X-Men #10 annotations
As always, this post contains spoilers, and page numbers go by the digital edition.
X-MEN vol 6 #10
“Sisterhood of the Metal Bones”
Writer: Gerry Duggan
Artist: Javier Pina
Colourist: Marte Gracia
Letterer: Clayton Cowles
Editor: Jordan White
COVER / PAGE 1: Wolverine (Laura) faces off against someone clawed. Anyone who’s been reading the X-books for a while will recognise her as Lady Deathstrike without too much trouble.
PAGE 2. Flashback: Wolverine is resurrected.
This page is plugging what seems likely to be a continuity error in issue #5, where Laura was shown as having a complete metal skeleton (as opposed to just metal claws). In issue #8, she said that this changed “after returning from the Vault”, so this is apparently an expanded version of the resurrection that we saw at the end of X-Men vol 5 #19. If so, Synch and Cyclops should both be here too, but let’s assume they’re out of shot.
The dialogue seems to confirm that Proteus is the member of the Five responsible for resurrecting people complete with their biological implants – which makes sense, since he’s the only one of the group who could logically do that.
“Is this a mulligan?” Um… no? A mulligan is a second chance at doing something that went wrong the first time.
PAGE 3. Rogue and her gun.
She’s scanning Phobos, as we see in the next scene. Why you’d disguise a scanner as a weapon is beyond me, other than the fact it looks cool. Which is a good enough reason for a lot of things in comic, I guess.
PAGES 4-5. The X-Men discuss Phobos.
Phobos, the moon of Mars, was terraformed by Feilong on behalf of Orchis in issue #6. Aside from being a human (and anti-mutant) outpost on the doorstep of Mars, it also represents a challenge to the claim that terraforming Mars was a uniquely mutant achievement, even if Feilong was working on a smaller scale. The teleportation link to Earth also maintains the usual parallels between Orchis and Krakoa. Since Orchis is a secret society, the civilians who visit Phobos presumably understand it to be a legitimate project of Feilong’s company.
Although Rogue describes Phobos as “occupied”, we’ve seen nothing to suggest that the mutants of Arrako had actually established a presence on the moon. Indeed, that’s why Feilong chose it, rather than just setting up a presence on the other side of Mars.
Nightcrawler’s body. Nightcrawler died in Way of X #5 while preventing Phobos from crashing out of orbit. His body was found by Feilong, and kept as a decoration, in X-Men #6.
“Logan’s left enough metal skeletons for Orchis to make a hall of Wolverines.” In Inferno vol 2 #1, we saw that X-Force had been sent on repeated suicidal attacks on the main Orchis space station, leading to Orchis acquiring a collection of duplicated corpses.
PAGE 6. Recap and credits.
PAGES 7-10. Wolverine sneaks into Phobos.
The narration plays up the idea that Laura suspects the X-Men don’t have as much faith in her as they do in Logan. The recurring problem with having legacy characters active at the same time as the original is that there’s always a nagging sense that they aren’t the real one; I’ve said similar things about Miles Morales on the podcast, but you can’t really call her “Wolverine” without going on to make clear which one you mean. And you don’t really have that issue with Logan.
“Many sisters…” This refers to the first arc of All-New Wolverine from 2015-16. As it says, a bunch of other clones of Laura were produced. Most of them are dead, though Scout and Bellona are still out there.
Earth-Arakko-Relay satellites were previously mentioned in issue #7.
PAGES 11-15. Wolverine discovers Lady Deathstrike.
Lady Deathstrike is a prominent villain of the original Wolverine. Her back story involves a quest for revenge after her father’s technique for bonding adamantium to human skeletons was apparently stolen and used on him; she knows perfectly well that it wasn’t his choice, but that’s not the point. She was turned into a cyborg by Spiral in order to become a match for him, making her an early example of a post-human villain (and thus part of the third force of machines in the logic of the Krakoan era).
I think this is the first time we’ve seen her in the Krakoan era. Her most recent appearance seems to have been in last year’s Legends of Shang-Chi #1, when she stole part of the enchanted Equinox Blade; that plot has presumably been dropped.
