Polaris/Lorna Dane: Queen of Mutants/Mistress of Magnetism Appreciation 2023

[jmc247]

How was Lorna's overall portrayal on THE GIFTED?
I've only seen clips but I appreciate that they kept the silver age touch of having Lorna color her hair initially to hide the green mutation expression.

In the first season of the show the character was close to perfection. She was ranked as one of the breakout characters of the 2017-2018 TV season by countless papers. Emma Dumont really nailed it and carried the whole show. Her rapport with Esme Frost (aka Skyler Samuels) and Eclipse (aka Sean Teale). Lorna's relationship with Eclipse was really great the first season of the show and was everything that Lorna's romantic relations in the comics failed to be.

Calling the second season a disappointment would be an understatement. They effectively gave Lorna's role to a new character and Lorna's character descended into Eclipse's overly emotional baby momma territory. The first half the second season for Lorna is sometimes watchable. The second half of the second season for The Gifted Lorna is unwatchable and the epic ratings collapse in season two tells the story that it wasn't just me.

But, to focus on the good side the first season really showed how well a mutant activist Lorna can function. As a character Lorna works great when she has an overall goal and mission bigger than herself. This was true of The Gifted and its true of the comics.

Emma Dumont to this day still loves the character.

[salarta]

How was Lorna's overall portrayal on THE GIFTED?
I've only seen clips but I appreciate that they kept the silver age touch of having Lorna color her hair initially to hide the green mutation expression.

Her portrayal was excellent in season 1. I didn't watch season 2. My main reason was because of how poorly Dreamer's death was handled, like it was extremely clear that they started from wanting her to die and threw in some very horrid writing to get there. Horrible handling of character death and lack of respect toward a character when doing it is a massive narrative turn-off for me. But I've heard they did horrid with treatment of Lorna in season 2 which would've killed my viewership too.

Since you mention her hair, I remember seeing a LOT of people complaining about her not having green hair in the original promo materials. It was a rare case of me actually telling people to settle down and wait for more info. I spent a decent amount of time back then reminding people how Lorna's original hair reveal went down and how Gifted could end up doing the same (which it did). I wouldn't have done that if it was a comic book out of the X-Men comics office, because the X-Men comics office has thoroughly established an abysmal track record. Whereas the showrunners for Gifted had no such track record and so deserved a chance to see where they went with things before judging.

[juan678]

[rhaenylis]

I really like KT's take on Lorna
Obviously she can't really do much but the characterization is pretty good

[jmc247]

I would argue it's even more essential to do the same here, as unlike with Storm's case, the concerns we have for Lorna's character are currently on the verge of existential crisis. Does her history and identity mean anything to them (them mainly meaning White, since I strongly believe writers would actually cover things for her if they could), or is she just a package of memes?

Lorna should not fall to pieces on a dime. Anyone who writes her doing so doesn’t understand the character at all. Her exterior should be hard and often brutally so, but the hard exterior should mask a different interior.

Right now her exterior is marginally solid. She isn’t breaking down over Rogue dying for two seconds. X-Factor (2020) Lorna probably would have. In that way certainly KT’s Lorna is better then it was then.

Though she doesn’t exactly have her edge at this point or seemingly much deeper lurking under the hood of the character. Maybe she does and is covering for it. But the past year and a half I agree she has borderline felt like a pack of memes.

[UncannyLZ]

It’s obvious that Duggan deleted the tweet because he only had a few minutes to answer questions, and after a while, fans were filling his mentions with questions well beyond his time limit. It’s also obvious that he liked the Polaris related questions, but didn’t respond to them because he has plans for her. That was DEFINITIVELY Polaris in time warp vision Monet and Forge saw in the last issue of X-Men. So far, he’s shown he uses his own plots and stories. He used [redacted] as the shocker for the reader since he write Devil’s Reign X-Men and Iron Man will be a major part of Fall of X (he writes Iron Man).

What are his plans for Lorna? I’m not sure but he definitely has them. Hopefully, it cements her lane with the X-Men and as a X-Men. I want Lorna to be seen as the “Magneto is right” member on the X-Men and seen by writers and fans as such the way they’d expect Iceman to be the jokester powerhouse on the team. Really want Polaris to continue this momentum into being A lister on the X-Men roster and in their office.

[jwatson]

really enjoyed the latest scarlet witch and i found a lot of what wanda was thinking really connected as things Polaris went through so it made me enjoy the "your enough" because it feels like maybe lorna is in a place where she feels that for herself now. Which would be some good growth. Either way she was drawn and colored amazingly. The letterer was really good here too i liked the layouts of the lettering.

[salarta]

Next page of the minicomic.

[Daedra]

Next page of the minicomic.

I love this, it’s a long time coming and it looks beautiful, I enjoy when fans take matters on their own hands and these hands seems to be very capable.

