The X-Axis – 26 August 2024
X-MEN: FROM THE ASHES INFINITY COMIC #12. By Alex Paknadel, Phillip Sevy, Arthur Hesli & Clayton Cowles. Some From the Ashes arcs have been rather obviously designed to yank a character into a new status quo so that a main line title doesn’t have to waste time on it. The Omega Red arc isn’t one of those, and turns out to be just a nice little story about a violent murderer returning to the miserable town where he grew up. There’s some low-level villainy for him to deal with but it’s more of a character and tone piece than anything else. I’m all for trying to round out Omega Red, who’s a very one-dimensional character with rather convoluted powers – honestly, I’ve never really understood what links the tentacles, the death spores and everything else about him. A perfectly fine little story designed to flesh him out a bit, without actually toning him down too much.
SAVAGE WOLVERINE INFINITY COMIC #5. By Tom Bloom, Guillermo Sana, Java Tartaglia & Joe Sabino. It’s a middle chapter of an Infinity Comic and so there’s not much to add to what I’ve said before: it’s a small town body horror story, pleasingly low key and well executed. Certainly at the high end of the range for Infinity Comics and worth a look if you have a subscription. (And if you don’t… well, Unlimited is very good value for the archives and for almost the whole Marvel line on a three month delay, but the Infinity Comics exclusives are at best in the “nice to have” category, rather than being a reason to sign up in themselves.)
X-MEN #3. (Annotations here.) The O*N*E try to raid the Factory and it doesn’t go well. We’re still doing single-issue stories with background elements building towards a bigger picture, but they’re getting a little bit more prominent by this stage. Having read Jed MacKay’s Moon Knight and Dr Strange, this approach doesn’t come as a surprise to me, and it worked out well on those titles. It is fair to say that we’re devoting the A plot of each issue to fights against comprehensively outpowered bad guys, and I’m not entirely sold on Agent Lundqvist as a rival for Cyclops – he seems like a standard issue government bigot at this point, but we’ll see how it goes. I do like Ryan Stegman’s design for him, though – it’s nice to have a few more normal people in this book for a change. There are some creative bits in the action sequences, and a bit more going on with Scott than you might assume, with his established persona starting to fray a little around the edges. The book is settling in well.
NYX #2. (Annotations here.) Looks like we’re doing the approach of spotlight issues on each character, which is fine, but can be an odd way of building an ensemble cast, since it takes the better part of a year before they actually get around to being an ensemble. Some interesting choices here. If we’re calling the book NYX then it makes sense for Laura to be calling back to her roots in that title, and I’m fine with the idea of her instinctively separating herself from the mutant community that she thinks she’s protecting, only joining it as a means to an end. Mojo is a really odd choice of villain for the street level book, but then again he’s being retooled as a more sinister and violent version than we’ve seen in years, and god knows we’ve all seen enough TV parodies to last a lifetime, so by all means let’s find a different angle. Spinning “Mojo gains power from audiences” to “Mojo gains power from a community” makes a kind of sense, even if it’s a bit of a reach for this to be a better option than running his own dimension. Still, maybe he got booted out again. On the whole I think the book gets away with using him, at least in this issue, and Francesco Mortarino makes him look more of a legitimate threat than he has been in years. Plus, it sends the message that NYX still gets to have some scale to it. I’m curious to see if the whole storyline can make him work, at least.
X-FORCE #2. (Annotations here.) Mmm. This was more readable than the first issue, but there’s still very little going on here to hold my interest. We’re doing random threat of the month here too, but it feels vastly more arbitrary, and there’s no real sense of any reason for this particular cast to be together. To be fair, I think this is partly the point – Geoffrey Thorne is trying to do something with the idea that Forge’s powers lead everyone to essentially arbitrary things because they to trust in his instincts – but I don’t think it’s translating into a satisfying story. It’s far too “This happened, and then this happened, and then…” The book looks perfectly nice, and there’s a baseline level of competence to the whole thing, but it’s not doing anything to hook me.
I’m glad the Omega Red story didn’t try to tone him down- I was afraid they were going to say he wasn’t a serial killer before the KGB got to him.
