X-Factor #2 annotations
As always, this post contains spoilers, and page numbers go by the digital edition.
X-FACTOR vol 5 #2
“We Could Be Heroes”
Writer: Mark Russell
Artist: Bob Quinn
Colour artist: Jesus Aburtov
Letterer: Joe Caramagna
Editor: Darren Shan
X-FACTOR:
Havok is apparently either living with Polaris or at least staying the night with her, despite her firm disapproval of his involvement in X-Factor. He defends the operation to her, despite his doubts, and explains that the team aren’t going on any missions until they figure out how last issue’s debut got so many characters killed. In fact, later in the issue, he seems to be arguing for this investigation to take place, which implies that he’s lying to Polaris about it being in train already. Even so, he understandably objects to her clumsily pushing him into an intervention by the Mutant Underground.
General Mills plays to Havok’s insecurities by telling him that he was put in charge of the team because he was a proper hero that they would look up to.
Pyro is appointed as Havok’s second in command. Havok objects to this, citing Pyro’s history in the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants – though Pyro was pretty clearly rehabilitated as a Marauder during the Krakoan era. He maybe has a better point in terms of whether Pyro has ever shown any leadership skills. And in fairness, if Havok sees X-Factor’s function as being to improve mutant PR, he might well question what a well-known ex-terrorist is doing on the team from that point of view. For his part, Pyro seems happy to swan around Factor House and enjoy the free drinks.
Cecilia Reyes says that she signed up to be a medic, and apparently regards this as just a job.
Frenzy regards the whole situation as “screwy” but is willing to shrug her shoulders and go along with it. I think the line about her having bred dogs in the past is new information, but there’s not that much in her back story established before she became a villain, other than a single childhood flashback in X-Men Legacy #268, so sure, why not.
Xyber, sole survivor of the original team, clearly thinks he’s screwed and that he’ll go the same way as the rest of his squad in the not too distant future. He looks depressed.
Granny Smite explains that her mutant power is immortality. Her power doesn’t stop her ageing – apparently she keeps trying new methods of suicide in the hopes of finding one that’ll work. She seems to have signed on with X-Factor in the hopes of getting herself killed. While she freaks out the team by attempting to drown herself without explaining what she’s doing, she seems cheerful enough.
The key thing here seems to be that Havok seems to be the only member of X-Factor who actually believes in the group’s official purpose (or at least is trying to convince himself that he does). Pyro, Frenzy and Cecilia are only here because they need a job, Xyber has lost confidence in the project, and Granny Smite is hoping to die.
SUPPORTING CAST:
Polaris remains hugely disapproving of Havok’s involvement in X-Factor, partly out of concern for his safety, but partly because she dislikes the whole idea of a mutant team working for humans. She reiterates that she regards Polaris as her only name, but grudgingly calls Havok “Alex” (though in her narration, she calls him “Havok”). She doesn’t seem surprised by the presence of gunmen at the Mutant Underground meeting, but she does defend Havok from them. Still, she chooses to remain with the Underground, and seems generally oblivious to some fairly obvious red flags about the group – including them threatening to shoot her and physically restraining her.
Rodger Broderick cheerfully agrees that the team’s safety is not his first priority, but insists that it’s “a respectable second”. In the logic of the story, Havok might read that as disarmingly blunt rather than completely ludicrous – they are a military team expected to go on dangerous missions, after all. And when the Mutant Underground realise that Havok is wearing a wire, Broderick seems genuinely concerned – though he might just be worried that X-Factor can’t keep chewing through characters.
General Mills believes that last issue’s mission was a disaster because X-Term knew that X-Factor were coming, and she suspects the Mutant Underground. There’s no evidence for either of things in the story, but it’s possible she genuinely believes it.
Angel remains hospitalised.
VILLAINS (?):
The Mutant Underground are supposedly a grass roots mutant group which Polaris has got involved with. Bruin, the only one who gets a name, is a new character. He gives us a fairly standard back story about being treated as a freak because of his visible mutation, and makes a reasonable argument (which Russell clearly agrees with) that it’s a mistake for Havok to sign up for X-Factor. Bruin seems genuinely surprised by the allegation that the Mutant Underground are spying on X-Factor. More worryingly, he also argues, albeit in reasonably polite terms, that mutants need to live their lives on the premise that humans are irredeemably awful.
Even more troubling: the moment Alex starts objecting, two gunmen come into the room. Once they spot his hidden camera, they threaten to kill both him and Lorna (something that Lorna does resist, but doesn’t appear to cause her any wider doubts about the group). Bruin tries to talk them down, but he’s clearly not in charge. Several more gunmen show up as the scene continues, and there seem to be at least eight of them in total. Nobody explains, or gets a chance to ask, what they were doing at this supposed informal chat in the first place.
