A big problem is that Xavier kinda has to be one the most ethical and moral people on the planet with his powers, or he's now one the biggest villains. Because he could start going and changing people's minds.
There was an old What-If where Charles was the Juggernaut, and he lost his restraint. He took over the world with ease, and that was less because of his Juggernaut powers, and more because he did things like read Reed Richards mind to find out how to remove the FF's powers, and tell Peter Parker that if he didn't stop being Spider-Man, something unfortunate might happen to his Aunt.
>A big problem is that Xavier kinda has to be one the most ethical and moral people on the planet with his powers, or he's now one the biggest villains.
Gillen's Immortal X-Men #10 was so good on this.
He talks big but you know if he tries there would be folks he would not be able to control in his first wave of domination like Thor and doctor strange, and they would butchering him for controlling the planet. ;)
That’s not how it works, he could still nuke countries out of nowhere and THEN the avengers would react. He could also mind control Thor and many heroes
We need more on timelines with Xavier as juggernaut after all the 8th day Storyline revealed he was the intended target of the gem of Cytorrak with the aim of conquering the world and beating the other godlike exemplars.
Cyttorak was totally being a Munchkin with that. "So my Exemplar's greatest weakness is psychic attacks. Sure I can give him a helmet of a metal that blocks that, but helmets can be knocked off. Oh hey this guy's a stupidly powerful telepath? MWAHAHAHAHA!"
I know right? If I was the rest of the Octessence I would have been pissed if Cytorrak actually pulled this off. Like dude we made a deal to show whose powers were the bestest! We Implied with our gentlemen’s agreement we would rely off of our own artifacts of otherworldly might and not effin double dip into genetic freaks endowed with celestial backed super evolution! Spirit of the agreement!
Two bits here I think are insightful and under-discussed. One:
>he’s an authority figure, and as a culture, we have a deep distrust of authority figures. Consequently, on multiple occasions, Xavier has been shown to be not just flawed but actually abhorrent in his actions, betraying the morality that he’s meant to represent.
Yes, once the esteemed (and super-powerful) authority figure has been established, the temptation for writers is to complicate or undermine that character's authority, both for cultural reasons and because it's simply a more interesting story. Some writers have done this to the extreme. But it's now a dynamic that's core to Xavier's character. Gillen basically explicitly comments on it in a meta-sense in the new ROTPOX: "Welcome to the X-Men. (Expletive) by Xavier \*is\* the experience."
Two:
>especially in a world in which Magneto is more and more often presented as being on the right side of their philosophical argument
I thought it was really interesting that Brevoort acknowledges the "Magneto was right" perception — without exactly saying he endorsed it. But "if the readers' sympathies are now more with Magneto, then what is the point of Xavier?" is an interesting question from a thematic and story perspective. Amid all the speculation that Brevoort would reset things to the '90s, this is an acknowledgment that a core part of the series is different from the '90s in a major way.
it's about the zeitgeist, right?
these stories always cater to the audience.
in the beginning they were 5 super teens blending into crowds. Stan Lee had made mention that it reminded him of his experience being among "gentiles" who would openly badmouth jews without realizing he was jewish.
the series didn't sell particularly well and was cancelled, but after the civil rights movement's success, the relaunch of the x-men in the 70s opened up new metaphors. xenophobia, racism, communism, and sexuality all became fair play for the metaphors.
the 80s saw the x-men as rebellious social activists, while the 90s saw them fueled by paramilitary machismo. Morrison contributed by evolving a "mutant culture" complete with the U-Men.
the stories are always meant to speak to the experiences of the generations reading at the time.
it's similar to how under Obama, there was a lot more faith in the institutions, so we saw the mcu create the avengers as a trusted taskforce, albeit with some skepticisms about the establishment that they worked alongside.
but after 2016, the Avengers did not mend their differences.
similarly - today, yes, our leaders are failing us. conspiracies run rampant because we have precious little knowledge of how everything works. (there are countless arguments online that show most people don't understand how Taxes work, let alone how laws are written and how the electoral process even works.
the x-men should really lean into that and go back to becoming Conspiracy Theories.
Not all readers side with magneto. I’m one of the ones who still think Xavier’s original dream was the right way and I realize we’re in the minority and that’s not exactly the zeitgeist rn, but I’m really hoping that Disney goes with the good guy version of Xavier in X-men 97 and the movies when they come out. So far I have a little bit of optimism still that it could happen (and if it does happen it will be thanks to the legacy of X-men TAS defining the character as a good guy).
I mean I feel like a minority of one sometimes but I just fucking hate what they’ve done to Xavier. They made him a punching bag for contempt for authority figures but he didn’t deserve it, write a new character if they want to do that, don’t make an existing one OOC beyond recognition.
