seeks to solve his "blasphemous" existence and the paradox of Number Nine being the perfect woman when absolute perfection is unachievable.

Daredevil #276

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

It's an almost terrifying examination of a fanatic struggling to adapt their beliefs to the reality of the world around them and of multiple personality disorder case trying to overcome the different voices to the point that Ultron actually starts tearing out wires in the hope of removing the troublesome circuits. It's made worse by the android retaining his inbuilt weaponry, such that Daredevil's attempt to crash a pick-up truck into him gets nowhere.

Understanding is a key part of this story. Daredevil's enhanced senses may mean that he can hear at a distance, but he doesn't truly understand that Ultron is trying to reform with the help of Number Nine by removing the murderous programming from his earlier selves. Instead he assumes that the android is going to kill the woman. The Inhumans Gorgon and Karnak are still around but the former doesn't contribute much beyond a few futile blows whilst the latter takes an inordinate amount of time to work out just what Ultron's vulnerable point is. Instead it's Ultron's own struggle that brings salvation, as he pulls up his head to expose the non-adamantium wiring inside, and thus making himself vulnerable to attack. This leads to the moment this issue is best known for - Daredevil knocking Ultron's head off with a stick.

Viewed in isolation the full-page panel must seem absurd, but within the story it makes sense that the android has weakened his own defences in an attempt to attack and remove his circuits, and Daredevil and Karnak have taken advantage of this to attack at the critical moment. But it's not a total victory as Number Nine has seen the good in Ultron and wants to rebuild him as the good being she heard.

On the surface of it, the idea of sending a powerhouse like Ultron against Daredevil seems like absurd overkill, although it was justified last issue by the rivalry between Doctor Doom and the Kingpin that leads to the former aiming for a quick, easy kill to show he can succeed where his fellow villain has failed. But the story works so well by making Ultron into a conflicted, vulnerable figure who reflects the wider themes of the series at the moment, showing the conflicts about perfection and societal programming. As a result the android's defeat is convincing and this makes for a good, strong piece.

Daredevil #276 has been reprinted in:

• Acts of Vengeance Crossovers Omnibus (2011)
• Daredevil Epic Collection: Heart of Darkness (2017)

Daredevil 275 - Acts of Vengeance

One of the more unusual battles spawned by "Acts of Vengeance" must surely be pitching Daredevil against the powerful robot Ultron. On the face of it this is surely absurd yet the devil is in the detail.

Daredevil #275

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

The Daredevil issues of "Acts of Vengeance" come from an unusual and now largely forgotten era of the series. It's true that Daredevil has lots of forgotten eras, but this is by Ann Nocenti, who until 2006 was the most prolific writer on the title when she was just pipped by Brian Michael Bendis at the end of his run. It says something about Daredevil that it has chalked up over six hundred issues (across multiple volumes with the original numbering returned to a few times), yet its three most prolific writers (Stan Lee is the third) each wrote in the range of only about 50 to 57 issues. The book did a bit better with artists with its most prolific, Gene Colan, turning in nearly a hundred issues. By contrast this issue's penciler, John Romita, Jr, is near the end of a run of thirty issues.

Part of the reason why this period isn't so well remembered is the setting. Daredevil is best known as a New York lawyer by day and vigilante by night, prowling the darker parts of the city. So an extended storyline that takes him out into the countryside and has him meet the Inhumans, Gorgon, Karnak and Lockjaw probably isn't going to spring to mind when one thinks of the series. However the underlying theme of the current storyline is a familiar piece of social commentary that Ann Nocenti's work is especially noted for. Daredevil has found himself at a farm house owned by Skip Ash, a geneticist who has conducted experiments on humans including creating "Number Nine", who can instantly heal and has been mentally conditioned to be an idealised traditional housewife and cheerleader. This brings conflict with Skip's natural daughter Brandy, an artist and ardent feminist, leading to arguments about programming. Daredevil himself ideally just wants to be alone, to escape all the other people with problems around him, but he too reacts to his societal programming.

This creates a good environment for a contrast with the guest villain from the crossover. At first the idea of pitching Daredevil against Ultron may seem absurd, but this is a highly conflicted Ultron. Doctor Doom, yet again, is selecting and overseeing the dispatch of the foe and has reconstructed the android, incorporating all twelve sets of previous brain patterns in the hope of creating the perfect mix. However this instead gives the android multiple personalities that conflict over his purpose and direction as he realises he is flawed and thus his (re)creator is flawed, but Number Nine's perfection attracts at least some of Ultron. Like Number Nine, and indeed like Brandy and other characters, Ultron is driven by his programming with conflicting influences trying to determine what course of action he should follow. It's a good metaphor without being overstated. The actual fight only starts near the end of the issue as Daredevil, Gorgon and Karnak find Ultron, but it makes for a convincing strong power level.

This is a surprisingly thoughtful issue given that the elements at first sight look absurd. Instead we get a foe with an internal struggle that matches the environment into which he is sent, providing a good exploration of an android all too often used for over simplistic battles. This may not be the traditional urban environment that Daredevil is known for, a result of the crossover turning up in the middle of a protracted storyline, but it provides a strong tale none the less.

Daredevil #275 has been reprinted in:

• Acts of Vengeance Crossovers Omnibus (2011)
• Daredevil Epic Collection: Heart of Darkness (2017)

Star Brand Classic volume 1

Star Brand Classic volume 1 reprints issues #1 to #7 of the series. The series is written by Jim Shooter with one plot scripted by Roy Thomas. All but one issue is drawn by John Romita Jr, the exception is by Alex Saviuk.

This may seem a stable line-up compared to some New Universe titles but as the other two Classic volumes go up to issue #9 then in the interests of comparison it's worth noting that Star Brand's next two issues were both written by Cary Bates and one was drawn by Arvell Jones and the other by Keith Giffen.

Being written by the Editor-in-Chief and originator of the New Universe, it's natural to expect this series to be the flagship of the line and a template for how to do it right. But instead this is a series that fails to conform to the model of the ordinary universe until one single event unleashes changes upon everything. Instead we get a series that's more of an alternate take on the Green Lantern origin with a twist. Earth may be depicted as "the world outside your window" until a change happens but that's not true of the wider universe and we get a series based upon an encounter with aliens and all the consequences that flows from that. We also get a protagonist who is very different from the usual types encountered in Marvel comics. For all that was revolutionary about the Marvel Silver Age heroes, they ultimately conformed to the traditions of superhero ethics. They might have doubts and insecurities but ultimately they could always be relied on to do the right thing and a big fuss was made whenever they temporarily lapsed. Outside of the costume they were generally respectable people as well.

Star Brand is a very different take on it all. The lead character, Ken Connell (note that "Star Brand" is the object that gives him power, not a superhero code name) is not the most likeable of men. Most notably he's in two relationships at once, with one girlfriend kept ignorant of the other, and he's willing to cheat on them both, doing so with a woman found on a distant beach and even contemplating bedding a seventeen years old babysitter, though not going through with it. Otherwise he's an ordinary person whose career has seemingly stalled as a car mechanic in a large garage and whose hobbies include motorcycling.

The series does its best to present a more realistic approach to an everyday guy suddenly getting powers. He doesn't immediately rush out to stop crime and save lives. Indeed on one occasion he decides not to go and save four men from a collapsed building, in part because he can't get the time off work. When he does venture out he's concerned about concealing his identity and this makes him cautious. There's a moment when he tracks down terrorist students but instead of attacking them he simply breaks open their car boot full of weapons and then calls the police. In another he goes to save a boy trapped down a well but fear of recognition makes him take a long distance route of digging a tunnel and in the meantime the boy is rescued by Jenny Swanson in her robot suit from Spitfire and the Troubleshooters.

More generally this is a world where powers have consequences and special abilities don't come automatically. Ken may be able to lift a sofa when testing his strength, but it damages the roof in the process. When dealing with terrorists he finds a gun, but hasn't a clue how to use it effectively. Ken may be able to fly at great speed and even into space but he hasn't a clue how to know which way to go and has to resort to following coastlines, rivers and roads before taking maps with him. Disappearing from day to day activities gets him in trouble both at work and with one of his girlfriends. His flight gets noticed and his face recognised by terrorists, whilst it's only after the event that he realises he's left his fingerprints all over a gun and can be potentially traced. He contemplates revealing himself to the government but is then told he would be treated as a threat, experimented upon and disposed of. And the Star Brand itself comes in the form of a transferable tattoo but finding a place to hide it isn't easy.

