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X-PLAINED:
- Several potential origins of Havok’s stupid hat
- Generation X #67-70
- Revolution (more) (again)
- Shockwave (more) (again)
- Adrienne Frost (more) (again)
- The New Xavier School and/or Massachusetts Academy (more) (again)
- Possible necrophilia
- Dorm life
- How not to draw clothing
- Rules of entry to Jubilee’s dorm room
- The Rich Person Store
- How to say the word “consigliere”
- The ‘90s
- Blackmail
- Limits of telepathy
- Arson
- Ninja Boogie
- Panic
- How to keep Synch safe
- Adultification
- Failure to keep Synch safe
- Where to pick up to follow along with us
- Plot threads we’d like to see picked back up
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So, I’m not 100% on this, but I think the Fighting game may have been inspired by Tekken 3. Cause the character shown in the Visual Companion does look similar to the character Yoshimitsu as he appears around Tekken 3.
As someone who played that game to death, that is 100% Yoshimitsu from Tekken 3
Related to this, while the PS2 would have been out by the time this issue went to press in Japan, it would not have come out elsewhere. This isn’t to say one of the members of Generation X (or the artist) couldn’t have gotten an import system, but it’s more likely it’d still be a PS1.
To counteract the inevitable person who says the’ll stop listening to your show because of the Reagan comments, I’m going to listen to your show EVEN HARDER because of the Reagan comments!
SAME!
My only disagreement is that Reagan doesn’t even deserve Mephisto’s attention. He deserves the further indignity of Satannish being his tormentor.
(But seriously, there was a point in 2020 when Biden said that Republican presidents of the past could’ve handled a pandemic and I was like “NO. WE KNOW FOR A FACT THEY COULDN’T.” And then the Slotkin response….oy. Reagan may not be rolling in his grave, but tons of ACT UP members are….)
Something about how parents were pulling their kids out in a frenzy also had me realize they entered them too. Which was likely quick to suddenly fill up the school. Which, I’m like, “HOW DID THAT WORK?” Like how many rich kids who want to go to elite private schools are waiting for a new one to open up like it’s a new restaurant. The only way I could think it working would be a lot of kids expelled from tons of other places, which that seems like EITHER a powder keg OR the most socially progressive group of kids.
Um Actually time! At least in Sicilian pronunciation (which likely would be the one used in organized crime), consigliere would have a silent g.
Emma does have the relevant track record as the headmistress of the original Massachussetts Academy, which was an insitution so historically snooty, wealth aware and politically powerful that back in her youth Janet Van Dyne, who grew up to be the Wasp, nearly attended it herself (Jan being from VERY wealthy family, even before she became a massively successful designer)
After all, Kitty’s parent opted for Emma’s school to send her to over Xavier’s, until Phoenix rewrote their minds to change their decision (and which Chuck didn’t amend that for reasons which were never detailed, but which I am SURE were entirely ethical)
@Devin: The private-school-for-troublemakers angle is a great idea. From the characters point of view, it’s a terrific bit of differentiation for the school — the advertising writes itself, really — and it would give cover for any crazy superhero fights. Quite disappointed they didn’t take this route, actually.
The route they DID choose, I don’t think hangs together well. It’s a good story, but it’s not a good Generation X story, as it relies too much on poor characterizations and illogical choices to get where it’s going.
Lord knows Warren Ellis isn’t shy about ignoring continuity or established character voices/personalities, but a hand-wringing Emma Frost letting her students be threatened? Unsure of what to do? Even before Morrison’s run, I don’t see it at all. After what happened to the Hellions, she’d START with the gun.
I really don’t buy fragility of Jubilee, either. This girl started out as a lone wolf; she’s fought ninjas; she’s watched Wolverine bleed out more than once. A snowball thrown by asshats she doesn’t like anyway isn’t going to faze her. (I get that it’s a different kind of story, but when you’re working with established characters, you’ve got to color within their lines.)
And as you mentioned, Banshee’s actions at the end are inexplicable — unless the writer simply wants to kill off a kid and isn’t really concerned with how the killing gets done. It comes off as phony.
I LOVE the art, though.
BTW, Michael Corleone has some helpful tips on consigliere pronounciation:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4f7ln_al3qo
So, a new writer comes in to the school based book, radically chnages the personalities of most of the cast, making the kids talk and act significantly younger than they had, and then has one them killed off by a rather lacklustre villain who is never heard from again. (Sorry, Adrienne is not a particularly interesting character, never mind villain, IMHO)
Hmmm, why does this seem familiar, I wonder?
Gosh Emma and Sean come across VERY badly in this don’t they?
And that’s aside from things like Sean “Former Interpol agent and stuff” somehow managing to NOT notice the placement of quite so many unsubtle bombs being planted around the school he is repsonsible for the security of.
I’ve not always been Emma’s biggest fan as a character, but the idea that Emma (at this point in her character progression) would EVER worry more about profit margins than the safety of her mutant students seems almost offensively absurd. She’d personally torch the place for the insurance before she allowed that to happen (She’d set off the fire alarms first though… well, maybe not in Adrienne’s room, but we all have our little eccentricities)
And at the end, her sister’s quite clever failsafe plan for exposing the school just… doesn’t happen? That seems overly convenient.
I do remember reading an interview with Ellis where he said something along the lines that he felt Emma had lost a lot of her more interesting character traits during this run, that she had gone from a damaged, ruthless bitch (not a word I like to use, but I’m 98% certain that was the word he used), to someone who might be found wearing cardigans unironically, and that he wanted to bring the harder side of her out again. I’m not sure this story remotely sells that transformation.