God Loves, Man Kills (GLMK) is often time praised as being one of the defining moments in the history of mutants and X-Men. We're told it's a shining example of what an X-Men story should be. However, GLMK came out in 1982, today we're going to take a look at how it's aged over the last 33 years.
GLMK opens with two black children being chased down after their parents had been killed. The two are killed for being mutants and their bodies are crucified on a nearby playground. Magneto appears and is upset that he didn't arrive in time. He removes the bodies and performs an autopsy on them. Elsewhere Kitty Pride is fighting with a man who used the phrase Mutie-Lover. When she's stopped by her friends and told it's no big deal she tells the bartender "You'd care a lot more if he called me a nigger lover," and runs off. There's 3 panels of other mutants looking shocked by her words and a 4th panel of a crying black woman. Great job on that Kitty. If you're wondering she doesn't apologize, but her friends do.
Back at Xavier's mansion the team of; Wolverine, Nightcrawler, Colossus, his sister Illyana, and Kitty (who is going by Ariel half the time for some unexplained reason), is preparing to watch a debate between Professor Xavier and Rev. Stryker. The team watches Xavier get destroyed because despite having all the facts and points, he seemed like a jerk.
In the studio Xavier has disappointed Storm and Cyclops. The three leave but are attacked in a park in a scene that makes no sense. I'm serious, it's just for the sake of story telling. None of the three use their powers. In fact, Storm and Xavier didn't do anything. Xavier was useless without his wheelchair and Storm fainted. I'm not even joking. Meanwhile Cyclops attempts a fist fight with the attackers and is shot point blank range with the same guns that riddled the car with bullets and he doesn't even bleed.
The three are captured and Xavier is tortured with his darkest fears by Rev. Stryker in an attempt to brain wash him while Storm and Cyclops watch. Eventually it works and he reveals his plan to use Xavier to kill all mutants and goes to prep his sermon and genocide machine while Xavier kills Storm and Cyclops.
At the mansion the team is attacked during a training session and saved by Magneto. Wolverine tries interrogating them but when it fails Magneto tries with some magic or something that was clearly not magnetism. They get answers and head to Rev. Stryker's sermon. On the way there they take an elevator and collect Storm and Cyclops body. Then Magneto revives them with an electric shock because he generates electricity now too.
Magneto leads the group to the stadium where the sermon is. Magneto tries to talk to the crowd and they beat him with sticks and stone him. Eventually security steps in to stop them. The evil of Rev Stryker is shown when he murders one of his henchmen for being a mutant and not knowing it. He goes for Magneto next but a security guard shoots him in the chest. Back at the mansion the X-Men offer Magneto a spot. He says no and everyone begs him to stay except Wolverine. He flies off.
We'll start with the good things about this story. It's a great story that perfectly showcases Magneto's personality. He isn't a violent man by nature, he's a caring man. However he sees violence as the only opportunity. When the team enters the stadium Magneto rips removes the roof and gently places it back while being stoned. A senator even states "He's not here to fight, he's just making an entrance, maybe we should listen to him." In fact, Magneto is the only person who doesn't fight in this story. Later when he's offered a role with the X-Men he considers it but tells them "For all our stakes, mutant and human kind I hope you win [Charles], but should you fail I will be waiting." Violence is his last resort. It's not even that he's illogical. At one point Cyclops is just going off about all the bad things Magneto does and he responds that his goal is to create a utopia where mutants will be free from persecution. He then lays out a plan to make it happen ans Cyclops is left saying "That's actually a good plan." and sides with Magneto again later. The complexity of Magneto's character is great in this.
Rev. Stryker is an evil man and he's an excellent villain. They took the time to build him as villain and give him a back story. After the security guard shoots him he says "If that's the word of God, Sunday School sure has changed since I was a kid." He completely goes the opposite direction of Christianity but still uses it to justify his wrong actions. He makes little to no sense, yet he's so charismatic he's able to bring in thousands of followers and afford an extravagant lifestyle.
Talking about Stryker is a good transition into the bad. While it was nice that he had a back story, it was stupid. It goes like this. Stryker is a highly decorated soldier. He's driving from Mexico to Arizona with his pregnant wife. He falls asleep and crashes the car. She goes into labor prematurely. He delivers the baby but it has a deformity so he slits the baby's throat. Then he hands the baby to his wife and breaks her neck. Then he sets the car on fire to hide the evidence and pretends to be hurt. He becomes depressed and an alcoholic. One night he's drunk and sees Xavier talking about mutants and decides his son was a mutant, not just disfigured. The next thing to come on is an infomercial for some church. Still drunk he decides God was punishing him for his sins by giving him a mutant baby because his sperm was too good to have birthed a mutant. Then he wanders in the forest for a decade before starting his ministry. I can't make that up. That has to be the worst back story for a villain ever. He's just an evil man who got confused while drunk. The worst part is all of this was just crammed into two pages.