The supporting cast are a mixed bunch. Most prominent are Ken's girlfriends. At one point he proposes to Barb and moves in with her and her two children, Laurie and Bobby. However they're put at danger by the alien who originally gave Ken the Star Brand, though the relationship ultimately crashes when Barb finds out about Debbie. Whereas Barb is slightly older than Ken and a working woman, Debbie seems younger and less with it. She is nicknamed "Duck" and often says "Quack" when the nickname is used. Ken uses her as both an emotional crutch and a confidante, yet she sticks by him no matter what and cannot bear the thought of their relationship stopping. The other cast members are less developed, such as Myron Feldman, a psychiatrist and Ken's friend who starts billing him for their time together, or various work colleagues such as his foreman, John Eberhardt.

This series doesn't go down the route of conventional bigger than life villains with the exception of the mysterious "Old Man" who gives Ken the Star Brand in the first place. His name is unpronounceable and we have only his word for his motives, which seem to be to recruit a young, malleable person to take part in a distant interstellar war. Otherwise the most recurrent foes are Libyan terrorists, reflecting the obsessions of a lot of 1980s fiction, with Ken even flying to Libya and destroying a military base. Beyond this Ken deals with minor annoyances, some with more success than others.

Although the writer and artist are generally consistent, there are signs of errors and laziness creeping in. Some names, particularly Kath, get used more than once whilst both the art and colouring can be a little inconsistent making it difficult to keep track of which minor character is which. Scenes at the end of issue #3 are meant to take place after dark bit are coloured as though it's broad daylight. The start of the same issue implies that it's the morning after issue #1, overlooking issue #2 in the meantime. It's hard to escape the idea that this series was almost thrown together to get it out without much care, which is shocking for the flagship book of such a major launch.

Overall Star Brand is very different type of series from a typical Marvel book, which means it meets at least one set of expectations. But it stops short of some of the hype, retaining the alien races that the New Universe was supposedly going to do without. It's also still feeling its way a lot of the time, trying to figure out just how much time should be spent on Ken's day to day life as opposed to his powers, and it doesn't always get the balance right. This is very much a concept in the experimental stage and it would have been better to have tried the idea out as a low key one-off series to refine it first, rather than such a high profile launch of a whole line. This is not a bad book in itself but it doesn't live up to the contemporary hype.

Essential X-Men volume 6

Essential X-Men volume 6 comprises Uncanny X-Men #199 to #213 and Annual #9 plus New Mutants #46 and Special Edition #1, X-Factor #9 to #11, Thor #373 to #374 and Power Pack #27. Chris Claremont writes all the X-Men and New Mutants issues, Louise Simonson the X-Factor and Power Pack issues and Walter Simonson the Thor issues. The art on the regular X-Men issues is mainly by John Romita Jr with individual issues by Rick Leonardi, June Brigman, Barry Windsor-Smith, Bret Blevins and Alan Davis with the annual by Arthur Adams. The New Mutants regular edition is drawn by Jackson Guice and the Special Edition by Arthur Adams. The X-Factor issues are drawn by Terry Shoemaker and Walter Simonson, the Power Pack issue by Jon Bogdanove and the Thor issues by Sal Buscema. And yes, there's a separate labels post.

This volume contains material from three different crossovers and they represent almost the full spectrum of types. There's what is basically a crossover between annuals that amounts to just a couple of specials telling a combined story. There's a big event crossover based around a limited series with other titles just dipping in to the story for a short period. And there's a storyline told over several ongoing titles.

The annual is the second half of a crossover with the New Mutants Special Edition. This was originally planned as an annual but turned out to be so long it was instead put out in the deluxe format of the day. This avoided the problems of graphic novels as it wasn't too much more expensive than a regular annual, would be easier to find in later years and also reproduces well in black and white. Unfortunately, this extension now means that the second issue in the volume features a team of characters who are largely unfamiliar to the regular X-Men series and the story takes an age to wade through. Worse still it's placed after a dramatic issue ending as Magneto agrees to go to trial and even though the length of time it takes to set up a trial makes this the natural place for the story (and the trial issue shows the return to Earth) it still feels like an obstacle in the path of the story rather than a crucial step forward. The tale sees Loki allied with the Enchantress to seek revenge on Storm and the X-Men but instead Storm is currently with the holidaying New Mutants and so all are transported to Asgard. The Special Edition naturally focuses on the New Mutants in this different environment but whatever its merits as a New Mutants tale here it's just an extended character study of unfamiliar characters. The X-Men annual brings our regular cast into the story but for the most part they're just exploring Asgard and rescuing the New Mutants from the changes Loki and the Enchantress have brought. Storm is also transformed and given both a hammer and weather powers to take the place of the absent Thor as the new goddess of thunder. It's an intriguing idea but it isn't explored as fully as it could be, with Ororo one of many characters distorted by the magic around them. Other good points include the prospect of the New Mutants staying in Asgard where they are accepted rather than returning to a world that fears and hates them. But ultimately this doesn't really feel like an X-Men story but an intruder from another series. Beyond seeing Rachel publicly adopt the name "Phoenix", to Cyclops's displeasure, this is an entirely forgettable crossover in the way of the main narrative. The art is, however, highly effective, helped by having Arthur Adams draw both parts. There are even some fun pop culture references including Warlock's disguises as the Starship Enterprise and Hägar the Horrible.

Issues #202 & #203 are crossovers with the later stages of Secret Wars II. Crossover issues for this event can be mixed, ranging from the Beyonder merely passing through the events of a regular issue to an incoherent mess as he gets needlessly involved in ongoing storylines to something spectacular when the encounter is used to explore the regular characters in-depth in such unusual circumstances. Here we get a two-part story focused upon Rachel as she sets out to destroy the Beyonder who instead enhances her power and manipulates her into attempting to destroy the whole universe. The parallels with Jean's descent into all-powerful madness are all too clear, especially when Rachel nearly uses the M'Kraan crystal as her main instrument of destruction. Eventually she relents, realising she cannot sacrifice so many lives who are unaware of their situation. It's a strong character study of Rachel and a chance to bring redemption to the legacy of Phoenix at a time when other titles were resurrecting Jean Grey and decoupling her from the power. This is one of the best of the Secret Wars II crossovers.

The "Mutant Massacre" was the first big crossover between various mutant titles and various satellites; the latter consisting of those also written by various mutant writers. It's surprising to find the whole thing collected here (bar a rather detached Daredevil issue) as the X-Men and X-Factor are kept apart throughout this volume and Essential X-Factor volume 1, which was released the same year, only the X-Factor side of the crossover is included. We also get an early example of the mess that can come when crossovers try to show the same even from different angles as a scene where Magneto and X-Factor spot each other outside the Hellfire Club has noticeably different dialogue in each series. The event itself is rather unsatisfying as a group of killers called the Marauders make their way into the Morlocks' tunnels under New York City and start killing the mutant residents. No clear reason is given for the action at this stage and the Marauders are mainly a set of previously unseen mutants, including Arclight, Blockbuster, Harpoon, Malice, Prism, Riptide, Scalphunter and Scrambler. They do, however, also include Vertigo and Sabretooth. The actual victims of the attack are surprisingly less than the story implies, largely amounting to just one established character, Annalee, and a whole bunch of background extras and one-offs created just to be killed off here. All the other established Morlocks are shown escaping, though some may now end up in one new home or another. As an event it's rather tame in the broader impact on the world. But as a character piece this is a desperate time. Few of the heroes who go into the tunnels emerge unscathed and by the story's end Nightcrawler, Colossus and Shadowcat are all incapacitated in one way or another whilst Storm undergoes a crisis of confidence. And the story introduces the conflict between Wolverine and his best-known foe, Sabretooth.

The Wolverine/Sabretooth conflict has become such a core part of both characters that it's extraordinary to realise that both had been around for about a decade before they were first shown fighting together. It seems the problem was that Sabretooth was deemed an Iron Fist villain and thus unavailable to Chris Claremont after he left that character's series, but with Power Man and Iron Fist having come to an end only a few months earlier it was now possible to transfer Sabretooth over to X-Men. The series doesn't waste time in throwing the two foes against each other twice in as many issues and dropping hints about a longstanding enmity between them. Neither character's full history has been detailed, leaving many mysteries to be addressed another time, but it seems we have a conflict between a hero and a distorted reflection of himself. Given the little we do know about Wolverine's past we have perhaps the conflict between a tamed savage and an untamed one, showing the very different route Wolverine could have taken.

