Mind Control: Quickie Cliffhanger style

Chris Claremont really knows his way around mind control.

Whether he uses it to help along running plotlines, set up shocking story twists or... in this tale from X-men Forever... spice up a cliffhanger. But before we get to the 'to be continued' moment, let's get started.

In the alternate reality of the X-men Forever series, the mutant population was plagued by a lethal disease called 'Burnout'. In essence, having mutant powers burns up the body, leading to premature deaths.

The older mutants like professor Xavier and Sabretooth were already feeling the effects. Charles los his ability to walk and Sabretooth's healing factor was starting to give out, which left him blind and without a hand. The feral mutant was staying with the X-men at the time (long story) when the mansion was invaded by the Morlocks who took him ánd Moira McTaggert prisoner.

Even in an alternate reality, their leader Masque was as sadistic as ever...

How unlike Masque to... lend a hand... to someone who helped kill many of his fellow Morlocks. After all, Sabretooth was a member of the Marauders during the Mutant Massacre. But as Sabretooth explains, it wasn't him.

Years ago, he had handed Mister Sinister a sample of his DNA and the evil mastermind used this to make as many Sabre-clones as needed. The real one had never actually been a Marauder. Besides, that's not why Masque dragged Sabes and Moira to the sewers.

"So save us, doctor... Or suffer."

Masque wants Moira to work on a Burnout cure, using Sabretooth's healing factor as a template. Which was exactly what the doctor was already doing... in the X-men's fully equipped, highly advanced laboratories, ya know, the one with the alien Shi'ar medical technologies a few centuries beyond human development...

And now she has to do the same job underground where the most advance piece of technology available is that lone little lightbulb dangling in the back. Smart move.

It was equally stupid to break into the X-men's home through the sub-basement and leave a trail of destruction that led the team right to Masque's doorstep. Shadowcat, doing her best Wolverine impression, ordered Masque to stand down and let everyone go free, but he's a sneaky one...

"Why won't they stop screaming?!"

Well, little 'Ro, if you think a single, mumbled 'aarrrgh' from Cyclops is a scream, I wonder what you're doing on the next page...

Oh my! Masque's touch apparently mind controlled both Gambit and Cyclops, turning them against the team, as the now monstrous men lunge for the young child. Will they catch her? Will Masque change her too? What a cliffhanger!

X-men Forever vol. 2 # 5 opens with a recap of the events I just recapped... While 'Ro is chased through the sewers by Gambit, Cyclops and some other Morlocks. That kills a few pages and just when they catch up with her...

"Show over, Masque! We... both back in control of our bodies."

... Well, that didn't take long. Usually this takes at least half a dozen issues and big speeches about mind, body and soul to get it all sorted out. To quickly dismiss the mind control angle after playing it up in the cliffhanger almost feels like cheating the readership... Then again, it ís a refreshing change of pace.

Either way, this brought Masque's mind (or body, come to think of it) control shenanigans to an end. He next showed up in Genosha, along with one of the many, many Storms that Claremont starred in this particular title.

Shadowy Charley: Mindcontrol Xavier style

So, just where had Charles been while the King was busy conquering Earth?

Well... long story short... A while ago, Xavier got mugged by an anti mutant mob and would have died if the Morlocks hadn't taken him to their healer. He managed to put ol' humpty dumpty head back together again, but Charles didn't allow himself any time to fully heal. This caused him to have a fatal heartattack in Uncanny X-men # 200.

Luckily, his ladylove Shi'ar empress Lilandra had been aware of his anguish thanks to their mental link. She came to his aid and teleported him away so he could get the proper medical attention on board the Starjammer. But when the stargate to Earth got destroyed, Charles was left stranded in space.

This meant the X-men were cut off from their mentor for an extended period of time. But as luck would have it, another crisis brought the X-men and Xavier together again. Lilandra's terrorist sister Deathbird asked intergalactic teleporter (and singing sensation!) Lila Cheney to bring the X-men to her. Lila complied and after a brief struggle, Deathbird told the X-men what was wrong. Well, take a look. She wasn't kidding: something was very-very wrong indeed...



Professor Xavier, using his mental powers to enslave the Imperial Guard along with the Shi'ar empire itself? Surely, its still years before every writer started to paint the X-men's benign leader as an evil mastermind, so this is totally out of character for the man. But the mind control fun didn't stop there, because when the X-men confronted their mentor, he got a few new playthings.

"The X-men are mine"

But who are you, anyways? Turns out the real professor Xavier was being kept in a stasis jar, while his body and powers were copied by... A Skrull. More than 15 years before Secret Invasion, Claremont had undercover Skrulls trying to destabilise other worlds. After his ruse was discovered, the Skrull dropped the Xavier guise and took on Psylocke's form when the team tried to free Xavier. Luckily, Forge wasn't as vulnerable to Psy-Skrull's psychic knife as he'd hoped.





 "You've disrupted my pattern... triggered a partial reversion to my base form..." 

You just gotta love Claremont's knack for over-X-plaining the obvious. But still, Forge's battle with the Skrull formerly known as Xavier/Psylocke marked the end of the battle for domination of the Shi'ar empire. Professor Xavier was freed and, when told about the Shadow King threat, he decided to return home and deal with the crisis. Lets take a look how he chose to start the fight against his mind controlling arch nemesis.