There are definite signs of the Underground being a cult. The group’s founder Jovius is said to have died (presumably after Krakoa) and there’s a statute of him in the meeting room. Several members wear T-shirts with his face on – Lorna doesn’t have one at the meeting, but she has one at the start of the issue, and she was also wearing it in the second red carpet scene last issue. Jovius is a new character; the significance of the name isn’t clear yet, but it was a nickname of the Roman Emperor Diocletian, referring to the god Jove (i.e., Jupiter).
OTHER SPECIFICS:
Page 7: “We’re elevating you to team leader!” Havok was already announced as the new team leader at the end of the previous issue, so this is an odd line. (General Mills seems to think it’s a new anouncement as well, on page 9.)
Page 14: “Does this place look suspiciously like the Hotel California?” Alex is thinking of the cover art to the Eagles album Hotel California, which is actually a photo of the Beverly Hills Hotel on Sunset Boulevard.
Page 23: “The Beastie Boys song?” I have no idea what Russell’s referencing here. The only song called “Rime of the Ancient Mariner” that I’m aware of was by Iron Maiden.
Polaris looks like a grasshopper-themed supervillain in that costume.
If Havok is questioning why there’s a well-known ex-terrorist on the team he needs to take a long hard look in the mirror
Polaris-Locust’s girlfriend?
This comic is obviously taking place in an alternate timeline where the Beastie Boys did that Iron Maiden song. Who knows what hijinks Moira got up to in this life to cause this seemingly innocuous change?
I’m glad I wasn’t the only one confused by that line. Fleetwood Mac has the album The Pious Bird of Good Omen which makes references to the poem. That’s still a long way from the Beastie Boys, and that’s all I could come up with.
Let’s be fair to Bruin. I mean, aren’t humans irredeemably awful? Yes, so are mutants but still, the point sort of stands.
The Beastie Boys joke threw me, too. Their closest song title to Rime of the Ancient Mariner is probably “Rhymin’ & Stealin’”, but that’s not too close.
I’m giving X-Factor a chance, but it isn’t all that great so far. The highlight of the issue was Pyro wanting to know if he can use fire to help when the situation didn’t warrant it. I hope Frenzy & Dr. Reyes don’t just sink into the background, and that the plot gets moving.
The “Hotel California” line may also reflect the song’s final line: “You can check out any time you like, but you can never leave.”
Any bets on Broderick being the leak to the Mutant Underground in the name of creating a profitable, PR-friendly conflict?
Yup, this is very much a Mark Russell story. What else needs to be said?
Meanwhile:
X-Men: brings back extremely fringe, obscure mutants for their team of extremist antagonists.
X-Factor: throws in a bunch of random generics without any discernable personalities or names.
I mean, come on, why not pull from the trash heap of Morrison-era comics like Muties, or the Brotherhood, or District X, or whatever? There are tons of unused mutants who would have been great as cameos…
Maybe Granny Smite’s immortality isn’t physically based, but a highly specific form of fate manipulation. So “trying new ways of dying” has a chance of being amusing in how she “miraculously” survives (though this time it was quite mundane).
“… apparently she keeps trying new methods of suicide in the hopes of finding one that’ll work.”
Attempting to read Chuck Austen’s entire Uncanny X-Men run in one sitting might do the trick.
How could Alex believe General Mills when she claimed that the Mutant Underground found out about the attack from Lorna and passed the information on to X-Term? We saw that the members of X-Factor only found out about the attack a couple of hours before it happened- Xyber was clearly surprised. So Alex would have to blab to Lorna about the mission (which he wasn’t on), Lorna would have to blab to someone in the Underground and that person would have to pass the info on to X-Term all within a couple of hours. It’s possible but highly unlikely.
In fact, why is Alex so sure that it WAS a traitor? If the membership of X-Term includes a precog or a telepath, they could have found out by using their powers.
I’m not buying Alex being dumb enough to wear a spy camera that’s labeled “Button Cam” on an undercover mission. He’s not a complete idiot.
In fact, I’m not buying Alex, Frenzy, Cecilia Reyes or Pyro joining X-Factor considering how untrustworthy Broderick and General Mills obviously are. Alex at least has the “I don’t want anyone else to die” excuse, and so might Cecilia but the others?
it’s annoying how all of the members of X-Term and the Mutant Underground are random nobodies we’ve never heard of except Laynia and Lorna. MacKay had a better idea when he dragged out three Z-list villains to work for Sugar Man and Fitzroy. X-Term and the Mutant Underground would have worked much better if they used obscure mutant villains like the Termite or the Peace Monger. Plus, that would make it easier to explain why the Underground was so quick to suggest killing Lorna.
This is related to the other problem- Russell has no clue how to write a battle between opposing mutant factions. Take last issue. Darkstar controls the Darkforce. We’ve seen decades of stories showing how powerful and deadly Darkforce can be and just had a crossover where Varnae uses it to battle the Avengers. But instead of a cool battle between Darkstar’s Darkforce powers and Rusty’s fire or Feral’s agility, we had a battle that mostly consisted of goons armed with conventional weapons. (Except for Robot Dude.) And this issue, all of the members of the Mutant Underground are armed with guns, not using mutant powers.
