Amazing X-Men #2 - nitpicking
Blaze
O'Brien) wrote:
> Just a few thoughts that came to me while reading Amazing X-Men #2.
> In case I come across as the sort of person who drives Stephen Fry
> into cross-channel ferries, I should point out that the issue was
> not without its good points. The scripting on Abyss was quite good,
> and the writing of Quicksilver was also pretty good.
and that was about it. hear, hear on the many, many inconsistencies in
this ish, some of which even i didn't spot, and i'm an experienced
r.a.startrek.tech nitpicker. (you haven't _seen_ nitpicking until you've
read the mini-faq on holodeck technology.) but when the characters,
story, and art get this inaccurate when compared with what we all already
know, the story's just plain ruined.
btw, one you missed -- considering that nemesis killed wanda before even
apocalypse got a good look at her, how'd copycat know what she looked
like, even in the wrong costume?
--
Blaze
Anything that happens, happens.
Anything that, in happening, causes something else to happen,
causes something else to happen.
Anything that, in happening, causes itself to happen again,
happens again.
It doesn't necessarily do it in chronological order, though.
-- Douglas Adams, "Mostly Harmless"
Paul O'Brien
In case I come across as the sort of person who drives Stephen Fry
into cross-channel ferries, I should point out that the issue was
not without its good points. The scripting on Abyss was quite good,
and the writing of Quicksilver was also pretty good.
And then...
SPOILERS.
* I'll start with the really obvious one. The Sentinels really
don't put up much of a show in this story. Box goes to all that
trouble to reprogram them to attack the X-Men last issue, and
then all they do is stand there. Only one of them actually does
any attacking, and Box has to specifically reprogram it again
to do that.
* Which reminds me. Look at Dazzler's posture just after she's
been shot by the Sentinel. Flying through the air in an explosion,
she has her legs bent at right angles at the hip and dead straight
at the knee. That's bloody painful - and it's certainly not a
position that you'd find somebody who's just been shot in.
* While I'm complaining about Dazzler, isn't her hair awfully
long? Aren't the X-Men supposed to have more practical costumes
in this reality? Isn't hair that long the functional equivalent
of having a five foot rope tied around your neck? (The same
also applies to those non-functional fringes on Banshee's costume.)
* But going back to the Sentinels. The totally non-threatening
Sentinels are then defeated by Storm by calling up an electrical
storm. Aren't these things insulated? The storm doesn't seem
that severe - the other X-Men aren't even wet! And the Sentinels
are knocked out immediately.
* And then the really silly bit. The Sentinels are reprogrammed
by a combination of Storm's electrical pulse and Banshee's harmonics.
What, you can reprogram a Sentinel by hitting it with a giant
cattle prod and then getting the Red Army Male Voice Choir to sing
at it? That's silly!
* And if you can reprogram a Sentinel that way, what was the
point of the X-Men using that computer disc to reprogram them
last issue? Of course, the plot called for Box to be able to
reprogram the disc before they put it in. But why didn't Box
use his powers directly on the Sentinels? He doesn't need a
computer disc to work through!
* Look at the X-Men's position on the splash page of this issue.
This is the team being battle-ready, is it? Banshee in particular
seems to have decided to raise his arms above his head and then
swing them down together so as to get a particularly nice effect.
* Exodus doesn't do much in this issue. This is one of the
most powerful mutants on the planet. In our reality, he's beat
the Sentinels by blinking at them. Yet here he seems to be
unable to do much more than fly and fire energy blasts. Is he
much less powerful, or much less adept at using his powers here,
then? But if that's the case, why can't our Exodus teleport?
(If he could, he'd have gone straight back to Avalon after Colossus
teleported him off in X-Men #25.)
* Copycat and Box disappear into the crowd and the humans don't
seem to notice that they're mutants - despite the fact that they're
wearing the robes of the Madri, and that Box is clearly not human.
* Copycat adopts the form of Wanda Maximoff in order to distract
Quicksilver. Where did that headdress come from? Vanessa's
never demonstrated the power to change her clothing before!
* And even if she can, why the headdress? As we saw in X-Men
Chronicles #1, Wanda's costume in this reality was a generic
X-Men uniform, with no headdress. Where did Copycat get the
idea from?
* And her impersonation of Wanda is none too good, anyway.
One eye is clearly higher than the other.
* Dazzler communicates with Quicksilver and Storm through a
holographic projection. Is she making this hologram? How can
she do this at long distance? And how can it talk? Dazzler
generates light, not sound! Do the X-Men have some sort of
special device for this purpose? Wouldn't a radio be much
simpler?
