Uncanny X-Men #1 (spoilers/discussion)

[Havok83]

again being a fighter doesnt have to include her being a ninja. there are plenty of combat techniques from her land of original. her armored form was used a form of protection because she didnt have a means to protect herself; I don't recall it being her desire to necessarily be more h2h. unless you can point me to the issue where that is explicitly stated.

and the idea of being a ninja revolves around the Asian influence fans didnt like as they described it as being a form of "cultural appropriation". I loved Asian psylocke (as this was the version I was introduced to when I first started reading xmen). but people didnt like her this way. it just seems hypocritical for anyone to have not like Asian psylocke to now be on board with her retaining her ninja abilities. have her train and learn these abilities, fine no problem. anything less than this still falls in that "cultural appropriation" area that people who didn't like Asian betsy were screaming about.

She used a longsword and a shield in this issue. She is already experimenting with a fighting style from her land of origin. The ninja fighting style is something she's been trained in for years but she didnt use that here. She specifically mentions that she is using new psy-weapons and we proceed to see her with a different fighting style. All this talk is based off of a tweet by JDW whom was just reassuring readers that despite not seeing it in #1, Betsy still has her ninja fighting abilities

You'll have to take that up with those individual posters that didnt like Betsy as a ninja as I dont think they have commented since that post praising it

i dont understand why are these crappy scenes?

I didnt say they were crappy scenes. They were posted to prove a point about the notion that CC only had the X-men fight/attack those they were evenly matched with and could withstand those attacks either via invulnerability or healing factor. Clearly that wasnt the case and as Devaishwarya states, we have to suspend our disbelief when reading

[butterflykyss]

She used a longsword and a shield in this issue. She is already experimenting with a fighting style from her land of origin. The ninja fighting style is something she's been trained in for years but she didnt use that here. She specifically mentions that she is using new psy-weapons and we proceed to see her with a different fighting style. All this talk is based off of a tweet by JDW whom was just reassuring readers that despite not seeing it in #1, Betsy still has her ninja fighting abilities

You'll have to take that up with those individual posters that didnt like Betsy as a ninja as I dont think they have commented since that post praising it

I'm fine with the issue and how she was shown. that is how I expected and hope she would be shown as it makes sense to my point she was never originally a ninja. I was responding to the user that said she still was a ninja and my question was towards anyone who fell in that category. I hope the tweet is just to shut people up and the show her as she was in this issue.

[WhiteQueenEmmaFrost]

She's always been a fighter...she was trained by S.T.R.I.K.E. and learning martial arts is as much a mental memory as it is a muscle memory. Being physical action junkie is part of her character.

I think we have enough of characters not being written correctly we don't need things to be taken away from them.

[butterflykyss]

She's always been a fighter...she was trained by S.T.R.I.K.E. and learning martial arts is as much a mental memory as it is a muscle memory. Being physical action junkie is part of her character.

I think we have enough of characters not being written correctly we don't need things to be taken away from them.

when was British betsy ever a ninja before she walked through siege perilous?

[Drey]

oh trust me boo I dont try to bring logic to it and know not to do it. my analysis is more from the perspective of annoyance in the people qho made issue of Asian psylocke but are now ok with the "white" version of the character still possessing the traits associated with the Asian qualities of the character. the hypocrisy is more of what irks me lol. I should have clarified it better.

Ah, I see lol.

[Triniking1234]

oh trust me boo I dont try to bring logic to it and know not to do it. my analysis is more from the perspective of annoyance in the people qho made issue of Asian psylocke but are now ok with the "white" version of the character still possessing the traits associated with the Asian qualities of the character. the hypocrisy is more of what irks me lol. I should have clarified it better.

What traits are you talking about? Maintaining her ninjutsu knowledge?

[butterflykyss]

What traits are you talking about? Maintaining her ninjutsu knowledge?

not retaining the knowledge but still actually being a ninja (at least based upon the tweet that was posted). what I thought was done appropriately in this issue is that the visual references to her being a ninja were removed and a fighting style that "British betsy" would be more accustomed to based upon her origins was shown.

[butterflykyss]

Ah, I see lol.

lol yes

[WhiteQueenEmmaFrost]

when was British betsy ever a ninja before she walked through siege perilous?

I didn't say "ninja" I said she was a capable fighter. She had a history prior to joining the Xmen. Saying "ninja" is extremely vague and honestly she hasn't been depicted as doing anything remotely "ninja" in quite a long time. She doesn't actively speak Japanese, or outwardly demonstrate any Asian appropriation. The way she fights isn't necessarily any particular type other than fighting. She uses a katana, but in a very comic book way of fighting. Same with the way Elektra uses her sai...there isn't a true fidelity to the actual fighting style.

What traits are you talking about? Maintaining her ninjutsu knowledge?

Which really isn't depicted as any different than any other type of fighting going on in a scene tbh. She poses and stabs things.

not retaining the knowledge but still actually being a ninja (at least based upon the tweet that was posted). what I thought was done appropriately in this issue is that the visual references to her being a ninja were removed and a fighting style that "British betsy" would be more accustomed to based upon her origins was shown.

Her memory wasn't wiped. Her experience wasn't reset. She shouldn't lose anything she's learned over the past decades anymore than she lost any of her "Britishness" when Spiral put her in a different body.

I understand there was an opportunity marvel could have taken, but I think it's more dangerous to send the message that your experiences can be erased so easily. We're the sum of our experiences good and bad.

