stormandforge

[stormandforge]

sorry, it's 8!

No seriously, the new X-Force is a very feminist comic. Sure the leader's male, but his team is just women, and they're so much more powerful than him, and he treats them like equals. There's not an inch of toxic masculi...

...

Oh, Marvel.

[stormandforge]

X-Force hypotheses

The new X-Force has layers. Sure, it's a superhero comic, but it presents you with too many mysteries to be just that. There has to be a reason why Forge is being so secretive, why we know so little about the fractures and the Analog, why Tank's identity is kept under wraps, and so forth.

This extra layer makes for a more gratifying reading experience, if you ask me. I love a mystery. I love trying to decode. I love reveals that make you rethink everything you thought you knew about the story.

So I've been observing and collating. Kinda like Sage, except I can't do basic maths.

I started hypothesising in a previous post, where I'm 80% sure I uncovered something huge, but I'm not done. There are still things swirling in my brain. I'm sharing them below, even if Geoff Thorne and team can prove me wrong any day.

The hypotheses are all about Forge (and Sage). Because I'm me.

1. Forge isn't a villain.

I'm putting this one at the top, because what I say below might lead you to believe I have zero faith in him. It's the opposite.

What I do know of Forge, from spending the last 30 years staring at him: he compensates for self-loathing with hubris, tends to disregard consequences, and ends up frantically running around trying to fix his mistakes. That's he's lied about.

He's not a villain. He's an idiot.

Also, if he was turning evil, then there'd be no mystery at all, and it'd all be incredibly boring. And I don't get the feeling Thorne is a boring writer.

2. The process Forge used to upgrade his power involved sacred geometry.

Explicitly, sacred geometry is introduced in issue 4 with Nuklo and the Temple of the Dragon's Breath.

But it's been in the book all along. The "egg of life", which represents rebirth or renewal, is part of the machine Forge builds to upgrade his power in issue 1:

Then there's the triangle with the wider right side. As far as I can tell it's not officially sacred geometry, but it's still a geometric shape associated with Forge's increased power. We see it again when Forge suddenly levitates during intense power use in issue 5.

We can also talk about the circles around his eyes, a new manifestation of his power that results from the upgrade. At first I thought his eyes were just glowing and emitting light, but Marcus To consistently draws it as circles and semi-circles. If you look at the above image again you might even notice an extra circle on the right of the triangle.

The power upgrade itself features a lot of circles:

And then there's this, whatever it is (it's implied that Forge drew it):

Forge as a character has always been at the intersection of magic and science, so him using sacred geometry isn't that far-fetched.

3. Forge caused the fractures by upgrading his power.

This would explain while sacred geometry appears both around him and fracture phenomena. This would also explain why he won't take off his psi-blocking headband, lest the girls find out and kick his ass. And mostly, why he's so hell-bent on closing all the fractures, at any cost.

4. Sage will decode Forge's powers/read the Analog.

This theory was greatly influenced by Geoff Thorne's various interviews, where he went into detail about Forge and Sage's respective power sets, and how they were similar, different, and complementary (oh the nerdgasm I had listening to these).

Thorne repeatedly pits their brains against each other. Look at this:

And yet, when they're both staring into the Analog, Forge's creation, well...bow chicka wow wow:

You don't show these things unless you plan on having them work together in some way. I suspect Sage will get her hands (brain, really) onto Forge's, or at least on the Analog, sooner rather than later.

5. Forge already knows he needs Sage's power to unlock his brain processes/read the Analog.

Granted, his mission is nebulous enough that he needs her brain on the team anyway, but it feels like more than that. He recruits her first, remember?

Nice thing to say (and probably true in most life situations), but also a bit intense - unless you have a plan.

We also have two instances of him worrying about Sage's safety on the field. He urgently shoves a gun in her hand in issue 1, as if she can't take care of herself; and then there's that bit in issue 2 when they're all in free fall:

Tank and Surge are just as likely to go splat on the ground below, but ok...

