All New X-Factor 12 Preview (Spoilers)

[jmc247]

The irony here is Pietro is doing the very thing that people were hating on Gambit and Havok for doing earlier in the book. The only difference is Gambit and Havok had legit reasons to feel like they needed to look out for Lorna and were criticized for it while Pietro is being praised for doing the very same thing but with less justification. Seems a bit unfair that apparently the only person allowed to have a seemingly patronizing attitude towards Lorna is Quicksilver. Or rather that he gets the benefit of the doubt for his wanting to watch out for her being sincere while Gambit and Havok apparently were just being sexist earlier in the run.

I never had a problem with Gambit, Pietro, or Havok 'looking out' for Lorna in the terms you are thinking of and don't now. From Lorna's prospective though I suspect she is still not going to be happy in the least at Havok or Pietro when she finds out what transpired in the past. Then of course she has her boss 'watching' her every move as well. I somewhat suspect she won't be happy with that either.

[salarta]

I understood your point, I am just not buying into it. I completely agree that the writers and editors determine the character's personality & actions. No denying that. However, I do not believe that Peter David saw the sales figures for ANXF and decided to have Alex refer to X-Factor as a "B-Team" because those sales aren't as high as Uncanny Avengers. No writer in their right mind would diminish the value of their characters because the sales on their title aren't doing as great as they would like. That's self sabotage.

There are three things I need to say to that. One: I'm not saying definitively that Peter David's basing anything on sales, my primary point was that I think it's perfectly reasonable to speculate that may be the case. Two: It's not self-sabotage to admit something hardcore readers and certainly the executives and editors at Marvel notice, it's self-awareness. Three: The writer is not diminishing the value of the characters by any means, only acknowledging the state of the book.

On that second point, every single person knows that the Avengers are considered the "absolute best" team right now, the Marvel equivalent of DC's Justice League where all the characters considered most important in the entire line of books are grouped together, while X-Factor is a spinoff team of the X-books that at the time of ANXF #12 has almost no involvement with the rest of the Marvel universe. If the Avengers was a team of equal standing to X-Factor, then you'd be right, but in this case Marvel itself treats the Avengers like the single best thing in the history of ever and disregards the value of ANXF. It's incredibly easy to speak of the two in this way without sabotaging anything.

On the third point, Marvel is constantly bending over backwards to advertise and promote the Avengers books and everything about them, primarily because they own the rights to the Avengers for film purposes. By contrast, Marvel has never given All-New X-Factor, or even the last run of X-Factor at least since Lorna joined the team and probably earlier, even the most minimal of needed promotion. The state of the book isn't intrinsically related to quality of the book or interest in the characters. Those are definitely factors, but Marvel's lack of proper support for the book is the primary cause of low sales. Almost all the promotion of ANXF has had to be from Peter David putting in his own effort to spread the word, while events like Original Sin or Axis get tons of promotion, and books like Magneto or Wood's X-Men get pushed out into mainstream news for promotion. You could claim that those articles are purely those publications pursuing Marvel for what they find interesting, but I find that unlikely. I think it's far more likely that Marvel has certain things they really want outside news organizations to report, and will alert certain agencies to it. I expect this because it's exactly what happens in the video game industry: if a company wants a publication to report on a game they're putting out, they at the very least send out promotional items, teasers, images and information for those publications to use, with an expectation for those publications to make an announcement for them.

If there's little to no promotion of ANXF #14, then I think it'll be safe to say that definitively proves how little support Marvel itself is willing to properly offer ANXF regardless of sales numbers. Lorna and Wanda interacting for the first time in a decade is something countless people want to see, and it's the sort of thing that fits in perfectly with what Marvel has been trying to do in looking progressive and inclusive toward women. "We're providing you with a female Thor" or "We have an all-female X-Men team" is quite different from "Check it out, we're finally doing something with a sister-sister dynamic! This is just one of our many future things to get women up to equal footing as all the father-son and brother-brother stuff we have here at Marvel."

Salarta – that is an interesting take you got going on there with the characters being written with sales in mind because the writers do - I don't agree. I think all that was being said, was the fourth wall was not going to be broken by things fans know. And I can't subscribe to the idea that characters are written with sales figures of their books in mind. They aren't real and it doesn't matter. As for what Havok said, he was clearly being egotistical and just assumed that QS would want to be on a hero team instead of one that has been hired. A team that may or may not help humanity because they are not paid to do so.

Are characters written with attitudes and have egos in regards to what they do, sure. I see that. Havok thinks his team is superior to X-Factor because of goals. IMO.

