X-Men Issue 3 - Beware Of The Blob

In issue three we meet a villain whose power could finally fell the X-Men!  Will they be able to stand up to and survive against The Blob?




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Our team this issue:

The X-Men are riding a wave of success after the defeat of The Vanisher.  Their confidence as a team is growing, and with the help of Professor X's rigorous training program, they are becoming stronger each and every day.  We get another sneak peek into said training program in this issue, until Professor X detects the presence of another mutant nearby.

He dispatches the team to go out and look for the newly detected mutant, in casual clothes, so as not to draw too much attention or tip someone off to their presence.  The team doesn't know who they are looking for, but Xavier uses his telepathic powers to see through his team's eyes and help guide them in the right direction.

Warren Worthington sweeps Jean Grey off her feet and into his car, where they roar off in pursuit of the mutant.  The other team members split up and scour the city.

Iceman thinks he finds the mutant burning a piece of paper with  his powers, but it's really a guy holding a magnifying glass under the sun.

The Beast thinks he sees a man standing on air, but it's really a worker standing on a protective glass case for a business' sign.

Cyclops ends up at the circus where he thinks he finds the mutant using a rifle to shoot targets accurately without looking...but he really finds a charlatan booth owner who is tricking patrons into playing his game...then Xavier tells Cyclops that he is close to the mutant.  That's when Cyclops hears the Carnival Barker's call...introducing The Blob.

The Blob is an incredibly fat man, who can root himself into place to become immobile, and his skin is impenetrable, even bullets can't penetrate it!  After watching The Blob's show off his talents to the public, he approaches him privately in his tent.

Cyclops and the rest of the team get The Blob back to the mansion where Professor X runs him through many tests to determine if he is in fact a mutant.  Once Xavier feels confident in the fact that The Blob is a mutant, he offers him a place on the team...but The Blob refuses.

Taken aback by this, since he is the first mutant to deny admittance to the X-Men, Xavier orders that The Blob not be allowed to leave.  A fight ensues and The Blob escapes back to the circus.  Now, imbued with the knowledge that he is a mutant, The Blob takes over the circus, and plans a riot on the mansion.

Professor X fears that The Blob will revolt, especially now that he has the knowledge of not only where the X-Men's mansion is, but he also knows their true identities and powers.  Xavier works quickly and builds an Electronic Mass Influencer.  This EMI device will intensify Professor X's thoughts so he can alter the memories of multiple people at once.

Just as the X-Men feel they are prepared to attack...the realize quickly that they weren't ready to defend.  Outside the mansion The Blob stands on the front lawn with an angry mob of carnival workers and circus animals.  A fight ensues, pushing the X-Men to the very brink of their powers, before Xaiver activated his EMI device and wipes the memory of The Blob and the carnival workers, sending them back to their lives before this knowledge came to them.

The X-Men live to fight another day!

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I know that not every issue of every comic is going to be fantastic...but this one was particularly rough to read.  I'm not really sure what else I can say about this one.  

I like the idea of The Blob being a circus freak, I mean that was real for a long time.  However, the fact that he was able to quickly just convince everyone to fight the X-Men within the span of a couple of panels, because he was now "in control" was weak.

Also - how did the X-Men seriously not notice this angry mob of carnies with elephants, apes, and giraffes walking from the circus in the city to their front lawn???

All that aside there are a few important things that are setup here.

First of all, this is the first comic where Scott Summers' brooding and all too serious attitude is addressed by Professor X.  Cyclops was always seen as a bit of a stick in the mud as the X-Men.  He's the Lawful Good, the one headstrong character to understood the gravity of the team's mission, and took his responsibilities very seriously. 

One of the most important romances in the X-Men is also setup in this issue as well.  We start to see that Scott starts falling for Jean Grey...and more importantly that Jean sees him very differently from the other members of the team.

BUT...we also learn that Professor X loves Jean Grey as well!  Learning this makes me call into question Xavier's motives for bringing Jean on board.  Did Xavier know who she was when he sent her that mental invitation?  Or did it just happen to be dumb luck that Jean was pretty?  

All good questions, and hopefully we'll get some answers in issue 4!