Polaris: Queen of Mutants/Mistress of Magnetism Appreciation 2024

[kcekada]

I love that. I wish someone would revisit the Thomas/Adams era X-Men. I was disappointed in Byrne's X-Men: The Hidden Years, but wouldn't mind seeing a limited series. JB's stories disappointed because he immediately separated Alex and Lorna from the main group again, discarded Jean's classic green dress, padded his stories -- and brought in a young Storm for no reason other than he could.

[jmc247]

I love that. I wish someone would revisit the Thomas/Adams era X-Men. I was disappointed in Byrne's X-Men: The Hidden Years, but wouldn't mind seeing a limited series. JB's stories disappointed because he immediately separated Alex and Lorna from the main group again, discarded Jean's classic green dress, padded his stories -- and brought in a young Storm for no reason other than he could.

Forgetting that Lorna was the second x-woman and first close female friend to Jean is something of a cottage industry with Marvel mainly due to the incentive structure of how big the 80s and 90s became for them.

The incentive structure pushed them in the direction of pretending that Lorna was an early 90s creation of X-Factor which was not good for Lorna given it’s an side title that marginalized itself into its own pocket universe. That wasn’t true in the 80s of course, but became true as the 90s wore on.

Lorna winning the ‘21 vote was a good thing because it meant for the first time since the 60s she was on the same team as her contemporaries like Jean. Austen tried to act if they were on the same team as well even separated by titles.

I still don’t see her 60s dynamic returning with Jean, but a dynamic more similar to Xavier and Magneto is possible. Austen and Duggan’s versions had some of that. It will be that or going back to acting like Lorna is a 90s creation totally divorced from the core X-Men.

It wasn’t really until Genosha that Lorna got back to her story theme of X-Men 49-51 of being divided between Magneto’s legacy and the X-Men and that was and is frankly the best story theme possible for her post Claremont after he made others the second, third and fourth x-women.

TAS97 will either adapt her in the direction the late 90s and early 00s took her on as mutant controlled Genosha is a major side path there or go the C list diet Jean of X-Factor path they were already on in the 90s. The attempt to substitute Genosha with Lorna being distraught over moms death did her no favors either.

[Havok83]

Wow, I just realized that the X logo across her chest on her Xmen Blue costume resembles the X logo used for the Krakoa era

[GoingGreen]

Wow, I just realized that the X logo across her chest on her Xmen Blue costume resembles the X logo used for the Krakoa era

I always loved that uniform.

[Havok83]

I always loved that uniform.

i felt it was too generic for her and seemed something more apt for someone like Jean. I think it could work if she got her head piece,, maybe a cape and it was purple or green instead of blue. There are ways to tailor it to make it feel more like a Polaris costume



For example, I think they did a better job of individualizing hte look for the other characters. Jimmy got a Wolverine inspired bodysuit. Daken got to show off his signature tattoos. Bloodstorm's is pretty much her midriff with no jacket. Gazing Nightshade got another long coat and Xorn got a turtleneck reminiscent of his monk look. Nothing about Lorna's evoked any of her personality

[GoingGreen]

Yeah, agreed, I don't think it belonged on her. I didn't meant I loved it for her specifically. But I liked all the little variations of the look.

This look felt like a teen book when they're still figuring their style out or something. Like, an Academy X squad.

Maybe if they'd made the blue bits look more metallic, or gave her metallic armor pieces instead of those shoulder pads or something...

[juan678]

Factor X Age of Apocalypse Polaris, Clasic

https://twitter.com/JSwayArt/status/1770988452261020020

https://twitter.com/JSwayArt/status/1770921255270596887

[jmc247]

i felt it was too generic for her and seemed something more apt for someone like Jean. I think it could work if she got her head piece,, maybe a cape and it was purple or green instead of blue. There are ways to tailor it to make it feel more like a Polaris costume



For example, I think they did a better job of individualizing hte look for the other characters. Jimmy got a Wolverine inspired bodysuit. Daken got to show off his signature tattoos. Bloodstorm's is pretty much her midriff with no jacket. Gazing Nightshade got another long coat and Xorn got a turtleneck reminiscent of his monk look. Nothing about Lorna's evoked any of her personality

Agreed, I felt in general the character in Blue was lacking Lorna’s edge outside of one or two blink and you will miss them moments. For a writer that made a name for himself dealing with philosophical ambiguity he didn’t see much of any in Lorna. Some of that might have been editorial, but I doubt it was most of it.

Duggan’s Lorna was closer though it feels likes a compressed Fall of X schedule due to the line change and some pulled punches has undermined things for her.

Ultimately the Krakoa era for Lorna I would rate as her second best behind the Genosha era of roughly late 1999 to late 2005, meaning post HoM. The Genosha era was truly revolutionary for Lorna, but this era was evolutionary and a few big missteps kept it from being serious competition for the #1 slot.

Keeping Lorna out of mutant activism and politics in the Krakoa era until Fall of X was the biggest misstep of all. Behind that the wreck/steaming mess that they left Lorna’s relationship with Magneto and generally not taking advantage of Lorna’s history with another mutant island which made her current experiences even more relevant.

[salarta]

The problem of Lorna not having any unique visual touches while wearing a team uniform wasn't limited only to X-Men Blue. It was also a problem for All-New X-Factor, another series which had Jordan White as editor at the time.




I pointed out this problem back then, too. Lorna's supposed to be the team leader on All-New X-Factor, yet while Gambit, Quicksilver and Warlock get some personal touches (most notably Gambit, the character that ended up getting treated like the real leader in all but title, keeping his jacket), the closest thing Lorna gets to being "unique" is a slight tweak to her collar. Lorna, Gambit and Doug all have the eye lenses. I'm sure the only reason Danger doesn't have those lenses too is because they wouldn't have fit on the character's face (same with Warlock). And I think the only reason Pietro doesn't have them too is because Quicksilver had goggles in the Fox X-Men film out at the time and Perlmutter was incredibly petty.

