BEACON

Beacon is from Dallas, Texas. He was on his school's football team and appeared to be very much a typical high school student until his mutant powers emerged. He was found by Mr Sinister before the X-Men. Sinister manipulated Derek into thinking he would be ostracized by his peers now that he was a mutant and that they needed to stick together. He tricked Beacon into lashing out with his powers while on the football field in attempt to lure the X-Men. When they arrived, Beacon played his role of the hapless “new mutant” with out of control powers. Sinister ambushed the X-Men and had Beacon encase them in his gels, all excluding Jubilee who managed to escape. When Sinister was distracted, Jubilee managed to reach Beacon and convince him to help her fight Sinister. With Beacon defected, he let the X-Men go free and they fought off Sinister who fled. He was offered a place at the school in Westchester, however he opted to remain in Dallas. He wanted a normal life, to finish school and eventually go to college.

The comics in which Beacon were introduced were part of the restaurant chain, Pizza Hut, promotional tie-in with Marvel Comics. It was admittedly a strange match-up and he has yet to reappear. Potentially Marvel does not own the rights to this character and he is owned by Pizza Hut? Interestingly the issues were written by Scott Lobdell who was writing the main X-Title at the time of publication and featured X-Men were not all part of the popular 90s cartoon. Based on the line-up and the choice of writer it appears there was an concentrated attempt by the powers that be for Beacon to at least have the veneer of being a "canon" character.