This might be my strangest “X-Men X-Plainer” yet. My previous two (Cable and Sabretooth) were time consuming due to the sheer volume of their appearances over the years and determining what was essential to understanding their characters and what could be discarded. The Complete Marvel Reading Order website (an invaluable tool for a nerd like me) credits Cable with appearing in 662 comic book issues to date, and Sabretooth is credited with appearing in 470 issues to date. Those numbers are continually increasing on a monthly basis too. Bastion is a much different beast. The same website credits Bastion with appearing in a measly eighty-five issues as I write this. That is a paltry number for an X-Men villain, but something tells me that number is about to go up in the near future. Despite his relatively few appearances, Bastion has a rather complicated history. To understand Bastion, you first have to understand the Sentinels.
Sentinels made their debut in Uncanny X-Men #14 by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby all the way back in 1965. As a quick aside, I will be referring to the original X-Men series as Uncanny X-Men even though the “Uncanny” wasn’t added to the title until 1981 in order to differentiate it from the X-Men sister series that was launched in 1991. Sentinels are pretty straightforward. They’re giant robots created by an anti-mutant bigot named Bolivar Trask to hunt down and capture or kill mutants. They are able to detect anyone carrying the mutant gene. It’s revealed in Uncanny X-Men #16 (also by Lee and Kirby) that Trask has also created an even larger sentient Sentinel called Master Mold that doubles as a factory capable of churning out new Sentinels.
Trask ultimately sacrifices himself to destroy the Master Mold after it determines that both mutants and normal humans need to be eliminated, but this very early story sets the template for how Sentinels would operate in the future. The original ‘90s animated series adapted this story pretty well.
The important thing to note is that Sentinels serve as the physical manifestation of bigotry in a world where superheroes exist. People with superpowers aren’t going to struggle too much with real world groups like the Proud Boys, but robots that stand three stories tall and can shoot lasers out of their hands are going to be a problem.
Sentinels would make numerous appearances throughout the ‘60s and ‘70s as recurring threats for the X-Men, but we wouldn’t see another Master Mold show up until Incredible Hulk Annual #7 (1978) by Roger Stern and John Byrne. The massive Sentinel is ultimately defeated by the Hulk and X-Men aboard a space station before it explodes and its debris plummets to the ocean below. File that in your memory banks for later.
One of the most famous X-Men stories involving Sentinels came in the pages of Uncanny X-Men #141-142 (1981) by Chris Claremont and John Byrne. Known as “Days of Future Past,” it tells the story of a dystopian future in which Sentinels have taken control of society and have either exterminated or imprisoned the majority of the mutant population and their allies. I’ll probably go further in depth on this story at some point in the future, but the key point here is that time travel shenanigans ensue to try to prevent this nightmare future from coming to pass. It’s also worth pointing out that this story was published three years before Terminator was released in cinemas. I’m not accusing James Cameron of stealing someone else’s story, but Harlan Ellison certainly did.
While the time travel shenanigans successfully prevent the main continuity timeline from reaching that dystopian future, that alternate timeline still exists. Once you introduce time travel shenanigans into a story, it’s all but impossible to not go back to that well. In Uncanny X-Men #191 (1985) by Chris Claremont and John Romita, Jr., a new kind of Sentinel from the “Days of Future Past” timeline travels back in time to present day to continue the hunt for mutants. Its name is Nimrod.
Nimrod is a very big problem. While Sentinels have traditionally been portrayed as giant robots that stand at least three stories tall, Nimrod is the size of a (very large) human. He also has a distinctive look (love that white and pink color scheme) that makes him stand out from his mechanics predecessors. He’s able to quickly adapt to the superpowers of the mutants he fights, and he’s able to repair himself almost immediately after sustaining damage. He’s not unlike the T-1000 from Terminator 2: Judgment Day that hit cinemas six years after Nimrod’s debut. I’m really starting to suspect that James Cameron was reading comics in the ‘80s. Anyway, the string of stories centered around Nimrod wrap up in Uncanny X-Men #209 (1986) by Claremont and Romita when he is defeated by the combined might of the X-Men and Hellfire Club. He does, however, manage to teleport away before Wolverine can deliver the coup de grace.
Remember when the X-Men and Hulk destroyed that Master Mold up in space? It turns out that a giant sentient robot factory isn’t exactly easy to kill. We learn in X-Factor #13 (1987) by Louise Simonson and Walt Simonson that he has been slowly rebuilding himself at the bottom of the ocean using any raw materials that drift his way.
Now rebuilt enough to once again cause some damage, he makes his way to Anchorage to eliminate the nearest mutant threat: Cyclops. The story continues in the following issue, and it’s a banger. It’s just Cyclops going toe to toe with a not-quite-fully-operational Master Mold in Alaska. Cyclops is a badass, so he manages to obliterate the hunk of junk at a construction site. You’d think Cyclops might have made sure it was down for good knowing that this thing can repair itself from scrapped parts, but he just leaves the debris behind at a construction site. Maybe not the best move.
