Illyana Rasputin: Magik Appreciation 2019

[Havok83]

Due to my headcanon "Magik Throws Fights”, I never believed 1) that Hope actually used Illyana's powers or 2) that Sinister actually overcame Magik's mental shields.

It's been shown that as Hell Lord of Limbo, Illyana can block all access to Limbo against all rivals. Not that Hope is worthy of being called a rival, but Magik's Hell Lord mastery, and Belasco's & Dormammu's spells have been shown to defeat Illyana's mutant powers in the past.

If Hope did temporarily copy Magik's powers to travel to Limbo, once Hope arrived, she'd be in a completely different dimension from Magik, would lose the powers, and so would be trapped as demonchow.

My "no-prize" explanation is that Magik's "Extraordinarily Powerful and Sophisticated Psionic Shields" tricked Sinister into believing she was under his control, at which point Magik was the one who ported Hope to & from Limbo...

Regarding teleporting through Limbo, except for the period Limbo was inside of her, all travel was through stepping disks & through Limbo. (While Limbo was within Magik, they traveled through swirling flames & demonic images to locations, the stepping disks & Limbo being non-existent at that time.)

Back during Claremont's reign, I spoke with him about Illyana simultaneously summoning a pair of disks, held parallel and separated by an inch or two in Limbo, which would let her effectively bridge portals on Earth.

Trickier would be if in addition she separated the disks by a second or more, which would allow them to arrive at destination before departing, slowed by delays, or numbed by time dilation. (If time in Limbo is maintained faster than on Earth, bloodflow could be reduced or effectively stopped, letting her 'knock out' or paralyze opponents, like the way an arm or leg "falls asleep" when bloodflow is restricted.)

Different artists are inconsistent, but if stepping disks are transparent to light or other energies, it might be possible to spy, or even have effective precognition using such methods, plus lasers or magical blasts generated in Limbo could be used on Earth. (Holding portals in front of your eyes separated by a second would allow a second of foresight, plus I mentioned earlier dropping one side into the ocean, Earth's core, or the Sun to deliver blasts of water, lava, or plasma.)

(Separating disks in time might be limited though, because as a Hell Lord, Illyana can't overlap herself in time. Until Bendis, stepping disks had never caused anyone to overlap themselves outside of Limbo, and Illyana Hell Lord had never been seen to overlap herself. <Yes with Little Snowflake, but not Empress Magik.>)

Hope used Magik's powers in Rosenberg's run when Illyana was incapacitated as a demon



Its not touched upon, but I ddint believe she took them all through Limbo

[G0RM]

Hope used Magik's powers in Rosenberg's run when Illyana was incapacitated as a demon



It's not touched upon, but I didn't believe she took them all through Limbo

Again, my headcanon is that Magik was making a big dramatic scene (she overacts badly sometimes, (method actor?-) although the other characters usually seem convinced by her fibbing), using her powers to send them to and from Limbo, while giving Hope the impression she was doing it.

Do you believe Hope can hold onto a power even after she leaves the vicinity of the original mutant? For how long? What happens if they run out?

Is your impression that Hope can use any mutant's power wherever or whenever they are?

Can she use Cannonball's despite him being in the Shi'ar Galaxy?

How about mutants living, dead, as yet to be born, or in different timestreams?

Because in the end, the Shi'ar Galaxy is a lot closer than Limbo, which is an entirely different dimension, in another timestream disconnected from our own.

Being stuck in Limbo would suck unless Magik has told the demons not to eat stray Mutants, since they obviously enjoyed munching on stray Inhumans.

Readers and characters are frequently manipulated by Illyana.

While she was still in the cell, it was obvious to me that she was manipulating Piotr into taking the Juggernaut's powers and could have dismissed them any time. It seems equally obvious to me that she put on an act about O.N.E. & Xi'an/Tran, Dark Beast etc.

(I guessed Louis Simonson's secret regarding Illyana 1.0 at the end of Inferno, which is why they published my letter in TNM v1 #78.)

[Mr Abductor]

She's Olympic athlete level in mortal form, multi-ton as simple Darkchilde, and Hulk-level when in full SoulArmored Darkchilde mode, when she tossed transmode enhanced S'ym around like a rag doll, regular S'ym having beaten alternate versions of Colossus & Wolverine to death.

