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rei-ismyname · 8 days ago

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Giant-Size Wolverine retcons

Marvel, famously, loves having Wolverine as a cash cow, to the point it has its own entry on TVTropes. This manifests as a LOT of Wolverine #1s being released as well as the clawed-one showing up on deceitful covers and guest starring anywhere they think they can justify it. Less common (but still frequent enough) is Forrest Gumping him into historical events or rewriting events he was there for as a character study cynical profiteering.

Sunfire is still great - 'banal prattle.' You tell em

This is the latter, foregrounding Logan in Giant-Size X-Men to the detriment of almost everyone else. In the original Giant-Size X-Men, Logan sits at the back and says very little. Here he takes charge and uncharacteristically identifies that the new squad lacks synergy and a sense of teamwork. He opens with 'it's your first day as new X-Men, people. I'm going to show you how this works.' Uh, isn't it yours too? Did I miss a meeting?

Poor Kurt. Eddie Munster is just mean

So he starts a fight, telling everyone there's one too many people. Colossus objects for sexist reasons (not objection to killing lol) and Storm puts him in his place. Sunfire and Thunderbird both have little patience for white people or bullshit and Logan catches a fireball...

... and an elbow to the spine. Ororo goes off with electricity and Kurt just doesn't want to die, so he BAMFs behind her and starts choking Storm from behind. Logan turns the tables on Proudstar and drops a one liner about metal conducting electricity. I'm no wizard, but I don't think it interacts well with human flesh, either, especially if they have a metal skeleton. Obviously he takes everyone down and has the biggest dick in the world.

Yeah... about Thunderbird.

Banshee bursts in and reveals Logan is acting against Chuck's wishes. I'm generally in favour of that but I'm not fond of its narrative function at all . He has an open shirt, a toothpick in his mouth, and looks oh so pleased with himself. I'm not some reactionary purist who worships the sacred texts and pushes back against retcons. Quite the opposite, in fact. Additive retcons are fantastic when done well - Magneto being a Holocaust survivor stands as one of the best in fiction.

I don't think that's what this is, or at least it's not successful. In Giant-Size X-Men #1 there's no time for this pissing contest because all the other X-Men need rescuing ASAP. Chuck rounds them up and handles the basics then defers to Cyclops, the field leader of many years. They leave immediately and nobody is getting along. Sunfire leaves then comes back. Scott is all business because he's worried about the folks on Krakoa and there just isn't time. If they respect the chain of command in the field that's good enough. Team building can come later.

What's achieved here besides sidelining everyone to centre edge lord Logan? Not a lot, in fact I'd say it minimises Logan's character arc most of all. He was a grumpy loner who eventually learnt to trust people, came to see the X-Men as family, and committed to the team. Logan knowing half this stuff already and having this degree of social confidence just undermines that, as well as Cyclops' leadership of this ragged band. Not sure what Whedon was thinking tbh.

That wasn't the end of it, though. Interestingly, this is Chris Claremont writing here. Again, I'm not a purist and I'm under no illusion about CC's later X-Men work. He'd worked with these characters for a long time but Giant-Size was Wein & Cockrum, so he's choosing to expand the origin story. Thunderbird is still alive so they're still pretty new here. Anyway, Cyke is running a danger room training session - Storm vs Thunderbird.

After some kinda bizarre ethnic posturing Ororo is pinned.

Unsurprisingly, she starts to wig out due to her claustrophobia. Logan picks it up with his advanced senses and jumps in. Scott owns the mistake and ends the training session.

I find it hard to buy Scott would feel like his authority was undermined here. Logan is being as paternalistic as ever, but Scott blames himself for failures. He doesn't externalise it and he understands he's not leading children anymore. It's Chuck who has difficulty adapting to this specific dynamic. Also, Logan had zero interest in leadership. None. It was Ororo who was a friendly rival to him and ended up succeeding him as leader. He also didn't especially trust or show respect to anyone. Everyone else has problems but the focus and Charles' confidant is Wolverine. That's silly as hell.

Okay, private insecurity and self-doubt, totally Scott's thing. I'm just going to ignore literally everything else that's happening, especially 'damaged goods.' Ugh.

