Should Wanda go on trial for for her actions? Or should Doom go on trial for his actions?

[AcesX1X]

He was using dark magic merged science for Valeria's delivery. He used her as his familiar in Unthinkable.

the devil is always in the detail. he may have, but susan did not.

[gurkle]

I'm not particularly invested in whether she did it or not, to be honest. I just want an unambiguous telling of the events; because nothing cheeses me off as a reader more than investing time and money in a story, then the writers not living up to their end of the bargain and leaving major things out. It's cheating.

I would have been OK with that, but it's not going to happen. Brevoort's said they're not going to go back and retell the story. A vague "Doom was somehow at fault" thing was all we got in AXIS and is all we're going to get, especially now that Secret Wars might change the characters in some ways.

The explanation is vague because we have here a very powerful writer (Bendis) with a very popular story (House of M) who presumably does not want his story completely overturned and rejected. So Children's Crusade constantly threaded the needle to retcon stuff without really changing it. Nothing about Disassembled was actually changed, for example - the only thing that happened is that instead of dying, Scott Lang was plucked from the timestream as the explosion happened, but we didn't see the body in Disassembled so the story is still exactly the same. Doom's confession, or Hawkeye maybe sleeping with a Doombot, were ambiguous enough that we could still, if we wanted, believe that Bendis's stories happened exactly the way he wanted them to happen.

I don't mind people not liking the explanation, but I think people who say "Doom must be lying, here's why" are being a little trollish. There is no way to "prove" what happened because it's all made-up. We have here a situation where readers are given the freedom to choose one of multiple explanations for what happened in Disassembled and House of M, and those of us who choose the "Wanda is innocent and being mind-controlled by Doom all along" explanation are simply playing by the rules.

What I don't understand, again, is the people who are obsessed with the idea that someone must be "punished" for the mutants who fell out of the sky and the mutants who got depowered. Those things nearly all happened in books where Wanda didn't appear, and are exactly the same no matter whose "fault" they are. It's like, if you do a story about the fate of the broccoli people, I don't really care if it was Jean or a separate entity who ate the planet; the story is about the broccoli people and what happened to them. But some readers of Decimation have become obsessed with the idea that the only possible ending to the story is to identify a culprit and punish them, and I don't understand the thinking.

[People Of The Earth]

They didn't believe him when he said he was guilty in CC, so why would they do anything to him?

The X-men are still heroes after all. They have first-hand experience with possession and mind-control.
I'd think the fact Wanda was a hero for decades whilst Doom a world-class villain warrants Doom more credence when he says he dit it than what happened during HoM.
Hence why the X-men should have come for Doom afterward, the same way they came after Wanda during CC.

I'm not particularly invested in whether she did it or not, to be honest. I just want an unambiguous telling of the events; because nothing cheeses me off as a reader more than investing time and money in a story, then the writers not living up to their end of the bargain and leaving major things out. It's cheating.

That's a normal feeling with Bendis' work at Marvel.

Also, given the fact that editorial wants her back as a hero, then it's pretty clear a trial would find her innocent. I'd put money on Marvel doing it in such a way that there's still room for doubt though.

I think too that she would be acquitted.
Now, it wouldn't surprise me if the judge turned out to be Mystique or something.
I can see her refusing to acknowledge the jury's decision to have Wanda acquitted and try to kill Wanda herself in the middle of the tribunal.

susan did not make a mistake there, nor did kitty and the x-men when kitty was dying. but scarlet helped him to practice some form of necromancy and who knows what other forms of black magic or satanic rituals. so there is a major difference.

I don't see you so judgmental about Magik and her spells.
She's training with Strange, her magic is probably more nefarious than anyone else in 616, nevermind her own history in Limbo....
Shaming Wanda for it doesn't rhyme to anything, when you have so many sorcerers and magicians who can do the same in 616.

[Iron Maiden]

the devil is always in the detail. he may have, but susan did not.

Still the point is she needed his help no matter what the means. And she got what she wanted....her baby girl Valeria.

[Sea Hound]

I would have been OK with that, but it's not going to happen. Brevoort's said they're not going to go back and retell the story. A vague "Doom was somehow at fault" thing was all we got in AXIS and is all we're going to get, especially now that Secret Wars might change the characters in some ways.