In Limbo, she can tear apart reality, and so is effectively infinite, at least until tested by Magus, Galactus, Beyonders, or Thanos with Infinity Gauntlet. (Technically the time she pounded on S'ym was during Inferno, when New York was infected by Limbonic energies, but she had previously taken punches from the Blob as partially armored Darkchilde without Limbonic enhancement, and was barely stunned.)

Remember too that she passed on taking the strength of Juggernaut when offered by Cyttorak Himself simply because she preferred to give a lesson about tainted Power to her brother, and recently she curbstamped Jugs effortlessly without bothering to take his strength.

Adding in teleportation where she's sometimes shown dodging bullets & lasers etc, she should fight like a combo of Beast & Nightcrawler in Darkchilde form without armour, and approaching Thanos with Infinity Gauntlet if she adds in full armor, magic, and abuses teleportation, much less time travel.

(Note that Stepping Disks give her power over Space and Time, her mental barriers and memory spells show partial mastery of Mind, magic & Sword give her mastery over Soul, in Limbo she controls Reality, and during Inferno she clearly embodied Power. On the whole, using her full mutant-HellLord powers at their maximum, she should be considered on par with Thanos wearing Gauntlet... and would have just as much trouble making friends :'-(

That's some good stuff, she's seems pretty average amongst her X peers when on earth and not utilising magic, looks like her real bread and butter comes from her being in limbo and/or in her Darkchilde forms.

Thanks for the type up.

Also where do you stand on Storm, Wolverine etc 'dodging' Cyke's optic blasts, possibly making them hypersonic+ in reactions and therefore scaling to most of the Marvel verse due to their physical encounters with other fighters who have matched or exceeded their speed?

[Fokken]

(I guessed Louis Simonson's secret regarding Illyana 1.0 at the end of Inferno, which is why they published my letter in TNM v1 #78.)

Which secret? Share with the kids in the back of the class please and thank you!

[WallStreeter]

Again, my headcanon is that Magik was making a big dramatic scene (she overacts badly sometimes, (method actor?-) although the other characters usually seem convinced by her fibbing), using her powers to send them to and from Limbo, while giving Hope the impression she was doing it.

Do you believe Hope can hold onto a power even after she leaves the vicinity of the original mutant? For how long? What happens if they run out?

Is your impression that Hope can use any mutant's power wherever or whenever they are?

Can she use Cannonball's despite him being in the Shi'ar Galaxy?

How about mutants living, dead, as yet to be born, or in different timestreams?

Because in the end, the Shi'ar Galaxy is a lot closer than Limbo, which is an entirely different dimension, in another timestream disconnected from our own.

Being stuck in Limbo would suck unless Magik has told the demons not to eat stray Mutants, since they obviously enjoyed munching on stray Inhumans.

Readers and characters are frequently manipulated by Illyana.

While she was still in the cell, it was obvious to me that she was manipulating Piotr into taking the Juggernaut's powers and could have dismissed them any time. It seems equally obvious to me that she put on an act about O.N.E. & Xi'an/Tran, Dark Beast etc.

(I guessed Louis Simonson's secret regarding Illyana 1.0 at the end of Inferno, which is why they published my letter in TNM v1 #78.)

Headcanon is simply a way of lying. The book blatantly says Hope used Magik’s teleportation powers to teleport the other XMen out of the area. That’s fact as this it what’s published.

Making up things just because you don’t like what was published gets unti dishonesty. I love Jean as they Phoenix but currently not only is she not Phoenix, she is using the codename Marvel Girl and dresses that way. Fact.

[WallStreeter]

That's some good stuff, she's seems pretty average amongst her X peers when on earth and not utilising magic, looks like her real bread and butter comes from her being in limbo and/or in her Darkchilde forms.

Thanks for the type up.

Also where do you stand on Storm, Wolverine etc 'dodging' Cyke's optic blasts, possibly making them hypersonic+ in reactions and therefore scaling to most of the Marvel verse due to their physical encounters with other fighters who have matched or exceeded their speed?

