On October 16th, 2019 Marvel Comics will release X-MEN #1. This will be the 5th comic to be called X-Men #1 (not counting things like the Taco Bell or Stridex promo comics which also bore that name). This is because readers like nice clean jumping on points for stories, and the sales data backs that up. But there are some consumers, loud consumers, who dream of the days when the numbers on a comic book were big. Single digits just don’t get their bird a’chirpin’ the way a girthy triple digit does.
To help get those folks rocks off, Marvel has included a helpful little set of digits they call a “Legacy Number”. This is a monstrously high number that reminds people that, yes, we have been making X-Men for over 50 years. The only problem with the “Legacy Number” is that it is a lie.
You see, X-MEN #1, the original one, was first published in September of 1963 and ran until issue #66 in March of 1970. Pretty straight-forward and clean numbering. From #67-#93 the title continued to be published, but without new content. It was only reprints. That all changed in August of 1975 when X-MEN #94 came out with some hot new Claremont and Cockrum content. The title soon became a hit and Claremont was on the book for 17 years until X-MEN #3 in 1991.
Astute mathematicians would note that 3 is less than 94. And that’s because the numbering went crazy. X-MEN continued to just be called X-Men until issue #142 when the title was legally changed to UNCANNY X-MEN. The book had been unofficially called that since #114 but they didn’t get around to doing the paperwork until 1981. Chris Claremont would have an uninterrupted run on the comic until #279 in 1991, at which point Marvel decided the world needed more X-Men.
X-MEN #1 (vol. 2) was a smash hit and is still the best selling comic of all time. With it, Marvel decided to have a new numbering, unencumbered by the then nearly 30 years of counting. And things were simple for years, UNCANNY X-MEN continued sequentially until issue #544 in December of 2011. Adjectivless X-Men, however, got messy.
The book continued until 2001 when it was re-titled as NEW X-MEN #114, a title which continued through #156 in June of 2004. It then revered to just being X-MEN until #207 in March of 2008. After that, the book became X-MEN: LEGACY till December 2012 with #275. They relaunched it as X-MEN: LEGACY #1 (vol. 2), which ran for 24 issues before jumping back to the original numbering for #300 in 2014.
A bit confusing, yes, but mostly follow-able. Except for, well, everything else. The same month NEW X-MEN reverted back to X-MEN, Marvel released NEW X-MEN #1 (vol. 2). It was a direct continuation of NEW MUTANTS (vol. 2) and ended up running for #46 issues that some people won’t shut up about. That book then became YOUNG X-MEN for 12 issues that most people would like to forget.
Then in September of 2010, running in parallel with X-MEN: LEGACY, Marvel launched X-MEN #1 (vol. 3) for 41 issues of bad vampire plots and Marvel Team-Ups. That was followed up by the girl powered (except for the creative team) X-MEN #1 (vol. 4) which petered out after 26 issues and a Secret War. There were also 60 issues of an ALL-NEW X-MEN split between two volumes but we don’t need to count those in the legacy numbering.
With that, X-MEN #1 (vol. 5) should have a nice clean #301 on the cover to follow the original vol. 2 numbering. Heck, if you wanted to add up the other adjectivless and New numbers you’d chunk it up to #414. But the number on the cover is actually #645, because X-Men Editor Jordan D White hates me.
How did we get there? Well UNCANNY X-MEN was relaunched four times from 2011 till earlier this year. Those volumes added 20, 36, 19, and 22 issues to the count respectively. That takes us up to #645 and maybe lets Marvel get away with an extra larger (and extra expensive) #650 soon!
So to summarize, instead of sorting out what the Adjectivless X-Men number should be, Marvel cut the Gordian Knot and instead just gave X-MEN the UNCANNY X-MEN numbering like it had in the 60’s. In a way, it’s a kind of beautiful acknowledgement of the storied legacy of the franchise. In another way, I hate it. And and a third, more important way, all of this is a meaningless number so that collectors just shut up about having small numbers on their comics and none of us should worry much about it.
Zachary Jenkins runs ComicsXF and is a co-host on the podcast “Battle of the Atom.” Shocking everyone, he has a full and vibrant life outside of all this.
