ANOLE [Victor Borkowski]
BLING! [Roxanne ‘Roxy’ Washington]
CULLEN BLOODSTONE
DAKEN AKIHIRO
HULKLING [Theodore ‘Teddy’ Altman]
KARMA [Xi’an Coy Mahn]
KAROLINA DEAN
LOKI LAUFEYSON, God of Mischief
MOONDRAGON [Heather Douglas]
MYSTIQUE [Raven Darkholme]
NORTHSTAR [Jean-Paul Beaubier]
PRODIGY [David Alleyne]
RICTOR [Julio Esteban Ricter]
SHATTERSTAR [Gaveedra-7]
WICCAN [William ‘Billy’ Kaplan], the Demiurge
I feel like Tini was trying to lampshade the "these two characters are gay and in the same book and therefore will eventually be paired with each other" trope, but like most of Excalibur, it was poorly executed. There was also a privilege and entitlement angle as the kiss was not really consensual. Cullen came off very badly, I guess he's just a villain now.
I wish I was happier about Rictor being a regular in one of the main x-books after years of limbo... sigh.
I don't know if that's fair. Personally I have been enjoying EXCALIBUR (and STRIKEFORCE). I am not exactly thrilled with the direction that Cullen's character is going here, but in general I have been enjoying Tini Howard's work on both of these series.
As for Cullen, although I'm disappointed to see him going down this path I also can't say that it comes entirely out of the blue. As Cullen himself put it...
cullen-villain.jpg
I'm not caught up on Excalibur, but I've been hearing people complain about Cullen's portrayal there. If it's really that bad, hopefully some future writer can soft retcon it by saying it was the Glartrox messing with his behavior or something like that. The perks of having a literal monster living inside of a character, I guess...
Oh, that's nice to hear. I honestly didn't think that was ever going to be brought back.
Everyone will like different things, but I find both titles very weak.
In Excalibur, Betsy is acting all weak and conflicted and cow towing to Apocalypse, while eveyone else is getting barely any light and the changes she has made, like to Rictor, are unexplored and underdeveloped. Pacing is off, everything is rushed.
I have no issue with Cullen being a villain, I have issue with the type of villain, the weak racism and sudden transformation into posh snob stereotype. It's weak.
In Strikeforce, characters fare a little better, but are still background noise half the time, with the pacing super slow instead. Plus, Im against that title for continuing the awful Daimon redesign anyway, as I admit some bias there.
Last edited by legion_quest; 03-05-2020 at 02:54 AM.
I will raise my throne above the Stars of God
I agree that Cullen going darkside isn't exactly out of the blue, and writers aging up teenage characters to suit plot isn't new either. It's just the execution of Cullen's turn to villainy that's a headscratcher. This particular flavor of it - fox-hunting, "polite" racism, snooty aristocrat villainy - is pretty much out of nowhere.
Also have to point out...
Just because writers have done it before doesn't mean it isn't bad writing and doesn't suck.
I'm more inclined to go "subtext" with it as opposed to "queerbaiting". To an extent, I think Hickman is doing what Claremont was with Destiny and Mystique, Byrne and Mantlo were with Northstar, or, for a more recent example, or Pak was with Hercules - pushing up against the boundaries of what editorial will let him get away with vs what he'd make explicit if he could.
Buuuuut context means that's about as far as I'm willing to go. As said, Hickman knew going in there was no way in hell that Marvel was going to be OK with an unequivocal depiction of four of the franchise's most recognizable characters in a queer poly 'ship and, at the same time, unlike Byrne and Claremont, Hickman had actual out characters he could have given some spotlight in addition to the subtext (Karma over in New Mutants for example). That, combined holding Mystique's murdered wife over her head when Xavier has no intention of bringing her back and the heavy implication that this will be what drives her to undermine Krakoa... meh.
I'm not mad. There's enough rep upcoming to keep me happy, in fact. But I'm not giving Marvel credit for the tittering innuendo either.
Last edited by Anduinel; 03-06-2020 at 11:06 PM.
I don't think aging up teen characters is bad writing in and of itself. The passage of time in the books is always inconsistent, and while it would be nice if there was an internal rule of "teen characters created in X year real time will be adults by X year real time", apparently it's up to individual writers. Such are the perils of reading content created in a sprawling, barely-tracked IP farm. In this case, I don't think it was altogether necessary to age Cullen up to make him a villain (I'm assuming the kiss with Ric was more the motivation anyway), but that part honestly wouldn't particularly bug me if he'd been more in character. It's the shoehorning of Cullen into that role at all that's baffling.
Last edited by Anduinel; 03-06-2020 at 11:07 PM.
HALLUM: imma name this good boy after my best friend cullen bunn
MARVEL: cullen's coming back
US: POG
US: no wait **** take it back
I don't blind date I make the direct market vibrate
I see it as queerbaiting precisely because of that: he could’ve chosen actual queer characters to be the representation of the flagship book, or at least existing characters that editorial would be more willing to let him out. What bothers me is that he’s using the characters that we know he probably won’t ever out, so he is deliberately using the “queer card” to bring attention to his work, while knowing that he won’t actually be able to give us a real representation. That is queerbaiting, if you ask me. Claremont didn’t have a choice other than to do what he did back then. Hickman does now. He’s an amazing writer, but I think he still has a long way to go when it comes to queer rep. His previous queer characters (Stonewall and POD) are an example of how he hasn’t really done much to highlight queer characters being queer. He never officially outed Jerry, and Al Ewing did more for Aikku’s sexuality than him.
That is not a criticism of the entire DOX line, however. Like you said, there are other books with proper queer rep and I’m thankful for them.