The Four Color Media Monitor

The Indiana Gazette ran one of Andrew Smith's puff pieces about the botch job the live action Marvel screen adaptations have led to back in the comics, and what a surprise, he's defending the forced removal of Scarlet Witch and Quicksilver's mutancy from canon in the past 5 years:

But in the comics, she isn’t exactly Miss Popularity on the sentient island Krakoa, where all of Earth’s mutants now live.

That’s because for many years — well, from her introduction in 1964 to 2016 — Wanda thought she was a mutant. Not only that, but from 1983 to 2015, she thought she was Magneto’s daughter … and so did he!

But that was temporary.

It turns out that when the Fantastic Four and X-Men were the cinematic property of Twentieth Century Fox, those characters found themselves being minimized in the comics. And characters like Wanda and her brother Pietro were de-mutantized so they could be used by Marvel Studios.

“Scarlet Witch” #11 (2016) established that the two were never Magneto’s children, but instead gained superpowers from genetic tinkering by Marvel baddie the High Evolutionary. Which is why all the mutants on Krakoa call her “The Pretender.”

But worse, Wanda had a mental breakdown in 2005 and used her powers to remove the powers of 90 percent of Earth’s mutants. Those that happened to be, say, in flight or underwater or something … well, they died. The survivors, suddenly powerless, were none too happy.

Hmm, how come no objective commentary on whether the tale was good or bad? So pathetic how these news propagandists pretend this is real life, and obscure all the lazy approaches to writing. No matter how reversible these directions are, it doesn't make them tasteful to begin with.

So all those mutants Wanda killed are back (or most of ’em, anyway), and boy, do they hate her. Even if what she did wasn’t permanent.

And give her a break, guys: She did try to revive a few million dead mutants on the island of Genosha, but only succeeded in creating millions of mutant zombies. (Don’t think about it.)

Well if the only way she's revived dead mutants is through zombification, as though this were a George Romero horror flick, that's not fulfilling the real deal, is it? But he sure must think it's such fun seeing all the mutants hate-hate-hate upon Wanda, judging from his sensationalistic writing. After talking about how Magneto continues, in the new pseudo-canon, to treat Wanda as his daughter, Smith continues to describe the following:

But then how come Wanda’s dead body is found the following week in “X-Factor” #10? We don’t know the hows and whys, but she is not only dead, she is most sincerely dead. The last we saw of her alive she was with Magneto, and um … oh, dear. Maybe “I will do what I must” isn’t entirely a good thing when it’s uttered by a guy who’s spent most of his adult life as a supervillain.

Of course, we don’t know that Magneto did it. Although Wolverine’s reaction demonstrates that he thinks so. Add to that, next month will see the first issue of a five-issue miniseries titled “The Trial of Magneto.”

So we’re definitely supposed to think Magneto did it. And I think he did. And why would he kill a woman he regards as his daughter? Well, because of what he said: “I will do what I must to make things right.”

Well if the script establishes that he really did, that's disgusting. As is Logan's potentially violent reaction, which has got to be par for the course in these overblown events. Then Smith says:

So that’s my cunning deduction. Or is it an induction? Anyway, I think Magneto killed her, and now will try to use his power and authority — he’s on the ruling council of the island — to have Wanda resurrected by The Five.

As. A. Mutant.

That's no excuse for Magneto slaying her, if he did in the story. And then, Smith gets worse with his views:

One is: If Wanda is modified to be a mutant going forward, you may ask, “What about her brother Pietro, aka Quicksilver”? To which I will reply, “Who cares?” Honestly, he’s a jerk.

The other is: I could be wrong. Maybe that’s not Magneto’s plan. Maybe he didn’t even kill her. But right now it’s not looking good for ol’ bucket-head.

Wow, more damning of fictional characters as though they're real, and as though it's their fault for being "jerks". And he doesn't complain how Magneto, for whatever established faults he had in the past, has here been turned into a pawn in some revolting game of Let's Kill The Beauty For Shock's Sake event. It's an gigantically noxious influence that's gone on too long, and besides, what about Dr. Strange and Spider-Man being put in the revolving-lid coffin to boot? Do we really need even that? Nope. This is some of the shoddiest apologia you can find in the mainstream press these days, that's been going on for far too long, and has utterly ruined mainstream comicdom.

Labels: Avengers, dreadful writers, golden calf of death, history, marvel comics, misogyny and racism, msm propaganda, women of marvel, X-Men