Previous Posts: Introduction | Chapter 1: Lee/Kirby Part 1 | Chapter 2: Lee/Kirby Part 2 | Chapter 3: The Roy Thomas Era (1966-1968) | Chapter 4: The End of the Silver Age (1968-1970) | Chapter 5: Origins and Flashbacks Part 1 | Chapter 6: Silver Age Flashbacks Part 2 | Chapter 7: X-Men: First Class Vol 1 | Chapter 8: X-Men: First Class Vol 2 Part 1 | Chapter 10: The Hidden Years | Chapter 11: X-Men on Hiatus (1970-75) | Chapter 12: The Champions Part 1 (1975-76) | Chapter 13: The Champions Part 2 (1977-78) | Chapter 14: The College Years (1978-83)

We now enter a pretty weird era. By 1983, the X-Men were an incredibly hot commodity and it seems there was renewed interest in the old team members. J.M. DeMattias, who was writing the non-team book The Defenders and struggling to find a new take on it, convinced his editors to relaunch it as The New Defenders with a stable lineup of characters. So Iceman and Angel join Beast (already a cast member) along with a fairly random assortment of other Marvel characters. Although not an X-book, it ends up dealing with a lot of mutant concepts by virtue of its cast.

Also, as we’ll see, the book positively drips with queer readings. By 2021, more than half the core members of the New Defenders have officially come out of the closet in print, and this book lays a lot of the groundwork for those stories.

This week, we’ll cover the short period before DeMattias quit the book, including the first Iceman miniseries.

 

Defenders #122 (August 1983)
Writer: J.M. DeMattias
Artist: Don Perlin

Iceman visits the Beast on summer break from college, as Valkyrie, Hellcat and Hellstrom announce they’re leaving the team. Beast decides to try to form a more permanent roster of Defenders.

How much did Hank and Bobby miss each other? Enough that what when Bobby shows up, he tackles Beast and Beast leaps into his arms and kisses him.

Next, Bobby follows Hank and Gargoyle into the bathroom where Bobby, uh, helps Gargoyle lather up.

As Hank boasts about his sexual conquests, Bobby simply notes that he’s not seeing any girls, because of course he isn’t. Then they bump into Hank’s (gender-neutral?) teammate Overmind, and Bobby is simply gushing at how big he is.

Later at dinner, Hank and Bobby are bickering like an old married couple and even team maid Dolly notes how much they “adore each other.” When Vera coincidentally shows up, having been stood up by Beast, she doesn’t even acknowledge Bobby, whom she hasn’t seen since X-Men: The Hidden Years #2, an acknowledgement of how he ghosted her best friend Zelda.

 

Defenders #123-124 (September-October 1983)
Writer: J.M. DeMattias
Artist: Don Perlin

Iceman, Beast, and Gargoyle visit Scarlet Witch and Vision, and get attacked by Harridan, Seraph, and Cloud from the Secret Empire. No one makes any comments about the fact that Cloud is basically just a naked woman, so it seems like Bobby’s growing up.

Meanwhile, Dr. Strange, Hulk, Namor, and Silver Surfer are being told of the prophecy that if they continue working together, they’ll destroy the earth, which leads to next issue’s permanent roster change.

 

New Defenders #125 (November 1983)
Writer: J.M. DeMattias
Artist: Don Perlin

After Mutant Force attacks the wedding of Daimon Hellstrom and Hellcat, the New Defenders team is formed: Beast, Iceman, Angel, Valkyrie, Moondragon, Gargoyle.

When Hank and Bobby come home drunk to find Angel waiting for them, they all decide to dance around in their underwear. Bobby reminisces about them busting into Cyclops’ room together “doing our old Rockettes routine,” and this is a flashback I really need to see.

Later at the wedding, Bobby is a jealous brat when a woman flirts with Warren. During the fight, he gushes over Gargoyle, “that Isaac is really something else.”

Angel recaps what he’s been up to over in X-Men, and the narrator refers to a story that was to run in upcoming issues of Marvel Fanfare to explain his newfound confidence, but that story never ran.

No three straight men have ever held hands this way.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

New Defenders #126 (December 1983)
Writer: J.M. DeMattias
Artist: Alan Kupperberg

The New Defenders squabble over who will be team leader until the giant Leviathan escapes from SHIELD and they work together to stop him. Meanwhile, the Secret Empire uses the distraction to break Mutant Force out of prison.