Another Wolverine conflict appearing in the X-Men titles for the first time here is that with Lady Deathstrike, previously seen in Alpha Flight and, in her pre-cyborg form of Yuriko, in Daredevil and other titles. However despite Yuriko's body being transformed by Spiral as, presumably, part of her ongoing plans, the issue (#205) feels like an emergency filler, as does its immediate predecessor where Nightcrawler rescues a young woman from Arcade's complex only to discover she's unknowingly the heir to a European throne. She's written out so quickly it's as though plans were made and rapidly ditched.

The issues in this run are from the era when the X-Men titles grew into a clear franchise with the launch of a third title, X-Factor, as well as continuing to feed elements between X-Men and New Mutants. Both throw up a few problems within this volume. Although the New Mutants are usually introduced when they appear it can at times be confusing to know what's going on over in their title that feeds into this one. In particular Magneto seems to spend most of his time as the school's new headmaster over there rather than here, reducing the impact of his now working with his old foes. More problematically Betsy Braddock seems to just appear in the mansion from nowhere and has presumably been imported from the UK Captain Britain stories via the New Mutants. The "Mutant Massacre" sees her demonstrating her telepathic abilities and courage to the point where the very last page in the book shows her being welcomed to the team under the name Psylocke, but it would have been less jarring if there had been some explanation as to where she's come from and what she's doing in the mansion.

The biggest impact in the long term comes from the launch of X-Factor. Issue #201 represents X-Men's contribution to the heavy lifting required to set up that series as Cyclops is written out abruptly. At the same time he has to face now being a father himself but also the loss of his main father figure as Professor X is stuck in deep space with Lilandra and the Starjammers. He feels his family pulling in direction but the team in another, a situation made worse by his apparent lack of interest in keeping in contact with Madelyne whilst he was in Paris for Magneto's trial. Finally Storm forces the issue by challenging Cyclops to a duel for the leadership and surprisingly wins. This proves the impetus for his departure but the whole thing feels forced, trying to simultaneously extract Scott from both the team and his family and support his characterisation in the new series. It makes the newly born baby boy (so far unnamed) suddenly feel surplus to requirements along with Madelyne. The whole thing all feels very sudden and forced, as later interviews have confirmed that X-Factor was created by editorial dictat. Also complicating this series is the publicity campaign in the early issues of X-Factor that inadvertently ramps up anti-mutant tensions.

The other main loose end with Scott concerns Rachel as it's never established if he's deduced that she is his daughter from an alternate timeline. Also, in light of the retcon that set-up X-Factor, it's never made clear just who her mother actually was - the real Jean or the Phoenix entity that impersonated her? Rachel is succumbing to doubts, fears and revenge leading her to go on a rampage that nearly has her killing the villain Selene until Wolverine intervenes and stabs Rachel. It's a shocking moment but seemingly the only way to prevent the Phoenix menace taking off once more. Rachel survives but is alienated from the X-Men and succumbs to the lures of Spiral.

The dark world that Rachel comes from seems to be getting ever closer in many different ways. Early on we see other mutants starting to work for the government as mutant hunters when Mystique negotiates for the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants to become the government sanctioned agency Freedom Force, complete with provisional pardons for all its members. Meanwhile Magneto's alliance with the X-Men takes some big steps forward as he surrenders himself for trial before an international court and then after the trial is derailed by terrorist attacks he accepts Xavier's request to take his place as headmaster as Xavier goes off into space to be healed from his recent injuries. It's a bold step forward though as noted above Magneto is featured less in the volume than one might expect though he is shown mulling over an offer of a rank within the Hellfire Club as an alliance between the Club and the X-Men; however this doesn't seem to go anywhere here. Nevertheless it's a sign of how the X-Men's world is twisting into an ever-darker environment in which the "baddies" are now either on the "good" side or the side of authority - and the two are not always the same. Meanwhile Professor X, hitherto the guiding light of the team, finds himself accidentally lost in space when the Starjammers' ship is unable to return to Earth.

This is actually quite a bleak run for the series, breaking down traditional assumptions and instead presenting a dark world where sides are now far more blurred and death is ever closer. The reformation of Magneto is seemingly complete and his replacing Xavier is a dramatic step but one that has been carefully built up to. Less well handled are some issues in the middle of the run with the rapid writing out of Cyclops and the starting then stopping of the story of Nightcrawler's new friend. The two big crossovers covered here provide some strong character moments for the series but overall the "Mutant Massacre" is based on a rather thin premise that makes it less than stellar. Also underwhelming for its length is the annual Asgard crossover due to the excessive time devoted to the unfamiliar to here New Mutants at a critical stage in the book. Overall the result is a somewhat mixed run.

Essential X-Men volume 5

Essential X-Men volume 5 initially contained X-Men #180 to #198 and Annuals #7 & #8. Later editions have transferred Annual #7 to volume 4 and added the mini-series X-Men and Alpha Flight. Everything is written by Chris Claremont with the art mainly by John Romita Jr and a couple of fill-in issues drawn & co-plotted by Barry Windsor-Smith. Annual #7 is drawn by Michael Golden and Bret Blevins and #8 by Steve Leialoha. The mini-series is drawn by Paul Smith.

Unfortunately this volume represents the start of a period where the series begins to rather complicated and confusing, with a mixture of long running subplots and the curse of crossovers and tie-in titles. But this series alone can't be solely blamed for a worrying trend that began at Marvel in the mid 1980s whereby it becomes increasingly hard to follow an individual series without having to pick up multiple additional titles. The first obvious sign is when most of the X-Men are taken away to fight in Secret Wars and come back with new costumes that generally don't last very long and accompanied by a female dragon who grows in size. And the X-Men's account of their experience with the dragon on the alien world isn't exactly what gets shown in Secret Wars itself; a sign of the problem in creating a gap in the narrative and only filling it in afterwards. Meanwhile Kitty comes to grief whilst investigating the Massachusetts Academy but this storyline is told in the pages of the New Mutants and subsequent issues see various New Mutants appear without the greatest of introductions; it's not even clear if Rachel's arrival is partially told in that series. Later on a two part tale ties in with the battle against the Dire Wraiths but if you're not familiar with the premise from the pages of Rom then it's not too clear what's going on. At around the same time two of the team members are briefly absent from the main series because they're co-starring in the mini-series Kitty Pryde and Wolverine, which isn't included here. Then there's a crossover with Power Pack, although the X-Men only appear in the issue from their own series and it's structured as such that it can be read without the Power Pack ones. Towards the end of the volume comes the first crossover with Secret Wars II and Magneto is suddenly hanging around with the X-Men. And to top it all off there are references to adventures in issues to come of Marvel Fanfare. Amidst all this the references to the graphic novel Dazzler: The Movie are easy to follow without that book itself. For what it's worth Panini's pocketbook reprints of this era, which are currently only up to issue #194, have included several of the New Mutants issues, so both Kitty's mission and some of the characters are more familiar when they pass through the Uncanny X-Men issues, but none of the others.

The Power Pack and Secret Wars II crossovers are adjacent to each other and show two extreme approaches to how to handle the concept. Issue #195 could almost be an issue of Power Pack with the X-Men guest starring, and indeed none of the title team actually appears before the tenth page. A non-completist reprint series could quite easily leave this issue out without it being too noticeable. By contrast issue #196 just sees the Beyonder, in his earliest days on Earth, wandering through the events of the issue and observing, with few noticing his presence and none of the events are driven by his presence.

Also somewhat surplus to requirements are issues #190-191, which feature what is ultimately a brief alternate universe until the reset switch is hit. A decade later this approach would consume the entire franchise across twice as many months, but here we get a two part sequel to an old issue of Marvel Team-Up as Kulan Gath returns and transforms Manhattan into a Hyborian Age city. There are guest appearances by the New Mutants, the Avengers, Spider-Man and Doctor Strange, but at times it's less than clear just who the primary stars are. The climax sees many familiar characters killed off in the final battle but then Doctor Strange and Illyana combine their magic to undo the whole thing, rendering it non-consequential and not even the few characters who retain their memories mention it again in the volume. This story would probably have been better placed as a mini-series or one-shot that could have been more broad ranged in its cast. Here it feels like another intruder on the general flow of events, even if in the reset timeline Gath's transformation is stopped by the arrival of new X-Men foe Nimrod.

