American Comics Update: The Good Doctor Collection: Six Of The Best: X-Men #102-107 inc. Mighty Marvel Firsts
*Marvel: From the Good Doctor Collection this week, the last six issues of Dave Cockrum’s defining run on the X-Men, #102-107 (guest artist on #106). Featuring the Juggernaut, Magneto, Phoenix, Firelord and culminating in #107 with the debuts of both the Starjammers and the Imperial Guard, two science-fiction based super-teams long associated with the X-Men both, oddly, were the result of artist Dave Cockrum’s impatience. Cockrum had illustrated a critically acclaimed and successful run of DC’s Legion of Super-Heroes, but following altercations with editor Murray Boltinoff, Cockrum quit the Legion and DC to co-create the ‘New’ X-Men. By way of cocking a snook at DC, Dave came up with a suspiciously similar team of alien super-heroes, the Imperial Guard, each one of which was a (just barely) non-litigious clone of a Legionnaire. Similarly, the Starjammers had been created by Cockrum for a solo tryout in Marvel Premiere or Marvel Spotlight, but on being told those books’ schedules were filled years in advance, Cockrum offered the band of space pirates to X-Men scripter Chris Claremont, who bolted on a retconned relationship to an X-Man and threw them into the mix. #107saw the first full appearance of both teams (the Starjammers having done the ‘enigmatic cameo’ bit since #104), taking the cast list – never forgetting our mutant heroes – to around 50, for a full-on free-for-all!
IN THIS UPDATE: X-MEN
#102 GD £11.75 Subscription crease
#103 FN £36
#104 VG- £17
#105 FN £40 (Pictured)
#106 FN/VF £29
#107 FN/VF £120 (Pictured) 1st Imperial Guard, 1st Starjammers. Nice clean cents copy with great colour and gloss, square corners, nice pages and staples, just some spine ticks that just break colour bringing the grade down a bit.