I think writers write the stories they think will be entertaining and hope that fans like what they have written. Do they worry about sales, sure. Do they make it apart of a character's personality trait, I don't think so. Just my view though.

As for the preview, not bad. I'm glad QS walked out on Havok.

Main thing I'm saying is that they can be written with sales figures in mind, it doesn't necessarily mean that's what's happening. Whether or not a writer wants to incorporate sales into their book as some meta play is purely up to them, and I'd see absolutely nothing wrong with it if that was the case here. If it was the case, then I hope that helps propel the book into more of the no-holds-barred awesomeness it's capable of. X-Factor's status as a "lesser" book means it can try new, fresh and exciting things and be safe for doing so, while Avengers is really kind of stuck because all eyes are on them and any controversy could be the one that destroys that book. As long as the characters are written respectfully, now's the time above all others for ANXF to start showing off some very new and different ideas that can't be done on Avengers. ANXF is a good book, but its premise has a lot of unique promise that still needs to be tapped into.

[Quicksilverfan]

I'd also have to say the same for Peter David since ANXF #7, and I think in terms of ensuring quality, it's harder for writers than artists. Artists, you can look at a picture and see what's wrong right away, usually as you're doing it. You can get a little of that with writing, but by and large it's really difficult to just see it immediately if there's a problem. As amazing as art can be, a person could also take a glance at it and absorb it, while you have to devote more time to looking at and thinking about story.

That is actually totally untrue about artists and their work. Artists do not in fact see what is wrong with their picture "right away". Sometimes they do and sometimes they don't. For instance, Carmine does make mistakes in his work, mostly having to do with perspective, but I'm willing to look past it because doing what he does at the speed he does is hard.
I tend to think writing is easier simply because a writer would already know the english language. You don't need to look up reference to say the things you want to say. With drawing, and of course some artists have better visual memories than others, you need to find reference photos for most everything that you draw.

I kind of think Pietro would've wanted to join X-Factor anyway regardless of whether or not Alex asked Pietro to spy on Lorna for him, purely because of what happened during X-Factor #260. Actually, do we know for sure that Alex first proposed Pietro joining X-Factor? I don't have the issues in front of me to look at old ones, but I think it's possible Pietro could've suggested his joining the team and Alex attached a request/demand for Pietro to include spying and reporting back. Possibly in exchange for the Avengers on standby to provide funding or support if something went awry.

Following X-Factor 260, it seems Pietro was really hurt by the fact Polaris opened fire on him. So I don't know if he would be all that into joining x-facctor if not for alex telling him to spy on Lorna.

I'd still like to see Nurse Annie around on ANXF as a supporting character. I think the dynamic between them could be pretty amusing now that Alex is out of the picture for both of them. I also know Peter David's liked using less appreciated characters, and the common consensus toward Annie seems to be hatred. Getting people to like her would be an interesting challenge for a writer.

No to nurse Annie. That whole story with her and Havok and Polaris made everyone look bad. I don't even know what her purpose was in the story beyond breaking up Lorna and Havok. I'd rather not revisit the character, as it'll trigger horrible memories of Alex's and Lorna's aborted wedding.

[Andru]

There are three things I need to say to that. One: I'm not saying definitively that Peter David's basing anything on sales, my primary point was that I think it's perfectly reasonable to speculate that may be the case. Two: It's not self-sabotage to admit something hardcore readers and certainly the executives and editors at Marvel notice, it's self-awareness. Three: The writer is not diminishing the value of the characters by any means, only acknowledging the state of the book.

Essentially we are having a debate about something else entirely now...My main point is that the fictional characters of Marvel don't roam around discussing whose title sold better last month. It just doesn't happen. You aren't going to see Gambit calling up Rogue begging her to take him back because he is afraid ANXF is going to be canceled and he'd rather be in Uncanny Avengers.

I understand the points you are making, I just don't think they fit here.

[Quicksilverfan]

I love this preview! That was "meta" indeed! I can only hope this means the discussion between Havok and Pietro mirrors the discussions between editors and writers, and Quicksilver gets to stay in X-FACTOR for as long as PAD wants to write him. Everything Pietro and Havok said resonated with the real-world and made me feel quite satisfied. Alex is just incapable of thinking through the consequences of his behavior and words; that's been the consistent portrayal over in UNCANNY AVENGERS and for years before that. But Pietro has been very self-centered and lacking in empathy, too. This is character-growth for Quicksilver. I like to think that this is the result of him being with his other sister, as he says; he needs to take care of a sister, kind of his thing since the 1960s.

