The Dawn of X is here! All living and dead X-Men and X-Villains have been brought to the new mutant paradise of Krakoa! It’s a big launch party of a country with a whole host of new comics exploring the new status quo, with tons of group shots of a bunch of mutants. Obviously stalwarts like Cyclops, Wolverine, Jean Grey and Kate Pryde are all over these comics, but what about the obscure and random mutants who have appeared over the years?

We all have our favorite mutants and X-Men. And we all have our obscure and random favorite mutants who were sprinkled throughout decades worth of X-comics. My own personal favorite mutants, like Multiple Man, Mimic and Strong Guy, have yet to appear on Krakoa in Dawn of X. But making a list out of my favorite mutants isn’t anything new for this blog. So how about a list of my favorite random, obscure, single-appearance mutants from the furthest corners of the longboxes?

Join me after the jump for six mutants who, I promise, existed at one point or another for a fleeting moment, and whom I’d like to see basking in the new mutant paradise!

6. Postman

Please, please Mister Postman

Way, way back in 2002, Marvel put out a 4-issue mini-series called Morlocks about a squad of Chicago-based mutants who were helping each other complete one final wish before disappearing into the sewers forever. I reviewed this series for a website called MutantHigh.com, back in my earliest days of online comic reviews. It was a nice little contained story with a bunch of really interesting characters. I think Litterbug was the only one who eventually moved on to other comic appearances, because most of these Morlocks lost their powers on M-Day. But that’s all over now and these minor characters can come back!

Chief among them was Postman, the leader of the group. He had the power to make people forget something with just a word…but he couldn’t reverse it. And tragically, he accidentally caused his wife to forget her entire life. This is what drove him underground, and he became leader to a bunch of young mutants who needed guidance. Postman was pretty cool, with a tragic power and backstory. If he’s got his powers back (because who hasn’t these days?), I would enjoy following up on him after all these years.

5. Paulie Provenzano

He’s painfully Italian

I have an odd history of when I’ve read X-Men comics and what I’ve read. Very rarely in my life have I collected and read every single ongoing X-Men comic, or even just one series at a time. And, quite randomly, I picked up the entirety of the Eve of Destruction storyline in Uncanny X-Men in 2001. This was right on the eve of the big Grant Morrison relaunch, so it was a bit of a lame duck session for X-Men comics. It involved Magneto kidnapping Xavier as he held court on Genosha, and the few remaining X-Men attempting to stop him.

To accomplish this, Jean Grey used Cerebro to find a couple of random mutants to quickly recruit and put into X-Men uniforms. She got some traditional characters, like Northstar, Frenzy and Dazzler, and she got the never-before-heard-of sister of Sunfire, but then she picked two random nobodies with no superhero experience whatsoever: Wraith and Omerta. Wraith was my favorite. He was a young guy whose skin had turned translucent, and that was enough to put him on the X-Men. But now we’ve got Glob Herman, so there’s no need for Wraith. So I’m going to go with Omerta instead. He never actually had that codename in the actual comics, he was instead just Paulie Provenzano.

Just give him a basic 90s costume

Paulie Provenzano was a complete asshole and homophobe. A major subplot of the storyline was Paulie being bigoted towards Northstar, but slowly coming around. This was also 2001, so an LGBTQ+ subplot wasn’t exactly handled with the kind of care we’d expect in a 2019 story. Still, they tried. Paulie was a mafia goon with invulnerability who tried to take over and run things, only to get recruited by Jean Grey to become a quickie X-Man. He was ridiculous and bigoted and probably a terrible character, but I firmly believe any character is worthy of redemption and proper use. And I think having an asshole like him around could be fun. Here’s a guy who had one very brief, very weird shot at being an X-Man and then nothing came of it. Now he could be back among them and perhaps he thinks he should be on a team, but nobody wants him. Could be fun.

After Eve of Destruction, Paulie and Wraith simply disappeared and were never heard from again, making the whole thing even weirder! Some Wikipedia notes state that Paulie may have been killed at the Neverland Camps in Weapon X, but that’s not solid. And even if he is dead, Krakoa is all about resurrection. I just think he’d be an annoying little thorn in a couple of different sides. And maybe, at long last, he can have gotten over his bigotry.