6. Forge and Sage already have put their brains together.

I don't know man, there's something going on with these two. This panel in issue 5 is on my mind:

(Yes I've cropped out dead Nori, because my heart still aches.)

The ellipsis. It implies that Forge did, in fact, knew what was going to happen, but how could he? That's not how his power works, he's been saying this since issue 1.

Meanwhile, Sage be like:

Sage, in her own words, can "think of everything". So it's plausible that if Forge knew what would happen to Nori, he got that info from Sage somehow.

(The way Nori ended up on the team is weird anyway. Why didn't the Analog tell Forge she was needed from the start? Maybe it didn't. Maybe Sage had more of a say into the make-up of the team than we know about.)

If Sage did indeed predict this outcome, it's clear she doesn't know she did. I'm not saying she's forgotten: if you know your Sage lore, you know she's physically unable to forget anything. I'm saying she doesn't know.

A propos of nothing, have you noticed that she's been dissociating? There might be something to that. Twice now she's spoken in third person in her narration:

While it's plausible that she mentions herself in third person in her own data, the "Miss Tessa" bit remains weird. She hasn't been "Miss Tessa" in a long time. Also I don't get the feeling her Hellfire Club years are something she looks back on fondly - why would she use an outdated name associated to a time she'd rather forget?

(This is when I once again mention my recent post on X-Force, which has everything to do with the Hellfire Club. I don't know how it all connects, but I'm pretty sure the Club has a part to play in this book.)

For the record: if Sage indeed told Forge what would happen, it's not because he coerced her into it. You try coercing the girl with the tachyon brain. No, if she supplied this information, it's because she wanted to. If she doesn't know she did it, it's because she's found a way to keep that piece of data out of her brain.

Which isn't to say she's a villain either. Sacrificing Surge to save the world is a very pragmatic decision. And Sage is nothing if not a pragmatist. (And you know she wouldn't have done this without a plan to bring her back, because "she was just a child." Take heart, Nori fans.)

Does anyone have hypotheses about X-Force they'd like to share?

[stormandforge]

No seriously, the new X-Force is a very feminist comic. Sure the leader's male, but his team is just women, and they're so much more powerful than him, and he treats them like equals. There's not an inch of toxic masculi...

...

Oh, Marvel.

[stormandforge]

This art is the stuff if dreams. Look at her! 🥰

(Ignore the radiation poisoning, just look at the pretty.)

Storm #2 - "Death by Voodoo" (2024)

written by Murewa Ayodele art by Lucas Werneck & Alex Guimaraes

[stormandforge]

How gorgeous is this 😍

Storm #2 - "Death by Voodoo" (2024)

written by Murewa Ayodele art by Lucas Werneck & Alex Guimaraes

[stormandforge]

X-Force #5 - "One Second Later" (2024)

written by Geoffrey Thorne art by Marcus To & Erick Arciniega

[stormandforge]

[stormandforge]

Storm #5 variant cover by Mark Brooks (on sale 19 February).

[stormandforge]

He trippin'

Or playing with his holograms or something.

I still like that he calls on his favourite girls in moments of need though. That's a true feminist right there.

(Or someone incapable of moving on, but let's not dwell on that)

Preview of X-Force #7. Art by James Towe.

[stormandforge]

Because these moments of her history bear repeating, always.

Legend.

I wish I had Storm's confidence

Though if I had complete control over the weather maybe I would.

I'd certainly zap this guy, or at least steal his wallet again.

Then again, she doesn't even need them to be the coolest. After lezzing out in Tokyo and getting a dope new look, she is just as competent - winning a duel with the admittedly distracted Cyclops for leadership of the X-Men AND a duel vs Callisto for her teammate's lives + rule of the Morlocks.

The ol' knife in the heart mic drop. Storm rules

[stormandforge]

*snickers*

Saving his ass in every form of media.

