Some New Mutant Love

Ya know I realised today that I haven't written about my love of The New Mutants in awhile. One of the things that brought this on was me finally getting a copy of The New Mutants: Classic Vol. 4 and chatting about it with a couple of people. So, in an attempt to rectify that, I figured I would do some of that today. First I would like to talk about how disappointing it was when they killed off Doug Ramsey. To me this was a wasted opportunity, he could have been one of the most effective mutants. After all his power is that he can understand all languages. Think about that for a minute. Besides, using it to translate and communicate with all the countries of the Earth and all the alien races of the Marvel Universe, he can also understand body languages (much like Batgirl before she learned to speak) of both humans and non-humans. But, he could also understand all computer languages. Just going with the computer and body language aspects would be like combining the skills of Oracle and Cassandra Cain into one character. Just doing that would have made him into one of the most badassed characters around, then you add in his powers as the best translator in the MU and you have one very powerful mutant.

Next I would like to talk about (again), how one of the things that separated the X-Men from other teams of superheroes and really made them stand out (at least for me). Was the Xavier School. As I've written on here before this is one of the worst parts of that whole House of M fiasco in my opinion. Without the school there isn't much difference between the X-Men and any of the other superhero teams and to keep this post on subject. I would like to add that one of the things that I really enjoyed back in the day about reading The New Mutants was the whole the junior varsity team vs. the varsity team rivalry between the new mutants and the X-Men, especially in the story arc of Kitty Pryde joining the New Mutants and how she felt like it was a demotion from her place on the X-Men.

Finally, I would like to spend a little time on how good this series was in its character work. From the first issue up until Rob Liefeld began working on the book you could really see the through line of the growth each character developed through out the series. From Sam becoming more comfortable as a leader to Rahne gaining more self confidence as well as becoming more comfortable in her own skin. Even the development in both Bobby and Danielle of learning to work with a team and each becoming less implusive in their actions. I could go on and on about all the things I love about this book. But, I think this is a good stopping point.

Away My X-Men

Lately, I've been thinking about the X-Men and the different things I like about them. This train of thought then brought me to how much "House of M" really bugged me. Besides de-powering one of my favorite X-Men (the mighty and awesome Jubilee). It also really annoyed me how much they shrunk the mutant population. One of the things I dug about the X-Men pre-House of M was the variety in mutants and powers and how the different groups within the Xavier Institute. Of all the things I miss about the X-Men and their affiliated "X-Teams" the pre-House of M variety and the combinations that led to make my really miss those days. sadly, stories like House of M have become a trademark of Joe Quesada's editorial run at Marvel. After all who would of thought after this terrible story we would have the whole Civil War fiasco followed by Peter Parker selling his soul to the Devil and getting a divorce out of the deal. One the plus side it looks like they're finally undoing a couple of these stories and even though DC has been better at the major event promotions as of late. One of the things that really has been bugging me about both companies has been the whole Nothing Will Ever Be The Same!!! events. Of course, the main reason I'm not a fan of these events is because, the only thing that makes one of these events stick is wholey dependent on how good the story is. After all once another writer takes over a book (s)he is able to throw out the stuff they don't like while keeping the continuity they either like or were fans of back in the day and in teh end I guess, even us fans have the power to do that as well and in my X-Men Universe Jubes is still a mutant and the kids that starred in the X-Men Academy books are all still at the school and they all still live in New York state.