Polaris: The Mistress of Magnetism Appreciation 2022

[PolarIceFire]

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Lorna in Marvel Future Fight. The first time they used her Duggan X-Men outfit in a game.

Lorna is FINALLY BEING added to FF and I love its in her current costume

ETA:
Looks like she is also confirmed to get a T3

It's the Pepe...

cherry on TOP! That's fast become my favorite go-to look for her ever, outside of the classic, OG green regalia & some of its iterations.

[juan678]

[Soulsword323]

ow, X-Fan JMC was wondering, what do you see as the main differences between the Scarlet Witch and Polaris?

Steve: Wanda and Lorna have had a complicated relationship in the past, but now that they’re both rededicated to giving family a shot, I think they’ll potentially bond over things that have in the past brought tension. Now, the question of Polaris’s parentage is clear, and she’s secure in being Magneto’s biological daughter. From that security comes her desire to reconnect with her adopted sister (and brother, in time).

Both Wanda and Lorna have struggled with mental health in the past, and both overcome it. But that being said, Lorna remains a scientist. She sees the world through a scientific lens, one where logic and proven answers rule, and physics reigns — even if she’s a mutant who can manipulate magnetism. She still sees herself as manipulating the provable, natural world’s inner workings. And Wanda? She manipulates reality itself, she can make an untrue thing true, make the impossible possible. And so she is more worried about the endpoint, the goal, not the journey. Lorna is the opposite. But as we see when Polaris appears, often times it takes the meeting point of their two philosophies to get the job done.

AIPT: And while we’re talking family, X-Fans Ian, JMC, Kingdom X, and PolarIceHavok were all wondering if Wanda’s feelings about Magneto’s recent death might be explored.

Steve: They’ll absolutely be explored! You’ll be seeing that in issue 2, for which the solicit just came out, in a killer backup story by Stephanie Williams and Chris Allen that features Storm as well — I can’t wait!

I really enjoy what Orlando had to say about what separates Lorna and Wanda. Lorna's realism vs Wanda's spirituality is a smart take, and that obviously works for both characters. It honestly reminds me of a scene between Polaris and Storm in X-Factor after the death of Multiple Man. Where Storm see's Jamie's passing as him becoming a part of something greater, and all Lorna see's is the absence of her friend (I'm paraphrasing).



However, I do worry that we won't see Lorna's thoughts on the passing of her father. It looks like that subject will be tackled for Wanda in the issue before Lorna's, and I don't know if we'll get the chance to see Polaris'. Obviously it's the Scarlet Witch's book, but I'm going to be very disappointed if we see Wanda's thoughts, and not Lorna's. Thus far Lorna has had a stronger rapport with Magneto than Wanda, and writers really should be showing the aftermath of that loss to the people he was the closet with.

I also worry about what he can mean when it comes to bonding over previous tension. I'm hoping that this is a sign that the sisters will come together over the loss of Magneto, but I worry that cues will be taken from Williams take on Lorna, and that it'll try to reinforce a more negative stance from Lorna's POV. We'll see what happens, but thus far things seem okay.

Link

Lorna in Marvel Future Fight. The first time they used her Duggan X-Men outfit in a game.

Nice! Happy to see Polaris added to that game. Also, love to see Lorna wearing her X-Men uniform. It looks wonderful!

[JB]

Yes queen! She looks amazing.

[salarta]

Saw the news about Future Fight last night. Future Fight is a game I saw Lorna requested for practically every time they updated, so it's been a long wait for people wanting her in the game.

I'm holding judgment until I know more about the game's plans for her.

What I will say is in general, the video game side of Marvel seems to have a much better sense of her worth than the comics, especially the X-Men comics. It's not just about her being in the games. It's also about how they recognize the value in adding her, and do real, tangible things to promote her. Now, they've done a couple things that merited complaint, and none of them have acknowledged Genosha for her, but it's clear from announcement to continuing social media to gameplay that they put some actual thought into her as meaningful in her own right.

I mean, look at this announcement for Future Fight. Use of the word "storied" implies they at least understand she has a long history. It doesn't mention Havok or Magneto, instead focusing on Lorna herself. If this announcement had followed the X-Men comics' behavior this past decade, it would've been written like this: "This X-Factor member is finally ready to join the X-Men for her lover's sake, wielding the same powers as her magnetic father."

Of course, I wish it used some version of Lorna's iconic costume instead of the Krakoa one. But I think the level of promotion they're doing for adding her, combined with an actual good description (at least so far), offsets that. Plus I checked and there's no Brand in the game, so no risk of mistaking the two.

