The Mutants: The X-Men and the Twilight of the Gods (Part 1)

“And what’s he, then, that says I play the villain?” 

~William Shakespeare, Othello

“What have they done?  She was a hero, she was purity and courage and flame and she’s been undone.  I must know more!”

Such was my reaction to the rewriting of Dr. Moira MacTaggart.  A long-time X-Men supporting actor, she suddenly reappeared after a hiatus to dominate the House of X run, first as a manipulative key-player in the machiavellian superstructure of the series’ character-hierarchy, more antihero than paragon of virtue, then suddenly transmogrifying into a terrifying arch-villainess with murder in her heart.  What had they done?

Literary interests come and go, and I have lately been reading a lot of X-Men.  The itch has always lingered in the back of my mind and from time to time I’ve picked up a comic or two—or a multi-volume series, at one point collecting the entire Age of Apocalypse run, only to shelve it perpetually for one unfortunate reason: I am a completionist.  To miss out on a story or series is deep irritation to me, and I cannot name the number of perfectly good titles—comics, novels, movies—that I’ve put off for the sake of not having access to the earlier material.  Compound this with the tens of thousands of issues of X-Men comics extant and one is faced with a herculean task equal parts horrific and tantalizing.  It is a dilemma reminiscent of Bilbo’s on his doorstep; less “Then again why not?  Why shouldn’t I keep it?” and instead, “Why shouldn’t I just read them all!”

And so the task remained unfinished—nay! unaddressed—for many years, whole catalogues of comics on my shelf awaiting the simplest of reading pleasures, yet put off for the imaginary-yet-real agony of lost context.  Two events stirred me from this nonsensical stupor; the first was the culmination of the Marvel Cinematic Universe’s run with Endgame, the second was the rediscovery of Dr. Moira MacTaggart.  

Of Endgame there’s little enough to say: the theatrical release of Infinity Wars left me in a daze of astonished euphoria (“The mad bastards actually did it!”), which led to viewing the sequel with total relish.  (To say that the MCU’s stupefying decline in later years was bewildering after the unbelievable success of its first run would be a tragic understatement; insofar as I am concerned, what began with Ironman ended with Spiderman: No Way Home; the rest is so much bedazzled window dressing).  Fresh from Endgame, I immediately acquired a copy of the trade paperback of Infinity Gauntlet (1991) that inspired it all.  From there I made the leap to other major Marvel Comics events like Secret Wars (2015) and its namesake primogenitor, also titled Secret Wars (1984).  Of the X-Men, there was little sign, but the point here is that I was spurred to action at long last with the realization that having greatly enjoyed the movies, my appreciation would only deepen by reading the original comics.

What drove me back to the Mutants was the discovery of House of X (2019).  A limited series, it began what appeared to be a fresh narrative arc for Xavier and his acolytes.  There were new costumes, new villains, a whole new nation-state exclusive to mutant-kind, all under the forbidding headline that Charles Xavier’s dream (of human and mutant co-existence) was dead.  But lacking all context, I was as confused as I was intrigued, and the now-habitual turn to Google offered more questions than answers: Why is a genocidal monster like Apocalypse one of the good guys?  Wasn’t Destiny dead—no, she was dead, but now she’s back?    And what’s the deal with Dr. Moira MacTaggart—wait, she was dead too, but also resurrected?  And now she’s evil?

My vague memories of the no-nonsense scotswoman resurfaced in a jumble.  Her brief cameo appearance in X-Men: The Last Stand barely registered, while her role as free-thinking American CIA agent in the X-Men: First Class series did not figure at all.  I remembered that she was a longtime ally and ran an isolated scientific institute complimentary to Professor Xavier’s high school; that both were the faces of secret facilities hosting various mutant superhero teams.  So what was her role in this new milieu, and why was she a villain—and for that matter, a primary threat?  

On I read, and my head spun: here was the wholesome and courageous female scientist, maternal counterpoint to Xavier’s paternal professor, reimagined not merely as some brainwashed toady en route to the Big Bad, but a true believer with real blood on her hands and plans to kill every single mutant on earth—to include her own son and her adopted daughter.   What was going on?

