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In which Xorn goes out on the town; silverware is morally neutral; Cyclops pursues dubious counsel; the X means ten; and Fantomex is eminently enjoyable.
X-PLAINED:
- The parentage of Hope Summers
- New X-Men #127-130
- Mutant Town
- A monster who is not a monster but is, perhaps, a metaphor
- X-Corporation Paris
- The whole Phoenix situation
- Fantomex
- Weapon XII
- A gene-hazard
- Corporal Animal
- E.V.A.
- The Weapon Plus program (somewhat)
- The World (somewhat)
- The Shi’ar Empire vs. Earth
- Xorn variations
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I guess it’ll come up again more fully when Planet X comes around, but I’ve never understood this idea (or Elbein’s stance) that there could be no coming back for Magneto after that storyline. Wolverine gets passes all the time for all the people he’s killed, largely because he tends to be under some kind of mind control or other. Jean flash-fried five billion brocoli people, and the retcon that absolved her of that has itself been undone. She’s still around. Why should a Magneto fully under Sublime’s control be any different?
I have mixed thoughts on this.
The Sublime aspect of it really does allow for a lot more wiggle room and – to an extent – always felt like Morrison putting in a “take backsies” device already for future writers.
Re, your point with Jean, that retcon did enough load bearing for years that now it doesn’t matter as much but was essential for the other narrative to grow around it and make it irrelevant. Krakoa also has pushed that issue with Greycrow and Apocalypse. Though, admittedly, Greycrow’s damage was undone by resurrection and most of the worst stuff Apocalypse did was in other timelines.
With Magneto here, it’s likely the scale, the demeanor, and the imagery that makes it REALLY hard to turn around, or at least have a character anywhere near approaching the tragic, noble anti-heroism that had been really built around the character. Granted, it seems like Magneto is enjoying the same benefit of Jean/Phoenix with stuff like Ewing’s approach: now that it’s been enough time and we have other stories, writers can start to play more with “but how much of this WAS magneto?”
All of this is to say, IMO, where the line is drawn between “too far” and “not” is vibes. I’ve noted in other conversations that there is an irony that Hank Pym has been basically permanently sidelined likely in no small part due to his domestic abuse stories decades before tainting the character beyond repair, but other characters with a history of murder and war crimes are more likely to face rehabilitation. Objectively viewed, it can seem silly (“are we saying mass murder is better than spousal abuse?”) HOWEVER, part of that is due to the fact that FAR more readers are likely to be the survivor of or know someone who is the survivor of domestic abuse rather than having their city be annihilated by a giant space laser or the like, so that level of evil hits home far more (hence, Poison Ivy may have a higher body count than Dr. Light, but only one of them is ever gonna be cheered on by fans).
All of this is to say that touching on Holocaust imagery gets too close to the “too real.”
GRANTED, I also think this has meant that some rehabilitations don’t work as well as the writers intended, especially if recent events make something hit much more closer to reality (I have a long rant about why I’m not there for Bad Batch’s major S3 character rehabilitation, having watched it in 2026).
tl;dr Vibes
I think the main difference with Hank Pym is that, to the best of my knowledge, very little has ever been done to suggest that his abuse of Jan was down to some other factor beyond his own agency (or, if someone ever did try to retcon that, it never took root). Morrison *explicitly* states via Wolverine in Here Comes Tomorrow that Magneto was being controlled by Sublime during Planet X; what does the character’s tragic, noble anti-heroism have to do with any of that? It’s literally not him at that point.
This arc definitely does feel a little sophomore slump-ish to me, but mainly I think due to the fact that Morrison is playing with the toys they care less about (i.e. X-Corp) and it shows in the way that it has that classic “writer shows this is serious by killing C-Lister”. I almost wonder if it had been more concentrated with the core team if it would have felt different. But yeah, Fantomex definitely works in a way that almost feels like it shouldn’t (and probably didnt’ for at least some folks) in how he’s just written to be cool and such an out of place character in the dynamics (but one whose out of planeness ultimately seems more like a feature than a bug).
I will say, one thing that Xavier’s arc here reminds me of is some celebrities who were forced out of the closet who then were relieved afterwards. Dick Sargent of Bewitched is the one who comes to mind. Basically, had the option of a tabloid outing him or outing himself, came out, and then in interviews would talk about how much he wish he had done it sooner.
(OBVIOUSLY, this doesn’t excuse outing folks)
Morrison mentioned in an early interview that he was inspired by Stanley Kubrick for his X-Men run, and I came up with this watch-along/read-along lost of Kubrick films as they translate to New X-Men:
“E Is for Extinction” = 2001 Space Odyssey
“Imperial” = Spartacus
“New Worlds” = Barry Lyndon (specifically the Fantomex Stuff)
“Riot at Xavier’s” = Clockwork Orange
“Murder at the Mansion” = Eyes Wide Shut
“Assault on Weapon Plus” = Full Metal Jacket
“Planet X” = Strangelove
“Here Comes Tomorrow” = Artificial Intelligence
Still haven’t found where The Shining would be…possibly with Murder at the Mansion, but it doesn’t quite fit thematically.
In a medium generally preoccupied with boobs and butts, there are a surprising number of full-on crotch shots this issue.
More impressive yet, they’re completely different and neither is gratuitous. You’ve got Jean’s spread-legged portrait, evocative of divine yoni iconography — fitting in that it’s this panel in which the cosmic Phoenix appears directly. Moreover, her position is straight-on and (very) open — completely honest femininity.
