View Through The Glass

I’d like to get back to the conversation that we had on Tuesday about that opening panel of the first X-Men comic. Seated within the study of “an exclusive private school in New York’s Westchester County,” Professor X faces left in profile-view, framed perfectly by the panes of a large window. Backlit by a single circle of yellow light on the wall behind him, the Professor is depicted in an unassuming-yet-curious way. Beyond any talk of his placement in a White House doppelganger and what that means, or the visual frontloading which establishes the earlier X-Men’s focus on his character, Professor X’s setup in this panel speaks worlds for the message which this series tries to convey. As a paraplegic, Charles Xavier is different from those around him. Despite his status as a human (a mutated one, sure, but human nonetheless), he is deemed less-able than others because of his inability to walk and move around with ease. Within the reality of this comic series, however, he is one of the most powerful beings on the planet. By positioning Professor X in the panel as he is shown from the shoulders-up –where readers cannot make assumptions about his physical (or telepathic) abilities—Stan Lee and Jack Kirby essentially allow readers to begin imagining a universe in which all people are capable of super things, regardless of their physical differences. Whether there are mutations in their genes, or the loss of mobility in their limbs, every main character in the X-Men reality is on a level playing field, and this panel drives that home.