Also this week in Marvel’s 85th Anniversary story was an Excalibur story taking place in the team’s early days by Alan Davis. It was an okay story but annoyingly, it features Kitty suggesting that they try to contact Professor Xavier even though he was stuck in outer space at the time. The editors should check the continuity more in these continuity implant stores by older writers.
@Michael- They usually suck at this. I vaguely remember a backup story from twenty years ago written by Joss Whedon. I think it was about the first danger room session for the all-new, all-different X-Men right after the Krakoa mission. Sunfire was present, which he shouldn’t have been, since the first thing Sunfire did after the team got back from Krakoa was to tell Xavier to piss off before walking out the door.
Probably edited by Mike Marts.
@Moo – After Sunfire told Xavier to piss off and stormed out, he realized he’d left his keys on the Danger Room table and went back to get them and goddammit a Danger Room Sentinel started blasting away at him and what was he supposed to do just let it?
(now gimme my No-Prize!)
I mean they’ve all been to space. I wouldn’t write off trying to contact a bud because they’re in space. Especially when your bestie is the Phoenix
@Maxwell’s Hammer- Winner, winner, turkey lunch!
I’m liking the individual stories in X-Force, and the characterization. But the over-arching plot, with its breathless racing around to no defined purpose, is really leaving me cold.
Omega Red was designed with the mindset of two 12 year olds arguing.
“Nobody can beat Wolverine, he’s got claws”
“Yeah well what if I had the Constrictor’s gloves, and also they were indestructible. Then I could hold him away while I kill him.”
“It doesn’t matter, Wolverine just heals any damage.”
“Yeah well what if I had special death spores in the tentacles, that made him so sick he couldn’t heal.”
“Wolverine would go berserker rage and win.”
“Yeah well I also have a berserker rage, but I’m also a serial killer so I don’t care. And also the Russians gave me better implants than Wolverine because they’re more evil than Canada.”
“Whatever. Want to go to my house and start Image Comics?”
@Si – 100% accurate!
Well, almost. Russians aren’t more evil than Canadians. I’m Canadian. We’re just biding our time.
Moo: It’s always the polite ones, eh?
I was on the fence about X-Men but this issue won me over. X-Force, however, is getting dropped if it doesn’t pick up soon.
According to Bleeding Cool, Kate Pryde will be back to being called Kitty and will try to date at least one woman during the first issue.
Some stuff from Breevort’s blog:
Rich Johnston:Tom, quite some time ago you expressed your disdain for the character of Illyana Rasputin, Magik, and your lack of desire to do anything with the character. Now she is front and centre, can you tell us of your reconciliation towards the character?
Tom: In the past, I haven’t liked Magik pretty much at all. But that doesn’t mean that the character doesn’t have fans, lots of them. And being in the position that I’m in now means that I can prevent her from being written in the manner that used to irritate me. So there’s no problem with using her.
Archer:Tom, I wonder why some villains in the Phoenix books so far are Thor villains? Because I don’t remember Phoenix having anything to do with Thor… Can you tell us whose idea it was?
Tom: Those villains were selected by PHOENIX writer Stephanie Phillips, working in conjunction with editor Annalise Bissa, Archer. And it’s really just a coincidence that there are a few Thor foes in there, though that also makes some sense given the scale on which the Thunder God operates.
Stiles:was Kwannon being part of X-Men an editorial decision or a preference of Jed’s? I’m so happy that she can finally be in the spotlight, and I’m loving how Mackay writes her.
Tom: Psylocke being in X-MEN came out of conversations between Jed and Ryan Stegman, Stiles. I didn’t advocate for her and certainly didn’t insist on her, but I didn’t have anything against using her either. It was all a question of pulling together a line-up that Jed and Ryan could be excited about.
Arnie: I am excited about Storm joining the Avengers, but the latest trailer has me worried about her position. Storm has been a leader of many teams before but in the Avengers she’s a new recruit. Will Ororo prove herself to be a capable leader again in this team, because she looked very passive in the recent trailer and she has never been a passive character.