The other major side-shows are the two annuals. Annual #7 is a particularly oddball issue but the final page reveals all - it came out during Assistant Editor's Month, when the regular editors were away at a convention, leaving the assistants in charge. In the regular title the month was marked solely by a one page story in place of the letters page, and this wasn't included in Essential X-Men volume 4 so it was easy to mix. However the annual more than makes up for it, putting the X-Men through a bizarre adventure as the Impossible Man goes rampaging through the Marvel universe, stealing a bizarre collection of items for a scavenger hunt and the X-Men seek to stop him, with the chase even going through the Marvel Bullpen. It's a pity that the cover doesn't explicitly warn the readers that it's part of the event, but it falls perfectly into the spirit of it. The Impossible Man is one of those creatures that it's very easy to get wrong, but when done in the right context the result can be good tongue in cheek fun. Unfortunately Annual #8 is one of the worst issues in the whole series. It's a science fiction fairy tale told by Illyana to the X-Men and New Mutants around a campfire, with Lockheed and Kitty in starring roles. Presumably Kitty's earlier fairy tale had proved popular at the time and so led to this follow-up, but the story is weak, inconsequential and has ridiculously cartoony art. It just hits all the wrong buttons and simply doesn't work.

 A much more serious side comes in the regular issues. Although there have been signs of it in individual stories in recent volumes, it's here that the theme of anti-mutant hatred becomes ever more prevalent, starting with the introduction in Congress of a Mutant Affairs Control Bill. Fear and hostility are widespread throughout the story, with bigots everywhere, ranging from the students who try to kill Professor X to the government agents commissioning and deploying weapons designed to strip a mutant of their powers. It's an ever more hostile world where casual fear and racism is rampant, to the point that even mugging victims are scared to be saved by the X-Men. The shadow of the dark world seen in Days of Future Past returns with the arrival in the present day of Rachel Summers and later Nimrod. Rachel may have landed in an alternate timeline from her own, but that doesn't make the danger any less real. Nor does it negate her memories of just what she did in her past.

We soon see the horror of Rachel's past through flashbacks to her days as a "hound", drugged and manipulated by the authorities who used her to track down other mutants. It's a chilling idea but fortunately it's established fairly quickly. By contrast there's an increasing presence of characters with mysterious backgrounds - not only do we have Wolverine but Rogue's past is coming through in dribs and drabs with the complication of Carol Danvers's memories confusing her and those around her. And then there's Nimrod, a robotic mutant hunter from the future that carves out a reputation in the present day as a popular vigilante.

Some characters go through journeys, with Professor X suffering a major assault by bigots, including some of the students on the university course he now teaches, and struggling to regain full control of his telepathic powers. Meanwhile Magneto's path to redemption continues as Xavier brings him in to help the X-Men, leading to the amazing but understated moment when a bullet is sent the way of a murderous bigot and it's only the master of magnetism who prevents it reaching its target. Storm goes through her own hell when in trying to save Rogue she's hit by a blast that strips her of her powers. As she recovers she falls for her rescuer Forge, a mutant Native American inventor, only to discover that he created the weapon. Subsequently she drifts through the world, slowly coming to terms with how everything has changed - even basics as adapting to the temperature around her are new. However her non-mutant skills are shown to the fore and she eventually returns to Kenya where she discovers her purpose in life in bridging the divide between cultures, in a quite philosophical issue that rounds out the volume. Storm's absence creates a vacuum of leadership, with Professor X's attempts at more fieldwork falling away and Nightcrawler finding himself a worried leader also facing religious conflict as he struggles to reconcile the existence of the Beyonder with his faith. In his temporary absence it's Kitty who comes to the fore as the best strategist. Her relationship with Colossus ends when she discovers he found another whilst away on the Beyonder's planet, and other X-Men such as Wolverine and Nightcrawler feel that Peter has been a jerk (another slight discontinuity with Wolverine's conclusions in Secret Wars itself that Colossus's feelings for the healer Zsaji were a by-product of how her alien power worked). Eventually he and Kitty settle as just friends.

The conflicts themselves are getting a bit repetitive with multiple encounters with the Juggernaut, even if the second involves Nimrod, the Hellfire Club and the Morlocks, even if some individual characters are being added such as Selene. There's also yet another return of Arcade, again in seeming conflict with Doctor Doom. There are some foes brought in from other series, such as the Dire Wraiths from Rom, Magus, the father of Warlock in the New Mutants (nothing to do with Adam Warlock or the Magus) or the Hellions from the New Mutants, including the revenge seeking younger brother of the original Thunderbird. That team now also include the first appearance in comics of Firestar, with her appearance ending in a sign that she's on the road to becoming a fully fledged hero.

The most recent editions of this volume have added the mini-series X-Men and Alpha Flight. Consisting of two giant sized issues they tell the story of "The Gift" as Loki seeks favour with Asgardian deities by giving humanity an amazing fountain that can grant them powers and transform them into perfect beings, offering the prospect of creating a utopia on Earth and ending all the problems. But it comes at a price as magical beings are slowly killed by it whilst the transformed humans are denied imagination. The X-Men and Alpha Flight jointly investigate the area and discover the stark choice of whether to accept such a solution or whether to retain what it is to be human; a question that divides the teams amongst themselves. Eventually they reject the gift but it's a painful outcome. This is doubly so for Rachel who would give anything to prevent the dark future she comes from, yet at the same time she discovers her own future is ever less likely to come to pass as her mother is already dead and her father's wife is pregnant but with a boy, not the only child she is. The story sees her first encounter with Cyclops, but it's ambiguous as to whether he's guessed that he is her father. The story is suitably epic for this kind of mini-series but without too much familiarity with the current status quo of Alpha Flight it can at times be confusing to follow some of their own troubles and dilemmas. Still it's good to see the story has at last been included here.

But overall this volume represents a series that is getting too complex for its own good and spawning too much of a franchise. It's a little hard to fault X-Men for the reproduction problems that have reported prevented any Essential New Mutants volumes, or the volumes for not carrying numerous limited series and crossovers that only have a partial bearing on the series. But for the contemporary reader it was necessary to purchase an ever increasing number of additional comics to stay abreast of everything, whilst at the same time continuity was getting over burdensome, with repetition and subplots dragging on forever. This volume represents the series taking a decisive turn for the worse.

Essential X-Men volume 4

The original edition of Essential X-Men volume 4 consists of Uncanny X-Men #162 to #179 and Annual #6. Later editions have transferred Annual #6 to volume 3 and added both annual #7 (which I'll look at with volume 5) and Marvel Graphic Novel #5 entitled "God Loves, Man Kills". The writing is all by Chris Claremont. The art on the regular issues sees the end of Dave Cockrum's second run, then a run by Paul Smith followed by the start of a run by John Romita Jr. Annual #6 is drawn by Bill Sienkiewicz. The graphic novel is drawn by Brent Anderson.

The high octane excitement continues in this volume, with adventures ranging from an outer space battle with the Brood to smaller scale, more personal adventures such as Rogue's quest to join the X-Men to control her powers that are making her lie impossible. There aren't too many additions to the ever growing extended cast of allies and foes - the most significant are Madelyne Prior, Lockheed the alien dragon and the Morlocks, who include the likes of Callisto, Leech, Plague, Masque, Sunder and Healer. But rather than quantity the series focuses on quality, with each of the new arrivals making an impact in their own way. At the same time there's quite a lot of development of the existing characters.

At one extreme is Cyclops, who is establishing roots in multiple directions. Having already discovered that Corsair is his father, he now discovers his grandparents and in the process meets a surprising woman. Madelyne Pryor is a cargo pilot for his grandparents' company in Alaska - and the spitting image of Jean Grey. More amazingly she was the sole survivor of a plane crash at the very moment that Jean died. At this stage it's never cleared up whether Madelyne is somehow Jean reincarnated or if this just an amazing coincidence, but she and Scott rapidly fall for each other. Within just seven issues of meeting they get married and Scott both leaves the X-Men and declines his father's invitation to go off into space on adventures with the Starjammers. Instead he seemingly retires, flying off with Madelyne to enjoy a happily ever after.

Meanwhile Storm undergoes developments of her own, including temporarily bonding with a young Acanti, a giant fish that flies through space. Subsequently Storm seems to be losing her refinement of her powers and then she decides to change her look, adopting a very 1980s leather costume and mohawk, to Kitty's horror. Kitty herself is continuing to grow and acting on her feelings for Colossus. At times she is highly suggestive to him, a rather disturbing point considering she is only fourteen years old and fortunately Colossus goes no further than kissing. However Kitty gains an affectionate companion of a different kind when she encounters a small alien dragon on another planet; subsequently the dragon comes to Earth and is dubbed "Lockheed", regularly staying by her side and deploying his laser power to help her.