She’s used magic taught to her by Dr. Strange to Gabe down sentinels and she was not in Darkchukde form. Even under Rosenberg, she used her magic to deflect Siena Blaze’s attacks. Suena is pretty powerful.

Most of her power comes from being the mistress of Limbo or her training by Doctor Strange, with the exception of her ability to teleport through space and time. This power always had the ability to be tied to Limbo. It’s why Belasco kidnapped her in the first place.

[WallStreeter]

Very, very interesting no-prize worthy explanation: Krakoan life is killed by exposure to Limbonic energies! (Others have discusssed the relationship of Limbo with Krakoa, and there's that bit about Black Blossoms opening a passage to a place Krakoa had no knowledge of... Limbo?)

I have long held the theory, and I have yet to see evidence against Limbo having been totally vaccinated/toxic to T/O virus since Inferno.

In Fall of the New Mutants, she refused to let Warlock stay in Limbo, and it is self-evident that although Limbo & Inferno were terminally afflicted by metastatic T/O, there isn't the faintest trace of it anymore, despite Limbo being filled with stepping disks that allow time travel. That means all the demons infected during Inferno are either quarantined against travel through stepping disks before Magus & after Inferno, or they are cured/killed in the attempt.

Given that S'ym & N'astirh were both infected during Inferno & cured afterward, I suspect the LightChilde vaccinated all of Limbo before & after Magus/Inferno so that anyone infected is cured of it if exposed to Limbo for longer than seconds (thus her & possibly Wolfsbane shrugging it off in the recent period with O.N.E. . I suspect Illyana has inoculated herself against any & all technological infection ever since she discovered Dark Beast had broken their powers after AvX, and was just playacting when she pwned Juggernaut & O.N.E. and 'reverted' to demonic form.)

Sym has his techno virus even in tbe 90s, when Kurt went to Limbo to rescue Amanda. We stopped seeing the techno virus after Amanda Sefton took over Limbo.

The LightChild did not get rid of the techno virus.

I love Magik, but there’s no reason to make up things that she did not do.

[WallStreeter]

Sorry, No

That is how her power works. Just because we do not see it every time she teleports, doesn't mean it is not happening.

True. Though how her powers work have also changed. At one point she absorbed all of Limbo into her body.

So she could not have been taking people through Limbo when it was in her.

[G0RM]

That's some good stuff, she's seems pretty average amongst her X peers when on earth and not utilising magic, looks like her real bread and butter comes from her being in limbo and/or in her Darkchilde forms.

Thanks for the type up.

Also where do you stand on Storm, Wolverine etc 'dodging' Cyke's optic blasts, possibly making them hypersonic+ in reactions and therefore scaling to most of the Marvel verse due to their physical encounters with other fighters who have matched or exceeded their speed?

An analyst with photographic reflexes noted that Captain America doesn't seem to be the fastest at movement or have the quickest reflexes (Spider-Man and other precogs having negative reaction speeds), but that he feels almost like the conductor of an orchestra or choreographer of a ballet.

Captain America instead predicts what reactions an opponent will have under every circumstance, feeds them choices knowing what patterns they will follow, and does that for the entire battlefield, arranging for collisions, and opening up pathways like a Grandmaster in chess.

Wolverine moves in utterly non-repetative ways, having no pattern to his motions when berserk, although he has efficient martial-arts style some of the time. Storm probably senses all air-motions, and also predicts opponent's moves, since she defeated Cyclops even when she had no powers, although she was relying on him not to use lethal force.

When "dodging bullets" one doesn't have to be faster than a bullet, but rather be able to predict the hand-motions of the person holding the gun, and like a fool's-mate in chess, leading a simple-minded opponent into making bad moves is straight-forward.

Skilled opponents one or more levels up from you, though, can lead you to think they are inferior opponents until you suddenly find yourself waking up Dead (Arcade snuck into the X-Mansion, defeating all security countermeasures, and shot Storm with a tranquilizer gun before she ever knew he was there; he got so bored with everyday assassination that he created MurderWorld, after all.)

