THE 50th Anniversary Of The Year Draws Near

Doctor Who? Hell no. That is in November! I'm referring to an equally momentous Golden Jubilee marking 50 years since Stan Lee and Jack Kirby published the first issue of The X-Men.

I got into the X-Men around the time I got into Doctor Who. All my friends at school were collecting the Fleet X-Men card sets and, being easily lead, I soon joined them. I'd seen the X-Men cartoons, of course, but it was really those card sets that started the real love affair. The sheer diversity of characters appealed to me and it wasn't long before I'd discovered Whatever Comics in Canterbury.

And thus an on again, off again relationship began. I went through periods of devouring X-Men comics, old and new.

There is no point in pretending that the "mutant coming out" stories and the "oppressed minority" subtexts didn't appeal to me greatly. And the characters were interesting and easy to fall in love with. The Beast and his sarcasm but underlying deep and powerful love of science and mankind. Storm and her thoughtful nature and powerful anger. How could you not love them?

Right now, in its 50th year, X-Men is having one of its best runs yet. Wolverine and the X-Men, though slightly knocked off course by the AvX summer event last year, has refound its feet and is back to being hilarious and quirky. All-New X-Men and Uncanny X-Men have taken off brilliantly and I can't wait for the next issue of each. Bring the original 5 X-Men forward in time to see what they've become was an excellent way of exploring the original characters in a new and interesting way. Plus next year we have Days of Future Past coming out in the cinema which will be something to behold.

As we prepare for the 50th Anniversary spectacular story "Battle of the Atom" (though I'm slightly disappointed the future X-Men featured arent't the X-Men 2099, missed opportunity [especially as Spider-man 2099 is back in continuity]) I'd just like to say THANK YOU to everyone who has made the X-Men such a fantastic franchise, full of rich characters, interesting stories and excellent analogies for modern day issues.