Deathstrike tells us that she turned to Orchis (specifically mad scientist Dr Stasis) for help after she began to suffer adamantium poisoning. Various stories over the years have claimed that Wolverine suffers from adamantium poisoning if his healing powers are switched off for some reason. Quite how that works, when adamantium is meant to be completely inert and indestructible, is a little vague, but let’s assume that its presence somehow interferes with other bodily functions and that “poisoning” is being used rather loosely here. Marvel haven’t exactly been consistent about this point – Bullseye has an adamantium skeleton too, and it doesn’t seem to have done him any harm.
PAGES 16-18. Wolverine is discovered, ejected and rescued.
Polaris apparently won the bet about how long it would take for Wolverine to be discovered.
PAGES 19-20. Deathstrike recovers and leaves.
We get another one-panel flashback to one of the X-Men’s pitches at the Hellfire Gala vote (from X-Men vol 5 #21), which has been a recurring feature of this run. Synch would have been voting for Laura because he was still in love with her after their (subjective) centuries in the Vault, which he remembers and she doesn’t. Laura doesn’t exactly lobby to be on the team but generally takes the line that she’s at Krakoa’s service and willing to do things that can atone for her past.
Oddly, Cyclops is wearing his regular costume in this scene, despite Lady Deathstrike being around (albeit unconscious). He’s meant to be Captain Krakoa when around non-Krakoans, to explain his apparent death in issue #7 without revealing the secrets of Krakoan resurrection. He was wearing the Captain Krakoa costume earlier in the issue, too.
PAGE 21. Rogue and Destiny.
Destiny is Rogue’s adoptive mother. Traditionally that was Mystique’s role, but the increased emphasis on Mystique and Destiny’s relationship has resulted in Destiny being positioned more explicitly in that role too. As usual, they disagree about the value of the X-Men’s approach. Given her powers, Destiny’s warning that Rogue “will come to see things my way” might well have to be taken literally, though Destiny only ever identifies the most likely futures.
Gameworld has been sending aliens to attack Earth for amusement purposes throughout the Duggan run.
Gambit‘s poker game is also attended by the Thing, Forge and a woman who can’t be clearly identified.
PAGES 22-23. Rogue asks Rocket about Gameworld.
This isn’t as random as it sounds. Aside from the fact that Rocket is an outer-space character from Guardians of the Galaxy and Duggan has written him before, Gameworld is run by Cordyceps Jones, who debuted in 2017’s Rocket #4.
PAGE 24. Data page. An exchange of messages within Orchis. The woman “M” who offers her services to Feilong and Dr Stasis is obviously Moira MacTaggert, who was resurrected as a post-human in X Deaths of Wolverine #5 – hence her reference to knowing about them from “past lives”.
Stasis’s “Oblivion Institute” was previously mentioned in issue #1.
PAGE 25. Trailers.
Given the card scene in X-Men #2, and assuming Gambit has a relatively stable group, I presume the woman is meant to be the Black Cat, consistent with the depicted hair and fur trim costume.
The casual ease with which the X-men spy on the Phobos base just makes it all the more bizarre that Abigail Brand was hanging out there last issue. Unless she’s not planning on keeping her membership on the Central Column secret for long?
Marvel has a real problem with characters using the same name. Off the top of my head there are currently two Hawkeyes, at least two Spider-Men, two Wolverines, two Captain Americas, two Ghost Riders, two Novas and two Daredevils.
I’m pretty sure the first time Logan got sick after losing his powers, in the first Genosha storyline, the implication was that the adamantium covering his bones interfered with red blood cell production, leaving him a hemophiliac.
Nova is a weird case of name duplication. The name Kid Nova is right there, established, and ready to go. Or if you wanted to go edgy, Black Nova. The name Spin from Spidey and his Amazing Friends has grown on me. X-23 should not be used for Laura, for several reasons.
But there should absolutely be two Hawkeyes.
I’m fine with two Novas, the guy is basically Marvel’s Green Lantern equivalent.
There was a bit of a cock-up in this issue (and here comes the spoiler): Rogue’s extended rescue sequence ends right before the climax. Suddenly it’s just “Later, back at the Treehouse.”
