Your Unpopular/Controversial Opinions on the X-Universe

[gonnagiveittoya]

What are you talking about?

There are some...let's call them influential stan accounts on sites like Twitter and the like that are outraged over From The Ashes (fresh over being outraged over 97 synergy till the show actually released) who were very, very insistent that if you didn't like Krakoa or even just certain elements of it, you were a regressive bigot who must want to only see minorities suffer who just wants to go back to the old status quo. Which is a lot harder stance for them to take now that they're the ones wanting to go back to a previous status quo

[marhawkman]

Hm, no? The brothel were Stacy X worked was actually funded by... Worthington Industries. Warren was really pissed off when he discovered his money were invested in activities like that one. Might be wrong, but the team actually went to the brothel because Warren discovered he owned a share of it.

I agree on hating the obscene treatment Stacy got from the team at the time, especially at first. Later (to push for Warren/Paige I think), she was written as annoying and the treatment (while still unwarranted) made more sense.
Her confrontation with Wolverine, where she rants about Warren being an hypocrite and where she stands by/owns up her choice to be a prostitute, is a brilliant scene IMHO. I'm usually no fan of Wolverine, but he was very good in that scene. I'm glad she was used in a better way in Krakoa.

Oh, oops, forgot who ran that thing. Still though, Xavier, Warren, and Emma had companies doing... weird stuff.

[Galen Nycroft]

Certain X-Men characters need to be retired, as their stories and character arcs are basically over. Storm, Nightcrawler, Beast, Colossus, Magneto...time for them to be sunset in favor of other mutants.

Even though the Krakoan era fell apart after Hickman left, it did showcase lesser used mutants and X-Men characters (such as my favorite Synch).

How will we ever get the next legacy characters if the same four or five X-Men, whose stories are finished, are used in every damn iteration of the X-Men? I am not saying all the legacy X-Men characters' stories are over, just Storm, Nightcrawler, Colossus, Beast, and Magneto. There is nothing left to do with these characters. Emma Frost is getting dangerously close to this mark where SHE needs to be retired for a while.

[Havok83]

Certain X-Men characters need to be retired, as their stories and character arcs are basically over. Storm, Nightcrawler, Beast, Colossus, Magneto...time for them to be sunset in favor of other mutants.

Even though the Krakoan era fell apart after Hickman left, it did showcase lesser used mutants and X-Men characters (such as my favorite Synch).

How will we ever get the next legacy characters if the same four or five X-Men, whose stories are finished, are used in every damn iteration of the X-Men? I am not saying all the legacy X-Men characters' stories are over, just Storm, Nightcrawler, Colossus, Beast, and Magneto. There is nothing left to do with these characters. Emma Frost is getting dangerously close to this mark where SHE needs to be retired for a while.

You'll potentially get that in Exceptional X-men

[marhawkman]

X-Men has had the old tradition of having characters semi-retire and just... use the main cast with someone new and just leave the old cast... over there.... doing... not this.

[the illustrious mr. kenway]

X-Men has had the old tradition of having characters semi-retire and just... use the main cast with someone new and just leave the old cast... over there.... doing... not this.

Unlike the other Marvel properties, X-men feels built for a passing of the guard. So having the generations pass the torch on would be great.

[Havok83]

X-Men has had the old tradition of having characters semi-retire and just... use the main cast with someone new and just leave the old cast... over there.... doing... not this.

I feel like this was ever really only done with the Original X-men and their partners

[Galen Nycroft]

You'll potentially get that in Exceptional X-men

Yes! This is actually the book I am most optimistic about. Hoping for more than those three new characters revealed.

[Johnrevenge]

You'll potentially get that in Exceptional X-men

More like future background characters. As soon as the book ends and Ewing leaves they'll be quickly forgotten. Not worthy the time nor money to get invested in them. Also the designs and names are boring and generic. Carnero is a great interior artist, but a bad character designer.

[marhawkman]

I feel like this was ever really only done with the Original X-men and their partners

I liked the Academy era for this, as... yes the old characters are there, but they're teachers and the students are the main stars.

[Havok83]

I liked the Academy era for this, as... yes the old characters are there, but they're teachers and the students are the main stars.

Yeah but those teachers were still main X-men in other books. Its not like the Academy X students had taken their place as new X-men (no pun intended)

[bat39]

The anti-woke backlash to X-Men 97 is disappointing but not at all surprising. The franchise has an undeniably progressive premise but the execution of that premise over the decades has also appealed to far right audiences, or at least hasn't exactly scared them away.

For as much as fans brag that the best X-Men characters are the women, it's no secret that the franchise's most popular and marketed character is Wolverine, a white guy who can best be described as a cross between Dirty Harry, James Bond and a slasher villain and whose solo stories contain questionable writing choices regarding women and non-white people.

That's not even getting into how the team originally consisted of four guys and one girl, all of whom were white. Or how four out of the five most prominent mutant leaders (Professor X, Magneto, Cyclops, Wolverine and Storm) are white men. Or how objectified women are (though that isn't limited to X-Men).

Leaving aside the many issues with taking the 'mutant metaphor' too literally as a metaphor for any particular minority group, I think the the big fallacy with this argument is an assumption that there's some consistent universal idea of what's 'progressive' that absolutely everybody can agree too, and which is in complete alignment with whatever a corporation may position as being 'progressive' in order to appeal to certain influential political individuals and groups.

Like, I'm sure there are a lot of people who appreciate the X-men franchise for the message of hope and tolerance and embracing differences without necessarily agreeing with every aspect of corporatized 'DEI' and its manifestation in media products.

And ultimately, the franchise isn't just about a single 'message'. There's tons of stuff about these characters that appeals to people on multiple levels. Wolverine's inner struggle with his darker impulses, coupled with the 'coolness' factor of being an all-round badass superhero/soldier/spy/samurai can easily appeals to millions of casual and hardcore fans who don't necessarily share every political view of the creators.

Unlike the other Marvel properties, X-men feels built for a passing of the guard. So having the generations pass the torch on would be great.

True. Then again, its the very nature of a 'brand' and 'franchise IP' to be unchanging, and to preserve its characters - as far as possible - in amber.

The 'passing of the torch' from the O5 to the 'All New All Different' X-men worked because the Silver Age X-men were B-listers (if not C-listers) at best. Claremont put the characters on the map, and for better or worse, that's been the base template of the franchise. Hell, Claremont's own desire to retire Cyclops failed and he was brought back eventually, along with resurrecting Jean. Its the O5 and ANAD characters who remain the pivots around which the X-men turn, with a handful of later additions (Gambit and Jubilee spring to mind) who've also persisted.

[NK1988]

Maybe it would have been better if the X-office was a separate thing where characters could age and move on.

This is something I see championed a lot by more casual fans. I've been told many times that the "solo universe " adaptations, where only mutants exist, like the Fox movies or X-Men Evolution, "just make more sense" for several reasons. Although usually the main listed reason is "why are mutants always on the verge of genocide when there are superpeople everywhere and and folks like the Fantastic Four are public celebrities."

[marhawkman]

This is something I see championed a lot by more casual fans. I've been told many times that the "solo universe " adaptations, where only mutants exist, like the Fox movies or X-Men Evolution, "just make more sense" for several reasons. Although usually the main listed reason is "why are mutants always on the verge of genocide when there are superpeople everywhere and and folks like the Fantastic Four are public celebrities."

The obvious solution is to have bad guys with goals other than "exterminate Mutants".

[Agent Z]

Kelly Hu's Lady Deathstrike is a better character than the comic version who's just an Orientalist joke with shallow writing.