Are there any People of Color Writing XMEN?

[Wolverine12]

Please get back on topic. There is no point in arguing who’s had the worst life experience amongst yourselves.

[Silver Fang]

Please get back on topic. There is no point in arguing who’s had the worst life experience amongst yourselves.

Agreed. Thanks for allowing the topic to remain active. I think it's an interesting one, sadly it's sensitive & can lead to defensiveness.

In any case, there are few writers of color on the X-books in comparison with the straight white male writers.

We have

Tamaki
Chris Robinson -Editor
The writer for Prisoner of X

And Greg Pak, who is taking off with Agents of Atlas, featuring an all-Asian cast. Which is nice, but for some reason an all-black team has yet to come & seems taboo.

[Wolverine12]

Agreed. Thanks for allowing the topic to remain active. I think it's an interesting one, sadly it's sensitive & can lead to defensiveness.

In any case, there are few writers of color on the X-books in comparison with the straight white male writers.

We have

Tamaki
Chris Robinson -Editor
The writer for Prisoner of X

And Greg Pak, who is taking off with Agents of Atlas, featuring an all-Asian cast. Which is nice, but for some reason an all-black team has yet to come & seems taboo.

This is something that deserves discussion and attention. Yes ultimately the best person should get the job but I think a big issue is that the opportunity to find the best person is too narrow. Broadening your candidate pool will only create competition which theoretically should lead to better stories/art.

As for an all Black team I believe at one point that mighty Avengers headed by Sam Wilson/Captain America featured that. I could be wrong as this was several years ago.

[Beetle]

Mighty Avengers had:
Falcon
Luke Cage
Blue Marvel
Spectrum
Blade
Power Man
White Tiger
Spider-Man (both Otto and Parker)
She-Hulk
Kaluu

And frequently guest starred Iron Fist and Jessica Jones

So let's say 6/10 of the main team members were Black

[ARkadelphia]

This is something that deserves discussion and attention. Yes ultimately the best person should get the job but I think a big issue is that the opportunity to find the best person is too narrow. Broadening your candidate pool will only create competition which theoretically should lead to better stories/art.

As for an all Black team I believe at one point that mighty Avengers headed by Sam Wilson/Captain America featured that. I could be wrong as this was several years ago.

Most of the characters in that series are black, but not all, as I recall. I think She-Hulk was in it for instance.

[Killerbee911]

Agreed. Thanks for allowing the topic to remain active. I think it's an interesting one, sadly it's sensitive & can lead to defensiveness.

In any case, there are few writers of color on the X-books in comparison with the straight white male writers.

We have

Tamaki
Chris Robinson -Editor
The writer for Prisoner of X

And Greg Pak, who is taking off with Agents of Atlas, featuring an all-Asian cast. Which is nice, but for some reason an all-black team has yet to come & seems taboo.

The Crew was a all black team Storm,Black Panther, Luke Cage ,Misty Knight,etc. The Mighty Avengers was heavily minority Falcon, Power Man, Luke Cage,Blade, Monica Rambeau,White Tiger, Blue Marvel and Superior Spiderman. For the sake of this discussion it was written by Al ewing a white british writer and he seems be a big advocate for Blue Marvel and Spectrum.


More on topic I love when people says it doesn't matter and then we find out ,the editor says "We let him choose his team" and unsurprisingly the straight white middle age comic writer picks out a team that is heavily white and with characters they grew up loving and seeing themselves in, so many writers see a bit of Cyclops in them and ton of others grew up with a crush on Kitty. Leah Williams got to pick a X-men roster it had two gay men and one bisexual women that is not a accident. Vita Ayla got to pick a roster of characters her first pick was Bishop. People might think it does not matter but the ripple shows up in your comics.

[PsychoEFrost]

The Crew was a all black team Storm,Black Panther, Luke Cage ,Misty Knight,etc. The Mighty Avengers was heavily minority Falcon, Power Man, Luke Cage,Blade, Monica Rambeau,White Tiger, Blue Marvel and Superior Spiderman. For the sake of this discussion it was written by Al ewing a white british writer and he seems be a big advocate for Blue Marvel and Spectrum.


More on topic I love when people says it doesn't matter and then we find out ,the editor says "We let him choose his team" and unsurprisingly the straight white middle age comic writer picks out a team that is heavily white and with characters they grew up loving and seeing themselves in, so many writers see a bit of Cyclops in them and ton of others grew up with a crush on Kitty. Leah Williams got to pick a X-men roster it had two gay men and one bisexual women that is not a accident. Vita Ayla got to pick a roster of characters her first pick was Bishop. People might think it does not matter but the ripple shows up in your comics.

