X-Men (1963) #59

Cover by Neal Adams

Cover Date: August 1969

On-Sale Date: June 1969

Synopsis: The X-Men rescue their friends, and Cyclops tricks the Sentinels into flying into the sun.

Proposed Placement: XY 3, May

CHRONOLOGICAL NOTES

Page 4

Judge Chalmers reveals here (in panel 2) that Larry predicted the very hour of his mother's death when he was only five years old.  Larry's father created a medallion to erase Larry's memory and negate his mutant powers (which rules out my conjecture from last issue about Mrs Trask possibly being a mutant).  I have Larry at age 5 in XY -13, and I'm currently assuming that his vision and his mother's death happen in the same year.

In the third panel, Judge Chalmers explains that Bolivar Trask was motivated to create the Sentinels by fear of other mutants discovering Larry's powers.  I'm not sure it makes sense for him to then go on to create a bunch of robots that would be bent on imprisoning his son, but zealots aren't always logical I guess.  Judge Chalmers then carried on with Bolivar's work in the belief that he could protect Larry.

Knowing all this, I do wonder what was going on last issue when Judge Chalmers ripped off Larry's medallion.  He knew it would reveal him to the Sentinels, which can't have been what he wanted.  Maybe in his crisis of conscience he was trying to stop Larry from taking things too far, but he was a little too late for that.

Page 6

Panel 1 of page 6 shows the Sentinels capturing the Blob, Unus and Mastermind at a circus.  They were last seen as a part of the villainous group Factor 3 back in issues #37-39, and it makes sense for the Blob and Unus to go back to the circus after that fiasco.  I guess Mastermind tagged along with them as well, not really having anywhere else to go.  I think these three will work as a trio during the years where the X-Men don't have their own title (but I could be thinking of X-Men: The Hidden Years here).

Panels 3 and 4 present a curious mystery: who is the mutant presence that is detected on the south face of the base?  It can't be Cyclops, Marvel Girl and Beast, as they are coming in through the north face.  Most of the other known mutants are accounted for in this story, except for Magneto, Changeling and Professor X.  Magneto's currently hiding out in the Savage Land, so it's unlikely to be him.  Changeling is dead, and also not especially powerful.  Professor X is currently believed to be dead, but he's actually in the basement of the mansion preparing to fight off the alien Z'nox.  I think he's the most likely candidate, perhaps appearing here in his astral form to help out his students, but it's a mystery that's never been answered.

Page 19

Cyclops ends the Sentinel threat by using a logic trap to convince them to destroy the source of all mutant powers (i.e. the sun).  Operating on the reasonable assumption that Sentinels fly at roughly the same speed as a jet plane, it should take them a very long time indeed to traverse the 150 million kilometres between the Earth and the Sun.  This wouldn't be a problem for my timeline, except that the buggers come back in an issue of Avengers a few years down the line.  So while this page probably should happen many years in the future as far as my timeline is concerned, I have to ignore logic here and assume that somehow the Sentinels just got there and back very quickly.  Luckily for me, Marvel Science can handwave a lot.

Page 20

This is the introduction of Dr. Karl Lykos, better known as the villain Sauron.  Here he claims to be a colleague of Charles Xavier, though no other details are given.  Those will be forthcoming in the next two issues.

COUNTING THE DAYS

All of this issue except for page 19 happen on the same day as X-Men (1963) #58.  Page 19 should happen at some point in the future.  Looking ahead I have the return of these Sentinels in Avengers (1963) #102 placed in June of XY 4, over a year in the future.  I guess the Sentinels could reach the sun about halfway between the two stories, in November or December of XY 3.