For those keeping track at home, we have one Sentinel from the future that can repair itself and adapt to various mutant powers that is on the loose somewhere and one Sentinel from present day that can repair itself with just about any spare parts it can locate. Those are two problems that seem pretty severe to me. I wonder what would happen if the two came into contact with one another? Wonder no more because that’s exactly what happens in Uncanny X-Men #246-247 (1989) by Chris Claremont and Marc Silvestri. Claremont is often praised for the way he sets up and pays off long running plot threads over multiple years (think “Dark Phoenix Saga” and “Inferno”), but I’ve always appreciated his ability to write a two-issue arc that is jam packed with action. This is an excellent example. Essentially what happens is Nimrod comes into contact with Master Mold’s hard drive, and Master Mold begins rebuilding itself using Nimrod. Since Nimrod is also a sentient Sentinel that can repair and regenerate itself, the two basically merge together to form one giant hybrid Sentinel. This is not good news for mutants.
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As you might expect, this leads to the X-Men fighting this monstrosity. It’s as good a comic book fight as you can hope to see. Silvestri is also at the top of his game illustrating it. The fight goes as poorly for the X-Men as you might imagine. No matter what they do to it, the Sentinel just pulls itself back together and keeps on fighting. This is where things get weird. The X-Men at this time are currently in possession of a magical artifact called the Siege Perilous. I’m not going to get into all of the lore surrounding this item, but the important thing to know is that it opens a portal and grants anyone who steps through it the life that they deserve. The X-Men decide to shove the sentient robot through said portal and hope that takes care of the problem. Unfortunately, Rogue gets pushed through it as well. Whoopsie. Don’t worry, kids. She’ll be fine.
Now let’s jump ahead to the ‘90s. Specifically, let’s jump to 1996. This was a strange year not just for the X-Men, but for the comic book industry as a whole. The speculator bubble had finally popped, and the industry was facing some pretty dire financial straits. Marvel had staved off its collapse in part by launching the “Age of Apocalypse” event that consumed the entire line of X-Men comics in 1995. They were desperate to replicate that success, so they spent most of 1996 by having the X-Men deal with a new global threat from a character called Onslaught. I will almost certainly do an “X-Men X-Plainer” on him one day. Marvel ended up putting all of their eggs in the Onslaught basket, and they eventually had virtually every book they were publishing at the time become involved with Onslaught in some way or another. While everyone was distracted by Onslaught, a shadowy figure popped up in the pages of X-Men #52 (1996) by Mark Waid and Andy Kubert: a man named Bastion.
We did it! We finally got to Bastion himself. All we get is an image of someone in a trench coat, but it’s a start. It’s implied that he is a government agent of sorts with an anti-mutant agenda. The next time we see Bastion is in Uncanny X-Men #333-334 (1996) by Scott Lobdell and artists Pasqual Ferry and Joe Madureira. Bastion is seen giving a presentation at the Pentagon as he lays out the mission objectives of his own top secret government force called Operation: Zero Tolerance. He describes as a human survival task force, but it’s clear what he really means is it’s a mutant extermination force. He follows up his little presentation by going to New Hampshire and meeting presidential hopeful and anti-mutant bigot (and son of Sabretooth and Mystique) Graydon Creed. It’s pretty clear that Bastion is the one pulling Creed’s strings. He basically lurks on the periphery during the Onslaught escapades, and then he exploits the situation to ascend to power within the American government.
When Charles Xavier takes responsibility for the deaths and destruction caused by Onslaught and turns himself in, Bastion makes his play. He kicks off the “Operation: Zero Tolerance” event when he kidnaps Jubilee in Generation X #25 (1997) by Scott Lobdell and Chris Bachalo. Bastion’s plan is mess with Jubilee’s mind in order to trick her into divulging all of the X-Men’s secrets. The event really kicks off in full in X-Men #65 (1997) by Scott Lobdell and Carlos Pacheco. Bastion launches simultaneous attacks on the X-Men all across the country using his secret weapon: Prime Sentinels.
What are Prime Sentinels? In short, they are human-robot hybrids enhanced with futuristic technology to hunt down and capture or kill mutants. They also all dress like Bastion. What a narcissist. For as silly as they might look, they are most definitely a problem. While many of them are the result of volunteers signing up to become mutant killing machines, others are essentially sleeper agents who have no idea that they have been technologically enhanced. Bastion has the ability to awaken them at any moment to join his crusade against mutantkind.
That makes them even more dangerous than their gigantic counterparts as they are able to move stealthily among the populace without suspicion.
The event itself suffers from some of the pitfalls that plagued most events from this time period. It’s mostly a case of the villains striking the heroes, the heroes regrouping, and then the heroes striking back at the villains before the cycle starts over again. For the amount of story actually contained within the event, it probably could have been told in eight or ten issues. Instead, this story is told over the course of twenty-three issues. It’s just way too bloated. That said, there are certainly some fun things to pull out of this story.
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One of the best things to come out of the event was Iceman getting a starring role after a lengthy stretch of being mostly sidelined in X-Men comics. We also get a couple of newcomers in Marrow and Maggot joining the X-Men, so that’s fun.