X-Men vs Street Fighter Sega Saturn 1997

[stormandforge]

This has always bothered me.

I shouldn't be surprised, since he had secret feelings for Jean in the 60s, but ugh, gross. Looking at your students that way isn't OK.

Isolated incidents, that's what I choose to believe. Drunk writers. Yup, didn't happen.

*puts fingers in ears* LALALALALA

Charles has been on his feet for a page and a half and already he wants to stick his wiener in everything he sees. Come on Professor! Like you didn’t notice Storm is a babe!! What the fuck have you been looking at!? This guy has a couple of loose strands of pastrami up in that old noodle of his. (The Uncanny X-Men #180 – Apr 1984)

[stormandforge]

Forge at the Hellfire Club: a hypothesis

Guys guys guys (X-Force readers), I just had a brain wave. Big spoilers, be warned.

You know how we've been trying to decode who Sage is talking about in this bit of narration?

"One picosecond after she dies, I'm thinking. Of course I am - I'm always thinking. I remember the first time we met. I wasn't "Sage" then, I was still undercover at the Hellfire Club, working for Charles."

Many of us read this bit as one block. As the same train of thought. Meaning: Sage remembered meeting the person who dies at the Hellfire Club.

It followed that this person, the person who dies, would be Betsy, because Sage had canonically met her at the Hellfire Club. But no, it's not Betsy who died. And it doesn't make much sense for the person who actually died (Surge) to be at the Hellfire Club while Sage was there either. Nori would have been too young. (I know time in Marvel is flexible, but come on, that was long ago.)

What I've suspected for a while is that the now infamous opening phrase "One picosecond after she dies, I'm thinking. Of course I am - I'm always thinking" was a separate train of thought from the rest. It definitely is when it appears again in the next issues, so it makes sense that it should be from the start. It's a mantra - or a haunting, as it were - to be read on its own.

So the phrase we've been debating "I remember the first time we met, I wasn't Sage then, I was still undercover at the Hellfire Club..." isn't connected the bit above it (the person who dies); it's the beginning of a new train of thought.

It's the beginning of her reflection about Forge. She's saying she first met Forge when she was at the Hellfire Club.

We don't know when Sage and Forge first met, so I thought, why not, they could have known each other for a lot longer than we thought. They could have crossed paths when the X-Men clashed with the Hellfire Club back in the day.

But today I decided to look at the narration on its own, without the art or the dialogue, and a very different picture emerged:

"I remember the first time we met. I wasn't "Sage" then, I was still undercover at the Hellfire Club, working for Charles. Usually, I can instantly size up any new player. I create predictive models of everyone I meet. How they think, their motivations, how they move. Not him. Forge was...a jumble. Too many variables and some were in conflict, some oppositional. There were just too many holes in his data flow. At one point, I just asked him. 'How do you work?' He said, 'End of the day, there's nothing wrong in the world that I can't fix by putting my hands on it.' I thought he was a bit full of himself. Even with people like Shaw and Frost strutting around. Now? I know he's not. But what is he? I'm still collating."

We've been deceived by the comic book format, which splits Sage's narration onto several pages and makes you lose her train of thought.

She's saying she met Forge at the Hellfire Club. They were both there.

Fucking hell, the bit about Shaw and Frost? Right there in front of our faces! I thought she was talking about Krakoa times, but nooooo, look!

Forge. Working at the Hellfire Club. Back in the day when Sage was there.

WHEN? WHY? HOW?

More importantly, did they make him wear the ridiculous Victorian outfits? Or did he hold on to his denim shorts?

Please let there be an image of Forge in denim shorts at the Hellfire Club. Come through, Marcus To.

[stormandforge]

Raw reactions to X-Force #5

Yup, someone dies.

MASSIVE spoilers (and controversial opinions) below.

It's Nori. There'd been so much foreshadowing in the comic - and so much fan discussion about the upcoming character death - that I had started believing it wouldn't be her. But no, it was always going to be her. When you consider the way she joined the team, her post-Krakoa trauma, her selflessness and her relationship with Forge, it makes complete sense.