This issue begins a long-running subplot of both Iceman and Angel mooning over Moondragon, who is interested in neither of them (by 2006, Moondragon would be in a lesbian relationship with the second Quasar, Phylla-Vell). Bobby believes he doesn’t have any chance if Warren is also charming her. This continues his long-running trend of pursuing women who aren’t interested in him. In this case, his thought bubbles seem to suggest his interest is genuine, but this is explained away in New Defenders #140: Moondragon is using her mental powers to seduce all members of the team to try to get them to remove her power-dampening headband.

Angel again refers to an unpublished Savage Land adventure that was supposed to run in Marvel Fanfare but never did.

 

New Defenders #127 (January 1984)
Writer: J.M. DeMattias
Artist: Sal Buscema

Cloud escapes the Secret Empire and asks the Defenders for help but is immediately recaptured.

Meanwhile, Iceman brings Beast, Warren, and Candy Southern to his parents’ house, where he finally tells them he’s still superheroing. It’s not clear when exactly Bobby “came out” to his folks about being Iceman, since he was still keeping a secret identity through the entire run of The Champions. This is Mr. and Mrs. Drake’s first published appearances since the “Origins of the X-Men” backup strip in X-Men #44-46. Mr. Drake says he worried about Bobby getting killed when he found out he was in the X-Men. Presumably, Bobby came out to his folks sometime between the end of the Champions and Bobby’s appearance in Uncanny X-Men #145-146 – although, given that two of the five students at their son’s private school turned out to be publicly known as X-Men should have been a big clue.

Iceman leaves his parents in a state of shock when he transforms into his ice form in front of them. The scene looks like it was meant to be read as a humorous take on an actual coming out, but to be honest, it’s so confused about what Iceman’s parents know and accept already that it’s a bit muddled.

 

New Defenders #128-130 (February-April 1984)
Writer: J.M. DeMattias
Artist: Alan Kupperberg, Don Perlin and Kim Demulder, Mike Zeck

The New Defenders attempt to rescue Cloud from the Secret Empire but are captured. The Secret Empire attempts to brainwash them into killing the New Mutants, but Moondragon successfully blocks the brainwashing and frees them. Meanwhile, the Secret Empire was also planning to launch a satellite that would cause the US and USSR to ratchet up hate for each other and start a nuclear Armageddon, with the hope that they’ll emerge to rule the ashes. The New Defenders stop the satellite, crush the Secret Empire, and arrest Mutant Force.

The villain for this arc is Professor Power, who fought Professor X and Beast in Marvel Team-Up #118 and #124. He blames Professor X for not helping to cure his son (whose body he’s now inhabiting) and plans to get revenge by killing his current and former students. In the end, Moondragon destroys his mind as she tries unsuccessfully to bring back his son’s consciousness. (Nevertheless, Professor Power crops back up a few times, and runs into Iceman again in Spectacular Spider-Man #197-199.

As for Bobby, this arc is mainly notable for continuing the running gag of both he and Angel both being horny for Moondragon. He also casually mentions his father’s upcoming retirement party, trailing the Iceman miniseries.

 

New Defenders #131 (May 1984)
Writer: J.M. DeMattias (plot) and Peter Gillis (script)
Artist: Alan Kupperberg

While delivering a speech at Brooklyn University, Beast is attacked by aspiring villain The Walrus, and appealed to by aspiring hero Frog-Man. Beast, Iceman and Angel – having what must be their worst day – are all beaten by Walrus, who in turn is beaten by Frog-Man. Beast is spared having to give Frog-Man membership in the New Defenders when his dad shows up and drags him home.

This is a really bizarre issue, and it’s most notable for a scene in the Green Room before Beast’s speech where a female student is flirting with Warren and Bobby, and Bobby responds by introducing himself as Beast’s boyfriend Lance. She runs off, causing Hank to worry that she might believe it.

So, maybe this was meant to be hilarious in a Three’s Company sort of way, but isn’t this just Bobby finally being honest?

Valkyrie knows what’s up.

 

Iceman Vol 1 #1 (December 1984)
Writer: J.M. DeMattias
Artist: Alan Kupperberg

Iceman returns home to Port Jefferson on Long Island for his father’s retirement party and has to defend their neighbors when aliens White Light and The Idiot attack.

We’re skipping ahead in the publishing order, but this is where the miniseries fits continuity-wise, as well as thematically given it’s DeMattias’ last swing at the character.

