Scott Summers: Cyclops Appreciation 2020

[xiyon]

I just think it's kind of silly to have marketed X-Men as the saga of Cyclops and yet other characters are featured more prominently. It's not enough that he "drives things", that's so tangential. And to those saying he's featured prominently in the solicit for issue 16 - first, covers lie, and second, we're talking about the sixteenth issue. If he's the POV or the protagonist or whatever qualifier, it shouldn't take over a year for him to feature prominently again. There are or were more than a dozen other series or one-shot books already focusing on other characters, so why can't Scott be a bigger focus in the X-Men book?

Who knows--- maybe the X-Office thinks fans are stupid enough to buy the book on marketing alone.

"Come for Cyke! But please stay for Hickman's infodump and talking heads!"

[TheDeadSpace]

Maruarders is simply a better written book than Gold bc Gold itself also had arcs focused on Rachel, Storm, and brought in a whole secondary tea when Kitty's was out of commission. The Kitty focus is still heavy but she's shared the limelight with Emma and Shaw. The book itself is primarily about the Hellfire Trading Company which makes sense why those 3 have been at the forefront.

Back to X-men, Scott's only been the focus of three issues. #1, #2 and the Granny one. To a lesser extent the Crucible. Unlike Maraurders and the other books though, he doesnt seem to have an arc. He just shows up as a sometimes POV character but mostly cameos in the background. He isnt really getting character development and the fact that its been so long since a book was told from his POV, it makes that stand out even more

I'm in complete agreement. I don't want to "beat a dead horse", but the bolded is what annoys me the most so far. I'm happy with his fatherly moments, but a small arc would be a huge improvement. Also, with how things are currently being presented, it seems as if Scott is the only one making effort to maintain a family. I wish the other Summers would appear more supportive of their family members. That said, I'm not sure I would consider moments with Logan as part of those either.

[Omega Alpha]

One issue with this approach of shifting the spotlight every issue that Hickman might not have realized is that it can work fine with Cap. America or Iron Man in Avengers, or even Wolverine here, is that they have their own solos, so it doesn't matter if they disappear or stay in the background for half a dozen issues. While in the F4, the cast is much smaller to begin with, so there was never a complete disappearance or irrelevance of anyone for too long (sure, the Future Foundation had a lot of characters, but again there were two books).

For example, there could be a bigger focus on Vulcan in a few issues, and it would be fine normally, since of his connection to Cyke and to the overall family theme. The problem is that once you bring stuff that has really no relation to the core characters you're focusing on, like the Mystique one or the most recent focused on in building lore to X of Swords, then you end up asking yourself "what's that got to with the previous issue?", even if they're fine issues individually. Hell, this will probably look worse on trade.

He did this well in Avengers- the main book focused in this immense cast of characters (at one point, there were 22 members) and different stories, while NA focused solely in the Illuminati and the Incursions storyline. If he did something similar here, even if both books only releasing one issue a month (Avengers released 2), then I think it would have worked better. The Giant Sized ones could have been a part of the other book as well.

Add that the fact that, probably in no small part because he was supposed to be the lead here, he didn't do anything in any of the other books except Hellions, and it gets worse.

[Darthfury78]

Please! Please, leave Maddie out of it! Let the woman move on already, and give her better stories.

Far, far, FAR away from the Summers clan and their bloody drama. Let her start working with Selene, again. Hell, make them a couple! Just leave her out of the the Summers/Grey/Logan/Frost bs.

[Hizashi]

Who knows--- maybe the X-Office thinks fans are stupid enough to buy the book on marketing alone.

"Come for Cyke! But please stay for Hickman's infodump and talking heads!"

The marketing, Hickman being the writer, Yu being the artist, what I assumed would be the premise were all reasons for me to pick up X-Men; Hickman’s involvement and a desire to see more of Bobby, Sam, and the others got me to pick up New Mutants.

[Havok83]

Jay talked about the Scott Snapshot issue in the recent Xplain podcast. He said that he wrote Scott as autistic in the story as well as trans. The latter part isnt explicit but there's nothing to suggest that he isnt.

[loke13]

So I said this in the other thread but I wanted to hear y'alls opinions. Why isn't Cyclops more respected in the superhero community? He was a respected leader of the X-Men for over a decade and even if you take into account Utopia era Cyclops it makes no sense The Avengers lineup is a littered with problematic and arrogant characters and more than one prominent Avenger has had their "Fall From Grace" moment.

[Havok83]

So I said this in the other thread but I wanted to hear y'alls opinions. Why isn't Cyclops more respected in the superhero community? He was a respected leader of the X-Men for over a decade and even if you take into account Utopia era Cyclops it makes no sense The Avengers lineup is a littered with problematic and arrogant characters and more than one prominent Avenger has had their "Fall From Grace" moment.