If 2020 X-Factor had a baseline team look, I'm certain Lorna would've had the bare minimum for that, too, given Jordan White's presence.

The bottom line with her team designs during White's involvement, before she won the X-Men vote, is that he didn't think she was worthy of anything that showed her uniqueness and helped her visually stand out. He hasn't said that in any explicit way, but the implicit nature of it is really clear when you look at his track record. I'm sure it's also why her first Hellfire Gala dress was generic junk, and her X-Men team costume had absolutely no personal touches either. She only finally got those back with Fall of X as White's abruptly on the way out.

[Factor]

My ideal Polaris look would be close to this commission my friend made for me. It’s inspired by Kirk’s X-factor design.
But maybe the inside of the cape would be green:

[GoingGreen]

a


Factor X Age of Apocalypse Polaris, Classic

This is a new one on me. As much as I hate a monochromatic green outfit on her, I actually enjoy this. I think it's juuust sleek enough while being juuust enough of an homage to actually be kinda cool. However, few other artists would pull it off, imo.

I find 4 costumes iconic for her: Original Grecian Polaris, Shi'ar costume Polaris (it's not as well known now, but it was VERY well known / popular even 20 years ago), Austen's run / Dominatrix Polaris, and modern Krakoan X-Men Polaris. Moving forward, I think the one visual element that is uniquely her and could bring the Polaris to any look is the side cutouts. She's worn it across so many iterations of her Grecian look, even when evolved into a space look... I think if you do the cutouts right, it can make many "generic uniform" looks feel very Polaris.

Btw, I saw the other day (I didn't have time to respond at the time, and just remembered) someone mentioned the Krakoan X-Men being the first time Polaris and Phoenix were on a team together since the 70s - just wanted to be factual in that this is incorrect. As the X-Franchise plunged into oblivion prior to Age of X-Man, Polaris served on the X-Men as led by Phoenix, and they worked with each other a few times. It's an abysmal title, sometimes embarrassing, and included next to zero sentiment, but it did happen.


ON X-MEN 97 NEWS - I know I said I didn't want to speculate, but I can't help myself. This includes spoilers, so I'm going to hide my theory...
spoilers:

Storm loses her abilities in Episode 2 and leaves the X-Men. There's reference to an upcoming 2parter called Lifedeath, the same name as a story where she stayed with and fell for Forge. In TAS, Forge was the handler/leader of X-Factor, which of course includes Polaris. So there is definitely a large window...

end of spoilers

[marhawkman]

I still like the Acolyte uniform... that.. she didn't wear for long.

[jmc247]

I still like the Acolyte uniform... that.. she didn't wear for long.

Which one?





If you are talking about the second I would agree it was perhaps her best team uniform.

[marhawkman]

yeah, I was thinking of the second. I'd tweak the colors if I was to re-use it, but keep the overall look.

[UncannyLZ]

This is a new one on me. As much as I hate a monochromatic green outfit on her, I actually enjoy this. I think it's juuust sleek enough while being juuust enough of an homage to actually be kinda cool. However, few other artists would pull it off, imo.

I find 4 costumes iconic for her: Original Grecian Polaris, Shi'ar costume Polaris (it's not as well known now, but it was VERY well known / popular even 20 years ago), Austen's run / Dominatrix Polaris, and modern Krakoan X-Men Polaris. Moving forward, I think the one visual element that is uniquely her and could bring the Polaris to any look is the side cutouts. She's worn it across so many iterations of her Grecian look, even when evolved into a space look... I think if you do the cutouts right, it can make many "generic uniform" looks feel very Polaris.

Btw, I saw the other day (I didn't have time to respond at the time, and just remembered) someone mentioned the Krakoan X-Men being the first time Polaris and Phoenix were on a team together since the 70s - just wanted to be factual in that this is incorrect. As the X-Franchise plunged into oblivion prior to Age of X-Man, Polaris served on the X-Men as led by Phoenix, and they worked with each other a few times. It's an abysmal title, sometimes embarrassing, and included next to zero sentiment, but it did happen.


ON X-MEN 97 NEWS - I know I said I didn't want to speculate, but I can't help myself. This includes spoilers, so I'm going to hide my theory...
spoilers:

Storm loses her abilities in Episode 2 and leaves the X-Men. There's reference to an upcoming 2parter called Lifedeath, the same name as a story where she stayed with and fell for Forge. In TAS, Forge was the handler/leader of X-Factor, which of course includes Polaris. So there is definitely a large window...

end of spoilers

I think Lorna’s 4 iconic costumes are the modern all green design of the original, blue and gold 90s X-Factor, a purple/magneto inspired look (Austen run/Werneck redesign) and although she not be in a skirt, the Krakoa X-Men look. I think these 4 looks are the first 4 readers and non-readers would think of Polaris to be in.

I definitely agree that the side cut outs are her thing visually! I think they are the costume design element that makes the look “Lorna”.

If you’re talking about the X-Men disassembled era of Uncanny X-Men (#1-10), I disagree that it’s abysmal. To me, It’s a fun X-Men arc before the major relaunch starring the “X-Men” which included Polaris! The writers filled the roster with popular characters like Jean and Jubilee and included Lorna who they either like and wanted or consider popular enough to be included (I personally think that was Kelly Thompson’s doing but idk for sure). It also had some solid art of Polaris with the X-Men

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