Psylocke Psaturday: And yet, we're still not out of The X-Tinction Agenda

Psreviously, on Psylocke Psaturday...


Panel from Uncanny X-Men #271 (December 1990), script by Chris Claremont, pencils by Jim Lee, inks by Scott Williams, colors by Glynis Oliver, letters by Tom Orzechowski and L. Lois Buhalis
...Cameron Hodge, a.k.a. X-Factor's greatest villain (snicker), had just captured Wolverine and out purple-haired point of this pseries of psosts, Psylocke! Disclaimer: As Miss Olivia Munn is out ill from our theatre tonight, the role of Psylocke will be played by Emma Stone.

In fact, as crossover ish X-Factor #61 tells us, a whole lotta mutants have been trapped like Mars flies in a klein bottle. Also, they've been, completely violating the Geneva Convention, cruelly imprisoned without a background. This human rights transgression later inspired the United Nations to adopt worldwide the controversial Colletta Accords.


Panel from X-Factor (1986 series) #61 (December 1990), script by Louise Simonson, pencils by Jon Bogdanove with John Caponigro, inks by Al Milgrom, colors by Mike Rockwitz, letters by Joe Rosen
Being caught, imprisoned, and robbed of their powers hardly ever happens to the X-Men, so you're not likely to see this scene at any time in the immediate future.


Panel from X-Men #272 (January 1991), script by Chris Claremont, pencils by Jim Lee, inks by Scott Williams, colors by Joe Rosas and Glynis Oliver, letters by Tom Orzechowski
OH FOR PETE'S SAKE COMIC BOOK

The world is immediately outraged by this news that shakes the nations! Commenting on the subject is a Marvel Comics editor, the world's most verbose man, an Orion lawyer, and Sunspot's dad.


Even this guy, on his way over to Netflix's Daredevil set, has a word or two to say.


Of course, the X-Men are strong and resistant, and not a single X-Man or X-Woman or X-Beast is going to crumple under the terrific pressure of being handcuffed on top of a platform and


OH COME ON NOW BETSY

Oh, it's a trick. Okay, Psylocke, you're forgiven. This time. Ten points from Gryffindor Claremont, however, for not using the obvious Pat Benatar "hit me with your best shot" reference in panels one and two. It was right there staring at you, Chris!


Everybody run
Psylocke's got a gun


More or less "meanwhile", Psylocke's not the only X-Men fleeing. Let's just take a quick glance at Pre-Teen Storm™ (action figure available now from Toy Biz!) make her escape by (snicker) hiding in a laundry basket (hee hee hee) that's being loaded onto a truck for (snicker snicker) Geno-Sheen Custom Laundry! BWAH-HA-HA-HA-HA-HA oh you were serious Louise Simonson I'm so sorry.


Panels from X-Factor #60 (November 1990), script by Louise Simonson, pencils by Jon Bogdanove, inks by Al Milgrom, colors by Glynis Oliver, letters by Joe Rosen
Then (just so you know how this all ends, pretty much), Havoc zaps Cameron Hodge to pieces. Boom! End of villain.


Panels from X-Factor #62 (January 1991), script by Louise Simonson, pencils by Jon Bogdanove, inks by Al Milgrom, colors by Glynis Oliver, letters by "Task Force Z2"
Well, that's taken care of him. Oh wait! He's still here! Zap 'im, Cyclops! Yay! Truly then, this is the end of Cameron Hodge!


OH FOR CRYING OUT LOUD he's got more death scenes that the Terminator and the Anti-Monitor put together!


Zapt him Jean! Zapt him good! HOORAY THUS ENDETH CAMERON HODGE FOREVER


Um...okay, then...FINISH HIM, RAHNE! (tapping fingers impatiently)


And then Rictor buries him under the biggest building collapse until 9/11. Oh, that won't terrify and scar New Yorkers at all, X-Men. GOOD JOB, MUTANTS.


Then, everybody gathers on stage for the traditional obligatory post-apocalyptic battle team portrait. Say 'Claremont,' everybody!


Panel from Uncanny X-Men #273 (February 1991), script by Chris Claremont, pencils by Whilce Portacio, inks by Scott Williams, colors by Joe Rosas, letters by Tom Orzechowski
Next issue: Claremont makes sure we all know each other's names, and Psylocke seems to be the only one not bothered by tentacle porn:


Panels from Uncanny X-Men #274 (March 1991), script by Chris Claremont, pencils by Whilce Portacio, inks by Scott Williams, colors by Joe Rosas, letters by Pat Brosseau

Psylocke Psaturday: Genosha swings like a human rights-violating Amnesty International-condemned pendulum do

Previously, on The X-Tinction Agenda:

Panel from Uncanny X-Men #271 (December 1990), script by Chris Claremont, pencils by Jim Lee, inks by Scott Williams, colors by Glynis Oliver, letters by Tom Orzechowski and L. Lois Buhalis
Eh, that's enough of a recap. Let's get right to the Psylockin' action!

