X-Men #111 (Jun 78): Mindgames!
Creative Team: Chris Claremont, author; John Byrne, penciler; Terry Austin, inker; Tom Orzechowski, letterer; Mary Titus, colorist; Archie Goodwin, editor
Starting Line Up: Cyclops, Pheonix, Nightcrawler, Wolverine, Banshee, Storm, Colossus
Guest Star: Beast
Synopsis: The X-Men have disappeared, and Beast has gone looking for them. He finds them as acts in a local carnival in Sullivan, Texas. Banshee is a carnival parker, trying to get people to pay five dollars to see the freak show. Aside from Banshee, Beast is a little unsure if the freaks are the new X-Men, having not met them yet. He recalls when he got a call from Moira McTaggert telling him she hasn't been able to get ahold of anyone at the mansion. He went over to check it out, but found the mansion as if no one has been there in weeks. Beast used Cerebro to track down the X-Men. Beast finally recognises Pheonix for sure (albeit a lot different from the Marvel Girl he knew) performing a trapeze act. He goes to her trailor after he act, but she doesn't recognise him. She calls the head of carnival security, Cyclops, who doesn't recognise him either and think he's some kind of monster. Cyclops calls the rest of the carnival for help, and Beast is suddenly outnumbered. He tries to hide, but Colossus finds him. The rest of the carnival beat him down, right in front of where Wolverine is chained up. As they take Beast away to their boss, something starts to stir in Wolverine. The boss turns out to be Mesmero, who is taking his revenge on the X-Men by humiliating them in a carnival. He begins to mesmerise Beast. Wolverine finally snaps to his senses and escapes from his bonds. The last thing he remembers is Mesmero's eyes burning into his mind. Wolverine (suddenly with his costume back) finds Cyclops and Pheonix. Wolverine finally gets his chance to deck Cyclops (since he won't remember) and then tries to talk Pheonix back to her senses. When she won't listen, he starts smacking her around until finally she's had enough, blasts him, and regains her senses. Wolervine's ok, though, and they go off to save the rest of the X-Men. Meanwhile, Mesmero is still trying to meserise Beast, but Beast is putting up a good fight. Finally Beast gets his chance to attack, but before he can get to Mesmero, some blast strikes him from behind and he goes down. Whoever blasted him causes to Mesmero to panick. Meanwhile, the rest of the X-Men, back to their senses, are taking apart the carnival guards and heading for Mesmero's trailor. When they get inside, they find Mesmero slumped over, defeated... at the hands of Magneto, who has come to finally defeat the X-Men, once and for all.
Yeah, but is it good? The ending sure as Hell is. I usually don't comment on art, but the last panel of this issue is a full page picture of Magento (the only time he's shown in the issue) and it looks freaking wicked. Especially in the b&w reprint I'm doing these reviews from. For the rest of the issue, I'd either prefer to see the X-Men preforming their carnivals acts, or Beast battling someone like Colossus. Beast is a ton of fun and I'm glad he's going to be in the next couple of issues. This is actually the start of a long story act, made up of smaller story arcs. I won't ruin it for the people reading these reviews (all 2 of you), but Magneto is up next issue, and that's 'nuff said!
Significata: Mesmero returns, but turns out to be choads and easily defeated by Magneto (as if the X-Men wouldn't have done it anyway). Cyclops worries himself that the new team still isn't ready for Magneto. Wolervine finally decks Cyclops. Beast, a former X-Men, is more or less, formally introduced to the new team.
