Age of X-Man: Marvelous X-Men #3 (spoilers/discussion)

[MechaJeanix]

I thought the issue was fine. Like many of you I am waiting for the end to this story. It has definitely been a slow build. I await next issue as I am hoping Jean will get some attention or at least maybe she will begin to remember some things.

I did like the focus with Storm and Magneto. Both are great characters. I've never been a big fan of Nate Grey, though I did like him during his early days.

[nx01a]

>The most powerful moment was also the most meta.
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>I enjoyed the philosophical angles, especially Nature Girl bringing up humanity's ingrained genetic need for community being countered by mutants being made to [ironically] socially evolve past that.
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>And X-Man having a good look at himself through how others perceive him... but still not being moved. Full on psycho.
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>I loved the Bahamas hurricane relief plus mentioning that the islanders will survive because they're strong. Quite a few of the writers seem fond of the Caribbean; I like it.
>The art degenerated in some of the more minor panels unfortunately.
>Storm and Magneto, two of the world's most powerful mutants, are pawns in a reality warp powered by two omega level god mutants and a celestial artifact meant to terraform planets. I, for one, have no issue with them being outgunned. I'm impressed that they saw through the illusion at all.
>The Life Seed as the lamp illuminating X-Man's basement city recreation was apt while being incredibly sad.

The issue may be 'boring' but I think it helped flesh out some of the ideological underpinnings of the AoXM and the motivation of X-Man himself.

[MichelleDiMera]

He hasn't done anything as bad as Victor Von Doom either, but I fail to see how either of the three or what they have/haven't done are relevant to me wanting Nate dead and gone.

Well.this place has always cried and whined about Nate Grey for years while prompting up inferior characters like Gambit and a endless amount of D listers. So that's no surprise but they have basically vilified him to push this sexless agenda gimmick for the duration of this story.

[MichelleDiMera]

To me, what makes Nate worse is that the people he's controlling are his friends and family and he's treating them like toys. Dr. Doom did something similar, but Battleworld at least wasn't totally fake. It also wasn't something Doom created just because he wanted to, but because he sort of had to to save what remained of all reality. He was doing his best, but he was also still Doom and Doom is gonna do what Doom is gonna do.

Nate thinks he was saving everyone, but he is clearly also doing this to save himself from his own death and loneliness. Let's not forget that the whole situation in Uncanny is only happening because he kidnapped most of the powerful and scary mutants and left mutant society in tatters. It's all ultimately selfish and the fact that he knows but pretends that he doesn't realize that just makes it worse.

And then there's the fact that he doesn't even take free will away, he just mindwipes and brainwashes people continuously and if they don't take to it, he throws them in prison.

Also, I'm still having bad feelings for Evan. I think Apocalypse is certainly sincere in his love for him, but I'm not sure what that means here.

This is a new out of nowhere development..Nate Grey sacrificed himself as the Shaman for life on earth to continue. They basically have him doing a Stryfe type of manipulation out of the blue to push the story along. That's odd writing..not a slight on Nate..any real reader of Nate Grey knows he would never consort with Apocalypse.

[MichelleDiMera]

Magneto made it a vendetta to try and murder Emma bc she mind controlled him for a minute in IvX. You think Nate mindcontrolling him for days during Diassembled and now months in AoX is gonna go over well?

Emma is a ungrateful pitiful villain who hid and ran after her actions. Nate is hiding in plain sight behind a Wanda level type of illusion

[Rosebunse]

This is a new out of nowhere development..Nate Grey sacrificed himself as the Shaman for life on earth to continue. They basically have him doing a Stryfe type of manipulation out of the blue to push the story along. That's odd writing..not a slight on Nate..any real reader of Nate Grey knows he would never consort with Apocalypse.

Well...I never liked Nate. Between him, Cable, and Rachel, he was always sort of my least favorite.

Also, I'm running with the theory that he may have been manipulated by Xavier for the upcoming Hickman event.

[Lucyinthesky]

Xavier is supposed to be involved with Namor´s recent mental instability so this theory has merit as we don´t really know what happened with Nate and "X" doesn´t quite seem like the same old Proffesor X imo.

[Tycon]

Oh, like he engineered this whole thing to take most of the X-Men off the board so he can enact the plan for his new dream. That’s plausible, but I do like that this is essentially a Nate Grey who’s deeply traumatized by his experiences in the AoA and saw the Terrigen Mists, IvX, Extermination, Mothervine, and O.N.E. events and felt like he was failing as mutantkind’s shaman. Like it doesn’t completely line up with prior characterization and without Zac/Lonnie it would be an incoherent mess but now that we have Age of X-Man, I don’t think we can say that this is super OOC. Especially when you consider the fact that he’s dying.

[Lucyinthesky]

Agreed, it could go either way specially with Nate dying.

[Kurolegacy]

The premise of AoX is just not strong enough to sustain 6 books, 2 one-shots, 32 issues for 5 months. It's either someone breaking the anti-love rule, or rebelling or remembering Earth-616 memories.

The fact that the grand ultimate crime of this world is love just makes this whole event boring as Hell. We've seen the X-Men tackle racism, genocide, world ending threats, apocalyptic worlds, the list goes on, so seeing them go on and on about love as if it's the anti-Christ that needs to be quelled just feels overly melodramatic and results in me not being able to take any of it seriously. How they thought such a concept was enough to hold up 5 minis over the span of 6 months is beyond me.

