Jonathan Hickman on Jay & Miles Xplain the X-Men

[Kingdom X]

I don’t really listen to long podcasts but apparently this one has some interesting stuff including:

1)Al Ewing was brought on to write Moria X
2)Hickman wanted to write an Imperial Guard series
3)Giant Sized was supposed to end with Storm having a kid

Sure there is other interesting stuff in there, but I really don’t have the time haha.

Podcast link:https://www.xplainthexmen.com/2022/0...ze-special-10/

Reddit post where I found the bits of info: https://www.reddit.com/r/xmen/commen...lain_the_xmen/

[davetvs]

This sounds interesting, thanks for sharing Friend! I'm not one for podcasts either but I'll give it a listen. Ewing on Moira X sounds amazing (Ewing on anything sounds amazing.)

[BobbysWorld]

I definitely have THOUGHTS about various parts of this, but I'm pretty glad the Imperial Guard stuff didn't work out, as I'm kinda of the opinion that the less focus on Sam and Izzy's time with the Imperial Guard, the better. Like, Krakoa definitely has its sketchy sides, but its always been apparent that Hickman's aware of that and seeded them deliberately. One of my biggest gripes with his Avengers stuff was how casually proprietary he had the Shi'ar talking about Izzy's baby as a future Shi'ar Superguardian, and I was always just like....oh, so are we not going to have Sam and Izzy display any upset about people drafting their baby as a future imperialist soldier because of mumble mumble 'obligations to the Empire'? No, not even when writing Izzy and Sam when the New Mutants go to Shi'ar space? Okay. Cool, cool. Cool cool cool.

[Devaishwarya]

My one important take-away from that interview was...

A lot of different stuff happens (intentional and unintentional) that results in the books and stories we get and the writers and editors are under pressure to ensure that they put out stories that they are happy with and that we fans can appreciate...and sometimes they fail.

And sometimes...what we might have gotten (if all went smoothly) would've been far worse.

[ExodusCloak]

I don’t really listen to long podcasts but apparently this one has some interesting stuff including:

1)Al Ewing was brought on to write Moria X
2)Hickman wanted to write an Imperial Guard series
3)Giant Sized was supposed to end with Storm having a kid

Sure there is other interesting stuff in there, but I really don’t have the time haha.

Podcast link:https://www.xplainthexmen.com/2022/0...ze-special-10/

Reddit post where I found the bits of info: https://www.reddit.com/r/xmen/commen...lain_the_xmen/

So that creature in the World is Storms baby. I wonder if aborted Brood fetus can be ressurected now cause of Wandas thing.

[jwatson]

I learned that these type of things don't always need to happen. lol. I'm not going to listen because i don't think i want to know anything else. lol.

[Rift]

I'm too ADHD to sit through a podcast but I'll try anyway. I wanna get more detail on some of these plots. I'm especially interested in Storm having a kid. Like who's the father, if any? And it'd give her more opportunity to show her caring, nurturing and vulnerable side I feel a lot of comics have forgotten about.

[ExodusCloak]

How many babies in all the timelines has Storm had:

Brood fetus
Technobaby
Becka Munroe - Brainchilds child
Kymera
Azari
Forge and Storms child
Major X

[jwatson]

How many babies in all the timelines has Storm had:

Brood fetus
Technobaby
Becka Munroe - Brainchilds child
Kymera
Azari
Forge and Storms child
Major X

It seems like the motto is "when it doubt, have females pop them out." Yeesh. Though funny how the idea of a wife ages a man but the idea of a baby softens a woman and makes her nurturing. like really.

[Kingdom X]

I'm too ADHD to sit through a podcast but I'll try anyway. I wanna get more detail on some of these plots. I'm especially interested in Storm having a kid. Like who's the father, if any? And it'd give her more opportunity to show her caring, nurturing and vulnerable side I feel a lot of comics have forgotten about.

That’s probably the side of her I’m least interested in seeing more of. Black women often get saddled with mothering roles (see: the mammy trope) especially in predominantly white narratives, and their own character development gets put to the side.

[ExodusCloak]

I'm too ADHD to sit through a podcast but I'll try anyway. I wanna get more detail on some of these plots. I'm especially interested in Storm having a kid. Like who's the father, if any? And it'd give her more opportunity to show her caring, nurturing and vulnerable side I feel a lot of comics have forgotten about.

They were going to be raised in the World...which means there was never gonna be any nurturing. Unless they were going to leave her in the World

[Devaishwarya]

Storm and T'Challa's techno baby growing up in The World was cut, thankfully!
Ultimately Storm was never pregnant when she entered the World to cure herself of the CotV Technovirus.