[Harpsikord]

not retaining the knowledge but still actually being a ninja (at least based upon the tweet that was posted). what I thought was done appropriately in this issue is that the visual references to her being a ninja were removed and a fighting style that "British betsy" would be more accustomed to based upon her origins was shown.

Do you have an issue with Kitty Pryde being a ninja? She was a ninja long before Betsy was and her skills are still referenced on occasion. How do you feel about Elektra? Betsy is making it a point to recognize that she is properly herself now, but to say that she doesn't have these ninja skills isn't appropriate. She doesn't have the same physical capabilities but she should still be able to use these skills. They are hers.

[davetvs]

oh trust me boo I dont try to bring logic to it and know not to do it. my analysis is more from the perspective of annoyance in the people qho made issue of Asian psylocke but are now ok with the "white" version of the character still possessing the traits associated with the Asian qualities of the character. the hypocrisy is more of what irks me lol. I should have clarified it better.

How is it hypocritical? Running around in an Asian woman's body and using an Asian martial art are very different things. If that was the case Batman, Daredevil, Elektra, Kitty, etc. would all be cultural appropriators too since none of them are Asian.

[butterflykyss]

I didn't say "ninja" I said she was a capable fighter. She had a history prior to joining the Xmen. Saying "ninja" is extremely vague and honestly she hasn't been depicted as doing anything remotely "ninja" in quite a long time. She doesn't actively speak Japanese, or outwardly demonstrate any Asian appropriation. The way she fights isn't necessarily any particular type other than fighting. She uses a katana, but in a very comic book way of fighting. Same with the way Elektra uses her sai...there isn't a true fidelity to the actual fighting style.



Which really isn't depicted as any different than any other type of fighting going on in a scene tbh. She poses and stabs things.



Her memory wasn't wiped. Her experience wasn't reset. She shouldn't lose anything she's learned over the past decades anymore than she lost any of her "Britishness" when Spiral put her in a different body.

I understand there was an opportunity marvel could have taken, but I think it's more dangerous to send the message that your experiences can be erased so easily. We're the sum of our experiences good and bad.

psylocke at times wasnt even drawn as an Asian woman but even under those circumstances we knew as readers she was still Asian. this extends to her fighting abilities. her style of fighting and her weapons of chose were very much based upon her history of being a ninja. it not being explicitly stated doesnt negate this fact, hence why the tweet proclaimed she is still a ninja.


and her memory wasnt reset, why then did the artist purposefully show her using traditional European weaponry versus her katana? the reason is the whole physical aesthetic of cultural appropriation.

[butterflykyss]

Do you have an issue with Kitty Pryde being a ninja? She was a ninja long before Betsy was and her skills are still referenced on occasion. How do you feel about Elektra? Betsy is making it a point to recognize that she is properly herself now, but to say that she doesn't have these ninja skills isn't appropriate. She doesn't have the same physical capabilities but she should still be able to use these skills. They are hers.

how did kitty canonically become a ninja? did she train under a master who was capable of showing her how to effectively be a ninja? and those abilities, being a ninja, was Kwannon not British Betsy. She was in a body where those abilities existed. let's say for instance she body swapped with nightcrawler and had his agility for years. then after some time went back to her form do you think she would retain those physical abilities simply because she remembers how to do it?

How is it hypocritical? Running around in an Asian woman's body and using an Asian martial art are very different things. If that was the case Batman, Daredevil, Elektra, Kitty, etc. would all be cultural appropriators too since none of them are Asian.

being able to train and learn abilities is one thing ( as those characters you mentioned did) and British betsy doing this without any conditioning in her original form is another. they are not the same.

oh it's hypocritical because people who had issue with her being Asian now want her to keep the "cool" things associated with her being Asian.

[WhiteQueenEmmaFrost]

psylocke at times wasnt even drawn as an Asian woman but even under those circumstances she was still Asian. this extends to her fighting abilities. her style of fighting and her weapons of chose were very much based upon her history of being a ninja. it not being explicitly stated doesnt negate this fact, hence why the tweet proclaimed she is still a ninja.


and her memory wasnt reset, why then did the artist purposefully show her using traditional European weaponry versus her katana? the reason is the whole physical aesthetic of cultural appropriation.

Only if she were pretending to be something she wasn't. In her case it's different. She wasn't a white British woman trying to be a Japanese Ninja.

Psylocke/Kwannon was more like what Marvel's recently done in the Infinity Wars and combined two characters with both aspects of each other.

What you're arguing fits far more to characters like Kitty, Elektra, Wolverine who CHOSE to take on those attributes.

[Harpsikord]

how did kitty canonically become a ninja? did she train under a master who was capable of showing her how to effectively be a ninja? and those abilities, being a ninja, was Kwannon not British Betsy. She was in a body where those abilities existed. let's say for instance she body swapped with nightcrawler and had his agility for years. then after some time went back to her form do you think she would retain those physical abilities simply because she remembers how to do it?

Betsy was also taught how to use her ninja abilities though; some of it was gained through Kwannon and the rest of it was stuff that she learned to do over the years that she actually had those abilities. Kwannon didn't know how to use all of the weapons that Betsy did and such as that. Through the same logic, Kwannon shouldn't be able to use telepathy or the psychic knife at all whatsoever, and yet she can and she does. Also the situation with Nightcrawler is entirely different than Psylocke keeping the ninja skills - Nightcrawler's agility is supernatural, not learned.