X-Men Monday #67 and BotA Interview with Leah Williams

[Hi-Fi]

Just bring Loa back, Leah. I trust you.

[Gray Lensman]

Kinda easy to have such a society if a magic mutant island suddently exists and just solves all problems of production and resource gathering. No exploitation of labour if there is no labour to be done.

Though given that the remaining activities are extremely limited in number and mostly taken by a handfull of individuals with specific skills or powers (and often recieving these position via personal connection) one has to to wonder how long this all could last until a "Player Piano" situation arises where the majority of the population feels utterly useless and all the partying and entertainment starts to wear them down mentaly?

There are allready thousands of mutants on Krakoa who's only job is to fill the backrounds and the leaders plan to add millions to that. What are all of those supposed to do in a society that has no need for labour, very few options for service work and is mainted by a small elite of skilled, empowered or connected individuals?

In Star Trek they explained the problem to have been resolved by people in the federation being encouraged to work for their personal betterment, administrative and service work still existing and classic craftmanship being valued for non-standard qualities.
But that setting also has countless worlds to settle and settled worlds were one can still find a niche for their work to be valued.

Meanwhile Krakoa is extremely limited in physical scope and desired jobs or activities. So there seems to be a huge danger for a majority of the population to end up as "dead weight".

Nothing against a bit of an utopic society dreaming. But there is a reason i have a brewing "Brave New World" feeling when i think about Krakoa.



What if there is a mutant who was born as or became dissabled via an accident, but also lost their super powers from M-Day?

Would they go through the croucible and then get printed out with their powers again but still dissabled?

Feels a bit like they try to avoid unfortunate implications but run straight into a classic super hero comic issues ("Why would someone remain dissabled if there is all that super tech to correct that?").

There are a ton of Mutants with some form of disability.

Cyclops needs an external device to hold his powers in check, and has been depicted as also being colorblind due to the visor. Some autistic people also identify with him as he has shown signs, but that has never been confirmed as canon. Plus, like many X-Men, he is also a survivor of emotional trauma, notably physical child abuse.

Wolverine is the poster child for PTSD not only on the X-Men, but the Marvel Universe as a whole.

X-23 takes her father's PTSD angle and adds in childhood sexual abuse.

Chamber is mute due to his power blowing away the needed parts of his body.

Forge and Karma are both missing a leg, although they have replacements that beat anything normal science can pull off at present.

Storm had claustrophobia.

Jubilee has Dyscalculia (a condition that makes counting difficult).

Legion has multiple personality disorder.

And I know I am probably missing more than a few - but I refuse to count Xavier as long as he is out of the wheelchair. I didn't forget him.

[Grunty]

There are a ton of Mutants with some form of disability.

(...)

And I know I am probably missing more than a few - but I refuse to count Xavier as long as he is out of the wheelchair. I didn't forget him.

This reminds me. Hasn't the whole "depowered mutant" situation been also used as metaphor for being disabled?

I mean the points are all there. Suddently losing a part of what made them what they were. Feeling "weak" or less "able" without the missing part. Trying to be strong without it. Etc.

Even getting repowered via alternate means plays into the metaphor as example of overcomming disabilities via treatments, prosthesis or therapy.

So technicaly going through the crucible and getting repowered via "human copy machine" itself is allready a form of erasing "disability representation" by removing the metaphor with a method that involves physicaly dying and being "reborn" as able bodied.

And if metaphors for disabilities don't count, wouldn't that harm the mutant metaphor too?

Feels like quite a can of worms.

[Kingdom X]

This reminds me. Hasn't the whole "depowered mutant" situation been also used as metaphor for being disabled?

I mean the points are all there. Suddently losing a part of what made them what they were. Feeling "weak" or less "able" without the missing part. Trying to be strong without it. Etc.

Even getting repowered via alternate means plays into the metaphor as example of overcomming disabilities via treatments, prosthesis or therapy.

So technicaly going through the crucible and getting repowered via "human copy machine" itself is allready a form of erasing "disability representation" by removing the metaphor with a method that involves physicaly dying and being "reborn" as able bodied.

And if metaphors for disabilities don't count, wouldn't that harm the mutant metaphor too?

Feels like quite a can of worms.

I think the mutant metaphor is too murky to have hard and fast rules at this point.

[MYCMTSC]

Leah: Exploring resurrection protocols and gender identity is a definite fascination for me, absolutely. So I would say yes to this question with the obvious caveat that plans are not set in stone, and readers should still hold us responsible for trans representation in Krakoa. Me just talking about it doesn’t count.

BREAKING:
Eye Boy is trans

[Will Evans]

BREAKING:
Eye Boy is trans

You mean Eye Girl.

[DAHX]

A few more interesting things from the podcast:

• Creating the Resurrection Bible (set of rules of the resurrection protocol) was a collaborative work with other writers.
  
  
• She’s planned the first 30 issues of X-Factor to be reversed engineered from each of these rules, so hopefully it will be a long series!
  
  
• the book has great sense of humor and jokes
  
  
• the warwolf is like Rachel’s emotional support pet
  
  
• warwolf is going to be telepathically communicating with Rachel. It takes like 6 arcs to get there. (I really hope the series will be as long as Leah indicates )
  
  
• Leah thinks Rachel is a soft butch lesbian
  
  
• on Krakoa there’s no currency, everything is free, all the clothing. There’s no hunger or starvation.
  
