Empyre: X-men #4 - "You're a damned fool, woman" review *spoilers*

[ExodusCloak]

Marvel themselves had Wanda treated by both Strange and Xavier both people that are very unqualified. Then Marvel states that no, she's not losing her mind, it's the Life Force. Because they couldn't explain how she got this sudden power up. There is a spectrum of mental illness. It doesn't make people commit genocide or create zombies. That's not what's happening here.

Wanda tried to write a wrong by altering reality. That was a plot point in Dissasembled and HoM. Her power made it easy to lose track of reality and her altered reality due to the nature of her powers back then. If she didn't like something she changed it. And the resulting personality affect of having a power close to reality warping is that you are able to shaft any responsibility or ownership of your sins. Much like how Hellions is explaining Empaths personality defect

HoM was due to spite.
This was due to being an idiot and not learning her lesson
There isn't a quick fix for your sins. And that comes back to the very nature of her powers and what they evolved into

[salarta]

I guess? I don't know Hickman well. I did follow him on Twitter and he always trolled X-fans so it could be just a side effect of that.

I'm not saying this was misogynistic by any means, but it did rub me the wrong way when he made a troll tweet to vote on which female X-Men character is a "Karen" while no similar tweet was made about male characters.

[Triniking1234]

At best, Disassembled and House of M were the result of a ongoing mental breakdown and she recovered after Doom took her in.

[GenericUsername]

Wanda tried to write a wrong by altering reality. That was a plot point in Dissasembled and HoM. Her power made it easy to lose track of reality and her altered reality due to the nature of her powers back then. If she didn't like something she changed it. And the resulting personality affect of having a power close to reality warping is that you are able to shaft any responsibility or ownership of your sins. Much like how Hellions is explaining Empaths personality defect

HoM was due to spite.
This was due to being an idiot and not learning her lesson
There isn't a quick fix for your sins. And that comes back to the very nature of her powers and what they evolved into

Wanda's powers were not that until Disassembled made it so. Wanda's powers are that she's a conduit. She can tap into powers. That was re-written to be that she could warp reality herself at will. And oh she also went crazy because of babies.

There is a quick fix. It's called reboot. She needs it with heavy stipulations. Because they don't have a grip on this character at all.

[GenericUsername]

At best, Disassembled and House of M were the result of a ongoing mental breakdown and she recovered after Doom took her in.

Marvel has declared she has a mental illness. Had her go to a therapist in her solo book. And then stated that she has depression. But that doesn't seem right. Nothing matches up. Because before she had mania that made her warp reality. Then she was just possessed by the life force. Now she has depression... *shrugs*

[gurkle]

Wanda tried to write a wrong by altering reality. That was a plot point in Dissasembled and HoM. Her power made it easy to lose track of reality and her altered reality due to the nature of her powers back then. If she didn't like something she changed it. And the resulting personality affect of having a power close to reality warping is that you are able to shaft any responsibility or ownership of your sins.

That was never her power before House of M suddenly made it her power. Before that her powers were loosely defined but were basically a mix of probability manipulation (making stuff fall down, bullets miss her, etc) and magic she didn't fully understand, but she never had the ability to change anything she wanted, and in fact her powers were extremely limited - she couldn't even levitate for more than a few seconds or teleport or whatever. Even in the run that came right before Avengers Disassembled/House of M she was portrayed as someone who had to concentrate very hard to cast a complicated hex and was very careful about how she used her limited powers.

The reason I go into this is to make the point again that almost every fact given about her in House of M was wrong, so the story doesn't make much sense to someone who had followed Wanda for a long time before that. It kept saying stuff that wasn't true until that very story, or was never true at all (e.g. Strange telling her she couldn't have children, when it was her husband who couldn't). Not that readers shouldn't enjoy the story anyway, it just explains why fans of the character don't accept her characterization there - because it only makes sense to readers who weren't fans of the character before.

[ExodusCloak]

Wanda's powers were not that until Disassembled made it so. Wanda's powers are that she's a conduit. She can tap into powers. That was re-written to be that she could warp reality herself at will. And oh she also went crazy because of babies.

There is a quick fix. It's called reboot. She needs it with heavy stipulations. Because they don't have a grip on this character at all.

But thats what I'm saying. Wandas powers became that and was used to depower mutants in some behind the scene feud to punish Fox for keeping the rights to the X-Movies and reset the mutant franchise.

