STORY: "The Measure of the Man" (22 pages)  Iceman, Bishop and Rogue prevent mysterious genetically engineered creatures from killing Opal Tanaka. Storm steals the blueprints of a government-designed suit of armour which cloaks the wearer from Magneto's electromagnetic awareness.

What you need to know:
The weird creatures in this story (which appear to be a whole load of unravelling skin stuffed into a costume) are a prototype version of the Phalanx, according to the next issue.

Storm begins to suspect that when she first met Xavier as a child, he used his telepathic powers to influence the course of her life. If true, this is an enormous addition to past continuity which really does throw an entirely new light on Xavier, but it has never been verified and seems to have fallen by the wayside.  The general idea is revisited with somewhat more enthusiasm by Mark Millar in Ultimate X-Men some years later.

Contrary to popular belief:
The Ambassador St Croix who appears in this story apparently doesn't have any close family connection to Monet St Croix of Generation X. For one thing, he's American (Robert Kelly says so) and she's not. For another, he presumably never remarried after the death of his wife Lenore, who died in 1947, so there doesn't seem to be any scope for Monet to be a descendent.

Comments:
Normal service is resumed with this competent story beginning the build-up for the Phalanx storyline. The main plot is unobjectionable, and the image of Rogue after she uses her powers to absorb the mind of one of her attackers and promptly finds out just how weird they really are is a good one. The subplot is a bit more questionable, hinting at untold nastiness beneath Xavier's facade, which is never really delievered on. There's also a very curious, and arguably downright wrong, scene in which Storm complains about Xavier asking her to steal, when she had previously been proud of her heritage as a thief.

As the previous issue was double sized, this story has guest art from Jan Duursema, who cropped up doing rush jobs on a lot of X-books of the period. This is a very patchy effort indeed, but a couple of pages shine through.

FEATURE CHARACTERS
Professor X, Storm (both last in Gambit vol 1 #1) and Bishop
Rogue (last in Gambit vol 1 #4; next in X-Men vol 2 #25, then in Wolverine vol 2 #75, then in X-Men Annual vol 2 #2, then in Avengers vol 1 #368, then in X-Men vol 2 #26, then in Avengers West Coast #101, then in issue #307)
Iceman (next in X-Men vol 2 #25, then in Wolverine #75, then in Avengers vol 1 #368, then in X-Men vol 2 #26, then in Avengers West Coast #101, then in issue #307)

SUPPORTING CHARACTERS
Opal Tanaka (last in issue #301; next in Iceman vol 2 #1)
Robert Kelly (last in issue #299; next in X-Men: Prime)

VILLAINS
The Phalanx (first appearance)

OTHER CHARACTERS
Ambassador Louis St Croix (first appearance; next in X-Men vol 2 #51; also in flashback)
Lenore St Croix (his wife; first appearance; dies in flashback)

Revised: 28 March 2005

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