My immediate questions were somewhat answered in finishing the House of X miniseries and dabbling in some of its follow-on comics.  In short, a new cadre of writers were on the scene, eager to make their mark on a franchise fifty-six years old and (so I discovered to mild surprise) recently struggling with multiple cancellations and false-starts.  It seemed to me that poor Moira was one of the sacrificial lambs to their ambitions, her recasting a sort of shock to the system to galvanize eager readers (like myself, I may shamelessly admit) into purchasing new comics.  Nor was she alone in catching my eye.  As stated above, new villains, old villains as new allies, and other character redrafts held my attention, especially the nigh-damnable line put in the mouth of Magneto toward the end of the earliest chapters: In a meeting with international delegates to their fledgling mutant nation, Magneto—first and greatest villain-turned-antihero—outlines a plan for mutant-international relations that concludes with the ominous ultimatum:

As a Christian, I was offended.  As a reader, fascinated.  

Magneto’s defining trait has always been hubris, one that I had thought mollified in recent storylines.  Here, evidently, the new writers sought to return to him his first impulses, restoring in their hero his most villainous characteristic.  Would they erroneously intend to validate Magneto’s blasphemy in the ensuing series, to see it accepted and lauded by fans of the “Mutant Metaphor” (that of the mutants as mouthpiece for intersectional oppression, so pervasive in recent years), or was Magneto’s pronouncement the foreshadowing to a Greek tragedy in the making?

And there it was for me: echoes of Oedipus, of Achilles, of Xerxes upon his throne; of the queen-mother become the mother-of-monsters, threatening to eat her own young.  I had to know more.  

I had to go back to the beginning.

Remember that Roman Empire trend?  While guys were/are thinking about the Roman Empire, I’m pretty sure the ladies are pondering Regency England.

Looking Back At Neanderthal Ancestry

"What is man that you are mindful of him, and the son of man that you care for him? You have made them a little lower than the angels and crowned them with glory and honor."

~Psalm 8:4-5

It may have been while I was in college that the news dropped that Europeans, Asians, and American natives are descended in part from neanderthals. At least, that's when I first heard of it, and the people talking it over seemed to think it was somehow earth shattering. I thought, "huh, I guess that would make sense."

I'm not caught up on my Ancient Ancestors lore, so I can't speak with any authority on what has or has not been determined based on the genomes and other scientific studies. But the news that select humans had "bred" with their genetic cousins appears to elicit different reactions depending on the audience - not all of them nice. A quick google offers suggested-searches of "does White come from Neanderthals?" and "what percent of Neanderthal does each race have?" Even the idea that "all peoples outside Africa have got a little in 'em," though maybe grounded in the data, lends itself easily to narrative spin. The official word appears to be, "Humans moved out of Africa and got it on with the neanderthals," yet based on the suggested searches above, there's a predisposition to lean into the "all races except the Africans."

One assumes (but look where assumptions get us!) that maybe there's a desire for non-Africans to have a little of the degenerate "race" in our genes. And from what I know of popular culture at least, there's the idea that the neanderthals were all killed off in an ancient genocide by their more intelligent human neighbors. One hopes that I am wrong is supposing this, but I suppose that such thought would lend itself to teleological lines of reasoning that elevate certain "races" over others.

Yet I also suppose (unsophisticated luddite that I am) that an alternate view is permissible: that we're all one race, and that our neanderthal cousins were simply another branch in the genetic tree that came out of Eden. We weren't breeding with the most genetically compatible ape-men; our forefathers (of the non-neanderthal sort) gave their daughters in marriage and took to themselves wives from other human neighbors, whom modern science has unkindly labeled "neanderthal." They worshipped God, or didn't, raised children, waged war, and mourned their dead. I should like to have met one, just to see what sort of Man he was and to hear his thoughts about the state of things. One imagines he could educate me a great deal in the ways of the hunt. Probably in architecture, too, and maybe introduce me to a surprising depth of philosophy. 

As GK Chesterton wrote about the primitive cave painters: all we can really say about them as people, is that they were artists.

