Marvel Comics General

Moonstone once flew headfirst into a mountain and broke her neck

This should be remembered whenever Moonstone is discussed

How did THAT happen? Did Sue Storm make it invisible?

Captain Monica Marvel was chasing her and Moonstone made some bad navigational decisions

Roger Stern really understood the "torture your favorites" principle of writing. Moonstone was clearly his favorite of his own creations, showing up in series after series that he wrote, and he always ensured that however clever or pragmatic she seemed, she was, when it came down to the wire, kind of an idiot.

He did the same with the Vulture (I believe he's on record that Vulture was his favorite Spider-Man villain) and Mr. Hyde (who showed up frequently in his work just like Moonstone). Stern's Vulture is a self-destructing idiot with no dignity or self control, and Mr. Hyde is an idiot with too much power and no restraint at all.

It may feed into how Roderick Kingsley is not a very charismatic villain outside of the Hobgoblin costume - that he was always intended to be the emperor without his clothes after the buildup of the Hobgoblin.

The Moonstone/Samson dynamic in the Ellis Thunderbolts run was great.

Whatever his flaws, Samson is a psychiatrist who takes his duty to patients seriously. Moonstone is a psychiatrist who drove patients to suicide for personal gain.

They do not get on. To put it mildly.

When she's protected by Osborn and Samson's brought in to treat Speedball/Penance, the friction is minimised.

When a hostile telepath influences Moonstone to attack Samson and Penance, he's overjoyed. She gave him an excuse to repeatedly punch her, and he happily takes it.

I made a page for the comic Spellbound (1988). (Just Spellbound had a fanfic namespace already and there were some earlier comics that shared the name.)

Edited by lalalei2001 on Apr 28th 2024 at 8:55:59 AM

I get that Moonstone II was a Captain America background minion that stole the powers of a Captain America villain so that she could torment The Hulk. Doc Sampson is a most appropriate foil even discounting that they are both psychiatrists. I'm surprised she doesn't have more to do with Captain America(or not, since two moonstones kind of put her out of his weight class). She works as Master of Evil fodder as well as anyone else and she's an ideal Thunderbolt, but I think Marvel missed out on some good comic books by not exploring Karla Sofen's adversarial relationship with Monica Rambeau.

Doc Sampson is more natural on far more levels, but who else is? Rambeau's got ambitions where Sofen's got desires but a lazy nature that leads to short cuts and short sighted plans. Rambeau's disciplined, responsible and sarcastic with no immediately obvious vulnerabilities. It'd be interesting to see a psychiatrist seriously take on the challenge of exploiting the weaknesses most people wouldn't recognize, to see Rambeau seriously have to study something other than protocol, chemistry or radiology, face an assault she can't beat with any of the six forms of magnetism, with anything on the electromagnetic spectrum. There are many similarities to explore, though there's always a twist. Both have mother issues, but Rambeau loves hers while Sofen...doesn't. Both are in love with their super powers to the point of risking death to keep them, but while Rambeau's were a round about reward for service and bravery, Sofen stole hers in a gross violation of ethics. They both want to be the boss, more often than not, but Rambeau "wants" to usually because she believes she'll be the most competent leader, happily stepping aside for Captain America and Luke Cage, while Sofen just wants to be on top so she can have other people do work for her and do what she says in general;enough twists that Rambeau could conceivably overcome Sofen's manipulations despite Sofen's greater understanding of the psychological fields and social sciences.

At any rate Karla Sofen versus Monica Rambeau seems more interesting than Karla Sofen versus Carol Danvers. Danvers's issues are well documented, and often on full display for anyone in the Marvel Universe who lives under a rock or some gas giant's moon. Danvers is also more temperamental and less reasonable. Sofen not playing Danvers like a fiddle while avoiding direct confrontation at all costs is hard to buy. Genis versus Karla similarly didn't make sense to me. Gensis's mental instability is legend. Karla is about the worst person outside of some hostile empath to pit him against. It's pretty obvious why Moonstone and Hulk wasn't a long term thing either, but I could see Karla Sofen versus Monica Rambeau being a feud the likes of Carol Danvers and Anna Marie, Steve Rogers and Anthony Masters, Bruce Banner and Crusher Creel, Genis-Vel and Rick Jones.

Just because she started in Captain America doesn't mean she should have anything to do with him beyond that.

Mystique started in Ms.Marvel, but most people don't think of her as a Carol villain do they?

Some of the punches Carol punched Rogue with over the years really ought to have been punched at Mystique. Alas.

I could see a potential Moonstone/Monica rivalry coming out of Avengers Under Siege but anything that could have happened was derailed by Gruenwald or whoever else insisting Monica be character assassinated and shoved under a bus so Captain America could take charge

Monica is really a case study in forsaken opportunity and squandered momentum

Given they are both Stern creations, I always half assumed that Stern was angling for Karla to be Monica's nemesis. It just went by the wayside because both characters were iced for a decade and the writer who revived Moonstone (Busiek) didn't want to write Monica.

