Young Avengers appreciation 2019

[Drops Of Venus]

So what happens to Rayshuan now? Does that explain him being MIA in Marvel Rising latest mini?

I think Rayshaun is safe in the Marvel Rising franchise right now, since they already went through the trouble of using him for all of the merch. It's unlikely they would replace him with another character at this point. Other than that, I think what will determine his fate is whatever Marvel is doing with Eli. If Eli actually sticks around as Patriot in the comics as a significant part of their universe, and as the cherry on top, if he actually makes it in the MCU as Patriot, things will not be looking good for Rayshaun, because the hype on Eli as Patriot would be bigger than ever, and the comics synergy would very likely favor Eli for obvious reasons. They could both be Patriot, of course, but I think the difference in this case, as compared to other shared titles like Spider-Man or Hawkeye, is that Eli and Rayshaun are actually very similar characters, to the point where using one would almost make it feel like the other one is redundant in that universe. I think that is the biggest thing that will make it hard for both of them to be equally valued as Patriot at the same time. IMO, one of them would have to have a makeover in order to stand out from the other, if you wanna push both.

The fact that Billy and Tommy are not actually brothers may be the most-forgotten fact about them. That or the fact that Billy actually is the biological child of the Kaplans.

Yeah, as I pointed out last page, even the OFFICIAL MARVEL WEBSITE page inaccurately refers to the Kaplans as his ''adoptive family''. And don't even get me started on how many times I had to hear that ''Wanda is his real mom''. It's like people don't understand how family actually works. This misconception goes so far that I've seen some segments of the fandom fiercely advocating that treating Billy and Tommy as white characters is ''whitewashing of their romani roots'', which doesn't make any sense when they are not actually Maximoffs. There are people who literally take panels from the comics and edit them with Billy and Tommy having darker skin just to make a point about this, and I don't think they realize that this just comes off as an awkward attempt of blackface. I know people mean well, but... yikes.

It is odd and a little bit off-putting that he's had more connection with Wanda over the recent years, thanks to stuff like Children's Crusade, than he seems to have with his *actual parents* who, AFAIK, have done nothing worthy of being forgotten (other than probably only being alive because of this, since living family tend to be endangered and / or snuffed off as a source of drama / angst, when certain writers remember them...).

Maybe Billy 'cast a spell' that makes everyone forget the Kaplans are his parents. For their own protection!

"Let's hurt that little punk by going after his parents!" "Yeah, that witch-y Avenger chick? No thanks. Don't want to be turned into a toad..."

Who knows if Tommy even has parents. His entire backstory can be summed up as, "Busted out of juvie. Met Coat of Arms there." and it took several years to get even that second sentence.

It would be dark irony if he didn't have parents, because (dun-dun!), it wasn't Hulkling that was subconciously reality-warped into existence by Billy to be the 'perfect boyfriend' (as Kid Loki implied to sow seeds of doubt in them) but Tommy, to be the 'brother I never had.'

I have all of this tragic headcanon for Tommy's backstory; that he grew up with no real family, always being tossed around in the foster care system. Honestly, it'd explain so much about him.

[MaximoffTrash]

I think Rayshaun is safe in the Marvel Rising franchise right now, since they already went through the trouble of using him for all of the merch. It's unlikely they would replace him with another character at this point. Other than that, I think what will determine his fate is whatever Marvel is doing with Eli. If Eli actually sticks around as Patriot in the comics as a significant part of their universe, and as the cherry on top, if he actually makes it in the MCU as Patriot, things will not be looking good for Rayshaun, because the hype on Eli as Patriot would be bigger than ever, and the comics synergy would very likely favor Eli for obvious reasons. They could both be Patriot, of course, but I think the difference in this case, as compared to other shared titles like Spider-Man or Hawkeye, is that Eli and Rayshaun are actually very similar characters, to the point where using one would almost make it feel like the other one is redundant in that universe. I think that is the biggest thing that will make it hard for both of them to be equally valued as Patriot at the same time. IMO, one of them would have to have a makeover in order to stand out from the other, if you wanna push both.