The X-Tinction Agenda was the X-titles' thinly disguised anti-apartheid fable, told via Genosha, the fictional Marvel country where humans ruled mutants, emigration was at a strict zero per cent, and cats were living with dogs. Sounds pretty nasty, huh? Well, imagine that country being manipulated behind the scenes by X-Factopr's arch-enemy, Cameron Hodge, a guy so evil they put his head on the body of a mechanical spider-worm (Spider-Worm! Spider-Worm! He should be doing a prison term!), and they didn't even bother to give him a cool codename! Genosha: it makes Latveria look like Denmark. Still, we were all pretty sick of it by the twenty-first century and I'm not ashamed to admit that I didn't disapprove when Grant Morrison pretty much took it off the table as a world power in New X-Men. Marvel Comics: wiping mutants out by the millions since 1963!

Enter: Wolverine, Jubilee, and Psylocke — pretty much the closest thing we had to an X-Men team following the splitting of the group and their transmorfrigationing after entering the Siege Perilous. Wolvie, Jubes, and Psyke are all falling down out of the sky, apparently, rather than entering the country through customs the way normal folks do. Wolverine: the best there is at what he does, and what he does best is give piggy-back rides!


Whereas you and I would probably take in the sights, check into our hotel, maybe head out for a quick meal of local Genoshan cuisine (their fritter cakes are to die for), Psylocke just starts kicking people. With "power and grace." I'm pretty sure she buys souvenirs the same way.


Are you keeping track of the number of times the phrase "focused totality of my telepathic powers" is used? Chalk up another one! And in case you're tracking Psylocke's powers for that new edition of The Official Handbook of the Marvel Post-Secret Wars Universe, What Are We Calling This One, Earth-616-8?, please note that not only does her psychic knife cause you to say "Glxgkyl' (which is a compound verb in the world of Sugar and Spike), but it also makes you weep vanilla pudding.


Hey, it's Rictor and Boom-Boom! Hi, Rictor and boom-Boom! (sets off klaxon) We have a crossover! We have a crossover! Also, please note that the kids are less scared of known berserker killer Wolverine than they are of the Asian supermodel. Mmmm, that's good Mary-Suein'!


Confused? Don't be! Here's a handy recap panel in the form of a Psylocke mind meld! Not onbly so Jim Lee can draw this impressive scene, but so that you dont' actually have to buy X-Factor or New Mutants to figure out what's going on. Remember, Jim Shooter sez, every issue is someone's first!


Somehow yet once again they manage to fall into Genosha out of the sky a second time. Is Genosha built on a layer cake model, like Minas Tirith, so that those on the top can just toss their garbage over the ledge onto the level below? And where'd they get those planes? And more important, where'd they get the quarters to run them? Also: a special appearance by Betsy in Genoshan Flight Suit™! Aw, it was nice of Jim Lee to be thinking of variant action figures already.


Wolverine Down! ("What do you stuff a wolverine pillow with?") Luckily Logan and Betsy are picked up by the only Genoshan poilice who have never read the story of the Trojan Horse. And Chris Claremont...stop trying to make "psishot" happen.


Cheese it, Psylocke! It's Cameron Hodge, and he's doing H.R. Giger cosplay!


And that's two "focused totality of my telepathic powers" in this comic. Seriously, try saying that aloud (and with a straight face) and you'll begin to see why it never achieved the catchphrase popularity level of "It's clobberin' time!" or "My Spidey-Sense is tingling!" or "Do you know what happens when a toad gets struck by lightning?"


So, that's pretty much how Wolverine and Psylocke died. Or...did they? Buy two other comic books to find out (sort of) and then join us back here next time for another Psylocke Psaturday, same purple-haired time, same purple-haired channel!

Psylocke Psunday: Let the Munn Shine In

Before this here blog o' mine slippedy-slipped into real-life-overload low-content Star Wars/Today in Comics History day-and-night mode, I promised you more about The X-Tinction Agenda featuring Psylocke. And, um, sorry! I don't have it written yet. I kinda think you won't mind, though, because here's some pshotographs of our psurple psychic from the psages of Entertainment Weekly which I'm sure won't mind me reposting them seeing as they didn't extend my subscription the way they were supposed to and instead they just mailing me two copies of each issue. So take it away, Olivia Munn co-starring in X-Men: Apocalypse, coming to a theater near you on May 27, 2016!



