In Left Unresolved, I spotlight storylines that have been, well, left unresolved.

Today, we look at what the deal is with Brian Xavier.

The first time we learned about Brian Xavier, Charles Xavier's birth father is when we first met the Juggernaut. The Juggernaut, you see, was Charles Xavier's step-brother and we first saw (in X-Men #12 by Stan Lee, Jack Kirby, Alex Toth and Vince Colletta) how the two met as children after Brian Xavier was killed in an explosion and his colleague, Kurt Marko, became Xavier's step-father...

Okay, now, obviously you all know about Weapon X, right? You don't need me to tell you that there was an experiment committed on Logan where he had adamantium injected into his body to turn him into a perfect killing machine. However, in the early 1990s, Wolverine also discovered that he did not really remember what happened to him during his life. He discovered that he had memory implants from the Weapon X project, which was far wider in scope than just a simple experiment on a single mutant.

In Wolverine #49 (by Larry Hama, Marc Silvestri and Dan Green), Wolverine asks Professor X for help breaking through all the messed up things that have been done to his memory and help him learn more about his past...

The next issue, we discovered how the Weapon X project had intentionally CREATED false memories for Wolverine and the other members of the project through the use of elaborate sets (Wolverine toured an old Weapon X facility while Xavier and the X-Men hung back collecting data from Wolverine'e exploration)...

Wolverine unknowingly triggered a computer program known as Shiva, which creates robots to fight mutants...

As it turned out, Shiva was designed as a back-up in case the Weapon X participants went rogue. So Shiva was designed to kill Wolverine, Sabretooth, Maverick, etc. and it came with the ability to learn from its losses, so it could alter itself in its next fight so Wolverine can't kill it the same way the second time...

Okay, so that all sets the scene pretty well for X-Men #12-13, but I think there should be one more thing added. X-Men #12 was the first issue of X-Men (the 1991 version of the series) that came out after Jim Lee left the book. This was a weird little period where it seemed like Art Thibert was going to take over as the new penciler on the series, but then Thibert ALSO left to join Image Comics.

Fabian Nicieza was now the writer on the book.

In a back-up story in X-Men #10-11 (by Scott Lobdell and Mark Texeira), Maverick hunted down a scientist who had seemingly stolen an "Xavier File," Alexander Ryking, and Maverick ends up killing him, even though Ryking insists that he did not steal the file...

Page 2: [valnet-url-page page=2 paginated=0 text='Guess who got that file?']

In X-Men #12, Wolverine discovers the "Xavier file" in Xavier's office and he confronts Xavier over the fact that the file seems to indicate that Brian Xavier was secretly involved in genetic mutation...

Later, at the funeral of Alexander Ryking, Ryking's son, Carter, shows up, who also is a mutant! He is the one who sent the file to Charles...

Carter thinks that their parents' work was designed to CREATE them as mutants.

The X-Men travel to the base to find some answers, but instead find Carter (now calling himself Hazard). He fights the X-Men all issue long and they ultimately defeat him, but in the process, discover that there's nothing there to prove what Brian Xavier was up to. As they leave, though, a piece of paper suggests that Brian Xavier was behind the Shiva construct that we showed before as part of Weapon X!

Many moons later, in X-Men: Legacy #211 (by Mike Carey and Scot Eaton), we learn that Nathan Milbury (Mister Sinister) also worked with Xavier and Ryking and his plan was to pick co-workers who had the X-Gene and then make it so that Sinister could later take over their mutant children if he needed a body when his current one broke down. He tried to take over Xavier's body in the present but failed.

Xavier sort of confirms it the next issue...

However, none of that confirms whether Brian Xavier did or did not try to create a mutant son for himself. Plus it doesn't show whether he was involved in Weapon X. It's just a big ol' case of an unresolved storyline.

If anyone has a suggestion for an unresolved comic book plot, drop me a line at brianc@cbr.com!