Another thing I didn't like was almost all of the characters were out of character. It starts with Magento being so arrogant that he speaks in 3rd person on page page 29. Magneto is prideful, but not arrogant. There's a difference. Wolverine is somehow the calm, logical and intelligent member of the team. A real quote from Wolverine in this story is "Relax they [Storm and Cyclops] aren't dead. They're are in a state of deep stasis. A jolt of electricity will revive them." Now, I know Wolverine has been around for a while and picked up some first aid tricks but that is way above his logic level. Storm is a pacifistic and actually fainted. After Wolverine, Storm should be the member of the team to attack first. Why is she wearing ballgowns and fainting? Nightcrawler is leader of the team for some reason and Colossus is a cowboy for some reason, he has a hat and everything at one point.
My last storytelling issue is the symbolism. The symbolism should be big in this story considering the villain. When it was meaningful it was great. The symbolism of Magneto being stoned by a crowd, great example of how the usage worked in their favor. Contrasting that were moments where it was simply forced in. On one occasion it's mentioned that there are 6 X-Men all with code names so it's like there's 12 of them. Just like Jesus had 12 disciples. Speaking of Jesus, Charles Xavier was being tortured by living out his worst nightmare. His worst nightmare was that he was whipped and crucified like Jesus only to rise again and repeat it. It was just such an odd forced scene to read.
The art is also one of my problems. It opens with this dark and blue tinted noir style that sets the tone. None of the other pages in the book have anywhere near the same amount of detail and style. In fact some of the pages are drawn incredibly poor when compared to others in the same book. In addition there are some issues with how the characters are drawn. Take for example Kitty. Sometimes she's a white woman with brown hair. Sometimes she's a black woman with black hair. Sometimes she's an Asian woman with blue hair. But, it's all Kitty.
Is God Loves, Man Kills a good story? Kind of. If you take it as a standalone story and ignore some of the inconsistencies it's great. But here's the problem. All of that could be explained because the story was originally printed as a one off set in an alternate universe. However it was so popular that it was officially made cannon. Now the story brings up questions like "Why is everyone acting so weird?" "Why is Illyana a half mutant in this story?" "Does Xavier really think he's Jesus." GLMK could truly be a classic story but it's ruined by being forced into the cannon of the X-Men only to have key parts retconned while others become X-Men Standards. It's a case of a story being forced into being something it's not.
You can hear Darrell on the CP Time and Powerbomb Jutsu podcasts. He also plays classic arcade games on The Cabinet
Follow @OriginalKingD
Back at Xavier's mansion the team of; Wolverine, Nightcrawler, Colossus, his sister Illyana, and Kitty (who is going by Ariel half the time for some unexplained reason), is preparing to watch a debate between Professor Xavier and Rev. Stryker. The team watches Xavier get destroyed because despite having all the facts and points, he seemed like a jerk.
In the studio Xavier has disappointed Storm and Cyclops. The three leave but are attacked in a park in a scene that makes no sense. I'm serious, it's just for the sake of story telling. None of the three use their powers. In fact, Storm and Xavier didn't do anything. Xavier was useless without his wheelchair and Storm fainted. I'm not even joking. Meanwhile Cyclops attempts a fist fight with the attackers and is shot point blank range with the same guns that riddled the car with bullets and he doesn't even bleed.
The three are captured and Xavier is tortured with his darkest fears by Rev. Stryker in an attempt to brain wash him while Storm and Cyclops watch. Eventually it works and he reveals his plan to use Xavier to kill all mutants and goes to prep his sermon and genocide machine while Xavier kills Storm and Cyclops.
At the mansion the team is attacked during a training session and saved by Magneto. Wolverine tries interrogating them but when it fails Magneto tries with some magic or something that was clearly not magnetism. They get answers and head to Rev. Stryker's sermon. On the way there they take an elevator and collect Storm and Cyclops body. Then Magneto revives them with an electric shock because he generates electricity now too.