[Maestroneto]

The fact that the grand ultimate crime of this world is love just makes this whole event boring as Hell. We've seen the X-Men tackle racism, genocide, world ending threats, apocalyptic worlds, the list goes on, so seeing them go on and on about love as if it's the anti-Christ that needs to be quelled just feels overly melodramatic and results in me not being able to take any of it seriously. How they thought such a concept was enough to hold up 5 minis over the span of 6 months is beyond me.

It's because of the institutional belief that X-Men fans only care about shipping characters.

[Silver Fang]

It's because of the institutional belief that X-Men fans only care about shipping characters.

That seems to be every fandom. Fans are interested in much more, but the pairing wars tend to be the most intense. The Naruto wars went into overdrive when the final pairings got revealed. lol It was so fun, I 'd love to go back in time & read the outrage all over again. lol

On the Buffy-Boards, the wars are still strong with Angel vs. Spike after 20 yrs. And it didn't take long for it to flair up with the new comics. The series started, and Angel was nowhere to be found. So his fans worry & rave he's been dropped for Spike. Now Angel has his own book coming, and fans hate the changes made to him -such as him being 18 now, and he's starting off in a separate book away from Buffy who writers said would "be in the mix" somewhere in his romances. But Spike stayed on the main title with everyone else. And Bangel fans theorize it's so they can do Spuffy with no Angel interference.

But also, JDW says the X-Men is a soap opera first & foremost. So trolling with shipping is what they do best. lol

[Maestroneto]

That seems to be every fandom. Fans are interested in much more, but the pairing wars tend to be the most intense. The Naruto wars went into overdrive when the final pairings got revealed. lol It was so fun, I 'd love to go back in time & read the outrage all over again. lol

On the Buffy-Boards, the wars are still strong with Angel vs. Spike after 20 yrs. And it didn't take long for it to flair up with the new comics. The series started, and Angel was nowhere to be found. So his fans worry & rave he's been dropped for Spike. Now Angel has his own book coming, and fans hate the changes made to him -such as him being 18 now, and he's starting off in a separate book away from Buffy who writers said would "be in the mix" somewhere in his romances. But Spike stayed on the main title with everyone else. And Bangel fans theorize it's so they can do Spuffy with no Angel interference.

But also, JDW says the X-Men is a soap opera first & foremost. So trolling with shipping is what they do best. lol

Just like the X-Men, both Naruto and Buffy are products that encourage shipping through the stories they choose to tell which heavily rely on romantic entanglements as plot progression (love triangles, unhealthy romances, unrequited love, etc). There aren't any shipping wars among Avengers fandom, for example, because Avengers writers don't use relationships as the cornerstone of their franchise.

(In addition, both Buffy and Naruto are about a bunch of hormone-fueled teenagers/adolescents/young adults, which really shows the immaturity of the grown-ass people in the X-Men)

[PrezValentine]

The fact that the grand ultimate crime of this world is love just makes this whole event boring as Hell. We've seen the X-Men tackle racism, genocide, world ending threats, apocalyptic worlds, the list goes on, so seeing them go on and on about love as if it's the anti-Christ that needs to be quelled just feels overly melodramatic and results in me not being able to take any of it seriously. How they thought such a concept was enough to hold up 5 minis over the span of 6 months is beyond me.

I remember people here praising such a mature and never-before-seen on X-books take on love and sex. Seems like not even that was enough.

[Rosebunse]

Oh, like he engineered this whole thing to take most of the X-Men off the board so he can enact the plan for his new dream. That’s plausible, but I do like that this is essentially a Nate Grey who’s deeply traumatized by his experiences in the AoA and saw the Terrigen Mists, IvX, Extermination, Mothervine, and O.N.E. events and felt like he was failing as mutantkind’s shaman. Like it doesn’t completely line up with prior characterization and without Zac/Lonnie it would be an incoherent mess but now that we have Age of X-Man, I don’t think we can say that this is super OOC. Especially when you consider the fact that he’s dying.

My theory holds that Xavier didn't just take them off the board, he's also traumatizing them and showing them a wonderful world that is ALMOST perfect. And if they come back to 616, they're coming back to a world that was worse for them than when they left, something which again was caused by Nate and, in this theory, influenced by Xavier. This is going to make anything Xavier gives to them very appealing.

The fact that the grand ultimate crime of this world is love just makes this whole event boring as Hell. We've seen the X-Men tackle racism, genocide, world ending threats, apocalyptic worlds, the list goes on, so seeing them go on and on about love as if it's the anti-Christ that needs to be quelled just feels overly melodramatic and results in me not being able to take any of it seriously. How they thought such a concept was enough to hold up 5 minis over the span of 6 months is beyond me.

It isn't love which is banned so much as it is forming groups and tribalism. And to be fair to Nate, let's be honest, romance and weird family dynamics have killedmore X-Men than any Sentinel ever did. So he's not entirely wrong.

With this plan in place, it also makes people even trying to form groups outside of the occasional work team illegal. The X-Men all live alone and even in this issue, Magneto says that Storm isn't allowed to come visit him, at night, in his home. We even see that in NextGen where Glob says that Hisako isn't supposed to be in his room, even though she's just a friend coming to check up on him.

With all of this, it's harder for people to come together and talk about their shared experiences and find fault in their memories.