POWERS OF X [04] : Something Sinister (SPOILERS)

[jamesslow]

yes, i'm seeing the techno-organic interface as benign, although this could always be subverted by others (not by best-boy dougie!) in some kind of trojan scenario

[TOTALITY]

Isn't the Krakoa interface we see with Doug in HoX #1 vaguely techno-organic in nature? (Looking at the panel again it's open to interpretation) It could be as benign as Doug seeding Krakoa with the transmode material necessary for that union.

Hmm, I actually did take it on first read as interfacing through his Warlock-arm, but definitely open to interpretation looking at it now, in contrast to how the transmode infection in today's issue was definitely visually clear. You just know it has to be significant though, not just because they dedicated a whole panel to showing it up close, but all the Phalanx stuff in X^3, and how the boundaries between organic and machine are of such thematic importance to the whole story. Can't wait to see where it goes!

[petrefax]

Apparently gillen approves.

I don't know if this has been posted yet if it is a repost admins feel free to delete post.

Screenshot_20190912-005840.jpg

[jamesslow]

Errr, never tried reply with multiple quotes, hope this works...

Hope someone else can answer definitively, but if this is the first 616 mention, then that effectively establishes it as a thing in this continuity well enough for me

Either way this (and Nimrod's mention of "incursions") raises the last big story written by Hickman, i.e. the Secret Wars death of everyone and everything - that makes me uncomfortable because how could Moira's death not have triggered her rebirth in each of her 9 lives so far?

The clones are also a Gillen thing. And the camp..because it's fun? At least it certainly was in Gillen's hands! I think he actually did elaborate on his reasoning at some point, but it may have been on a now defunct social media platform he used to have (what was that? oh, Formspring, I think!)

I think the phrasing is mostly figurative (although because it's comics it's also almost literal).. it was demons, of Limbo. First S'ym and later, primarily, N'astirh.

Is Inferno worth catching up on? (Who were the main writers?)

I haven't read Adamantium Agenda so maybe that will fill in the missing piece of my understanding of this clue, but others pointed me towards Spider-Man and The X-Men #6 from 2015 which has Ernst reveal that she's been acting as a mole for Sinister in exchange for him giving No-Girl a body. But she ultimately fights against him alongside the X-Men and her betrayal only gets her 5 months detention. I was wondering how/why this could be the thing where Hickman needed to specify that the samples were switched, though, because in the issue I just read, Sinister's lab is destroyed but it's not like they specify that all his records were destroyed. Does Adamantium Agenda have something like that?
Anyway, to answer your main question, that very issue of Spider-Man and the X-Men has this panel I pulled that confirms that as of 2015 at least Ernst was still around and the Cassandra Nova thing still seems in-play...
Attachment 86959

Umm, it's been a little while since I read Adamantium Agenda, but it certainly ended (spoilers... alert?) with our heroes destroying Sinister's stash of all mutant DNA -- which Hickman is now suggesting were swapped out beforehand. (It also established that someone in Xavier's Institute is not really a mutant.)

This leads me on a different tangential thought -- Apoc and his suicide squad in X^2 must have obtained more information from their raid of the machine databases than merely the date Nimrod came online (you wouldn't need a massive hunk of crystal "injected" into Mother Moira to record one date) -- maybe it's sinister's mutant DNA log?

Not sure what it means (fashion sense runs in the family?) except that the outfit, and the fact that Hickman's research apparently may have included the comic panel I just posted, makes it seem that Cassandra is not far from Hickman's thoughts...

Cassandra is certainly formidable -- I've got Morrison's run but I can't recall if he was the one who retconned her from being Charles's killed-in-the-womb twin to an alien psychic parasite. (I have also said that I hated the way he revealed Xorn as drug-addicted, deathcamp-building Magneto... who only lasted a few issues before getting decapitated again, after killing Jean again -- what a clusterfuck of an ending to a series with such powerful concepts!)

I can't recall the X-Men encountering Surtur. There were those 80's annuals where the X-Men and New Mutants visited Asgard.. but no Surtur IIRC. Bringing in that mythology would be almost like a meta nod to how Walt Simonson's Thor overlapped somewhat with his wife's time as the main X-book writer besides Claremont. The Mutant Massacre crossed over with Thor too... but not in a "mixing of mythologies" type way. I feel like the closest we've got to that is Dani becoming a Valkyrie...

Yeah nah, I've got the X Men and New Mutants in Asgard annuals with OroThor and Dani Valkyrie -- fun stuff, but no Surtur...

Skipped your questions I didn't really have anything for! (not even a rambling side comment, lol.)

(Would've enjoyed one of your rambling side comments, though!)

EDITED TO ADD: hahaha, I embedded all my responses within your comments -- TOTAL FAILLLLL

[powerpax]

Inferno is a mess but fun and likely very relevant going forward. It is largely the brainchild of Claremont, though the evil heel turn of Madelyne Pryor, etc. was forced on him by editorial.

It was Morrison who said Cassandra Nova was the mummudrai, a psychic parasite, not an alien from another world. That's a misunderstanding of the origin, I believe. 'Mummudrai' is simply the Shi'ar word for this kind of parasite that can be faced within all organic life at its genesis. IIRC she originated within the womb and became Charles' twin embryo via psychic force of will. Both origins came from Morrison. (I also loved Magneto in Planet X and it was pretty much blamed on Sublime, but that's me. AFAIC it was absolutely the real Magneto, under the influence of Sublime.)

