Polaris Appreciation III

[Mitteloss]

Who draws Lorna better then Coipel? Not many that I can think of and he really likes Lorna as a character. The idea is really exciting of an all female title.

Agreed :) Very excited.

[jmc247]

Agreed :) Very excited.

Its sad sometimes to think how little Lorna has when it comes to relationships with other x-women. 05 Jean doesn't know her and she has had only quite limited dialogue with most other x-women.

[The_Greatest_Username]

Coipel as the artist is the main reason I want her there!

At least O5 Jean now knows of Lorna's existance because she absorbed those memories. One step at a time...

[kcekada]

Who draws Lorna better then Coipel? Not many that I can think of and he really likes Lorna as a character. The idea is really exciting of an all female title.

I loved her all-too brief appearances in AvX. If Wolverine can be in every team book Marvel publishes, it shouldn't be that difficult for XX to use Lorna as needed, but her slot will probably get taken by Dazzler or (ack) Jubilee.

[PwrdOff]

Coipel as the artist is the main reason I want her there!

At least O5 Jean now knows of Lorna's existance because she absorbed those memories. One step at a time...

See, teen Jean obviously should have brought teen Lorna and teen Wanda along with her so she doesn't just get enveloped in all of this boring "revolution" nonsense 24/7 and can actually have some fun adventures leaving the boy banders back at the school to brood over their redundancy.

[salarta]

I still loathe the look they put on her for the current run of X-Factor. All the same criticisms I had before remain: it rips away almost all the iconic features of her appearance right when she needs them most, and the change to her hairstyle makes her look like a teenage girl. If this costume change had come directly after House of M and we could be absolutely sure it would go back to her iconic one when she was done on that book, I don't think I'd have any issue with it. I would have seen it as the team having some fun trying out a new look for her. But the change came at such a time that it was essentially like walking up to someone stuck in the back of a crowd and throwing a blanket on them. It's like she's being forced into hiding when she should be brought out in the open for everyone to admire. And I honestly don't trust that she'll get to have her iconic costume back at any point in the future.

But at this point it seems like I'm beating a dead horse, and the damage is done anyway so no sense crying about it further unless it continues into wherever she goes after Peter David. I just felt I should reiterate it since I saw several posts by people saying they were liking the look or that it was growing on them. If the side that thinks it's awesome gets to speak, I see no reason why the opposite side, people that hate it, should be silent.


As for the XX series, I would love to see Polaris in it. I think I've said as much in prior posts that I would love a book that was all-female with Lorna as a major player, and that I also don't think it necessarily would need a "leader" per se. However, I have two predictions, one could be taken any which way, and one unfortunate. The first prediction is that if it is an all-female series, it will have Scarlet Witch or Storm as the leader. Scarlet Witch as leader seems unlikely since she's on Avengers and all, but it's possible. Storm seems more likely due to decades of her being pumped up combined with how there are no other female characters that have been allowed to have as much of a presence on the X-Men side as her.

I would have liked to say perhaps Emma Frost, but Marvel has been spending far too much time setting her down as transforming into Cyclops' arm candy to the point that I don't think they would let her be part of a team apart from him on a different book. It's notable that newsarama does not think Emma Frost has a chance at it either despite how she's been lingering around so much. I doubt Rogue would be the leader given Mike Carey isn't there writing her anymore.

My other prediction is that Lorna won't get to be on it. She may be a perfect fit, but Marvel has passed up thousands of golden opportunities for her in the past, and rarely if ever promotes her. We all know she has a very storied history of being misused or ignored at Marvel, I don't see that changing any time soon. The other complication is that we know Peter David is against characters on X-Factor doing much outside X-Factor. Lorna getting to be on the book would require one of several scenarios. Either Peter David allows her to be in more places than just X-Factor (and for more than just a few issues), X-Factor gets canceled, or Marvel takes her off X-Factor in the same way Alex was taken from him. I don't see any of those three happening.

I'm sorry if I seem fatalistic, but the past half a year has murdered the optimism I had for Lorna's future. I haven't seen anything in Marvel or in the fanbase in recent months that gives me reason to expect her to get any real chance to shine. Casual fans are picking up on her more and more, and things they have said and done recently would have given me massive swells of hope for Lorna a year ago, but things have happened since then. You can't support a house with only one beam.

[kcekada]

I think there are a lot of questions yet regarding this series. Is it even an ongoing? If Lorna isn't selected initially, doesn't mean she can't show up down the road. I think her inclusion will depend a great deal on the writer and, maybe, PAD ... though I don't think he has much say in the X office. I will say that writing Lorna should be a unique opportunity for most writers -- as she's one of the oldest female mutant characters at Marvel, has loads of potential power wise, but is still mostly untapped character wise. Although I was never a fan of Austen's work, that period of craziness actually works to her favor -- taking away the vanilla/Jean Grey lite flavor she had before his run.

[The_Greatest_Username]

See, teen Jean obviously should have brought teen Lorna and teen Wanda along with her so she doesn't just get enveloped in all of this boring "revolution" nonsense 24/7 and can actually have some fun adventures leaving the boy banders back at the school to brood over their redundancy.

I'd LOVE to see Teen Lorna!

I think there are a lot of questions yet regarding this series. Is it even an ongoing? If Lorna isn't selected initially, doesn't mean she can't show up down the road. I think her inclusion will depend a great deal on the writer and, maybe, PAD ... though I don't think he has much say in the X office. I will say that writing Lorna should be a unique opportunity for most writers -- as she's one of the oldest female mutant characters at Marvel, has loads of potential power wise, but is still mostly untapped character wise. Although I was never a fan of Austen's work, that period of craziness actually works to her favor -- taking away the vanilla/Jean Grey lite flavor she had before his run.

