By 1979, the X-Men had gotten popular enough to earn an annual. Technically, this was their third one (as acknowledged by the numbering), but the first two were reprints thrown together from regularly published issues during the dark days of 1970-1975, so they didn't really matter.
John Byrne had to worry about doing the art for the regular issues, so the annual was penciled by the magnificent George Perez. It seems someone in the production team decided to acknowledge their missing plotter, unless the store sign for “Byrne's Drafting Equipment” in the very first panel of the comic is just an enormous coincidence. Now, Byrne's a great artist, no doubt about that, and not to mention instrumental in shaping the early days of the All-New, All-Different team, but even he pales in comparison to Perez, who can legitimately be called one of the best comic book artists ever, at least in my humble opinion.
This is only the beginning of his career – he'd started doing prominent work beginning with Avengers #141 in 1975 – but already the sheer level of detail in his art is amazing. He beautifully depicts lavish fight scenes where every bit of space is filled with bodies, weapons and debris – and yet nothing gets lost. If there's one thing Perez is famous for, it's his ability to stick a million different characters in a panel and make them all distinctive without crowding anything. Perez went on to have a long and illustrious career, which included redefining the Teen Titans and penciling one of the most historically significant limited series ever, Crisis on Infinite Earths, both with Marv Wolfman. He also drew a large chunk of my favorite run on the Avengers – Kurt Busiek's.
But while I'm on the subject of art, I should mention that the annual is still inked by the ever-faithful Terry Austin, whose work provided important visual continuity for the series. Honestly, I feel bad about not talking more about him (and inkers in general). The truth is, I'm horrible at actually quantifying and judging the work inkers do, so I feel it's better to keep quiet rather than talk out of my ass. On that note, the primary colorist for X-Men around this time was Glynis Wein (the wife of Len Wein, actually), but her work on the annual seems recognizably different.
The annual features Arkon, an enemy of the Avengers. Arkon is the ruler of a planet called Polemachus (which isn't actually named in this story) that's lit not by a sun, but by a ring of energy. When that ring gave out, Arkon tried to save his world at the expense of Earth, but the Avengers managed to build him with a device supplying the ring with power. The reader only finds this out at the end of the story, but the device has failed, and now Arkon's world is ending. He isn't a villain per se, but he is from a rather simple-minded warrior-culture and is thus seemingly incapable of asking for help without acts of violence.
Arkon pops up on Earth and heads to Avengers Mansion to look for Thor. He finds Thor absent, but soon gets word of another individual who could help him: Storm.
Meanwhile, the X-Men are having a training session in the Danger Room. Things go very wrong when Ororo feels confined, shoots out some lightning and destroys the control computer. The team have to fight for their lives to deactivate the out of control systems. The situation's really a bit ridiculous because of how extremely easily the X-Men end up in deadly danger. But hey, I guess that's why they call it the Danger Room?
Soon afterwards, Arkon arrives to kidnap... uh, solicit Storm's assistance. His dickish behavior earns him a fight with the X-Men, but he ultimately manages to teleport Storm ahead to Polemachus. The X-Men follow her, and end up in a massive battle against Arkon's army. This issue is filled to the brim with fighting. A lot of it just the X-Men wailing on mooks, but it's all presented enjoyably enough that it never gets old. Oh yeah, and Colossus commandeers a dragon from the attackers, so that's awesome too.
Eventually, the team finds Ororo, but the locals have explained the situation to her, that she can reignite the energy ring with her weather powers by sacrificing her life, and she's willing to do it. At this point, Arkon finally settles down and explains the whole thing. The X-Men figure out another way to help the people of Polemachus, one that harkens back to the crazy stupid plan for stopping the Z'Nox in X-Men #65. They fix the Avengers' device as best they can; then Storm shoots Cyclops with the full force of her lightning, which somehow supercharges him and allows him to fire especially strong optic blasts into the device, powering it up again.
And that's the end of that crisis. Polemachus is lit up once again, the X-Men are hailed as heroes (Arkon suggests they team up and conquer the universe) and sent back home. Fin. All in all, it's s pretty fun story, though it's clearly about the “Fuck yeah!” action and excitement than any meaningful progression for the characters. Arkon's ridiculously combative nature makes the conflict a little contrived, but I can't really complain too much. It worked out okay. Index of Happenings:
Deaths: 6.
Resurrections: 4.
Depowered: 1.
Revamps: 1.
Team: eight.
Overall: sixteen.
Final word: Seriously though, George Perez is awesome.
Next time: A story 21 issues in the making... Mutant X!
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