Yeah, as I pointed out last page, even the OFFICIAL MARVEL WEBSITE page inaccurately refers to the Kaplans as his ''adoptive family''. And don't even get me started on how many times I had to hear that ''Wanda is his real mom''. It's like people don't understand how family actually works. This misconception goes so far that I've seen some segments of the fandom fiercely advocating that treating Billy and Tommy as white characters is ''whitewashing of their romani roots'', which doesn't make any sense when they are not actually Maximoffs. There are people who literally take panels from the comics and edit them with Billy and Tommy having darker skin just to make a point about this, and I don't think they realize that this just comes off as an awkward attempt of blackface. I know people mean well, but... yikes.



I have all of this tragic headcanon for Tommy's backstory; that he grew up with no real family, always being tossed around in the foster care system. Honestly, it'd explain so much about him.

Yup, the Twitter or Tumblr fanbase has all kinds of weird claims such as.
1. Kate Bishop is Asian because... Dark Hair and occasionally darker skin tone, I mean I wouldn't mind if they cast an Asian actress in live-action but I have seen people calling others whitewashing her in some fancasting.
2. Associate Billy's Jewish heritage with Magneto while he is really Jewish for being reborn into a Jewish family which are Kaplans.(This is usually paired with thinking Wanda is a full-blown Jewish character, often mistaking her religion as well.)
3. Tommy being bi or gay... not that he couldn't be bi.
It's like they find this teenage hero group and slam all kinds of their expectations of diversity or whatever on them without thinking what they actually are.
Probably the usual of Twitter/Tumblr fandom with all the empty rage and passion, shouting for their favs' "rights" without much meaningful disccusion.

[Wiccan]

The Kate thing is super ridiculous. When she was announced to be on the MCU some people were seriously complaining about them likely casting a white actress... Like... lol.

[Digifiend]

Even being female is diversity enough anyway. The men outnumber the women a lot, but in real life the ratio would be far more equal.

[scourge]

3. Tommy being bi or gay... not that he couldn't be bi.

Well, at least one alternate reality version of Tommy is bi or gay. And the writer of Unstoppable Wasp (or the artist, I honestly forget) counted Tommy among the LGBT characters featured in the issue the YA appeared in so there's that at least.

But tumblr/twitter does indeed get more on the weird side.

[Nevets]

Out of curiosity...what were the legal troubles with Eli?

[NexusTenebrare]

He's officially NOT on par with Franklin, who has been declared an Omega Mutant. You can only be an Omega if nothing and nobody can do it better than you. For example, Forge isn't an Omega Mutant because Reed Richards and Tony Stark can outdo him even without his "create anything he can imagine" powers.

It was explained in House of X #1.

Just read House of X and I just wanted to comment that this is completely wrong.
For one thing, there are two characters listed as Omega-level telepaths. Both Jean Grey and *ugh* Quinten Quire. So the whole no one can do it better rule already doesn't make sense.
And as far as Billy goes, there are already various reality manipulators listed. The trick is that they have diferent sub categories. Jamie Braddock is a 'Quantum' reality manipulator. Proteus is a 'Psionic' reality manipulator. Franklin is a 'Universal' reality manipulator.
So Billy could easily be counted as a 'Magic' reality manipulator.
The reason he isn't on that list is presumably because Marvel doesn't even know themselves whether Billy counts as a mutant and because Hickman has no desire to use him in his story.

[Star_Jammer]

The Kate thing is super ridiculous. When she was announced to be on the MCU some people were seriously complaining about them likely casting a white actress... Like... lol.

Welcome to 2019, I guess.

[Drops Of Venus]

Yup, the Twitter or Tumblr fanbase has all kinds of weird claims such as.
1. Kate Bishop is Asian because... Dark Hair and occasionally darker skin tone, I mean I wouldn't mind if they cast an Asian actress in live-action but I have seen people calling others whitewashing her in some fancasting.

I actually like the idea of Kate being asian in the MCU, but yeah, I hate how the word ''whitewashing'' has been thrown around with some people not actually understanding what it means.

