I dig this splash page, where Cannonball is swearing to Magneto that he’ll stay undercover if the headmaster lets him go to his girlfriend’s rock concert. It strikes the perfect tone and balance for a book about teens with powers.
But the main story in these issues develops Lila Cheney’s connection to the aliens holding Gosamyr hostage.
Last issue, as the cliffhanger, we briefly met Gosamyr (who will be an ongoing character) and her jailor Spyder (who won’t).
Spyder doesn’t just own Gossamyr–he also owns Lila Cheney as a slave, and in this story he’s coming to collect. During the concert.
You see where this is going, right?
Yeah. Sam’s gotta break his word to Magneto and use his powers to save Lila. Note how Roberto has a sweet little rationale for him in the panels above. Spyder’s troops capture Lila despite Sam and Roberto trying to stop it.
The rest of the team teleport to Limbo to change into their uniforms and track Spyder. Look how Warlock makes a privacy shield for Rahne.
Very cute.
Magik then tracks down Spyder’s ship.
And we continue to see signs of the coming corruption of Magik and the Inferno event.
Gosamyr, who is still free from Spyder but trapped on his ship, decides to help the kids, hoping that after they rescue Lila, they’ll save the rest of Gosamyr’s family, who are also held by Spyder.
She gives them clothes.
And then Gosamyr uses her powers to influence the male members (no pun intended), and some of the girls are unhappy about it.
Nevertheless, , the team goes off into a space adventure to free Spyder’s slaves. Lots of big space adventures and fights.
Lila appears to die in the end, crashing Spyder’s evil doers into a sun.
At the end, the team tries to return to Earth by teleporting through Limbo, but find that once they’re there, they can’t get out.
Next: Inferno!
Getting from outer space to Earth via Limbo proves problematic. Magik is “stuck” in her Darkchylde form, S’ym is up to his usual nonsense, etc., so most of issue #71 is a fight thorugh Limbo.
There are a few scenes in New York showing Magneto and the Hellfire Club dealing with the “animated city” that is now New York. One in particular is pretty damn harrowing….
At the end of the issue, Magik and the team fight their way through Limbo and open a portal to New York, but as a result of N’astirh’s interference, the portal won’t close and the Limbo demons start raining down into New York.
Lila appears to die (but she’s a teleporter so she’s not really dead).
And Magik goes full-on demon…
As does Gossamyr.
That was unexpected.
Meanwhile, Magneto is going evil again…
He also gets involved in the Inferno stuff.
City items really shouldn’t pose a problem for him.
The New Mutants story is basically one long arc, but this seems like a good pause point.