It feels weird for me to keep reading X-books but I don’t know why I’m still getting this.
10 issues and it really feels like three issues of story at best.
How many issues ago was it that they were splitting the team to go after the aliens?
Hickman’s version wasn’t my favorite, but at least it was theoretically generating plots for other books to pick up.
Even if they mostly didn’t.
Oh boy, brain fart.
It feels weird for me to keep reading X-books but I don’t know why I’m still getting this.
The Moira text page feels like Duggan’s bid to re-assert that no, really, this is the flagship book, I swear. It’s been so light and inconsequential so far, and we’re seemingly headed for a roster shakeup, which seems way too early. Immortal and Red’s first issues made much stronger cases that they are, if not the centre of the line, then certainly core books. Immortal especially so.
I don’t ordinarily push for books to be involved in crossovers and events, but the core book largely ignoring Inferno and X Lives/Deaths feels like an error from a publishing standpoint. Either it’s the flagship and therefore those events don’t really matter, or the events matter so X-Men isn’t really the flagship. It’s nominally the A book but it reads like a B book.
I think it ultimately goes back to what Paul pointed out during X of Swords – nobody really put anything on paper about there not being a formal X-Men team during Dawn of X, so it officially coming back doesn’t have any dramatic heft. And now I struggle to figure out how it’s somehow important that the X-Men are back in business to deal with MODOK and a Guardians of the Galaxy subplot.
I’ll take X-23 over “Wolverine” for Laura every time, although a more unique name is probably best.
I just don’t see the point of the name change (yes, I know that it dates back to some six or seven years ago). She is already plagued by identity problems, and now she has to share even her codename? Not seeing the upside there.
I’m still mad they changed Gabby’s from Honey Badger to Scout.
With regards to calling Phobos “occupied”, I figure they either meant that it was occupied (inhabited) by Feilong/Orchis in general (to distinguish it from the presumably unoccupied Deimos) or occupied in an unfriendly sense (again by Feilong/Orchis) to distinguish it from the presumably under-Arakkoan jurisdiction Deimos.
I’m almost inclined to believe they mean it in the unfriendly sense, (or as defined by Wikipedia, “provisional control by a ruling power over a territory, without a claim of formal sovereignty”). Arakkoa consider it theirs, but humans went and stole it from them.
I assume they said “occupied” because the view the Martian moons as mutant property.
Of course, they stole Mars from all the people of Earth since the solar system (and Earth’s moon) are supposed to belong to pretty much everyone like Antarctica.
@Ceries- The really annoying part is that Storm, Magneto and Sunspot know Brand is working with *someone^- they just don’t know who and they can’t PROVE It. (And Roberto’s dialogue makes it clear he’s been suspicious of her for quite some time.) That kind of plot only works if Orchis has some kind of technology to defeat any kind of spying the Krakoans can use, since Storm, Magneto and Sunspot probably asked someone to spy on her.
I’m in for an X-Men Espionage Squad (a nod to the Legion of Super-Heroes) which consists of characters like Mystique, Trance, Cipher (not Doug!), Forgetmenot, Shinobi Shaw, Morph (Benjamin Deeds) and so on.
Shapeshifting, astral form, undetectability, forgettability, intangibility, another form of shapeshifting… throw in a psychic/telepath and a teleporter for transportation/exfiltration, and you’re all set. Maybe even recruit a size-changer like Micromax or Kidogo or Mystique’s old handler, Shortpack.
I mean sure, X-Force is nice, and Laura is great, but why not a team actually built around stealth and subtlety instead of stabby-stab sneak-sneak click-boom? Hell, maybe recruit from the vast Krakoan population as needed for specialized missions, like the Secret Avengers/Secret Defenders/G.I. Joe Special Missions… But for fuck’s sake don’t let Beast anywhere near the project or he’ll fuck it up.
“Marvel has a real problem with characters using the same name. Off the top of my head there are currently two Hawkeyes, at least two Spider-Men, two Wolverines, two Captain Americas, two Ghost Riders, two Novas and two Daredevils.”
