X-men, parentage and clones

[Ricochet Rita]

First of all, we should start from the point that sort of 90% of 'donors' are involuntary in this kind of stories: their clones are, so to speak, fruit of a violation. Of course this doesn't mean clones don't deserve care and affection, I'm just saying that most of the times their 'parents' don't even know they exist, nor they've had offsprings of their own free will. That's part of the 'loneliness of the clone'.

Depending on the physical/mental age of the clone, they could either have a sibling relationship or a parent/child relationship with their progenitors. In situations where the clones are closer in age to the original (cases in point, Laura and Gabby from All-New Wolverine, or outside the X-Men, Spider-Man and the Scarlet Spiders), they feel more like siblings than parent(s) and child(ren).

This could be the rightest answer overall.

For one, an Opposite Sex Clone like X-23 is not technically a clone at all, which was explicitly acknowledged in her origin book. She's only called a clone because it's comics, and pretty much ANY scientifically-produced "offspring" made from harvested donor genetic material is called a clone by default.

This, too. For example:



Longshot/Shatterstar is one of the most warped cases. Both are fathers, both are children, are they siblings, or none of it? How could we say that one of them is responsible of the other one? (Well...I guess Longshot IS responsible of 'Star, since he 'built' him with Alison...though I pretty much doubt he had the slightest idea about procreation, I pretty much doubt he could be really fertile, and up to today I still don't understand why Ali didn't took precautions).

[xhx23x]

I think it count. Particularly in the case of Laura and the Cuckoos, but in those cases the parental connection has been explored somewhat in the comics themselves.

But you can make cases for people like X-Man, Stryfe or Shattershot who we know how they came to be but have no real connection to their, erm, donors in an emotional way. Well, Nate did get a bit too close with his mother figure that one time.

[Dementia5]

If this counts as clones, i dont want Storm's children to have white hair because the white hair thingy only happens every after a few generations to the chosen child.

Too late, Kymera has white hair too.

[Huntsman Spider]

First of all, we should start from the point that sort of 90% of 'donors' are involuntary in this kind of stories: their clones are, so to speak, fruit of a violation. Of course this doesn't mean clones don't deserve care and affection, I'm just saying that most of the times their 'parents' don't even know they exist, nor they've had offsprings of their own free will. That's part of the 'loneliness of the clone'.



This could be the rightest answer overall.



This, too. For example:



Longshot/Shatterstar is one of the most warped cases. Both are fathers, both are children, are they siblings, or none of it? How could we say that one of them is responsible of the other one? (Well...I guess Longshot IS responsible of 'Star, since he 'built' him with Alison...though I pretty much doubt he had the slightest idea about procreation, I pretty much doubt he could be really fertile, and up to today I still don't understand why Ali didn't took precautions).

And speaking of cloning as often being an act of violation, some media have the unwilling/unwitting progenitor treat it as such, like Superman with Superboy in the first season of Young Justice. Hell, keeping it to Marvel, Spider-Man has made it clear over and over that cloning is a pet peeve of his after the mess that The Clone Saga made of his life at the time, and The Clone Conspiracy likely only made that worse. He's been cordial enough with the clones that didn't try to kill him or kill the world to prove they were right in their deranged goals, but he really, really doesn't like clones.

[Rosebunse]

It really depends on the situation and the clone.

Wolverine was never close to Laura, but he accepted her as a daughter because, well, he seemingly wanted to make it up to her because he realizes that Laura is as much a victim as he was. And he seems to feel some level of guilt for the entire situation. To make things more interesting for the Wolverine family, Daken, famous forhating his father and everyone else, rather easily and happily accepts Laura and her clone Gabby as his little sisters. And then you have Laura who readily accepts Gabby and her other clones as her sisters.

Of course, you also have Spiderman, who definitely took his cloning much differently. I think Spiderman tries to have a positive relationship with his clones, he might even consider them sort of like his brothers. But he's still keeping them at arm's length because of course!

Then you have clones like Evan/Kid Apocalypse/Genesis, who's considered by many to be the actual reincarnation of Apocalypse. The other characters try to support him and not hold it against him, but it's still there.

[WebLurker]

It really depends on the situation and the clone.

Well, different kinds of stories.

Wolverine was never close to Laura, but he accepted her as a daughter because, well, he seemingly wanted to make it up to her because he realizes that Laura is as much a victim as he was. And he seems to feel some level of guilt for the entire situation. To make things more interesting for the Wolverine family, Daken, famous forhating his father and everyone else, rather easily and happily accepts Laura and her clone Gabby as his little sisters. And then you have Laura who readily accepts Gabby and her other clones as her sisters.