Maybe all the "excellent" fan-fics out there is (one of) the reasons why current writers have foregone any such/similar stories for Lorna...for fear of being accused of plagiarism. (It's one of the reasons why they are strongly dissuaded from reading and accepting fan "ideas")

I used to accept this line of thinking as a reason, but now I call BS.

Genosha for Lorna is equivalent to Weapon X for Wolverine and Uncle Ben's death for Spider-Man. It is THE biggest event in her character history, whether certain prejudiced people in the X-Men comics office want to accept it or not. Nobody has said "Marvel, you have to write Lorna's history and experience with Genosha and the genocide in exactly this way." Nobody's given a specific approach and insisted Marvel must take it. All anyone has said is that Marvel needs to acknowledge and respect it, and look to how it was addressed in past X-Men comics for guidance.

The fact of the matter is, the X-Men comics aren't even remotely trying to acknowledge that Lorna had anything to do with Genosha at all, let alone that she's a genocide survivor. As an office, they've had 20 years to do more with it. The current editorial and creative team has had since 2018. They've done absolutely nothing with it besides troll with exactly two covers that led to nothing.

Because the X-Men office refuses to do anything, I have a different take. At least in Lorna's case, this "policy" isn't about legal protection against plagiarism accusations. It's an attempt to dissuade fans from pushing for things that the X-Men office should do but won't.

Let's take a realistic view. Sit in the editor/creator seat. Let's say you're working on Wolverine and you keep seeing messages from fans about how Weapon X really, really needs to be addressed again. Are you seriously going to look at all that demand and think "Whoops, guess we can't do anything involving Wolverine's experience with Weapon X ever again because people won't stop talking about it?" That would be ridiculous. What's more likely to happen is you making a note of it as an area where there's money and narrative opportunities to be made off of heightened fan interest.

That is, if you're not a biased tool that cares more about your personal nostalgia than about doing good creative and business work.

I'm well aware that certain people in Marvel's X-Men comics office would love if they could convince fans to have as little respect for the most important experience in Lorna's life as they do. But that's not how this is gonna go. Fans will keep talking about it. Spread the word. Raise its profile in public awareness. The X-Men comics can either be part of that atmosphere and benefit from doing the right thing, or they can continue to look backwards, regressive and horribly mismanaged as the general public develops a better understanding of Lorna than anyone who works there. It's their choice.

If there are so many "excellent" and "great" fan-fics out there (I'll have to take your word for it...as I stay clear of those things) that many of you have already read and enjoyed, why in Magneto's name do you want some "hack" writer come and butcher it and do it a grave disservice and you end up dissatisfied and still complaining that they could have done a better job/that you've read better by F-F writers?

Three reasons. One, while fanfic has been doing infinitely better for Lorna than the X-Men comics, it's still true that the comics themselves have more public awareness of them than fanfics get if for no other reason than the company's marketing arm making it so. Two, comics by their very nature include art as part of the story, offering certain possibilities in storytelling that fanfics (or any other prose works, e.g. the official books) do not.

Three: an editor or writer is only a hack if they refuse to make real efforts at improving in the face of criticism and important observations.

They don't have to like being criticized. They can downright hate it. But if they're going to be professional, they need to be able and willing to look at what was said and make adjustments to their work if there's something to what's been said. An electrician may hate being criticized, but that shouldn't stop them from fixing a problem that if not fixed could get someone electrocuted. Obviously comics and fiction writing aren't going to kill someone if written poorly, but the underlying principles of quality and professionalism still stand.

Peter David is a case in point for me on this. I complained very, very heavily about how poorly Lorna was treated in All-New X-Factor #3-6. He fixed his treatment of Lorna starting with ANXF #7. It was too late to save the book, but that course correction is why I tell people to read ANXF #7-20 when asked for a Polaris reading list. If he had not course corrected, today I would be telling people to avoid ANXF entirely.

Compare this with X-Men Blue and the most recent iteration of X-Factor, where I don't encourage people reading any part of those books. Why? Because neither book did anything good for Lorna, and never put forth any real efforts to course correct. X-Men Blue put in minor tweaks. X-Factor actually doubled down on its problems.

If people at Marvel genuinely care about doing good work, they will put in the time and effort to get there, and that time and effort will help them grow as a professional and a person. If they don't, then they'll expose themselves. Criticism comes with the territory if you're being paid to create an official product that people are expected to buy. Fans doing better work than you for free isn't a get out of jail free card.