Well, you have three options:
1. Only the original character perseveres, never dies, never changes, keeps the name in perpetuity.
2. The names become legacies, allowing for new takes on the same old properties.
3. Completely new characters are created instead hahahahahahahahahahahaha I’m just kidding there are only two options.
@The Other Michael
The squads are not intended to make sense power-wise, they are supposed to use the popular characters, hence the Wolverine over-saturation.
Also, having too many convenient powers just makes everything too easy and the story boring. These characters are mainly intended to be used as esoteric background characters, not as actual players.
If you want to no prize the poisoning bullseye is the only person to have undergone the Darkwind process. Weapon X stole the process so may not have had all the notes such as how to avoid blood poisoning (or may not have cared) and spiral used Mojoworld magic/science so not the same process. The only other adamatium user with out a healing factor was cybur who had all his augmentations outside his body on his skin so no impact on red blood cell production. The may also be why the x-23 program only coated claws to avoid the risk to their assets
Legacy characters I think Laura can go back to X-23 a story around reclaiming it from the people who harmed her and it’s what most people know her has. And call gabbie honey badger.
Nova will soon be joining the MCU once he does either Sam or Rich will end up being the Nova based who gets cast, I would make Sam Nova and Rich Nova Prime.
I would make Robbie the only ghost rider as Blaze has enough name recognition not to be Ghost rider.
Hawkeye should be Kate ideally the main Hawkeye it would have helped if the Disney show had retired Clint, he can go back to Ronin.
Miles is a big problem you can’t remove Peter (Ben should be Scarlet) but demoting Miles sends a bad message in the long term I think miles will get a new name, once again I think it will come from the movies
I’ve become convinced that for many years now the main X-Men title, the flagship of the line, has not been the best / most interesting X-Men title being published at the time. Maybe since Morrison’s run ended.
And before that, adjectiveless and Uncanny were in a state of near-constant crossover if I recall correctly, so who’s to say which even was the ‘main’ title?
So Red and Immortal doing interesting, characterful stuff, while adjectiveless is this beautiful, vague nothing, is par for the course as far as I’m concerned.
Marvel always really consistently get it wrong with launches of a new era. We get the great Immortal X-Men in week one, the great X-Men Red in week two, and it all looks exciting. And then we get a week where the only X-book is this one, and we’ve lost all the momentum just like that.
I assume Knights of X was meant to be the big week three launch at one point, but I’m not too optimistic about that one either… 🙂
Honestly, Marvel is a bit better about the name duplication than they were a few years ago. Remember how Dr. Doom and Riri Williams were both Iron Man, Jen Walters and Amadeus Cho were both the Hulk, and Jane Foster was Thor while Thor was Odinson but also still Thor?
On the other hand, DC’s doing it now with two Supermen and two Batmen.
Josie is pretty much dead on. Marvel has a slate of names with cultural cachet, but all the diversity you’d expect from characters mostly made in the ’60s. Introducing NEW characters, though, is risky and hard. Thus, the Barry Allen solution. Recycle the name with someone new and you get a new character with an instant “I Matter” shine. Bonus valuable IPs for the small cost of being confusing.
Well, it’s not like they’re not trying. I mean it’s only been, what… six years since the debut of the new, hot ongoing series ‘Mosaic’?
I was going to ask ‘but seriously, has there been an actually new character with their own book since Moon Girl’, who’s ‘new’ status is kinda muddled by being the distaff counterpart to Moon Boy anyway, but then I checked and Moon Girl actually debuted a year before Mosaic.
I guess it must be that crop of Aero, Sword Master and other East Asian characters? Apparently they’re from 2018?
I wonder how much wheel-spinning/course-changing this X-Men series has had to do since its launch. The first few issues dealt with the Cordyceps Jones plot while giving each character the spotlight for an issue. The Ben Urich and Orchis stuff was relegated to subplots. Then, we got the Jean vs. Nightmare issue that felt slight and disconnected, but made sense as a one-off between arcs.