Magik might literally be in Spider-Man's league, in that she might have senses that extend across time, given that she uses stepping-disks that puncture through time, and her master move, the "TemporalSpacial Claudication", lets her warp fate, creating the outcome she desires (usually at a horrible cost though, like calling Nimrod into the 616 as the price to return New York to normality in UXM v1 #191.)

Illyana has used disks to pull Captain America's thrown shield & Thor's thrown Mjolnir off the battlefield, and shortly after her death and Resurrection by the Beyonder, fought Thor, Captain America, and the Black Knight simultaneously using only her sword, while they retreated from her.

Magik routinely redirects bullets, and has saved herself and teammates from instantaneous hidden explosions and secret blasters, suggesting she can snatch targets backwards in time (when she wants to; other times she throws fights for the Deep Game, or for masochistic purposes, as with her fight with Black Widow just before she took the Phoenix Force to teach her brother a lesson in the price of power.)

[G0RM]

Which secret? Share with the kids in the back of the class please and thank you!

Louise had an online interview with CBR about Illyana 1.0 before Illyana 2.0 'returned'.

https://www.cbr.com/louise-simonson-...he-magik-gone/

Where she confirmed my theory in the interview, as well as by publishing an edited version of my original letter in TNM v1 #78.

It's easy to follow: you just need to go through TNM v1 #73 panel-by-panel, and understand that she intends to perform a trick of misdirection, like a stage magician.

Note also that there have always been two versions of every X-Man in UXM v1 #160. Wolverine & Colossus were already Dead when the action started, Nightcrawler had been corrupted by Belasco, Old Woman Storm was a major player, Cat hid offstage due to shame, but where was little Snowflake?

I like to number our universe as 616, and the reality where the other X-Men were abducted as Earth-666, and so it was Illyana-666 who died of Legacy, the last survivor of the doomed X-Men of Earth-666, stolen by Magik before UXM#160 started, and placed in the burned out armor in TNM#73 after Magik stepped offstage.

(Or to use Warlock's numbering scheme, Illyana 0.0 was swapped by Illyana 1.0, and Illyana 2.0 is an imperfect copy made by Belasco, Illyana 1.0 hiding in shame somewhen offstage, subtly pulling the strings of her Catspaw Illyana 2.0 ever since Inferno.)

Louise expressed surprise that no other author has brought Magik back previously, but as far as I can tell, nothing suggests that Illyana 1.0 is anywhere but hiding in shame, like Cat did in #160, and how Belasco mostly his offstage for decades except for Black Sun & Magik's Return. (Specifically, Belasco never made appearances while everyone was fighting over the SoulSword.)

(Well... There was the blond mummy wearing the Beatrice Medallion that Project Purgatory found... If Zeb states in an interview that Illyana 1.0 died of Legacy offstage, I would accept it, despite my headcanon. On the other hand, there are an infinite number of timestreams, and in most of them Illyana is a Cross-Time Traveler, or Reality Warper, or Black Swan, or is getting it on with Leah as Hell Lord to undead armies, so presumably there are some precisely like my headcanon, and can step onstage the instant she overcomes shame & stage-fright.)

[244]

Okay. So headcanon time:

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[G0RM]

Headcanon is simply a way of lying. The book blatantly says Hope used Magik’s teleportation powers to teleport the other XMen out of the area. That’s fact as this it what’s published.

Making up things just because you don’t like what was published gets into dishonesty. I love Jean as the Phoenix but currently not only is she not Phoenix, she is using the codename Marvel Girl and dresses that way. Fact.

Thank you for your concern, WallStreeter.

Your point about headcanon being self-delusion is well taken; the nature of science is to doubt everything, especially your own wishful thinking. "Once you eliminate the impossible, whatever remains, no matter how improbable, must be the truth."

But headcanon and Backstory are different.

The headcanon of the New Mutants was that if they turned over the Limbo Babies to the government, everything would work out for the best.

Zeb Wells knew different.

What I see on panel is fact (or at least appearance, as with Jason Wyngaard's Shadow during the Dark Phoenix Saga), but what characters say is simply what they say, whether they believe it and are right, believe it and are wrong, or are lying or misdirecting with the intent to deceive.

