I miss the old Moira

[Uncanny X-Man]

I found it interesting how Rob Liefeld speculated in his latest podcast that the reason Marvel effectively sidelined Moira and deemphasised the exploration of her multiple previous lives was due to the similarities to the The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August novel (as detailed on Bleeding Cool) and fear of possible further action from author Claire North.

I don't know how accurate that might be but it would certainly recontextualize the cancellation of Moira X's planned ongoing book.

[charliehustle415]

I found it interesting how Rob Liefeld speculated in his latest podcast that the reason Marvel effectively sidelined Moira and deemphasised the exploration of her multiple previous lives was due to the similarities to the The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August novel (as detailed on Bleeding Cool) and fear of possible further action from author Claire North.

I don't know how accurate that might be but it would certainly recontextualize the cancellation of Moira X's planned ongoing book.

I loved that book, and to be fair it is shockingly close to HOX/POX.

But if I remember correctly Hickman did say he read the book while writing HOX/POX.

https://www.comicsbeat.com/money-and...onday-murders/
https://bleedingcool.com/comics/hous...orth-spoilers/

I came up with the idea for the book when I was on vacation at the beach with the family. I was reading a book on economics (I mean, that wasn't all I was reading. It was my 'serious' book. If I remember correctly I think I was also reading Claire North's, The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August [which is just fantastic], and the latest Expanse novel, Nemesis Games) and there was a section on the contrast of what money used to represent and what it represents now.

But can one be sued for a concept like this? Or is it to completely avoid the issue altogether?

[The Cool Thatguy]

Careless character assassination ("(idiomatic) A malicious discourse designed to damage the reputation of someone.") might be the more appropriate term.

Especially since the destruction of the character was arguably not done for the sake of a story about Charles as the main character, but rather to change the entire history of the X-men in order to fit a writer's supposed "grand epic" science fiction story about black hole god being, dystopian unavoidable timeline progressions, alternate erased universes and the rise and fall of a super human society.

For this purpose the writer essentialy created an entirely new character and introduced her into the backround of all X-men history via a massive retcon that recontextualizes 60 years of published history, on pannel events and characterization, as having been part of a grander shady machination and not what the reader was supposed to think it was.
But in what seems to be an attempt at giving her "legitimacy" she got the name and appearance of an allready existing character slapped on, even though it actualy means erasing everything established about said character as being fake or just an act.

When one looks at it from a distant, it can be argued that nothing about HOX/POX actualy required the new character to have been Moira MacTaggart, since nothing of Moira's previous established characterization and personality was required or used for the story at all.

The writer could have named her Molly O'Malley, with a different appearance and design and HOX/POX's story and end result would have basicly been the same. The only difference would be a lack of "Oh no! She wasn't what we thought she was the entire time!" moment, but given that few fans seem to have actualy been shocked or bothered by it and given the scope of just how much had been retconned, it's likely that the introduction of an entirely new character in the same role wouldn't have bothered them either.

However if character assassination is the more appropiate term, it wasn't done out of what seems to have been malice but rather callous disregard and indifference towards the damage done to an allready established character and her published stories.

I wouldn't regardless it as careless, so much as lazy. But then, six of one...

Hickman wanted to establish his new mutant state with as little effort as possible. Hence Moira and her constant reincarnations

[wlfking]

I loved that book, and to be fair it is shockingly close to HOX/POX.

But if I remember correctly Hickman did say he read the book while writing HOX/POX.

https://www.comicsbeat.com/money-and...onday-murders/
https://bleedingcool.com/comics/hous...orth-spoilers/




But can one be sued for a concept like this? Or is it to completely avoid the issue altogether?

Hrm. I know you can be sued for things like this. I don't know if anyone has been successful. Someone tried to sue the makers of Assassin's Creed for having a story element similar to something in their book.

https://www.gamedeveloper.com/busine...ne#close-modal

[charliehustle415]

Hrm. I know you can be sued for things like this. I don't know if anyone has been successful. Someone tried to sue the makers of Assassin's Creed for having a story element similar to something in their book.

https://www.gamedeveloper.com/busine...ne#close-modal

Maybe Disney/Marvel wanted to avoid the controversy altogether especially given that Hickman is their biggest writer.

[cranger]

I found it interesting how Rob Liefeld speculated in his latest podcast that the reason Marvel effectively sidelined Moira and deemphasised the exploration of her multiple previous lives was due to the similarities to the The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August novel (as detailed on Bleeding Cool) and fear of possible further action from author Claire North.

I don't know how accurate that might be but it would certainly recontextualize the cancellation of Moira X's planned ongoing book.

Once Liefeld gets something in his mind, it just exists there forever and takes on a life of its own. He was very vocal about how he did not like the Hickman era and I think as the years past that little tidbit is the one thing he can grasp on to that does not sound like it was personal. Comics rip things off a lot more than whatever similarities there might have been with that story.

[The Cool Thatguy]

Ten bucks says that we get the worse timeline possible...

Moira is robbed of her powers, yet somehow Krakoa somehow still comes into being, thus robbing Moira of her relevance, just like she lost her character prior to Hickman.

[Wolverine12]

Moira's entire character has been altered and destroyed so that Chuck might have an enemy to angst about.

If that's not fridging, I don't know what is.

