Polaris: Queen of Mutants/Mistress of Magnetism Appreciation 2024

[Lucyinthesky]

I am almost sure Exodus and the Acolytes were the ones being referenced.

Magneto´s image of Lorna in his mindscape looked way like they had an initial meeting so Lorna would not begin a team of whorshippers for her father when she knows him personally imo, I believe she may be part of Forge´s X-factor team at this point and probably will show up on S2 to help fight apocalypse and maybe she will meet up with Magneto when he gets back from the past. One thing I liked from the little we could see of TAS Lorna is the fact she is very strong willed, she left iceman because she thought he didn´t compromise enough with the mutant cause and it would not surprise me if she did the same with Havok if he wanted to leave X-factor as well for this reason. So I could see her agreeging with magneto in a few points but not all of it.

[Will Evans]

I think he may be used as a get out of jail free card bc Magneto should be captured when he returns. They can easily blame it on Joseph and say he was responsible for the EM pulse

I’m pretty sure Val Cooper has already given a detailed report to the government of everything that happened from her POV .

[juan678]

[jmc247]

To be honest, Polaris fans should probably feel relieved she wasn't in the original E is for Extinction. Tying her to someone the writer was insisting should only showcased as "A Mad Old Terrorist Twat" to use Morrison's words would NOT have been good for her - and I doubt Marvel would have been willing to do a second ass-pull retcon for Polaris.

E for Extinction was planned and written pre-911. Morrison’s hate on for Magneto only really started post 911 about a year later when he identified him with Bin Laden in large part ironically enough due to the x-films. I will let you decide for yourself when he wrote New X-Men 132 in early 2002 if Magneto sounds like Bin Laden or not.

[Havok83]

I’m pretty sure Val Cooper has already given a detailed report to the government of everything that happened from her POV .

I dont see why that matters? Its not like she knows od Joseph's existence.

[GoingGreen]

I'm really happy his first stop is by his daughter's side. This was a rare good choice Magneto made for their relationship.

[salarta]

Finally, some good news. Hopefully Marvel in 20 years doesn't pretend Lorna didn't take part in fighting THIS attempted genocide like Marvel today's done to Lorna concerning Genosha for the past 20 years.

[GoingGreen]

This is spilling over from the Havok thread. Don't worry about it, it's not a big deal.

As I made my point, I don't feel I need to repeat myself on things. But I feel that I do have to respond to a couple things before leaving you all to your convos (assuming a reason doesn't come up that I need to post again).

I'm a Polaris fan. I have a pre-existing account on this board. Things were said about Polaris here that I had issue with, so I said something about it. I'd have done the same thing no matter who said it. Or to put it another way, this song isn't about you.

Meanwhile, I've had cases of people making multiple throwaway accounts just to harass me (that I would block, then they'd make another one), and a person who made a throwaway Twitter account with a username targeting me specifically. Among other incidents. Point being, I know what it's like to have someone "stalking" me online, it's very different from this.

That's not stalking, that's harassing. While an argument could be made, I wouldn't accuse you of harassing me. That said, I don't think anyone should harass you, as coocoo bananas as you come across sometimes. I hope those people grow up and leave you alone.

I'm not disputing your experience, your "credentials" as it were. Nor am I saying anything about who is or isn't a "real fan." I'm questioning the context and order of events as described.

I had a reason for mentioning my FF4 experience. People who insisted Rosa Farrell was a "worthless damsel in distress" character were people who had played the game. Many of them had played it when it was first released. That direct experience didn't stop them from missing or forgetting key elements. Being there when something was released does matter, but it's not the whole picture. In the same way that modern archaeologists didn't just see someone from the 19th century said a Viking grave was a man, shrug their shoulders and leave it at that. Claims need to be looked into and reassessed from time to time.

More pointedly, a claim was made that people reading the comics back then had no understanding of why Lorna did various things in Austen's run until toward the end of it when readers saw the genocide in Lorna's mind. I disputed that because New X-Men 132 that showed Lorna pulled out of Genosha's ruins as a genocide survivor happened before Austen's run, not after. People reading X-Men at the time should have known that events in New X-Men 132 directly informed how Austen wrote Lorna right after.

One thing you could have said in response is that New X-Men 132 and Austen's run were different books, and casual readers can't be expected to have read a different book prior to Austen's run. That reason doesn't let hardcore fans off the hook, but it does provide a circumstance where your claim could apply. It does show an area where Austen screwed up, by not making Lorna's circumstances clear enough for casual readers until later. It just doesn't mean the genocide was an excuse made after the fact, or that nothing existed at all to inform readers of that context. The run was written from the start with Lorna's trauma from the genocide in mind.