I always thought that there was a degree of irony that for all the cracks it it had, Wolverine had a better relationship with a clone of himself than he did with his son (of course, there's also the irony that X-23's backstory would seem to make her most likely to be a supervillain, but she's the only one of Wolverine's kid to turn out good). I suppose all the complexities in how the characters relate to each other makes the family dynamics seem more realistic.

[Rosebunse]

When you look at Daken and Wolverine leading up to their final confrontation in Uncanny X-Force, the two of them actually had a chance to reconcile, if only a little.

Daken may have hated Logan, but Logan was willin to put up with a lot from Daken. It was only when Daken threatened literally the entire world that Wolverine ended him. And even then, Daken was implied to be jealous of Evan and the other students because Logan spent more time with them than he did him.

Really, I think it's easy to see why Daken has a positive relationship with Laura; she loves him unconditionally, even if she too will readily murder him if he crosses a line with her. And he seems fine with that.

Again, the Wolverine family just speaks to how complex this can get. They are all very disfunctional people, and yet Logan and the much less functional Daken accept Laura as their blood family. Why? Seemingly because they just want her in their weird little family.

We don't really see this in any other clone relationship.

[kevlon]

Namorita was raised as the child of Namora. As a clone Namorita was implanted into Namoras womb.

You try telling Namoras that Namorita isn't her child.

[Dethi]

Well as almost everyone said, it depend for each characters.

[WebLurker]

When you look at Daken and Wolverine leading up to their final confrontation in Uncanny X-Force, the two of them actually had a chance to reconcile, if only a little.

Daken may have hated Logan, but Logan was willin to put up with a lot from Daken. It was only when Daken threatened literally the entire world that Wolverine ended him. And even then, Daken was implied to be jealous of Evan and the other students because Logan spent more time with them than he did him.

Interesting that they used the same idea for Laura; the X-23 one-shot and ongoing series made a point that she was hurting over the idea that she was something of an afterthought to Wolverine compared to some of the other younger X-Kids, like Jubilee (I think she underestimated where she stood with Wolverine to an extent, but I also think that Wolverine not having done as good as he could've is a fair assessment). She did admittedly not use it as a justification to be evil like Daken did, but it is interesting how the two characters parallel each other.

I haven't read that much about Daken himself, but I did find it interesting in the original Daken/X-23 crossover story, that for all his hated for his father, he seemed to initially see X-23's existence as a clone of him to be an affront against Wolverine's honor than needed to be dealt with and when Wolverine finally died, he wanted him buried and treated with respect, all while still apparently hating his guts. Franky, I think that made the character far more interesting than the concept (an evil Wolverine who borders on sociopathy) sounds on paper.

Really, I think it's easy to see why Daken has a positive relationship with Laura; she loves him unconditionally, even if she too will readily murder him if he crosses a line with her. And he seems fine with that.

In the original crossover story, Daken didn't seem to have much respect for her until he saw firsthand that her reputation as a fighter was as good as advertised (which made sense given the context of the story). It also seems like the idea that they can relate to having similar backgrounds has also played a role (in that crossover, it was pointed out that both of them had been raised to be weapons for others, the only real difference being that Laura was trying to deprogram herself and recover her humanity while Daken embraced what he'd become...as long as he was the one in control). In a funny way, they're almost a Wolverine/Sabretooth contrast (kind light and dark reflections of each other), except not as enemies.

Given the set dynamics with the characters, I'd be really curious to seem them both reacting in the same scene to learning that Wolverine cheated death; for the strange respect that Daken had for him, he never stopped hating him and wanted to kill him to the end (as I understood it). Conversely, while Wolverine and Laura had a sometimes difficult relationship, they did genuinely see each other as father/daughter and loved each other as such. So, I can't see them agreeing on the outcome of Wolverine's return very much, given that they are almost polar opposites in regards to how they feel about him.

Again, the Wolverine family just speaks to how complex this can get. They are all very disfunctional people, and yet Logan and the much less functional Daken accept Laura as their blood family. Why? Seemingly because they just want her in their weird little family.

We don't really see this in any other clone relationship.

I suppose from a meta standpoint, Laura is not really written as a clone character, if that makes any sense. While the character did toy a bit some some typical clone stuff (X-Force and X-23 did a bit with her wondering if being a clone meant that she wasn't a real person), most of the usual things, like having the memories and personality of the original, aren't addressed. I mean, Logan removed the clone angle entirely and the character was still essentially the same.

[Bl00dwerK]

It's not a matter of "count". It's a matter of truth, and the truth is clones aren't offspring.

[WebLurker]

It's not a matter of "count". It's a matter of truth, and the truth is clones aren't offspring.

What about in cases of adoption, then?