The explanation is vague because we have here a very powerful writer (Bendis) with a very popular story (House of M) who presumably does not want his story completely overturned and rejected. So Children's Crusade constantly threaded the needle to retcon stuff without really changing it. Nothing about Disassembled was actually changed, for example - the only thing that happened is that instead of dying, Scott Lang was plucked from the timestream as the explosion happened, but we didn't see the body in Disassembled so the story is still exactly the same. Doom's confession, or Hawkeye maybe sleeping with a Doombot, were ambiguous enough that we could still, if we wanted, believe that Bendis's stories happened exactly the way he wanted them to happen.

I don't mind people not liking the explanation, but I think people who say "Doom must be lying, here's why" are being a little trollish. There is no way to "prove" what happened because it's all made-up. We have here a situation where readers are given the freedom to choose one of multiple explanations for what happened in Disassembled and House of M, and those of us who choose the "Wanda is innocent and being mind-controlled by Doom all along" explanation are simply playing by the rules.

What I don't understand, again, is the people who are obsessed with the idea that someone must be "punished" for the mutants who fell out of the sky and the mutants who got depowered. Those things nearly all happened in books where Wanda didn't appear, and are exactly the same no matter whose "fault" they are. It's like, if you do a story about the fate of the broccoli people, I don't really care if it was Jean or a separate entity who ate the planet; the story is about the broccoli people and what happened to them. But some readers of Decimation have become obsessed with the idea that the only possible ending to the story is to identify a culprit and punish them, and I don't understand the thinking.

I think Marvel are having their cake and eating it too. They've never clarified what happened, and as you said, the story as it exists allows for a few valid interpretations. If they don't want to revisit it, and explain what happened, then bringing it up, and hinting about it; (like in Axis), is just trolling a divided and frustrated readership.

The thing with the broccoli people, is that aside from their death, they have no other presence. In theory, of course they matter, in practice no one gives a damn about them. We know nothing about them other than their death. No emotional investment. And Jean paid a huge price, for something that wasn't her fault. That story was never really about the broccoli people.
HoM affected characters who've been in hundreds of comics, with real fans, in a lasting way. It also completely changed where the X-Franchise went. I'd like to hear a proper ending for the story; and I think Breevort is wrong not to allow it.

A trial doesn't have to be a witch hunt. I hear what you're saying about some fans not being satisfied until she's strung up: I don't think that's the only possible, (or even likely) outcome. The thing with CC is that even in story, the writer was throwing doubt on her exoneration. It's not surprising that not all fans accept it. Especially when Bendis really went to town making her guilty, and the X-books spent years describing the consequences. So yes, I think there should be some consequences for whoever it was who was responsible.

(Does Wanda even remember what happened out of interest? They took away her memory in CC, which I hate. Hated it with Iron Man post Civil war too.)

[Iron Maiden]

I would have been OK with that, but it's not going to happen. Brevoort's said they're not going to go back and retell the story. A vague "Doom was somehow at fault" thing was all we got in AXIS and is all we're going to get, especially now that Secret Wars might change the characters in some ways.

The explanation is vague because we have here a very powerful writer (Bendis) with a very popular story (House of M) who presumably does not want his story completely overturned and rejected. So Children's Crusade constantly threaded the needle to retcon stuff without really changing it. Nothing about Disassembled was actually changed, for example - the only thing that happened is that instead of dying, Scott Lang was plucked from the timestream as the explosion happened, but we didn't see the body in Disassembled so the story is still exactly the same. Doom's confession, or Hawkeye maybe sleeping with a Doombot, were ambiguous enough that we could still, if we wanted, believe that Bendis's stories happened exactly the way he wanted them to happen.

I don't mind people not liking the explanation, but I think people who say "Doom must be lying, here's why" are being a little trollish. There is no way to "prove" what happened because it's all made-up. We have here a situation where readers are given the freedom to choose one of multiple explanations for what happened in Disassembled and House of M, and those of us who choose the "Wanda is innocent and being mind-controlled by Doom all along" explanation are simply playing by the rules.

What I don't understand, again, is the people who are obsessed with the idea that someone must be "punished" for the mutants who fell out of the sky and the mutants who got depowered. Those things nearly all happened in books where Wanda didn't appear, and are exactly the same no matter whose "fault" they are. It's like, if you do a story about the fate of the broccoli people, I don't really care if it was Jean or a separate entity who ate the planet; the story is about the broccoli people and what happened to them. But some readers of Decimation have become obsessed with the idea that the only possible ending to the story is to identify a culprit and punish them, and I don't understand the thinking.