But the biggest developments come with Carol Danvers and Rogue. Carol has been hanging around with the X-Men ever since Rogue stole her powers, but now the Brood subject her to accelerated evolution and hybrid nature results in her gaining the powers of a star as the being Binary. It's a major step forward but not long afterwards she departs for space and so there's little opportunity for further development as she continues to grow her emotions once more. However before she goes she briefly confronts Rogue once more when the latter turns up at the mansion seeking help. Rogue is now portrayed as much younger than in her earlier appearances and very much has the feel of a young, vulnerable woman trying to come to terms with herself and to evade being used by others. This leads to an early fight with Mystique and the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants, but Rogue makes clear what her free will is. She also has a rapid baptism of fire when she and Wolverine are the only available X-Men to evade the effects of poison in Japan and Rogue puts her life on the line to save Wolverine, who in turn lends her his healing power. Later on she again risks her own life to help save Colossus and the other X-Men come to accept her. Meanwhile Professor Xavier undergoes a major transformation when his body is destroyed by the Brood but his mind is transferred into a cloned one with fully functioning legs. Although his mind and powers take time to adjust, it seems he will now be able to play a much more active role in future adventures.

This volume comes from the period when the series began to spawn a number of spin-offs. The most obvious ongoing one was the New Mutants, founded whilst the X-Men were away in space, but in general the two teams manage to stay out of the way of each other's adventures apart from a brief fight when the X-Men return from space and discover strangers in the mansion. Beyond that and an issue where Kitty is briefly set to be transferred to the New Mutants until she demonstrates how far she's already come (with the New Mutants themselves noticeably absent), plus the occasional mention and cameo, the New Mutants are almost as distant from these issues as the Defenders. More noticeable was the rise of the limited series, with both Wolverine and Magik (Illyana - Colossus's sister) receiving one. Neither is included here but both are referenced. In particular the Wolverine limited series is followed up on in issues #172-173 which feel almost as though they should have been part of the limited series (and are sometimes collected with it) but it ran out of space. Given the practice in more recent volumes - Essential Defenders volume 7 springs most readily to mind - I wonder if the limited series would have been included had this volume come out in more recent years. (Although there have been some modifications to the contents of the Essential X-Men volumes for new editions, there may not have been enough space to crowbar in a whole extra four issues as well as the graphic novel.) Consequently Wolverine doesn't get as much good material as usual, but both his desperate solo flight from the Brood and his wedding where his bride jilts him, having been convinced he is not worthy, both give him depth on either side of the series. The Magik limited series is rather less noticeable by its absence and seems to cover her missing years in Limbo that are alluded to here.

There are other signs of wider developments at Marvel impacting on the series here. Issue #167 contains one of the oddest scenes in the whole volume as Lilandra learns of events in Fantastic Four where Reed Richards saved Galactus's life and immediately transmits a warning that he will be prosecuted for the subsequent destruction of any known inhabited planet. This isn't remotely relevant to current events in Uncanny X-Men, and hardly a pressing matter for Lilandra who is at this stage a deposed monarch in exile and, as she admits herself, in no position to be rushing around issuing warnings in the name of intergalactic war. It just feels like a gratuitous snipe by Chris Claremont at his former collaborator John Byrne. I was surprised to see that this scene had originally seen print several months before Byrne's better known snipe in Fantastic Four when he declared an earlier Uncanny X-Men appearance by Doctor Doom to have been a slightly out of character Doombot that the real Doom casually disposed of. In the normal retellings of the feud and how it impacted on the comics themselves it's usually Byrne who gets depicted as the proactive antagonistic one, beginning with the Doombot incident, but here is a sign that it seems to have started even earlier and possibly with Claremont.

What is getting a little annoying are the constant references to Phoenix, especially as it's now a few years since her death. They come in multiple forms, especially with Madelyne's resemblance to Jean Grey, but the most blatant come when Storm sees what looks like the image of the Phoenix force in an explosion, and even more so when Mastermind manipulates Madelyne into impersonating a resurrected Phoenix. However the resolution proves crucial as Cyclops saves Madelyne and fully comes to accept Jean is gone, saying a final goodbye at her grave before going on to marry Madelyne. Hopefully this will bode well for future volumes. But just as one irritation seems to be on the way out another is looming with the continued teases about just what Nightcrawler's connection to Mystique is. It was first raised back at the end of volume 2 but is now becoming a never ending subplot with a seemingly obvious solution that she is in fact his real mother. It's one thing to have something never explicitly stated, but the way this is played it feels more like eternally unfinished business.

Included at the end of the original edition of this volume is annual #6, but it feels extremely inconsequential to the series, and its initial absence from volume 3 (and catch-up placement here) has not been noticeable in the slightest. The story sees the return of Dracula and his final showdown with Rachel van Helsing, with Dracula's daughter Lilith thrown in for good measure. It may be resolving leftover matters from the Tomb of Dracula and also following up on Dracula's earlier appearance in X-Men, but the X-Men themselves feel rather out of place in a rather confused storyline focused on vengeance and possession. Still as an annual it's easy to overlook this awkward tale and move onwards.

Also potentially easy to overlook is an addition to recent editions, Marvel Graphic Novel #5, entitled "God Loves, Man Kills". Released at about the same time as issue #167, it shows signs of having been created much earlier, not least because Kitty is here using the codename "Ariel" that she in fact rejected in the regular series, and also wearing a different costume from the norm. The story focuses heavily on anti-mutant prejudice as a zealous preacher declares them unholy and launches a crusade to purify the human race, using Professor Xavier's powers. In the struggle the X-Men find themselves allying with Magneto despite their differences. The world depicted in this tale is much darker than the comics, with the preacher's "Purifiers" seemingly unstoppable as they go about their mission. It's a world of dark alleys, of gangs who try to rape Kitty as payment for protecting her, where people get shot and bleed, where two little children are chased to a playground and murdered, and where a well-connected charismatic speaker can easily sway the crowds. It's one of the better examples of what the graphic novel format can do, presenting a deeper story free of the shackles of the Comics Code Authority, but also keeping it sufficiently standalone that it was not necessary for contemporary readers to pay out almost ten times the price of a regular issue, or for readers then and now to have to track down a harder to find format.

Regardless of the rotating nature of the annuals and graphic novel across different editions of this volume, the regular issues remain strong and solid, showing both diversity of new creation and a willingness to build on existing successful elements. The team's line-up is kept reasonably intact with only Cyclops retiring and Rogue coming on board, allowing for the character development that can only really happen when there's a stable cast. Although some individual elements may irritate they don't detract from the overall thrust of the series that keeps moving forward, offering exciting adventures but also always making the reader care about each and every one of the characters. Nor is there much requirement to obtain additional comics just to know what’s going on, with the spin-off New Mutants title wisely concentrating on a separate line-up of characters, though Wolverine's limited series could have been better explained, especially as it's followed up on but not included here. But overall this volume maintains the series's strong momentum that has been running since the revival, a astonishing achievement after so many years.

Essential X-Men volume 3

Essential X-Men volume 3 first contained Uncanny X-Men #145 to #161 and Annuals #3 to #5. Later editions have seen Annuals #3 & #4 transferred to volume 2; Annual #6 transferred from volume #4 (where I'll look at it) and the addition of Avengers Annual #10. The writing is all by Chris Claremont and most of the art by Dave Cockrum; other issues are drawn by Jim Sherman, Bob McLeod, Bill Sienkiewicz and Brent Anderson. The annuals are drawn by George Pérez, John Romita Jr and Brent Anderson. The Avengers annual is drawn by Michael Golden.

This is predominantly a volume of consolidation and development rather than creation, with very few significant first appearances. Dave Cockrum returns to the series and there's some more space opera with the Shi’Ar but otherwise there's a continued focus on the core characters within a world that is growing steadily more hostile to mutants. There are very few changes to the team - Angel storms out in protest over Wolverine's presence and Cyclops comes back on, but otherwise it's a period of stability for the line-up. We get more use of past X-Men in the form of reservists, with Ice-Man, Polaris and Havok all pressed into service for one adventure whilst Banshee appears more and more in a supporting staff role; his powers not having restored themselves. Another supporting character comes in the form of Carol Danvers, now depowered following events in Avengers annual #10, who hangs around with and helps the X-Men for the time being.

