X-FACTOR #148 - August 1998

Sorry Is the Hardest Word

Credits: Howard Mackie (writer), Lee Moder (penciler), Scott Koblish (inker), Glynis Oliver (colors), Comicraft (letters)

Summary: Henry Gyrich locates Havok and places him under arrest for his terrorist activities. Polaris suddenly appears and steals Havok away. The government’s soldiers and Mandroids pursue the mutants, leading Polaris to disrupt the Mandroids with an EM pulse. One of the Mandroids goes haywire, forcing Havok to rescue Gyrich. Val Cooper arrives and uses her authority to exonerate Havok. On their ride home with Val, Polaris tells Havok that their relationship is over.

Continuity Notes: Dark Beast is mistakenly referred to as being “from the future” twice. Havok is being arrested specifically for attacking an airliner in Uncanny X-Men #339.

We Get Letters: Tom Raney is announced as the new artist, beginning in issue #150. The editor even teases new character designs for the team by Raney that will debut soon. Raney will go on to pencil X-Factor’s replacement series, Mutant X, a book that Marvel still doesn’t seem to know will exist. This is the next to last issue and no one seems to know the book is cancelled.

Review: Havok’s rehabilitation continues, as Howard Mackie now tries to justify Havok’s treatment of Polaris and his terrorist attack from Uncanny X-Men #339. Mackie’s still going with the “I was undercover!” defense, which works about as well with continuity as claiming Dark Beast is from the future. No explanation is given for what exactly Havok hoped to achieve by attacking a civilian airliner, or blasting Polaris in the face and nearly killing her; “undercover” is the only rationalization Mackie seems willing to muster (although in a previous issue he intimated that Havok was still under Dark Beast’s influence during those scenes, which contradicts all of the telepaths and third-person narrative captions that assured us this was “the real” Havok). Oddly, Havok’s brutal assault on Polaris isn’t even mentioned at all. She’s more upset about him disappearing without personally saying goodbye, it seems. As far as breakup scenes go, this one’s obviously lacking, although it is a minor miracle that some effort’s being put into rationalizing the past three years of storylines at all. The action sequences are the issue’s highlight, as Lee Moder brings some excitement to the mineshaft chase scene and Mandroid fights.

X-FACTOR #146 - June 1998

Fairie Light

Credits: Howard Mackie (writer), Lee Moder (penciler), Scott Koblish (inker), Richard Starkings & Comicraft (letters), Glynis Oliver (colors)

Summary: Fixx uses her sprites to monitor Greystone, Archer, and Havok as they depart in different directions. Havok meets with Madrox, who’s unexpectedly invited Polaris to join their conversation. Greystone assumes his civilian identity of Brian Young and attempts to rescue Brian’s sister from their abusive parents. Archer takes the human form of Jude Black, a wanted terrorist with an estranged family. When he tries to reconnect with Jude’s family, he’s attacked by revenge-obsessed Genoshan Mutates. Fixx calls the team together, and the Genoshans quickly exit.

Continuity Notes: Fixx says that by touching Havok with one of her sprites, he’s now telepathically connected to the other XUE members.

We Get Letters: In response to a letter, optimistic about the book’s future, “We’ll say it again as we head up to issue #150, old fans and new will be enjoying X-Factor again!” Aside from the continuing misconception that the book will make it to #150, I think the “again” is slightly amusing.

Review: I wonder if the creative team ever realized that the occasional callbacks to the “classic” X-Factor just reminded people of how bad the later issues looked in comparison. Howard Mackie is still trying to sell the XUE characters as the new stars, but it looks like someone has recognized that the book can’t abruptly drop all of the established regulars. For some reason, Havok, the character who suffered the most during Mackie’s bewildering run, is going to be the bridge between the old and new teams.

If you really are a Havok fan, do you really want to see the same writer responsible for abusing the hero beyond recognition using him as a means to pass credibility on to a group of new characters? If any character represented the low point of Mackie’s writing, it would have to be Havok. And now that Marvel’s twisted him into a dupe/villain/retroactive spy over the past few years, apparently because they had no idea what to do with him, the readers are expected to keep following the book that’s dragged him into the mud? That’s even more naïve than believing people care about the XUE’s human identities.

One’s an ex-terrorist with marriage issues (and he’s named “Black”…as in “dark,” like a villain, get it?), and the other’s a kid from an abusive family (his last name is “Young”…and he’s a kid, which is a crazy coincidence). Yes, the fans really wanted this instead of a reunion of Havok, Strong Guy, Polaris, and Madrox. Heck, at this point in continuity, Marvel could’ve easily brought back the original X-Men cast to revive interest in the title. Why this book continues to go in such misguided directions is mystifying.