[Veitha]

Apparently gillen approves.

I don't know if this has been posted yet if it is a repost admins feel free to delete post.

Screenshot_20190912-005840.jpg

Now I can't wait for Sinister's Massive Secrets. I hope Gillen does come back to the mutants.

[jamesslow]

Now I can't wait for Sinister's Massive Secrets. I hope Gillen does come back to the mutants.

OMG I just read Gillen's UXM#7 and, at the risk of going so far off-topic as to get this post deleted, we absolutely need to get Namor back in the X Men, written in that style...

IMPERIUS SEX!

[Veitha]

OMG I just read Gillen's UXM#7 and, at the risk of going so far off-topic as to get this post deleted, we absolutely need to get Namor back in the X Men, written in that style...

IMPERIUS SEX!

We need to get the whole Extinction Team back imo. It was such a cool concept, plus Gillen was great with the kinda villainous characters. Namor constantly hitting on Emma was gold.

I could see Xavier making an Extinction Team with all the Omega mutants.

[TOTALITY]

Errr, never tried reply with multiple quotes, hope this works...



(Would've enjoyed one of your rambling side comments, though!)

EDITED TO ADD: hahaha, I embedded all my responses within your comments -- TOTAL FAILLLLL

Haha, it was still legible! Breaking the quote up into chunks is kind of tedious; you have to manually close the first quote block with the "/quote" tag (but with brackets) and then put the "quote" and "/quote" tags around each subsequent part of the quote (which you can do by highlighting the text and clicking the quote symbol on the little message toolbar)

Anyway, yeah, powerpax answered your Inferno question. I would add that Louise Simonson was pretty equal with Claremont in her contributions; it was pretty much the two of them writing the whole X-line in that era. Simonson wrote the X-Factor and New Mutants issues, and a tie-in miniseries, X-Terminators. I remember the New Mutants stuff in Inferno being pretty good and bittersweet, even though it came out of being forced to write Illyana out of the book, which I believe was due to a decree from Bob Harras that they needed to get magic (upper and lowercase) out of the x-books. Inferno was meant to be kind of the 'last hurrah' for that stuff for a while..

[powerpax]

Weezie was involved but from what I can recall she was following Claremont and editorial's lead through most of that event (she even drops in hints about Sinister being Scott's childhood friend from the orphanage, Claremont's original backstory for the character). I'm still amazed we finally got Illyana back again. I honestly thought we never would. It killed me as a kid - she was my favorite. Losing Dani and Warlock and Rahne so soon after was a shocker as well.

I loved Inferno as a kid but I was always upset that Maddy and Illyana both got raw deals, as far as I was concerned. Today I can see just how insane an event it was, but it's still so much fun. The tie-in books, especially Ann Nocenti's Daredevil with JRjr, are perhaps even more glorious.

[Ultimate Rogue]

So Krakoa and Arakko were separated/split, and Arakko was pushed into the chasm. So is Arakko to become what we've known as limbo, and so the original Horsemen have been sentinels keeping it at bay - until - Inferno 2, even maw hotta', incoming!

I had assumed that when the original Horsemen were mentioned, that they mean't the 'robotic riders' originals, I hadn't registered the Egyptian recons, but I do like the look of the Egyptian ones.

[Glio]

I could not read the whole thread. Someone else has noticed that Xavier's explorer's clothes are disturbingly similar to Cassandra Nova's in New X-Men 1, right?

[jwatson]

Does anyone know about Select beings? Was that a hickman story?

Wikipedia says.

Any organism infected by the Phalanx is automatically inducted into the group mind. Recently, however, Ultron's guidance have allowed certain individuals with exceptional powers and/or abilities to become the "Selects", beings who are connected to the Phalanx hive mind, but retain their individual identities.

Could this be what Xavier is going for? And would it make mutants essentially immortal? I'm not familiar with the story/

[MichelleDiMera]

It was unexpected that Hickman would bring back the 2011 Gillen type of Sinister.

[jwatson]

Marvel 2099

In the possible future known as 2099, the Phalanx tried to invade the planet Earth a second time. To prevent Earth from being converted by the Transmode Virus, Spider-Man (Miguel O'Hara) forms an uneasy alliance with Dr. Doom, who had encountered the Phalanx in their first attempt to invade Earth in the 20th century. Doom knew that the Phalanx would have a "scout program" so he added his own subroutine to the coding called subroutine Cynthia which would erase the scout program. When Doom jumped to the future he lost track of the scout program and therefore created the Mutant Messiah myth to track the carrier down again.

When, during a mission, the mutant Nostromo becomes sheathed in a strange cocoon, he reveals himself to be the carrier when he "hatches" as a Phalanx. Doom sends some operatives to bring the boy to him, however, some of the operatives turn out to be Phalanx themselves and begin attacking the group.

Nostromo is eventually delivered to Doom, who then activates the subroutine within Nostromo and, bidding Spider-Man to take him to safety, blows up his castle, while Twilight brings reinforcements of aboriginal Martians to destroy the Phalanx in orbit.

I also find this interesting since Marvel is suppose to be revisiting 2099 soon and Jean was also in a mysterious cocoon.