  
• Daken will be rude to Eye-boy because he has trypophobia (aversion to the sight of irregular patterns or clusters of small holes) and can’t stand looking at him lol
  
  
• on working with David Baldeon: “there’s nobody I would’ve felt more confident and more excited going into X-Factor with other than David because we had just come out of Gwenpool Strikes Back”
  They have a shared vision of the book, they move in the same direction without consulting with each other. Leah likes getting his ideas, feedback and thoughts and they discussing them regarding the script

[DAHX]

And RB Silva’s variant cover for X-Factor #4 was revealed in Aipt X-Men monday:

[Frobisher]

Krakoan nightlife has now stretched to Lorna's Saturday night viking re-enactment party where they pillage whatever is at the other end of a randomly selected portal, nude.

[salarta]

The nudity is required. Anyone caught not nude is themselves pillaged.

[Grunty]

I think the mutant metaphor is too murky to have hard and fast rules at this point.

Have to agree there.

Kind of the problem when you try to cramp more and more different groups of people from real life into a singular metaphor. Doesn't help when said metaphor is based on super hero comics with an inflexible setting.

[Will Evans]

A few more interesting things from the podcast:

• Creating the Resurrection Bible (set of rules of the resurrection protocol) was a collaborative work with other writers.
  
  
• She’s planned the first 30 issues of X-Factor to be reversed engineered from each of these rules, so hopefully it will be a long series!
  
  
• the book has great sense of humor and jokes
  
  
• the warwolf is like Rachel’s emotional support pet
  
  
• warwolf is going to be telepathically communicating with Rachel. It takes like 6 arcs to get there. (I really hope the series will be as long as Leah indicates )
  
  
• Leah thinks Rachel is a soft butch lesbian
  
  
• on Krakoa there’s no currency, everything is free, all the clothing. There’s no hunger or starvation.
  
  
• Daken will be rude to Eye-boy because he has trypophobia (aversion to the sight of irregular patterns or clusters of small holes) and can’t stand looking at him lol
  
  
• on working with David Baldeon: “there’s nobody I would’ve felt more confident and more excited going into X-Factor with other than David because we had just come out of Gwenpool Strikes Back”
  They have a shared vision of the book, they move in the same direction without consulting with each other. Leah likes getting his ideas, feedback and thoughts and they discussing them regarding the script

I hope the writer can confirm Rachel on page then

[Zelena]

Kinda easy to have such a society if a magic mutant island suddently exists and just solves all problems of production and resource gathering. No exploitation of labour if there is no labour to be done.

Though given that the remaining activities are extremely limited in number and mostly taken by a handfull of individuals with specific skills or powers (and often recieving these position via personal connection) one has to to wonder how long this all could last until a "Player Piano" situation arises where the majority of the population feels utterly useless and all the partying and entertainment starts to wear them down mentaly?

There are allready thousands of mutants on Krakoa who's only job is to fill the backrounds and the leaders plan to add millions to that. What are all of those supposed to do in a society that has no need for labour, very few options for service work and is mainted by a small elite of skilled, empowered or connected individuals?

In Star Trek they explained the problem to have been resolved by people in the federation being encouraged to work for their personal betterment, administrative and service work still existing and classic craftmanship being valued for non-standard qualities.
But that setting also has countless worlds to settle and settled worlds were one can still find a niche for their work to be valued.

Meanwhile Krakoa is extremely limited in physical scope and desired jobs or activities. So there seems to be a huge danger for a majority of the population to end up as "dead weight".

Nothing against a bit of an utopic society dreaming. But there is a reason i have a brewing "Brave New World" feeling when i think about Krakoa.

In Brave New World, people were still working, each one according to their capacity…

Well, to not have idle hands, they still can make craftmanship and sell it to the rest of the world, or make videos of their parties and sell them to networks (the Mutant Temptation Island…).
It’s not like everything we do is that necessary anyway.

[DragonPiece]

A few more interesting things from the podcast:

• Creating the Resurrection Bible (set of rules of the resurrection protocol) was a collaborative work with other writers.
  
  
• She’s planned the first 30 issues of X-Factor to be reversed engineered from each of these rules, so hopefully it will be a long series!
  
  
• the book has great sense of humor and jokes
  
  
• the warwolf is like Rachel’s emotional support pet
  
  
• warwolf is going to be telepathically communicating with Rachel. It takes like 6 arcs to get there. (I really hope the series will be as long as Leah indicates )
  
  
• Leah thinks Rachel is a soft butch lesbian
  
  
• on Krakoa there’s no currency, everything is free, all the clothing. There’s no hunger or starvation.
  
  
• Daken will be rude to Eye-boy because he has trypophobia (aversion to the sight of irregular patterns or clusters of small holes) and can’t stand looking at him lol
  
  
• on working with David Baldeon: “there’s nobody I would’ve felt more confident and more excited going into X-Factor with other than David because we had just come out of Gwenpool Strikes Back”
  They have a shared vision of the book, they move in the same direction without consulting with each other. Leah likes getting his ideas, feedback and thoughts and they discussing them regarding the script

30 issues planned? Not many Marvel books last that long, shocked to see she is planning that far ahead.

[Havok83]

30 issues planned? Not many Marvel books last that long, shocked to see she is planning that far ahead.

Just because she envisions 30 issues, doesnt mean she's going to get it. Alot of writers plan out years worth of stories when they begin writing but most never get to see that materailize which is why we get dropped and rushed plots. Bunn and Gillen were notorious for having a long game which didnt see fruition. 30 issues itself is quite rare in the X-world. The longest running series in recent history were Blue and Gold (36) but those double shipped and were the flagships. I dont think X-Factor will go anywhere near as long