Art by Russel Dauterman
- Name: Tabitha Smith
- Code Names: Time Bomb, Boom Boom, Boomer, Meltdown
- First Appearance: Secret Wars II (Nov ’85)
- Powers: Creates Energy Time Bombs
- Teams Affiliation: Fallen Angels, X-Factor, X-Force, X-Terminators, New Mutants, Nextwave
About
Do you ever think about escaping your life? Forgetting everything you have, everyone you know, everywhere you’ve ever been, and just running away. It’s the dream of the outcasts and the loners, start fresh without anyone having any preconceived notions of who you are or what you could do. Tabitha Smith was one of the few bold, or stupid enough, to actually run away and use her mutant gift to make a better life for herself. The mutant known as Boom Boom would always be a weird inspiration, an abrasive, vapid, and vain character who fans love because she choose to be those things. Whether she went by Boom Boom, Time Bomb, Boomer, or Meltdown, Tabby made sure she was in control of her own destiny from day one, and she has never relented.
Tabitha first appeared in issue #5 of the giant cross-over event (or Jim Shooter’s mid-life crisis depending on who you ask) known as Secret Wars II by Shooter and Al Millgrom. The Beyonder, who had been on a quest to find the meaning of life, the universe, and everything, got very frustrated with a train and used his immense cosmic power to disassemble it in the blink of an eye. Riding on the train was 13 year old Tabitha Smith, calling herself Time Bomb, who was ecstatic to find someone else with powers like her. Tabby told The Beyonder that she was a mutant and she was on her way to Westchester to join some school she had heard about there for mutants. The two stayed together and Tabitha told him about her life, how she could generate “time bombs”, how so many of her friends were lost to drugs or suicide, how her father beat her because she was a mutant, and how she was running away to this school she had heard about for a better future. Eventually the pair made it to the Xavier Institute and there The Beyonder was immediately attacked by the X-Men and the New Mutants, the god decided he wanted no part in this and ran off.
Tabitha was devastated and alone, feeling like the last person in the world she could trust had abandoned her she set a huge time bomb and held it close. She called out to The Beyonder saying he would save her if he ever cared. One for dramatic rescues, The Beyonder saved Tabitha and they traveled out into space to the Worldcomplex Headquarters of the Celestials, home of the slumbering space gods and intergalactic tourist trap. There The Beyonder revealed his true nature when he challenged the Celestials to stop him from destroying all reality. He tried to calm Tabitha down by giving her whatever she wanted, to be beautiful, to be older, to be normal, but Tabitha Smith was always comfortable in her own skin and just wanted to go home. Her request was granted.
Art by Al Milgrom, Steve Leialoha, Joe Rubinstein, and Many Hands
Tabitha called out for The Beyonder one last time. He was overjoyed that his friend wanted him again, he had almost given up trying to understand what life means. They embraced as Boom Boom rambled about having to live for the moment and then started running away. That’s when the time bomb she slipped into his back pocket exploded and the combined might of the Avengers, the West Coast Avengers, Thor, Dr. Strange, and the Fantastic Four appeared to apprehend The Beyonder. The trailer park trash had tipped them of to save the universe.
Art by Al Milgrom, Steve Leialoha, Joe Rubinstein, and Many Hands
Boom Boom, as began calling herself, fell in with the classic X-Men villain Vanisher and his all girl gang of thieves. She was good at her job, if not a little overt, but often butted heads with her boss, threatening to call in the mutant hunting X-Terminators (who were actually X-Factor in disguise, it’s a long, and poorly thought out, story) on him if she didn’t get her way. He called her bluff and Boom Boom don’t back down to no one. Beast and Iceman took the case and tracked down the two, unsurprisingly Vanishier vanished, leaving Boom Boom without a home. X-Factor took her in to help teach her to control her mutant gifts. She teamed back up with the Vanisher in the Fallen Angels mini-series, which also featured Sunspot, Multiple Man, Devil Dinosaur, and two lobsters named Bill and Don among others, going on a bizarre intergalactic adventure. She returned in time to help her fellow young mutant rescues from X-Factor escape the clutches of their once ally Cameron Hodge and his soldiers of The Right.
Boom Boom continued to train with her fellow mutants, growing close with them and finally having some sort of family. In the Inferno event two members of that family, Artie and Leech, were taken by the demon N’astirh and Boom Boom helped the older kids organize a rescue, taking on the team name the X-Terminators. After the success of the mission, where they teamed up with the New Mutants, the groups decided to join forces. The two teams integrated together well and Tabitha began a relationship with their leader Cannonball.
Art by Jon Bogdanove, Al Milgrom, and John Wllington
When Cable began leading the kids, and turned the team into a proactive task group known as X-Force, Boom Boom stayed on and further developed her powers. She continued her relationship with Cannonball, who was the only other member remaining from the New Mutants, and rebranded herself as Boomer. After Cable left the group, Cannonball was promoted to the team’s leader and with nowhere else to go, moved to team into the X-Mansion. Boomer’s relationship with Cannonball became strained and she began confiding in Sabertooth, who the X-Men were holding captive. The girl was naïve enough to trust him and used one of his time bombs to free him from his captivity. Sabertooth had been biding his time and critically injured Psylocke in his escape.
