#newmutants61

Strangely, out of all the New Mutants who are affected by Doug Ramsey’s death, including Rahne who was experiencing a budding romance with him before he was killed, we spend the most time watching Illyana cope with his loss. I really like how she unconditionally defends Magneto here, solidifying the connection the two characters made a few issues ago when Magneto helped her suppress S’ym’s uprising in Limbo. Good character development! (The New Mutants #61 – Mar 1988)

God damn it Illyana is so cool. She is as profoundly affected by the death of Doug Ramsey as anyone else, but she’s not going to let it cloud her judgment when it comes to the well-being of her brother. And being the only adult in the room and the person who is ultimately responsible for not watching his kids close enough, Magneto is left to clean up the mess of Doug’s death. I have to say, this was a spectacular issue of the New Mutants. The emotional ramifications of Doug’s death are handled with a great amount of realism and consideration. We aren’t immediately flying off to the next plot point, which tends to be the case with a lot of comic book deaths. We spend the whole god damn issue dealing with it. It’s a hard stop as far as the narrative goes. All of the characters are reasonably traumatized, and there’s a sense that we’re all going to be dealing with this for some time to come. (The New Mutants #61 – Mar 1988)

Jesus this is heavy. If anyone can deal with loss and death without completely going (more) insane, it’s Magneto. But holy shit how much of this can anyone expect him to take before he fucks off on back up to his asteroid base and starts planning to blow up the planet again. He’s been sincerely trying to be a force of good in the lives of these children, and we can’t expect that to last for long if their bodies start piling up. (The New Mutants #61 – Mar 1988)

Whew! Ok. Despite what the cover of this comic would have you believe, the New Mutants don’t have a new costume party on Ani-Mate Island and completely forget about Doug’s dead body. The effects of Doug Ramsey’s death in this issue are actually the heaviest of any X-Man death I’ve ever seen. Doug’s dead body is shown in no less than 20 panels in this comic book, either completely exposed and out in the open with his dead eyes staring dissonantly into space, or shrouded with a sheet on a morgue slab. And every character has a significant emotional breakdown over it. This is definitely a bigger reaction than when Thunderbird died and everyone just kind of shrugged and walked away from the crash wreckage. (The New Mutants #61 – Mar 1988)

Hey what gives with this cover!!! Doug Ramsey just got the shit killed out of him!! Why does everyone look so happy before they even leave the Ani-Mate’s island! Like, where’s Doug’s body! Aren’t you going to take it back to his parents and have a funeral?? And why does everyone have new costumes all of a sudden!! Oh well. I guess we’ll find out in a second. I should really learn to calm my tits down and read a few pages ahead before running to my keyboard and shitting my pants over a cover like this. Anyway, this is the final issue in the Fall of the Mutants omnibus and it looks like we’re finally going to say goodbye to the bird boy and his Ani-Mate buddies. My favorite is that Snuffleupa-squid there that’s waving goodbye. That’s the same motherfucking squid monster that appeared from the bottom of the motherfucking sea and tore Cameron Hodge’s plane apart. Turns out he’s just a cuddle old squid-buddy!! I want to be his friend. (New Mutants #61 – Mar 1988)

Magneto goes to his new allies at the Hellfire Club in order to use their equipment to locate his students, and while he’s there he gets briefed on all the other Fall of the Mutants events going on with the other X-Men teams, as X-Factor battles Apocalypse in New York and the X-Men fight the Trickster in Dallas. And hey!!! What the heck is Friedrich von Roehm doing in these panels!!!! He got the shit disintegrated out of him by Nimrod back in Uncanny X-Men #209!! Major artwork flub right there. This is like in those old episodes of Transformers where Cliffjumper starts talking and they cut away from him and back and he turns into Bumblebee. (The New Mutants #61 – Mar 1988)

For whatever reason, the New Mutants decide to cope with their grief over the death of Doug Ramsey by making new costumes for themselves. Despite the butt ugly “Graduation Uniforms” the gang has been wearing for a few issues, I pretty much like every single one of these costumes, except for a few small details, like Sunspot’s Hellion-esque plunging v-neck and the underwear-on-the-outside look the guys are sporting. For the most part everyone looks pretty bad assed. (The New Mutants #61 – Mar 1988)

Heck, Doug’s not even the first New Mutant to die, since Karma died early on (before I even started including New Mutants comics on this blog) but then came back to life. I like these old school photos and I think I’m going to create a hashtag to start tracking them since there’s been a few others before this. (The New Mutants #61 – Mar 1988)