The Return of Cloak & Dagger

[Dread]

I still don't get why Cloak & Dagger would be in with the evil establishment considering they were both anti-SHRA heroes who stick with "lost causes" like the Runaways. The only way it makes sense is if they're moles or being blackmailed somehow.

 

[Manic]

Maybe Emma convinces them to do it for the good of the mutant community. It would take some truly noble reason to convince them to move all the way to California-- especially Cloak, who still retains some of his old West Coast rap hate from the 90's.

 

[Dread]

I also still don't quite get why Emma is with the Cabal. She has to know they are obviously villains. She hasn't really been one herself for over a decade real time, since she founded GENERATION X. Siding with the bad guys just because they happen to be in power at the moment has only failed every single time it has been done in recorded history. They don't have the few remaining mutants' best interests at heart. They're all too powerful for Emma to manipulate in any way to her benefit, aside for maybe Namor, who is basically just muscle at this point (and switches from heel to babyface more often than Triple H). The Hood has Dormammu at his back, and everyone else is beyond her.

If anything, "The Cabal" is basically, "Loki, Dr. Doom and Namor forming a collective to wait out Norman Osborn's fall from power to immediately fill the vacuum while convincing him they are allies, with Hood and Frost as arm candy/pawns". Granted, I haven't read a lot of Bendis' material lately.

 

[Anubis]

Are they mutants? I thought they got their powers from drugs.

 

[Dread]

That was before mutants got REALLY cool in the 90's. The official story is that Cloak and Dagger were latent mutants whose powers were triggered and manifested by being injected with experimental drugs. Much as Namor became "Marvel's First Mutant" by sheer magic in the 90's when "mutant" was akin to printing money, Bill Clinton was just being elected and the last original industry idea laid down to die. Since, well, any idea nowadays is usually, "do what worked 10/15/25/35 years ago, only more decompressed with modern art".

 

[Anubis]

Eh, still sounds like a stretch. Truthfully, the only reason they're even with this new group is for transportation.

 

[Manic]

I also still don't quite get why Emma is with the Cabal. She has to know they are obviously villains. She hasn't really been one herself for over a decade real time, since she founded GENERATION X. Siding with the bad guys just because they happen to be in power at the moment has only failed every single time it has been done in recorded history. They don't have the few remaining mutants' best interests at heart. They're all too powerful for Emma to manipulate in any way to her benefit, aside for maybe Namor, who is basically just muscle at this point (and switches from heel to babyface more often than Triple H). The Hood has Dormammu at his back, and everyone else is beyond her.

If anything, "The Cabal" is basically, "Loki, Dr. Doom and Namor forming a collective to wait out Norman Osborn's fall from power to immediately fill the vacuum while convincing him they are allies, with Hood and Frost as arm candy/pawns". Granted, I haven't read a lot of Bendis' material lately.

I think she joined the Cabal in an effort to keep the government off the X-Men's back. Tony Stark kept SHIELD away from the mutant community because there was still some small part of him that was a decent human being, but she was going to need to know for herself if Norman Osborn would harass the X-Men. After all, as far as we know, the X-Men don't have the same advantage of X-Factor Investigations where Val Cooper and the ONE are keeping the Initiative at bay.

 

[Dread]

I think she joined the Cabal in an effort to keep the government off the X-Men's back. Tony Stark kept SHIELD away from the mutant community because there was still some small part of him that was a decent human being, but she was going to need to know for herself if Norman Osborn would harass the X-Men. After all, as far as we know, the X-Men don't have the same advantage of X-Factor Investigations where Val Cooper and the ONE are keeping the Initiative at bay.

True, but the problem with that is that Norman Osborn will take out the X-Men if he feels he has to no matter what Frost does for him. To not realize that is to do something akin to allowing Loki to enter your new kingdom unrestricted despite him literally orchestrating the destruction of the last.

Wait, nevermind.

