- Name: Forge
- Code Names: Maker
- First Appearance: Uncanny X-Men #184 (Aug ’84)
- Powers: He makes stuff
- Teams Affiliation: X-Men, X-Factor, X-Force
About
By trade, I am an engineer. I take a concept and turn it into stuff. In practice this involves a ton of meetings and a liberal use of the Microsoft Office Suite combined with the occasional technical discussion that ends with someone saying “yup that seems right”, but I digress. There is a weird mystique to the engineer, to the inventor. Pop culture seems to think that give them a cave and a box of scraps and they could build a robot suit. In reality engineers tend to be hyper specialized and also not allowed around the screwdrivers much less a MIG welder. Still every superhero team needs their own inventor, and when Beast isn’t around the X-Men have Forge.
Forge was born Cheyenne and dedicated himself to his people. He was trained as a shaman by a man named Naze, but has was torn. Forge saw himself as a futurist, he saw the old ways of his tribe as irrelevant in a world torn apart by war. He left his tribe and enlisted in the Army, determined to be a warrior. In the jungles of Vietnam, Forge’s dreams of glory were crushed by the brutal reality of the conflict. He killed boys his age, saw friends die, it strengthened his determination to get his fellow soldiers home safe.
One day, a fateful one, Forge’s unit was ordered to hold a valley against Viet Cong soldiers. The VC got the upper hand and slaughtered Forge’s men. Enraged, Forge reached deep, back to his roots, and summoned a spell, forbidden and dark. With the nine souls of his fallen comrades, Forge opened a gateway to a demonic realm that slaughtered his attackers. In a moment of clarity, Forge realized what he was doing but he could close the path. He ordered a B-52 bombing run on the valley to close the portal, it only cost him his hand and leg.
After the war, Forge became bitter. More than just turn his back on it, Forge utterly disowned his native heritage and embraced his mutant gifts. He was able to make anything, to invent whatever he dreamed up. When Tony Stark quit developing weapons, Forge was more than willing to take up the job. Of special note was a device called the Neutralizer that could shut down any superpower. It was just a prototype but that didn’t stop Henry Peter Gyrich from using it to capture the mutant criminal Rogue. The shot didn’t meet its’ target and instead his Storm, a fact that Forge felt immense guilt about.
He took Storm to his home, Eagle Plaza in Dallas, and tried to bring her back to health. He understood what it was like to have a part of yourself stolen, he tried to help her through that loss. He was taken by her, many were, and she began to fall for the broken thing that he was. Their romance would have been timeless if he hadn’t hidden his role in depowering her. Storm left him and Forge remained bitter and alone.
After a team up with ROM Spaceknight that will never be reprinted, Forge decided to put right the wrong he did in Vietnam (these two events were probably unrelated). He tried to trap the demonic Adversary back but Storm had been manipulated into believing that he was unleashing the horde into the world. She shoved a knife into his heart, unaware that the Adversary was only using her. Forge and Storm were sent into a pocket dimension where they spent a year living together. All the lies and attempted murder didn’t matter when they were the only people on the planet. They embraced their love until Forge invented a way home. He used his magic to seal the Adversary away, but like a magic, it had a price. Nine souls for the nine he used in Vietnam. Storm and the X-Men were willing sacrifices and Forge was left alone again.
Thanks to a vision, Forge believed that Storm was still alive and made it his mission to find the X-Men. After stopping by Muir Island, Forge teamed up with Banshee and began his quest to figure out where his love went. They met up with X-Factor and got roped into the conflict on Genosha where Forge finally found his lover again, but something had changed. Forge had found the closest thing to balance he ever had and Storm had been deaged, re-aged, and generally messed with plenty. He thought a proposal would fix everything, but Storm hesitated when he asked for her hand. It didn’t matter that Storm would have said yes, the fact that she wasn’t sure was too much for him. He left her and the X-Men.
In the time between, Forge began taking care of Mystique. They had a lot in common, both had been used as assets by the government, both had lost something they loved dearly. Forge took a role leading the government-sponsored X-Factor team and began to transform the group. He brought Mystique into the group and that lead to a darker organization, one Forge wasn’t comfortable with. After failing to prevent the assassination of Grayson Creed the team disbanded, and Forge returned to Eagle Plaza, helping the X-Men when needed.
After M-Day, Forge became obsessed with fixing the mutant race. He was the Maker, he could do something about this. It drove him to madness and he began splicing human DNA to create what he thought were “new mutants”. He also learned of an invasion from an alternate dimension and planned to use his mutants to combat them. The X-Men were horrified by the murder and carnage Forge was willing to commit, the scarcely saw him as Forge any longer. SWORD was unwilling to reason with him and threatened to destroy his base with an orbital laser. The X-Men tried to save him, but Forge was truly lost and wanted to go down with his ship.
He did not die, but remained a crazed hermit, his mind broken. Cable, wanting the Maker’s help, used his telepathy to make Forge see his mind as a machine, as something he could fix. Forge regained his clarity and joined Cable’s short-lived X-Force squad. After that was over Forge finally rejoined the X-Men and was the primary support during the M-Pox crisis. Strangely, he developed a strong friendship with Lunella Lafayette, the nine-year-old smartest person on Earth. He continues to build, fix, and try and solve the world.
Must Read
Forge is in a fair number of stories but none of them as close to as good as Uncanny X-Men #186. This classic story called Lifedeath gives him a chance to play off Storm in the most satisfying exploration of their relationship. Forge is a fascinating character in this one-shot, equal parts mysterious and enthralling. You truly believe his relationship with Storm means something to both of them, even if they only just met. It is an X-Men classic for a reason so you should pick it up and give it a reread.
Ranking
Forge is a solid supporting character, but not much else. He works well playing off others, but solo stories fall flat. He isn’t bad by any means, but he isn’t going to be on the shortlist for a team. He is better developed than the similarly powered Wiz Kid but Longshot is a much more exciting character to read about. He is better than someone like Layla Miller who was fascinating right up until the moment she wasn’t, but I think Danger can be used in a lot of the same way’s as Forge only more interestingly. That puts Forge in as the new number 73 in the Xavier Files.
Forge was requested by Patreon supporter Stephen Koppel. Thank you for your support! If you have a request for how about you send it below? If you want to cut to the front of the two-year long line, we have a Patreon you can support Xavier Files for just $1 to get a line cutting reward.
Make sure you check out my podcast BATTLE OF THE ATOM. It’s where Bish & Jubez creator Adam Reck and I talk about every single X-Men story that ever existed and rank them from best to worst. Episode 30 is up and we become a Spider-Man podcast. Make sure you subscribe to any of the following platforms (or others, I’m not picky) Apple Podcasts | Google Play | Stitcher | RSS.
If you liked what you read be sure to follow Xavier Files on twitter, Tumblr, Facebook!
Next week we get magical with Pixie! See you then!
[formidable id=”4″]
Zachary Jenkins co-hosts the podcast Battle of the Atom and is the former editor-in-chief of ComicsXF. Shocking everyone, he has a full and vibrant life outside all this.
