House of X & Powers of 10 discussion

[JKtheMac]

I don't remember the slightest thing about Second Coming but I remember thinking Messiah Complex was a lame, editorially-handicapped excuse for an already bad 90s event.

I am not quite sure how to explain it, but that was a period of fiction that always tried too hard to be profound. Every key character had to be fundamental to the safety of mankind, religious themes abounded, everything was laden with import. I put it partly down to the drugs everyone was on. Good stories came out of this era but serialised fiction wasn’t quite the right medium for it.

Characters couldn’t just be a kid, they had to be a potential messiah or anti-Christ. Anti-heroes couldn’t just be dark they had to be related to Cain or Remus. Analogy was dragged kicking and screaming out of the subtext and exposed in the story.

Then I compare that period to today and there are a lot of similarities. Yet somehow I don’t get that feeling of laden import now. Maybe I am the one that changed. Like I say it’s a feeling not a thesis.

[Killerbee911]

Depends how he is written, which is the case for everyone. Also it depends who you are. I think Wolverine is cool, but I have very little time for him. I have always been baffled by the continuation of the anti-hero in comics well past the concept’s sell by date.

Anti heroes are not nice guys and codes of honour are basically excuses for what we nowadays call toxic masculinity.

Antiheroes deliver justice in away the normal good guy can't and in way we wish secretly would happen. It is as simple as Cyclops puts Joker in jail who will escape. Wolverine kills the Joker. The Jerk screaming slurs Cyclops walks away from,The Jerk screaming slurs Wolverine knock out. It is easy to understand antiheroes there is no sell date, Just like there is no sell date White knight boy scout types.

Also I think you have Jerkish characters and antiheroes mix together. But that is topic for another day

[JKtheMac]

Antiheroes deliver justice in away the normal good guy can't and in way we wish secretly would happen. It is as simple as Cyclops puts Joker in jail who will escape. Wolverine kills the Joker. The Jerk screaming slurs Cyclops walks away from,The Jerk screaming slurs Wolverine knock out. It is easy to understand antiheroes there is no sell date, Just like there is no sell date White knight boy scout types.

Also I think you have Jerkish characters and antiheroes mix together. But that is topic for another day

I slightly disagree with you on what an anti-hero is, but it is certainly is a topic for elsewhere. It clearly has nothing to do with justice from my perspective. Much literature on the topic is very ill-informed IMO, which doesn’t help.

[Doctor_Foxey]

Funny thing mutants and humans are the same species though. That and the X gene would more likely work through epigenetics then mutation. Generally mutation non reproductive cells leads to cancer etc. Epigenetics is the kind of change within a generation that can be adaptive but that means a large segment of the population probably already has the genes for getting mutant powers and mutant powers are something that could come or go in a population depending on the environment.

[JKtheMac]

Funny thing mutants and humans are the same species though. That and the X gene would more likely work through epigenetics then mutation. Generally mutation non reproductive cells leads to cancer etc. Epigenetics is the kind of change within a generation that can be adaptive but that means a large segment of the population probably already has the genes for getting mutant powers and mutant powers are something that could come or go in a population depending on the environment.

Someone always brings up one variation or other of this same argument. The fact is that Stan wasn’t a scientist he just wanted a new way to make superheroes without the need for detailed backstory. This then rapidly evolved into a story about human evolution.

Even though it isn’t scientifically sound in the real world, it isn’t totally outrageous to see these fictional mutants, in this very artificial context, as a form of human evolution and as such the best model is still probably as a new and very novel sub species. If it really happened it would transcend our understanding of genetics anyway.

Hickman is sidestepping this a little. The far future species is ‘post-human’ they have passed a singularly and are aiming at another.

[tornshattered]

Funny thing mutants and humans are the same species though. That and the X gene would more likely work through epigenetics then mutation. Generally mutation non reproductive cells leads to cancer etc.

Whoa, whoa whoa!! Mutation of non-germline cell DNA rarely leads to cancer. I mean there are a handful of genes whose mutation will start the process of the cell becoming cancerous. Mostly though, nothing will happen. You get hundreds of mutations just by standing in the sun for a second.

Epigenetics is the kind of change within a generation that can be adaptive but that means a large segment of the population probably already has the genes for getting mutant powers and mutant powers are something that could come or go in a population depending on the environment.

I agree about the fact that epigenetics is the key in making any sense of the X-Gene, but I think epigenetics is more likely to lead to the activation of the X-Gene(eg via oxidative stress induced demethylation). Epigenetics might also be the determinant in the type of powers one might receive. Another theory I have is that the strength of the powers might be related to the amount of repeats in the DNA, similar to CAG repeats in huntington's, just more complex. That's why certain families, like the Greys, the Summers and the Magnetos(sorry, couldn't think of a better name for them) have such high energy outputs.