That death scene goes hard. We actually see her burned-up corpse, we hear her farewell words - oof, my heart. Rest in power, little blue-haired hero.

This said, everyone attacking Geoff Thorne over Nori's death needs to calm down. I would understand this amount of upset if he'd done her dirty, but he really hasn't. He's consistently written her with respect, gave her as much spotlight as he could in a team book, and gave her a heroic death. Stories kill characters, people. That's just the way it is.

Also: Nori's coming back, maybe even in this run. We just don't know yet. And don't give me nonsense about the resurrection protocols being gone - mutants came back from the dead before Krakoa, they will continue to do so.

"Forge always has a plan." YES. Nothing to do with his power; he's just always up to something. That's Forge 101. Fuck me, it's so good to have a writer who understands him. And because Thorne has done his homework, I believe what we're witnessing is a typical Forge plan: something that he believes will benefit the greater good, but that is also misguided and full of hubris and will repeatedly backfire in his face.

Forge can be cold, but this is subzero. He loves Nori, he wouldn't act that way if he was fully himself. Something's going on. Someone needs to shake him real hard - beat him to a pulp, really - and realign his neurons. The two most qualified people to do that are showing up in the next issue, so I'm thinking this is what will happen.

Why does he take her gauntlets? It can't just be for the sake of getting his tech back. As i said he's not that cold, and also he can probably make those again in his sleep.

FORGE ALMOST KILLED AN ALT VERSION OF STORM IN COLD BLOOD. The man is not well, I'm telling you.

There's a theme of Forge hurting the women he cares about in this issue. Trust Sage to see the pattern and get the hell out before anything can happen- the hurting or the caring.

OK, now he's levitating with a big shiny triangle around his body. That's magic, isn't it? For a second I started thinking the Analog must be magic after all, but then I remembered Sage loves staring into it too, so it can't be. Mmm...still processing.

Thorne understands Forge's power better than any writer I've seen (yup that includes Claremont), and I appreciate that he mentions his need for materials to build anything. It should be obvious, but most writers have him make things out of thin air. There's only so much he can fit in that utility belt.

So many people, so many things! Poor Marcus To.

Marcus To is still doing excellent though. Do I need to tell you that Forge is hot? I think I've been clear on that already, but let me reiterate: FORGE IS HOT.

"Slippery as ice": oh, that made me hap-py. Such an evocative, accurate way of describing Sage.

No, Forge's power doesn't let him see what will happen. But you know whose power can see every eventuality? Sage's. This was highlighted in the very first issue, and Forge repeats the exact same words from this moment in this issue. THERE'S SOMETHING TO THAT.

I continue to dig the dynamic between Forge and Sage, curses and all. The little cerebral push and pull they have going on is very interesting.

Also continue to adore Tessa herself. The way she challenges Forge at every opportunity, the way she always asks the right questions *chef's kiss*. Everyone obviously wants to murder Forge on that last page, but I love that she's the one who tells him to go fuck himself, even though she's been the person closest to him on the team. She's my girl. I'm this close to opening a side blog entirely devoted to her awesomeness. (I see what Geoff Thorne means when he says she tries to steal the show. She does!)

OK, so, there's no way Forge has a team anymore at this point, so I assume the next issue will be a downtime one. I imagine he'll go home, have an existential crisis featuring his two exes (as you do) and then get back on the road. Or something? Also, the next issue has a Sage variant cover, which could imply she plays an important part in it. One can only hope. If it's the issue of Forge getting his ass kicked by awesome women, she should take part.

[stormandforge]

Forge is a bastard. He's my bastard, but he's a bastard.

This was a veiled X-Force #5 spoiler. Now go read it.

[stormandforge]

Been staring at this

[stormandforge]

On this Eve of Halloween, I present The Vampiress Ororo