Now, the book is bouncing between Orchis and Captain Krakoa, neither of which seem to be going anywhere. The Ben Urich plot is resolved clumsily and hastily. We spend time with Modok and Destiny when the team should be dealing with the plot started in the first few issues. Pretty soon, there will be a roster shake-up. Also, the series went from more-or-less monthly, to having multiple issues ship with (admittedly good) fill-in art within a couple months. To me, the progression of the book doesn’t feel natural or logical. Is it just Duggan’s writing? Maybe, as Marauders went from good to sloppy after the first year. I still wonder if he had to redo his scripts and delay or eliminate some plot points on the fly.
I get covering for a plot mistake, but the adamantium thing being treated as some comedic whoopsie while other books deal with the ethical implications of unconsented alterations on ressurected bodies is just another blunder on a list of things that illustrate how uninteresting this book is.
Like, you just decided to do some character beat about Laura feeling shoved under the shadow of Logan! If you need to cover for the blunder, why not draw a stronger connection between that and the idea other characters treat the wolverines as interchangeable? Instead we get some narration about characters taking bets on the success of her infiltration that doesn’t even come off in-character.
@Allan M “The Moira text page feels like Duggan’s bid to re-assert that no, really, this is the flagship book, I swear.”
I mean, if two writers from the rest of the line got so much critical acclaim for doing so much with the first issue of their respective new books I would feel insecure too. But then maybe Duggan should spend less time arguing with twitter randos about how krakoa isn’t a fascist state and more time polishing whatever plots and character beats he’s trying to bring together. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
@Alastair “The may also be why the x-23 program only coated claws to avoid the risk to their assets”
It’s explicitly stated in her origin comic that Laura only had adamantium claws due to her still being a kid. Since she was still a growing kid, adamantium coated bones would have interfered with her growing.
Laura:
IIRC Laura first full appearance in the Hickman period was just over two years ago, in #5 of the previous series, and that was when she resumed calling herself “Wolverine”.
That issue, written by Hickman, had a panel making clear that Logan encouraged her to take that name and saw it as a show of support and faith in her.
Dugan seems to have a different take and to emphasize how unconfortable Laura may feel about using that name and dealing with the corresponding comparisons and expectations. This is a rough period for Laura’s sense of identity. She is also separated from Scout and dealing with the awkwardness of Synch’s attitude towards her.
Have we seen any scene about her retaking the “X-23” name after her time in All-New Wolverine? Did that happen off-panel with no comment?
———————–
Dugan’s voice for Scott:
It is seriously mismatched. This Scott is far more flippant and self-assured than any previous interpretation of the character. Scott does not go around saying that he is the X-Men, nor does he casually make jokes about the competence of his teammates. He is Cyclops, not Batman.
——————————
Legacy characters and shared names:
Miles, I have convinced myself, should go by Gecko. His powers are sufficiently different from Peter’s to make the sharing of codename rather arbitrary. Maybe it is just me, but I don’t think that it is a bad name either – certainly not inherently more awkward than “Spider-Man”. There may be a good story somewhere in the future about his possible conflict of feelings when considering a change of codename. Does it hint of self-assurance and authonomy, or is it instead lack of support and acceptance?
Generally speaking I think that characters may well share codenames for various reasons, but it is unreasonable to expect them to go into action together with any regularity without some form of less ambiguous alternate name.
For instance, I understand that the two Hawkeyes usually go by their civilian names these days, and treat the codename as an earned title in practice.
On the DC front, for a while there in the 1990s both Mary and Billy were supposed to answer mainly to “Captain Marvel” and that was needlessly unconfortable and IMO just plain wrong, particularly given how they actually had differently colored costumes at the time. Mary is her own person; it does not diminish her to have her use a codename of her own.
An interesting case is that of David Bank. Vance Astro, already “Justice” by that point, gave him his own former codename “Marvel Boy” in the late 1990s. It turns out that this specific codename was used at some point by Uranian, Quasar (Wendell), Noh-Varr (The Protector), a duplicate of the Uranian (Thelius / “The Crusader”) and a duplicate of that very duplicate (“Blue Marvel”). As well as by two different, unconnected boys named Martin Burns back in the golden age. Someone ought to number them already…
Ghost Rider is a very specific concept, despite the existence of so many variations at the same time and even the occasional squads of them. While Howard Mackie insisted very often that the Danny Ketch version of Ghost Rider is somehow significantly different from Johnny Blaze’s, I don’t think that even he could tell how or why. In pratice often are all just “Ghost Rider” and call themselves by civilian names when necessary or convenient. There are exceptions, notably Vengeance and recent developments regarding Danny Ketch. Hulk is a similar case; the visuals alone weight a here, making their identification trivial in most situations, yet a bit awkward in others.