Art by Rob Liefeld and Brad Vancata
Boomer was doing a lot of self-reflection after this and decided to reconcile with her father. Unfortunately, her father was caught in the crossfire of a fight between supervillains and this guilt weight heavily on Tabitha. She took another new code name, Meltdown, and a more aggressive attitude like her mentor Cable. She remained on X-Force when it was revamped as a covert ops team under Peter Wisdom and she was able to rekindle her relationship with Cannonball, at least for a short time.
Some time later, Tabitha joined the Highest Anti-Terrorism Effort, or H.A.T.E. while going under her given name. When it was discovered that H.A.T.E. was being funded by the Beyond Corporation, a constant foe of H.A.T.E., Tabitha and her team defected and formed NEXTWAVE to combat Beyond on their own. Tabby was written in this series like Paris Hilton with time bombs and most previous canon was thrown out the window but it was funny and fantastic and I loved it. At the end of this (and this was a very recent retcon to fix Nextwave’s complicated continuity status) the members of the team had their memories altered and people didn’t have any recollection of these adventures.
Art by Stuart Immonen, Wade von Grawbadger, and Dave McCaig
The anti-mutant group The Saipan League captured Tabitha, who was back to going by Boom Boom, and the new X-Force made it a mission to rescue her. Unfortunately the team was shunted into the future and a bullet was put in the head of Tabitha Smith.
Art by Clayton Crain
Must Read
Nextwave is easily the best comic that Boom Boom has ever been a part of. It is smart, funny, beautifully drawn, and is one of the most enjoyable books to read again and again. But it isn’t an in character story for Tabby, it takes her vanity at face value and not as a result of her choice to have something for herself. The Louise Simonson X-Factor does the best job at developing Boom Boom as a living, breathing, mischievous character, but it is a bit dated and doesn’t have all of the fun that Ellis gave to the character. The best amalgamation of the two comes from Dennis Hopeless’s Cable and X-Force run from Marvel Now. Here Boom Boom goes back to her X-Force roots and has a bomb going on missions with her team. It makes her funny and impulsive without coming off as hopelessly stupid, like she could in Nextwave. This series was spiritually followed up with a Secret Wars series called Inferno which once again proved that Hopeless should be writing more Boom Boom. This run can be found on Marvel Unlimited or in four trades on Amazon.
Art by Salvador Larroca, and Frank D’Armata
Hu? What do you mean I didn’t talk about Cable and X-Force? Why do you think Boom Boom is dead? Wait what’s that? A temporal vortex? What could be on the other side?
About
After finishing their mission in the far future, X-Force was sent back moments before they left and were able to eliminate the leader of The Saipan League before Boom Boom could be killed.
Boom Boom sided with Cyclops after the Schism but soon joined Cable on a mission to prevent threats to humanity and mutant kind before they happened. She was recruited by her former X-Force teammate Domino to infiltrate a S.W.O.R.D. base and enjoys turning plan A into plan G with a well-placed time bomb. When the team disbanded Boom Boom was left with nowhere to go. She returned to Utopia and took an isolationist stance alongside other mutants, calling themselves the Utopians. The Original Five X-Men came to the island and convinced the Utopians to return with them to their home in the Canadian Rockies. It felt like Bendis had much larger plans for the Utopians, Boom Boom included, but they had to be truncated to make way for Secret Wars. Boom Boom has yet to appear in the All-New All-Different Marvel Universe but I am holding out hope the Dennis Hopeless gets a chance to write her again soon.
Art by Mahmuh Asrar and Rain Beredo
Ranking
I like Boom Boom. Not as much as @intoitpodcast host Elle Collins but I still like Boom Boom. I think it is really effective to have a character who is pretty unlikable from an objective stance turn into someone you want to root for. Boom Boom is kind of inspiring because she always has control over her destiny and makes sure she is the woman she want to be, even if that woman is vain and materialistic. Even the X-Men: Evolution animated series got this perfect when Boom Boom decides not to live with the X-Men and not to work with the Brotherhood, she does what she wants. Looking at the center of the list, I am more excited when Boom Boom shows up than I am when Globby does so she is at least in the top half. While I love her arc, I think my feelings on Maggott are pretty strongly stated so she has to go below him. So for two weeks in a row, that leaves Rachel and the deciding factor. They are about as old but by virtue of her bloodline, Rachel is way more important. Rachel is more conflicted but Boom Boom is just more fun. Since this is my list Tabitha Smith is going to explode above Rachel Grey as the new number 5 here on the Xavier Files.
Boom Boom was requested by friend of the blog and official Xavier Files Iceman Award for efforts in being a Cool Dude winner @mistaketheory! Thanks for the request, it was a blast (get it? A blast? Because she makes time bombs?)! If YOU have a character you want me to do, send me a message on my Ask Box and I’ll get it added to the list. If you send it anonymously I can’t respond privately to you which means if there is an issue or something I think you should know, I can’t tell you and who wants that.
If you liked what you read be sure to subscribe to the tumblr so you never miss an update. You can also follow me on twitter @Xavierfiles where I throw out my thoughts about the X-Books that come out each week. That’s also where I harass Cullen Bunn and Dennis Hopeless about getting Maggott back into the X-Men books, join in on that fun with #BringBackMaggott!
Next time we go behind the music to look at the life of bouncer, turned government agent, turned detective, turned king of hell when we talk about the lovable oaf (and not Homestar Runner character) known as Strong Guy! See you Tuesday!
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.