Magneto leads the group to the stadium where the sermon is. Magneto tries to talk to the crowd and they beat him with sticks and stone him. Eventually security steps in to stop them. The evil of Rev Stryker is shown when he murders one of his henchmen for being a mutant and not knowing it. He goes for Magneto next but a security guard shoots him in the chest. Back at the mansion the X-Men offer Magneto a spot. He says no and everyone begs him to stay except Wolverine. He flies off.We'll start with the good things about this story. It's a great story that perfectly showcases Magneto's personality. He isn't a violent man by nature, he's a caring man. However he sees violence as the only opportunity. When the team enters the stadium Magneto rips removes the roof and gently places it back while being stoned. A senator even states "He's not here to fight, he's just making an entrance, maybe we should listen to him." In fact, Magneto is the only person who doesn't fight in this story. Later when he's offered a role with the X-Men he considers it but tells them "For all our stakes, mutant and human kind I hope you win [Charles], but should you fail I will be waiting." Violence is his last resort. It's not even that he's illogical. At one point Cyclops is just going off about all the bad things Magneto does and he responds that his goal is to create a utopia where mutants will be free from persecution. He then lays out a plan to make it happen ans Cyclops is left saying "That's actually a good plan." and sides with Magneto again later. The complexity of Magneto's character is great in this.
Rev. Stryker is an evil man and he's an excellent villain. They took the time to build him as villain and give him a back story. After the security guard shoots him he says "If that's the word of God, Sunday School sure has changed since I was a kid." He completely goes the opposite direction of Christianity but still uses it to justify his wrong actions. He makes little to no sense, yet he's so charismatic he's able to bring in thousands of followers and afford an extravagant lifestyle.
Talking about Stryker is a good transition into the bad. While it was nice that he had a back story, it was stupid. It goes like this. Stryker is a highly decorated soldier. He's driving from Mexico to Arizona with his pregnant wife. He falls asleep and crashes the car. She goes into labor prematurely. He delivers the baby but it has a deformity so he slits the baby's throat. Then he hands the baby to his wife and breaks her neck. Then he sets the car on fire to hide the evidence and pretends to be hurt. He becomes depressed and an alcoholic. One night he's drunk and sees Xavier talking about mutants and decides his son was a mutant, not just disfigured. The next thing to come on is an infomercial for some church. Still drunk he decides God was punishing him for his sins by giving him a mutant baby because his sperm was too good to have birthed a mutant. Then he wanders in the forest for a decade before starting his ministry. I can't make that up. That has to be the worst back story for a villain ever. He's just an evil man who got confused while drunk. The worst part is all of this was just crammed into two pages.
Another thing I didn't like was almost all of the characters were out of character. It starts with Magento being so arrogant that he speaks in 3rd person on page page 29. Magneto is prideful, but not arrogant. There's a difference. Wolverine is somehow the calm, logical and intelligent member of the team. A real quote from Wolverine in this story is "Relax they [Storm and Cyclops] aren't dead. They're are in a state of deep stasis. A jolt of electricity will revive them." Now, I know Wolverine has been around for a while and picked up some first aid tricks but that is way above his logic level. Storm is a pacifistic and actually fainted. After Wolverine, Storm should be the member of the team to attack first. Why is she wearing ballgowns and fainting? Nightcrawler is leader of the team for some reason and Colossus is a cowboy for some reason, he has a hat and everything at one point.
My last storytelling issue is the symbolism. The symbolism should be big in this story considering the villain. When it was meaningful it was great. The symbolism of Magneto being stoned by a crowd, great example of how the usage worked in their favor. Contrasting that were moments where it was simply forced in. On one occasion it's mentioned that there are 6 X-Men all with code names so it's like there's 12 of them. Just like Jesus had 12 disciples. Speaking of Jesus, Charles Xavier was being tortured by living out his worst nightmare. His worst nightmare was that he was whipped and crucified like Jesus only to rise again and repeat it. It was just such an odd forced scene to read.
The art is also one of my problems. It opens with this dark and blue tinted noir style that sets the tone. None of the other pages in the book have anywhere near the same amount of detail and style. In fact some of the pages are drawn incredibly poor when compared to others in the same book. In addition there are some issues with how the characters are drawn. Take for example Kitty. Sometimes she's a white woman with brown hair. Sometimes she's a black woman with black hair. Sometimes she's an Asian woman with blue hair. But, it's all Kitty.Is God Loves, Man Kills a good story? Kind of. If you take it as a standalone story and ignore some of the inconsistencies it's great. But here's the problem. All of that could be explained because the story was originally printed as a one off set in an alternate universe. However it was so popular that it was officially made cannon. Now the story brings up questions like "Why is everyone acting so weird?" "Why is Illyana a half mutant in this story?" "Does Xavier really think he's Jesus." GLMK could truly be a classic story but it's ruined by being forced into the cannon of the X-Men only to have key parts retconned while others become X-Men Standards. It's a case of a story being forced into being something it's not.
You can hear Darrell on the CP Time and Powerbomb Jutsu podcasts. He also plays classic arcade games on The Cabinet
Follow @OriginalKingD
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I enjoyed the story here--but the typos--and language arts issues--jeez louise
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