1985 can be seen as a major turning point in the evolution of the X-Men cosmology – it was the final year in which writer Chris Claremont held complete control of Marvel’s merry mutants. In February of the following year, the first issue of X-Factor, instigated by then Editor-in-Chief Jim Shooter and written by Bob Layton, hit stands, reviving and retconning Jean Grey and (some purists might say) undermining Claremont and John Byrne’s Phoenix Saga.
It wasn’t the first time editorial had pushed for a new X-Men book following the astronomical sales of Uncanny X-Men, but as that pressure increased, Claremont insisted on writing the second book rather than have anyone else mucking about in his garden. The New Mutants arrived in 1982, and while Uncanny continued Claremont’s near-decade-long epic, the new series allowed for growth and experimentation.
By 1985, the book had already hit its iconic peak with the arrival of artist Bill Sienkiewicz and the vaunted Demon Bear Saga; it had introduced all the major players who would be at the heart of the book until the end of Claremont’s time on the series. One could see Demon Bear as the crest of the first act of Claremont’s New Mutants, and the eventual Inferno crossover as the closing curtain before the series was handed off to Louise Simonson (whose takeover of X-Factor corrected that ship to a heading more aligned to the X-Universe she helped establish as X-editor).
If that’s the case, then the issues collected in The New Mutants Epic Collection – Asgardian Wars might be seen as the uncertain middle era. With the creative partnership with Sienkiewicz over, the book didn’t quite seem to know where it was going, or what stories it needed to be telling.
This isn’t to say that there aren’t important stories being told, here; the volume sees major concepts introduced and touched on that would later resolve in major ways. In the titular story, Dani Moonstar becomes an Asgardian Valkyrie. Magneto, on the first unsteady steps of his aborted redemption arc, takes over as headmaster of Xavier’s school (Charles, over in Uncanny, had fucked off to space to be a Shi’ar consort). Emma Frost likewise begins a sort of redemption of her own, establishing her stance fully in the gray middle ground of morality. Illyana continues her descent into Limbo’s darkness, while Doug Ramsey and Warlock flirt with (and then consummate) a sort of BFF-bonding that would ultimately leave Doug fatally infected with the Transmode Virus (and set up their current relationship in the Krakoan era). Hell, this volume also sees Claremont’s reclamation of Betsy Braddock, who had recently mini-fridged in the pages of Marvel UK’s Captain Britain.
The problem is that all these concerns are only established – their eventual narratives are only continued outside the bounds of this volume. This doesn’t mean that there aren’t truly iconic single issues in the book. The Beyonder kills the team in #37, and #38 sees them struggling with the concept of their mortality following their (immediate) resurrection in the pages of Secret Wars II. Magneto battles the Avengers in #40, and in #41 Dani battles death itself.
The book also hosts some of the most compelling artists of the era, with the Mutants’ trip to Asgard being handled by Art Adams, regular pencils by the fashion-forward Jackson Guice, and longtime Captain Britain collaborator Alan Davis landing Betsy in the States in Annual #2. Sienkiewicz even contributes frequent inks. It’s a volume that looks incredible.
It’s a collection that reads as disjointed, unsure of itself, but which establishes the next batch of conflicts. Nothing here is expendable reading for the larger New Mutants narrative, regardless of its issue-by-issue shift of purpose, and every issue manages to feel near-perfect, almost self-contained. In such a way, Asgardian Wars illustrates the hectic, near-manic creativity of the Claremont Era just as it began its final days.
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