There was a time when X-Men fans almost got to see Charles Xavier’s original students don all-new costumes and superhero identities. Joe Casey had a heralded run as writer of Uncanny X-Men and other X-adjacent titles, such as the underrated X-Men: Children of the Atom limited series that retold the origins of the first class of X-Men — Cyclops, Marvel Girl (Jean Grey), Iceman, Angel, and Beast. Casey returns to the franchise for Weapon X-Men, and in the lead-up to the launch he’s revisiting some old pitches from the past that never got approved. One of those involves the original X-Men “graduating” with updated costumes and codenames.
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“So here’s something that might be marginally interesting… at least from some sort of vague, historical perspective. Let’s talk about another project that did not achieve liftoff,” Joe Casey wrote in his Substack newsletter. He then revealed he’d been talking with X-Force artist Mike Allred about collaborating on a future project. One idea was to make it a sequel to X-Men: Children of the Atom. The comic would have been titled X-Men: Amazing Adventures, with “Amazing Adventures” being a callback to the title that Marvel would occasionally use on books such as the reprints of Stan Lee and Jack Kirby’s Amazing Adventures of the Original X-Men.
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“Basically, the hook of X-MEN: AA would be the following… NEVER BEFORE REVEALED! THE FINAL EXAM! That’s the way to sell it… that this previously untold tale examines the original X-Men’s most ‘amazing adventure’, playing hooky from Xavier’s school in all-new superhero identities,” Casey revealed. “It starts off innocently enough, but soon escalates into a much bigger roller coaster ride for the kids, who quickly realize they’ve gotten in over their heads.”
The X-Men would gradually go from fighting street crime against the likes of Kingpin to battling a new Masters of Evil. This would catch the eye of S.H.I.E.L.D., who recruit the heroes to take down a Hydra sect. Their final mission would be to travel to Latveria to defeat Doctor Doom.
“So, I know what I just described sounds like a pinball machine out of control, but there’s a coherent thruline to all this stuff,” Casey wrote. “One villain leads to another. And the idea is that, with each escalation, the kids are shitting themselves… as in, ‘This is getting much bigger than we thought it would!’ Now, in the end, we’ll reveal that Prof. X knew about their extracurricular activities the entire time, and was even quietly pulling a few strings behind the scenes. It was all part of their final exam as X-Men.”
Original X-Men’s new superhero identities revealed
One of the big calling cards for X-Men: Amazing Adventures would have been the new costumes and codenames the original X-Men adopted. Mike and Laura Allred already did a fantastic job coming up with the visual look for X-Force/X-Statix, so Joe Casey was hoping he could do the same for his X-Men pitch. Below is his breakdown of the original X-Men and their new superhero names.
MASTER BLASTER (Cyclops) – I was thinking, since Cyclops might be the most hesitant to go along with this scheme, he would wear a full-face mask (like Spider-Man or the Black Panther) with cool-looking sunglasses built into the mask. Within each “lens” of the sunglasses are mini-visors (slits cut horizontally across the center of each lens… so when he uses his optic beams, he fires TWO beams simultaneously). Other than that, it’s wide open for your design genius.
AVENGING ANGEL (Angel) – Angel will be the one who instigates this entire thing, harkening back to his pre-X-Men days as the costumed superhero, the Avenging Angel. My only idea for this is to go back to the Steve Rude design from the first issue of the CHILDREN OF THE ATOM mini-series (or a slight variation on it). The idea being that Angel just pulled out his “original” costume and used it here.
JACK FROST (Iceman) – Taking his new name from a Golden Age hero, Iceman is the character that I think needs the most radical design. After all, he’s simply an “ice man” when he’s a student. As Jack Frost, he definitely needs some kind of uniform to cover the majority of his “ice” form. Also, I think it’s worth it go with the more “crystallized” version of Iceman, as opposed to the early Kirby, “soft serve” version that had no facial expression whatsoever. Maybe, as Jack Frost, this was the first time that Bobby Drake realized he could have a more solid form, and more of a face with that form. As far as his uniform, I always thought that blue/black leather gear would look good against his ice skin. Maybe a jacket (kinda like what you’ve put on Madman every so often) over some simple kind of costume…
MAGPIE or REDWING (Marvel Girl) – I’m torn on which name is better for Jean Grey. Any suggestions, Mike…? In any case, I think the only thoughts I have on her are that RED should be the primary color of her costume, and that it should utilize some sort of “bird” motif (if, for no other reason, to telegraph the fact that one day Jean will become the Phoenix… and readers might dig it if we somehow gave a nod to it here).
STOMP (Beast) – Okay, for the Beast, I figure he wants to disguise the features that he normally displays as an X-Man, primarily his bare feet and bare hands. I thought it might be cool if he sported these insanely big Doc Martin-style boots (but more stylized, more colorful, more “superhero-y”) that had these intense, treaded soles. Hence, the name, “Stomp”. Yes, as Stomp, he’s still an insane acrobat, but his primary offensive attack is using his boots to kick the shit out of people. Kinda’ like Gorgon from the Inhumans.
Weapon X-Men #1 by Joe Casey and Chris Cross goes on sale February 19th.