Tom: You’d probably need to speak to the AVENGERS editorial team more than me about this, Arnie. What I can tell you, though, is that Storm didn’t go over there to be the leader of the Avengers. And just about everybody else on that Avengers squad has leadership qualifications that are just as impressive as Ororo’s. I don’t think she’ll be passive—I don’t think that any Avenger is. But I don’t think she’s going to be providing that group with leadership especially.
Andrew Albrecht: I have a question about Phoenix Issue 2, it seems like Scott and his Dad Corsair have a very tense relationship again, when last we saw they were enjoying each others company at family dinner. Is this a new shift to their dynamic after the young cyclops time displaced adventures with his dad/Krakoan age? Or is it simply the resurfacing of past grievances?
When it comes to ending a relationship like David/Tommy (Prodigy and Speed) is that up to writers or editorial? It did feel a bit out of nowhere for me, because last we saw them together they were happy, and then we see Tommy grieving his boyfriend with his Uncle Pietro. Next thing I know David is eating Chinese takeout with his new boyfriend. Is this something we’ll understand better in Issue 4 which is supposed to focus on Prodigy?
Tom: I think that anybody can have a cordial dinner with relatives, Andrew, but that doesn’t make any underlying emotional issues disappear. And on a more basic storytelling level, it’s always more interesting when every character doesn’t get along perfectly with every other character. Corsair is a lot of aspirational things, but a good father he has not been. I wouldn’t expect any one dinner to remedy that.
In terms of the relationship between Prodigy and Speed, we weren’t the ones that broke them up, but I had no problem with that being done. People, especially young people, tend to get together and separate with a certain amount of frequency. And without a series that was carrying thier relationship forward, there wasn’t really a whole lot of good reason why Speed should be saddled with Prodigy’s baggage and vice versa. And none of this will be addressed in NYX #4, sorry. Speed isn’t so much as mentioned in that issue.
In other news, Gail Simone had this to say about the Endling:
https://www.thepopverse.com/comics-gail-simone-uncanny-x-men-1-from-the-ashes-david-marquez-marvel-outliers-endling
“An endling, in biology, is the last existing member of a particular species. The Endling wants to be that.”
“And without a series that was carrying thier relationship forward, there wasn’t really a whole lot of good reason why Speed should be saddled with Prodigy’s baggage and vice versa.”
i.e. “the writer didn’t want to have to deal with Speed so we’re gonna just not have him around.”
The reason why so many comic book relationships don’t survive past the cancelation of whatever series established them. It’s kind of annoying when you actually get interested or invested in the character dynamic and then it’s erased. You either end up with a long string of brief romances, or a One True Pairing that writers constantly try to dismantle even though it doesn’t make sense to do so, where no one ever accepts the interloper/replacement…
@The Other Michael- the weird thing is Breevort seemed to be saying it wasn’t the X-Books’ idea to end the relationship, so they didn’t want to deal with the fallout. So whose idea was it to break them up?
I like Prodigy and Speed as a couple, but I’m fine with them not being together. Prodigy is an interesting enough character on his own, and the series has enough interpersonal dynamics to explore without Tommy.
@Scott B: “I was on the fence about X-Men but this issue won me over. X-Force, however, is getting dropped if it doesn’t pick up soon.”
Couldn’t agree more. I’m giving each FtA series a few issues to win me over (except Phoenix, which I actively disliked) and X-Force is my least favorite so far.
The thing about bisexual characters is that Marvel is cowardly. You never see them with a member of the opposite sex, because half the audience will consider it backsliding if it isn’t done right. So they get stuck in stable gay relationships. Or a sequence of stable gay relationships, with no hint that they might also like the opposite sex.
The one exception I can think of is Mystique, but she’s a mercurial deceiver, and really the kind of image bi people fight against.
It was the opposite with John Constantine at DC/Vertigo where the character was canonically bisexual, yet almost every one of his relationships was with females (let’s not even mention about John’s most prominent male lover from that era…). This led to a major backlash online anytime fans would bring up John being bi as people would disdain the idea that John should be considered anything other than “straight”.