As a Quicksilver fan, I must speak up: Pietro is not self-centered and lacking in empathy. He is aloof but he does care about people. Case in point: In Avengers Academy, he recognizes that Finesse has trouble identifying people's emotions so he gives her a document to help her with that. He also saves Juston's sentinel in AvX even though he isn't fond of Sentinels. Prior to that, in Mighty Avengers, he's clearly worried about US Agent being arrested (or demoted, I forget exactly) by Osborn. He responds to Amadeus Cho call for help in "Siege". And there are many MANY other instances of Pietro doing good deeds for people, but I don't want to bore you. Point is, Pietro may pretend he doesn't care about people, but his actions clearly demonstrate he does.

[Quicksilverfan]

Being fair to Alex though you can't blame him for the wedding at all, that was all Austen putting himself and his family into the comics, leaving Lorna as the odd woman out...now though PAD seems intent on making Alex look as bad as possible as often as possible. Remender is using Alex as his mouthpiece and PAD seems to have HATED Alex for awhile now. Alex is being written badly to make Pietro and the team look better, in truth this X-Factor is a B team no matter how many fans think otherwise.

Got a question for you, since you clearly are a fan of Havok: where was Havok written well? The few things I've read of him, he's always been a bit of a flake who's afraid of not measuring up to his brother. Also, I don't think PAD is intent on making Alex look bad. He's only been in ANXF three / four times and it's all seemed in-character, at least to me.

[Neko]

Essentially we are having a debate about something else entirely now...My main point is that the fictional characters of Marvel don't roam around discussing whose title sold better last month. It just doesn't happen. You aren't going to see Gambit calling up Rogue begging her to take him back because he is afraid ANXF is going to be canceled and he'd rather be in Uncanny Avengers.

I understand the points you are making, I just don't think they fit here.

Thank you - thought I was helping you in explaining it but I guess I failed.

[LoganAlpha30X33]

That is actually totally untrue about artists and their work. Artists do not in fact see what is wrong with their picture "right away". Sometimes they do and sometimes they don't. For instance, Carmine does make mistakes in his work, mostly having to do with perspective, but I'm willing to look past it because doing what he does at the speed he does is hard.
I tend to think writing is easier simply because a writer would already know the english language. You don't need to look up reference to say the things you want to say. With drawing, and of course some artists have better visual memories than others, you need to find reference photos for most everything that you draw.



Following X-Factor 260, it seems Pietro was really hurt by the fact Polaris opened fire on him. So I don't know if he would be all that into joining x-facctor if not for alex telling him to spy on Lorna.


No to nurse Annie. That whole story with her and Havok and Polaris made everyone look bad. I don't even know what her purpose was in the story beyond breaking up Lorna and Havok. I'd rather not revisit the character, as it'll trigger horrible memories of Alex's and Lorna's aborted wedding.

Annie's purpose was to be the comic book version of Austen's wife, as he wrote Alex as himself, hence the sudden overwhelming interest in Nurse Annie...not to mention Annie's kid had the power to connect Alex and Annie in their dreams and "help" their romance. Though the way things are going this version of X-Factor could end very badly.

[Quicksilverfan]

On the third point, Marvel is constantly bending over backwards to advertise and promote the Avengers books and everything about them, primarily because they own the rights to the Avengers for film purposes. By contrast, Marvel has never given All-New X-Factor, or even the last run of X-Factor at least since Lorna joined the team and probably earlier, even the most minimal of needed promotion. The state of the book isn't intrinsically related to quality of the book or interest in the characters. Those are definitely factors, but Marvel's lack of proper support for the book is the primary cause of low sales. Almost all the promotion of ANXF has had to be from Peter David putting in his own effort to spread the word, while events like Original Sin or Axis get tons of promotion, and books like Magneto or Wood's X-Men get pushed out into mainstream news for promotion.

I don't really follow you. Marvel wouldn't publish a book if it's secretly hoping for its demise. ANXF had better numbers at the beginning but they are dropping. That's not a fault with promotion, that's people who picked up the title and for whatever reason decided to drop it (I think a lot of the people who dropped were past X-Factor fans who were disappointed with the completely new cast and new premise for the book)
Here's the thing with X-Factor: it's biggest star is Gambit, and last I checked, Gambit doesn't have the name recognition of Spiderman, Iron Man, Wolverine and what have you. Even if Marvel promotes the hell out of it, there's still going to be a sizeable portion of the comic book fandom who are going to say "None of these characters interest me, therefore screw this book". Be honest Salarta, if Polaris wasn't a part of this book, would you have picked it up? In my case, if Pietro wasn't in it, I wouldn't have.
I doubt X-Factor was ever meant to be a "summer blockbuster", it's more of an "indie" which has a smaller but dedicated following. You don't give the same promotional push for indies that you do for summer blockbuster. Not to mention that there is no "big stake storyline" to center the promotion around. So far we've had the team being gathered, and the story about Georgia. Not exactly world-shattering, or character-changing stuff that would interest newbies to the title.