I don't think it's being trollish to say that adding Doom to a story almost 10 years after the event is a bandaid and doesn't really stand up to closer scrutiny when you look at the timelines involved and the lack of motive. HoM happened because of all the stress of Quicksilver being killed by Magneto, etc. Doom was not directly involved in that unless you blame him for her having those increased powers.

[gurkle]

I don't think it's being trollish to say that adding Doom to a story almost 10 years after the event is a bandaid and doesn't really stand up to closer scrutiny when you look at the timelines involved and the lack of motive.

It's trollish to say that while saying that the story of HoM and Disassembled must be taken as gospel, even though they completely violate the character's prior continuity, timelines and motives.

I can see saying that House of M is a good story and the Doom retcon is a bad story. That's what matters, after all - not whether something fits in with continuity 100%, but whether it's a good story. (I think that's what people really mean when they insist HoM is gospel: sure, nothing she said or did in House of M fits anything she said or did before, but many readers were interested in her for the first time in that story, and don't want to see that taken away.) But does it matter that "Doom was mind controlling Wanda" doesn't exactly match up with the timeline? No, no more than it really matters that Wanda already remembered she had children. These are stories written by different writers, and they don't match up, and they will never match up perfectly.

So yeah, Doom was in hell or something while Disassembled happened. He was still mind controlling Wanda because that is the interpretation that's been offered to fans who don't want to see the character abused, and it just doesn't matter that the continuity doesn't fit perfectly. Bendis knows as well as anyone else that you sometimes have to ignore continuity for the sake of the best story.

[DrBat]

(Does Wanda even remember what happened out of interest? They took away her memory in CC, which I hate. Hated it with Iron Man post Civil war too.)

Didn't she get her memories back at the end?

[Mary Jay]

So yeah, Doom was in hell or something while Disassembled happened. He was still mind controlling Wanda because that is the interpretation that's been offered to fans who don't want to see the character abused, and it just doesn't matter that the continuity doesn't fit perfectly. Bendis knows as well as anyone else that you sometimes have to ignore continuity for the sake of the best story.

I admit to being in agreement with most of your arguments. Although I would point out that for longtime fans, the fact that a story contradicts what has been stated before, or how a character acts according to canon (and by canon I mean the general characterization of this character up to that story) could be argued as being a 'bad' story. For fans of Wanda (and Avengers fans in general), Disassembled was a load of crap, plain and simple. Maybe they're being trollish, but that's how they felt, and I have to agree with them even though I'm not a fan of Wanda myself. Those things that happened in Disassembled, HoM, or whatever, are not why I'm not a fan. She's just not a character I have affinities with. I think it's all that gypsie thing... I don't know.

Having said that, I believe the fact that they retconned Wanda's actions as somehow being possessed or whatever sort of gave her a free pass that a lot of other heroes didn't get. Other heroes still get crap (both from fans and in-story, from other characters) for lesser things, but not Wanda, cause poor Wanda was possessed... Is it because she has boobs?

[Majin_O.A.W.]

The consequences of Wanda’s action forever changed the Marvel Universe, until this very day. The first issue of House of M was released in June 2005, and here we are in 2015 and we’re still dealing with the problems created in this storyline.

I disagree. The signs of Wanda's villainy started during Byrne's darker than Scarlett Story. Her corruption began waaaaay back then. This led to Disassembled, which in turn led to House of M.

It didn't.

It was a poor attempt to redeem Wanda and try to blame Doom for her actions. It failed as Doom is never shown doing what Wanda did and Wanda is shown throwing Doom under the bus multiple times after she got what she wanted from him.

Agreed. Wanda tried to mask her corruption by allying herself with Doom.

CC had it's problems but essentially it played the mind control card. And mind control in comics is pretty much a universal free pass eventually. It was enough to get both Avengers and X-men to drop the matter at least legally though obviously there's still hard feelings. Which is exactly where marvel wanted her. They still wanted to milk the drama but they wanted her to be able to operate freely.

Just stop it. Admit that Wanda is one of the single greatest threats to the mutant universe ever and we will drop the matter.

The cover up was at the start of HOM. The decision to not have her locked up was at the end of CC.