I think a lot of her power potential has been explored in the past decade. Going foward I think her character would benefit (character wise) from taking a more proactive stance on mutant issues.

[PwrdOff]

I hope that after the repeated failures of her numerous attempts to reinvent herself, Lorna has finally learned that she should embrace who she is and see the value in just being herself instead of trying to live up to someone else's ideal. Sure, she might be a little soft and wavering compared to the majority of the mutants out there, but just look at where all of this "decisive action" has gotten them. Realistically, Magneto has been such a terrible influence on her life and has proven himself such a miserable twat that she should never try to pattern herself after him again. And he has never given her the same kind of affection back - in his eyes she's merely the spare, not the heir.

[The_Greatest_Username]

Lorna's history with Magneto is a little splotchy. Mike Carey wrote a Magneto that cared about Lorna and wanted to get her back from space, but then suddenly when she gets back to Earth she wants nothing to do with him.
I feel like after spending time with Magneto on Genosha Polaris finally had an identity for herself among the X-Men. She saw things differently from Xavier and was willing to terminate threats to the mutant race long before it was popular (such a hipster). I've been meaning to start a thread on this but I'm much too lazy.

[jmc247]

Lorna's history with Magneto is a little splotchy. Mike Carey wrote a Magneto that cared about Lorna and wanted to get her back from space, but then suddenly when she gets back to Earth she wants nothing to do with him.

I feel like after spending time with Magneto on Genosha Polaris finally had an identity for herself among the X-Men. She saw things differently from Xavier and was willing to terminate threats to the mutant race long before it was popular (such a hipster). I've been meaning to start a thread on this but I'm much too lazy.

That is how I see the situation as well both in terms of her non-existant relationship with her father and her early 2000 era views on mutant rights and terminating threats are important for the character and it made her interesting and more then Jean Gray lite with green hair.

[salarta]

I hope that after the repeated failures of her numerous attempts to reinvent herself, Lorna has finally learned that she should embrace who she is and see the value in just being herself instead of trying to live up to someone else's ideal. Sure, she might be a little soft and wavering compared to the majority of the mutants out there, but just look at where all of this "decisive action" has gotten them. Realistically, Magneto has been such a terrible influence on her life and has proven himself such a miserable twat that she should never try to pattern herself after him again. And he has never given her the same kind of affection back - in his eyes she's merely the spare, not the heir.

I'd have to argue that the way things panned out with Lorna post-origins is another of those numerous attempts to reinvent herself instead of just embracing who she is, given putting herself through several radical changes in the aftermath. That said, last night after my last post, I did find a logic to her costume change that makes me a little more comfortable with it despite how I think the change is seriously screwing with her (and X-Factor's) chances of being read and her getting to have her potential used and explored more after Peter David is done with her.

That logic: any time Lorna goes through severe mental and emotional trauma and instability, she ditches nearly all her iconic costume elements, and dons purple. Consider.



All three cases, purple is the defining color. In two cases, she ditches her cape entirely. In two cases, she ditches her headgear entirely. Then there is, of course, the time when she wore the red and gold outfit as an attempt to assuage herself of her own body image problems. She wears her iconic look or a variation of it when she is mentally and emotionally at her best and in her right mind, aside from mind control. It's when she's crazy or severely damaged (Malice was possession, but considering the circumstances Malice took possession of her, I think it counts... plus it was the first time she carried out this dynamic) that she refuses to wear her iconic costume or a variant of it. It's her rebelling against herself and refusing to acknowledge and accept who she is.

The only exception that comes to mind right now is her original run on X-Factor, but those were uniforms rather than costumes. Under these terms, I'm more accepting of the current costume for the time being, as it means this is merely a sign that she's still not accepting who she is and where she comes from. It also explains why she would disparage the idea of ever seeing Magneto again; she's not allowing herself to accept and embrace this latest revelation of her family history, and she knows that talking to Magneto would force her to deal with this latest trauma at a time when she wants to pretend it never happened. "If I avoid my father and the rest of my family, I don't have to actually confront and work through the fact that I killed my parents."

In short, she's running away from herself in every way she conceivably can. And I actually discerned this thanks to stumbling on an interview about how Storm has a mohawk again to cope with HER recent life upheavals.

[The_Greatest_Username]

I guess it's no suprise then that my favorite Polarises wore purple.

That is how I see the situation as well both in terms of her non-existant relationship with her father and her early 2000 era views on mutant rights and terminating threats are important for the character and it made her interesting and more then Jean Gray lite with green hair.

I'm still hoping that element hasn't died for the character.

[jmc247]

I'm still hoping that element hasn't died for the character.

Its hard to tell if its died or not as Lorna hasn't exactly been easy to read the past few years, but I agree with you I very much hope those elements are not gone from the character. Lorna had alot in the 2000s to seperate her from her usual role as the green haired Jean Gray. The past several years its been hard to know what motivates her and how she sees the world, mutant issues, her father, using lethal force at times, etc.

[Psyknight]

Its been over a week the longest break the Polaris Thread has had from posting in a very long time. I know its a sad time with everything that PAD is going through, but I suspect he would want us to keep going and we will make sure to update things about his recovery as time goes on. In the meantime some of the best Polaris art I have seen in a long time has come out reciently.

Why Lorna's classic costume is still by far my favorite outfit in her 44 year history is illustrated amazingly well by the artist below.



http://dangerous-beauty778.deviantar...s-AP-346735307



Polaris by Aaron Lopresti



Polaris and Scarlet Witch

http://browse.deviantart.com/?order=...laris#/d5qqmlr

Stunning!!! I love all the costumes featured here.