[Soulsword323]

[img]https://i.postimg.cc/Fzt3Xns1/CAPMARV2019047-Preview-4.webp[img][img]https://i.postimg.cc/MHyR6bv5/CAPMARV2019047-Preview-5.webp[img][img]https://i.postimg.cc/SxQ849qL/CAPMARV2019047-Preview-6.webp[img]

I appreciate the authority KT gives Lorna, and you get the sense that Polaris has leadership experience in these panels. I wish Thompson could blend more of what she does with Lorna, with what Duggan managed to do though. If we got more of the personality Lorna had in Duggan's X-Men, this would be a fantastic showing for Polaris.

Polaris' force field being able to keep out Hazmat's radiation, and the various types she creates, is a really strong feat for Lorna. We've seen her do this in Genosha, but keeping herself, Gambit, and Rogue, safe, is a really nice power display for Polaris. Really appreciate that.

[salarta]

I love this, it’s a long time coming and it looks beautiful, I enjoy when fans take matters on their own hands and these hands seems to be very capable.

Thanks! I wish it didn't require fans taking matters into their own hands, I wish the X-Men comics office respected Lorna enough to do this sort of work themselves. But at least this much can be done to make up for Marvel refusing to do it.

[jmc247]

X-Men 19 sells out and gets a second printing with a recolored cover.

Next page of the minicomic.

That looks quite good. The emotion there is impactful.

Runs can respect her Genosha history without going the extra mile just by remembering it and considering how it might impact her views or something as simple as how she responds of Sentinels. How should Lorna say respond to a Sentinel attack now? How would you if you lost everyone you cared about in the world and was stuck with memories in your head for weeks of them killing the Gensohan population?

I appreciate the authority KT gives Lorna, and you get the sense that Polaris has leadership experience in these panels. I wish Thompson could blend more of what she does with Lorna, with what Duggan managed to do though. If we got more of the personality Lorna had in Duggan's X-Men, this would be a fantastic showing for Polaris.

KT's Lorna is competent yes, though not every writer can be expected to do the same kind of job with her persona. The next best thing if someone isn't an ongoing writer for her is to remember her edge and ruthlessness at moments. KT's Lorna had that for about a fraction of a second a few issues ago.

[jmc247]

Emma Dumont podcast interview

Starting at 45:00 for Lorna heavy stuff.

Emma Dumoint: "Lorna Sally Dane is mutant royalty."

Emma knows Lorna has moved to X-Men recently. Emma says she loves Lorna. She said she was the most into comics of her cast. Emma talks about getting X-Men 50 for her Birthday a few years back.

Skyler Samuels was Emma's closest friend on the cast she liked playing with the most. She wasn't all that happy about the baby storyline in season two and the weak depressed stuff. I was right there with her. They tore out the backbone of the character who was most working on their show and made it so even I couldn't watch her character in the second half of the second season and it was a chore to watch her in the first half. The only scene in the whole of the second season she brought anything like the intensity she normally had was the first episode when she was having her child. The show ended with lower ratings then the Inhumans in its final episode because of their Lorna related decisions I have no doubt. Lorna's arc in the first season really was great though and Emma very much carried it.

She says she asked for a body suit and the headgear, but only got the headgear. In terms of power skills she wanted to do, she wanted to do the iron and blood trick Lorna and Magneto can do in the comics. She is sad she didn't get to play with knives in season 2.

[anyajenkins]

The whole show just kinda drove off a cliff in the second seasoning, don’t know what happened exactly. The first season had moment of ‘that was cool’ and ‘WTF just happened’, and the second part just over took the show. I don’t even think I finished it.

[jmc247]

The whole show just kinda drove off a cliff in the second seasoning, don’t know what happened exactly. The first season had moment of ‘that was cool’ and ‘WTF just happened’, and the second part just over took the show. I don’t even think I finished it.

The Gifted writers were handed a very easy and straightforward winning hand before the season started if they just followed what was virtually spoon fed to them Lorna and the Frost's attempting to save mutants their way and the Mutant Underground attempting to save mutants their way with the two occasionally bumping heads and certainly finally reconciling to an extent at the end.

They decided to be too cute by half. They pulled their punches from the Polaris vs Eclipse conflict and in doing so sucked out the power and depth from it that it had in season one. They turned Lorna meek and into a whiner.

I would say about season one of The Gifted that it was a romantic relationship for Lorna done well because she maintained who she was and her goal and agenda. In season two it was a relationship done badly as she became little more than Eclipse's wayward baby momma. At the same time the show doubled down on the plot threads and characters who didn't work in season 1.

Their thinking was probably that heroic Lorna would be more popular and they would bring someone else in to be the mutant activist. Even I couldn't watch the second half of season two it was that bad which was sad because Lorna's season one story and character was excellent.