The second story came out in 2005 in Giant-Size X-Men #4. Aside from the Wolverine oversaturation and other weird shit I've pointed out, I feel like there was a concerted effort to bring certain characters closer to their FOX movies counterparts. Chuck started looking like Captain Picard, Scott was Flanderised a bit but moreso deemphasized, and Logan started to look and act more like Hugh Jackman. He joined more teams, regressed in social growth yet became way more important to the X-Men. More important to the very fabric of the Marvel universe.

I get why it happened (capitalism) but I think it was executed poorly in many instances. These are particularly egregious, but Wolverine was and is fucking everywhere - under many different writers. There's always going to be a sense of asynchronicity under those circumstances. I've actually come to really dislike Logan lately. Obviously it's an issue for most long running characters, but his particular regression to the mean every new book bores the shit out of me. He's not growing at all, even when everything around him changes. On Krakoa he was mostly just gruff and stabby, monologuing about hell, beer, time, nature, poison, and being the best he is at what he does. 🙄

He'll usually find someone worse than him to point at and call out with transparency he never applies to himself. Magneto, Scott, Beast, Scott, Chuck, teenage Scott, Sabertooth, Omega Red, Beast, Chuck, and Scott again. Someone please deconstruct this guy! Send him to therapy, break him down to his base components and examine them. Fuck his moping or running naked with wolves or fighting the W-digo - give him a messy boyfriend and force him to get the fuck over Jean Grey.

He can still fight ninjas and mentor troubled teens and sulk about whatever his latest thing is - just have him grow! His books will still sell, people will still cheer when he says bub, and snikt isn't going away. Hire Al Ewing to do it like he did with Loki, Hulk, Magneto, Sunspot, etc. Some of those changes actually stuck and the characters are more popular than ever! Is that too much to hope for? Almost certainly, but one can hope.

Boy I got carried away on that outro, lol.

#x comics #wolverine #giant size x men #ororo munroe #cyclops #marvel #x men #comics #magneto #charles xavier #professor x #krakoa #thunderbird #retcon #chris claremont #nightcrawler #jean grey #sunfire #colossus

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mattzerella-sticks · 8 months ago

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My Idea for a Live-Action X-Men Movie...

Thinking... how can we introduce the X-Men into live action, whether through movie, tv show, limited series, etc. ... and I have an idea.

Let's start in media res.

Charles Xavier's School for the Gifted has been active for the past few years, however with a small class size of seven. Scott. Jean. Bobby. Hank. Warren. Alex. Lorna. Despite only consisting of seven students, due to Xavier's wealth he has been able to keep his school open and thriving since the beginning.

However that has changed as the size of his class has dropped from seven to one after a botched mission led to the capture of his students save one, Scott Summers.

And the opening scene is Xavier sitting in his mansion, worried, waiting, until Scott kicks his door down, tells them his team is gone, and passes out due to exhaustion.

We then pick up on our narrator for the movie, the character whose eyes we will be seeing the entire movie take place through, stepping off a plane and into JFK airport...

Ororo Munroe. Storm.

She had travelled from her home in Africa seemingly on a whim, as if drawn there by fate, and - unsure where to go or what to do next - she goes to a nearby bar to make her next plan.

Who should happen to sit next to her but a short, hairy man in a cowboy hat and a thick, Canadian accent?

Ororo, meet Logan. They do not hit it off.

She does happen to hit it off with the soft spoken Russian man who is reading poetry at the other end of the bar - Piotr Rasputin - and the bartender, a Native American man - James Proudstar - who wasn't supposed to be working that day but traded shifts with his roommate.

While they are all gathered there they hear a voice in their heads and turn around to see Charles Xavier, a man they all recognize and all soon realize is the reason they are now gathered together in this bar. At first they all want to leave but Xavier implores them to at least first hear him out, which they agree to do, but he tells them he won't start until the final member of their group is here.

Cue shouts and gunfire as Kurt - Nightcrawler - runs, leaps, and teleports across the airport in all his blueness.

Xavier manages to calm the crowd however not before one of the security guards manages to call in that the threat is a mutant and it's a race to grab Kurt before reinformcements arrive. But wouldn't you know it the group is not the best team yet and the reinforcements do arrive in the form of Sentinels.

