SWORD #10 Review *spoilers*

[Rnap22]

I’m hoping, whether it’s here or Inferno, that we will see that Karima has been working with mutants all along. Or if she really did turn on them, why?

I enjoy Brand and her moving the people where and when she needs them. It’s a shame we had to lose the Peak. Hopefully the can salvage it. If not, at least we have the Keep. It would be cool to have an Arakko “royal guard”. I wonder how they would look upon the Regent “needing” a guard (we all know Storm doesn’t), but it would be awesome to see some of the Arakki be a force for aliens causing trouble on their turf.

[Rev9]

Point, and the only reason they're so indignant about the coming of homo novissima is that, well, humans in that path of jump-starting their own evolution use that primarily if not solely to kill off mutants. That's been kind of the point of this new/current era, that no matter what mutants do or don't do, every technological advancement made by humans since they came to awareness of mutants' existence has been made with the ultimate purpose of wiping out what they see as their chief rivals for dominion over the planet Earth. In a nutshell, the shared mindset of humans and mutants alike nowadays is that survival and prosperity is a zero-sum game that can only be won by one of them, so each is determined to be the one that wins in the end, no matter what they have to do or what lines have to be crossed for that to happen.

I agree, I just think the generalisation does the story no good.Yes Orchis are the bad guys ,and their methods are extreme but they too look at it as keeping up with the mutants lest humanity is snuffed out(which with the terraforming of Mars is a very realistic fear, because what can be done to make life on Mars possible can be done by the same to make life on Earth impossible) .Then there's the idea that X-Men are the arbiters of technological breakthrough which is ridiculous on the face of it.Technology is neutral, the user is the one imbuing the tech with direction for either good or ill.Are mutants above reproach in regard to how badly some of their experiments have gone with the plantinels or storing minds so close that that gave Onslaught a breeding ground? A good historical example is the invention of the Thompson in the roaring 20s ,while it got a nasty rep for being associated with lawlessness being a darling gadget of organised crime.That didn't stop it from being useful to the US Army in ww2 fighting the Nazis ,when it was one of the best close quarter infantry weapons the US had. I totally agree with you,I just think the writers are too heavy handed to articulate the granular details and nuance.

[CoCoBandz]

Post Inferno Orchis and Nimrod will be toast and I can't wait. Time to move on to real villains.

I hope they turn Gyrich over to the Shi'ar.

[Rev9]

Post Inferno Orchis and Nimrod will be toast and I can't wait. Time to move on to real villains.

I hope they turn Gyrich over to the Shi'ar.

I doubt ,Orchis will be toast, severely crippled sure but toast is unlikely. It is a moot point what Orchis does anyway,because HN are not a future eventuality ,they are already here and they are my fave X-Men villains ,the Children of the Vault..at level 4 evolution ,things are about to get real

[carmoc1234]

I doubt ,Orchis will be toast, severely crippled sure but toast is unlikely. It is a moot point what Orchis does anyway,because HN are not a future eventuality ,they are already here and they are my fave X-Men villains ,the Children of the Vault..at level 4 evolution ,things are about to get real

i agree orchis will probably not be completely gone. i did see a theory that brand is looking at acquiring orchis and its assets as a part of her plan for the sol system.

[BroHomo]

I’m hoping, whether it’s here or Inferno, that we will see that Karima has been working with mutants all along. Or if she really did turn on them, why?

Her programming?!?

Notes- My only gripe is I wished they built up Wiz-kid and Teen Cable's relationship before this issue.

Yeah same here would be nice to see Taki talk to another young mutant (even if the young Mutant is really an old one) lol be nice to see Taki actually have some friends.

Briefs over boxers, that’s the real reveal.

Ugh I hated it! I thought they were panties at first aNd the it looked like he was a Ken doll from the front :/

This is a good way to write around Wiz-Kid's disability and dyslexia: he acknowledges how it's inconvenient for him, and how it makes other people view him. He's willing to walk again, but he (quite reasonably) doesn't want to die in order for it to happen. He even notes the inadvertent pressure mutants are putting on him to fit in; not only with his general attitude, but how he isn't gung-go on dying. There's pressure to conform. It felt a lot more genuine than the Karma situation.

The Krakoan at the end reads PLANET FALL

Yeeeeah thank Gob Gyrich is an idiot.... Taki's ? reasoning for betraying Krakoa was pretty flimsy. Selling out your whole people just cause a few stare? And what was he getting back in return??

Karma situation??

[cable guy]

Post Inferno Orchis and Nimrod will be toast and I can't wait. Time to move on to real villains.

I totally agree with this.

I'm really getting tired of the Orchis thing as well.

[JB]

Post Inferno Orchis and Nimrod will be toast and I can't wait. Time to move on to real villains.

I hope they turn Gyrich over to the Shi'ar.

I don't know about Nimrod but Orchis appears to be here to stay.

AIPT: X-Fan Jim Burdo said you’ve portrayed Orchis as morally gray, even sympathetic. Is Orchis trying to commit genocide or make humanity into something more that won’t be replaced as the dominant species?

Jonathan: I think you’re just going to have to keep reading. It’s a little more complicated than that after Inferno.