It was a very sad state of affairs that for decades the best representation bi comic fans had in the “mainstream” was John Constantine (with his 99% textual relationships with females) and Mystique (whose relationship had only been hinted at on the page).
@SI- the other major exception is the Black Cat but that’s because Felicia’s most famous relationships are Peter and Flash. {The last miniseries with MJ didn’t help matters much- it had Felicia in a relationship with an Obviously Evil woman, and Felicia kept making excuses for her until she finally realized the truth. “Yes, she threatened to murder my friend’s boyfriend but I’m sure she had a good reason.”)
@Michael – Is that how that Jackpot & Black Cat mini-series ended up? Oooof, I’m really glad I bailed after trying the first issue.
I’m not sure he would be any better representation than Mystique, but I feel like Marvel ought to just let Deadpool be in a relationship with a guy already. I’m probably letting Nicieza’s Cable/Deadpool exert too much influence on my perspective, though.
And in other news, the first issue of the Dazzler series will feature Scorpia fighting Dazzler in LA, even though we last saw her in New York City helping Tombstone consolidate his power as the new Kingpin. I guess this takes place after Wells’ run on Spider-Man ends but still, it’s always annoying when writers just need a villain and they choose one another book is using in an ongoing plot.
Am I the only person who’s surprised that Wolverine has never experimented?
Hickman hinted at it, but editorial immediately dropped it when Hickman left.
Retconned sexuality is tricky. It’s still difficult for me to see Kitty as being anything other than straight. The same goes for Betsy. Rachel, Rictor, and Shatterstar I could accept as LGBTQ characters no problem. Iceman I struggled to accept as gay at first until I reread X-Men #1 (1963) and realized that the first sentence spoken by Bobby Drake was, “A girl… big deal!” Stan Lee was ahead of the curve.
I’m pretty sure that’s a joke about Stan Lee’s writing of Bobby, but just in case, Stan was making the point that Bobby was the youngest X-Man and was still childlike as opposed to the teen hormones of the other X-Men.
I still think they should have made Bobby bisexual to appease everyone. People used to argue that making a character bisexual it was too easy for writers to ignore same-sex attraction and focus exclusively on opposite sex attraction, but as Si was pointing out, this is obviously no longer the case with Marvel Comics. Sure, Bobby struggled with relationships with females, but he struggled with his mutant powers and keeping a job too. It could just be that he was repressing his attraction to males and focusing so much on females that it was leading to the awkwardness in his relationships with women. Then, all the nerds couldn’t spend their time arguing that Iceman only dated women for decades, so he couldn’t possibly be gay. Yes, I realize that gay individuals do often go through a period where they try to fit in with heterosexuality before coming “out of the closet”, but the homophobic are never going to accept that explanation. At least if the character is bi, you can say, “Yeah, they dated the opposite sex for years, but they came to embrace they had attraction to the same sex as well. There.”
The thing with Claremont’s female characters is that it’s completely in-character to reveal they were always bisexual because Claremont pretty much intended every female character to be bi. Except Jean, as she was too morally perfect and motherly to ever be truly sexualized.
Not saying any of that is “progressive” but there you go. It goes with Claremont’s BDSM fetishism hangups.
I did like how Hickman was playing with the concept that mutants, being the next stage in “human evolution”, would be much more open to pan or omnisexuality.
“I’m pretty sure that’s a joke about Stan Lee’s writing of Bobby, *but just in case*”
Hmm. That doesn’t read like you were “pretty sure.” But that’s okay, Chris. I’ll try not to be offended that you considered the possibility that I might be that dense.
*weeps*
I dunno. I still would have retconned Colossus’s sexuality before Iceman’s.
“I dunno. I still would have retconned Colossus’s sexuality before Iceman’s.”
Come to think of it, those fastball specials are kind of grab-assy.