Easily the strangest thing about “Operation: Zero Tolerance” is what we don’t learn. Namely, we are never told what Bastion’s deal is or how he acquired the futuristic technology required to create the Prime Sentinels. It seems like the kind of information that would come to light over the course of the story. Nope! Bastion’s backstory wouldn’t be revealed until an epilogue issue after he had already been defeated.
It would be told in a one-shot comic called Machine Man/Bastion Annual #1 (1998) by Mike Higgins, Karl Bollers, and Martin Egeland. It involves Cable and Machine Man of all people having to deal with Bastion who is trying to turn Machine Man into a Sentinel. This dude loves Sentinels! This issue finally explains why. Remember when the Master Mold and Nimrod hybrid was shoved through the Siege Perilous? Well going through that portal caused it to become human. That’s right. Bastion is that Sentinel made human.
Bastion mostly falls by the wayside once the ‘90s end, but he plays a major role in the relaunched X-Force #1-6 (2008) by Craig Kyle, Chris Yost, and Clayton Crain. The Christofascist Purifiers wish to bring him back online to exterminate mutants as part of their anti-mutant religious zealotry, and it’s up to X-Force to handle the problem by any means necessary. The Purifiers think they can control Bastion, but he is simply not someone who follows orders. Bastion is the one who gives orders. He quickly seized a leadership position and proceeds to use the techno-organic alien known as Magus to resurrect some of the worst anti-mutant mass murderers in history to form his own council of hate.
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This dude is the worst. Bastion and his group concoct a needlessly complicated plan that is thwarted by X-Force, but he managed to escape to fight another day. The usual.
Bastion isn’t gone for long. He re-emerges as the primary antagonist for the “Second Coming” line wide X-Men event that launched in 2010. This event was kicked off when Hope (the mutant messiah who was taken into the future to be trained by Cable as a child) returns to the present as a teenager along with Cable. Her return triggers a response from basically every anti-mutant hate group on the planet with Bastion being the one leading the crusade to find and kill her.
Bastion is at his most terrifying during this event. He has steadily grown more machine and less human since his initial appearance back in 1996, and this version of him is almost entirely robotic by this point. The Nimrod portion of himself has data from the future indicating that Hope will trigger a new mutant genesis, so that makes killing her his top priority. He is also still leading the Human Council composed of history’s worst anti-mutant mass murderers, so that’s not great.
This is a pretty bleak and depressing time for the X-Men and mutantkind in general as there are only around 200 mutants alive on Earth following the Scarlet Witch depowering the vast majority of the mutant population during the Decimation. The writers working on this event are a real murderers’ row for the era including Mike Carey, Matt Fraction, Zeb Wells, Craig Kyle, and Chris Yost. The pencilers include David Finch, Terry Dodson, Mike Choi, Ibraim Roberson, and Greg Land.
Bastion at this point is much more robotic than he has been previously portrayed. The human aspects of him are almost entirely gone. He still operates mostly behind the scenes, but he does take matters into his own hands in X-Force #26 (2010) from Kelly, Yost, and Choi when he critically injures Rogue and Nightcrawler while trying to kill Hope. He later opens up a time portal in X-Men Legacy #236 (2010) by Carey and Land in order to allow Nimrod Sentinels from his future to come into present day to try and wipe out the X-Men. He’s really going for broke in this event! He’s ultimately defeated when an extremely pissed off Hope summons all of her Omega level might and annihilates him. I feel confident that we won’t be seeing him again.
Just kidding. He pops up again in X-Men: Blue #3 (2017) by Cullen Bunn and Jorge Molina looking much more like his traditional self. He tells the X-Men that he’s on their side this time. This story was published when Marvel was attempting to replace the X-Men with the Inhumans because they were being petty about the movie rights belonging to Fox, so the mutant population was falling to dangerously low levels while the number of Inhumans was skyrocketing. Bastion offers his assistance to help boost the number of mutants and stave off their extinction so that he can then have the privilege of wiping them out himself. Shockingly, the X-Men turn down his offer. He mostly lurks around the edges of the book for much of the series before joining Havok, Emma Frost, and Miss Sinister of all people in a plot to use biotech from the Ultimate Universe to create new mutants and make them the dominant species on the planet. Again, his motive for this is essentially so he can take more pride in exterminating them at a later date. It’s an odd alliance. Regardless of his motivations, his story comes to a close when Xorn shows up and sucks him into the singularity inside of his head when he takes his mask off in X-Men: Blue #28 (2018) by Cullen Bunn and Marcus To.
And that’s a wrap for Bastion! He hasn’t appeared in a comic book since. I’m a little surprised he never showed up during the Krakoan era considering the primary villains over the last five years have been a new version of Nimrod and the Omega Sentinel (an improved version of Bastion’s Prime Sentinels). Perhaps he will return once this current era concludes this summer. Either way, I suspect he is about to experience a sudden surge in popularity thanks to a certain animated series set in 1997.