X-Factor Unknown (Updated)

Will's Comic Art Page has this unused X-Factor inventory page for sale.  If anyone knows who the artist was, please let us know! - Update!  John Trumbull and several other eagle eyed readers recognized these as Joe Stanton pencils, from an inventory story that was ultimately published in inventory clearing house Marvel Fanfare 50!  As an E-Man fan, I'm ashamed I didn't catch this myself.  Mark this one as published, and check out the color version below.

 http://www.comicartpage.com/featureddetail.asp?Piece=3451

George Perez - Avengers 178 - Updated!

There are quite a few differences between this unpublished cover for Avengers 178 featuring the Beast and the published version, both by George Perez.

(Professor H. and Tom Brevoort have both brought it to my attention that the published cover is by John Buscema.)

Image from The Marvel Age of Comics:

http://themarvelageofcomics.tumblr.com/post/16159938626/unused-cover-to-avengers-178-by-george-perez-and

What If Magneto Formed The X-Men?

While still working on Uncanny X-Men Chris Claremont and John Byrne came up with an idea for a new story:  What if Magneto Had Formed The Original X-Men?  While this issue was never produced, several pages of character sketches exist.  However, John Byrne has just completed a commission of what the cover might have looked like!

The first page of the issue, a tribute to X-Men #1, was completed.

Jean Grey's codename was Psyke.  Dani Moonstar of the New Mutants originally had the codename Psyche.

While Cyclops is unchanged here, other sketches have different versions of the visor.  Jean Grey's costume is also slightly different here.

Beast had arm gauntlets with retractable claws, and Archangel was to have a flaming sword.  Angel's name would be changed to Archangel later in X-Factor.

 Both Scarlet Witch and Quicksilver were to be part of this team.

The Photoshopped  image below was going to be the cover piece for this article until John Byrne came to the rescue with the excellent commission at the top of the page.

For more information about this story, check out John Byrne's Forum:

http://www.byrnerobotics.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=43669&PN=1&totPosts=103

Beast and Nightcrawler

This sketch by Rob Liefeld showcases Beast and also Nightcrawler, a character he never drew during his time doing X-Men related books.

The End?

According to Bob Layton's website:

"This piece, penciled by Jackson (Butch) Guice was slated to be the cover to X-Factor #2--which featured a story revolving around the Beast--Hank McCoy facing off against the powerful size-changing mutant known as Tower.  However, it was deemed unsuitable because the editors felt it was too soon for a mere, single character on the cover of a team book."

http://www.boblayton.com/Art%20Gallery/artgallery_page4.htm

Featuring The Beast and Iceman

In 1968, after the apparent death of Professor X,  The X-Men split up into smaller groups for several issues.  Angel and Cyclops had previously been featured in solo stories, and now Beast and Iceman were featured in an adventure together against the Maha Yogi.

Next, Cyclops and Marvel Girl were pitted in battle against Computo and his robot hive.

However, while the end of this issue promised another adventure of Beast and Iceman in the next issue, the team's breakup was cut short.  The next issue featured a reunited X-Men in battle against Mesmero.

But fear not, readers!  Know that in my constant observations of all things X, I observed that Beast and Iceman did battle Metoxo in an unpublished adventure.  While only one page of this story has surfaced, it may yet be possible that a complete unpublished issue 49 exists!  Behold the art of Werner Roth and Sam Grainger:

A larger version is available at Heritage Auction's website:

http://comics.ha.com/c/item.zx?saleNo=110114&lotNo=14642

(Note that they have the issue numbers wrong in their description of the piece)

Also, thanks to Professor H's wayback machine, there is a version of this page colored by Professor H himself!

A link to the full sized page can be found here:

http://professorhswaybackmachine.blogspot.com/2011/11/coloring-samples-part-2.html

However, this is not the end to our tale.  Beast and Iceman's battle with Metoxo the Lava Man was recounted in a very different way by Kurt Busiek and James Fry (with inks by Neil Vokes) in 1994's Marvel Holiday Special.

Here is a portion of the flashback scene for this battle:

While it was nice to finally see this story come to light, it would be even better to see the original tale published.  Please contact Citizen X if you have observed any more pages from this story, or any other unpublished tales of the X-Men.  That is all for now, readers!