 This photo brought to you courtesy of Google image search.

American G.O.D.S.

"Whom do you worship and to what lengths will you go to appease your god?"

These are the most significant questions asked in Jonathan Hickman's G.O.D.S., which is less a Marvel mini-series or event and more a collection of eight stories that are intricately linked.  Other reviews have lamented how the story is just a "sandbox playground" for Hickman's "vanity project" and I can see why: the multiple plots seeded throughout; self-referential world-building; worst of all, the inconclusive catastrophe-of-the-week that serves as the catalyst for the first issue, but is resolved off-screen somewhere between issues Seven and Eight.  Yet I think that this perceived narrative weakness is in spite of the story, not because of any lack of story.

What readers expect of limited series like G.O.D.S. is an event: the status-quo-upset seeded in the beginning, with the threat building up and escalating through the ensuing issues, and then fully realized and either averted or serving to springboard into another series.  G.O.D.S. delivers none of these, instead shoving that comfortable outline into the background and using it as a framing devise for the real story: the estranged romance of Reddwyn and Aiko (and to a lesser extent, the goals of their respective sidekicks Dimitri and Mia).  This romance in turn asks the questions "Whom/what do you worship" and "to what lengths will you go to either appease your god or to achieve your own ends?"

The source of Wyn and Aiko's estrangement is their allegiance to two different divinities of the Marvel pantheon.  But those loyalties are only surface level; Wyn's real allegiance is to Aiko, while her allegiance is to herself.  This plays out through the eight chapters as Wyn and Dimitri, Aiko and Mia each grapple with the overt stakes of various cosmic adventures, while indirectly dealing with the consequences of their own motivations.  On the surface, Aiko's machiavellian actions render great rewards: she is affluent and influential, always standing at the shoulder of the most important person in the room or else first through the breach to conquer some new frontier.  Wyn's actions, or inactions, seem to have the opposite result: he's a cosmic fixer in the tradition of Dr. Who, jovially relying on wits and intuition when resources are not readily available.  

But the facade is exposed in the details.  Aiko is a ranking member of an ancient and powerful illuminati and goes surrounded by people and resources, operating from a private cubicle in a glitzy and pristine workspace, but she is entirely friendless; in the only scene showing her interact with others of her organization, they curse her out for her laze-fair distain for the god that she really doesn't reverence.  As the story progresses, the only friendship she does develop ends in tragedy.  Wyn, meanwhile, blundering about like an eldritch hobo, knows everyone by name, easily befriends newcomers, and demonstrates genuine empathy.  Though sometimes expressing nihilistic anxieties, he places a premium on truthfulness and decency, virtues that Aiko flippantly regards as tools in her arsenal.  It's a shakespearean tragedy that leaves readers rooting for Wyn, admonishing and pitying Aiko, and shedding a tear for the ruination that comes of hubris.  Even the time skip in the eighth chapter, which suggests that some things have been set right, really only serves to show the brokenness of everything; that even with repentance, the consequences are lasting.

I suppose those are the final questions that Hickman broaches: what place has repentance in the Greek tragedy; what place has forgiveness?  And if you could go back and do it all again, would you? 

“Hey, Algorithm, I enjoy reading and illustration, painting miniature soldiers, and hiking, as well as learning about foreign cultures.”

The Algorithm selecting ads for my social media feed: “Good to know! But have you considered SPORTSBALL?”

Not Your Typical Superhero Movie, That’s For Sure!: A Review of the Supergirl Trailer

“That the dog returns to his vomit and the sow returns to her mire, and the burnt fool's bandaged finger goes wobbling back to the fire.” 

~Rudyard Kipling

“This movie is a wacky, irreverent adventure about a dysfunctional loose cannon protagonist with a love of dancing and 1980s pop music, who uses snarky humor to mask their inner pain and turmoil.  They’re not your typical superhero, that’s for sure.  But when they get embroiled in a world-ending conflict, they’re forced to team up with a group of likable misfits.  They’re not your typical superhero team, that’s for sure.  Our gang have to learn to put aside their differences and work together to save the day, and along the way our main character finds a new surrogate family in this crazy group of outcasts and learns that sometimes the real heroes are the friends we make along the way.  This isn’t your typical superhero movie, that’s for sure!”