4. Ugly John

Grant Morrison’s greatest creation

Speaking of Grant Morrison’s X-Men relaunch, one of the things he really brought to the X-Men overall was a lot more weird mutants. No longer were they handsome, studly men  with invulnerability powers. Now we had mutants like Beak and Basilisk and Dummy (side note, add all of Grant Morrison’s weird mutants to this list! Like Jumbo Carnation and No-Girl!). One such mutant was Ugly John, a guy whose power was to have three faces. Not three heads. His face was tripled, all in the same place. He was rescued from a Sentinel attack by Cyclops and Wolverine in the very first issue of Morrison’s New X-Men, and he was shortly thereafter killed by Cassandra Nova. And if the Krakoan resurrection process is as awesome as they claim, surely they can reach back in time and bring back Ugly John to live in paradise!

3. Rhapsody

Needs more appearances

Rhapsody has made one single appearance in one single storyline and it drives me crazy. Why would this interesting character stay buried for so long? Once upon a time, when Peter Jackson was writing the 1990s X-Factor, he told a story where Multiple Man and Quicksilver head out to middle America to investigate a mutant charged with murder. This was Rhapsody, a blue-skinned woman who could manipulate people whenever music was played. This storyline, specifically the issue X-Factor #79, was a defining moment in comics for Young Sean. I don’t remember how I came to possess such a random issue of X-Factor, but it was my proper introduction to Multiple Man, who would go on to become my all-time favorite comic book character. I think one of the reasons I loved him so much was that this issue was also one of my introductions to realism in superhero comics. I mostly read Spider-Man in the 90s, with stuff like the crazy Clone Saga. But here was an issue where the superhero wore street clothes, had sit-down meetings with law enforcement and used sarcasm. I was instantly in love.

Rhapsody was the villain of the story. She manipulated Multiple Man into helping her evade the police, only to eventually reveal she had used her powers on the murder victim and he ended up dying of a heart attack. She ended up in prison and…hasn’t been seen since. She got mentioned once, after M-Day, where she was randomly chosen as one of the mutants to retain their powers. And a blue-skinned woman with short hair has appeared in the background of some random panels in some random X-Men comics. But why this awesome blue woman with music-based powers hasn’t returned to comics for real is beyond me. I hope she does.

If nothing else, if my dreams come true someday and I get to write a Multiple Man comic book, you better believe I’m bringing back Rhapsody!

2. Lacuna

How many mutants have had their own TV shows?

Lacuna was a supporting character in X-Statix back in the day and, in fact, was one of the only mutants to survive the series. She was the star of a TV show where she used her powers to punk celebrities. She had the power to freeze time and then walk around manipulating the environment, like the movie Clockstoppers. She’s also got orange skin. I liked Lacuna while reading X-Statix, and was even more thrilled that she survived the series, considering the comic was famous for killing off everybody. I thought, for sure, Marvel would find something to do with her. They kept using Doop, after all.

But nope! No sign of Lacuna since. Now X-Statix is coming back and some of the members are alive again for unexplained reasons. Plus, obviously, all mutants can be resurrected on Krakoa. So maybe Lacuna can run the Krakoa media division! Or have a pro-mutant talk show on the Krakoa News Network!

1. ForgetMeNot

The world needs more chubby and balding X-Men

ForgetMeNot is brilliant. I love mutants with weird powers, and he’s got one of the weirdest. If you ever take your eyes off ForgetMeNot, you instantly forget everything about him. If you’re chasing him down a hallway and he turns a corner, you immediately have no idea why you’re running or what you were doing, let alone that he ever existed. He showed up a couple of years ago and revealed that he’s been an X-Man for years…but nobody remembers him. Professor X implanted a memory note in his own brain to remember ForgetMeNot once an hour, but then he died and ForgetMeNot was even more alone. Then he was used in a couple X-Force stories and I’m pretty sure he made it out alive.

The important thing is he still exists, he’s a longtime X-Man and Krakoa would be a perfect place for him! There’s people all over the island, and surely with Professor X back, he could implement some kind of PR campaign to keep people from forgetting ForgetMeNot. ForgetMeNot is a neat character with a really creative power, and I hope he’s enjoying paradise on Krakoa!

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