Issue(s): Power Pack #35
Cover Date: Feb 88
Title: "Life or death!"
Credits:
Louise Simonson - Writer
Jon Bogdanove - Penciler
Hilary Barta - Inker
Marc McLaurin - Assistant Editor
Carl Potts - Editor

Review/plot:
The nice thing about Fall of the Mutants is three of the participating series are written by Louise Simonson. In the case of New Mutants, that didn't mean too much, but Power Pack ties in very tightly with the events of X-Factor.

The older Power Pack kids are still grounded. Their dad is away at a science conference ("World Disarmament, SIE.T.I and theoretical physics", according to a paper he is holding), and their mom is on their way home from her studio when the power goes out in the city due to the attacks from the Horsemen of Apocalypse. Katie is not grounded, only because she was supposedly too young to know better, so when reports of the Horsemen's attack and subsequent unrest and looting make her worry about her mom, she leaves the apartment over the protests of the others, and heads to the subway to look for her.

We saw in X-Factor #25 that Pestilence was chased into the subways by X-Factor, so Katie finds her attacking people on subway cars.

Everything's a little more comedic here thanks to Jon Bogdanove's art.

But Katie does get tagged by Pestilence and starts feeling sick.

The rest of the Power kids are unsure if they should disobey their parents' orders and leave the house or not, but they decide to do it when Apocalypse's ship appears over the city.

We discover that Power Pack have learned the Kymellian technique of healing themselves, and they use it to cure Katie.

They then arrive in time to help Cyclops and Marvel Girl with the Empire State Building's antenna, which was knocked off by Apocalypse's ship.

A big deal is made in this issue of the fact that Jack's degravitization power is subject to momentum. Jack also finally settles on a super-hero name at this point: Counter-Weight (i continue to tag the characters with their original names).

Power Pack and X-Factor are attacked by both Pestilence and Death...

...while catching the antenna. Pestilence gets knocked off her horse and, despite their previous fight, Katie tries to rescue Pestilence. But Pestilence continues to attack Katie, so Katie is unable to save her when a portion of the antenna sliced off by Death falls on her. Pestilence's death weights heavily on Katie, but Jean tells her that it's not her fault. This is also the scene where X-Factor tells the kids that they are counting on them to protect the city instead of treating them like babies and sending them home.

The timing in this issue is a bit condensed, though, because from here the group goes directly to stopping the Ship from falling on the Statue of Liberty. I guess the idea is that they're working on that the entire time X-Factor is fighting inside the ship.

The kids then wave goodbye as X-Factor emerge from the ship to face the reporters and reveal their identities, and manage to get home before their mom. They confess to going out of the apartment after Katie, but not, of course, about their powers. She says she's not mad.

The final panels of this issue spill over to the lettercol, taking up half the page.

The rest of the page contains excerpts from a single long letter documenting the sad neglect of Franklin over the years ("he showers affection on anyone who pays the slightest attention to him. Jarvis... is a good example: he's merely doing his job, keeping the boy happy and occupied, and Frank latches onto him with the intensity of a long-lost son"), and then goes on to remark how good Power Pack is for the kid. I originally included the scan above just to show the oddity of the lettercol page including story content, but i realized if i commented on the letter, which is good, people might try to squint and read it. And i don't want you to hurt your eyes, so you can click on that image for a larger view.

This issue repeats a lot from X-Factor #25 which may feel like a bit of a rip-off, but between Jon Bogdanove's art and expansion of the scenes and seeing it from Power Pack's perspective, there's plenty of new material. And it's nice to see Power Pack's reaction to being taken seriously by X-Factor.

Quality Rating: B+

Historical Significance Rating: 2 - Power Pack develop a healing ability

Chronological Placement Considerations: This takes place concurrently with X-Factor #25.

References:

• All the Power kids except Katie were grounded after they snuck out of their apartment in Power Pack #33.
  
• The radio identifies the Horsemen as the group that ravaged portions of Central Park in X-Factor #19.
  
• This story runs parallel with and repeats scenes from X-Factor #25.
  
• A talk radio host, reacting to War's attack on New York, says that the Mutant Registration Act isn't enough and mutants should be outlawed altogether. A footnote reminds us that the Mutant Registration Act was passed in Uncanny X-Men #224.
  
• Katie uses the Kymellian healing technique that she learned in Power Pack #24-25 to recover from Pestilence's attack.
  
• Julie says that her knees, shredded in Power Pack #32 while fighting Razor Cut, also healed very quickly, indicating that the Kymellian healing works "sort of automatically".

Crossover: Fall of the Mutants

Continuity Insert? N

My Reprint: N/A

I read this issue in my Fall of the Mutants trade the other night, and I really like all the intersection with X-Factor 25. And as usual with Power Pack X-over tie-ins here lately, I found myself enjoying them. Maybe I unfairly judged Power Pack all those years? Maybe I just didn't see why they were being shoehorned into so many X-events and other appearances (come to that, I still don't). UXM 195, UXM 205, X-Factor Annual 2, and X-Factor 25 all guest starred or at least featured appearances by some or all of Power Pack, plus two issues of Power Pack tied in pretty closely with Mutant Massacre and Fall of the Mutants, and it got a three-issue Inferno tie-in as well (admittedly, there were a lot more tie-ins for that one). It's kind of a lot, and it feels like they're being shoved down our throats. Yet each time I actually read a Power Pack issue (usually dreading it beforehand), I find myself enjoying it far more than expected, and appreciate what I read for reasons beyond the tie-in of it all. I find the scripting, at the very least, to be among Simonson's best. Maybe it's just me.