It is certainly easier to right what you know. There is also the concern that if you write someone badly, that you did for some other reason (because you're racist, sexist, misogynistic, homophobic, etc).

[PsychoEFrost]

For instance, I am a writer. Not fantasy, I do sports. Surprising amount of overlap. I do have fans e-mailing me to kill myself, so the fanbases are certainly just as... "passionate".

If I got to write comics, I would love to write something with Jessica Jones, Luke Cage, and Iron Fist. I like their dynamic, and there are some fun stories to tell. But would I try and tell Cage's perspective of growing up in one of the worst areas crime wise in New York? Hell no. I grew up in the most gentrified area of Chicago. I don't know crap about that, and trying to write that would feel super forced.

[OblivionX33]

Given the sheer lack of poc in most x-men team line ups. Despite the analog its been pretty bare overall.

[Killerbee911]

It is certainly easier to right what you know. There is also the concern that if you write someone badly, that you did for some other reason (because you're racist, sexist, misogynistic, homophobic, etc).

Good writers will research what they write so that isn't a issue,The problem is that some writers don't feel need to put in effort in on certain things. For example for years Blink was "pink girl" from the Bahamas and when it was time to cast her in movies and tv she was casted with asians which was fine because the books never cared to flesh that out. The writer for Exiles is not one of those writers so when he took over he flesh out Blink back story. As someone who is Afro Caribbean you could see the effort he put in the details about the character. It was enough to pass as authentic Caribbean and even better there was active effort to make Blink features match someone from African decent.

Stan Lee and Jack Kirby created Black Panther so it is not about your background matching to the stuff you are writing. But having more varied backgrounds on your creative teams helps better flesh out characters and change who is at forefront of things in stories. People underestimate the little details but that is what make characters feel more real to readers. Some writers have research the hell out of things( which is why Hickman having spreadsheets is dope) and some writers have natural advantage of their background helping which is why Extremist issue 4 hit home for some because the writer understand that content. You don't have to be from New York to get New York and the life you can research that but when your life experience intersects with what you are doing it helps flesh out the project. So when Luke Cage neighborhood becomes gentrified area of New York(which a lot of New York is becoming) you can give that more realism.

[comeatmebro]

some writers have natural advantage of their background helping which is why Extremist issue 4 hit home for some because the writer understand that content.

I like Sina's Bobby much better than Leah's so maybe you are right

[Killerbee911]

I like Sina's Bobby much better than Leah's so maybe you are right

Leah is writing a alternate universe Iceman, It is not 1 to 1 comparison. You can still like one better than other but they aren't necessarily trying to accomplish the same thing.

[MechaJeanix]

Agreed. Thanks for allowing the topic to remain active. I think it's an interesting one, sadly it's sensitive & can lead to defensiveness.

In any case, there are few writers of color on the X-books in comparison with the straight white male writers.

We have

Tamaki
Chris Robinson -Editor
The writer for Prisoner of X

And Greg Pak, who is taking off with Agents of Atlas, featuring an all-Asian cast. Which is nice, but for some reason an all-black team has yet to come & seems taboo.

I read some Agents of Atlas the other day (I think it was the War of the Realms stuff) and it was so diverse and so good. It made me think what the X-men could be if we didn't center the white characters all the time (and I say this as someone whose fav character is Jean Grey). Diversity is beautiful and reflective of our actual world. The sad thing is that some people do not have a diverse world because they live in a homogenous area and refuse to look outside of it. Sometimes we have to be intentional to experience the diversity of our world.

The X-men should be one of the most diverse books and we deserve diverse writers. I'm afraid we will always have writers like Rosenberg and others who center the male characters like Cyclops, Wolverine, etc (or even when they don't we still get stories of Rahne being murdered in a way that mirrors trans panic.. ugh!).

[JB]

Yes ultimately the best person should get the job but I think a big issue is that the opportunity to find the best person is too narrow.

And this is where I admit to not having enough knowledge. Has it been said how opportunities such as this at Marvel work? Has it been revealed to be too narrow? I'm not sure how the process of finding writers happens. I just want to be sure we're not discussing assumptions here.

[Wolverine12]

And this is where I admit to not having enough knowledge. Has it been said how opportunities such as this at Marvel work? Has it been revealed to be too narrow? I'm not sure how the process of finding writers happens. I just want to be sure we're not discussing assumptions here.

I don’t have access to Marvel’s hiring practices so it is only an assumption that not everyone that is qualified to write for them gets the opportunity.