@Mike Loughlin- I couldn’t the joke with Pyro. Pyro isn’t supposed to be a complete idiot.
@Omar Karindu- I don’t think there was a traitor. In issue 1, Warren thinks that X-Term found out about them using radar. I think General Mills is just paranoid.
I wouldn’t mind seeing the Termite again, considering the fond memories I have of his only story-arc. As far as I know, his mutant powers were never restored after the Neutralizer gun was used on him. Was he not welcome on Krakoa? I guess he could have been in the Crucible. He would certainly fit in a Mutant Underground.
“Pyro was pretty clearly rehabilitated as a Marauder during the Krakoan era. He maybe has a better point in terms of whether Pyro has ever shown any leadership skills. And in fairness, if Havok sees X-Factor’s function as being to improve mutant PR, he might well question what a well-known ex-terrorist is doing on the team from that point of view”
In universe would Pyro be known publicly more as a former member of Freedom Force than as a member of a couple of Brotherhoods? Did Freedom Force ever get “outed” I thought they were just abandoned in the Annual crossover story. Maybe he’d have some notoriety for ‘dying’ attempting to save the life of presidential candidate Gradyon Creed?
Regarding Pyro, it annoys me that he’s now had many appearances in the modern era, but he’s still not very developed as a character at all. Outside of Kate and Emma in Marauders, everyone else got short shrift.
It’s especially strange to me given how potentially Pyro is very well known from the MCU version. And the version we have here (still with bizarre skull tattoo??) is some fratboy type, compared with the somewhat foppish original version.
Who is he?? Let him have a meaningful conversation with someone. Pair him with Avalanche!
I’d make similar complaints as to the treatment of Frenzy and Cecilia as “just there” for long stretches. Which is a shame as they each have such great story potential. I feel like writers can’t juggle a large cast these days. Give everyone a little bit of plot, inter-team dynamics and relationships, please!
I’d argue that Pyro is one of the most developed characters in the X-mythos. We know he hates James Joyce and writes romance novels. This is more information than we have for the majority of the X-characters (not counting the main X-Men, Magneto, Sinister, and Mystique). It’s pretty sad.
The version of Pyro we’ve seen since Krakoa bears little resemblance to the Claremont version. I guess dying of the Legacy Virus must have changed his personality.
Workshopping a General Mills / cereal joke but haven’t gotten there yet.
I think Pyro is actually most famous as an author, after all the mutant culture stuff recently. He’s at least a recognised name. Though he might be more of a celebrity bad boy.
This continues to be not very good. I wouldn’t mind characters I like being dropped into a comedy series where they’re made to be doofuses, if that series didn’t open with a threat that any of them can be killed at any time.
It would really suck if Joanna and Cecilia die for comedy here.
@Paul Fr- it was a Senator Kelly he died saving, who was running on a pro-mutant rights platform.
Seems like Pyro has been “updated” too many times. Who knows what he’s supposed to be like these days?
Definitely pair him with Avalanche again. I always suspected they were a couple. But that was during the Claremont run, so not exactly surprising.
Whatever happened to the second Pyro they introduced? He slept with Iceman and then disappeared far as I can tell.
@Thom H.- Pyro did try to rape a teenage girl in an issue of Nocenti’s Daredevil, though.
Are there storylines people can recommend where Alex Summers is not being an idiot? He and Lorna were grad students back in the Claremont days, but of course they had to run across Eye Killers.
Wow, I do not like Russell’s writing AT ALL.
Isn’t this the second Pyro, Simon Lasker – the one who debuted in X-Men Gold #1 in 2017 and may have been last seen dead in X-Force #11 (2020)? The first Pyro was St. John Allerdyce, a 1980s Claremont creation. They aren’t all that different at a casual glance, but apparently Lasker’s powers are a bit wider – Allerdyce can’t create flame of his own and it looks like Allerdyce is vulnerable to flames that he is not controlling himself.
I thought it was Lasker, not Allerdyce, who was in the Marauders, but now I am unsure.
@Luis- No, the Pyro with the Marauders was Allerdyce, not Lasker. The Pyro with the Marauders was a novelist- that was Allerdyce. And this Pyro has the same tattoo as the one in the Marauders, so it’s Allerdyce.
@Steven Kaye: X-Factor v1 71-89 was the first Peter David run on the title. Alex led the team during that time, and was usually written as self-doubting but competent. It’s one of my favorite runs on any X-title.
Mutant X- um… this comic isn’t all that great, but the first 12 issues and first annual are dumb fun. Alex is transported to an alternate universe, and has to take the place of that reality’s Havok. If he’s written as an idiot , so are most of the characters. If you like the first issue (either on Marvel Unlimited, or for no more than $1), go for it. The series goes downhill (and it wasn’t at the highest summit to begin with) after about issue 12, however.
I’m still just tickled to see the old logo back in print. Love that cover. It brings to mind the cover o Polaris’ first appearance in UXM #50.