X-Men (1963) #22

 

Cover by Werner Roth

Cover Date: July 1966

On-Sale Date: May 1966

Synopsis: The X-Men are captured by a bunch of d-list villains under the command of Count Luchino Nefaria.

CHRONOLOGICAL PLACEMENT

Page 1

Xavier describes the missions against the Sentinels and Dominus as being "of late".  This is vague (the way I like it), but it means that there shouldn't be any huge gaps between any of the stories since X-Men (1963) #14.

Page 7, panel 3

The last vacation the X-Men took was interrupted by the Mimic, so there shouldn't be any attempted vacations between issues #19 and #22.

I believe that this is the first mention of Jean's sister, Sara Grey (although she's not named here).

Page 8, panel 1

Count Nefaria made his first appearance in Avengers (1963) #13, and his most recent appearance was in Tales of Suspense (1959) #68 (in the Iron Man story).  Since then he has gathered the remnants of the Maggia and recruited five super-villainous goons.

Page 18, panel 3

Nefaria's goons are (from left to right) the Scarecrow, the Porcupine, Plantman, the Eel, and the Unicorn. The X-Men fought most of these guys during the wedding of Reed and Sue Richards, but none of them should remember.

• Scarecrow made his first and only appearance before this in Tales of Suspense #51 (in the Iron Man story).
• Porcupine first appeared in Tales to Astonish (1959) #48, and his last appearance before this was in Fantastic Four Annual (1965) #3.
• Plantman first menaced the Human Torch in Strange Tales (1951) #113. His last appearance before this was in Strange Tales (1951) #121 (again vs. the Torch).
• The Eel first appeared in Strange Tales (1951) #112. His last appearance before this was in Strange Tales (1951) #117. (Both were Human Torch stories.)
• The Unicorn first appeared in Tales of Suspense (1959) #56 (in the Iron Man story), and before this he most recently appeared in Fantastic Four Annual (1965) #3 (where he got to have an energy beam duel with Cyclops).

The X-Men are captured at the end of this story, and this cliffhanger continues directly into next issue.

COUNTING THE DAYS

This story takes place over two days.

• Day 1:
• Page 1 to 17: The X-Men are taken out one by one and captured by Nefaria's goons.
• Day 2:
• Page 18 to 20: The freighter carrying the X-Men delivers them to Nefaria's headquarters.