This miniseries seems like it was designed intentionally to be chock full of subtextual hints about Bobby’s sexuality, even as on the surface it’s brimming with Bobby’s supposed lust for his female neighbor, Marge.

When he first meets her, he tells himself he’s in LOVE, and decides to try to impress her. So he makes an ice pole to slide down in front of her. Unfortunately, it’s not strong enough and collapses under his weight. That’s right, Iceman is unable to maintain a stiff pole for a woman.

Later, he encounters a bigoted cop who accuses him of “spreading your filth around this town.” There’s definitely a strong parallel to anti-gay bigotry in the word choices here.

But then we get to something much more direct. After evading the cop, Bobby ices down and gets dressed in a neighbor’s yard. He pauses to reflect on the growing trend of religious extremism targeting mutants in X-Men: God Loves, Man Kills (Marvel Graphic Novel #5) and following Dazzler’s coming out in Dazzler: The Movie (Marvel Graphic Novel #12). And then an older woman literally calls him a “sexual deviant.” Seems the old woman did know what she was talking about after all.

Incidentally, this is the issue that establishes that Bobby’s father is Irish-Catholic and his mom is Jewish. Bobby says he went to Hebrew School as a child. He may be joking, but it seems to me he was raised Jewish enough to be bar mitzvahed.

Iceman Vol 1 #2 (February 1985)
Writer: J.M. DeMattias
Artist: Alan Kupperberg

After an argument with his parents, Iceman ends up transported back to 1942, where he meets them as a young couple. There, he’s attacked by Kali, who’s looking for Marge. William Drake gets killed in the battle, meaning Bobby will never be conceived. Well, this issue did come out five months before Back to the Future.

Before going back in time, Bobby has a heart-wrenching soliloquy about how hard it’s been on his parents that he’s a mutant and how he’d “give anything to be normal.”

As soon as he lands in 1942 in his costume speedos, a cop accuses him of wearing some other man’s underwear.

Continuity trivia: Ok, Marvel time aside, something is a bit screwy with the characters’ ages. Bobby says is about to say he was born (or, possibly, conceived) in 1959. That would make him 25-26 as of the publishing date. That’s a little old, considering he was meant to be either Jean’s age or a year younger, and she was 23 when she died in 1980. It would also push all the other original X-Men close to 30. Bobby has still been written as a fairly young college student up to this point. It’s got to be a math error.

 

Iceman Vol 1 #3 (April 1985)
Writer: J.M. DeMattias
Artist: Alan Kupperberg

Now trapped in nonexistence, Bobby has nightmares about his life until the cosmic entity Oblivion offers to restore his dad to life in return for Bobby bringing his daughter, Marge, back to him. Marge doesn’t want to return and strikes Bobby down before her desire to confront her father sends them both back to Oblivion.

Bobby’s dream recap of his life has some interesting points. He sees his parents as infantilizing him, but but also seems to resent Xavier and the X-Men for using him. At one point, he dreams of Xavier wanting to hop on his back and ride him. He just wishes he wasn’t a “freak.”

When we get to the Champions era, he dreams of Hercules picking him up and he exclaims “I love you!” He quickly covers that by saying he meant to say that to Darkstar, and for the first time he seems to recognize that Darkstar was never actually interested in him.

 

Iceman Vol 1 #4 (June 1985)
Writer: J.M. DeMattias
Artist: Alan Kupperberg

Iceman fights back against Oblivion, and his love for his parents leads Oblivion and Marge to make peace of a sort with each other. Oblivion sends him back to earth and he makes peace with his parents.

This is a really weird end to a really weird series. I guess we’re meant to see a contrast between Iceman striking off on his own and Marge just returning to her father’s control. And maybe they’re cosmic beings and beyond such relationships, but the text really suggests that by the end they’ve replaced familial love with romantic love for each other. The sentence “Let us come close… merge… become one…” is uttered.

The peace Bobby makes with his parents over being a superhero doesn’t last. When next we see them in Uncanny X-Men #289, William Blake is a racist and bigot again.

Next Week: Peter Gillis takes over writing New Defenders and Bobby starts chasing after yet another woman… or does he?

Where to find these issues: They’re all on Marvel Unlimited and have been reprinted multiple times. Most recently, they were all collected in Defenders Epic Collection Vol 8: The New Defenders. They’re also split across The Essential Defenders Vol 6  & Vol 7. A trade paperback called The New Defenders Vol 1 collects everything except the Iceman miniseries. That miniseries was collected in a Marvel Premiere Hardcover edition called X-Men: Iceman.