STORY: "Whispers On The Wind" (23 pages)  A man seeming to be a younger Magneto is found and taken in by Sister Maria, the nun in charge of a South American orphanage.  "Magneto" has no idea who he is, and Maria names him Joseph.  At first she thinks he may have a chance for a fresh start, but when he uses excessive force to protect the orphanage against threats from the corrupt government, she sends him to the USA to search for the X-Men.

What you need to know:
This story begins the long running Joseph plot, eventually tied up some years later in a way that was almost certainly not intended by Scott Lobdell when he started it off.  X-Men vol 2 #86 finally reveals that Joseph is a copy of Magneto created by his enemy Astra to defeat him.  Magneto has defeated Joseph and left him for dead. This is therefore Joseph's first appearance.  Consequently, this issue has the unusual distinction of being the only issue of the series in which no present or former members of the X-Men appear.

It's also the first significant appearance of Sister Maria de la Joya.  She also crops up in a few later issues as well, but she's not particularly important.  (Joseph and Maria both in fact appeared in a brief cameo in X-Men vol 2 #46, before this issue.)

Comments:
By all accounts, Scott Lobdell was a writer with a rather cavalier approach to long term planning.  Certainly he knew what he was trying to achieve by de-aging Magneto (and when this story was started, it seems clear that he intended Joseph to be Magneto). The idea was to take away all the nasty memories that had made Magneto the man he was, and do some stories on the eternal theme of nature versus nurture.  As for quite why Magneto was in his twenties again, he hadn't really worked that one out in detail, but no doubt it would come to him.  It never really did, and eventually the next set of X-Men writers ended up writing Joseph out of the series altogether while they tried to work out what the hell they were going to do with him.

Fortunately, for all that the wider plot is a mess, the theme remains an interesting one, and the eventual explanation that was given for Joseph's existence leaves the points made more or less valid. This issue isn't too bad on that basis, introducing Joseph as a basically nice character but making clear the potential for him to be somebody rather less likeable.  The art is a slightly shaky effort by Roger Cruz, an uneven mixture of good storytelling and questionable Joe Madureira pastiche.  Overall, though, an okay issue.

FEATURE CHARACTERS
None

SUPPORTING CHARACTER
Joseph (between X-Men vol 2 #46 and #53; also in flashback immediately preceding this story; also in flashback following the flashback in X-Men vol 2 #86 and preceding X-Men vol 2 #46)

VILLAINS
Colonel Ramos and his soldiers (first and only appearance for all; most are killed by Joseph)

OTHER CHARACTERS
Sister Maria de la Joya (last in X-Men vol 2 #46; next in issue #344; her first name and title are revealed in this story)
Father Helcio (first and only appearance)
Migdalia, Umberto and other children (in Maria's care; first and only appearance for all)

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