I think it's absurd to hold an entire fanbase accountable for reading one specific issue. Comics weren't the same 20 years ago. It was much more difficult to acquire comics online, which meant you had to make it out to a comic or book store to get your hands on them. It also wasn't possible to hop online and research exactly what issues your favorite characters showed up in chronologically. Some lucky characters had big enough fan bases that they'd have entire websites dedicated to them, run entirely by fans, when the internet was less crowded. Those usually had some great logs to research through and go hunting comic shops for back issues. But I digress. It wasn't as simple as going online and finding something. And fans who weren't hunting for information about Polaris wouldn't even think do that research in the first place. So if they weren't paying that much attention, or God forbid, didn't have the $3.00 for a comic because they needed lunch money, it was pretty easy to miss New X-Men 132, to which you seem to hold to some paragon of X-Men Mythos, when most people who did see it just saw an interesting issue and moved on with the book. I just can't demand that fans who read a different book, a year later, to think "wow, she's acting crazy because of that thing on Genosha last year!" Especially when she's in there with a smile, threatening and physically assaulting a "defenseless" school nurse (who she later tried to kill and threatened to kill her like 9 year old kid...), and kinda embellishing the moment to justify her actions. Additionally, might I point out, just because someone went through trauma and is experiencing emotional issues... doesn't mean we allow them to do shitty things like that.

My last point, and then I'm done with this, is that your holy New X-Men 132 issue, which is a great issue and definitely required reading for us Polaris stans, don't misunderstand me there... but this issue didn't even actually say she experienced genocide. It was about Magneto's message. The time of her on the island is entirely shrouded in mystery in this issue. They're guessing the entire time about who is doing it, what is happening. The X-Men didn't even go there looking for Polaris, they literally were just dropping by to look at Genosha Ground Zero, and happened to arrive during Polaris' "ghost stories". There's a comment about her only being able to survive in it for a few hours, which kindof implied she was only there for a few hours, while someone else said Magneto wasn't letting Genosha or Polaris die, and it was all so very mixed and bizarre. It was a weird, borderline psychedelic issue. I liked it, but again, it wasn't about Polaris experiencing genocide, it was about Polaris opening Magneto's box and being torn apart by radio waves of 16 million dead mutants. It was one of the echoes of Genosha that Polaris was used for.

And I didn't accurately remember all this, I had to go and dig out the issue and read it again, and Polaris is my favorite character across all media. I can't imagine what a more casual fan would think about that moment, but I guarantee they weren't filing it in their Polaris memories in case she showed up again and was portrayed as crazy.

[UncannyLZ]

The Krakoa era may be mid overall but to me, it gave me exactly what I wanted. It made Polaris more relevant to the “X-Men” franchise. I’ve said I’ve wanted Genosha to be used as a spring board to give Lorna depth but I think I have to accept that’s not going to happen, especially in a post X-Men 97 world. I think what Lorna did on Krakoa had a big enough impact where adaptations of it will have to use her.

Polaris was with Cyclops and Storm rescuing mutants at the start of Krakoa
Polaris was the messenger in the X of Swords event that freed Arrako “the strength of the house m must never be questioned”
Polaris won the first X-Men vote at the 1st Hellfire gala
Polaris shed the “cool girl” attitude and put on a new Magneto inspired look to take down the Orchis base.
All while making it very clear she is still Magneto’s daughter.

It may not have happened on the page the way I wanted but when it’s all condensed down to its basics for an adaptation, Polaris is still there! I think she’s really cemented herself with have appearance in adaptations of this era more than her previous (except maybe the 90s X-Factor but I think Krakoa era Lorna had more impact)

The topics we’d like to see her tackle with being a survivor of Genosha could still be discussed in the comics, especially considering all of the books are dealing with a post Krakoan world. It happened and people remember. Hopefully, her next writer uses that for her.

[ARkadelphia]

Claremont might have been a Jem fan. Sadly we never got to hear her field leader or teammate say “Showtime, Synergy!”

Claremont came around eventually and didn’t try to force his old vision on Lorna the way others reverted back to older versions so I can give him props for that.

Truly outrageous

[jmc247]

First about Duggan he said a year ago he really liked Lorna in a podcast. Whatever one thinks of him as a writer he has demonstrated that to be the case. I listened to his old interviews at the time and he would go on and on about Jean and Synch and Laura for the entire podcast and maybe have a line for Lorna so it was always hard to know.

Austen in contrast spends 20 minutes of an hour interview gushing over how much he loved Polaris and Havok as characters. Though Havolaris fanboys set on their 90s vision of them really cannot accept he wanted to push both characters and putting them through the ringer was actually a sign he cared.

