{"id":5094,"date":"2020-02-14T22:00:15","date_gmt":"2020-02-14T22:00:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/?p=5094"},"modified":"2020-02-14T22:00:15","modified_gmt":"2020-02-14T22:00:15","slug":"x-force-7-annotations","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/?p=5094","title":{"rendered":"X-Force #7 annotations"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

As always, this post contains spoilers, and the page numbers go by the digital edition.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

COVER \/ PAGE 1.<\/strong> Domino (without any of her plant grafts) about to be crushed by a toppling domino. It’s symbolic.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

PAGES 2-5.<\/strong> Domino and Sage discuss a series of freakishly improbable killings.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

This is self-explanatory – someone is killing humans who have been prominent supporters of mutants, and is doing so in ways which rely on such ludicrous coincidences that some sort of super power must be involved. For what it’s worth, we haven’t heard that much in the Hickman era about humans who are pro<\/em>-mutant, as opposed to humans who are just willing to deal with Krakoa for the drugs. But evidently they’re out there.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

Domino claims that her luck powers haven’t been working properly since she had part of her skin stripped off by XENO in issue #1. Since the assassin showed up at the same time, she reasonably assumes there’s a connection. Oddly, this scene claims that Domino is consistently rolling double 1s on her dice now – in other words, not only has she lost her superhuman luck, but she’s actively unlucky<\/em>. We’ve not really seen any evidence of that in the series up till now, nor does it seem to be backed up by anything we see later on.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

PAGES 6-7.<\/strong> Recap and credits. The story is “Domino Has Fallen” by Benjamin Percy and Oscar Bazaldua.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

PAGE 8.<\/strong> Data page. Subplot time, as Beast records his discussion with Forge about using rocks to record sound, so that they can smuggle them into places disguised as rocks, tiles and so on. Ringing rocks<\/a> are real things, but this is real Silver Age-style cod science – it resonates, therefore it can be made to do it in reverse and act as a recorder…? Well, it’s comics.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Beast’s list of targets are the obvious major ones in the Marvel Universe. The Roxxon corporation doesn’t come up very often in the X-Men’s stories, but it’s the Marvel Universe’s default evil mega corporation (and has been since the seventies).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Forge.<\/strong> Beast’s relationship with Forge is clearly a bit awkward. In Percy’s interpretation, Forge seems to be more of a jock, and Beast is baffled by how to read his behaviour. But they’re united in pursuing technological ideas without worrying about ethical implications. In Beast’s case, that’s probably because of his ends-justify-the-means mindset. In Forge’s, it’s more likely to be an enthusiasm for the technology as an end in itself.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

PAGE 9-13.<\/strong> Domino goes for a run, and crosses paths with Colossus.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Domino’s dream.<\/strong> She remembers being personally dissected by the anonymous XENO leader – the masked man with the peacock tattoo.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“Sometimes it feels like everyone on the island has forgotten the past.”<\/strong> This is a point that we keep coming back to – overall, the people on Krakoa seem remarkably willing to embrace the radical new status quo. Even characters like Domino, who don’t quite get on board with it, appear to accept that it works for everyone else.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“Resurrection has made it possible to choose a future self that’s unburdened by the past, a scarless existence.”<\/strong> Domino seems to mean this literally – that a mutant with injuries or scars could always just commit suicide and start afresh with a new body. It’s not clear that Professor X would necessarily approve of this use of resurrection, rather than as a failsafe – he certainly seemed to regard it as an abuse of the system when Apocalypse intentionally got himself killed in Excalibur<\/em>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Since the resurrection system involves restoring the mutant’s memories from back-up, Domino may also be floating the possibility that someone could choose to have inconvenient or painful memories removed, at least if they come too close to the end.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Colossus.<\/strong> Colossus was injured in issue #1 while rescuing mutant refugees from Russia. We’ve only seen some glimpses of that mission in flashbacks. Something seemed to be up with Colossus earlier in the series, but that hasn’t been followed up yet. At any rate, he talks as if the Russian experience was extremely traumatic for him.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Domino and Colossus were (briefly) a couple in Cable & X-Force<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Colossus’s interest in painting has been established for decades. Somehow, he seems to be painting without artificial light at two in the morning. Must be an exceptionally clear and starry night…<\/p>\n\n\n\n

PAGE 14.<\/strong> Data page. Another note from Beast, who reports having found a mystery part-burned piece of artisan paper in his study. A “deckle edge” is paper with a rough-cut edge, i.e. not machine-made.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Russian word written on the paper appears to translate as “chronicler” or “scribe”.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

PAGES 15-16.<\/strong> After another killing, Sage and Domino settle on the Sierra Institute as the next target.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Order of X.<\/strong> A mutant-worshipping cult previously mentioned in Marauders<\/em> #4. In Marauders<\/em>, it’s been suggested that these cults are the result of widespread damage caused by Xavier’s telepathic message to the human race.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Sierra Institute.<\/strong> There is indeed a Sierra Institute<\/a> in the Sierra Nevada Mountains (which is where Lake Tahoe is), though it seems to be mainly interested in human resources. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

PAGES 17-25.<\/strong> Domino stands guard at the Sierra Institute and pursues the assassin to a casino.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The speaker, Professor Elise Owsley, is a new character. So, presumably, is the assassin, who appears to be a lab-grown anti-Domino.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

PAGES 26-27.<\/strong> The Krakoan trailer text reads NEXT: INVERTED.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

As always, this post contains spoilers, and the page numbers go by the digital edition. COVER \/ PAGE 1. Domino (without any of her plant grafts) about to be crushed by a toppling domino. It’s symbolic. PAGES 2-5. Domino and Sage discuss a series of freakishly improbable killings. This is self-explanatory – someone is killing […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[31],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5094","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-annotations"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5094","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=5094"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5094\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5099,"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5094\/revisions\/5099"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5094"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5094"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5094"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}