STORY: "False Fronts" (22 pages)  Onslaught tries to recruit Phoenix, but she turns him down.

What you need to know:
Onslaught finally comes right out and interacts with the other characters, by yanking Phoenix onto the astral plane and talking to her for an entire issue. 

This is the first time we get a clear view of Onslaught.  By this point they'd (more or less) settled on the idea that Onslaught was a psychic entity combining Xavier's repressed urges with bits of Magneto wiped back in issue #25.  That's why Onslaught's colour scheme mimics Magneto's, and their helmets have similar designs.  Onslaught doesn't actually explain who he is in this issue, although he says that Phoenix ought to be able to work it out for herself.

Most of Onslaught's monologue this issue consists of ranting about the hypocrisy of humankind.  He finds it all terribly frustrating.  We also learn that he's not enormously impressed by Cyclops either.  "He hasn't had an independent thought since he was 15.  He has no will of his own."

Onslaught shows Phoenix that Xavier used to be in love with her, which really did see print as a throwaway line of dialogue in X-Men vol 1 #3.  Other than a passing mention in X-Men vol 1 #101, it hadn't been mentioned since.  This is supposed to illustrate the fact that Xavier has plenty of dodgy thoughts and darker emotions but generally represses them all - thus empowering Onslaught.

We catch up on the real Beast, who's still chained up in a cell.  He discovers a trap door, which seems a bit of a design oversight on the Dark Beast's part.  (Then again, the Beast is chained to a wall, so maybe he figured it didn't matter.)

Juggernaut finally returns to Earth, after being banished by Onslaught back in Wolverine vol 2 #92.  He smashes his way back to Earth through Psylocke's magical shadows - because nothing can stop the Juggernaut, after all.  So if he really wants to get home, he's going to get home.

He's actually been away in the Ultraverse - another superhero universe which Marvel acquired when they bought out Malibu - starring in a book called All-New Exiles.  This is skirted over.  Psylocke scans the Juggernaut, but only learns that he's "been someplace else, in shadow.  It's not clear where."  This was a recurring theme around this time, where Marvel/Malibu crossovers were fundamental to events in the Ultraverse, but were only grudgingly acknowledged (if at all) in the Marvel books.

Juggernaut knows who Onslaught is, because Onslaught attacked him back in Uncanny X-Men #332.  But he's got a mental block which prevents him from remembering.  Quite sensibly, Juggernaut decides that he's going to go to the X-Men and get Phoenix to sort it out.

Through the power of plot convenience, the wandering Joseph turns up in South Carolina - where Rogue turns up last issue.  The two of them meet up in X-Men Unlimited vol 1 #11, then get swept into Onslaught.

The final page seems to show the word "Onslaught" burned into Jean Grey's forehead.  Or maybe it doesn't.  It's not visible on the previous page, and it never comes up again, so heaven only knows what's supposed to be going on here.  Maybe it's just a hallucination.

Comments:
We're now into the run-up to Onslaught, a problematic crossover if ever there was one.  Onslaught suffered from a combination of poor planning and being hijacked in service of an unrelated plot.  When the character was introduced and Marvel started dropping hints about him, they really hadn't worked out anything much about him.  Consequently, the hints don't actually add up to much.  The Onslaught crossover was thrown together in a similarly haphazard way, and often reads as though the writers are all working from different drafts of the plot.  It doesn't help that the primary point of the storyline was to justify Heroes Reborn, which had absolutely nothing to do with the X-Men, meaning that a long-running X-storyline had to swerve off and start involving different characters altogether.

Despite all the problems with the character, however, this issue comes very close to making him work.  There's a glimmer here of a villain who might have been interesting to read about, in the right story.  Waid at least lays out some promising ideas about what might drive the character, although it has to be said that none of them ever really take us very far in terms of the storyline that saw print.

Again, the ridiculously over the top Onslaught design plays to Andy Kubert's strengths - it demands melodrama, and it gets it. To be fair, Kubert's on pretty good form here generally, with a lot more discipline than we normally get from him around this period.  The visual of Xavier's head unpeeling Escher-style as Onslaught and Jean enter his mind is a very effective one.

FEATURE CHARACTERS
Professor X (between Storm #1 and Uncanny X-Men #334)
Archangel (last in Uncanny X-Men #333) and Psylocke (last behind the scenes in Excalibur vol 1 #96; both next in Uncanny X-Men #334-335, then in Excalibur vol 1 #100, then in issue #55)
Phoenix III (between Excalibur vol 1 #96 and Uncanny X-Men #334)
The Beast (last behind the scenes in issue #51)

SUPPORTING CHARACTERS
Joseph (between Uncanny X-Men #327 and X-Men Unlimited vol 1 #11)

VILLAINS
Onslaught (between Cable #33 and Excalibur vol 1 #99)
Graydon Creed (between Uncanny X-Men #333 and X-Factor vol 1 #123)
The Juggernaut (between Uncanny X-Men #333-334)

Written: 6 April 2005

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