If there's little to no promotion of ANXF #14, then I think it'll be safe to say that definitively proves how little support Marvel itself is willing to properly offer ANXF regardless of sales numbers. Lorna and Wanda interacting for the first time in a decade is something countless people want to see, and it's the sort of thing that fits in perfectly with what Marvel has been trying to do in looking progressive and inclusive toward women. "We're providing you with a female Thor" or "We have an all-female X-Men team" is quite different from "Check it out, we're finally doing something with a sister-sister dynamic! This is just one of our many future things to get women up to equal footing as all the father-son and brother-brother stuff we have here at Marvel."

Although I'm interested in seeing Lorna and Wanda interact, I don't see why that would deserve a promotion. And honestly, if I were Marvel, I wouldn't call attention to the fact it's taken 50 years to have two sisters in a comic. That's the sort of thing you keep quiet about and hope nobody brings up.

[Andru]

Thank you - thought I was helping you in explaining it but I guess I failed.

No worries, we're on the same page

[salarta]

That is actually totally untrue about artists and their work. Artists do not in fact see what is wrong with their picture "right away". Sometimes they do and sometimes they don't. For instance, Carmine does make mistakes in his work, mostly having to do with perspective, but I'm willing to look past it because doing what he does at the speed he does is hard.
I tend to think writing is easier simply because a writer would already know the english language. You don't need to look up reference to say the things you want to say. With drawing, and of course some artists have better visual memories than others, you need to find reference photos for most everything that you draw.

I'm not saying artists see problems immediately, only that they're typically easier to spot compared to writing problems. It takes more time to read one sentence than it takes to take a quick glance at a piece of artwork. That doesn't mean every possible problem with art will immediately present itself with a glance, just that it's easier to spot.

Following X-Factor 260, it seems Pietro was really hurt by the fact Polaris opened fire on him. So I don't know if he would be all that into joining x-facctor if not for alex telling him to spy on Lorna.

No to nurse Annie. That whole story with her and Havok and Polaris made everyone look bad. I don't even know what her purpose was in the story beyond breaking up Lorna and Havok. I'd rather not revisit the character, as it'll trigger horrible memories of Alex's and Lorna's aborted wedding.

That's a fair point. I may be overestimating Pietro's willingness to put himself potentially at risk for the sake of Lorna, given they hadn't spent much time together after Genosha. As for Nurse Annie, I disagree, but we can always have differing opinions on that.

Essentially we are having a debate about something else entirely now...My main point is that the fictional characters of Marvel don't roam around discussing whose title sold better last month. It just doesn't happen. You aren't going to see Gambit calling up Rogue begging her to take him back because he is afraid ANXF is going to be canceled and he'd rather be in Uncanny Avengers.

I understand the points you are making, I just don't think they fit here.

Ah, then I misunderstood the intent behind your original message. In the case of what you described here, I completely agree with you. Even if their activities are still detailed in comics in-universe, unless a character explicitly says something about it, I doubt they actually go around discussing whose title sold better, just as you said.

I don't really follow you. Marvel wouldn't publish a book if it's secretly hoping for its demise. ANXF had better numbers at the beginning but they are dropping. That's not a fault with promotion, that's people who picked up the title and for whatever reason decided to drop it (I think a lot of the people who dropped were past X-Factor fans who were disappointed with the completely new cast and new premise for the book)
Here's the thing with X-Factor: it's biggest star is Gambit, and last I checked, Gambit doesn't have the name recognition of Spiderman, Iron Man, Wolverine and what have you. Even if Marvel promotes the hell out of it, there's still going to be a sizeable portion of the comic book fandom who are going to say "None of these characters interest me, therefore screw this book". Be honest Salarta, if Polaris wasn't a part of this book, would you have picked it up? In my case, if Pietro wasn't in it, I wouldn't have.

I doubt X-Factor was ever meant to be a "summer blockbuster", it's more of an "indie" which has a smaller but dedicated following. You don't give the same promotional push for indies that you do for summer blockbuster. Not to mention that there is no "big stake storyline" to center the promotion around. So far we've had the team being gathered, and the story about Georgia. Not exactly world-shattering, or character-changing stuff that would interest newbies to the title.