2. Associate Billy's Jewish heritage with Magneto while he is really Jewish for being reborn into a Jewish family which are Kaplans.(This is usually paired with thinking Wanda is a full-blown Jewish character, often mistaking her religion as well.)

I've never actually seen anyone making that connection between Billy and Erik, but considering how things go with Wanda, I'm not surprised that it happens. Something that I did see the other day was someone pissed off on Twitter because Billy was wearing cross earrings on Death's Head, and that bothered me because people seem to forget that Billy is a REFORM and not a traditional jew, which means that not even him is likely to have this radical mindset that he is not allowed to wear a cross as a fashion statement just because of his religion.

3. Tommy being bi or gay... not that he couldn't be bi.
It's like they find this teenage hero group and slam all kinds of their expectations of diversity or whatever on them without thinking what they actually are.
Probably the usual of Twitter/Tumblr fandom with all the empty rage and passion, shouting for their favs' "rights" without much meaningful disccusion.

Oh, that one I see a lot. And not just for Tommy, for Kate too. There were people who were legitimately mad at Kelly Thompson because she didn't write Kate as queer. Honestly, it's all probably because of Kieron Gillen's Young Avengers. He did a good job in outing David, Loki and America, but everyone else (Tommy, Noh, Kate) were left kinda ambiguous and up to the reader's interpretation. But of course some people in the fandom, being as desperate as they are, took it as something that was set in stone and lashed out at anyone who didn't follow up on that. I liked that we seemingly got a queer development for Noh-Varr recently, but it won't be the end of the world if Kate and/or Tommy are straight. Of all the titles I could complain about lack of LGBTQ representation, YA is simply not one of them.

Like I said, I get that people mean well, but a lot of the outrage tends to be misguided, based on imposed idealistic views on these characters.

Well, at least one alternate reality version of Tommy is bi or gay. And the writer of Unstoppable Wasp (or the artist, I honestly forget) counted Tommy among the LGBT characters featured in the issue the YA appeared in so there's that at least.

But tumblr/twitter does indeed get more on the weird side.

I don't remember Tommy's sexuality being brought up in TUW, so I'm assuming they just assumed he was officially an LGBTQ character because of Young Avengers or that Secret Wars AU. I'm gonna need a story with more evidence before I officially start counting him, though.

Out of curiosity...what were the legal troubles with Eli?

No one really knows the details, but it seems like there was some legal issues with the creator of Isaiah Bradley, which affected the entire Bradley family characters and essentially shelved them in editorial limbo. It also seems like those issues are done now, since Marvel is using Eli again.

[scourge]

I don't remember Tommy's sexuality being brought up in TUW, so I'm assuming they just assumed he was officially an LGBTQ character because of Young Avengers or that Secret Wars AU. I'm gonna need a story with more evidence before I officially start counting him, though.

They didn't say it in the issue but this is what was a lot of places when the issue came out:
This one
Then this one

[Digifiend]

Just read House of X and I just wanted to comment that this is completely wrong.
For one thing, there are two characters listed as Omega-level telepaths. Both Jean Grey and *ugh* Quinten Quire. So the whole no one can do it better rule already doesn't make sense.

That just means those two are equally powerful, they're potentially as strong as each other.

[Drops Of Venus]

They didn't say it in the issue but this is what was a lot of places when the issue came out:
This one
Then this one

Oh, I believe that Jeremy believes he's queer. I just don't like the justification. Tommy didn't even kiss David, he was kissed accidentally, didn't reciprocate, and right after that went to dance/flirt with Kate and it was never brought up again. I think it's a real reach to say he's queer because of that moment.

[scourge]

Oh, I believe that Jeremy believes he's queer. I just don't like the justification. Tommy didn't even kiss David, he was kissed accidentally, didn't reciprocate, and right after that went to dance/flirt with Kate and it was never brought up again. I think it's a real reach to say he's queer because of that moment.

Oh I agree its a reach (even if I would like to have more canonically queer characters). I just mean that the "Tommy is not straight" claim has more as a base than some of the other things the tumblr/twitter types stretch for.