That's Charles, dressed in Shi'ar battle armor (hence the triangular helmet), mind controlling a group of Scottish soldiers to hand over the X-men's old Blackbird jet. Charles had hoped the King wouldn't notice his return until it was too late, but the Shadow King was very much aware.

In fact, he sent someone very close to Xavier to take care of the professor. The King mind controlled Peter Nicholas to confront Charles when he was at the X-men's former headquarters in Salem Center. Peter who? Remember how Psylocke suckered Colossus into the Siege Perilous?

No? Well, it was one of his better deaths... Colossus was reincarnated as Peter Nicholas, a New York artist who, rather conveniently, was a dead ringer for Peter Rasputin. So much for advancing on the karmic scale. Of course, once the Shadow King found out about him, Nicholas was forced to attack Xavier and Stevie Hunter. Close to death, Xavier found himself with no other alternative than this...


Yup, that's Charles Xavier for ya... Destroying an entire person (a soul, if you will) to save his own life. He erased Peter Nicholas and brought back the original template of Peter Rasputin, who the Shadow King hadn't managed to get his claws into.

Talk about character suicide... Still, it worked and good ol' Colossus was back in the game... And did we need him! Shadow King finally revealed himself to Xavier... take a look.

Ow yeah, the King meant business. He had taken over the mutants on Muir Island: Legion, Strong Guy, Multiple Man, Siryn, Rogue and Moira McTaggert as his personal strikeforce.

His 'Islanders' had already taken out most of the X-men, but Xavier alongside X-Factor managed to defeat the King. However, it turned out to be a costly victory...

The Muir Island/Shadow King saga brought Claremont's 16 year run on Uncanny X-men to a close. He would later return for two more mind controlled runs, which we'll cover next time!

Beating it to death: Shadow King's shtick part 2

Just imagine for a second you were a powerful but disembodied psychic entity... Trapped on the astral plane, looking at a world you can no longer directly influence. I'm sure after a while you'd get pretty pissed off, right? That's basically the entire reason for the Shadow King acting the way he does (apart from being pure evil for, well, evil's sake I suppose).

When police detective Jacob Reisz died of an appearant heart attack, the Shadow King took control of his body and started recruiting people for his cause. No, he didn't really need a physical presence in this world, he could easily influence folks from afar.

But hey... your heroes need someone to punch, so the Shadow King recruited Lian, a woman (dressed in black leather, in true Claremontian style) who acted like his second in command. He also gathered a bunch of footsoldiers known as Hounds, who acted like wild animals and were dressed in... ow, you guessed it.

So, what was the Shadow King all about this time? Ow, the man had a big plan! He wanted to feast on all the hatred and bad feelings of humanity. You see, negative emotion is like a drug to the Shadow King. He feeds on it, so he does everything he can to fan the flames of intolerance and hatred.

It was never explained on panel, but I guess that's why people around Polaris suddenly started acting crazy. She had lost her powers in the Savage Land, but all of a sudden Lorna was superstrong and had some kind of uncontrollable negative emotional pull on people. Which was bad news in itself, but then the Shadow King showed up on Muir Island where Lorna had been residing. He took control of Xavier's son Legion and started pulling the strings behind the scenes. Take a look...

That's Legion, shown here in his Jack Wayne persona, pleading Carol Danvers for forgiveness. Carol had come to Muir Island after she got seperated from Rogue (its a long story involving the Siege Perilous, the Reavers, Magneto and more). Once she got to the island, Legion and the King tried to take her over. Poor Carol didn't really stand a chance. Not that her former mind-partner Rogue fared any better when she came up against the King...

... Hmmm, well, if you can't beat them, join them I suppose. But where Rogue joined with the King semi-willingly, there were others who offered more of a struggle. You see, Shadow King was also busy controlling the American government. In such an undertaking, there's one government official you just can't ignore: the ever ready willing and not very able Valerie Cooper. Val fell under the King's influence too, but at least she felt a little bad about it...

Owww snap and all that... But the King still wasn't without his pet peeves. He carried a particular grudge against Storm, who he considered a prize possession that had gotten away. He was hell bent on getting her under his control. Storm, by that time, had been reduced to a preteen by Nanny and was running around New Orleans with the (in those days) mysterious and exciting mutant thief Gambit. Shadow King tried his darndest to get to Storm.



The road to Storm went through the ragin' Cajun but the King and his hounds were very eager to add him to the list of mental accomplices as well. The big win for Shadow King was Storm herself however and, like he tried so many years before, the Shadow King once again attempted to control the weatherwitch.

Of course, Storm broke free and got away with Gambit (hey, this is called the X-men not Shadow King... the bad guys still always lose). Yet, the King and his flunkies remained a thorn in the X-men's side and they even expanded their targets to include the other X-teams like X-Factor. Here, original X-man Jean Grey gets blindsided on the Astral Plane by the Shadow King and Lian, his Queen.


Jean was saved by (early 90s bad ass) Psylocke, but by then it was obvious: the Shadow King was a problem that had to be dealt with. So, who you gonna call? Yup... the man who originally took care of the King: Charles Xavier. In part 3: we find out getting Charles back also involves some mind control and the professor is revealed to be a fan of 2 can play that (mind control) game!