Polaris: Lorna Dane Appreciation 2019

[salarta]

I think I can go ahead and do some posts here now. Not really for discussion, but simply to relay information.

Recent tweets I've seen of people specifically calling for a Polaris solo. Mine not included but I've definitely made some. There was also better activity for Lorna on #XMenDay than I was expecting, but maybe I'll add that as another post in the future. I disagree with Grayhold saying greatest stories pre-date 2000s but we at least agree that she's fully capable of a solo and should get one.

[Snoop Dogg]

If Magnesh is Hick's boy, then Lorna has to cop some of that capital, right?

[salarta]

It depends. In a good scenario, Lorna being Magneto's daughter would at least lead to a few appearances. But there are other ways Hickman - or people above him - might think and behave.

In the Brevoort line of thinking, Hickman would completely ignore Lorna being Magneto's daughter, pretend all sorts of canon never happened, and possibly erase her from various past events. In the Dick Giordano line of thinking, Lorna being Magneto's daughter would be an excuse to kill her and throw her into limbo, because "she doesn't add to the mythos" (of Magneto) or "she's redundant."

When I say Dick Giordano, for those not familiar, I'm referring to both his getting rid of Batgirl via Killing Joke (her time as Oracle wasn't planned), and what's explained in this blurb from the Supergirl wikipedia article.

The idea of killing Supergirl was first conceived by DC's vice president/executive editor Dick Giordano, who lobbied for the death to DC's publishers. He later said he has never had any regrets about this, explaining, "Supergirl was created initially to take advantage of the high Superman sales and not much thought was put into her creation. She was created essentially as a female Superman. With time, writers and artists improved upon her execution, but she never did really add anything to the Superman mythos—at least not for me."

Note that Giordano's thinking was BS, and would be worse today if followed because (obvious sexism aside) we have the hindsight of Batgirl and Supergirl's development since then to draw from. Supergirl has a successful TV show. Batgirl had a successful and lauded relaunch, and has been in multiple video games (including DLC dedicated to her).

We won't know what Hickman thinks of Lorna or does until things actually happen. This is just outlining a couple potential bad scenarios to prepare for. Hope for the best, prepare for the worst.

[jmc247]

Increasingly after looking at her history and with Dark Phoenix about to air I realize Lorna has had exactly one power corruption storyline and that was one mini series (below). Mind you the writer tossed it in as an excuse for her being on Genosha that didn't hold water and was disregarded by Morrison and Austen after in very emotional and heartfelt storylines.

Overall Genosha as a half decade storyline for Lorna was in the end reading it from start to finish an ideological awakening rather then a power corruption storyline, not that Lorna didn't like having a say over a nation didn’t have some of the power go to her head.



Hey, Ms. Marvel.

The power of season one of The Gifted for Lorna and how it rocketed the character to international fame was that it was an ideological awakening storyline and her coming to the conclusion that the problems in society were so systematic mutants needed revolutionary change.

Where season two utterly collapsed with the character came down to her not owning her own revolution, it was Reeva's revolution and Lorna was an unwitting foot soldier which might have made a few posters here who want Lorna to be a saint happy, but by in large most reviewers felt it was a pretty bad season for the character, the writers in the end wanted a reverse awakening for Lorna where she sees the other side, but they botched it about as bad as they could have and backed her away from it so hard and in such an extreme way (episode after episode crying and apologizing for everything she believed in over Reeva hiring a Fabian Cortez like mercenary) the actress didn't feel she was playing the same character and said as much.

The writers could have really used reading some of her fathers runs on the Hellfire Club or the Acolytes where he gets punked by a more radical revolutionary faction/actor and things go to ****, but he doesn't apologize for his beliefs. Season two of The Gifted was such a disaster it blew any hope I had for the character in the comics until the MCU gets to her (if they do get to her) as that isn't a given.

The series did do two good things though. Making the character an internationally known name and realizing the potential of ideological awakening storylines for Lorna at least in season one.

In the comics writers for Lorna favorite go to pathos is possessions. Mainly because Chris Claremont did it and he is considered the greatest X-Man writer of all time so they go back to his storylines for ideas. Then why doesn't Malice work like the Dark Phoenix Saga for Lorna? The DPS was not a possession... that was a retcon years later. It was a power and trauma corruption storyline... actually so was House of M for Wanda until they decided Doom did it. The ultimate good girls of the Avengers and X-Men lines go bad had a lot of power to the storylines and both had enough relationship to the other heroes it meant a lot. Lorna is not seen as the ultimate good girl and she has a grand total of two relationships on the X-Men that aren't totally defunct in fans minds and one of them is with her father so it would be difficult for her to have a DPS the same way.

