EXCALIBUR #81 – September 1994

Beginnings Middles & Endings

Credits: Scott Lobdell (plot), Chris Cooper (script), Klebs, Jr. & Paul Abrams (pencils), Pepoy/Carani/Champagne (inks), Dave Sharpe (letters), Chris Matthys (colors)

Summary

Britanic and Meggan talk about the experiences he had while lost in the timestream. Despite the changes they’ve gone through, they reaffirm their love for one another. Kitty Pryde takes Douglock to a pub and tries to figure out how much of Doug Ramsey is inside of him. She shows him a picture of the New Mutants but he doesn’t seem to remember them. After Kitty stops a violent college student from assaulting an old lady, Douglock identifies the people in the photo and tells her that he doesn’t want to be alone anymore. She invites him to join Excalibur. Professor Xavier and Moira MacTaggert take time off from their Legacy Virus research and go to Paris. They briefly kiss and then laugh it off.

Continuity Notes

Britanic and Meggan return to Excalibur’s original lighthouse headquarters. It was destroyed in issue #50 and reappears with no explanation.

Meggan tells Britanic that her “elemental bond” with nature gives her total awareness of her surroundings, allowing her to shape the environment around her. In the previous issue, she manipulated the magma that was flooding Stryfe’s underground base. She says that answering Britanic’s call from the timestream pushed her powers to the “ultimate degree”.

I Love the ‘90s

Professor Xavier mentally disguises Moira as Princess Diana while they’re dining at a fancy restaurant.

Review

It’s another one of the “quiet” issues that surround the crossovers. Scott Lobdell plots the story, so it’s not surprising that it reminds me so much of the talky issues of Uncanny. Chris Cooper’s scripting actually isn’t bad, so he’s able to create adequate conversations between the various characters. The two artists handling this issue couldn’t be more different, as the first artist turns in flat, amateur work, and the second does a nice job that reminds me of Adam Hughes. Considering the low quality of the preceding issues, I wasn’t looking forward to reading this at all, but it’s surprisingly okay. Like a lot of the quiet issues, it doesn’t advance any of the storylines and feels like it’s treading water, but there are worse ways to kill time before a crossover.

EXCALIBUR #80 – August 1994

Out of Time

Credits: Scott Lobdell (plot), Chris Cooper (script), Amanda Conner (pencils), Harry Candelario, Randy Elliott, Keith Champagne (inks), Dave Sharpe (letterer), Chris Matthys (colors)

Summary

Britanic questions Zero about the cure for the Legacy Virus as Stryfe’s underground base self-destructs. Zero tells him that the knowledge is inside of him but he’s unable to interpret it. The other members of Excalibur protect the human family from the explosions as Zero and Kitty search Stryfe’s computers for a way to stop the self-destruct sequence, or for any way to unlock the Legacy Virus info. Zero decides that the information inside of him is inaccessible and tells Excalibur to rescue the family while he stays behind to manually direct the blast sequences. After getting the family to safety, Douglock goes back to save Zero. Kitty points out to him that acting selflessly goes against his programming for self-preservation. While connected to the base’s computer system, Zero receives a recorded message from Stryfe. He tells him he’ll remove the last of his programming blocks so that he can have full access to the data that could lead to a Legacy Virus cure, but only in the final seconds he has to live. Douglock arrives, and Zero transfers the information to him. Zero is apparently destroyed in a final explosion as Douglock escapes. Back on the surface, Excalibur discovers that they’re inside the Pentagon. Meanwhile, Amanda Sefton tells Rory Campbell that she also saw the image of him as Ahab while in the timestream, and Moira McTaggert tells Professor Xavier that she is the human with the Legacy Virus.

Review

The Zero storyline is finally, finally over. Not only was Zero wrongly shoehorned into this title in the first place, but the actual storyline is extremely tedious and doesn’t add up to much of anything. If the purpose was to have Douglock join the team, shouldn’t the previous three issues have focused on him and not Zero? Douglock having the key to cure the Legacy Virus doesn’t go anywhere, and I honestly don’t remember if it was brought up again. Giving Moira the Legacy Virus is another storyline that’s suddenly introduced and then goes nowhere. I assume she was given the virus to set the stage for more humans contracting the disease, but I’m almost positive that no other humans were diagnosed. Having humans catch a fatal disease from mutants would have greatly escalated the human/mutant conflict, so maybe that’s why Marvel decided to hold off on the idea. An unrecognizable Amanda Conner shows up as the fill-in artist, turning in a fairly awful job. Having three guest inkers probably doesn’t help things, either. Everything about Excalibur at this point feels rushed, half-hearted, and pointless. I knew this stuff was bad as a kid, but I had already decided that I needed Excalibur to be a true X-completist.