Perhaps you are under the impression that Illyana is transparent in all she says and does, has never lied or kept a secret. That seems like an odd headcanon to believe, but you do you.

The weird bit about Phoenix is that literally the first thing she ever said was a give away, even if no one, not even Claremont himself, knew it at the time.

"Hear me, X-Men! No longer am I the woman you knew! I am Fire and Life incarnate! Now and forever - I am PHOENIX!"

"No longer am I the woman you knew..."

How much more explicit can you get, as a cosmic entity lying to herself that she was kinda sorta a mortal? Just because people interpreted it figuratively didn't mean she didn't mean it literally. Now how people could mistake a dweeby telekinetic/telepath for a matter-transmuting interstellar goddess just because she wore a similar face...

I get that appearance & reality can be different.

That's why I love Magik, a cosmic entity pretending she's a little girl: cloven hooves, horns and tail neatly tucked under her blond hair and painted-on spandex.

I simply knew that Illyana 1.0 was manipulating everyone and everything starting from her talk with Xavier in UXM v1 #164, and Illyana 2.0 has followed in her hoofprints. They learned deception from a Demon Lord, after all, and beat him at his own game, stealing Hell from the Devil, before she hit puberty.

And from what Zeb Wells has shown us, she's gotten, umm..., devious since then.

(When I was ten years old, I spotted Jason Wyngaard's Shadow on the wall & wrote in for a no-prize, but it was the second time it happened, and other sharp-eyed readers had already been awarded it, although those letters weren't published until after it was finally announced explicitly... Tricksters, liars, and con-men lie and manipulate. That's part of why I have always loved Illyana; she had secrets, but not much ill intent, and was herself always trying to look for her own self-deception, never trusting her own nature since Belasco first touched her.)

Henry Rollins on Deception:
https://youtu.be/awY1MRlMKMc

[Havok83]

Again, my headcanon is that Magik was making a big dramatic scene (she overacts badly sometimes, (method actor?-) although the other characters usually seem convinced by her fibbing), using her powers to send them to and from Limbo, while giving Hope the impression she was doing it.

Do you believe Hope can hold onto a power even after she leaves the vicinity of the original mutant? For how long? What happens if they run out?

Is your impression that Hope can use any mutant's power wherever or whenever they are?

Can she use Cannonball's despite him being in the Shi'ar Galaxy?

How about mutants living, dead, as yet to be born, or in different timestreams?

Because in the end, the Shi'ar Galaxy is a lot closer than Limbo, which is an entirely different dimension, in another timestream disconnected from our own.

Being stuck in Limbo would suck unless Magik has told the demons not to eat stray Mutants, since they obviously enjoyed munching on stray Inhumans.

Readers and characters are frequently manipulated by Illyana.

While she was still in the cell, it was obvious to me that she was manipulating Piotr into taking the Juggernaut's powers and could have dismissed them any time. It seems equally obvious to me that she put on an act about O.N.E. & Xi'an/Tran, Dark Beast etc.

(I guessed Louis Simonson's secret regarding Illyana 1.0 at the end of Inferno, which is why they published my letter in TNM v1 #78.)

I dont believe Magik had any control during this. She was a raging irrational demon. Yes I believe Hope took her powers. You'll notice that Magik's discs are yellow but when Hope uses it, it's blue. That was the way the artist could showcase who was using it. She knows when she mimics someone; she can feel it. Her powers are vicinity based and she likely lost the teleportation powers after she transported away, but all she needed to do is make one jump. If she went to Limbo, she'd likely be stuck there, which is why I think she didnt port to it.

[sungila]

Okay. So headcanon time:

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GORM you are amazing and thank you. I don't think of your head-cannon in a ballistic sense at all.
To me when you say 'head-cannon' I think of a vast limbo of libraries...a library in the liminal...a place of impossible in between where the un-books corridor swallowing echoes...that the never ending story must end to never...that's a place...so yes...think of a head as an actual cannon...a normal head in a ballistic sense and then see a handgun and the thought a bullet...now see the cannon as a periwinkle shell now a threshold...now walk inside and light a lantern and pass the other one to someone nobody there and begin burning, hurry blow out the page, now huh, the light isn't...

that's GORM's head-cannon

is this nonsense?