Lorna's possessions under Claremont really were not corruption storylines, she was straight up taken over by someone else and had no say over what was happening to her. Thus, it really says nothing about Lorna deep down as a person and short of Lorna getting a fabled solo comic it likely never will.

But, I will say as far as future storylines for Lorna that could bring back interest to the character... ideological awakening storylines are the way to go. But, you need to actually lobby that into some position on the X-books that lets Lorna interact full time with the likes of Jean and other x-characters. A corruption storyline like DPS looks good on paper until you realize Lorna has no friends to make it work and the only reason DPS worked was the huge build up and how it impacted relationships was key to it. Runs don’t have the length of time these days to make it work.

Its easier at this point to fit Lorna in as a sometimes ally and sometimes honorable antagonist to the X-Men and build relationships using that then there to lobby into the A list then as a B or C list hero waiting for a writer to champion the character as an A list x-woman the way Austen tried to.

Both Austen and PAD tried to lobby trauma storylines into personal awakening storylines over the past two decades. I felt at the end of their runs Austen's Lorna was in a better position to succeed because of the ideological competent that really mattered for differentiating her and giving something sustaining to talk about with say Wolverine or Xavier. In either case what the writers were trying to build on wasn't followed up by future writers and in PAD's case a lot of his work was rendered moot by Axis. Without the ideological component it’s just mental trauma and instability and there are limits to how much you can use that without making a character look like a nutcase.

Anyway.

https://www.newsarama.com/45292-marv...citations.html



The cover to the drawing of Lorna shown earlier in the month, it turns out it is an anthology comic where the only Lorna is actually Havok’s introduction story where Lorna is his damsel captured by Sentinels. A pass for me on that, great cover art though. Marvel is not subtly trying to get fans to buy back into a certain relationship.

The X-Men join the celebration of the House of Ideas’ 80th anniversary with the latest issue of the era-spanning MARVEL TALES! This anthology shines a spotlight on fan-favorite characters, features timeless stories and highlights some of Marvel’s most impressive talent from the past eight decades. First, Alex Summers suits up as the man called Havok in X-MEN (1963) #58 — a classic tale of the original X-Men by the legendary team of Roy Thomas and Neal Adams!

https://www.newsarama.com/45292-marv...citations.html

[Havok83]

Wow, shocked to see Lorna make a rare appearance with the OG team!

[Retcon]

If anyone can find the book where lorna told alex “I liked scott better when Jean was around” It would be greatly appreciated

[Soulsword323]

If anyone can find the book where lorna told alex “I liked scott better when Jean was around” It would be greatly appreciated

I'm not sure if you were just looking for the image, or the actual issue number (which I don't know off the top of my head.)

We need more Lorna and Jean.

[Retcon]

I'm not sure if you were just looking for the image, or the actual issue number (which I don't know off the top of my head.)

We need more Lorna and Jean.

This was it. Thank you.

[jmc247]

Jean and Lorna were just together for an arc, perhaps their last arc together in quite awhile. Storm and Jean had a long conversation and Lorna and Jean not so much.

One wants to resurrect Jean and Lorna’s relationship they need a better basis to do so then the failed 90s attempts. Writers don’t have them interact as they don’t see any potential in their interaction when they already have Storm as her best friend who agrees on most things.



Dark Phoenix and Polaris sketch card by calslayton



By Rachel Zimera

I want the long defunct relationship to show some life, but it isn’t going to happen without an massive overhaul.

[Retcon]

Most of there interactions were based solely on being the significant others of the Summers bros.

[Omega Alpha]

Lorna and Alex ended up getting the short end of the stick because they weren't part of neither the 05 nor the All New, All Different team and didn't get enough time under Roy Thomas and Neal Adams (although the book's sales were increasing, by the time they realized that, Adams had already moved to DC, and Marvel had cancelled the book). They should be really close to all of the 05, but there's not that much on panel interactions between them, outside those awful issues of Austen and Milligan with Iceman.

Havok got more to do in the X-men and later Avengers, but sadly seems to be used only when writers want to have characters whine about Cyclops, usually in a rant that makes no sense, so it's not really any better than Lorna's situation.

[jmc247]

Most of there interactions were based solely on being the significant others of the Summers bros.