I mean, aren't the Dark X-Men or Dark Avengers due to fight the X-Men at some point anyway? Right now it seems Frost on the Cabal is akin to either feeding everyone else to the lion hoping to be eaten last, or merely delaying the inevitable.

 

[Manic]

I mean, aren't the Dark X-Men or Dark Avengers due to fight the X-Men at some point anyway? Right now it seems Frost on the Cabal is akin to either feeding everyone else to the lion hoping to be eaten last, or merely delaying the inevitable.

Well, we know it's going to happen. Emma thought a fight could be prevented.

 

[Anubis]

So, if it's true that Jean's coming back, they must be preparing to get rid of Emma. I actually liked their relationship. She really loved the *****e.

 

[Dread]

Well, we know it's going to happen. Emma thought a fight could be prevented.

Emma made her chops with the Hellfire Club working gleefully alongside men like Osborn and should know well how they operate without telepathy. But, I suppose it is another case of Marvel thinking a character's experience should be ignored to have them act like any story in the Joe Q era is the first time they experienced any event.

I.E. SECRET INVASION = Marvel heroes acting as if no aliens had ever invaded Manhattan, ever. For christ's sake, aliens invade Manhattan so much in Marvel that schools should literally have "alien attack" drills next to "fire drills".

 

[JewishHobbit]

So, if it's true that Jean's coming back, they must be preparing to get rid of Emma. I actually liked their relationship. She really loved the *****e.

I am totally cool with that. Emma still remains the only X-Man that I have NEVER liked. I didn't even like her in Generation X all that much. In fact, the only time I DID like her as a decent good guy was during the Phalanx Covenant. After that I lost feelings. I hate her and Scott together and I would be nothing but happy if Scott sent her packing into the arms of Namor or whoever. Get rid of the wench! Get Scott and Jean back together.

 

[Dread]

The problem, though, is that Frost at the very least had a personality. In my opinion, Jean struggled to find one beyond "Power Mad Phoenix" or "Token Woman". Being a "Phoenix in waiting" or "Scott's wife" isn't the same. She really needs a more iconic stance.

 

[Manic]

Ugh. When Jean comes back, I hope she snubs Scott. I hope she snubs him good. He cheated on her while they were married. What, everybody just expects Jean to come back, Scott to say "Now that you're back, I'm breaking up with my mistress," and Jean to just take him back? Screw that. Let him stay with Emma. I hope Scott and Jean never get back together.

 

[Anubis]

If they're gonna bring her back, I'd like for her to not want anything to do with his ass. I mean, he did cheat on her. F**k that guy. She should hook up with Beast or Angel.

 

[Dread]

To be fair, Jean was the one who "pushed" Scott to be with Frost after she died at her very grave to prevent the horrible future where "Beast-on-Mutant-Crack" destroyed the world. Sure, it made no sense in any human endeavor to have a murdered wife literally encourage her widower to continue romancing his mistress, but Morrison made it very clear in interviews that he wrote Jean as his ex and Frost as his newer love, and thus that is where he was coming from. Never underestimate the narrative imagination of a writer venting his relationship baggage onto sci-fi characters.

 

[Anubis]

Well, they've already ignored just about everything else Morrison did, what will one more thing hurt? Lets say she isn't mad about it, at the very least she should have moved on and not want to be with him anymore.

 

[Dread]

Angel is certainly emo and introverted, as well as borderline sociopathic, enough for Jean if she wants that. I thought Beast was technically dating Whedon's Token Pithy Woman, a.k.a. Brand, although has that ended already?

The problem is that bringing Jean back is the same as bringing Steve Rogers back; no matter what the current editorial plan is, it merely makes it easier to revert back to status quo and whitewash the last few years of "development". And while I have been a fan long enough to know better, I become increasingly tired of something happening that makes the last few years worth of comics or continuity I invested in utterly worthless and pointless.