I am speaking a magic language, I can't call it Magik...I'm speaking about her...the speaking isn't her...

(I do love this, very much though and because not despite of anything at all, thank you, 244)

un-ferno.

When I think of making sense of senselessness I must inevitably surrender all to the 'senseless' senses and the smell is cinder and coppery slop and the sound is drip drip woooooossshhh and the feeling is icy raw hot and tingly and the taste is ashy. Masticated ink. We all have a remembering memory eating paper.

There is no way the express an absolute.

Absolutely impossible!

To express an absolute is to deny and destroy any unfathomable absolute-ocity.

Why in God's name would anybody believe there could be any use for God's name?

Or God's infinite love.
Incoming!

To say it is to also speak to its impossibility to receive. One could not possibly receive such a thing. And yet, one may be capable or culpable of eluding direct impact or somehow...opening a light disc with it or for it...to pass through...when a girl plays the boy in the lead as Peter Pan and what passes for flight may depend on the school budget...and/or socioeconomic environment and climate and discussions about it...is that her? who? him? what? Gossamer.



Passing.

Phasing is different.

The idea of 'passing' is interesting.

Staging.

Target. (see it)
in reverse.

tegrat!

(the sound in a comic, i think it'd be like a sigh/cry/choke/breath/last/first/gulp/stabbity/splash/puddle or something or anything at all)



Think of that stage for a second or don't.

That spotlight or not.

Is that a stepping disc?

Who's there?

knock knock

just air

not there

and coyote or Alice or the rain or my falling tears of grief or fist of rage or shovel...or expectations and conditions...my hollering a name...my vase...my shadow...kite and bolt spun spool...my body in a hopscotch square...slips...falls a long long long long way through the sky into a cloud, just before or in the ground...no sound...and yet...poof


So yes most importantly all this is to say, and I'll lead the ovation.

!TEGRAT!

i cut the ropes of unflying and step-off-stage and turn and sit and stand and clapping (fingers tapping) to say:

Hooray and bravo and thank you GORM

um, I think I accidentally grabbed a work book? damn. And it's used! Or is new like that?

[G0RM]

Sym has his techno virus even in tbe 90s, when Kurt went to Limbo to rescue Amanda. We stopped seeing the techno virus after Amanda Sefton took over Limbo.

The LightChild did not get rid of the techno virus.

I love Magik, but there’s no reason to make up things that she did not do.

Gosh Golly, Gee Whiz (Sense of Wonder) ! ¡ !

I'd be very, very interested to read that; do you have Titles and issue numbers?

If it's on the page visibly, I'll have to change my theories.

My memory was that when Doctor Doom tricked Kitty into pulling the SoulSword from the Stone by Excalibur's lighthouse, the demons of Limbo showed no trace of T/O infection, but I didn't see S'ym there.

But if S'ym still had the virus in the issues you're citing, what (or rather who, hint hint) prevented him from spreading it and taking over Limbo & recreating Inferno?

I stopped collecting comics after the Heroes Return, and restarted after Magik's Return.

I've tried to be an Illyana 1.0 completist (I'm bored by the versions of her in Exiles ) but additional appearances by S'ym and the SoulSword might have snuck past me (like how the SoulSword was a major factor in the Legion series even when Magik wasn't around.)

I picked up Sefton's miniseries & Black Sun, but some of the Winding Way stuff, and WitchFire's run in Alpha Flight are still outside my knowledge, especially because most of Alpha Flight isn't yet available through Marvel Unlimited, nor are some key issues of Excalibur.

If Belasco appeared anywhere between Storm & Illyana Magik, Kazar & Black Sun, or between Black Sun & the Return of Magik, I'd love to hear about it.

{Edit: I just found Nightcrawler (2004) on Unlimited, but haven't seen S'ym yet; I'll keep looking.

{Edit: I found S'ym in Cable (1993) #14 along with Belasco, and only Cable has T/O. The confrontation took place in the Nexus of All Reality, not Limbo. A good disproof of my theory would be if Cable, Warlock, or any infected Limbo demon ever spent time in Limbo after Inferno, but I haven't seen such a case.