Marvel's really dropped the ball on Lorna over the decades. They finally told her origin story ~40 years after they should've, but that huge time gap means there's so much else about her that should've been covered by now and hasn't been. Her mother's side of the family is one of those things.
It's also one of my arguments for why Lorna should really get a miniseries or ongoing solo. There's a hell of a lot of ground to cover, and Marvel's made it exceptionally clear over the past decade that they really need that kind of dedicated work on Lorna to understand who she is and what she offers. She needs someone in a position where they need to do some real research, sometimes read between the lines, then digest what she's been through to consider how it should have affected both her nature as a person and her place in the Marvel universe. Without that, we just keep getting people that don't put any thought into her outside shallow impressions of what they read in the Claremont era and the 90s.
I didn't see anything to suggest Lorna's origin issue got heavily promoted. What I remember from that time was an article on Marvel.com that was briefly visible on the front page. I don't remember anything else. Maybe I missed something you saw.
I think if Marvel had properly promoted ANXF #14, it would've sold a lot more. I remember there were no copies of ANXF #14 available on the shelf when I went to my local comic shop (back when I used to go to it). Readers managing to get a physical copy after it's already been published is dependent on if the publisher is willing to send it for second printing.
As for Enchantress, while I don't keep tabs on her usage, in all honesty I have to agree with her fans. She's been squandered too. I can think of a few ways she could've been used and wasn't. Marvel does like to try to trick fandoms into fighting each other over artificial limits though, and I've made it a point to reject those attempts.
Yes, many fans who first find out about Lorna don't know the history, and so don't realize why Havok is bad for her. Most do eventually see it though, and Marvel always falls into the pit of showing why it's bad because they can't help themselves. They keep not wanting to put in the time and work needed on Lorna to make that relationship not suck.
Yep, and kind of serendipitous that you mentioned Kitty's bachelorette party and I thought of it too before reading your post. Are we clones? We're clones, aren't we?
In my personal preference, when I say Havok away from Lorna, I mean so far apart that at most they're in different locations on the same book but they don't cross paths. The issues of Austen's run where we saw flashbacks of Lorna surviving the Genoshan genocide are a good example. Lorna and Havok were used on the same book, but they were doing different things. I'm really just looking for justice, not revenge. Justice to me means Lorna getting all the stuff she should've received and didn't for all these decades.
Besides, we also saw with X-Men Blue #9 that even when Marvel tries the "revenge" angle, they still manage to make it into a Havok promotion fest.
That's a good point, on the nature of how Marvel's typically depicted Jean and Emma's relationship. I'm thinking through both the Jean-Wolverine-Cyclops love triangle and the Lorna-Havok-Iceman love triangle in relation to that.
There's a lot of things wrong with Marvel and the X-books right now.
It was this variant cover. There were actually "two" covers - this is one half, the other half is a mirror image with the same women in different costumes.
Notice that all Marvel would've had to do to include Lorna was position Kitty closer to Storm. It would've been precisely that easy.
Regarding Omega, personally I think the entire classification system is garbage and needs to be binned. It's another way to create artificial limits, and they're always driven by ignorance and bias. The only two ways I can see them being good are 1) if they were made by a character in-universe, thereby showing that character's biases, or 2) if they were made with deliberate intent to tear down the whole concept at a future date. But if Marvel's going to use it, then I'm going to point out when bias is so pervasive that they don't even follow their own rules.
Marvel's one of the more predictable companies I've observed. They used to surprise me back in the mid-2010s, before I learned their pattern.
They'll appear to offer something good for her. They'll say nice things, maybe have some good images. Usually, it'll be a bait-and-switch where they're trying to use her to promote Havok or some other character. This is Marvel's most common behavior since 2017. Sometimes, it'll be an attempt to placate fans so they're less likely to complain when Lorna's not in anything for a year or two. Other times, it'll be good but undermined in some way. Finally got Lorna's origin story? Let's have her say she never wants to see her dad again. Spent time with her sister? Let's withhold the cover, and make it the second issue in a double shipping month. In 11 years, I have yet to see a case where Marvel does something genuinely good for Lorna and actually gives it the support it needs.
You'd think Marvel would jump all over Lorna's newfound popularity from Gifted. When they thought Blink would break out on the show, they were eager enough to relaunch Exiles and put 616 Blink on a team. But nope. They just used Lorna to promote Havok, Magneto and other male characters.
P.S. The Havok "True Believers" comic is now the second time in a year that Marvel's trying to get people to read Havok's introductory issue. The first time was
Marvel Tales: X-Men, where they had a nice cover featuring Lorna to promote Havok's story. Meanwhile, Marvel has not reprinted Lorna's introductory issue.