However we get a number of character developments, with Cyclops and Sprite especially benefiting from strong focuses. Within these issues Cyclops and Corsair of the Starjammers finally discover that they are son and father, leading to the inevitable confrontation about why Corsair never came after his son in the orphanage. It's a tense situation at first but soon Scott accepts that his father naturally believed both Scott and Alex had died when their parachute caught fire, whilst the horrific treatment and death of their mother had further distanced Corsair from Earth. The family reunion is handled well and helps add to Scott's character growth as he becomes ever more a strong individual, unfettered by the trauma of his childhood or the loss of Jean. The early issues see him marooned on an island with Lee Forrester, the captain of the ship he signed aboard before they were swept out to sea. Although the island scenario itself drags on for a few too many issues, it shows Scott slowly discovering another woman and moving onwards.

Also growing rapidly is Kitty Pryde, though she retains her youthful optimism and role as the team's little sister. Her crush on Colossus is becoming a relationship, with surprisingly nothing said about their different ages. Otherwise she shows enthusiasm and at times is at the core of a plot's resolution. However one thing that is off-putting is her constantly changing costumes in an attempt to get more individuality than the original style X-Men outfit she is given pre-graduation. At one point she comes up with an outfit that may have resembled early 1980s sparkly fashions but looks hideous and is mercifully subdued by the black and white. On another level she is growing ever closer to both Storm and her dance teacher Stevie Hunter. Issue #148 sees the three on a girls' night out, together with guest stars Jessica Drew/Spider-Woman and the Dazzler, which is interrupted by the introduction of the lonely mutant Caliban who comes searching for company, causing panic and chaos but also making Kitty realise how some mutants like Nightcrawler cannot help their strange appearance and she shouldn't be so uncomfortable around them.

But the biggest developments come for one of the X-Men's greatest foes. Issue #150 brings some of the strongest material yet for Magneto, with further enhancements in a flashback in issue #161. We get the clearest statement yet that he sees himself as a warrior defending his people, the mutants, making him a Malcolm X figure much more so than before. His background is also filled out with the exploration of his drive coming from the horrors he endured in the Holocaust. Rejecting Xavier's vision of mutant-human co-existence as unrealistic, he instead seeks to bring about mutant superiority, securing peace through security. Although there have been hints of this in some of his earlier appearances, we now have a clearly rounded vision of the character that moves him away from the run of the mill would-be world conquering supervillains and into a much more complex character. Yet the same issue also starts him down a new path when he thinks he's killed Sprite. Earlier he had no regrets about sinking a Soviet nuclear submarine that had fired upon his island, yet now that he thinks he's killed a child, he realises he's become like the monsters of his childhood, the guards at Auschwitz who joked as they herded people to their deaths, their lives meaning nothing to them. The horror that he has become a monster to the innocents he sought to protect and the very thing he hated and despised is a striking moment for the character. Was it also meant to be a subtle wider comment about events in the real world? Whatever the external intentions, there is a hint that he changed forever though it is not followed up on within these pages.

Magneto's shift comes not long after the X-Men's first encounter with another world-conquering villain from the early Silver Age. It's quite a surprise that the X-Men haven't clashed with Doctor Doom before now, given how much he's appeared all over the Marvel universe over the years. Here he seems rather subdued, being in exile from his kingdom and operating in a strange alliance with Arcade, with the gamesmaster also Doom's prisoner. Though there's a brief scene with Storm that sees the two slightly drawn towards each other, overall it's a rather disappointing use of such a major foe. Equally weakly handled is Dracula, who shows up for a single issue when he tries to take Storm as a mate, but there's none of the awe and majesty from the character's own series.

The Shi’Ar epic brings the first appearance of the Sidri, a monstrous gestalt alien species, and the fearsome insect race the Brood, as well as Deathbird, previously seen in Ms. Marvel, the sister of Lilandra. She's not the only foe of Carol's to come over, with Rogue also appearing, following on from the Avengers annual. Meanwhile a flashback to the younger days of Professor X and Magneto shows their struggle with Baron von Strucker and a nascent Hydra, giving Magneto his first encounter with leftover Nazi villains. An adventure into a magical realm brings the team into conflict with Belasco, previous seen in Ka-Zar, and new demon S'ym. It's a dark place in which the X-Men find time does not function as normal, bringing them into conflict with older versions of themselves. At the end Colossus's sister Illyanna is briefly lost for what is only seconds for the X-Men but a whole seven years for her. Having gone from six to thirteen, losing much of her childhood in that realm, must be a horrific experience and will hopefully be explored further in later volumes.

One aspect of the series that is slightly stating to irritate are the long drawn out subplots, especially as some of them keep overlapping on multiple Essential volumes and so take an age. Cyclops spends half a year lost on a desert island and then later the conflict with the Brood is stretched out with Professor X mentally wounded for many months. He is cured in the final issue in the volume but then Deathbird and the Brood return in a cliffhanger, with the latter planning to use the mutants as hosts for breeding. Unfortunately the remaining space is then taken up with other, less consequential material.

Lurking at the back of the volume (at least in the original edition) are three annuals. With #1 & #2 having been all-reprint specials in the wilderness years, these are the first original specials for the X-Men and show a variety of foes and guest stars. Two of them feature Arkon, first as an enemy, albeit with noble motives seeking to restore his world, and later as an ally when the Badoon invade; the Fantastic Four also guest star in the latter story. Meanwhile the other one features a trip into what is supposedly Hell, resembling the depiction in Dante's Inferno, with Doctor Strange guest starring and a fight with Minos, a being from Dante's poem. Reading all three annuals back to back, as per the original edition's presentation, it's easy to see why the whole format is so often dismissed and/or overlooked, including sometimes by collected editions. (Not only had Essential X-Men volume 2 left out two annuals, but at about the same time that this volume was making up for this omission, Essential Spider-Man volume 3 was missing out another pair.) None is drawn by the regular series artist of the day and none of the events are mentioned in the regular title. The middle annual may explore some of Nightcrawler's past and reveal his current girlfriend to be his adoptive sister and childhood sweetheart in disguise but it's still easy to blink and miss it. Nor is there any connection with the hint in the previous volume that he and Mystique are related. Placed at the rear of this volume, like an obligatory appendix, they feel like they were almost forced upon it and are being sidelined as much as possible. None feels like a typical, if extended, adventure of the type seen in the contemporary regular series so the annuals don't even work as one-off introductory specials. Of course the same charge can be levelled at many, many annuals for many other series, but it's rare to get three all at once and so the problem stands out the more. Worse still having so many at once has restricted the number of regular issues contained in this volume and possibly increased the necessity of ending on a cliffhanger, one that would be left hanging for nearly three years before volume 4 came along.

Later editions of this volume have also included Avengers annual #10 and it's easy to see why given that both Carol Danvers and Rogue go on to make significant appearances in the regular issues in both this volume and later ones. I've never been too clear as to how much of the issue reflects Claremont's original plans for Ms. Marvel and just when he conceived his plans for Rogue, but here we get a conclusion to Carol's conflict with Mystique that had been building and building and building and building in her own series (Claremont's long-running subplots have not been confined to the X-Men titles). Ms. Marvel gets put through the wringer once more as her powers and mind are absorbed by Rogue; with Professor X's help she regains some of the latter but is left a broken woman trying to put her life back together. The epilogue allows both her and Claremont to confront the Avengers and their writers about how callous they were when she was kidnapped and raped, but otherwise the bulk of the annual is given over to introducing a new foe who takes down the most powerful Avengers quite quickly. Other than the epilogue wouldn't it perhaps have been better to tell this story with the X-Men in their own annual? It would certainly have made a far stronger and more memorable offering than that year's team-up with the Fantastic Four against the Badoon, and the subsequent use of both Carol and Rogue in the regular series would have given the annual a lasting significance. Still that error of placing has now been corrected with its inclusion here.

Although more run of the mill than the two previous Essential X-Men volumes, and limited by the need to include the various annuals, this volume continues to show a series based strongly on character development and a distinct scenario. It takes in a diverse range of locations and threats but manages to stay consistent and true to its core characters, continuing to make them feel real and worth caring about. This is a series that has settled in a clear permanent role for the long run.

Sidesteps: Power Pack Classic volume 2

Power Pack Classic volume 2 has within it issues #11 to #17, plus Uncanny X-Men #195 and the graphic novel Power Pack and Cloak & Dagger: Shelter from the Storm. All the Power Pack issues are written by Louise Simonson, with the Uncanny X-Men issue by Chris Claremont and the graphic novel by Bill Mantlo. All but one of the Power Pack issues are drawn by June Brigman with a fill-in by Brent Anderson. The Uncanny X-Men issue is drawn by John Romita Jr and the graphic novel by Sal Velluto. The graphic novel was actually published in 1989 whereas the regular issues in this volume are from 1985, but the status quo it presents can only fit into the early years of the series, as we'll see when looking at a future volume.

