This week the Star Clipper bloggers are writing about their favorite betrayals in comics. The first betrayal that comes to my mind was when Colossus left the X-Men to join Magneto. This was literally a jaw-dropping moment in my comic-reading life. Colossus joined ranks with Magneto in “Uncanny X-Men” #304 in September of 1993 during the “Fatal Attractions” crossover.
I was ten-years-old when this issue came out. Though I read comics at the time, my main point of reference with X-Men was the “X-Men Animated Series.” If a character in the comic wasn’t on the main team in the cartoon (Cyclops, Wolverine, Rogue, Storm, Gambit, Jubilee, Beast, Jean Grey, and Professor X) I simply just didn’t think that character was as cool, with the exception of maybe Nightcrawler, Bishop, and Cable. Not only had Colossus not made his cameo debut on the X-Men cartoon (It happened a month later in November of 1993) to give me any point of reference of who his character was, but in the comic he was almost randomly leaving the X-Men to join their sworn enemy Magneto. This absolutely made me hate Colossus in 1993. I distinctly remember sitting around with my comic-reading buddies and talking about how bad a guy Colossus was after reading “Uncanny X-Men” #304.
In retrospect, I actually really like Colossus now. I’ve since gone back and read Chris Claremont’s legendary 70s X-Men run, where Colossus is one of the quintessential team members, and loved it. His relationship with Kitty Pryde is a great comic book romance (Particularly in Joss Whedon’s “Astonishing X-Men”) and it’s always exciting when he teams up with Wolverine for a “Fastball Special.” Even looking back on the issue when he joins Magneto, I think it’s almost silly how up-in-arms I was over Colossus’ betrayal of the X-Men. Had I been reading X-Men for a little longer, I likely would have been more upset over the ludicrous writing in the issue that causes Colossus to leave the team. Basically, during a fight with Magneto and the Acolytes, Colossus decides it’s Professor X’s fault that his sister Illyana died from the legacy virus. He then goes on to give up Xaiver’s pacifist dream of human-mutant coexistence and figures what better time then now is their to join with a mutant terrorist that he’d been fighting for the last 15 years. His decision was that quick and random, and by the end of the issue Colossus departs with Magneto much to my dismay. Now I have a harder time with the slapdash writing, but for a time in 1993 Colossus’ betrayal to the X-Men was absolutely unforgivable to me.
-Jon
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One of the few X-Men to cross over and become a follower of Magnetos strident anti-human preaching was Colossus one of the only X-Men known to be an atheist. Colossus briefly joined the Acolytes as a sincere follower of Magneto during events portrayed in X-Men in 1992. ..Magnetos followers thus share many traits in common with followers of other supposedly secular beliefs systems such as Communists who follow the teachings of Marx Hegel Lenin etc. Vegans who follow the teachings of Donald Watson and radical animal rights activists who follow the teachings of Peter Singer.