[MaximoffTrash]

I actually like the idea of Kate being asian in the MCU, but yeah, I hate how the word ''whitewashing'' has been thrown around with some people not actually understanding what it means.



I've never actually seen anyone making that connection between Billy and Erik, but considering how things go with Wanda, I'm not surprised that it happens. Something that I did see the other day was someone pissed off on Twitter because Billy was wearing cross earrings on Death's Head, and that bothered me because people seem to forget that Billy is a REFORM and not a traditional jew, which means that not even him is likely to have this radical mindset that he is not allowed to wear a cross as a fashion statement just because of his religion.



Oh, that one I see a lot. And not just for Tommy, for Kate too. There were people who were legitimately mad at Kelly Thompson because she didn't write Kate as queer. Honestly, it's all probably because of Kieron Gillen's Young Avengers. He did a good job in outing David, Loki and America, but everyone else (Tommy, Noh, Kate) were left kinda ambiguous and up to the reader's interpretation. But of course some people in the fandom, being as desperate as they are, took it as something that was set in stone and lashed out at anyone who didn't follow up on that. I liked that we seemingly got a queer development for Noh-Varr recently, but it won't be the end of the world if Kate and/or Tommy are straight. Of all the titles I could complain about lack of LGBTQ representation, YA is simply not one of them.

Like I said, I get that people mean well, but a lot of the outrage tends to be misguided, based on imposed idealistic views on these characters.



I don't remember Tommy's sexuality being brought up in TUW, so I'm assuming they just assumed he was officially an LGBTQ character because of Young Avengers or that Secret Wars AU. I'm gonna need a story with more evidence before I officially start counting him, though.



No one really knows the details, but it seems like there was some legal issues with the creator of Isaiah Bradley, which affected the entire Bradley family characters and essentially shelved them in editorial limbo. It also seems like those issues are done now, since Marvel is using Eli again.

With Kate's case, I think her backgrond is kinda the typical priviledged white girl model. Not that rich Asian family doesn't exist, it's just a different vibe.
Also as an Asian, it feels kinda strange when a character I am familiar with got changed into one. Not that I am against it, job opportunity for more actors/actresses is always welcome.
But sometimes I really question what ethnic background those wanting Kate to be Asian have?
Sometines this kind of change just feels too much like "throw a bone", you know? "We will make this character Asian for your sake!" like huh... okay? I already enjoy the character for who they are, won't matter much if they change something that is not essential to their character.
I don't want to sound petty, but if they are mostly white, are they just weaving their own fantasy of grand representation/diversity without considering those supposed to be resprensted?

[Drops Of Venus]

With Kate's case, I think her backgrond is kinda the typical priviledged white girl model. Not that rich Asian family doesn't exist, it's just a different vibe.
Also as an Asian, it feels kinda strange when a character I am familiar with got changed into one. Not that I am against it, job opportunity for more actors/actresses is always welcome.
But sometimes I really question what ethnic background those wanting Kate to be Asian have?
Sometines this kind of change just feels too much like "throw a bone", you know? "We will make this character Asian for your sake!" like huh... okay? I already enjoy the character for who they are, won't matter much if they change something that is not essential to their character.
I don't want to sound petty, but if they are mostly white, are they just weaving their own fantasy of grand representation/diversity without considering those supposed to be resprensted?

My reasoning for asian Kate in the MCU is mostly due to what we know about the Hawkeye TV show so far. We know that the story will explore Clint's time as Ronin. We know that he was ''working'' as Ronin in Japan back in Avengers: Endgame. I mean, the term Ronin itself is a literal part of japanese culture and history, so odds are a good chunk of the show might revolve around that. Within that context, I could see Kate fitting into the show as a person of asian descent. Her dad's a criminal in the comics, so what if he is one of the asian criminals Clint was going after in Endgame? I actually think that would make sense and incorporate her character into the story very well. But it's also not a dealbreaker for me if she's any other ethnicity, 'cause like you said, it's not really essential to her character.