It seems like all hope is lost when, out of nowhere, a stray quartz-colored beam blows one of the Sentinels apart and allows the group a moment to escape. They regroup in Xavier's car, which had been where Scott was waiting while Xavier gathered the others.

They return to the mansion where Xavier explains what happens to his team, that they were responding to a mutant in distress on an island that had ultimately been a trap - with only Scott escaping. The group has been gathered together to help Xavier and Scott rescue their teammates.

It's mostly a resounding no. Piotr would rather be at home on the farm. James has to go searching for a new job since he undoubtedly got fired from the bar for leaving during shift hours. Logan is "not a team player" and believes that the team is most likely dead anyway. Kurt is game but he is also "not the best fighter".

Ororo also agrees to help.

That surprises everyone. She says that while the circumstances that brought them together were underhanded, she cannot sit idly by while innocent people, people like her with a mutant gene, are in danger. Not just those on the island, who they are tasked with rescuing, but around the world especially since Sentinels have become standard issue around the world. While she does not see herself being a full-time member, she knows that the team Xavier had protected mutants like them from these threats and, with them gone, who will protect their community now?

Xavier tells them that, after they help rescue his original team, they would be free to leave and do what they want with their lives as they please.

Piotr is in. So is James. Logan sighs and agrees, "Since I don't want to be the odd one out." They agree to go save the others. Scott says, however, that before they can mount the rescue mission, they need to become a team first - referencing their battle at the airport and how they need to improve.

They agree to train.

Meanwhile, on the island, we see that there is a Master Mold along with Trask and scientists working on creating the next model of Sentinels in their ongoing war against mutants using the captured mutants from Xavier's Academy as test subjects. The scientists are just as much as prisoners as the X-Men, however, as they were led to the island on false pretenses and forced to work for Master Mold who had, unbenknownst to everyone until the final act, had taken over Trask and controls him as a puppet.

A few of these scientists came with their families. One of these families were the Prydes. Katherine Anne Pryde is seen as a non-threat by both Master Mold and Trask, and is able to freely wander the island as well as speak with the prisoners because, since everything is monitored and she is twelve, she cannot do anything to disrupt the mission. We learn from this scene that Master Mold is on the cusp of unveiling a new breed of Sentinel that, using the schematics pulled from Jean's mind, would be able to track mutants anywhere without needing to be called in. It was luck that the X-Men arrived on their island, fell into their trap.

Meanwhile back in Westchester, NY, this new team of X-Men are having a hard time at coming together to work as a team, which is making Scott mad. He and Logan almost come to blows if not for Piotr stepping between them to break things up. They both step away to cool off.

Ororo decides to speak with both of them. First, she goes to Scott, and tells him that he is not being a good leader. They have a heart to heart where he confesses that his friends are his family, and Jean... he has a lot riding on this being a success, and this is as new to him as it is new to them. He is not used to working with people he hasn't grown up with. Ororo tells him that he needs to lead from a place of love and courage, and not fear. Then, she goes to find Logan to see that he is brushing off Kurt rather coldly and Ororo does not wait to take him to task on his loner attitude. They clash a bit before Ororo tells him to get his act together or just leave, as it shouldn't matter to him what they think if he really doesn't care.

They all agree to do another training session, only they never get the chance as Xavier tells them it is now or never as there was a spike of pain from the same island his first team was lost, and that cannot mean anything good. The heroes go to get suited up and fly to the island base.

Master Mold is ready to create his new breed of Sentinels and it looks like they are a success, as they have been fitted with new upgrades. He activates a few and they immediately power online with the alert that there is a mutant among them.

All eyes turn to Katherine Anne Pryde. Kitty.

Her father and mother object but are restrained as the Sentinels begin to pursue her, only able to tell her to run before they are knocked out. Kitty runs and manages to escape the Sentinels after discovering her ability to phase through solid matter. The escape is not fullproof as they burst out the bunker in full pursuit. When she reaches the beaches with what looks like no place left to go, the clouds part and reveal the Blackbird jet which Ororo had just exited from and is now flying down to confront the Sentinels she spotted chasing the little girl. The Sentinels sense her power and lock onto her, only to get blasted by lightning and turret fire.

