Posted December 4-11, 2011 | Updated March 19, 2013 | April 2, 2013 | August 22, 2015

X-Men 19

It couldn't last forever, with issue 19, the parade of great X-Men villains ends, with the arrival of the Mimic. Boo! Hisss!

Lee on script as usual, Wroth on art, but the really noticeable thing is the heavy ink by Dick Ayers.

The Mimic, or Calvin Rankin, is a jerk from the first panel we see him. As for his powers, well, here he is mimicking the powers of the Beast

Here's the Mimic with the powers of both the Beast and Iceman.

Here's a flawed panel from the issue

The Mimic has copied Cyclops' power; the only thing is, unless those glasses are ruby quartz the optic blasts would be all over the place. And those glasses can't be ruby quartz - those specialized Cyclops visors can't just be picked up anywhere. Plus how does Calvin know to wear protective glasses in the first place?

Now here's the Mimic facing the X-Men with all their powers. He looks ridiculous.

The 'M' on the chest means 'Moron'.

Mimic beats the X-Men. I protest! The X-Men are battle hardened while this guy just walked off the street five minutes ago.

Mimic kidnaps Marvel Girl. I protest again! Stan Lee already did this gimmick in issue 10.

Oh well.

The Mimic then proceeds to tell his origin like we're interested. Then the X-Men arrive and in the ensuing battle the Mimic loses his powers and the Professor mindwipes him. Unfortunately, we are not so lucky, this freak will be back in a future issue (groan).