I don't think I said anything that made that kind of suggestion. What I said was that Marvel isn't giving the book the kind of promotion it needs. That's different from saying Marvel is actively trying to prevent it from selling. Not giving it the kind of promotion it needs can be based on a number of factors, such as thinking Peter David can promote it fine on his own without their help. Marvel not promoting ANXF like it should hurts sales, but it's not inherently malicious and doesn't automatically mean Marvel is trying to make it fail.

Although I'm interested in seeing Lorna and Wanda interact, I don't see why that would deserve a promotion. And honestly, if I were Marvel, I wouldn't call attention to the fact it's taken 50 years to have two sisters in a comic. That's the sort of thing you keep quiet about and hope nobody brings up.

It deserves promotion for many reasons, but I'm highlighting the objectively biggest and most obvious one, which is their status as sisters and Marvel's wanting to show they're progressive and inclusive toward women. Lorna and Wanda are the only high profile sister relationship Marvel has, so promoting the fact they're going to spend time together precisely fits into their efforts as far as being better toward women are concerned.

I can see your reasoning on not calling attention to how it took 50 years for Marvel to do any major sister-sister relations. I disagree with it and think it would show Marvel is able and willing to spot areas where they're lacking, then fix them without controversy forcing them to make those kind of changes, but I also understand why it would appear to be bad for their reputation that they have a history of not doing sister relationships. However, if Marvel takes highlighting how long it took to be a bad thing instead of an even clearer sign of how they're changing for the better, then they don't have to point out that part of it. They can leave it at "Check out this sister-sister relationship we have going on for this issue." I don't see any reason why ANXF #14 wouldn't deserve special promotion.

[Quicksilverfan]

I'm not saying artists see problems immediately, only that they're typically easier to spot compared to writing problems. It takes more time to read one sentence than it takes to take a quick glance at a piece of artwork. That doesn't mean every possible problem with art will immediately present itself with a glance, just that it's easier to spot.

Problems in drawings are not easy to spot...unless you were drunk when you were drawing. Heck, artists even have to deal with the fact that if they see a problem they might not know how to fix it. For example, one of my teachers was working on Wonderwoman as an assistant in the 70s, said they had to draw a panel of Wonderwoman looking at a flame, and couldn't figure out how to draw her eyes to look at the flame without making her look cross eyed.

I don't think I said anything that made that kind of suggestion. What I said was that Marvel isn't giving the book the kind of promotion it needs. That's different from saying Marvel is actively trying to prevent it from selling. Not giving it the kind of promotion it needs can be based on a number of factors, such as thinking Peter David can promote it fine on his own without their help. Marvel not promoting ANXF like it should hurts sales, but it's not inherently malicious and doesn't automatically mean Marvel is trying to make it fail.

Well, I felt there was an accusatory tone to your original post that Marvel was setting ANXF for failure by not promoting it. Personally, I don't think ANXF needs the sort of promotion you're thinking of. Like I mentioned in my previous post, the cast has limited appeal, and so far the stories haven't been far reaching enough to warrant special attention. A book like X-factor probably gets its new readers from word of mouth by fans and positive reviews by comic critics as opposed to ads in other comic books and store displays.

It deserves promotion for many reasons, but I'm highlighting the objectively biggest and most obvious one, which is their status as sisters and Marvel's wanting to show they're progressive and inclusive toward women. Lorna and Wanda are the only high profile sister relationship Marvel has, so promoting the fact they're going to spend time together precisely fits into their efforts as far as being better toward women are concerned.

I got to tell you, the "Check out this sister-sister relationship we have going on for this issue." promotion doesn't exactly make me want to run to the comic book store. It needs a hook. If I'm not a fan of the Magneto family, or Wanda and Lorna, why should I care that they're going to talk to each other? So they're the only sisters Marvel has, so what? Not everyone is a comic book geek who is interested with the history of sexism at Marvel. I have a sister, the fact that sister relationships aren't often depicted in the media doesn't keep me up at night.

[remydat]

I never had a problem with Gambit, Pietro, or Havok 'looking out' for Lorna in the terms you are thinking of and don't now. From Lorna's prospective though I suspect she is still not going to be happy in the least at Havok or Pietro when she finds out what transpired in the past. Then of course she has her boss 'watching' her every move as well. I somewhat suspect she won't be happy with that either.

I don't expect Lorna to be happy about it either.

[remydat]

As for promotion, X Factor is a niche book and it gets the promotion fitting for such a book. That has always been the reality which I am sure PAD is fully aware of.

[Kieran_Frost]

now though PAD seems intent on making Alex look as bad as possible as often as possible. Remender is using Alex as his mouthpiece and PAD seems to have HATED Alex for awhile now.

Nothing I've seen PAD write is making Alex look worse than Remender did...