* These Escher characters are clearly beyond Andy Kubert's
ability - his storytelling is shot to hell in most of Abyss's
scenes. In particular, in the panel where Abyss appears in
the doorway of his ship and on the cover, it is absolutely
impossible to work out what's going on. Kubert really should
have looked at Rick Leonardi's rendition of Discord in Spider-
Man 2099 to get an idea of how to draw these sort of characters.
* The moral of this story is: lose your temper, hit somebody,
and you'll win! Uh...
* And finally, though this isn't really a nitpick, what was
the point of having Spyne, Yeti and Arclight there? All they
do is get beaten in a fight off panel. This story would have
worked equally well with just Vanessa and Madison.
Paul O'Brien
pr...@festival.ed.ac.uk, elf...@srv0.law.ed.ac.uk
Stewart, improvise a football chant while eating this banana.
Jorge DeLaCruz
Also, isn't Arclight a female.
Jorge
--
"SPOON" the Battlecry of the Tick
FabNic
person, and it was, so...
I will accept the nitpicks on EVERYTHING that was wrong with AMAZING X-MEN
#2 (of which, there was a LOT, whether they were my fault or not), but I
will NOT accept criticism for Banshee's ridiculous "harmonics"
reprogramming of the Sentinels!!
That rewrite surprised me (to say the least... to say the most would not
be nice).
In my original plot and script, QUICKSILVER is leaving the group to save
Jeremy and Exodus says, "What about the Sentinels? They're going to wake
up soon." and Q answers, "Talk to them." To which they all say, "Talk?!!"
Later, when Storm and Q return with the brat they saved, we find out that
indeed, the X-MEN did actually talk to them, trapping the Sentinels in a
logic bind and leading the robots to actually agree to accept the X-Men's
help.
I'm not saying my bit was great or nothing, but geez, it ain't worse than
"harmonics," is it?
I can take a hit and I'll dive on the grenade if I have to, I'm such a
wonderful guy, but I will NOT be blamed for harmonics! (that's my new
motto, catchy, ain't it?)
-- fabian
Dwight Williams
> I wasn't going to say anything unless it was mentioned by more than one
> person, and it was, so...
>
> I will accept the nitpicks on EVERYTHING that was wrong with AMAZING X-MEN
> #2 (of which, there was a LOT, whether they were my fault or not), but I
> will NOT accept criticism for Banshee's ridiculous "harmonics"
> reprogramming of the Sentinels!!
> That rewrite surprised me (to say the least... to say the most would not
> be nice).
> I can take a hit and I'll dive on the grenade if I have to, I'm such a
> wonderful guy, but I will NOT be blamed for harmonics! (that's my new
> motto, catchy, ain't it?)
Indeed it is. Sigh.
Rewritten at the last minute. My condolences on that. Your version _would_
have worked much better, I think. Granted, not everyone reading the
X-Books is a computer programmer but I think even the kids would've
understood a "logic bind". Mind you, if that wasn't the editor's problem
with your solution, I'd appreciate it if you could share what exactly it was.
So, that and various net.headaches aside, how's life been treating you
otherwise since your last Ottawa visit? Family doing OK?
--
Dwight Williams(ad...@freenet.carleton.ca)
1706 Caminiti Cres., Orleans, ON, Canada K4A 1M1
Vorpal Bunny(TM)
was confused as to why they re-programmed the Sentinels, but then also
was able to talk to them. The dialogue in the last few pages seemed to
be a bit haphazard, as the X-Men congratulate themselves for re-programming
the Sentinels, but then also take solace in the fact that even Sentinels
can be convinced to work with mutants.
The part about convincing the Sentinels didn't make sense given the
dialogue presented.
--
\\ \\ /\ Daily Orange Staff Writer SP "Quip _IS_ /\
\\-\\ \/ SyraCWIS Project Document Maintainer O a valid \/
( X-X) /\ AND Keeper of the Forbush Man Flame O word in /\
{_^_} \/ >>--> http://web.syr.edu/~holee/ N! newswriting!" \/
Paul O'Brien
>I wasn't going to say anything unless it was mentioned by more than one
>person, and it was, so...
>I will accept the nitpicks on EVERYTHING that was wrong with AMAZING X-MEN
>#2 (of which, there was a LOT, whether they were my fault or not), but I
>will NOT accept criticism for Banshee's ridiculous "harmonics"
>reprogramming of the Sentinels!!
>That rewrite surprised me (to say the least... to say the most would not
>be nice).
I'm delighted to hear that that wasn't your responsibility. I
take it that the original idea was that the X-Men would just undo
Box's programming and exploit the Sentinels' preprogramming. Now,
that makes sense. That I could live with. I don't know who
actually came up with the idea, but I'd love to get my hands on
what they were smoking at the time.