EXCALIBUR #79 – July 1994

Twisted Logic

Credits: Scott Lobdell (plot), Chris Cooper (script), Ken Lashley (pencils), Harry Candelario & Randy Elliott (inks), Dave Sharpe (lettering), Chris Matthys (colors)

Summary

Zero teleports Excalibur and the family they rescued to one of Stryfe’s hidden bases under the Pentagon. There are over three thousand inert droids inside the base, but Zero says that this is the last place the active droids will look for him. Kitty Pryde is angry with Douglock for assuming Doug Ramseys’ appearance, but he doesn’t understand why. When Zero learns that Meggan senses feelings and emotions inside of him, he realizes that he is now a sentient being. His sentience allows him to overcome Stryfe’s programming, which causes the inert droids to begin self-destructing. Zero says that the droids will stop at nothing to kill him in order to destroy the knowledge he’s unlocked -- the secret of the Legacy Virus. Meanwhile, an enraged Stephen Lang senses that Doug Ramsey is missing from the Phalanx. A mystery man tells him to calm down and to focus on their grand plan. On Muir Island, Moira McTaggert and Professor Xavier study the development of the Legacy Virus. A distraught Moira shows Xavier a DNA model that confirms that the Legacy Virus can spread to humans.

Continuity Notes

In one brief scene, Val Cooper gives Forge a file on Kitty Pryde’s father, but Forge thinks that the information is too unreliable to act on. I know that Kitty Pryde’s father is considered dead today, but I don’t remember where this specific subplot went. I vaguely remember it staying in the background of Warren Ellis’ run.

How exactly humans can contract the Legacy Virus isn’t explained, although it’s worth mentioning that the Adventures of Cyclops and Phoenix miniseries established that it was originally developed to kill humans. The Legacy Virus is supposed to kill mutants by turning their powers against them (although it only seemed to give Illyana the flu), so I’m not sure what it would do to a human. A future issue will reveal that Moira has the virus (in another storyline that never goes anywhere).

Review

The Zero storyline drags on. Apparently, the idea was to set up Zero as a means to cure the Legacy Virus, but that concept was dropped quickly. Aside from being a tiresome story in its own right, it’s even more disappointing to know that all of the ideas being established are just going to be ignored soon anyway. The only aspect of the story that relates to any of the actual cast members of the title is Kitty’s reaction to Douglock. Their scene together doesn’t work at all, not only because the emotions ring false, but because the story also doesn’t bother to explain their past together. Not only does this storyline assume that you care about minor characters from another spinoff, but it expects you to automatically care about the relationship between two characters from the early ‘80s. Excalibur seems to be taking Cable’s place as weakest spinoff at this point.

EXCALIBUR #78 – June 1994

Fire in the Wild

Credits: Scott Lobdell (plot), Chris Cooper (script), John Ryle (pencils), Harry Candelario (inks), Babcock/Brosseau (lettering), Chris Matthys (coloring)

Summary

Zero meets Douglock while hiding out from Stryfe’s droids. Douglock questions why Zero is doing illogical things like building a fire when he is inorganic. Zero explains to Douglock that they must understand and define their purpose in the world. Meanwhile, Excalibur is hovering in their jet nearby. Britanic felt summoned to this area, but doesn’t understand why. Kitty calls her mother and asks about her father, but she hasn’t seen him in months, either. Below, Zero meets a young girl who is camping with her family. Douglock questions why Zero didn’t terminate her in order to cover his tracks from Stryfe’s droids. Zero explains to him that terminating life is wrong, and that he not only freed Douglock from the Phalanx for help, but also because he sensed that he was different from the others. Zero prompts a memory playback for Douglock, showing him his death as Doug Ramsey, sacrificing his life for his fellow New Mutants. Stryfe’s droids appear and attack the girl’s family. Excalibur arrives and protects the family with Zero’s help. Douglock goes against his Phalanx programming to save Kitty Pryde and the young girl. Zero uses his power to eliminate the droids, but an army of backups arrives. Zero teleports everyone away, as the replacement droids continue their pursuit. Back on Muir Island, Xavier arrives to help Moira McTaggert research the Legacy Virus.