 

[Anubis]

Eh, I never really gave a s**t about the X-Men anyway. They can do whatever they want.

 

[Dread]

Frost's grown on me. I'd rather a ***** with a personality than a saint without one. But then again I say that as someone who has really never cared for Jean. She's fine in X-MEN FIRST CLASS, but again, there she is "token girl" as Stan Lee intended. Honestly a part of me feels her fundamental problem is that she was kind of like "Sue Storm Lite" in 1963 and she hasn't evolved too much beyond that.

 

[JewishHobbit]

As far as the Scott affair thing... remember that Jean tried to cheat on him with Wolverine as well and he pushed her away saying it'd never work. I WANT to say that happened before she even learned about Scott and Emma so she's just as guilty as he is.

As for personality, she had it, it just wasn't so overpouring as Emma's is. I'd take a more subtle personality over Emma's anyday. Her's just makes me not like the comic and that's not good. I can honestly say that since she joined the team under Morrison's pen, there's only been one single issue where I actually liked her... ONE!!! It was the first issue after Messiah Complex where she and Scott were in the Savage Land with Kazar and his chick. I really liked the way she was written there... but that's it, and the next issue? Didn't like her again. She was tolerable through most of Whedon's Astonishing run, but still not likeable.

So for, what, 5 years or so that she's been on the X-Men and I like one issue with her in it? Yeah, I'm ready for her to go and Jean to come back as the leading lady.

 

[Dread]

Naturally, Emma Frost isn't immune to shoddy writing. Some writers overdo her snark attitude a bit; others haven't gotten the message that she's been on the "reformed" track since before Clinton's second term. I liked her overall in Whedon's run, I think he had a lot of fun with her.

I just never really got into Jean. She's a den-mother, but so is literally every single obligatory female member of a superhero team before 1995. Or at least many of them. The Phoenix stuff was cool once but now I just see it as a Cosmic PMS Bird. Besides, a character defined by becoming, essentially, an entirely different character seems to not be a good sign. Part of me thinks the problem was that as an original concept from Stan & Jack she wasn't exactly the most fleshed as some of their best. Immediately she was defined by her love for Scott despite being X-Men. Then at some point the Phoenix comes in. Those are being defined by others or stuff happening to her, not as a character unto herself. At least that was why I never cared for her, usually attaching to Kitty Pryde or Rogue for female X-characters (least as a kid).

If Jean were to come back, it would be high time she was defined not by her Cosmic PMS Bird or whoever she was dating, but whoever she was or is inside.

 

[The Mighty Thor]

I also still don't quite get why Emma is with the Cabal. She has to know they are obviously villains. She hasn't really been one herself for over a decade real time, since she founded GENERATION X. Siding with the bad guys just because they happen to be in power at the moment has only failed every single time it has been done in recorded history. They don't have the few remaining mutants' best interests at heart. They're all too powerful for Emma to manipulate in any way to her benefit, aside for maybe Namor, who is basically just muscle at this point (and switches from heel to babyface more often than Triple H). The Hood has Dormammu at his back, and everyone else is beyond her.

If anything, "The Cabal" is basically, "Loki, Dr. Doom and Namor forming a collective to wait out Norman Osborn's fall from power to immediately fill the vacuum while convincing him they are allies, with Hood and Frost as arm candy/pawns". Granted, I haven't read a lot of Bendis' material lately.

I don't understand it either; to be honest, I think it's probably just a way of removing Emma from the picture as a member of the X-Men and Scott's girlfriend so that Jean can eventually storm back in and make her triumphant return.

 

[Manic]

I thought Beast was technically dating Whedon's Token Pithy Woman, a.k.a. Brand, although has that ended already?

She's popped up during Ellis' Astonishing X-Men, and she & Hank are still bumping uglies. Some serious uglies.

 

[TheCorpulent1]

Cecelia Reyes still needs to come back so she and Beast can have hot, steamy doctor-sex.