I also think it's interesting to consider whether Moonstone got a net benefit or not from jumping around from hero to hero as Stern's pet villain. It got her out there, but it also made her seem tied to a writer instead of a hero.

Edited by TheEvilDrBolty on Apr 27th 2024 at 12:53:16 PM

Mystique still has the ire of Carol Danvers though, even if they don't come near one another very often anymore. Even without the Rogue incident, Carol didn't take kindly to the murder of her husband. Even if you miss those details though, there's still only one degree of separation between the two, as both still interact with Rogue. Like over at DC Aurania and Atomia don't even have any connection to Mera, or each other, but people typically compare the former two to the latter because they're all connected to Wonder Woman(I don't even know what Mera's relationship with her is outside of crisis crossovers and else worlds, Miss Marvel-Rogue-Mystique is far more clear) A better example is probably Fantastic Four and Multiple Man. I'm not implying there should be any lasting connections between Captain America and Moonstone II, just admitting surprise that there really are none. As alluded to, Gruenwald, the Captain America writer of the time was kind of possessive.

While it seems like Karla Sofen was being set up, or had otherwise fallen into perfect to position to be Monica Rambeau's nemesis, Nebula was definitely created to be Monica's villain. Two freight captains, one becoming a harbor patrol lieutenant, the other a space pirate. Captain Marvel's reluctant successor to Thanos's alleged granddaughter. Both want to be special but one seeks to be by providing service like her parents while the other seeks to inspire fear like her "parents" and "grandparent". Yet while Rambeau occasionally bumps into Sofen still, every once and while, Monica's basically got no connection to Nebula anymore. Their story is basically Monica almost stopping Nebula once only for The Beyonder to ruin it, Nebula successfully getting revenge by sabotaging Monica's command with her mole Doctor Druid, and Monica never really recovering from it. And I'm told the architect of that sabotage may have actually been Ravona Renslayer, whoever that is, impersonating Nebula. That would make them even more disconnected if true and mean Monica never made any mark on the one who set back her career(or maybe she did. I can't ever remember reading any comic books that explicitly identified who this Renslayer woman(?) was).

Edited by IndirectActiveTransport on Apr 27th 2024 at 1:21:30 PM

Ravonna is Kang’s love interest.

She hates him. Or loves him. Depending

As far as I know, there’s no clear reason given why Ravonna chose to impersonate Nebula.

Interview with Cheryl Lee Eaton on Black Panther Blood Hunt and some unlettered preview pages

Well looks like becoming a vampire is having a gruesome effect on T'Challa.

Why is T'challa becoming a vampire.

The upcoming event beginning next month Blood Hunt is vampire centric.

I feel like being the chosen servant of Bast and a former host of the Tiger God should make T'Challa immune or at least resistant to vampires. Cuz of Holy Burns Evil and such.

Edited by immortaleditor on Apr 27th 2024 at 3:22:36 AM

Also, T’Challa is the king of the dead.

Which gave him control over zombies at one point.

did it do him any good in Marvel zombies?

Of course the new antags if Blood Hunt are supervampires so they prolly have some tricks up their many sleeves.

Edited by slimcoder on Apr 27th 2024 at 3:49:55 AM

×2

He wasn't king of the dead in that earth.

It was in Secret Wars 2015 and he managed to command a zombie army to attack God Emperor of All Mankind Doom’s army

Of course this is post-Coates Black Panther.

Lotta writers tend to forget a lot of the tricks he can do.

Vampires in Marvel are like evil Lantern Corps in DC. If they're acting discreetly fine, if they're attacking openly in mass just call Monica Rambeau, the way the guys on DC Earth should have called The Ray when whichever Corps attacked Earth.

I think Monica Rambeau should have a book. Still call her "Spectrum" but call it "Lieutenant Marvel" so DC can't publish any comics with that title either. Moonstone, Nebula, Ravonna Renslayer, The Beyond Corporation, that's eight months of story lines. Plain old scams by a clinical psychiatrist who can lift and throw ninety tons, extortion and larceny committed by a space pirate, a whatever time travel stuff Renslayer does, and an effort to expose a semi legitimate conglomerate that is both a human run technology company on the United States East Coast and an entertainment company for beings alien to the Marvel Universe itself. Maybe, if people actually picked it up, it could be stretched to twelve months with a Blue Marvel date, a Kamala Khan team up, a call for aid from The Harbor Patrol, and a domestic issue like Monica accidentally ruining a credit card with her electromagnetic powers and Genis-Vell stealing her code name again. The annual issue could be a Nextwave reunion...assuming DC doesn't take Machine Man from Marvel, or a Strikeforce reunion, or an Ultimates reunion or Monica finally getting to lead The Avengers again for a day.

Has there ever been a Colonel Marvel?

I think one of the evil universes either had a Colonel Marvel or America