In the Claremont era thru the 90s yes it was ‘I am the green haired Summers brother’s girlfriend and ‘I am the red haired Summers brother’s girlfriend’ let’s say a few things about our significant other and that is about it.

The solution is sort of staring Marvel in the face though they haven’t picked up on it. Best friends divided by ideology was the bed rock the X-Men was founded on after all.

The problem is some want it to work while they agree with everything which means another around of them not interacting until one writer eventually wants them to talk about the Summers brothers.

For me their only truly iconic moment was Morrison’s New X-Men 132.

[salarta]

Wow, shocked to see Lorna make a rare appearance with the OG team!

The cover itself is good. It's a shame that Jen Bartel's talent was wasted and exploited by Marvel to pull a bait and switch where the story inside is meant to reduce Lorna to "exists only to be Havok's girlfriend and support his stories."

Lorna and Alex ended up getting the short end of the stick because they weren't part of neither the 05 nor the All New, All Different team and didn't get enough time under Roy Thomas and Neal Adams (although the book's sales were increasing, by the time they realized that, Adams had already moved to DC, and Marvel had cancelled the book). They should be really close to all of the 05, but there's not that much on panel interactions between them, outside those awful issues of Austen and Milligan with Iceman.

Havok got more to do in the X-men and later Avengers, but sadly seems to be used only when writers want to have characters whine about Cyclops, usually in a rant that makes no sense, so it's not really any better than Lorna's situation.

Havok got to be on Axis even while Lorna was excluded (despite Lorna's essential Genosha history). Havok was a major member of Uncanny Avengers. Marvel hijacked Lorna's return in X-Men Blue to promote Havok, then had a multi-issue story arc emphasizing him, then a team book he got to lead. In just the past 6 years, Havok's gotten spades more than Lorna, who Marvel seems to think doesn't merit anything even when she unexpectedly rocketed up in popularity through Gifted's version of her.

And right now, everything Lorna does, they keep trying to force Lorna's history with Havok on her, while ignoring everything else that hasn't been touched with her, some of it in decades. Havok got his origin story decades ago while it took Lorna 43 years to finally get hers told. Marvel blatantly fanboys and props up Havok while making excuses for why Lorna shouldn't get anything, including lying in saying there's not enough fan interest in her. Their situations aren't comparable.


Related.

[jmc247]

The cover itself is good. It's a shame that Jen Bartel's talent was wasted and exploited by Marvel to pull a bait and switch where the story inside is meant to reduce Lorna to "exists only to be Havok's girlfriend and support his stories."

They are trying to sell a new generation of Polaris fan on Havok’s original story and him saving her. Great cover yes, not so great insides.

I would say if they included even one Lorna back issue like X-Men 50 it wouldn’t be a bait and switch situation.

[Omega Alpha]

Havok got to be on Axis even while Lorna was excluded (despite Lorna's essential Genosha history). Havok was a major member of Uncanny Avengers. Marvel hijacked Lorna's return in X-Men Blue to promote Havok, then had a multi-issue story arc emphasizing him, then a team book he got to lead. In just the past 6 years, Havok's gotten spades more than Lorna, who Marvel seems to think doesn't merit anything even when she unexpectedly rocketed up in popularity through Gifted's version of her.

Yeah, but Havok's characterization pretty much anytime he's used these days is "guy that whines about Cyclops"; ironically, he never did it more than when written by two writers that are big fans (Remender and Rosenberg). In UA, he also gave one of the worst speeches in recent comics history, one so bad Bendis went out of his way to answer. Him being used in UA and now in UXM is actually hurting the character rather than help.

But I agree that Lorna should be used more, and has more potential than Alex right now. Ironically, considering that she has been shown to become more closely aligned with her father and distancing herself from Xavier's ideas, but never going to the extremes Magneto does, in a more moderate position, she should be in theory with some similar ideas as those of Cyclops, who also tried to blend together the two philosophies. Would be interesting if those two ended up working together and get along better with each other than with Alex. Maybe the two of them could convince to stop whining then.

They are trying to sell a new generation of Polaris fan on Havok’s original story and him saving her. Great cover yes, not so great insides.

I would say if they included even one Lorna back issue like X-Men 50 it wouldn’t be a bait and switch situation.

There's no reason to reprint that story except if it's reference din Powers of 10 or HoX. Actually, considering there seems to be Living Monolith on the cover of House of X #3 (next to Apocalypse) seems like a real possibility.