Because I can guarantee...no X-writer will write the story you want them to write the way you expect them to write it. (just ask the Rogue-fans, the Storm-fans, the Wanda-fans...hell, every character-fan)

If my goal was the X-Men comics office making the story I want them to make, I would be laying down very, very specific details and scripting. I would be saying specific things about the genocide that need to be used. I would be dictating how Lorna should treat various characters. "Lorna should want to rip this character's head off on sight." "Lorna should want to get it on with this person."

I've made no secret of how I like the idea of Lorna and Jean as a couple, but I've also been clear that while it's something I would like to see, I don't expect Marvel to cater to that specific desire. I do expect Marvel to have them interact in some meaningful way given their history. And I think the X-Men run with Lorna on it did that. Not as meaningful as I'd like, since I think more of their history should've come up. But bottom line, they did actual things together. Still a far cry from how I'd like to see them as a couple, but I'm not burning everything down just because they didn't get their freak on in the treehouse. Just them interacting in a meaningful way that makes sense with their history is sufficient.

Compared to how Marvel keeps pretending Genosha never happened for Lorna and depicts her horribly OOC in their never-ending quest to ignore her experience as a genocide survivor.

And I do think their ignoring the genocide for her is maliciously deliberate at this point.

[jmc247]

Genosha for Lorna is equivalent to Weapon X for Wolverine and Uncle Ben's death for Spider-Man. It is THE biggest event in her character history, whether certain prejudiced people in the X-Men comics office want to accept it or not. Nobody has said "Marvel, you have to write Lorna's history and experience with Genosha and the genocide in exactly this way." Nobody's given a specific approach and insisted Marvel must take it. All anyone has said is that Marvel needs to acknowledge and respect it, and look to how it was addressed in past X-Men comics for guidance.

The fact of the matter is, the X-Men comics aren't even remotely trying to acknowledge that Lorna had anything to do with Genosha at all, let alone that she's a genocide survivor. As an office, they've had 20 years to do more with it. The current editorial and creative team has had since 2018. They've done absolutely nothing with it besides troll with exactly two covers that led to nothing.

Because the X-Men office refuses to do anything, I have a different take. At least in Lorna's case, this "policy" isn't about legal protection against plagiarism accusations. It's an attempt to dissuade fans from pushing for things that the X-Men office should do but won't.

Marvel writers want the supremacy of their own stories over existing ones. I get that. Also, writers and editors don't like to be pushed around by fans. Duggan all but said they delayed giving Jean a new outfit for a year because they didn't want to be seen as caving to fan pressure at that moment. I emotionally understand all of that completely. But, surviving a genocide in a story line that was Lorna's biggest and most emotional isn't comparable to what she wears or doesn't wear. I can't understand how she views mutants and humanity without it.

More than that Genosha was the foundation of Lorna and Magneto's relationship and frankly by far the most interesting they have been written together outside of the House of M universe (which used their Genosha arc together as a template). It was also foundational to understanding Lorna's view on mutants and was really her only non-mind controlled presence since the 1960s on a non-Xavierite team.

Erasing it's been devastating to Lorna's character and deeply undermined a number of comic runs that probably thought they were freeing themselves by ignoring it. In actuality they were undermining themselves, you are correct nobody said how to use it just that it a big part of her history.

However, I do worry that we won't see Lorna's thoughts on the passing of her father. It looks like that subject will be tackled for Wanda in the issue before Lorna's, and I don't know if we'll get the chance to see Polaris'. Obviously it's the Scarlet Witch's book, but I'm going to be very disappointed if we see Wanda's thoughts, and not Lorna's. Thus far Lorna has had a stronger rapport with Magneto than Wanda, and writers really should be showing the aftermath of that loss to the people he was the closet with.

I also worry about what he can mean when it comes to bonding over previous tension. I'm hoping that this is a sign that the sisters will come together over the loss of Magneto, but I worry that cues will be taken from Williams take on Lorna, and that it'll try to reinforce a more negative stance from Lorna's POV. We'll see what happens, but thus far things seem okay.

Yah, Williams just wrote over any previous history or characterization with them. I have trouble re-reading those issues, its what happens when you decide not to root your stories in characters relationship history instead of going slow and moving characters like chess pieces in the direction you want.

Orlando did a decent job with the answer though I am as yet not exactly enthused. Lorna and Wanda's relationship felt overly forced just as the damage to Lorna and Magneto's relationship felt forced. I did a fair bit to promote Wanda and Lorna having a relationship over the years, but I feel like their relationship last year was forced which makes it hard to root for them.

[Agent Z]

Is it really necessary to reference Genosha and just find something else for Lorna to do (that doesn't involve dating Alex)? Even Spider-Man and Wolverine fans can get sick of hearing about Uncle Ben and Weapon X.