Wanda became a reality warper and that ability was explained as innate to her. Later they retconned it to being the Life Force and now any deus ex machina spell is written off as magic. Regardless MJJ, Jamie Braddock have issues because of the nature of the powers. If they don't like something change it. And when you are unable to change things or bend reality or people to your will and have to actually do work to fix issues its frustrating. So its learned behaviour which is why she keeps repeating the same mistake. Everything is a quick fix

HoM isn't an isolated incident it has become a trend over the past 15 years or so

[GenericUsername]

But thats what I'm saying. Wandas powers became that and was used to depower mutants in some behind the scene feud to punish Fox for keeping the rights to the X-Movies and reset the mutant franchise.

Wanda became a reality warper and that ability was explained as innate to her. Later they retconned it to being the Life Force and now any deus ex machina spell is written off as magic. Regardless MJJ, Jamie Braddock have issues because of the nature of the powers. If they don't like something change it. And when you are unable to change things or bend reality or people to your will and have to actually do work to fix issues its frustrating. So its learned behaviour which is why she keeps repeating the same mistake. Everything is a quick fix

HoM isn't an isolated incident it has become a trend over the past 15 years or so

Her powers did not depower mutants. The Life Force did. Her powers were used to tap into the Life Force, which then fully possessed her.

The problem is all the retcons and that she isn't portrayed consistently from one book to another. HoM type stories have only been in x-related books.

[Ichijinijisanji]

I mean, Peter Parker in The Clone Saga beat MJ while she was pregnant and you will never see him being treated like Hank Pym.

All the characters do bad things, in some thewriters decide to pay attention to it and in others they don't.

with hank pym the issue is sort of that his mental breakdown was tied to being yellowjacket who lacks any of the impulse control that Hank Pym does. In the comic Pete's was also more accidental while YJ's was portrayed as deliberate and he was making a killer bot to attack the avengers in the process. Even with the "artist mistake", Jan was shown walking around with a black eye, the portrayal is a lot different, even leading up to it where he destroys her dresses.
Ultron is made from Pym's brainwaves and thus has his thoughts and feelings just without the conscience. Ultron is almost like an alternate persona of pym himself like YJ, so he has the same pathologies.

It's part of why it keeps being brought up, and ultron at this point has created multiple mass genocides with billions dead so he's a major villain.




Some other reasons are that the Slap is his definitive moment since it was his first prominent arc. In pete's case it was a passing thing in clone saga. And some writers poorly exploited it, like Chuck Austen doubling down on that angle way too much, even portraying Hank as victim blaming.

[ExodusCloak]

Her powers did not depower mutants. The Life Force did. Her powers were used to tap into the Life Force, which then fully possessed her.

The problem is all the retcons and that she isn't portrayed consistently from one book to another. HoM type stories have only been in x-related books.

The Life force didn't exist in HoM when Bendis wrote that. He had Strange say there was no external influences whatsoever. So he intended her powers to evolve and the losing track of what's real and what's altered to be a side effect of her power.

The Life force was a retcon which made her less sympathetic as she wasn't genuinely mentally ill just selfish and sought out power which backfired

She is portrayed consistently as being an idiot. The only thing inconsistent is her remorse. In this book she actually shows proper remorse while in UA she wasn't remorseful she was belligerent

[GenericUsername]

She is portrayed consistently as being an idiot. The only thing inconsistent is her remorse. In this book she actually shows proper remorse while in UA she wasn't remorseful she was belligerent

No she literally is not. She's portrayed that when she needs to be an antagonist on the X-side. She has not been portrayed as that in her own book, in No Surrender, in No Road Home, Strange Academy nor the Damnation storyline and Magic dies storyline in Doctor Strange.

[ExodusCloak]

No she literally is not. She's portrayed that when she needs to be an antagonist on the X-side. She has not been portrayed as that in her own book, in No Surrender, in No Road Home, Strange Academy nor the Damnation storyline and Magic dies storyline in Doctor Strange.

She's been portrayed that way in CC, in UA in AvX in Axis and in this.

And those books including her solo ignored her role in HoM making those issues very inconsistent. You would think that would be the perfect place to put this all to bed

[GenericUsername]

She's been portrayed that way in CC, in UA in AvX in Axis and in this.

Yes, all tied to x-related things.

[ExodusCloak]

Yes, all tied to x-related things.

And all the Avengers related things swept HoM under rug. Her solo didn't even address the giant elephant in the room

[Wiccan]

The Life force was a retcon which made her less sympathetic as she wasn't genuinely mentally ill just selfish and sought out power which backfired

She is portrayed consistently as being an idiot. The only thing inconsistent is her remorse. In this book she actually shows proper remorse while in UA she wasn't remorseful she was belligerent

1) She didn't "sought power", the reason she needed the life force was so she could have children.

2) The fact that she was corrupted by an outside force rather than breaking down on her own makes her LESS sympathetic? That's just being petty.

3) She's not portrayed as "being an idiot" on the Avengers books she's been in(Zub's UA, No Surrender, No Road Home) or her solo.