In better news.

There are more pages, but I didn’t bother because Polaris isn’t in them and they’re not about her.

I’m okay with this. At present. There could be things I consider wrong with it that I don’t see right now.

I don’t particularly care for the “What have I done?” and “How could I be so stupid?” lines, but I can live with them for the time being. Specifically, I don’t care for those lines because they remind me too much of this page that was part of forcing Lorna into space with Havok.

The preview page lines aren’t bad like the example above. In the preview, Lorna’s focus is on how she shouldn’t be wasting time on thinking about Malice when the Raksha are in critical condition. There’s good reason for her to chide herself for that, unlike the example above. Still, it feels too similar, which is why I subjectively don’t care for the lines in that preview page.

To reiterate my stance: I don’t like the emphasis on “Magneto’s daughter” and phrases like “Lorna sure is Magneto’s daughter, isn’t she” because even intended in a positive and well-meaning way, I believe such remarks reduce her to just her connection to her father. As if she has nothing else to her beyond him, and as if she owes all her good qualities to him.

When you see Batgirl, people don’t say “she sure is Batman’s sidekick.”

When you see Supergirl, people don’t say “she sure is Superman’s cousin.”

An important connection between Batgirl and Batman, or between Supergirl and Superman, is acknowledged as it should be. But it doesn’t override who they are as their own characters.

To emphasize how this can be a problem and why it concerns me, I have two examples to give. One of them is, oddly enough, Supergirl.

Most people aware of comic books know all about how Batgirl was written as giving up on crimefighting and then paralyzed. Oracle was made out of that, but that was writers salvaging her from a plan to get rid of her.

What most people don’t know is that around the same time, Supergirl was killed off. Here’s the reason, found on the Wikipedia article for Supergirl (I don’t have access to the source material).

From Marv Wolfman, who wrote her death in Crisis on Infinite Earths:

Before Crisis it seemed that half of Krypton had survived the
explosion. We had Superman, Supergirl, Krypto, the Phantom Zone
criminals, the bottle city of Kandor, and many others. Our goal was to
make Superman unique. We went back to his origin and made Kal-El the
only survivor of Krypton. That, sadly, was why Supergirl had to die.
However, we were thrilled by all the letters we received saying
Supergirl’s death in Crisis was the best Supergirl story they ever read. Thank you. By the way, I miss Kara, too.

From Dick Giordano VP and executive editor at DC at the time:

Supergirl was created initially to take advantage of the high Superman
sales and not much thought was put into her creation. She was created
essentially as a female Superman. With time, writers and artists
improved upon her execution, but she never did really add anything to the Superman mythos—at least not for me.

You know where Supergirl is today. She even has her own TV show that’s become pretty popular. But back in the 80s, a year after her film? They killed her off.

Why? Because they perceived her as “just a female Superman,” “just Superman’s cousin,” as a character who had nothing unique and meaningful in her own right to make her worthy of keeping around when they already had Superman. They killed her because the overemphasis on her connection to Superman devalued her in their eyes.

My second example is sort of Supergirl but not: Power Girl. Remember these panels?

This is a writer trying to explain why Power Girl has a boob window in a way other than “because the people who created her wanted her to show cleavage.” Personally, I believe there are ways it could be explained that would serve Karen well, but that’s me, and it’s not the point I’m trying to make.

The point I’m trying to make is: this writer decided to fall back on defining Power Girl by her connection to Superman. These panels have been ridiculed rightly for the absurdity of the reason, the absurdity of how Power Girl is written as thinking and feeling, but it can’t be overlooked that this writer chose to frame it as Power Girl failing to find a symbol that would let her live up to Superman’s example. The absurdity of these panels is a direct consequence of overemphasizing Power Girl’s connection to Superman in the wrong way.

In all this, I’m not saying “Don’t refer to Lorna as Magneto’s daughter” or “Don’t say, do or support things that acknowledge that aspect of her.” It is a part of her identity and origins. It should be acknowledged and used.

But it’s possible to take it too far. It’s possible to take it so far that Lorna actively loses out on things she could and should be getting.

She could be left out of an event she should be in because “why have Magneto’s daughter when we already have Magneto.” Important parts of her identity can be ignored or forgotten because the writer doesn’t bother to look past her “Magneto’s daughter” exterior. Her unique qualities like the title Mistress of Magnetism can be rewritten as things she’s only allowed to have because of who her father is. She could get killed off because she’s “not unique enough” when they have Magneto, while X-23 and Daken and Jimmy and Old Man Logan and so on stick around.

Overemphasis on her being Magneto’s daughter can be just as bad as, if not worse than, ignoring that Magneto’s her father completely.

Again, I’m not saying don’t talk about it or celebrate it or support it. That’s presently a good side of her that I’d like to see developed in good, healthy ways. Just don’t make it all she is. And don’t perceive “let’s add Havok as her boyfriend” as sufficient differentiation, cause it’s not.

I complain a lot about things Polaris isn’t getting that she should, or things happening to her that shouldn’t. I think I’m justified in that, but, I also realize that doing this means I sometimes overlook all the progress she’s made since I discovered she exists.

A lot of the progress she’s made is stuff that should’ve happened decades ago. It’s still progress, though, and good to remember much of it’s only happened since 2009.

• Magneto confirmed as father
• Confirmed as being a full-fledged mutant again
• Origin story finally told
• Got to lead a team of her own
• Got (very brief) interactions with Wanda and Pietro
• Got to (very briefly) try a romance with Gambit (read: someone that isn’t Havok for once)
• Became playable in a couple video games for the first time ever
• Became not just a star, but arguably the biggest star on a live-action TV show
• Finally got an X-Men Legends figure
• Got to overcome (an AU) Malice (albeit ending much too soon)

That’s really a lot of catching up in a short time.

That’s not to say there aren’t things still missing, or lost opportunities along the way. One of the things that really should’ve happened on X-Men Blue and never did, for instance, was Lorna spending some quality time with teen Jean and teen Bobby. That was pretty much the thing unique to Blue that would’ve made her presence there meaningful. In the same vein of how All-New X-Factor never managed to take advantage of its modern corporate backdrop.

But in spite of the hurdles and paths not taken, Lorna’s really come a long way in a little shy of 10 years.

This post was more or less prompted by all the positive posts I’ve been seeing out there by fans of her. When I discovered her, it was more common for me to run into people who thought she was worthless. I still distinctly remember saying how Lorna should return from space, and one guy responding that she should be left in space to be forgotten and never used again.

Now, I see people talking about how badass she is. I see them talking about how much of a survivor she is and how her big draw is overcoming all the obstacles thrown at her. I see discussions about both her neurodiversity (bipolar) and her mental health issues (trauma). Whole articles on websites are dedicated to her, something I didn’t think I’d see at all back in 2009.

In short, lots and lots of people have come to see all the great things in Lorna that I’ve seen since I discovered her. It’s wonderful to see that awareness spread.

That’s the crux of most characters like Lorna: people are missing something they don’t even know they’re missing. Often times, it’s all about making people aware, whether it’s telling them about a character they didn’t know existed, or pointing out great qualities they never noticed before.

Someone I used to talk to once told me they’d read Lorna before but only really started to care and see her good qualities during the Austen era.

That’s really all it’s about. Being shown who the character is and what she can be for real. She’s tough, she’s hopeful, and she’s tough because she’s hopeful, even at her (in-character) lowest points.