salarta

I’ve decided that it would be beneficial, mainly for myself, to think back on the past year as it relates to Polaris. Bear in mind that as always, these are my opinions. They can differ from what other people think. I may also accidentally say things that are incorrect – perhaps even obviously so. It’s easy to forget details with the passage of time.

Lastly, this is entirely stream of consciousness. Whatever comes to mind. Not going out of my way to find details of note.

Here we go!

Uncanny X-Men

At the beginning of the year, the Uncanny X-Men event was still happening. We shifted from the main event book where Lorna had a couple nice feats and moments, to Vita Ayala on Prisoner X.

I felt the basic premise of Lorna on Prisoner X was good. Along with the writing of Lorna when taken in isolation of everything else. The problems I had with Prisoner X were: 1) the concept seemed inspired by Gifted, yet Lorna was slotted in as a supporting character for Bishop, and 2) it was yet another case of Lorna as support for a male character’s story. If the book had done something like “each character sees their own version of a prison” (e.g. Bishop sees a concentration camp, Lorna sees a mental institution or jail, another character sees a school, etc), I think I would’ve read it.

During this period, we saw X-Men fandom go from raving excitedly for what Rosenberg would do, to absolutely hating his guts because of all the character deaths – and at one point, unintentionally insulting the trans community with usage of Rahne as a clumsy allegory.

Bear in mind, the general public had absolutely no idea that Hickman was coming into the picture. As far as fans knew, Rosenberg was it.

Marvel forcing Havok on Lorna

This is where a special note is deserved.

Marvel was telegraphing intent to force Havok on Lorna starting 2017. This year is where they started to get more blatant with it.

In Prisoner X, they had a flashback image of Lorna kissing Havok – while there was nothing at all of her surviving Genosha.

At the end of Age of X-Man, Rosenberg had Lorna ask where Havok was.

Marvel released a figurine set of Lorna and Havok – shortly after they had released a “Magnus family” set that completely excluded Lorna.

Marvel Tales came out with a great cover depicting Lorna… only for the only story within it involving Lorna to be Havok’s introductory issues, where she was treated poorly to build him up.

We haven’t seen much of it in the past couple months, but Marvel is absolutely still trying to pull this shit and waiting for the right time. Certain of it.

House of X/Powers of X/Dawn of X

Then Hickman came onto the scene.

I knew when the teaser image came out, no Lorna in sight, that she would be excluded from anything truly meaningful. And I was right. Her only appearance in HoX/PoX was to have the resurrection process explained to her by her father, while the dialogue reaffirmed he’s her father.

Admittedly, what Hickman did in their dynamic was much better than on X-Men Blue when Magneto was written mansplaining surprise attacks to his daughter that had survived the Genoshan genocide. But it was still bad for two reasons. 1) It reduced Lorna’s role to “object to be talked at” and 2) just like the complaint about Blue there, HoX/PoX ignored her character history in places it should’ve been highly relevant.

I actually made a mistreatment bingo card and used it for the first time with HoX/PoX. It will be used for future events too.

Dawn of X hasn’t been any better. Her sole appearance to date was in X-Men #1, where the main character beats for her were once again “ex of Havok, daughter of Magneto.” Nothing of Lorna herself. One good thing I can say is that she did a thing with Storm, but that’s it.

The fact Lorna wasn’t included on any covers, not even the X-women variant cover (which had Mystique, Dani Moonstar and others but not Lorna) says it all really.

One more note I forgot. The idea of North as a hybrid of Lorna and Emma Frost’s DNA is actually a kinda cool idea – but also bad in the sense that it would be supremely shitty of Marvel to do a lot with him while doing nothing at all with Lorna herself. It would just be Marvel once again saying “Lorna is only good for building up male characters – this time, a character created from her DNA.”

To wrap this section up, a reminder: I think Lorna is actually better off not involved in HoX/PoX/DoX at all. There are a LOT of problems with it. Some I’ve said publicly (e.g. Omega classifications), others not. But even setting most reasons aside, the simple fact is that Marvel’s not given any indication that they have any respect for either the character or fans of her. They’ve shown no willingness to explore what she has to offer, or what her fandom sees in her. Simply put, Marvel in its current state doesn’t deserve her. And she’s completely wasted on them. Better to wait for a better Marvel once all of this has passed.

But this leads me into…

Fandom

I love you guys. This includes you guys reading this post, and you guys that don’t know this post exists.

Over the past year, I’ve seen some amazing things out of fandom.

4621NN, a Japanese Polaris fan, commissioned nearly a dozen absolutely amazing pieces of Lorna. This is on top of a corner of cool in a room they have which includes framed comics, framed artwork (lineart or not), collector’s cards, figurines and other things.

A car paint was made of Lorna for Forza Horizon 4 (a racing video game) less than a week ago.

More fanart, including some of the Magnus family observing Hanukkah. Tattoos. 3D renders and statues.

Some of the fanart to come this year is quite imaginative, like Malice version Lorna as part of a Misfits/X-Men mashup, or this great punk style Lorna piece.

Since HoX/PoX ended and DoX started, I’ve been saying that I put my faith concerning Lorna’s future on the fandom. Not Marvel. What I’ve seen this past year has absolutely vindicated me on that front, and been amazing work all around. Been seeing more and more of it toward the end of the year as more fans are starting to do things for themselves instead of expecting Marvel to provide.

My Activity

I simply can’t think of a better title, so this will have to do.

Just as the above has unfolded, I’ve done quite a bit this year as well as far as commissioning some great artists. For one, the Polaris minicomic co-created with Mlad (me on writing, him on art) finished in the early parts of 2019. I’m only including the “cover page” image here – follow the link for the whole comic.

Around St. Patrick’s Day, I decided to commission j-likes-to-draw for a piece of Lorna and Jean sharing in their affinity for green.

Then I learned that some people online were being incredibly shitty (as in, so bad that ‘racist’ isn’t a good enough descriptor) to a black Polaris fan for cosplaying Lorna. So I commissioned the ever-awesome bikenesmith for what he also awesomely titled Polarises of Color.

Seriously, go commission from him. He’s great.

As we reached Halloween, I put in another commission with BoxOfWant for something I’d wanted to see for years: Lorna dressed as a knight, Wanda dressed as a witch. There are two versions, one showing cleavage and one not. I’m posting the not cleavage because I’m a prude despite writing NSFW fics I like the way details around the chest shine out.

And that’s it… for now. 🙂 One more piece is on the way. Likely more if things go as I expect.

I can’t think of anything else to say. 2019 was a terrible year for me personally, but I think what I’ve seen for Lorna in the lead-up to its end suggests a north-star-bright future for her.