X-Men (1963) #64

Cover by Sal Buscema

Cover Date: January 1970

On-Sale Date: November 1969

Synopsis: The X-Men battle Sunfire, a Japanese mutant who's still mad about World War 2.

Proposed Placement: XY 3, May

CHRONOLOGICAL NOTES:

Page 7, panel 6

This is the first appearance of Sunfire, who's introduced as a young mutant being manipulated by his xenophobic uncle into hating America.  He gets an extensive origin flashback, and we've already hit a huge chronological problem in the first panel: Sunfire's mad because his mother was caught in the radiation from Hiroshima, causing her to die a few years later.  This wasn't a problem at the time of publication of course, but when you're looking at X-history as a whole it stretches Sunfire's timeline out quite implausibly.  There are a lot of Marvel characters with origins tied to World War 2, and most of them have explanations as to how they can still be alive and vital here in 2022, but as far as I can tell that's never been done for Sunfire.  For the moment I'm just going to leave it as is: Sunfire's mother got irradiated by the Hiroshima bombing in 1945, and she died years later when he was born.  Sure, it becomes increasingly implausible as time goes by, but that's Marvel for you.

Tying the origin of Sunfire to Hiroshima does allow us to pin down his approximate age, however.  This issue was published in 1969 and cover-date 1970, which would put Hiroshima in XY -24 or -25.  If Sunfire's birth happened a few years after that, then he'd be around 20-21 as of XY 3.  For the sake of easy math I'll say he's 20, and put his birth in XY -17.

Page 8

Page 9

The rest of the flashback involves Sunfire gaining his powers, and being raised and brainwashed by his uncle.  I've assumed that Sunfire is 18 when his powers activate, based on his uncle's comment about him coming of age on page 9.2.  That would place this flashback in XY 1, and his training montage spans the two years leading up to his debut story.

By the end of the story Sunfire has accidentally caused the death of his father (a peace-loving ambassador), and renounced his uncle's evil ways.  He'll be a hero from this point forward, albeit one who is a bit of a prick.  His main claim to fame is being part of the team in Giant-Size X-Men (1975) #1, before he buggers off back into semi-obscurity.

Page 7, panel 1

As for the X-Men, they don't have a lot going on in this story other than being there to fight Sunfire.  It's worth questioning why they didn't head right back to the mansion upon returning from the Savage Land though.  After all, when they left Havok was still recovering from his injuries, and you'd figure Cyclops at least would want to check in on him as quickly as possible.  Then again, it is Cyclops, who's not known for his emotionality.  (The real-world reason is that there's a big reveal coming when they do get back to the mansion, but that's a discussion for next issue.)

COUNTING THE DAYS:

This story takes place over a single day.  I've placed it the day after last issue (being generous about travel times from the Savage Land), but it could easily be two or three days later.