Eternals Appreciation 2021

[juan678]

“What excited me is the idea of going back in time, and exploring [the time] before Thanos was born, before anyone was born. Where does the MCU go back in time? that brings us to the mythology of the Celestials.”

— Chloé Zhao on the excitement of #Eternals.

[juan678]

https://www.cbr.com/eternals-directo...marvel-impact/

[juan678]

https://www.cbr.com/marvel-eternals-...knight-future/

[juan678]

https://www.cbr.com/thanos-parents-e...s-punishement/

[juan678]

[king of hybrids]

Why am I wholly unsurprised that in all the in-universe years Thanos has been a known threat to everything on Earth thatspoilers:

the only action the Eternals ever took about him (before he inconvenienced them directly) was to arrange for his parents to be tortured for eternity Also, am I the only one with an ominous suspicion that A’Lars’ fate was planned by Daina and Kronos from day 0?

end of spoilers

[Old Owl]

How do people here feel about the retcon that Eternals can’t have biological children now? I’m not a fan but I’m wondering how others feel about it.

[alanyoung909]

How do people here feel about the retcon that Eternals can’t have biological children now? I’m not a fan but I’m wondering how others feel about it.

Kieron Gillen mentioned it in an interview late last year so it was not too much of a surprise to me when it was revealed in this issue.

I quite like it. It expresses the themes that Gillen is exploring in his run in a very clear way.

The First Host of the Celestials created 100 Eternals and 100 Deviants on Earth before leaving.

The Eternals (the Forever people) are immortal but cannot reproduce. Their family relationships and social structure come baked in with their internal Celestial programming. There have always been 100 Eternals. There will always be 100 Eternals. They will never die, they will never win. The Deviants (the Changing people) are mortal and short-lived but live a live of rapid change and reproduce prodigiously. There are currently something like a few trillion Deviants living in their underground cities around the world.

So the ideological divide here is forever stasis vs forever change. I think this is a bit more interesting than a Eternals want to save the Earth / Deviants want to destroy the Earth angels-demons thing. Makes it a bit less of a New Gods copy too, which is good because New Gods already does the paradise/hell thing very, very well. But of course, YMMV and you can feel free to disagree.

Of course, now that the ideological gap has been set up, the natural conclusion of the run would be to find a way to bridge that gap. Eternals and Deviants must come together to find a Third Way. I have a lot of faith with Gillen to deliver, I just hope he gets the space and a long enough run needed to do it.

[Bruce Wayne]

How do people here feel about the retcon that Eternals can’t have biological children now? I’m not a fan but I’m wondering how others feel about it.

They can have children (with humans and deviants). They are just not Eternals. There's only 100 Eternals due to the machine and the Celestials. It ultimately makes them more distinct. For Eternals to succeed it needs to emerge from the shadows of other Kirby creations like Inhumans and New Gods.

[mung]

How do people here feel about the retcon that Eternals can’t have biological children now? I’m not a fan but I’m wondering how others feel about it.

Not much of a problem. The whole thing with aging and their set in stone time of origin makes them having kids and those aging only to stop at whatever is plot convenient weird. Plus most of the kids have been with non Eternals. Ikaris had that son with a human whom was namesake for the Icarus legend and Ikaris took his name afterwards. Thena's kids with Kro.

[Old Owl]

Thats dope that people seem to like the change. I the writer said in interviews he/Disney we’re gonna make retcons but I didn’t think. I already dipped out on the new Eternals series (due to creative differences lol) but I still to keep tabs on what the story is doing and how readers react.

[Daedra]

How do people here feel about the retcon that Eternals can’t have biological children now? I’m not a fan but I’m wondering how others feel about it.

I don’t like it, the writer actually managed to make the characters feel even more robotic and unrelatable, it seems to me they are now just a bunch of very advanced automaton made of organic material and capable of very limited burst of independence that ultimately always lead to a hard reset or “withdraw from the market” typical of a defective i-phone model.
The movie may or may not have enormous success but the comic version in my opinion is not on a good track, all this need to be edgy and controversial is taking away any little warmth these cosmic character still had left….and it was not a lot to begin with.

[juan678]

[juan678]

[Bruce Wayne]

I don’t like it, the writer actually managed to make the characters feel even more robotic and unrelatable, it seems to me they are now just a bunch of very advanced automaton made of organic material and capable of very limited burst of independence that ultimately always lead to a hard reset or “withdraw from the market” typical of a defective i-phone model.
The movie may or may not have enormous success but the comic version in my opinion is not on a good track, all this need to be edgy and controversial is taking away any little warmth these cosmic character still had left….and it was not a lot to begin with.

Less edginess and more like the ongoing is just continuing what the Gaiman mini established more than 15 years ago including all the implications of the Eternals being hardcoded with the directives of the Celestials. But it's interesting that most posters that criticize the ongoing's ideas aren't cognizant that these ideas are more than a decade ago.