Continuity Note

Xavier putting Beast in charge of the school in X-Men #31 was a prelude to him studying the Legacy Virus on Muir Island, but his dialogue in that issue was intentionally vague. I’m not sure how exactly studying the Legacy Virus is his way of “making amends” for “recent actions” he had taken.

Review

The Zero storyline continues, inexplicably in Excalibur. Zero was a recurring character in X-Force, going back to the Rob Liefeld issues. He never appeared in Excalibur before this story, and had nothing to do with any of the characters. Not only has Marvel brought Excalibur’s continuity closer to the other X-books at this point, but now the book’s acting as if it’s interchangeable with an entirely different title. I can’t imagine why a regular Excalibur reader would care anything about Zero being chased by Strfye’s droids for an entire issue (there’s no explanation of who Stryfe is, either) unless they were already an X-completist. The cast of the book isn’t given hardly anything to do, except Kitty Pryde who briefly reacts to Douglock. I can understand using Douglock as a way to pull Excalibur into the Phalanx storyline (due to Kitty’s past with Doug), but all of this stuff with Zero seems pointless. It’s pretty bad, and it’s not hard to understand why I’ve totally forgotten this storyline over the years.

EXCALIBUR #77 – May 1994

Lowest Common Denominator

Credits: Scott Lobdell & Richard Ashford (plot), Chris Cooper (script), Robert Brown & Ken Lashley (pencilers), Elliott/Champagne/Gorder/Hudson (inkers), Dave Sharpe (letters), Chris Matthys (colors)

Summary

In the past, a young Nightcrawler meets his friend, Christian, in the woods. The boy tells him that they can’t be friends anymore; revealing the bruises his father gave him. His father doesn’t want him to befriend a demon, saying that he’ll kill him before he lets the demon take his soul. Nightcrawler’s foster mother, Margali Szardos, tries to comfort him by telling him that love is stronger than hate, but her words mean little to him. In the present, Nightcrawler manages to teleport away with the young Gypsy boy he saved from a group of skinheads. D’Spayre appears, taunting Nightcrawler. He’s kidnapped Margali and claims that by dawn, the hatred created by the mobs will give him enough energy to steal her power. D’Spayre disappears as soon as Amanda Sefton returns. She sends Nightcrawler to follow D’Spayre and promises to stop the mob violence. In the tombs beneath Germany, Nightcrawler finds D’Spayre. Amanda rescues Margali while Nightcrawler confronts D’Spayre. When the demon attacks, Nightcrawler recalls the memory of his friend, Christian, returning to see him as an adult. He brings his son along and asks forgiveness for abandoning Nightcrawler as a child. Focusing on love instead of hate weakens D’Spayre’s attack, and when he tries to draw energy from the mobs, he sees that Amanda has already stopped the riots. D’Spayre disappears, and Nightcrawler reconciles with Margali, realizing that her earlier message about love is true. Meanwhile, Zero is being hunted down by robots programmed to destroy all of Stryfe’s data and materials. He teleports away, but not before he’s damaged. He calls for help and a techno-organic Doug Ramsey (Douglock) arrives.

Continuity Notes

Zero was a robot owned by Stryfe. He somehow ended up in the possession of Cable’s son, Tolliver, in the Deadpool miniseries. There, he was re-awakened as a peacekeeping “ultimate weapon”, meaning that he can nullify any other weapon. He tells Douglock that he has freed him from the Phalanx and that they are both techno-organic.

Since this issue has a May cover date, it actually predates UXM #313 as Douglock’s first appearance. Since Zero tells him that he’s been freed of the Phalanx, it must take place after the UXM story, though. Looking around online, it seems that UXM #313 is considered to be his first real appearance.

Review

Well, it’s a cheesy story about love conquering hate. There’s nothing egregiously wrong with the execution, but the story never gets very interesting, either. Most of the plotting is at least competent, except for Amanda Sefton stopping an outbreak of violence throughout Germany with no explanation outside of “I’m a sorceress”. If she could stop the violence that easily, why didn’t she do so before sending Nightcrawler into it? Considering the lack of Excalibur as a team in this story, I wonder if it was originally supposed to be a Nightcrawler solo story in X-Men Unlimited or Marvel Comics Presents. Taking into account the fact that this issue has three writers, two pencilers, and four inkers, I guess it’s lucky that it’s on the low end of mediocre rather than a true train wreck. It mainly comes across as filler while the book’s waiting for a good time to tie in to the Phalanx storyline.