X-Men In General

Superman loves being a regular guy and Batman would lose a lot of his scary side if people knew he was Bruce Wayne.

I’d argue that the trying to be a stand in for everything is kinda what got them into the rut in the first place though.

What got them into a rut was Ike Perlmutter downplaying them in favor of Inhumans. There was nothing wrong with the X-Men innately as a concept at all.

A movie like Logan proudly wears its mutant metaphor on its sleeve. It's far more of an X-Men story than Old Man Logan was. The story of Logan is about a bunch of kids fleeing to Canada chased by ICE agents and a dude named Donald. Kamala Harris, current Democratic Presidential candiate pointed out that the movie touched on automation issues. So the X-Men as a story speaks to the present, about issues of persecution, about corporate control and so on.

Sure parts of the X-Men have dated and are in need of updating, but that's true of a lot. I personally think that Superman is in need of an update. And a lot of modern Superman stories, about Superman being hated and feared, and being suspected initially and so on, is borrowing from the X-Men anyway. I don't have issues with superheroes having secret identity, in fact I think people need to bring that back and keep emphasizing it, if you remove a secret identity, you remove privacy, you remove the double life and you remove any meaningful way for characters to talk to civilians as people. Every story becomes about insiders and so on...that's what doomed Ultimate Marvel because every story was like "Further adventures of the Military-Industrial Complex" it became same-y.

You have to find a way to keep what's true and update it. Jason Aaron did that in his Thor story. On paper, it's impossible for Norse Mythology to speak about 21st Century concerns like environment, corporate control, and decline in religious belief and so on, but Aaron did it.

I'd argue that if a Superhero can't be seen as a person without the need for a double life, then you're doing it wrong. And it doesn't work that well with some heroes anyway. They tried giving Wondie her SID back after Infinite Crisis and look how that turned out.

Not all heroes need a secret identity, but major ones like Superman, Spider-Man, and Batman do. Their stories and characterizations depend on each figure's need and connection to a private life. The minute you take that, you don't have anything to replace it with. I think Tony Stark is better without a secret identity, likewise, I think the X-Men make more sense after Morrison had Xavier go public (albeit it was Cassandra Nova doing it hijacking his body) than before.

The idea of mutant culture was starting to be a thing until House of M cut the population down to 200.

And for the dumbest of reasons. Joe Quesada said apparently that mutants having their own culture and so on didn't make them feel like a minority...which flies in the face of any minority's history. Having your own sub-culture and so on doesn't make you less of a minority or stop being persecuted.

Not like having one has actually protected his loved ones anyway. Just ask Gwen Stacy.

I've seen some pretty dumb arguments for what constitutes a minority, but Quesada's reasoning will never, ever stop being stupid.

Edited by Dr.XXX on Aug 13th 2019 at 4:21:27 AM

Sounds like a rather... moronic stance if you are dealing with minority issues. Another nail on the X-Coffin.

I'm not saying it works. I'm saying that's why he thinks he has to have one.

Here's the actual quote by Joey Q, just in case people think we are being unfair to the man. In fact, I think we are charitable:

"aren't supposed to be a lot of these guys" that's just a lovely way of phrasing things about minorities aren't they, yikes.

"genie back in the bottle" is one of Quesada's pet phrases. I like that "never should have been in the forefront" because the reason they were is because Claremont wrote a great run that sold well and did well, so they earned their place in the run. Making statements like that is like saying they shouldn't have been successful.

Oh and Quesada wrote the story immigrant X-23 from X-Men: Evolution (a cartoon for kids and young teenagers and PG by and large) and made her into a prostitute in her opening story. Joe Quesada logic at work people.

Edited by Revolutionary_Jack on Aug 13th 2019 at 1:24:49 AM

The mutant town briefly shown in New X-Men and District X (not to mention their subculture bands—bands with names like Sabretooth!) was a wasted opportunity—District X was cancelled as of House of M. Calling 2005 - 2019 "the lost decade" for the X-Men was apt in HOX #2. Mutants are on the edge of extinction! Xavier's an awful person! And now dead! Cyclops is awful too! And HE'S dead! In many ways, Age of Apocalypse was less depressing.

If writers are willing to let go of Claremont tropes and also repopulate the mutant community, there's a chance that there's more great stories out there.

I don't think Claremont and his legacy are a problem. After all Fabien Nicieza and Morrison did a lot of work building on his stuff. And even during the Lost Decade, Cullen Bunn's Magneto is in Claremont's sandbox.

Was the whole decade "lost?" The NOW period (2012 to 2015) was generally well received for the X-Men.

In their time, I thought Claremont/Byrne were great. In fact, they were so good that editorial sees the idea of "X-Men = minority analogues" as pretty much the only option for telling an X-Men story.

By all means, let writers build on Claremont, like Morrison did (and Hickman over Morrison). But I could do a lot less with mutants living in a constant pre-Days of Future Past world with extinction just around the corner.

I enjoyed a few X-Men comics in the Lost Decade—but that was in spite of Decimation, not because of it.

Edited by flawlessvoid on Aug 13th 2019 at 4:45:35 AM

X-Factor was amazing. New X-Men was pretty good. And I enjoyed some of the mainline runs. But even the good stuff was still hampered by Decimation and everything that followed.

Lost Decade can be seen as value neutral. The mutants were at a loose end in that period regardless of if you liked them or not. And Cullen Bunn’s Magneto series is great. As are some others and Cyclops as revolutionary and his Emma romance took him out of Jean and Logan’s shadow.

I think getting past DOFP is what Hickman is seeking to do. I mean Moira’s 10th life is essentially about that.

Thanks for reminding me about PAD's X-Factor—really enjoyed that. And yeah, Bunn's Magneto was really good. There was a lot of other good stuff too.

Despite my complaining, I think I'm actually getting what I want in this new direction (fingers crossed). This is me feeling a little hope (and hype) after years of feeling that the overall line was predictable and fairly agonizing.

Quesada's attitude is actually what set in the rot in the franchise. Nostalgia in general, too. The mutant metaphor still works, it's still good and relevant, the issue is the franchise kinda stopped embracing the metaphor. It wanted Hated And Feared, all the time, with no respite, with no hope spots to indicate that things could get better. The problem isn't the metaphor, it's the constant focus on only the dangers of being part of a marginalized community. It felt like every single human on the planet wanted to personally murder all mutants, and that there were no humans who were actually on the side of mutants. It was what made X-Men Red so refreshing.

Ultimately, whether the Hickman era succeeds or not will depend on how willing the X-office is to get the fuck over its bigotry-boner and let mutants actually have conversations with humans once in a while.

X-Men solicitations for November 2019. Some interesting news: Krakoa is still around and still their base. Betsy is called a "citizen of Krakoa." Also, "The Hellfire Trading Company has control of Mutant trade on the seas..."

Edited by alliterator on Aug 13th 2019 at 3:09:31 AM

Wow, that's unfortunately-phrased.

Kieron Gillen said something interesting in an interview discussing his creator-owned work:

Bold emphasis added by me.