I suppose this would work if a reader held that opinion about Moira's development, if the reader thought Moira's growth was a marked improvement then it fails to stand. Side bar, Chuck's not angsting over Moira at all, he's so self obsessed that he thinks he marched all the mutants off to their doom and is stuck with Sinister in his head forever.

Again I'll point out that what you're claiming is in no way fridging a character. She matters to the story beyond advancing Charles plot sure it's part of it but it's not the whole point. If you don't want to admit that then I suppose there's not really a point in having a discussion about it.

The one development that I think was a poor choice was making Moira a cyborg. It hasn't really added much to her story other than she is Omega Sentinel 2.0 now. I think it would have been more interesting for her to remain depowered as a human but still work for Orchis. That would have really put the X-Men's goal of fighting for a world that fears and hates them to the test. Moira, an old human ally (or so we thought), the inspiration for the beginning of Krakoa is now a human again trying to destroy the mutants. Seeing Charles and the X-Men having to choose to destroy Moira or they themselves be destroyed would've made for a much better story imo and you could still have the machine uprising and betraying humanity and the story still works. I suppose we could still get some version of that with an emotional conversation/battle between the X-Men and Moira, I just think it would've felt higher stakes if Moira wasn't a killing machine.

[Uncanny X-Man]

Once Liefeld gets something in his mind, it just exists there forever and takes on a life of its own. He was very vocal about how he did not like the Hickman era and I think as the years past that little tidbit is the one thing he can grasp on to that does not sound like it was personal. Comics rip things off a lot more than whatever similarities there might have been with that story.

I agree that Liefeld was never really into Hickman's X-Men which might make his speculation biased. However Claire North did bring this up on Twitter when someone pointed it out to her and while there might not necessarily be room for legal action, Disney might just want to avoid any headaches and bad press, which would also make any adaptations of Moira's story in any other media unlikely.

[The Cool Thatguy]

I suppose this would work if a reader held that opinion about Moira's development, if the reader thought Moira's growth was a marked improvement then it fails to stand. Side bar, Chuck's not angsting over Moira at all, he's so self obsessed that he thinks he marched all the mutants off to their doom and is stuck with Sinister in his head forever.

Again I'll point out that what you're claiming is in no way fridging a character. She matters to the story beyond advancing Charles plot sure it's part of it but it's not the whole point. If you don't want to admit that then I suppose there's not really a point in having a discussion about it.

The one development that I think was a poor choice was making Moira a cyborg. It hasn't really added much to her story other than she is Omega Sentinel 2.0 now. I think it would have been more interesting for her to remain depowered as a human but still work for Orchis. That would have really put the X-Men's goal of fighting for a world that fears and hates them to the test. Moira, an old human ally (or so we thought), the inspiration for the beginning of Krakoa is now a human again trying to destroy the mutants. Seeing Charles and the X-Men having to choose to destroy Moira or they themselves be destroyed would've made for a much better story imo and you could still have the machine uprising and betraying humanity and the story still works. I suppose we could still get some version of that with an emotional conversation/battle between the X-Men and Moira, I just think it would've felt higher stakes if Moira wasn't a killing machine.

Hickman basically hollowed out Moira's character for the sake of Charles and Erik. She was transformed into a mere plot devise and they've been running roughshod over her, ever since.

Perhaps that's not fridging, but it's close enough. First Degree murder, second degree, same ball park.

[strathcona]

I have a feeling Moira will get depowered, and then that Moira becomes the "original" human Moira

Yup. We're going to see Xavier's group go back to Moira pre-mutation instead of killing her, she will be depowered. Then her life will go along the same 616 path we saw pre-HoxPoX. She's a baseline human without a mutation... but it can also explain how she got the Legacy Virus. Moira X on the other hand is from a different timeline and didn't start interacting with the 616 until her "return from the dead." Has there been an explanation of the potential for Moira to have 11 lives yet? Because that's how I see it.

[The Cool Thatguy]

Yup. We're going to see Xavier's group go back to Moira pre-mutation instead of killing her, she will be depowered. Then her life will go along the same 616 path we saw pre-HoxPoX. She's a baseline human without a mutation... but it can also explain how she got the Legacy Virus. Moira X on the other hand is from a different timeline and didn't start interacting with the 616 until her "return from the dead." Has there been an explanation of the potential for Moira to have 11 lives yet? Because that's how I see it.

And she'll go back to being dead after having her character assassinated. Yay!

...sigh

[LordUltimus]

Yup. We're going to see Xavier's group go back to Moira pre-mutation instead of killing her, she will be depowered. Then her life will go along the same 616 path we saw pre-HoxPoX. She's a baseline human without a mutation... but it can also explain how she got the Legacy Virus. Moira X on the other hand is from a different timeline and didn't start interacting with the 616 until her "return from the dead." Has there been an explanation of the potential for Moira to have 11 lives yet? Because that's how I see it.

Probably also invoke Dominion in there to further muddle things, like have it make Moira a mutant.

And she'll go back to being dead after having her character assassinated. Yay!

...sigh

To be honest, I prefer her dead over character assassinated.

[wlfking]

And she'll go back to being dead after having her character assassinated. Yay!

...sigh

Drat. Would like for Rahne to get her mum back but I guess I'm just being greedy. And of course there is all her other connections such as Proteus and Banshee.

[The Cool Thatguy]

Drat. Would like for Rahne to get her mum back but I guess I'm just being greedy. And of course there is all her other connections such as Proteus and Banshee.

Same, but they haven't missed a chance to screw her character over yet.