In my review of volume 1, I criticised the excessive number of guest appearances by the rest of the Marvel universe, at least one in every issue once the family moved to New York. The situation is slightly improved here as, discounting Franklin Richards and Jarvis (the Avengers' butler - at this point the Baxter Building had been destroyed, forcing the Fantastic Four to temporarily stay with the Avengers) since one is a new member and the other part of his existing status quo, there are only appearances by other heroes in issues #12 & #15, albeit with some slack picked up by the Uncanny X-Men issue and the graphic novel. The only villains from outside the series are the Morlocks in the first two issues and the X-Men crossover. Otherwise the series spends some time developing its own recurring villains in the forms of both the Snarks and the Bogey-Man, their father's ex-boss embittered by his downfall and now donning battle armour in a one-man war against the children.

Whilst issue #12 leads into a crossover with Uncanny X-Men, with the latter included here, issue #15 follows up on an issue of Thor that isn't in the collection. It's easy to work out the necessary details without out, but it's another sign of how the series can be over integrated with the rest of the Marvel universe. Issue #15 also has one of the most misleading covers, with Beta Ray Bill prominently shown yet he's only on one page and doesn't interact with the children. Another omission is Fantastic Four #282, the first half of which began the process of introducing a new member (although where possible it would probably best be truncated as the second half of the issue is both a Secret Wars II crossover and the middle part of a major Psycho-Man storyline). However once again the issues here move at a pace that means it possible to not even realise the dreams Franklin refers to had actually been shown.

Power Pack issues #16-17 see the addition to the team of Franklin Richards, the son of Mr. Fantastic and the Invisible Woman, who takes the codename of "Tattletale". Being even younger than Katie it would be tempting to see this as a "Cousin Oliver" move (and he's a cute blond kid to boot), but in his two issues collected here he holds his own well, even when fighting with Katie over silly stuff, and is endearing rather than annoying. But despite the feud, and her jealousy at no longer being the youngest one and thus special, she suggests letting him join them. (Franklin's somewhat limited ageing has been a source of much fan comment over the years so it would be interesting to look at latter day adventures involving both him and other Power siblings see at what different rates they've aged relative to each other.) His available powers are primarily the ability to see the future in his dreams but this proves critical in allowing the team (as we must now call them since he isn't related to the others) to quickly locate the other new arrival, Kofi Whitemane, a young Kymellian from the same family as Aelfyre "Whitey" Whitemane, who gave the Power siblings their abilities in the first place. Kofi is an interesting addition, reinforcing the alien connection of the children's powers but as a youngster himself he is still on a learning curve, and is sometimes surprised at how the Power siblings have managed to adapt their powers. Including Friday, seven is probably the maximum size for a team book before it becomes unwieldy, but fortunately the smartship only appears from time to time. As Franklin only gets his costume and codename at the end of the last regular issue in this volume, it's not yet possible to see how the series can handle such an expanded cast.

The series deals with some surprisingly mature themes and demonstrates that regardless of the characters' ages this is not a kiddie title. We see the siblings facing the horrors of kidnapping, the shock of waking up to find no-one recognises them and the horror of having both bodies and minds twisted so that they will no longer remember who they truly are. There's exploration of how loss can leave people twisted and angry with the world, whether the Morlock Annalee mourning her children, Batman Bates mourning a baseball career cut short by war, or Carmody the Bogey-Man, Professor Power's ex boss, mourning his life before the children destroyed the anti-matter converter. The kids face more down to earth problems as well such as school rivalries that see bullies manipulate situations to get others into trouble and unjustly punished, or the horrors that lurk in the sewers such as alligators. Throughout it all they retain a spirit of adventure but never drift into naivety. However there is one point where it would be nice if the series did go out of its way to explain something. Issue #13 sees the children go to a baseball match where Jack's hero's record is under threat, but heroes can often turn out to not be all one expects. It's a sombre tale of hope, failure and expectations, but it's a little hard to follow at times if one knows nothing about the rules of baseball and just what is happening in the game at any given moment.

The volume concludes with a graphic novel from 1989. Now I'm generally rather biased against graphic novels. Often they seem to be excessively priced - this one had a cover price of US $7.95 at a time when the regular series went for about $1.00 - and never have anything like as much story as the price indicates. Sometimes the art and more sophisticated colour can make up for this a bit (and in a colour reprint such as here the reproduction works, whereas the black & white Essentials haven't been kind at all to graphic novels) but nowhere enough to justify all the extra expense. Fortunately many of them are inconsequential and can be ignored if one wishes, but occasionally they're a core part of the continuity so have to be read if one is to get the complete story (and in the days of collecting back issues mainly via comic shops, past graphic novels were particularly difficult to locate). They're also often a pain to store, especially the Marvel ones from the 1980s which used an unusual page size. Of course when they come in collected editions the only real question is whether they consume space unnecessarily but here they take up the space that would otherwise have been given to only a couple of issues. Still it's hard to set aside one's dislikes of the format completely. Despite the order of billing, this is really a Cloak and Dagger story at heart, written by their co-creator, with Power Pack not even appearing until nearly halfway through. It focuses on the plight of runaways, showing two teenagers, one escaping a violent and abusive parent, the other an overprotective one. They find themselves in the darkness of the city where even supportive shelters contain their own dangers due to competition for numbers for funding and where life isn't the great escape they expected. At the heart of one shelter is a twisted man with the power to absorb others' life-force, a side effect of drugs that failed to cure his disease. There are clear parallels with the lives of Cloak and Dagger, with a look at the ethics of the former as he struggles to control his hunger for light. Amidst all this the Power siblings are very much sidelined, primarily only serving to locate where Dagger has been taken, and the story could easily have been told without them. It's not a bad Cloak and Dagger tale but it's a utterly unnecessary Power Pack one and could easily have been left out in favour of a few more issues from the regular series. It's also unusual in being set some years earlier than when it was published - was this either a conscious reaction against later developments, a delay in production or a writer returning after a break from regular Marvel work who was out of touch with recent developments? (The last one is unlikely as Mantlo's regular comic writing had ended only a year earlier when his run on Alpha Flight concluded, and he instead focused on his legal career. I think this graphic novel was the last comic he wrote, though until 1993 occasional other stories saw print in the various inventory series Marvel Fanfare and Marvel Super-Heroes.)

The graphic novel aside, this collection shows the series coming along well and developing its own mythology. The guest appearances have also been cut down, removing distractions and allowing the series' own characters to grow and develop. Whilst no individual issue or storyline leaps out as especially spectacular, overall it's a pretty solid volume that continues to put the children through a diverse set of situations that make them more than meet their potential.

Essential Punisher volume 2

Essential Punisher volume 2 contains the early issues from the Punisher's first ever ongoing series, carrying #1-20 & Annual #1 and also Daredevil #257 which carried a crossover with the series. Annual #1 was part of the "Evolutionary War" crossover that ran through eleven Marvel annuals (or twelve if one includes Alf) but the others aren't included here. (The only missing material that I can spot is the chapter of the history of the High Evolutionary that ran in all the annuals that year and which sought to clarify a rather convoluted continuity.) The Punisher issues are all written by Mike Baron, bar a back-up in the annual by Roger Salick, and drawn by Whilce Portacio, Klaus Janson, David Ross, Larry Stroman and Shea Anton Pensa, with Mark Texeira and Mike Vosburg handling the annual. The Daredevil issue is written by Ann Nocenti and drawn by John Romita Jr.

Looking back it seems amazing that it took so long for the Punisher to gain his own ongoing series. The most likely explanation is that Marvel were cautious about having a series with a violent protagonist who set out to kill his adversaries. (A similar concern presumably hit Wolverine.) But over time tastes change, as do censors, and this series was launched in an era that saw the rise of heroes who were either loners or had very few allies and who were willing to adopt violent methods to get the job done. In an era with the likes of a grim & gritty Batman, Timothy Dalton's take on James Bond, the A-Team and so many more, the Punisher was a natural fit. Of course not all these heroes were portrayed in quite the same way - there's a wide gap between the A-Team's almost cartoon violence where few people get hurt or killed, and the hard edged violence and blood of Licence to Kill.