Yes, but they wanted to kill her prior to House of M. Remember, her Avengers friends wanted to do that, because of they knew from Disassembled and Darker than Scarlett about the villainy they faced.

Bendis and Remender I think still had stories to tell, so I think they just resolved it to the degree that Wanda could walk around freely. Obviously many mutants were still mad, so marvel wasn't ready to completely put the matter to rest yet.

susan did not make a mistake there, nor did kitty and the x-men when kitty was dying. but scarlet helped him to practice some form of necromancy and who knows what other forms of black magic or satanic rituals. so there is a major difference.

The difference is, is that they were doing things to save their friends, Wanda was doing it out of vengeance. She wanted to make the Avengers, her friends, pay for what they had done to her.

He was using dark magic merged science for Valeria's delivery. He used her as his familiar in Unthinkable.

Which is why you should never ally yourself with Doom.

[gurkle]

I disagree. The signs of Wanda's villainy started during Byrne's darker than Scarlett Story. Her corruption began waaaaay back then. This led to Disassembled, which in turn led to House of M.

No, that doesn't make sense even if you ignore the fact that she recovered the memories of her children after the Darker Than Scarlet story, or that she was the victim of a plot by Immortus, or that every single hero has been driven mad at some point. It doesn't make sense because in Darker Than Scarlet she became a crazy mutant supremacist, and there is no possible way to get from that to "she hates being a mutant and wants to wipe them out." Avengers Disassembled, maybe, if you accept the in-story explanation that it's not really her fault and she doesn't know what she's doing. (But Bendis being Bendis, he has different characters say at different times that she's deliberately killing them and that she's not; he can't make up his mind and leaves it up to us whether she's guilty.) But certainly not HoM.

Again, if you need to ignore continuity to enjoy a story, that's fine. Stories don't have to line up with everything. But you needn't go around pretending this makes more sense than "a super villain was mind controlling her," because that fits way more with her history than the idea that she would ever be malicious against her own team or her own people. And that's why HoM is a bad story; not because a good person goes bad, but because there's no buildup and no justification, and you can't enjoy it unless you haven't read the character's history.

[Majin_O.A.W.]

No, that doesn't make sense even if you ignore the fact that she recovered the memories of her children after the Darker Than Scarlet story, or that she was the victim of a plot by Immortus, or that every single hero has been driven mad at some point. It doesn't make sense because in Darker Than Scarlet she became a crazy mutant supremacist, and there is no possible way to get from that to "she hates being a mutant and wants to wipe them out." Avengers Disassembled, maybe, if you accept the in-story explanation that it's not really her fault and she doesn't know what she's doing. (But Bendis being Bendis, he has different characters say at different times that she's deliberately killing them and that she's not; he can't make up his mind and leaves it up to us whether she's guilty.) But certainly not HoM.

Again, if you need to ignore continuity to enjoy a story, that's fine. Stories don't have to line up with everything. But you needn't go around pretending this makes more sense than "a super villain was mind controlling her," because that fits way more with her history than the idea that she would ever be malicious against her own team or her own people. And that's why HoM is a bad story; not because a good person goes bad, but because there's no buildup and no justification, and you can't enjoy it unless you haven't read the character's history.

How was she controlled when she sought Doom out in the first place? How was she controlled when she wished vengeance on the Avengers. No this was not the case. The seeds of her corruption run deep. Plus she wasn't she a founding member of the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants? One could argue that Wanda was never quite comfortable with the trappings of a hero and simply resorted back to her villainous ways.

[Mark]

Think of it this way. Take two disaster movies, the Poseidon Adventure and the Towering Inferno. in the Poseidon adventure there was no real fault, it was a natural disaster. Maybe you could have faulted the captain of that ship for not getting or paying attention to a report of tidal wave if one was available, but I don't know enough about seamanship to know if that was even possible. The story was about the people who made through that ship to be rescued. In the Towering Inferno you had a man-made disaster so the movie was not only about the people who made it through the fire, it was about why the fire happened and who was at fault. In the first case fault wasn't really there and the one person who might be held accountable went down with his ship, in the second case there was a person responsible. The idea that he wouldn't be brought to some sort of justice means to me that the story is lacking somewhat.
The comic book story to me is a story of stopping the bad guy and getting justice of some sort out of the situation. Jean faced her justice (in the original story) and faced it unflinchingly. She died to stop it from ever happening again. If the plant people of that planet got any justice at all it was through her actions. The people Wanda depowered will not get any sort of justice and part of the reason is the bad writing that put her there and the callous editing that keeps the situation murky. It is not a real situation anymore than the movies I noted, but in a fictional situation you rely on the author to know the characters, write the characters and make the story clear enough to be resolved and marvel did none of that. To me at least that puts it beyond the range of a good story and Wanda either got away with multiple deaths and maiming or Doom got away with it. If it were Doom I can see it, he's a villain and to him causing trouble is one of the job requirements. But Wanda is supposed to be one of the good guys. With no satisfactory resolution I can't count her as one of the good guys.