Images from Entertainment Weekly (July 24, 2015); image credits: Michael Muller (top); Alan Markfield (bottom)
Also: Mohawk Storm! I'm camping out for tickets already.

Psylocke Psaturday: Warning: Psylocke May Not Actually Appear in This Post

I often joke in these (digital) pages: "Hey, remember when there was only one X-Men comic?" I mean: how the Sam Scratch could they ever have a crossover event with only one comic? Luckily by the early '90s there was a fine assortment of titles that began with "X" on your comic book shop shelf, and for that matter one of 'em began with "N," one with "E," and one began with "Wolver." Most of which would somehow get tied up in the x-citing x-over x-Travangza The X-Tinction Agenda,, the Marvel event that taught a generation how to misspell the word "extinction!" And also produced house ads that were nigh-invulnerable to reading comprehension. The X-Men: blocking the literacy of America's youth since 1963!

Psylocke Psaturday: Strike a pose

Next time: the awfully startling X-Tinction Agenda! This week: a pin-up cover! Because why not!


Cover of Marvel Age #104 (September 1991), art by Jim Lee

Psylocke Psaturday: It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Madripoor

Welcome to Madripoor!


from Marvel Atlas #1 (January 2008), art by Klaus Janson
Yes, Madripoor! The island nation so full of vice they named it twice! (Truth in disclosure: they did not name it twice.) In the Marvel Universe you will never find a more wretched hive of scum and villainy, except perhaps for that T.G.I. Friday's in downtown Doomstadt, Latveria. Madripoor, home of the world's weirdest hot air balloons!:


from Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe: Wolverine one-shot (December 2004)

Psylocke Psaturday: That's just love sneakin' up on you

Nowadays we would call this period in the never-ending history of those merry mutants known as the X-Men the March to the X-tinction Agenda, with suitable banners emblazoned across and on every single Marvel Comics title with an "X" in it (and that includes the then-recently retitled X-Daredevil). This trumpet blare of the approaching storyline that promises to shatter the Marvel U. as we know it indicates that we're just kinda buying time and treading water for a wee bit until that big crossover close on the horizon gets here. Back in 1990, however, we just had our stories without any advertising telling us that these comics don't really matter because the main event is what we're waitin' for, an' we liked 'em that way. In this case, Uncanny X-Men has during most of 1990 become one of those books where individual members or small teams of 'em go off on their separate ways and have different adventures before all joining up for a triumphant reunion. Nowadays we'd just send somebody out of town for their own miniseries, but Uncanny X-Men featuring Colossus or featuring Rogue or featuring Gambit and Li'l Stormy were what was being served up at your local comic book store. Yes, because that approach was <sarcasm>really successful</sarcasm> the last time the X-Men tried it:


Anyway, I have to admit to a bit of excitement here, because as the cover of UXM #261 proudly declares, Wolverine, Psylocke, and Jubilee are gonna meet Hardcase and the Harriers! OH BOY OH BOY OH BOY I LOVE THOSE GUYS!



I'm sorry. I've just been informed I've made another one of my silly mistakes.

Anyway, the comic book promises "the ferocious introduction of Hardcase and the Harriers," which is a nice trick seeing as they had already appeared the year before in Wolverine.


Panel from Wolverine (1988 series) #5 (March 1989), script by Chris Claremont, pencils by John Buscema, inks by Al Williamson, colors by Glynis Oliver, letters by Janice Chiang
Anyway, this column is titled "Psylocke Psaturday" and not "Harrier Hwednesday," so what's our friendly neighborhood British/Japanese ex-pilot ex-supermodel ex-secret agent psychic ninja mutant X-Men up to? Why, she's perfecting her impersonation of Morticia Addams. In the next panel no doubt Wolverine exclaims "Bets! You spoke French!"


Panels from Uncanny X-Men #261 (May 1990), script by Chris Claremont, pencils by Marc Silvestri, inks by Dan Green, colors by Mike Rockwitz, letters by Tom Orzechowski
Jubilee still doesn't trust/is envious of Betsy, and it's a subplot that, while well handled by Claremont, pretty much goes away swiftly without comment, without even the type of quick-as-a-wink resolution that, say, the subplot of Kitty Pryde being spooked by Nightcrawler had ten years before. Psylocke is cool as a traditional English cucumber sandwich, and without even ever having met Professor X, she handily shows off one of his cleverer tricks of astral projection — sending out an invisible psychic avatar of herself to spy on the world. She encounters shades of Carol Danvers and Nick Fury (well, what woulda been a Nick Fury-bot at that point, if recent mega-events are to believed) and battles them briefly, continuing to set up a subplot about Wolverine's mental madness that would of course be completely forgotten a few issues from now and indeed never picked up in his own solo book.


And oh yes, they get to fight the previously promised Hardcase and the Harriers.


