There's a sure sign of success: excess.When the X-Men became one of Marvel's top sellers, the powers that be decided to try to tap into more of that money-making potential by creating another team of young mutants who needed to be trained in the use of their powers - the very idea that had been at the heart of the original X-Men.
(Of course, the real excess would come later as additional X-Men based titles were created and the cast expanded to the breaking point. But I digress.)
This team first appeared in a graphic novel, and was then spun off into its own comic, The New Mutants (cover dated March 1983).
The writing was handled by Chris Claremont, who was going strong on the original title - no doubt Marvel thought, why mess with a good thing? The story here isn't up to his usual standards, but that's because so much of it is devoted to setting up the premise and introducing the characters - so we have lots of pages of characters filling up word balloons talking about their feelings, their powers, their lot in life - the usual teen angst.
The art is by Bob McLeod with Mike Gustovich inking. McLeod was mostly known for his inks up to this point, but he turned in excellent work on this title. The characters are expressive, the layouts and design strong, and his style has a good Buscema feel to it.
This is a title that had some growing to do, as we learn about the members of the team - Cannonball, Sunspot, Psyche, Wolfsbane and Karma.
It's telling that 27 years later, none of those characters are "big names" in the Marvel universe - but they did grow into strong supporting characters, and the title would eventually become a "must buy" comic for Marvel.
This issue, while well done, was just the tip of the iceberg for these characters. There were much better days ahead.
Grade: B
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