Members of the Nova Corps and of DC’s Green Lantern Corps are similarly usually called “Nova” or by more specific titles or civilian names, depending on the situation.
Captain America is in practice a title bestowed in recognition of merits (or, in John Walker’s case, expectations). It is a plot point that Sam Wilson is both similar and easily distinguishable from Steve Rogers. Wolverine apparently thought of his codename in similar terms back in X-Men Vol 5 #5, but I don’t think that works.
Come to think of it, I don’t think that there is much clarity on what their biological links actually mean for Wolverine, Daken and Laura. Maybe that is intentional, to keep a wide range of story options when they meet or refer to each other.
“He is Cyclops, not Batman.”
I’m pretty sure Marvel and DC are trying to turn every character into Batman at this point. Or Spider-man.
Wendell Vaughn never used the codename Marvel Boy. He was introduced as Marvel Man. After little kids made fun of him for how terrible a name it was, he changed it to Quasar.
No. In his first appearance (Captain America 217), he uses the codename Marvel Boy. Subsequently, the Marvel Boy becomes a Marvel Man, at which point the monumental scene of the kid telling him it was a terrible name happened. So, for one glorious issue, Wendell was still a mere Marvel Boy.
Somebody named Wendell Vaughn should just be happy people call him anything other than Wendell Vaughn.
Marvel Man is not a great name, but I imagine Marvel didn’t want that Miracleman guy snatching it back.
Paul> Nightcrawler died in Way of X #5 while preventing Phobos from crashing out of orbit. His body was found by Feilong, and kept as a decoration, in X-Men #6.
This is the second time that the Nightcrawler corpse has been brought up so I think Duggan has plans for it beyond just being a nod to Way of X. I wonder if ORCHIS can somehow incorporate Nightcrawler’s genetic structure into the outpost so Phobos Base can teleport around the Solar System (or at least just around Arakko’s orbit).
This will increase the threat Phobos poses – it can be like the ORCHIS Death Star, a weapons platform that moves around quickly and targets mutant cities.
On a side note, I’ve always felt that ORCHIS (as initially envisioned by Hickman and Larraz) borrowed a lot of its iconography from the Empire / First Order from Star Wars:
The ORCHIS Forge, a megastructure that siphons power from the Sun, is reminiscent of Starkiller Base.
The ORCHIS foot soldiers are mix of AIM beekeepers and Imperial Stormtroopers.
Some of the ORCHIS shuttles in House of X were copies of the First Order troop carriers.
Even Killian Devo and Omega Sentinel remind me of Emperor Palpatine and Darth Vader.
Devo, like Palpatine, is an old and disabled man who is the brains behind the operation.
Karima, like Vader, used to be a hero who ‘fell to the dark side’ (got possessed by a future version of herself). She’s now ‘more machine than man’ and serves as Devo’s lieutenant while nursing an agenda of her own. I wonder if this means Karima could be redeemed and rejoin the mutants near the end of the ORCHIS storyline.
Paul> I think this is the first time we’ve seen her in the Krakoan era.
It is, but we have seen a couple of post-human bodyguards with Deathstrike arm-upgrades before in Marauders 4. Since that was a Duggan issue, I wonder if he plans to tie it back to X-Men somehow. Maybe those bodyguards were a Doctor Stasis creation using material from a captive Lady Deathstrike?
Speaking of Doctor Stasis, I wanted to post this theory in the Immortal X-Men 1 comments, but I’ll just do it here instead: does anyone else feel that Stasis is secretly a rogue human clone of Sinister?