@Chris V- I do think that some fictional characters would be better served being bisexual than homosexual. The most obvious is Alan Scott, who married both the original Thorn and Molly Mayne before DC decided he was gay. And in Molly’s case, he literally went to Hell for her. (The Thorn thing is weird, though, since he shared literally one panel with her before the JSA got their book back In the late 1970s- he was just flying her to get help from the Amazons. And later, in All-Star Comics 72-73, when Thorn fights the JSA, there’s no mention of a romance between them. But Roy Thomas for some reason decided that Thorn’s Rose personality fell in lobe with Alan on the flight to the Amazons and later married him under an assumed name, and he didn’t realize the truth because her aging had been slowed and…)
Rictor is another example- his feelings for Rahne were strong enough for him to leave the New Mutants and go to try to find her in Genosha. In Rictor’s case, though, he was young, to be fair, and wasn’t sure if Cable murdered his father, so he was reluctant to take orders from him.
As for Claremont and sexualizing Jean, remember, it was originally supposed to be Jean in the Dark Phoenix storyline. But also there was the time Mesmero hypnotized her. And arguably you could read Storm’s relationship with Jean as them being bi.
For my money, the best queer relationship in comics in ages was Moondragon and Phyla-Vell in Al Ewing’s Guardians of the Galaxy. It had high drama, character development, and a recognizable emotional conflict. Very moving and beautiful.
I realize it’s difficult to write superhero relationships well, much less relationships that tie into the central action. Not everyone is at Ewing’s level. But I find most comic book relationships, regardless of sexuality or configuration, kind of lifeless.
Prodigy and Speed were a cute couple, sure, but did their relationship do anything in the story? Does Rachel and Betsy’s? I love knowing that there are queer couples out and about, but let them contribute to the story.
I’m curious what the criteria are for folks here. If a character is canonically straight – which all characters had to be in a more or less explicit way, under both formal and informal sanctions on the topic of queer relationships – what, exactly, would the alternative have been?
I find the need to rationalize sexuality in these terms a bit odd, especially given the opaque ways desire works in real life, and that all of these characters live in heightened states of drama, risk, proximity, communion, and intimacy.
It makes sense as well that after so heavily pivoting towards the metaphor of the mutants as queer, the comics would finally concede that maintaining that queerness only as an abstraction is impossible, and outright offensive to these stories’s many queer readers.
We’ve finally settled on an origin story for Nightcrawler, accepted that Jean was always going to be the Phoenix, and seen a pseudo-utopia founded on mutant nationalism – and, uh, plants – be shifted outside space and time indefinitely.
I’m surprised how sexuality becomes this focal point where suspension of disbelief suddenly trips up – very often, and very easily.
Why would these worlds and lives amount to ours, at all? Especially amidst a number of characters whose relationships to their own bodies (and inevitably, their own sexuality) are so completely beyond the realm of common human experience.
I don’t mean just Rogue, for that matter, as the poster girl for unending and impossible lust. What’s it like to fuck someone whose body is as much ice as it is flesh, who has bones out out of their incessantly, or is a couole of hundred years your sinner?
What’s it like to fuck a telepath, for that matter, or some partially spectral figure like Chamber?
I’m very much in agreement with a lot of frustrations people have with Claremont’s ultimately rather sexist predilections in terms of how to write and position these characters.
But to expect conventional kinds of sexual identity…
I don’t know. Isn’t it all too kinky to begin with, anyway? Post-human kinky, even?
I would love if some of those ideas were incorporated into the X-books. I think the problem is that Marvel/the X-office/writers haven’t gone far enough in that direction.
Instead, what they mostly do is have a character say “I’m queer!,” couple up with another character, and then go about business as usual. Boring.
Frankly, I’m more intrigued by Glob Herman’s sex life than Betsy Braddock’s. I mean, he’s made of wax, right? What’s that like?
But I don’t think we’re ever going to get a truly science-fictionalized version of the X-Men, not as long as they continue to serve their superhero function. So it’s fist fights and identity politics instead of anything more radical and innovative.
@Thom I suspect if you’re interested in Glob Herman’s sex life you’ll probably have to stick to fanfic.
Yeah… if you think about it, we probably already have a pretty good idea of what Glob’s sex life is like.
And now you’re stuck with that picture in your head too.