However...the way the GSXM story ended did leave room for some kind of sentient amalgam being (the CotV virus and the technology used to expunge it) existing. Although...from that pod-cast, and from HiX-Man's response, it seems as though any such future plot points regarding the GSXM books are null and void, now.

[Rift]

That’s probably the side of her I’m least interested in seeing more of. Black women often get saddled with mothering roles (see: the mammy trope) especially in predominantly white narratives, and their own character development gets put to the side.

Honestly, mothering would be more interesting to me than her recurring schitck of showing up, doing something cool and leaving so other characters can move the story. Or her showing up, getting depowered, stabbing people and then leaving so other characters can move the story. Maybe motherhood isn't the best option for her, but for a character that (for me) is memorable for her heart and ability to lead, she'd be an excellent parent. But then again I'm raising two kids, so I'm biased toward seeing parenthood as a great experience.

But you make a good point. And I wouldn't want her to get Jubilee'd. In an ideal world, I'd love to see her raising a child in addition to being regent, remembering her connections to past X-Men, fighting on the front lines, dealing with political intrigue, getting involved in love triangles and generally not being defined by one role. Sadly, we live in a world where Jubilee would rather bring her child on missions than hire a babysitter.

They were going to be raised in the World...which means there was never gonna be any nurturing. Unless they were going to leave her in the World

Ew gross. What's the point then? To give a future character a cool parent, ala Major X? Make them something that needs to be rescued? Stray plot for another writer to maybe sorta possibly use down the line?

EDIT: I got to that point in the interview. For anyone curious: the Giant-Sized books went through a lot of changes, and it was "a little bit of a mess." Originally, Storm was supposed to just be pregnant, and she would give birth in the World, where the child would be raised. The end result of Storm's pregnancy would be that there's a kid who's heir of two kingdoms but didn't know it, and the World stuff would have ended up crashing into things. The child would be a unifying aspect and be a "leader" of two different societies.

EDIT 2: I'm really torn. On the one hand, a World/Wakanda/Krakoa/Arakko mix would give Storm a big story with personal stakes, dig into her history and push a lot of stories further. The kid could have been pretty interesting, and I like seeing next-gen characters. But on the other hand, a lot of focus seems to be on the kid than his parents, and he seems to be more important because he's related to them, than anything he does. I know we're just getting the cliff notes and not anything about his personal character, but still. Then Hickman said it would be "A kid from the future cartoony-thing," and all my interest in that plotline died.

[Askani's Flame]

I think the biggest and most interesting reveal in this was the fact that Petra and Sway were not supposed to be resurrected when they did. They were supposed to be just figments of Vulcan's imagination in the X-Men issues and he was going to continue seeding that in future X-Men books. Because they were not supposed to be allowed to be resurrected because they were from before Cerebro's actual online date according to Hickman (House/Powers of X). Which is why it was problematic that they came back but not Thunderbird and didn't make sense to most of us readers. And so the fact that he had to rewrite a line and made the mistake that Havok says that Petra and Sway went back through the portal, screwed up some of his future plans and he even says in the podcast that for him it was his biggest "****-up".

[Rift]

I don't have time for the full interview but here are a few points that stood out for me.

0) One of the hosts or w/e says that they can't shut up about the Academy X kids in their podcast. Maybe I should listen more often.
1) Hickman got Ewing into the books by offering him the Moira book. Moira-X was shelved partly because Hickman was leaving and plots had to be pushed into Inferno and beyond. (So more Moira plot down the line?)
2) Hickman talks about how, since Cyclops/the main X-Men can't get older, the younger generations are kind of stuck since they can't really age up.
3) Hickman didn't care for Sinister until Gillen's take, and he's been building Sinister from that. He says "Kieron is where Sinister belongs."
4) I get the feeling that Hickman wanted Hellion to be the new leader of the X-Men, and to make him a Sigma - better than Omega, but also cooler and loved by everyone.
5) The Shi'ar book would have had Bobby and Sam.
6) The Giant-Sized books went through a lot of changes, and it was "a little bit of a mess." See my earlier post about Storm's babby.
7) Hickman said his biggest screw-up was an issue of X-Men, where Havoc mentioned that Petra and Sway are back on Earth. He wanted them to be in Vulcan's mind, imagining them the whole time. He mentions that he was going to do "a whole bunch of Vulcan stuff," but cut himself off.
8) But yeah, Petra, Sway and Thunderbird existed before Cerebro was made, so none of them should have been brought back. (IIRC White once said Petra and Sway were revived because of Necrosha, even though Thunderbird was also revived during that time.)
9) Destiny always had a reach in the story and characters, long after she died. She also had an immaculate character design. So she was one of the first people Hickman wanted back.
10) Digital sales are great, hardcovers have been "ridiculously profitable." He thought the Shonen Jump-style reprints would fail, but they were popular.