[CoCoBandz]

I don't know about Nimrod but Orchis appears to be here to stay.

AIPT: X-Fan Jim Burdo said you’ve portrayed Orchis as morally gray, even sympathetic. Is Orchis trying to commit genocide or make humanity into something more that won’t be replaced as the dominant species?

Jonathan: I think you’re just going to have to keep reading. It’s a little more complicated than that after Inferno.

If they are going to be around still, I want them to be back burned like AIM. Evil corporations are so boring. Annihilation was fun. Nimrod is a Sentinel...

Also I don't know how in the actual hell anybody could see Orchis as being morally gray. We could fumble around with every mental gymnastic in the world if we wanted to, but it'd still boil down to the fact that they're creating genocide machines with one victim in mind.

[JB]

If they are going to be around still, I want them to be back burned like AIM. Evil corporations are so boring. Annihilation was fun. Nimrod is a Sentinel...

Also I don't know how in the actual hell anybody could see Orchis as being morally gray. We could fumble around with every mental gymnastic in the world if we wanted to, but it'd still boil down to the fact that they're creating genocide machines with one victim in mind.

I agree, I don't see them as morally gray at all. They kidnap and harm mutant children so off with their heads.
I get a sense it's going to be revealed that Moira is working with them, hence the "a little more complicated" comment. But we shall see.

[Midnight]

I agree, I don't see them as morally gray at all. They kidnap and harm mutant children so off with their heads.
I get a sense it's going to be revealed that Moira is working with them, hence the "a little more complicated" comment. But we shall see.

Yeah, Orchis and their motivations haven’t been explained or developed enough outside of the tired trope of mutant discrimination by humans to make them grey or sympathetic in my eyes. And even if they drop some pertinent info during/after Infernio to expand and deepen their motivations, it would still be hard at this point in the game to make them sympathetic IMO.

The Children of the Vault are great morally grey “villains”, if they can even be called that, and their back story is much more interesting. ****, the eco terrorist Golden Girl squad are more grey and even sympathetic compared to Orchis. I’d like to get away from Orchis and focus on three dimensional X-Men villains/antagonists.

[Huntsman Spider]

I agree, I just think the generalisation does the story no good.Yes Orchis are the bad guys ,and their methods are extreme but they too look at it as keeping up with the mutants lest humanity is snuffed out(which with the terraforming of Mars is a very realistic fear, because what can be done to make life on Mars possible can be done by the same to make life on Earth impossible) .Then there's the idea that X-Men are the arbiters of technological breakthrough which is ridiculous on the face of it.Technology is neutral, the user is the one imbuing the tech with direction for either good or ill.Are mutants above reproach in regard to how badly some of their experiments have gone with the plantinels or storing minds so close that that gave Onslaught a breeding ground? A good historical example is the invention of the Thompson in the roaring 20s ,while it got a nasty rep for being associated with lawlessness being a darling gadget of organised crime.That didn't stop it from being useful to the US Army in ww2 fighting the Nazis ,when it was one of the best close quarter infantry weapons the US had. I totally agree with you,I just think the writers are too heavy handed to articulate the granular details and nuance.

Fair points, though while the technology itself may be neutral, the minds designing it very often are not as neutral as we would hope for them to be. We found that out the hard way with surveillance technology and social media algorithms, since the data that went into crafting them came from what turned out to be at best more limited perspectives and at worst outright biased mentalities, hence proving to contribute even more to the preexisting marginalization or demonization of certain communities, if not incitement or fomentation of outright violence against them.

[Rift]

Karma situation??

I meant the whole situation where Karma was resurrected with her leg missing, for no in-universe reason, despite her showing dislike for it in the past. IIRC the reason was that Vita Ayala didn't want to erase disability representation. But I felt it came off as disingenuous and lazy.

[Sutekh]

I meant the whole situation where Karma was resurrected with her leg missing, for no in-universe reason, despite her showing dislike for it in the past. IIRC the reason was that Vita Ayala didn't want to erase disability representation. But I felt it came off as disingenuous and lazy.

There are mutants, like Forge, that I could see legitimately choosing to remain as they are. Karma's not one of them. She wasn't introduced with a disability like Forge or Xavier, and she's complained about it in the past.

But even Xavier himself, introduced in a wheelchair *decades ago*, has abandoned that chair and is walking on shiny new legs. He doesn't give a fig for disability representation...

Taki's an odd one. He could 'walk' in a split second, by reconfiguring his wheelchair into a pair of exoskeletal leg-braces and either using his powers to 'walk' or actually creating a genuine machine that responds to his mental commands and walks under it's own mechanical power (allowing him to continue walking even in a 'some idiot shot us with a mutant-powers-B-gone-ray again!' situation).

He could literally do this, with his brain (and his mutant power, obviously!), in less time than it took for me to type it. So he's gotta be *choosing* to remain in that chair, for other reasons (like he's been in it for so long that he's got zero sense of balance anymore and would have to learn how to walk all over again, which he doesn't want to devote the time to do, or allow one of Krakoa's thirty-bajillion telepaths to download into his brain...).

[Devaishwarya]

Overthinking your comics is very rarely a good thing.