"Fantomex is too much of a Gambit copy" is not a good argument because Fantomex has at least been in 1 or 2 good series/arcs which is more than Gambit had in her entire career
Last edited by nandes; 02-06-2020 at 05:11 PM.
Fantomex is actually a good character.
He’s just a character that is fundamentally premised around being unlikeable and irritating, all while remaining a protagonist.
All the complaints in this thread about Fantomex are just pointing out the intentional traits of the character. His role in stories is to be obnoxious and toxically masculine. It’s not an accident and you’re not supposed to like it.
**** yeah! I'm stoked. I'm one of the few Fantomex fans because I know that great stories always need unlikable characters. And he's a well-written unlikable character.
“Have courage and be kind. Where there is kindness there is goodness, and where there is goodness there is magic.” ― Cinderella
To be fair, the X-Men interview we got a few weeks ago really didn’t encourage confidence that they’ll really ever explain anything that we haven’t seen with them preferring to just kinda skip over it. Hell, we never really got the timeskip for Time Runs Out’s details filled in with Hickman’s Avengers. Things just happened off-panel for months and that was that.
Si Spurrier wrote him as a mutant in his X-Force series.
He was listed as a Mutant on recap pages, was infected with a serum that feeds off mutant powers, and had his powers mimicked by Hope, who only mimics mutant powers. (Well, and dragons)
So Fantomex is either both a sentinel and a mutant, or he’s a dragon.
I have loved Fantomex since his first appearance in the best X-men run, Grant Morrison's New X-men. I have never understood the disdain for this character. I need to go back and re-read his first appearances but I also thought he was a mutant. I thought his misdirection power was his mutation or even the EPA that grew out of him (did he not say it came out of his mouth and he fed it chocolates? Perhaps he is both mutant and "sentinel" (weapon) which makes him ripe for Hickman.
Hickman loves high sci-fi concepts and Hickman did name drop the World in the latest X-men issue. Hickman also seems to be a fan of the Morrison run (which is great. He's also a fan of Mike Carey's run so Hickman has good taste in past X-men stories).
I do hope to see more X-women stories and I am a little annoyed at the men getting these solo's and Jean, Emma, and Storm have to share one. But hey we get all these fun giant sized issues and we can't really complain.
Edit: Fantomex refers to himself as a mutant in his second appearance, New X-men 129.
Edit II: and in New X-men 130 he explains EVA as being his mutation.
Much of his backstory was lies and I'm not sure what future writers did but wasn't Weapon 10 and above all mutants?
Last edited by MechaJeanix; 02-06-2020 at 08:40 PM.
RIP the storyline where he infected The World with himself. Anyway hopefully he kisses some guys in this
I like the concept of his mutation but most of it was explored during Remender's UXF, therefore, I am beginning to see why Hickman is interested in this but he could have brought him back in his X-Men run.
I never saw much disdain for the character until around Astonishing X-Men. I think people got tired of Betsy being so tied to him, considering how toxic their relationship was. Certainly I didn't see any significant hate towards the character during Remender's time with him.
He certainly became a lightning rod for criticism of the Morrison run back in 2002-2003, which led to him taking a background role for a few years (appearing briefly in Weapon X before showing up in Uncanny a few months before Remender's UXF run started).
A lot of the hatred at the time came from people either missing the point, or getting the joke but just not finding it that funny (which is fair enough - Morrison is often not as funny as he thinks he is). Poor old Fantomex was just the wrong new character at the wrong time, when fans who didn't like the Morrison run *really* found something they could get their teeth into for their dislike.
For my part I found him entertaining enough, and I quite liked the idea of a horrifically messed-up attempt to make a JLA-style mutant-hunting team.
Back to this book - I've been hugely impressed with Reis' art on New Mutants, and letting him loose on The World has me having warm thoughts of Bachalo-esque design, so I will be picking this up!