I would have been OK with that, but it's not going to happen. Brevoort's said they're not going to go back and retell the story. A vague "Doom was somehow at fault" thing was all we got in AXIS and is all we're going to get, especially now that Secret Wars might change the characters in some ways.

The explanation is vague because we have here a very powerful writer (Bendis) with a very popular story (House of M) who presumably does not want his story completely overturned and rejected. So Children's Crusade constantly threaded the needle to retcon stuff without really changing it. Nothing about Disassembled was actually changed, for example - the only thing that happened is that instead of dying, Scott Lang was plucked from the timestream as the explosion happened, but we didn't see the body in Disassembled so the story is still exactly the same. Doom's confession, or Hawkeye maybe sleeping with a Doombot, were ambiguous enough that we could still, if we wanted, believe that Bendis's stories happened exactly the way he wanted them to happen.

I don't mind people not liking the explanation, but I think people who say "Doom must be lying, here's why" are being a little trollish. There is no way to "prove" what happened because it's all made-up. We have here a situation where readers are given the freedom to choose one of multiple explanations for what happened in Disassembled and House of M, and those of us who choose the "Wanda is innocent and being mind-controlled by Doom all along" explanation are simply playing by the rules.

What I don't understand, again, is the people who are obsessed with the idea that someone must be "punished" for the mutants who fell out of the sky and the mutants who got depowered. Those things nearly all happened in books where Wanda didn't appear, and are exactly the same no matter whose "fault" they are. It's like, if you do a story about the fate of the broccoli people, I don't really care if it was Jean or a separate entity who ate the planet; the story is about the broccoli people and what happened to them. But some readers of Decimation have become obsessed with the idea that the only possible ending to the story is to identify a culprit and punish them, and I don't understand the thinking.

[Mark]

I think marvel has discovered that a story can be terribly plotted, have no real resolution and completely trash a character and it will sell anyway. So long as that is true they don't really have to care and they can be as careless and callous with the characters as they want. As noted by gurkle some fans really don't care about continuity, so marvel can be as lazy as they want to be about it and it won't matter to the sales figures. In the end in my opinion that's all that matters to them.

I think Marvel are having their cake and eating it too. They've never clarified what happened, and as you said, the story as it exists allows for a few valid interpretations. If they don't want to revisit it, and explain what happened, then bringing it up, and hinting about it; (like in Axis), is just trolling a divided and frustrated readership.

The thing with the broccoli people, is that aside from their death, they have no other presence. In theory, of course they matter, in practice no one gives a damn about them. We know nothing about them other than their death. No emotional investment. And Jean paid a huge price, for something that wasn't her fault. That story was never really about the broccoli people.
HoM affected characters who've been in hundreds of comics, with real fans, in a lasting way. It also completely changed where the X-Franchise went. I'd like to hear a proper ending for the story; and I think Breevort is wrong not to allow it.

A trial doesn't have to be a witch hunt. I hear what you're saying about some fans not being satisfied until she's strung up: I don't think that's the only possible, (or even likely) outcome. The thing with CC is that even in story, the writer was throwing doubt on her exoneration. It's not surprising that not all fans accept it. Especially when Bendis really went to town making her guilty, and the X-books spent years describing the consequences. So yes, I think there should be some consequences for whoever it was who was responsible.

(Does Wanda even remember what happened out of interest? They took away her memory in CC, which I hate. Hated it with Iron Man post Civil war too.)

[Mark]

I think one reason it would be good to have a trial of some sort is that in a trial we could at last have the facts of what happened (even if they made up or arbitrarily decided upon) and the characters could react to those facts in a way that would illuminate their attitudes and beliefs. But again it takes strong, intelligent and patient writing and for this subject I think marvel would rather have Wanda as a lightning rod to stir up controversy.