Curiously it's a very different series that springs to mind as the most obvious starting comparison for these issues. At about the same time as the series was launched, so too was the second Silver Surfer series (the first eighteen issues of which can be found in Essential Silver Surfer volume 2). Both series rapidly became amongst Marvel's top sellers, as seen most obviously when both were part of a 33% price rise on the nine top-selling titles at the start of 1988 (taking effect from issue #8; the other seven titles were Amazing Spider-Man, Spectacular Spider-Man, Web of Spider-Man, Avengers, Uncanny X-Men, X-Factor and the New Mutants) and both were among the only eleven superhero titles to have an annual that year (the others were the same list as before plus Fantastic Four and the West Coast Avengers). Both starred long established Marvel characters who had previously been used relatively sparsely, and both were in settings somewhat detached from the mainstream of the Marvel universe. But the contrast in approaches is clearest between the first issues. The Surfer had a double-sized first issue that contained a complete story (as well as setting up threads that would run throughout the first thirty issues), summarised all the key points of the character's history and sorted out the key issue in the status quo to allow unlimited adventures. By contrast the first issue of Punisher is a regular sized first part of an ongoing storyline that doesn't really introduce the character at all.

Perhaps realising the mistake early on, issue #2 opens with a text box with the Punisher rapidly summarising the key points in a very quick and to the point manner. Most subsequent issues include either a thought box or dialogue that recap the Punisher's origin with the same information. The obvious omission each time is just why the Punisher went down the route he did - not every relative of a victim of crime turns vigilante and even if they do, many don't go in for the arbitrary killing of criminals. Punisher stories can veer off to various extremes on this point - either they implicitly acknowledge the issue and just present the Punisher as an exaggerated killer of almost cartoonish shallowness, or else they delve deep in his mind, trying to reconcile the factors. This series, however, follows a more middling course (at least in this volume) by presenting the Punisher as a straightforward man with a general mission but without delving into just what it is that drives him so. I'm not persuaded that this is the best approach as it leaves the Punisher as a somewhat hollow character. This is enhanced by the state of the series around him.

The supporting cast is rather limited. We hear about Microchip before we're first introduced to the computer hacker and equipment developer. His son "Junior" also appears, but is soon killed off. There's an indication that Junior could perhaps have become a questioning voice to draw out details of the Punisher's actions such as how he prioritises, but it's also clear that such an approach can't work when the Punisher invariably operates solo. Junior accompanies the Punisher on a couple of missions but can't always obey orders to stay in the van. The first time he saves the Punisher's life but the second time he loses his own. His father sticks around for the whole series, providing the Punisher with much needed equipment and support at times but rarely taking to the field himself. Microchip is the star of a back-up feature in the annual in which he has to protect the widow of an old friend from her new husband who has become a assassin. We see how resourceful and ruthless 'Chip himself can be, but otherwise don't learn too much more. The only other characters who come close to recurring are the small band the Punisher assembles to take down the Kingpin - Reese McDowell, a student, and Vernon Brooks, a teacher, both from a rough inner city school that the Punisher briefly teaches at whilst tracking down a radical revolutionary hiding there, and Conchita Ortiz, the widow of a soldier turned prison guard who helps the Punisher in trying to advance a convict's execution. Over the course of the story the attrition rate is high with only Vernon living by the end. The possibility is dangled of Conchita becoming a recurring romantic interest, but she is then immediately killed, a reminder of how grim and lonely the Punisher's path can be.

The Punisher's methods invariably don't leave many foes who can recur. We get a variety of archetypes - Latin American drug barons, Islamic fundamentalist terrorists, right-wing political extremists, cultist preachers, insider traders, serial killers, people traffickers, left-wing revolutionaries, drug dealers and mobsters. Many of these could be taken from the news though I don't know just which of these types were actually dominating the headlines in the late 1980s. The Kingpin appears in a multi-part storyline but curiously both he and the Punisher act as though they have never met - in fact they did so back in Peter Parker, the Spectacular Spider-Man #82. Still he's the only foe to walk away alive after Microchip and Vernon realise that it's the only way to prevent a vicious gang war.

The volume contains material from two different crossovers. One is a two parter with Daredevil and, as I previously discussed, Ol' Hornhead is one of the best heroes to contrast with the Punisher due to their very different views of the system of law & order. On this occasion we get a standard clash of values but presented in a novel approach - rather than a direct two part story each issue first focuses upon the title character's investigation of a disgruntled ex-employee of a pharmaceutical company who is taking revenge by poisoning bottles of its products until they encounter the other on a rooftop and fight over what to do with the criminal. Whilst the Punisher issue shows a conventional fight between the two, the Daredevil issue shows the same fight from the perspective of the killer who listens to them and concludes the two are more alike than they realise. We also get to see the Punisher acting as a detective, trying to quickly track down the killer and resorting to the unusual method of turning to the Jehovah's Witnesses to see if they have seen anything whilst door-knocking.

The other crossover is the second part of the "Evolutionary War" storyline. Although there had been stories told over a couple of annuals before this was the fist time such a large story was told there, taking up no less than eleven of the mainstream annuals (and also a humorous piece in Alf). At US $1.75 an issue (at a time when the regular Marvels cost $0.75 though most of the books were from the $1.00 line) it cost nearly $20.00 to own the entire crossover on first release - an early sign of the mess whereby readers increasingly found they either had to fork out large additional amounts for comics they wouldn't normally buy or else not get the full story. (A better approach in my opinion would be closer to that adopted by Secret Wars II and DC's Crisis on Infinite Earths whereby the main story is concentrated on a central limited series that individual ongoing titles feed off, but in such a way that a reader doesn't have to buy loads of other ongoing titles to know what's going on - and for that matter the limited series can later be collected by itself in a tradepaperback.) Fortunately most of the individual annuals are structured in such a way as to be reasonably self-contained with the High Evolutionary's plans as the sole common theme, and one can read them in isolation, as the Punisher annual is presented here on its own (and the same approach has been taken in the relevant volumes of Essential X-Factor, Essential Silver Surfer and Essential X-Men), though if one wants the entire story, including the back-up detailing the history of the High Evolutionary, it's available in an Omnibus hardcover edition (be warned though that this edition omits other back-up strips from each annual not related to the crossover). What makes the crossover stick out even more like a sore thumb is the poor motivation for the High Evolutionary's Eliminators (the High Evolutionary himself doesn't appear). This small squad of armoured humans are trying to wipe out all drugs across the world as a prelude to plans to forcibly advance humanity to the next stage of evolution, and also to eliminate potential threats like the Punisher. It's very hard to accept the High Evolutionary has anything like the resources for a global instantaneous war on drugs and as for the idea the Punisher could threaten his plans, it just doesn't seem likely.

The series doesn't limit itself to New York and instead takes us to many different parts of the United States and even abroad, with visits to variously Bolivia, Guiana (that spelling is used over twenty years after it became Guyana...), Colombia, Mexico and even the Australian outback. The multiple settings and situations help to keep the series fresh, showing the Punisher having to adapt to different situations and circumstances with some interesting results. That helps to make up for the shortfalls in character development and exploration.

Overall this series is quite mixed. The individual issues are generally well written and drawn, and it's easy to see why Whilce Portacio developed into one of the big name artists of the early 1990s. But fundamentally the main problem I have with the series is that there's very little sense of development and, with the exception of a few details, the stories could be rearranged in almost any order. Whilst the individual tales offer plenty of diversity and interest, with only really the annual sticking out as badly conceived, overall the whole thing just doesn't go anywhere. The Punisher has a mission against crime, but it's not always clear if he's just after organised crime or all criminals. There's no real overall strategy to his approach and instead he targets a succession of different crimes, sometimes responding to tip-offs, sometimes going after a particular wrong-doer them himself. Was this another series created by popular demand without thinking through its raison d'être? It's odd as all the issues in this volume have the same writer and editor (Carl Potts), so it's not as if it was a book handled by an endless succession of creators doing just a few issues at a time.

I'm not sure the basic problem lies with the Punisher's character - he's hardly the first example in comics of a bereaved relative with no actual super powers turning vigilante, and he's starting from a position of greater training than the likes of a young Bruce Wayne. Perhaps it's the way his approach of not adopting a secret identity and not being able to maintain a permanent base means that he rarely stays around any one place long enough to develop any roots, but again the wandering hero is common enough in fiction that it can be pulled off more successfully than here. Probably the deepest problem is the lack of any in-depth exploration of the Punisher's motivation and drive. Apart from his brief argument/fight with Daredevil there isn't any direct exploration as to just why he lacks faith in the system of law and order and instead has set himself up as a one man judge, jury and executioner. When the Punisher guest stars in other characters' titles it's often possible to contrast his outlook and methods with the title character's, but in his own title where the only supporting cast members are his technical support there just aren't any voices who can draw out the dilemma. Ultimately the Punisher is a difficult character to write a good developed ongoing series for, and unfortunately this volume doesn't hit the target.