I just finished reposting the adult fanfics I previously had posted on my primary account over to my NSFW blog, which can be found here (18+, NSFW, adult content): http://salarta-nsfw.tumblr.com/. I deleted them from this primary as well.
The next step will be removing the hentai I’ve reblogged or posted on my primary and putting it over on the NSFW blog. This will likely include material that I was the original Tumblr poster for. I will also look for theme or option that can hide my Likes on Tumblr from my main page, since I’ll still be liking adult content.
Please note if you follow my NSFW blog, the NSFW blog can’t follow back. It’s a secondary blog.
Ugh, these two. I hope something terrible happens to them. (X-Men #97 – Feb 1976)
Haters Gonna Hate Ha
The bedrock of their relationship actually IS horrendous, as illustrated vividly in these two panels.
While there are occasional moments where their relationship looks good, most of the time, it’s set up in such a way that Lorna looks like a pathetic hanger-on that lives and breathes exclusively for Alex. She ends up being written with no thoughts, feelings or values of her own, as someone that appears to have no worth or reason to exist in her own right. In most depictions with him, Lorna is nothing but a trophy girlfriend around for the sole purpose of boosting Alex’s prestige by his having a woman devoted to him.
That’s why they need to be apart right now, and continue to be for the next 7 years or so at least.
Fans and writers alike need to recognize that even if they’re in relationship, they’re still unique characters. They need to build character development that doesn’t depend on each other. Lorna especially needs this, and you need look no further than how it took over 40 years for Marvel (via Peter David) to let her have her origin story told and lead a team of her own as proof of this.
Her recent time in space proved how bad the relationship is for both characters until they’re properly developed separately. In the beginning, Lorna kept asking for permission to use her powers, and an entire potential storyline of Lorna dealing with an anti-Apocalypse cult was merely used as an excuse to get her into space. Her best scenes were with Crystal and Luna, but by the end, Lorna merely mimicked Alex’s defeatist depressed attitude, serving as merely a representation of Alex’s failure between her reaction and the fact she was tortured to get at him. With Alex, she was his extension; away from him, she had wit and political savvy.
Not to mention the entire premise of their getting back together while in space can be boiled down to “Lorna could die at any moment, she’s light years away from all she’s ever known, Alex is the only familiar man around she could get intimate with, time to settle so she can cope.”
If they do get back together in ten years, and they’re brought back together as equals instead of Alex as the dominant force and Lorna as his submissive girlfriend, imagine how great their dynamic could work. Instead of Lorna acting sad because Alex is sad, Lorna could push him to stop acting sorry for himself and be the man she saw he can be. While Lorna’s struggling to prove herself as a leader, or dealing with personal demons like the Genoshan genocide, Alex can give her moral or fighting support.
That’s why I don’t reblog stuff of Lorna and Alex together. Currently, their relationship is bad for both of them, but especially for Lorna. In the future, when enough time has passed, they may have another shot and look good for it.
I just finished reading Magneto #19! It was great! I’m really glad I starting reading the solo from the beginning, because I feel like there’s a lot of payoff for the book, for Magneto and for Lorna in this issue. It’s exposing me to things about the Marvel universe I didn’t know about.
More detailed thoughts below. SPOILERS involved, including some PICTURES from the issue. Also, I’m trying to limit only to a small number of images that are worth posting to illustrate things I want to say. Trust me, there’s a lot more awesome worth reading than just the images shown here.
Also, this is Polaris-heavy, because I’m a Polaris fan. Sorry to anyone disappointed by that.
Before I get started, I just want to illustrate how amazing and awesome this image is.
This is top notch. Insanely impressive. I would seriously buy a poster of this if it existed.
Moving on, in previews for the issue, we saw Magneto use a building for his fight. The building had people in it, Lorna says they need to be saved. Magneto tells her to save them, and we get this hilarious and perfect moment.
For me, this encapsulates three things I love about Lorna in this solo. One, there’s actual acknowledgment that she’s one of Magneto’s daughters, something Marvel hasn’t allowed in any major events. Two, her attitude is spot-on in my opinion, and it’s one of the rare moments we get to see her actually swear and speak in a way that comes across more naturally for her, in my opinion. Three, she looks just so goddamn badass. It’s an excellent visual example of the respectable powerhouse Lorna really is and should be treated as more often.
Which leads me into the next bit that grabbed me.
I don’t know the intentions per se of this one on Bunn’s part, but on my part it speaks deeply for me and how I feel Lorna always deserved much better as a character than Marvel has traditionally provided for her. I’ll save my waxing on that for another time, it’s just what spoke to me personally here. Both the power use and reflection in the windows here add great detail.
Of course, that’s not the only reason I include that image.
That image combined with the scene Magneto has with the chemist working on MGH (Mutant Growth Hormone, for those that have missed out on the Magneto solo up to now) make me think there’s another path the solo could go in for how this all ends. I don’t want to say what that is publicly in this case, because I feel that would hurt the wow and shock/awe factor if it turns out to be true, but what I’m thinking is better for Lorna. Other characters… not sure.
Magneto #20′s premise is that Lorna may be the key to solving the current crisis, which I’ve taken to likely mean she gets killed off in a sacrificial lamb way. What I see is a possible direction where that doesn’t happen, and that gives me a lot more hope than I had before.
Lorna saves the kids, and we get this moment.
Is it just me, or does Lorna look impressive as hell in these from-the-back shots? She very much looks like a monarch and leader here, a true Genoshan heir. She looks more regal and powerful to me than she ever has, and that’s a big deal for me in a good way.
The scene also points out how odd the kids are acting, which is a follow-up from the humans acting bizarre in Magneto #18. In #18, it just looked a bit strange; now, to me, it looks like it’s all a cue to something much bigger about to happen by the end. What that something is, I don’t know, but I get a sense there’s a definite reason for their behavior besides “the world’s ending, here’s their reaction.” A story-based reason.
After this, we see Magneto meet with Sugar Man, which is my first ever introduction to him. He seems like a sleaze, and that’s quite interesting in its own way. There’s explanation behind why Magneto chose him, which answers lots of questions fans would’ve asked.
I have to be honest, though: Sugar Man wielding metal weaponry to meet Magneto seems really forced. Like it was an excuse to have metal around so Magneto could easily kill him. It makes him seem more dumb than threatening, and I think the effect could’ve been gained by other means, e.g. Magneto bringing metal of his own to use on him. I don’t know, maybe Sugar Man IS that dumb, but it’s hard for me to believe that.
At the very end, we get a tease where Magneto asks who Briar really is, which we’ll learn in Magneto #20. Bunn’s also said Briar and Polaris have a big talk in that issue. This leads me to believe that perhaps Briar has a connection to both of them, just that we’ve seen more hints with Magneto given it’s his solo.
This could just be my fan imaginings playing on me, but I get this feeling that whoever Briar is, the reveal is going to be a “You’ve come a long way” kind of reveal for her, like we’ve learned so much about how someone has changed and grown as a person without even knowing they had.
All in all, I thought this was an excellent issue, and I’m very much looking forward to Magneto #20. Still with some dread at what might happen to Lorna by Marvel dictate, but now with more hope than I had a month ago as well.
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