Throughout this series, Stasis’ face has always been obscured, either by well-placed shadows or by his facemask. In comic book convention, any new character whose face is hidden must have an identity reveal at some point, unless the idea is to subvert that convention.
I think Doctor Stasis is a human Sinister clone that broke off from the rest (sometime before Bar Sinister moved to Krakoa) and set himself up in America. This isn’t an original theory (I read it off a message board) but I have been rereading Duggan’s X-Men and some clues stood out to me:
1. Stasis and Sinister both have a similar interests and capability in genetic engineering. Stasis is also reminiscent of the High Evolutionary, someone whom Nathaniel Essex shares a past with. This past was even referred to in the opening quote of X-Men 3, where Sinister talks about Wyndham.
2. In X-Men 7, Stasis refers to his hybrid animal minions as ‘chimeras’. We know from Powers of X and Hellions that the Krakoan Sinister refers to his hybrid mutants as ‘chimeras’.
3. We also know from Powers of X that Sinister is likely to betray the mutants for the man-machine alliance at some point, which is why Moira was hesitant to get him involved with Krakoa. While Krakoan Sinister is currently scheming against Krakoa with his Moira clones, we’ve seen no evidence that he is working with the humans yet. But what if another Sinister has already aligned himself with the humans? Stasis is one of the heads of ORCHIS (which is the Life 10 version of the Man-Machine Supremacy).
4. The X-Men is currently being led by Jean Grey and Scott Summers, two people with whom Sinister has always been obsessed about. Stasis’ interest in the team could stem from that.
5. As seen in X-Men 2, Stasis has been repeatedly trying to resurrect his wife and son through cloning, but with little success. The entire family dynamic had an old-fashioned vibe to it. Didn’t Sinister, back when he was Nathaniel Essex, have a wife and child who died in 19th century London?
6. Even Stasis’ costume is similar to Sinister’s. They both share the blue, red and black colour scheme and Stasis’ pop-up jacket collar is evocative of Sinister’s ribbon-collar cape.
So what do you think? If you disagree, who else do you think Stasis might be? Or do you think he’s a totally new character?
I thought we had talked about Stasis, but it must have been on Reddit.
Yes I agree Stasis has to be a double of another character, most likely Sinister.
For all the reasons you mentioned.
Plus the name- he’s a Sinister that is “in stasis.”
A: a state of static balance or equilibrium : STAGNATION
B: a state or period of stability during which little or no evolutionary change in a lineage occurs
“Remember how Dr. Doom and Riri Williams were both Iron Man”
If I remember correctly, neither character went by that name nor did other characters call them Iron Man, that was just the titles of the books they appeared in. Everyone just considered Doom a weird imposter/cosplayer, and Riri Williams was deliberately searching for her own handle until the title ended.
On a tangent about multiple characters sharing the same name, what is it with X-Women having a hard time sticking with a codename? Jean Grey, Kate Pryde, Emma Frost, Jubilee, Betsy Braddock . . . they’re more easily identifiable by their “real names” than their codenames. (In fairness, Jubilee isn’t even a codename.)
Also Rachel Summers, Monet, Illyana, Moonstar.
But in contrast, Storm, Rogue, Husk, whoever’s currently Psylocke.
Riri should have searched harder for a name, Iron Heart sounds like a Care Bears villain.
Good observation, Josie.
My current impression is that most women protagonists are in fact more remarkable for their civilian identities and personalities than for their codenames, powers or tactical roles. They tend to be better developed characters, and calling them by a different name is just not very noteworthy.
That is not IMO a problem. At least, not for the female characters.
For comparison, I stand reminded of the times when it was asked who would be called Captain America, or Iron Man. Or to take an example closer to the X-Men, Magneto was once the White King of the Hellfire Club and later decided to call himself the Grey King.
While those are not necessarily representative cases, I think that generally speaking male characters have more interest in titles and codenames than female ones who have their own personal mystiques and little need for validation by a codename.
Doom was occasionally called Iron Man, or at least talked about by other characters as ‘being Iron Man now’, though mostly by Bendis in the book where that’s what was happening. He hardly appeared anywhere else – an issue or two of Waid’s Avengers, and Two-In-One when it was being The Fantastic Two.