[Doctor_Foxey]

Someone always brings up one variation or other of this same argument. The fact is that Stan wasn’t a scientist he just wanted a new way to make superheroes without the need for detailed backstory. This then rapidly evolved into a story about human evolution.

Even though it isn’t scientifically sound in the real world, it isn’t totally outrageous to see these fictional mutants, in this very artificial context, as a form of human evolution and as such the best model is still probably as a new and very novel sub species. If it really happened it would transcend our understanding of genetics anyway.

Hickman is sidestepping this a little. The far future species is ‘post-human’ they have passed a singularly and are aiming at another.

You completely misunderstood what I was saying lol. I was saying considering what we know now of biology it is interesting to apply that and to consider how evolution works from someone who studied it. Epigenetics a processes cause genes to turn on or off depending on environmental situations like famine or stress.

[JKtheMac]

You completely misunderstood what I was saying lol. I was saying considering what we know now of biology it is interesting to apply that and to consider how evolution works from someone who studied it. Epigenetics a processes cause genes to turn on or off depending on environmental situations like famine or stress.

I was making a much more general point that it’s not really a story about genetics, just as Dune isn’t really a story about human husbandry. Whenever writers get too focused on genetics they are kind of missing the point.

[JKtheMac]

Antiheroes deliver justice in away the normal good guy can't and in way we wish secretly would happen. It is as simple as Cyclops puts Joker in jail who will escape. Wolverine kills the Joker. The Jerk screaming slurs Cyclops walks away from,The Jerk screaming slurs Wolverine knock out. It is easy to understand antiheroes there is no sell date, Just like there is no sell date White knight boy scout types.

Also I think you have Jerkish characters and antiheroes mix together. But that is topic for another day

As someone that believes Batman’s sell by date was some time in the mid eighties we are probably not going to agree on this. If you genuinely want to hack this out I have lots of very controversial opinions on the subject but it would end up being removed from the thread as a huge disruptive tangent as everyone argued about Wolverine or Magneto.

[Fokken]

WE-[PHALANX]-HAVE-DETECTED-JORGE-MOLINA-ART

TIME-TO-SMaAaAaAaASH-THAT-MOTHA'-F'IN-LIKE-BUTTON

You just kill me, left and right, with this sh*t. ha ha ha ha ha

[Jackraow21]

Second Coming

Dead Nightcrawler
Dead Cable
Big bubble
Lots of Nimrods
Bastion and his ugly beard

And last and most certainly least, Hope.

They should’ve just left Cable dead after this event. Rather than bring him back, only to kill him again at his own hands and replace him with this stupid kid version.

[loke13]

They should’ve just left Cable dead after this event. Rather than bring him back, only to kill him again at his own hands and replace him with this stupid kid version.

It's ok Kid Cable is finally getting more quality time with his Mom, Dad, and sister.

[Doctor_Foxey]

I was making a much more general point that it’s not really a story about genetics, just as Dune isn’t really a story about human husbandry. Whenever writers get too focused on genetics they are kind of missing the point.

No. It’s not strictly about genetics or biology. In a lot of ways Xmen is about evolution and adaptation in all their definitions. Genetics and biology are important mechanics in evolution/adaptation. Mechanics that can have a impact on future stories.

In my view, expecting advances in those fields to never have a impact on the story or to be used as a salient point is pretty regressive. Especially considering Hickman is the type of person who seems interested in the details and definitions.

Like for example what if the evolutionary process by which mutants are theoretically going to replace humans is by way of sexual selection not so much natural selection? Or that xgene is probably one gene that turns on other super power genes? Or the fact that humans and mutants are not actually separate species?

[The Jeeper 2.0]

Depends how he is written, which is the case for everyone. Also it depends who you are. I think Wolverine is cool, but I have very little time for him. I have always been baffled by the continuation of the anti-hero in comics well past the concept’s sell by date.

Anti heroes are not nice guys and codes of honour are basically excuses for what we nowadays call toxic masculinity.



Nah. We now have two great but very different writers on the two big team franchises. It’s not a competition.

Competition? Always a competition. Think about this, for the last several years all of the event or big stories have been filtered through the Avengers line and the X-Men had tie ins. It feels like with this run, the opposite will be true. The X-Men's scale feels huge again and I think the greater MU will be affected in unexpected ways.

[Clairaudient Freedom Soldier]

Cool ideas aren't enough. Hickman has made the mistake of too much telling and too little showing. He is not using the full skill and creativity of the artists. There is too little action. Too much talking. We already need another reset.