[salarta]

Is it really necessary to reference Genosha and just find something else for Lorna to do (that doesn't involve dating Alex)? Even Spider-Man and Wolverine fans can get sick of hearing about Uncle Ben and Weapon X.

Spider-Man and Wolverine fans get sick of hearing about Uncle Ben and Weapon X, but that only happens when Marvel's done enough with each that the fans are satisfied and want to see some new elements.

That's not where Lorna is right now with Genosha. The X-Men comics haven't acknowledged it for Lorna even once in almost 20 years now. They've let Jean, Storm, and now Kitty Pryde address it or even have whole story arcs dedicated to their addressing it, even if they weren't there when it happened. But Lorna? Nothing.

And if the argument you're trying to make is "We've heard enough about Genosha in general," then I have two responses. First, that it's been addressing a lot with other characters shouldn't mean acting like it never happened to Lorna. Second, that makes it even more damning for Marvel to have done absolutely nothing with Lorna while doing all these things with other characters with less stake in Genosha than her. If we act like there's a finite amount of Genosha content, then why the absolute HELL is it all going to characters who weren't even there and none of it going to the woman who was seen as Magneto's heir who relived the final moments of millions murdered for weeks? If you have limited resources, you put them toward the things that matter most. Lorna's experience of the genocide is among what matters most with that history. She served as the nexus for an emotional understanding of the pain and horror experienced in the genocide, both those killed and those who survived.

Now that I've said that, watch as the X-Men office has some other character show up and suddenly fill that role cause they can't stop being insensitive assholes.

What Marvel's done to date with this is the equivalent of doing multiple stories about Weapon X for 20 years but pretending Wolverine has no history with it at all for that entire time.

They have no legitimate excuse to keep ignoring it. None.

[UncannyLZ]

Is it really necessary to reference Genosha and just find something else for Lorna to do (that doesn't involve dating Alex)? Even Spider-Man and Wolverine fans can get sick of hearing about Uncle Ben and Weapon X.

Spider-Man and wolverine fans are sick of hearing about uncle Ben and weapon X because they talk about them consistently. When has Polaris ever talked about Genosha? (Or any of her history tbh). Other characters discuss the event of Genosha and use it to propel their stories, while Lorna never gets to and that doesn’t make any sense to me.

Polaris talking about Genosha does it mean she is going to be crying, in a bad mental space and full of hysterics. Simply acknowledging a monumental event in her past does not mean it’s going to be a negative or sad moment when it can just be used to push her story forward and give riders something to latch on to when they decide to actually use her. Emma frost brings up Genosha all the time but no one has a problem with that. Why is it that Lorna bringing it up means it’s unnecessarily bringing up the past?

Polaris lacks motivations for being around when that doesn’t have to be the case.

[jmc247]

Phoenix vs X-Men in Future Fight.

Is it really necessary to reference Genosha and just find something else for Lorna to do (that doesn't involve dating Alex)? Even Spider-Man and Wolverine fans can get sick of hearing about Uncle Ben and Weapon X.

Duggan treated Jean's Dark Phoenix Saga with the proper care and respect. Not too much focus, but he kept it as an important part of her and something she works to overcome.

Marvel wants to replace Genosha as a pathos for Lorna, but they so much want to replace it they can't even successfully make something else her motivational center. Lorna reacting to the death of Rockslide was supposed to be the replacement to Genosha for Lorna's motivational centering. The response was beyond terrible from fans not because the idea is horrible of her dealing with a mutant death is terrible (it's actually a good idea), but it was a transparent overly emoted attempt to say something false that this here was Lorna's first moment she had witnessed a mutant death.

The response didn't factor who she was as a character before the scene happened the way God Loves, Man Kills dealt with Magneto encountering the death of mutant children. Imagine if they decided to have Magneto in God Loves Man Kills act like that was the first time he ever experienced death ever? His fans wouldn't have been happy there either. Instead they were very happy and it stands as one of the characters great moments. That could have been what X-Factor #4 was for Lorna instead its one of her worst moments and in a bad way not a good one.

Lorna's character has been badly undermined by Marvel's Genosha related boycott that only applies to her not Kitty or Emma or Storm or Jean. Its not just harmed her, it badly harmed her relationships because frankly Genosha was the last time Lorna and Magneto's relationship was interesting and complex not just plain garbage. As a longtime fan of their relationship both her nice relationship with him under Bunn and her nasty relationship under Williams have been trash.

[juan678]

[juan678]

[Havok83]

I love how the MFF update is about the 05 X-men but Lorna replaces Bobby

[Phoenixx9]

Wow, look at Carol!

[juan678]

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