“That is not IMO a problem. At least, not for the female characters.”
I’m mixed on this, and I wonder if it comes down to two things: 1. Whether a name can accurately identify a character, and 2. Whether it’s easier to say than the alternative.
For example, both “Jean Grey” and “Rachel Summers” are more identifiable than “Phoenix,” whereas “Storm” is much easier to say than “Ororo.” Meanwhile, Emma Frost hasn’t gone by “the White Queen,” as far as I’m aware, in 30 or so years. Meanwhile, “Psylocke” no longer identifies Betsy Braddock, and “Captain Britain” still more commonly refers to her brother.
When I refer to Carol Danvers, either in the comics or movies, I find I always have to specify “Carol Danvers Captain Marvel.” I no longer think of “Captain Marvel” as just the dead Kree warrior, but it’s been used by so many characters that I have to specify.
At least for Jean and Rachel, “Marvel Girl” is patronizing and “Phoenix” is technically incorrect. But coming up with a new codename would probably feel inauthentic after all these years. Or signal an identity crisis. Or just be bad (see “Prestige”).
There wasn’t anything to be the White Queen of for a long time, if I recall correctly. And “Frost” is such a great surname for Emma that it might actually be better than any codename they could give her.
I blame Claremont for Kate and Dani’s lack of codenames. He kept piling identities and abilities and names on them that nothing ended up sticking.
Maybe female comic characters in general are written as more malleable so their codenames end up not matching their new situation or identity and it’s easier to just use their civilian names for the sake of continuity? Malleable, developed, interesting… however you want to say it.
In fairness to Claremont, “Sprite” and “Ariel” were pretty terrible codenames. I’m more surprised that Shadowcat didn’t stick.
With Dani, neither “Mirage” nor “Psyche” really fits her. “Moonstar” is trying too hard, but it at least sounds cool.
And with Monet, I think it’s just that nobody quite knows what to make of “M” as a code name.
Emma not having a codename makes sense for her character. Seems like she’d wince at being addressed by some silly superhero name and insist on being addressed as Emma. The White Queen, back when it applied, was a title and not really a codename. I think she’s quite okay with titles that indicate rank/status and such. If the X-Men had a proud tradition of dubbing their most prominent telepath at any given time as either Lord or Lady Mindjob, I think she’d happily allow herself to be addressed as Lady Mindjob if awarded the title, because it would mean she’s the shit. Suck it, Jean.
Rogue’s real name went undisclosed for so many years that it was never going to matter what her real name was once revealed.
The best codename that Kitty could’ve ever been given (and I’m sure it must’ve crossed Claremont’s mind) was one that was already taken by Will Eisner, and that’s “Spirit”. It would’ve perfectly suited her ghostly powers as well as her spunky personality.
It annoys me when super-heroes & -villains don’t have codenames, with the exception of Emma Frost. As noted above, “Emma Frost” sounds cool. Also, I could see the character thinking she’s above something as silly as a codename. I think “White Queen” works fine, but that’s a position in the Hellfire Club rather than a codename.
Most characters with mental powers have no code names or code names that have nothing to do with their powers (e.g. Karma, Justice, Saturn Girl, Cable, Phoenix, Moondragon, The Leader). There are only so many names you can make with “mind” or “brain” in them, and Mastermind and Brainwave were wasted on crappy characters. I would have kept Mirage for Dani, as her powers result in illusions, but maybe that’s just me.
(Not a character with mental powers, but I always liked “Shadowcat” for Kitty/Kate Pryde. Stupid Joss Whedon ruining it for everyone.)
I also think “Psylocke” is a stupid nonsense codename.
A problem with Psylocke for me is that apparently it’s supposed to be a play on “psyche,” but “psyche” only sounds like “psi-key” to me if you draw out the second syllable in what is (in my idiolect, anyway) a strange way. Instead I just think immediately of Shylock.
I thought the “locke” part of Psylocke was a reference to the English philosopher, John Locke.
I’ve never made the connection between Psy-locke and psy-key. But even then it remains a nonsense name – if anything, telepathic powers are to key to unlock somebody’s mind.