Austen believed in the gut punch. Duggan did not believe in the gut punch and actually pulled his punches from Lorna's possible internal conflicts with the X-Men. Even though they had very similar conceptions of Lorna's that made Duggan's much more palpable to a certain type of fan. For myself I like a gut punch if it's well set up. I can't stand it if it feels manufactured though.

If Krakoa is adapted for animation in a few years Storm will replace Lorna's role on the first X-Men team and they won’t have revolving core X-Men teams. It wouldn't even be up to the writers, those above them would demand it. Storm is the second x-woman as far as the company is concerned and only the MCU deciding differently could change that.

Any animated version will be streamlined massively with tons of side stuff cut out and altered. I expect all the Mars story arc to be left on the cutting room floor. Its frankly too far off and too disconnected from the main story with Xavier.

The biggest change in regard to Lorna's story outside of not being on the X-Men would almost certainly Scarlet Witch and Quicksilver being Magneto's kids and full members of the House of M, thus enabling it to feel like a real faction. The Krakoa era was planned when Marvel was still fully enforcing the Axis retcon. By the middle of it they were only half enforcing it. Try to reimagine the Krakoa from the prospective of a streamlined version with the creative staff in full use of Wanda and Pietro instead of being restricted as hell.

Scarlet Witch then Storm then Jean then Rogue then Emma are Marvel's biggest IP's for women that X-Men 97 regards as mutants. It's going to be a battle for scraps for anyone else. Wandavision which came out towards the end of season 1's writing rocketed Wanda to #1.

It also needs to be said Krakoa Lorna and what she unleashed on the space station was in character for a version of Lorna that survived Genosha. It would not be at all in character for 90s Lorna and I would be the first to say so. In terms of the Genosha erasure the issue isn't over yet. Lorna in the present day hasn't been seen at all.

There are two paths left that could halfway salvage that. The first Poccy finding her on Genosha along with Gambit. While I am thumbs down on a mind control arc as doing nothing for her other then peg her as weak willed I would grim and bare it if it meant fixing the genocide erasure. The second being Joseph not being used and Lorna being involved there after Genosha.

You don't get to House of M Lorna whose dream it is to see the island be resurrected along with her family much less Krakoa Lorna willing to unleash an alien army without Genosha period. You could if it was a different universe that never had any close version of 90s Lorna appear, but that isn't this one.

I would be among the very first ones to call bull$@&t on them if they attempt to leap over reality to get to a modern Lorna without putting in even barebones work.

[marhawkman]

I am almost sure Exodus and the Acolytes were the ones being referenced.

Magneto´s image of Lorna in his mindscape looked way like they had an initial meeting so Lorna would not begin a team of whorshippers for her father when she knows him personally imo, I believe she may be part of Forge´s X-factor team at this point and probably will show up on S2 to help fight apocalypse and maybe she will meet up with Magneto when he gets back from the past. One thing I liked from the little we could see of TAS Lorna is the fact she is very strong willed, she left iceman because she thought he didn´t compromise enough with the mutant cause and it would not surprise me if she did the same with Havok if he wanted to leave X-factor as well for this reason. So I could see her agreeging with magneto in a few points but not all of it.

TAS was in an odd place with the Acolytes since they had Apoccy steal the body of Fabian Cortez... and also didn't actually kill off the OG Acolytes. And also, didn't actually use Fabian's version of Acolytes. It mostly used Magneto's Acolytes. Which makes me wonder if that's where Exodus is gonna come in. take over as Acolyte leader now that Magneto is gone?

[jmc247]

[Lucyinthesky]

TAS was in an odd place with the Acolytes since they had Apoccy steal the body of Fabian Cortez... and also didn't actually kill off the OG Acolytes. And also, didn't actually use Fabian's version of Acolytes. It mostly used Magneto's Acolytes. Which makes me wonder if that's where Exodus is gonna come in. take over as Acolyte leader now that Magneto is gone?

I remember the Acolytes were in part a group fromed by Fabian Cortez in the series but they rejected him when it was clear he tried to kill Magneto, in Sancturary Episodes and Amelia, who was part of the original team, was living on Genosha when Bation attacked, so my guess is that some Acolytes survived and probably joined Exodus and the others stayed on Genosha while Cortez may still be Apocalypse.

[jmc247]

I think he may be used as a get out of jail free card bc Magneto should be captured when he returns. They can easily blame it on Joseph and say he was responsible for the EM pulse

That only matters if they try to make him an X-Men next season which they probably won’t.