This is the summary that kicks off a review by The Critical Drinker for a superhero movie that may or may not be the brainchild of James Gunn, the doubtful talent behind such hits as the Guardians of the Galaxy trilogy, Suicide Squad (2021), and Superman (2025). “May-or-may-not” is to acknowledge what The Drinker’s review spells out: all of James Gunn’s superhero movies share the same core themes and styling to the point where it has become impossible to tell them apart.  So even though Supergirl is not actually Gunn’s movie, it has the look of “the most James Gunn movie that ever James Gunn’d,” in The Drinker’s words.  I agree.  There’s the 1980s pop music, the quirky retro-futuristic aesthetic, the irreverent humor advertised in the movie’s poster (“Truth. Justice. Whatever.”) and Krypto the super-dog’s sloppy on-screen urination over a newspaper that features a front-page of Superman saving the day.  

It’s all summed up in the portrayal of Kara Zor-el, Superman’s little cousin, whom The Drinker describes as “Not your typical superhero, though: she’s a drunken, cynical, messed up party girl who likes to cut loose and do her own thing.  She’s definitely not here to live up to your expectations, that’s for sure!”  She’s kitted out like a Star Lord fangirl in trench coat and puffy pocket earphones, and drops “funny” one-liners like “this does not look like this is going to end well…for you guys!” (da-da-tzz, Kara Zor-el, everybody!) and truth-bombs, wearily telling a curious sidekick that Superman “sees the good in people; I see the truth.”

Sigh.

This being a sequel to Gunn’s Superman (wherein a very drunk Kara made a cameo appearance) may be the inspiration behind these “creative” choices, but that heritage hardly absolves Supergirl of its all-too-apparent failings, and sets it squarely within the vision of its predecessor.  Maybe that’s what works for some people; I can’t say how often I’ve heard that Guardians is someone’s favorite MARVEL movie(s).  Now, mine may be the unpopular opinion here, but I never did take to that particular trilogy.  The aesthetic was entertaining, and plenty of the visual humor appreciated (I did laugh at the Sovereign drone fighters leaning into retro video game cliches) and at the time the 1980s references were fun; however, the humor and writing overall waffled between mediocre and dreadful.  Rocket Raccoon’s forced hysterics, juvenile human-anatomy jokes, and the overplayed and never-ending attempts at levity grate on the nerves and negate any sense of gravity or wonder.  Say what you like about Joss Whedon, at least his Avengers scripts land the jokes and also maintain the sense of impending doom that the heroes face if they don’t eventually get their crap together.  

Which is all to say that Supergirl, in keeping with Gunn’s style, has missed a huge opportunity to actually break from the mold and do something new, because it is based (at least in part) on a graphic novel that is one of the best I’ve ever read: Supergirl: Woman of Tomorrow.

Now’s as good a time as any to commit to a full review of the Supergirl comic, but until I get to it, let me at least draw some differences to illustrate the opportunity missed.  First, Kara is not the main character; she’s the mysterious Stranger that stumbles (drunk) into young Ruthye Marye Knoll’s life as the latter is vainly seeking retribution for her father’s murder.  But where Gunn’s trench-coated inebriation appears to be the defining feature of his lovable rebel, Woman of Tomorrow’s Kara is drunk for a very specific reason, and trench-coated for a very specific reason.  For the rest of the book, she’s resplendent in red and blue, and the object of Ruthye’s curious awe—ignorant as the little girl is of Kara’s history—and thus a foil for Ruthye’s own hero arc from stubborn and petulant to mature and introspective and, ultimately, forgiving.  

Forgiveness, of one’s enemies and of one’s own survivor’s guilt, is the message of Supergirl: Woman of Tomorrow.  The message of Supergirl: Truth, Justice, Whatever looks to be shaping up as something less redemptive and philosophical and more dysfunctional, quirky, and “heart-felt.”  Because as long as it’s from the heart, that makes it good.  Right?