The X-Men land and confront the Sentinels but, unlike at JFK, they are able to work together and take them down. Even Logan finds himself being a team player. They rescue Kitty and she tells them where the prisoners are and also what Master Mold is planning.

The team decides to split up - Scott, Piotr, and James will confront Master Mold while Ororo, Logan, and Kurt follow Kitty to the prison area.

Of course we stay with Ororo because, again, she is who we are relying to guide us through this story.

We get to the prison area and it's Ororo, Logan, and Kurt going HAM on these guards taking them down while Kitty uses her powers to free the X-Men. She manages to get to the main control room and hits the button that releases all the prisoners who do their best to help, despite being weakened from experiments and torture.

We learn from Kitty that there's a prisoner missing, and they admit that it's Jean. She was taken by Trask.

So the group races to the main room where Scott, Piotr, and James are and see a BUNCH of Sentinels on the loose and pure pandemonium. Piotr and James are on the ropes and Scott is putting up his best fight, however just as the group arrives the Sentinels converge and blast him, with a woman across the room watching calling out his name as he 'perishes' (we'll circle back on this later).

Without their leader and shocked, Ororo steps up and takes command, leading the group into battle like she's been doing it all her life against the Sentinels while Kitty and Kurt evacuate the scientists. She cuts across the room almost instantly to get to Trask and Jean where we finally learn that the former has been completely taken over by Master Mold and is now a Sentinel cyborg. They battle it out but it's a tough battle given the numbers they're against until there's a moment where Ororo and Jean are tucked away, shielded from incoming blaster fire from Trask and the Sentinels, when Jean places her hands to the ground and closes her eyes. Ororo asks what she's doing and Jean tells her she's asking for help.

"From who? Xavier only sent us?"

"From the mutant we came here to help in the first place. From the island."

BOOM! We get the reveal that the island. Krakoa, is a mutant and has been weakened by the experiments run on it by Master Mold and the Sentinel. Jean tells the group that they need to let Krakoa 'feed' on a piece of their energy to recupe its strength for it to help them and they all look to Ororo as it's her call, and she says they should do it. They do and the ground rumbles and shakes and we can see the island begin to terraform as it fights back against Master Mold and the Sentinels. It takes out MANY of them while the X-Men pick up the slack on the rest.

Ororo takes on Master Mold/Trask hybrid as the island begins to sink back into the ocean, with Trask, damaged, spouting nonsense. That he is there to save the world, that he is the FUTURE, the INEVITABLE, that the X-Men cannot prevent the world falling apart in the future, that they will be responsible for the apocalypse. However, with a lightning zap and some timely telekinesis, the group escapes back to the Blackbird as the rest of the island has already been evacuated.

The X-Men return to Westchester without Scott and inform Xavier of what happened.

Time moves on. They recover. They mourn. A memorial service is held for Scott. Xavier's original students, Warren, Bobby, Alex, Hank, and Lorna, decide to leave the school afterwards as they believe they need to come at the Sentinel problem another way. They form X-Force.

Xavier comes up to Ororo after the service and asks her to stay on, despite her having no obligation to do so. She watches Logan and Kurt keeping Kitty entertained while Piotr and James speak with her parents, about Kitty staying on at the school and learning from Professor Xavier, and decides that she would like to stay and lead the X-Men. Jean joins them and says that she'd be happy to be on any team Storm is leading, revealing that -of the original students - she is the only one who is staying with the X-Men. The three look out onto the horizon as there are endless possibilities for the X-Men now *play the theme song*

END CREDIT SCENE NUMBER ONE - Magneto watches Xavier's new team of X-Men in action and converses with Mystique, saying that, "If Charles has put together a new team of recruits, we should, too."

END CREDIT SCENE NUMBER TWO - A blonde woman in all white speaks with a raven-haird men with red eyes and a crimson diamond embedded in his head. "You pulled a lot of favors to get him, are you sure he's worth it?" "Believe me. He is." The duo, Emma Frost and Dr. Sinister are looking over the body of Scott Summers, very much NOT DEAD, held in stasis as the camera pans out and reveals the Hellfire Club.

And that would be how we introduce the X-Men, and mutants, into live action movies.