{"id":5376,"date":"2020-07-15T22:03:34","date_gmt":"2020-07-15T21:03:34","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/?p=5376"},"modified":"2020-07-15T22:03:34","modified_gmt":"2020-07-15T21:03:34","slug":"giant-size-x-men-magneto-1-annotations","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/?p=5376","title":{"rendered":"Giant-Size X-Men: Magneto #1 annotations"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

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

And before anyone asks, I haven’t read the Free Comic Book Day story, which isn’t available digitally. From the sound of it, it’s basically a bunch of cryptic teasers for X of Swords.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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

COVER \/ PAGE 1<\/strong>. <\/strong>Magneto, in shadow, looks at the camera.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

PAGES 2-4.<\/strong> Magneto arrives at Mykines and asks to buy it from its owner.<\/em> <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Mykines<\/strong> is the westernmost of the Faroe Islands, which are about 200 miles north of Scotland. It does indeed have a lot of puffins. In real life, there’s a small village on the island, including a guest house for the small number of tourists (who are acknowledged in this scene, and who can reach the place by regular ferry and helicopter services). Most of the houses are now second homes; according to a BBC article about the Faroes<\/a> written in 2018, the current permanent population is nine. The Greek-sounding name is thought to be a corruption of a Celtic term for “pig island”.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

Mykines does have a lighthouse, but it’s been automated since 1970. It’s not quite<\/em> as remote as this story makes out – it’s only a few miles from the rest of the Faroe Islands, after all, and they have a population of over 50,000. Hickman’s version of Mykines may not be entirely in line with the real one.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“Islands have been an interest of mine for quite some time. I’ve been collecting them for years.” <\/strong>Aside from Island M, which we’ve talked about before, Magneto also had a less impressive island base in the early Silver Age.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“There were … certain requirements regarding location, weather…”<\/strong> It’s not immediately obvious what would be so interesting or useful about this particular location. As for weather, the Faroes are basically wet, windy and cloudy, but they’re not that<\/em> cold (the winter temperature is about 5 degrees celsius).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

PAGES 5-6.<\/strong> Cast page and credits. There’s no story title, and this is by Jonathan Hickman and Ram\u00f3n P\u00e9rez. The small print is reused from X-Men<\/em>. There are no other data pages in this issue.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

PAGES 7-10.<\/strong> In flashback, Emma Frost asks Magneto to find her an island.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Krakoa <\/strong>is seen clearly in page 7 panel 1 to be floating in the ocean, rather than being connected to the sea bed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Saucier<\/strong> is new. It’s not technically clear whether his skills as a chef are a mutant power, or whether he’s just a guy with four arms who also happens to be a talented chef.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Emma’s plan<\/strong> is only vaguely hinted at, but she does say that it’s prompted by watching humanity’s response to what the mutants have been doing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

PAGES 11-15.<\/strong> Magneto waits patiently until Namor the Sub-Mariner shows up.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Namor<\/strong> has shown up in Hickman’s run before, refusing to get involved with Krakoa, and expressing some scepticism about what the real agenda was. That makes him one of a very small list of mutants to actively reject Krakoa. His attitude here is in line with that; he doesn’t buy in to the mythology of Krakoa (“Less special each and every day, I think”), and Magneto finds that response interesting. Of course, Namor is also just generally keen on running down anyone he’s talking to.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For whatever reason, Namor seems to instantly understand what Emma would want with his island (even though she’s only just come up with the idea herself).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“Gresh”.<\/strong> That’s an invented term. It’s apparently some sort of communication device.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

PAGES 16-19.<\/strong> Namor and Magneto investigate a mystery in the Molloy Deep<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Molloy Deep<\/strong> is the deepest point in the Arctic Ocean. It’s east of Greenland, and it’s nowhere near Mykines.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Andromeda<\/strong> was an Atlantean who joined the Defenders in 1985, shortly before their book was cancelled. She’s been allied with Namor in the current Avengers<\/em> run. Basically, she’s serving here as “other Atlantean who you’ve vaguely heard of”.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“It’s the spiral of the Old Kings of Atlantis. Uhari, I think.” <\/strong>The Uhari are an aquatic race from Hickman’s Fantastic Four<\/em> run, who were suggested to be connected with the Atlanteans in some way. They were more visibly fish-like than the Atlanteans. In FF<\/em>, they were one of three aquatic races living in the Peak, below Vostok Station in Antarctica.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This tentacle\/spiral monster has distinctly cthulhuesque qualities to it, not unlike the decor of Island M back in the day. However, Namor identifies it as a kraken, a more conventional giant sea monster.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

PAGES 20-23.<\/strong> Inside the Kraken, Magneto and Namor meet three aquatic women.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

This seems to be the old three-fates trope. It’s all very cryptic. Magneto clearly breaks the intended format of the ritual by insisting on choosing the unspoken third option. The surviving crone appears to regard this as a disastrous result, which would at least explain why she was trying so hard to steer him away from it, but for some reason she also calls him a trickster, fraud and liar. That doesn’t seem to make sense, since all he did was to make a choice. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

For whatever reason, Magneto apparently wins a magic key which can be used to seal up the underwater gate again. It’s strongly implied that this is much more significant (at least to the crones) than either Magneto or Namor appear to regard it as. Perhaps the crones are simply concerned that access to the giant sea monsters has fallen into the hands of people who are taking it rather casually. Nonetheless, we see Magneto put the key away for safekeeping later on.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

PAGES 24-29<\/strong>. Magneto builds a citadel on Mykines and brings Emma through<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The obviously striking feature of this building is the giant Sentinel head that’s built into it – not something you’d have thought Emma would want as a design feature. Emma seems to be planning to invite people to come and live here, presumably building a power base independently of Krakoa. The fact that Magneto is willing to help her is curious in itself; evidently he understands her agenda to be in line with his.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“Apparently he won it gambling with some Danes after the Second World War.” <\/strong>The Faroe Islands have been a self-governing part of Denmark since 1948. Perhaps in the Marvel Universe Namor got hold of Mykines before that happened – although at that point there would have been over a hundred people living on the island.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

PAGES 30-31.<\/strong> Trailers. The Krakoan (obviously) reads NEXT: FANTOMEX.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

As always, this post contains spoilers, and page numbers go by the digital edition. And before anyone asks, I haven’t read the Free Comic Book Day story, which isn’t available digitally. From the sound of it, it’s basically a bunch of cryptic teasers for X of Swords. COVER \/ PAGE 1. Magneto, in shadow, looks […]<\/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":[31,27],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5376","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-annotations","category-x-axis"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5376","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=5376"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5376\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5382,"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5376\/revisions\/5382"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5376"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5376"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5376"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}