>In my original plot and script, QUICKSILVER is leaving the group to save
>Jeremy and Exodus says, "What about the Sentinels? They're going to wake
>up soon." and Q answers, "Talk to them." To which they all say, "Talk?!!"
>Later, when Storm and Q return with the brat they saved, we find out that
>indeed, the X-MEN did actually talk to them, trapping the Sentinels in a
>logic bind and leading the robots to actually agree to accept the X-Men's
>help.
And that makes Dazzler's speech at the end make more sense, too.
I mean, if you're going to rewrite something, you might as well
make all the necessary amendments in the rest of the story.
>I'm not saying my bit was great or nothing, but geez, it ain't worse than
>"harmonics," is it?
Nah. The rest really are nitpicks or art errors. "Harmonics" is
the only really, unbelievably silly bit in the issue, and I take
your word for it that it wasn't your fault.
>I can take a hit and I'll dive on the grenade if I have to, I'm such a
>wonderful guy, but I will NOT be blamed for harmonics! (that's my new
>motto, catchy, ain't it?)
Thanks for the comments. And BTW, there really were bits of the
issue I liked. Honestly!
Skywalker
: In article <3j284l$b...@newsbf02.news.aol.com>, FabNic <fab...@aol.com> wrote:
: >That rewrite surprised me (to say the least... to say the most would not
: >be nice).
: >I'm not saying my bit was great or nothing, but geez, it ain't worse than
: >"harmonics," is it?
: Wow. Just out of curiosity, who did the rewrite? If it was BOB, then I think
: that some on the net are highly overrating his writing skills...
: especially since you wanted to use the standard method of dealing with
: Sentinals that ended most scaps with them over the course of the
: years. (as opposed to one which is just plain silly.)
: -nick who is trying to debug his programming assignment by singing at
: the terminal.
Didn't anybody notice that on the cover to A.X.M.#2 Quicksilver had
NO FRIGGIN' HEAD!!!! What, was he scalped by a sentinel???
Nick Demmon
>be nice).
>"harmonics," is it?
Wow. Just out of curiosity, who did the rewrite? If it was BOB, then I think
Peter A Goodrich
: Also, isn't Arclight a female.
Yup. But here's two interesting tidbits of..stuff to waste bandwidth with!
A) Arclight is actually a female in the real reality, but in Alter-X
she's gotten a sex change with new ProMen! Dominator safe!
2) Who cares? Arclight, Yeti, and Spyne appeared for barely three
panels before they were defeated off-panel by the X-Men.
pete..oo! Legion joke!
Jacob W Michaels
[Fabe's stuff deleted]
[Response deleted]
*sigh* Just once, I would like to get Fabe's posting before ten responses to
it. It's not fair, I tell you! waaaa!
Jacob Keeper of the Hellions Flame
David R. Henry
>I wasn't going to say anything unless it was mentioned by more than one
>person, and it was, so...
>
>I will accept the nitpicks on EVERYTHING that was wrong with AMAZING X-MEN
>#2 (of which, there was a LOT, whether they were my fault or not), but I
>will NOT accept criticism for Banshee's ridiculous "harmonics"
>reprogramming of the Sentinels!!
Bless you, you fine martyr you. Thanks for the clarification. Abyss,
for what it's worth, was more interesting than most of the random
psychos of the month that we get in the X-titles. That's not saying
much by comparison, but, hey, it's a start.
>I can take a hit and I'll dive on the grenade if I have to, I'm such a
>wonderful guy, but I will NOT be blamed for harmonics! (that's my new
>motto, catchy, ain't it?)
It's making my .sigfile.
How did Dazzler pull off the talking hologram, btw?
--
David R. Henry - Rogue Fan Club // Cthulhu! Cthulhu! Cthulhu! And Cthooky!
"All you of Earth are IDIOTS!"-P9fOS / What was the question? -- Kate Bush
dhe...@plains.nodak.edu * Evolution: Give it some time, it'll grow on ya.
Michael Triggs
> Also, isn't Arclight a female.
Yes, she is... They really messed up in regards to this in Amazing X-Men #2...
They're going to need one hell of a retcon to get themselves out of this
mess... I can almost picture it:
Something along the lines of Arclight undergoing a sex change in order to
better serve Apocalypse... I think they intended for that person to be
Scrambler, of the Marauders, not Arclight...
min...@tigger.stcloud.msus.edu
> Didn't anybody notice that on the cover to A.X.M.#2 Quicksilver had
>NO FRIGGIN' HEAD!!!! What, was he scalped by a sentinel???
What? He had a head. In fact, he's screaming with his mouth open wide enough
to give us a lovely view of his gullet.
--Ben
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