Contrast that with Emma’s look. Once again, we’ve got a woman reclining, presenting her genitals — but this time she’s in shadow and twisted; her legs are positioned like hooks. It’s devious, sinister femininity. (It’s also another fake-out for the readers. At this point the story is still positioning Emma as a homewrecker when her actual motives are, if not pure, at least are better than we may think.)
I felt very seen by the recent episode where Jay said this is a run that a lot of readers “hate but appreciate.” I’m very much in that camp, for reasons this episode in particular really spotlights. At the same time, I’m having a great time hearing Jay & Miles highlight all the beautiful and very human touches Morrison sprinkled throughout these stories.
Miles pushed back on the complaint that this run is alienating. I think the key issue is that the X-Men themselves are alienated, from each other and the world, and that’s really hard for fans to whose favorite aspect of the book is the “found family,” raucous family meals where Gambit blows up the pancakes, and baseball on the lawn. It’s probably hardest of all for those of us for whom Scott & Jean are, as Miles described them, a “comfort couple.” Scott & Jean’s specific alienation from each other is the most obvious in the run, but you also have things like Beast’s newest mutation destroying his relationship. (Trish Tilby is mostly awful, but I also recall something about Beast having to use a litter box, which never made any sense.)
On a character level, as this episode points out when discussing the X-Corporation characters, it’s clear Morrison never read or cared for most of the 80s and 90s stories. When Scott laments that he and Jean have been going through the motions of their teenage relationship, it doesn’t ring true at all for fans of stories by Louise Simonson, Fabian Niciesza, or (the very problematic) Scott Lobdell. Marvel time can crunch so many years of continuity into a few weeks or months, but by this point in Scott & Jean’s marriage they carry an unabridged decade of memories of raising Cable together in the future. (In fact one of my no-prize explanations for Scott’s issues during this run is that Apocalypse specifically repressed a lot of those memories when he and Scott were merged.)
On the other hand, Morrison took the school public and worked to create an idea of mutants as a culture. In that way they were less alienated from the world than ever, and more relevant to real world movements than they had been in a long time.
To me, this segment of the run is Morrison’s first big miss. Fantomex does nothing for me — I find intentionally unreliable narrators irritating; every scene with them becomes a waste of time. And I think the proper comparison for him is not Pete Wisdom but Deadpool: a character that the creator clearly thinks is too cool for the room, but who actually does get more interesting later, under different writers.
Morrison’s ignorance about Cannonball, Monet and the rest is frustrating, but what really gets me is that the core characters in the story don’t behave like themselves either. Professor X is told that the Chunnel team is most likely already dead — and his response is to fly off to an imaginary chalet and haggle about an imaginary Macguffin and listen to imaginary exposition for 16 pages? (That doesn’t count the cutaway scenes to the Weapon XII fight or Scott/Emma; that’s 16 pages of Professor X and Jean not going to help the team after being told they’re in mortal danger.)
It would have been easy to avoid this — just have Fantomex not deliver that line — but Morrison can’t seem to help showing how his newest character is way ahead of everyone. It’s exhausting.
Also, neither of them has heard of “Fantomex,” the famous art thief — Jean notes this later — and yet neither she nor Xavier scan the surrounding city and realize that no one else has ever heard of the famous art thief either?
On the plus side, the Scott/Emma stuff is again terrific, and kudos for Kordey for ignoring the “Professor X is 40” nonsense.
This isn’t specifically relevant to this episode, but (per the release dates on Mike’s Amazing World of Comics) today (18th May) is the 50th anniversary of the release of Uncanny #100, the onset of the Phoenix Saga. Two days ago, it was the 25th anniversary of the first issue of Morrison’s NXM. Happy anniversary, various notable X-books!
I never saw Fantomex as being a self-insert character, rather I feel he’s what 12 year Grant Morrison would have thought was the COOLEST GUY EVER!
Fantomex is mysterious, he’s got guns, he’s smarter than everyone, he’s sneakier than everyone, he’s a thief, he’s a scoundrel and he always gets away with everything!
I suspect Morrison, like most of us in Scotland in the 1970’s, would not have been able to see Danger: Diabolik or Fantomas, but might have seen photos in books and magazines.
It was good to hear you answer my question about the Shi’ar, but I was hoping you’d speak a bit to how their relationship with the X-Men looks like an early stage of imperial procedure. Build a relationship with a native power bloc that is not in overall charge of the territory, This can involve gift giving (Shi’ar tech) and cultural exchanges. When the minority group has trouble with the majority provide ‘military support’. There have been numerous occasions since the introduction of the Shi’ar where they could ‘have come to the aid of mutants’ and sought to establish a military presence to ‘protect mutant rights.’ It would have been a classic imperial divide and rule strategy, seeking to get mutants to believe their interests lay with supporting the Shi’ar. I doubt it’s a story that could be told now and suspect it hasn’t been told so far as there seems little interest in comics as to what an empire is, despite the profusion of them.
THAT is a significantly better premise for an “A vs. X” series than what Marvel came up with.
Basic story: X-Men side with Shi’ar takeover as a way to protect mutants on Earth, clash with Avengers who are naturally opposed to idea. Many fights ensue. Presumably X-Men do a face turn at some point when it becomes clear that the Imperial Vizier is — wait for it — evil!
Cyclops still winds up a criminal at the end b/c of his involvement.