AvX. With that said, he hasnt really had alot of dealings with the larger superhero community since his return from the dead, largely because the X-men have not intersected with the larger MU much. Captain America was glad to see him back in Rosenberg's run and his most significant interaction was with the FF in the current era and I dont feel like they didnt respect him

[TheDeadSpace]

So I said this in the other thread but I wanted to hear y'alls opinions. Why isn't Cyclops more respected in the superhero community? He was a respected leader of the X-Men for over a decade and even if you take into account Utopia era Cyclops it makes no sense The Avengers lineup is a littered with problematic and arrogant characters and more than one prominent Avenger has had their "Fall From Grace" moment.

I guess AvX and the Inhuman fiasco is what tarnished his reputation for a while. Lately he hasn't had any interaction with the avengers except Captain America, so I'm not sure when it comes to the present.

Jay talked about the Scott Snapshot issue in the recent Xplain podcast. He said that he wrote Scott as autistic in the story as well as trans. The latter part isnt explicit but there's nothing to suggest that he isnt.

That's a slight misquote. He intended the story as a trans story but if a reader needed to, they could think Scott as trans since nothing indicates otherwise.

I will also add, that after having listened to the podcast, I'm even more impressed with how everything came out. A solid writing debut for him.

[FluffyCyclopsRLZ]

So I said this in the other thread but I wanted to hear y'alls opinions. Why isn't Cyclops more respected in the superhero community? He was a respected leader of the X-Men for over a decade and even if you take into account Utopia era Cyclops it makes no sense The Avengers lineup is a littered with problematic and arrogant characters and more than one prominent Avenger has had their "Fall From Grace" moment.

Utopia Era Cyclops called folks out on their apathetic crap and didn't apologize, thus unwittingly revealing the superhero "We'll protect the world, just don't expect us to make it better" scam for what it is. Makes sense the superhero community would get all pissy about it.

Anyway, yeah, count another vote in the "Yeah, it could be worse, by Cyke definitely got the worst deal of any x-book "protagonist" right now."

But, hey, who knows, maybe Hickman will go all meta in X-Men #16 and have Cyke go "Oh, I see, I've been the Cameo King for the last few months worth of sunny days, but what do you know, I'm mutantkind's undisputed leader on the rainiest day of the year, eh?"

[AJpyro]

Utopia Era Cyclops called folks out on their apathetic crap and didn't apologize, thus unwittingly revealing the superhero "We'll protect the world, just don't expect us to make it better" scam for what it is. Makes sense the superhero community would get all pissy about it.

Anyway, yeah, count another vote in the "Yeah, it could be worse, by Cyke definitely got the worst deal of any x-book "protagonist" right now."

But, hey, who knows, maybe Hickman will go all meta in X-Men #16 and have Cyke go "Oh, I see, I've been the Cameo King for the last few months worth of sunny days, but what do you know, I'm mutantkind's undisputed leader on the rainiest day of the year, eh?"

XM 16 Cyclops Faithful Decision: "Everybody gets One Cyclops Leads Moment. This is Yours. Imma goin on Vacation in space. Call me Never".

[FluffyCyclopsRLZ]

XM 16 Cyclops Faithful Decision: "Everybody gets One Cyclops Leads Moment. This is Yours. Imma goin on Vacation in space. Call me Never".

From the solicitations thread:

I can't believe no one's joked about Cyke throwing a coup, shutting down the Council and setting up a legitimate election only to have Emma & Kitty break up next month and become bitter political adversaries.

Emma will obviously steal the election, restore the Council, kick Kitty out, replace her with Maddie and holycrapwe'vegotourselvesanothervolume of Shadowcat, Cyclops and their Uncanny Friends.

[AJpyro]

From the solicitations thread:



Emma will obviously steal the election, restore the Council, kick Kitty out, replace her with Maddie and holycrapwe'vegotourselvesanothervolume of Shadowcat, Cyclops and their Uncanny Friends.

Why must you inflict Shadowcat on our Boy?

[MechaJeanix]

I understand and appreciate what you're saying. I guess my issue is that, while your breakdown (in bold) is accurate, Scott's use is not substantial and I quickly grew sick of the one and done format - not because I don't like the format but because Hickman's use of it here is clearly to set up other books. A one-and-done story works if it's complete, but by virtue of setting up later conflicts or other books, they fail in my opinion. There are currently 9 ongoing X-books, one concluded, and one upcoming - shifting some focus back to Scott and a smaller cast is not unreasonable in my opinion.

I feel you especially on the one-and-dones. At least we'll probably get a break from them with the X of Swords crossover. The issue after the crossover appears to be a Scott centered issue (of course covers and solits can be deceiving). I do want more Cyclops and so far Hickman does his voice well. So far the characters that Hickman writes best in my opinion include Apocalypse, Magneto, Xavier, and Cyclops.

[Glio]

Cyclops is having a story arc, but it's going to be long and slow. We already have a lot of potential stuff on the board (Vulcan, Havok, Madelyne, Children of the Vault, Sinister, doubts with Krakoa)
Hickman always makes very long arcs