It's their second appearance and once again the "trained to take on the Avengers" line is trotted out. Well, maybe, but consider that at this period in time, the Avengers consisted of what many fans might consider one of their lamest line-ups, and still the active members were Captain America, Gilgamesh the Forgotten Guy, Mr. Fantastic and the Invisible Woman, and Thor. Freakin' Thor, dudes. And yet here they are defeated by Jubilee. Hoo boy! Were Claremont and/or Silvestri trying to build up these characters and creating a "back-door pilot" for this new team? If so, wave goodbye to those tasty royalty checks, guys, because this is the second and the final appearance of Hardcase and the Harriers. Well, unless you count their appearance in The Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe Master Edition (yes, the one where you tear out the pages and store them in a three-hole binder)...but I don't.


Man, they really wiped out a dozen half-decent code-names for superheroes with this team, didn't they?

Why are the Harriers so ticked off at our mutant pals? Well, partly because Wolverine hired them to attack himself and the two X-Women to make sure that he and his team were in fighting shape, but mostly because Jubilee blew up their comic books.


So what was Psylocke doing during all this? Why, posing for her Milo Manara comic book cover, of course.


It's fairly early in the era of "ninja bathing suit-Betsy," so this might be the first sighting of the ever-changing-in-size uniform bottom. Sometimes it's fairly modest and pretty much covers up her whole derrière, but at other times it's not much bigger than a Sports Illustrated swimsuit model's thong. Well, here we can at least see it covers something. Not much, granted, but it protects UXM against the wrath of the all-powerful Comics Code Authority while at the same time giving young bulls boys something to ogle at in cartoon form. Good thing that they established at this point, then, that Betsy's thong bottom doesn't completely disappear up her


OH FOR PETE'S SAKE SILVESTRI

Psylocke Psaturday: The X-Position Agenda

Psylocke's next appearance is in 1990's annual, and hoo boy, is is eminently skippable.


Panels from "The Fundamental Thing" in Uncanny X-Men Annual #14 (1990), script by Chris Claremont, pencils by Mark Heike, inks by Geof Isherwood, colors by Nelson Yomtov, letters by Michael Heisler
This is the period when the X-Men have been dispersed and scattered in groups around the world, so every few issues follows another X-Man or three. Wolverine, Jubilee, and Psylocke are working their way across Asia, but they can't escape that year's X-Men/New Mutants/X-Factor/Fantastic Four Annual crossover "Days of Future Present," which, despite riffing on the title of one of the greatest X-Men stories and one of the greatest X-Men movies is...can I say it? It's not very good.. Most of the four issues involve the adult Franklin Richards, possibly from the future, who the heck knows?...skipping around and cameo-crashing in everybody's annual. Why is it I love the kid Franklin Richards and loathe the adult one? Ah, if o0nly he had crossed over into the 1990 Punisher Annual.

Wolvie, Jubie, and Psychie don't even appear in the lead story of X-Men Annual #14 (which, to be fair, has some fairly lovely Art Adams artwork whose continuity is marred by an uneven roulette wheel of assorted inkers) but in a back-up which serves a duel purpose of slightly tying into the main story and Wolverine recounting the history of the X-Men, both the Original Fab Five and the All-New, All-Different, in extremely text-heavy, caption box-crowded flashback panels:


(Never mind that the same recap concept had been done much, much better in UXM #138):


Panels from [Uncanny] X-Men #138 (October 1980); co-plot and script by Chris Claremont; co-plot and pencils by John Byrne; inks by Terry Austin; colors by Glynis Wein, letters by Tom Orzechowski
Wolvie doesn't even stop telling the tale to the skeptical Jubilee and the vaguely disinterested Psylocke when Franklin Richards and Rachel "I'm the Phoenix With the Spikes on Her Costume" Summers visit Wolverine to remind him to tie this story into the Annual's main plot.


Special guest appearance by Baby Cable oh geez just kill me now


Oh, and Jubilee and Phoenix have a catfight. Jubilee versus Phoenix. Let's just think about that for a while. Which one of those combatants do you think is more likely to wind up in a pile of flash-fried ashes?


So there ya go: X-Men Annual #14. It had Psylocke in it but not very much. In fact, there was more real estate taken up by word balloons than by Ms. Betsy Braddock. Oh, and collector/fanboys? First published appearance of Gambit.


Panel from "You Must Remember This" in Uncanny X-Men Annual #14 (1990); script by Chris Claremont; pencils by Art Adams; inks by Dan Green, Bob Wiacek, Al Milgrom, Art Thibert, and/or Steve Mancuse; colors by Brad Vancata, letters by Tom Orzechowski
So be sure that you bag and board this turkey, folks!