STORY: "A Skinning of Souls, part 1: Waiting for the Ripening" (22 pages)   The X-Men accompany Colossus on a trip to Siberia to visit his family.  Meanwhile, the Siberian town of Neftelensk has fallen under the influence of the Soul Skinner.

What you need to know:
This issue introduces a new villain, the Soul Skinner.  You don't need to know much about him, because he got killed off two issues later.  He gets an origin flashback in issue #19 - the gist is that he's an embittered telepath who went nuts after his child died, and started feeding off other people's angst, leaving them as empty shells.  This being an early-nineties X-Men comic, angst is in plentiful supply.  As we start the story, he's already taken over the town of Neftelensk.

Since he's a Russian villain, the Russian heroes get first crack at him (and of course they have to lose, since there wouldn't be much of a story otherwise).  Darkstar and Alexi Garnoff turn up, fresh from their appearance in the previous year's Soviet Super Soldiers #1 one-shot.  That book was also written by Fabian Nicieza.  At this point, both Darkstar and Garnoff were members of a shortlived group of rebel Russian heroes called the Exiles - no connection to the later Exiles title.

There's a passing reference to Darkstar's powers being in flux.  As far as I can recall, that's just acknowledging a subplot from Soviet Super Soldiers #1, and has nothing to do with this storyline.

Of course, the Soul Skinner just wipes out Darkstar and Garnoff without much effort.  Darkstar's angst-ridden visions include an appearance by her father, a relatively obscure supervillain called the Presence.  We don't see Garnoff's visions, but the Soul Skinner's commentary implies that his father did something nasty to him.

The official Russian superhero teams, knowing a lost cause when they see one, decide not to go within a mile of the place.  So Alexei Vazhin, the Soviet Nick Fury, trudges off to enlist Omega Red to do the job instead.  At least he's Russian, and if he gets killed, so much the better.  When he disappears off the map, the initial fallback plan involves Illyana (as we find out next issue, it boils down to accelerating Illyana back into a teenager, and getting her to teleport the Soul Skinner away).  However, Vazhin turns to the X-Men for help instead.

Psylocke is still being overfamiliar with Cyclops.

Rogue is still recovering from being blinded by a minor MLF member during the X-Cutioner's Song crossover.  Gambit is thoroughly unhelpful - his idea of being supportive is to nearly let her walk into the swimming pool in order to demonstrate to her that she can't trust anyone.  (Since Rogue recovered almost immediately, the chances of this being remembered in the context of X-Men's 2004 Gambit blindness storyline are minimal, but you never know.)  Professor X helpfully provides some commentary: Gambit wants Rogue to fall in love with him but is still holding back himself.

The Beast tries to talk to Xavier about something, but gets immediately (and very arrogantly) interrupted by Storm and X-Force.  We get back to this subplot in issue #19 - basically, he's having a midlife crisis and brooding over his lost youth.

Cannonball and Warpath have a scene with Professor X which serves no function other than to give a high-profile plug to New Warriors #31 (also written by Nicieza).

Revanche, the duplicate Psylocke, debuts in a subplot scene in Tokyo.  She beats up some generic thugs and declares herself ready to take revenge and find the X-Men.  Revanche is an extraordinarily and excessively complicated character, and we'll get back to her in a few issues time.

Comments:
We can deal with "A Skinning of Souls" pretty quickly.  It's not very good.

This arc is the first step in the demolition of Colossus' family, which would eventually lead to the character going off the rails, quitting the X-Men and joining Magneto's Acolytes.  The storyline has never been a particularly popular one, and the sheer sledgehammer nature of the angst is decidedly over the top.

The mechanics for getting there involve a self-contained three-parter against a disposable villain.  The build-up in the first part is alright, but as we'll see, the whole thing gets over the top very quickly.  To be honest, the best bits of the issue are the subplot scenes.

Quite why this story appeared in X-Men, given that Colossus was starring in Uncanny X-Men at the time, is a bit of a mystery.

The limitations of Andy Kubert's art, at this point in his career, are becoming apparent with this issue.  All of the characters are overacting wildly (when they act at all), and for some reason he was going through a phase of drawing in billowing clouds of dust all the time.  While this had the helpful side effect of avoiding having to draw feet, it just looks stupid to have Storm, Cannonball and Warpath surrounded by dust clouds when they walk into Xavier's study from the hallway.

FEATURE CHARACTERS
Professor X (last in Wolverine vol 2 #67; next in X-Force vol 1 #19, then in Uncanny X-Men #298-300, then in the second story in Uncanny X-Men #300, then in issue #20)
Colossus, Cyclops, Iceman, Psylocke and Wolverine (all last in Wolverine vol 2 #68)
The Beast and Rogue (both between Uncanny X-Men #297 and issue #19)
Gambit (between Uncanny X-Men #297-298)
Storm (last in Wolverine vol 2 #66; next in X-Force vol 1 #19, then in Uncanny X-Men #298-300, then in issue #20)

GUEST STARS
Darkstar and Alexei Garnoff (both last in Soviet Super Soldiers #1)

SUPPORTING CHARACTERS
Jubilee (last in Wolverine vol 2 #68)
Illyana Rasputin and Alexandra Rasputin (both last in New Mutants vol 1 #77)
Nikolai Rasputin (last in the second story in Classic X-Men #29)
Alexei Vazhin (last in Uncanny X-Men #280)
Revanche (formerly Kwannon; real name unrevealed; first appearance; last in flashback in issue #32)

VILLAINS
The Soul Skinner (real name unrevealed; first appearance; last in flashback in issue #19)
Omega Red (behind the scenes; last in issue #7)
General Fyodor Sheltov (head of the People's Protectorate; first appearance)
Valentin Shatalov (Crimson Dynamo VI, in his civilian identity; between Iron Man vol 1 #255 and Incredible Hulk vol 2 #393)

GUEST APPEARANCES
Cannonball II (last in X-Force vol 1 #18) and Warpath (last in X-Force vol 1 #17; both next in New Warriors vol 1 #31)

OTHER CHARACTERS
Flagwatch #133 (real name unrevealed; the Russian agent assigned to monitor Illyana; first and only appearance)

Revised: 8 September 2004

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