STORY: "Children of the Atom" (36 pages)  Following the dissolution of Excalibur, Shadowcat, Nightcrawler and Colossus are on a cruise when a completely new team of "X-Men" attacks, kidnaps Shadowcat, and takes her back to their strangely inhuman version of "Professor X."  The "X-Men" make Shadowcat cure a computer virus which was attacking "Xavier", but once he is restored he has his X-Men put her in "storage."  They also abduct Peter Corbeau, who was working on the mysterious Benassi Rocket project.  Valerie Cooper calls in the remaining real X-Men to investigate Corbeau's disappearance, only for them to come under attack from the impostors as well.

What you need to know:
This is the official 35th anniversary celebration of the X-Men.  Quite how that works out, bearing in mind that this is the October 1998 issue and the first issue was dated September 1963 (with Marvel shifting their dating policy around in the interim to throw things even further off) is a little difficult to work out.  Presumably it got the nod because it's a round number,  although just how meaningful that is when you take into account the book's varying publication schedule and periods of cancellation is highly questionable.

Obvious references back to issue #1: The Benassi Rocket is being launched from Cape Citadel in Florida, which is where the X-Men fought Magneto in issue #1.  We're told it's the anniversary of that attack, which is really sledgehammering the point.  The opening line is "Thanks, Jack and Stan", referring to the series creators Jack Kirby and Stan Lee.  (Note the order of the names, for what it's worth.)  More obscurely, the reporter in the opening and closing sequences is named Paula Reinman, referring to Paul Reinman, who inked issue #1.

The premise of the new X-Men is that their "Professor X" is the Cerebro machine which Bastion stole back during Operation: Zero Tolerance, altered as a result of a botched attempt to access its data.  Cerebro has somehow created its X-Men based on the data files which it holds on other characters.  That's why all of the new X-Men are crosses between other characters.  The "recruitment" scenes in this story simply depict the false memories which each of the "X-Men" has, which is why they all start with a caption reading "Program implement: Memory chip."

The Gray King is Jean Grey/Phoenix crossed with Sebastian Shaw. (He also has a "psionic dampening" power which might have been drawn from Chance II of the Fallen Angels.)  Chaos is the name and powers of Havok crossed with the autism of Legion.  Mercury is apparently meant to be a cross between Magneto, Quicksilver and Wolverine.  Rapture is the Angel crossed with Mystique, although with religious overtones above either of them (possibly drawn from Wolfsbane).  Crux is particularly difficult to make sense of and would seem to be a cross between Jubilee and ultra-obscure Spider-Man villain Equinox, The Thermodynamic Man, although that does seem very unlikely to be the intention.  Earthquake is the Blob and Sabretooth.

Since the last issue, the X-Men roster has been pared down to consist solely of Storm, Wolverine, Rogue and Marrow.  Why did everyone else leave?  Well, that was never explained.  Look, this is Uncanny X-Men of 1998 - if you want interesting and competently structured stories which haven't been reduced to a quivering, bleeding pulp by inane editing, you'll have to look elsewhere.  The exception is Cecilia Reyes, who has set up as a GP in Salem Center.  Which is at least consistent with her character.

Valerie Cooper has finally learned about the real Xavier's disappearance and conveys that information to the X-Men.  (This is necessary in order to preserve the mystery of whether Cerebro might be the real Professor.)

The X-Men have apparently got their Mansion "more or less to speed" again, so there's another storyline completely dropped with no payoff because it ceased to be convenient.  You see why I hate this period so much?

The story continues in X-Men vol 2 #80.

Comments:
Yeesh.  Another incoherent direction change, three former Excalibur cast members plugged back into the regular cast for no particular reason - and none of them get anything approaching a plot for months, confirming that nobody had any real reason for bringing them back.

The new X-Men are a somewhat interesting idea but, you guessed it, it all heads nowhere.  Apparently they were originally going to be real characters, but they end up as glorified robots and are dropped very quickly.

As I said repeatedly at the time: The reason why this whole period fails so badly is that there's no reason why the readers should care about the stories when it's so blatantly obvious that the creators (or more accurately, the editors) can't even be bothered to finish them. However many interesting ideas there might have been to start with, who can really get worked up about the shapeless nonsense which saw print?

FEATURE CHARACTERS
Marrow, Storm (both last in X-Men vol 2 #79), Wolverine (last in Uncanny X-Men / Fantastic Four '98) and Rogue (all four next in X-Men vol 2 #80)

SUPPORTING CHARACTERS
Colossus, Nightcrawler and Shadowcat (all between Excalibur #125 and X-Men vol 2 #80)
Cecilia Reyes (between X-Men vol 2 #79 and issue #362)
Peter Corbeau (behind the scenes between Iron Man vol 1 #319 and X-Men vol 2 #80)

VILLAINS
Cerebro (first appearance as a character; chronologically last in flashback in X-Men vol 2 #84; next in X-Men vol 2 #80)
The X-Men II: The Grey King II ("Addison Falk"), Chaos ("Daniel Dash"), Mercury III (unnamed), Rapture ("Sister Joy"), Crux ("Cristal Lemiuex" [sic]) and Landslide II ("Lee Broder"; first appearance for all; all appear next in X-Men vol 2 #80)
Eric Koppisch (first and only appearance)
Marco Benassi (behind the scenes; no actual appearance; first and only reference)

GUEST APPEARANCE
Valerie Cooper (last in Fantastic Four vol 3 #12; next in flashback in Thunderbolts #21)

OTHER CHARACTER
Paula Reinman (first appearance; next in X-Men vol 2 #80)

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