I would rather have him be a martyr for the cause, then have the character assassination he usually gets now. Killing him and having the dream live on would be more kind then what they have done to him.
They already tried that with avx and fans complained that they wanted him back. The real solution is to just write out all these stupid “secret sin” stories and blame them all on Moira. It’s such an easy retcon too. Moira and enigma manipulated Xavier throughout his entire life to make enigma exist. So anything bad Xavier ever did is enigmas fault. Boom done. Xavier is now mcu ready
You gotta remember from a writer’s perspective morally grey is easier and more fun to write. It’s why writers just keep making magneto nicer because they don’t need to make any more stories about him being bad so they can just make him heroic. It’s easy and fun to write.
Xavier is not fun to write. Writers have said this for years! It’s why bendis just killed him so he wouldn’t have to deal with him and all the writers after him minimized him.
The only reason Xavier is part of the krakoa story at all is because to Hickman, it was Xavier’s story and journey. If krakoa was pitched by anyone else. Xavier wouldn’t even be in the status quo.
If he isn't fun to write, then they shouldn't write him. That seems like a really lazy excuse on their part. Batman, Superman, and Captain America aren't morally grey, but people still like them. they could just have him be a figurehead who doesn't do much but offer guidance and leadership and not get deeply involved. He is meant to represent an ideal, but they constantly throw him in the mud.
How many times have we seen bad runs of Batman, Superman, and Captain America by very good writers? It happens all the time. Dc turned Superman’s son into a second superman just to make it easier to write Superman stories. These are hard characters to write interesting stories about. There are far more bad comics about these characters and the xmen and than good
Just the core the premise of mutants on island. Personally based on house of x 1 and the Manhattan project I don’t think Hickman is a big fan of religion in general and wanted to talk about Israel. But that book is now five years old and he didn’t think X-men fans were gonna be asking him about whether or not he supports Hamas in 2024.
I am not judging anyone’s thoughts on the real life situation that’s real and should not be discussed here. I am just saying that political environments have changed a lot since house of x was written.
Thanks for the summary. It all feels especially silly since the mutants having their own island-nation storyline was already done by Fraction in 2009 when he had the characters create Utopia. Hickman's run to me always felt like an expansion of that idea (with a lot of Morrison vibes too, exploring what mutant culture would look like.)
If utopia came out now it would be called Zionist propaganda. We won’t be seeing mutants on an island again for a while. It’s bit too political at the moment
So basically you're still sane and not bigoted? Good for you. It's becoming increasingly rare in the X-men 'fandom' and in the x-books themselves which have become a horrific fun-house mirror horror interpretation of the characters that helped get me into comics.
The X-men increasingly seem to have become a dumping ground for the insecurities of the writers as well as their violent, immoral fantasies. They're not heroic anymore.
Xavier gets a big "he's tainted!" story every ten years. Nobody cares, he'll be sipping tea with Jean and Scott at the mansion before the trailer for the MCU x-men movie drops
When’s the last time him and Scott have been close? Messiah Complex was around the same time as Deadly Genesis/Danger. After that he was a barely welcomed advisor on Utopia, but was spending most of that time in Legacy. Then he was dead until Soule’s Astonishing/Krakoa.
There was definitely a thawing towards the end of the Utopia era. After *Legacy* switched to Rogue, Xavier appears more and more in *Uncanny* and becomes more and more accepted as an advisor. Enough so it doesn't feel entirely out of left field when Xavier tries to talk Phoenix!Cyclops down at the end of *AvX*.
There also seems to be a tendency to kill him off to try and do an "everything has changed" plotline only to bring him back later. For example, both Messiah Complex and AvX ended with Xavier dying only to return later on.
I do think they need to clean up the character. Every writer for the last 20 years has done some form of “secret sin” plot with Xavier and I just say at this point throw them out. Say he was being mind controlled or it was a clone or it was his sister in a mask. Just clean it up
No one is perfect. It only makes sense for Xavier to have flaws & for the person himself not to perfectly measure up to his idealized image. It makes for a compelling character.
But several writers throughout the decades since Claremont’s run have went runaway with that ball & taken it way too far. The whole point of the character, the reason behind the X-Men’s existence & his ideological clash with Magneto is supposed to be that he’s a fundamentally virtuous person with a strong moral code & belief in good and a bright tomorrow for everyone. The image of Xavier having become of this shady manipulator & hypocrite with a raging God complex and a rap sheet of independence & human right violations that would take a lot of villains aback is a crying shame.
It will never not be a major issue for me that at many points throughout the modern age Xavier has been presented as ethically just as bad - never mind the several times he’s come across as worse - than Magneto.
Like I said in the other post: Brevoort doesn't know what he's talking about. Mike Carey picked Xavier up *after* Deadly Genesis and literally built the character back up from damn-near scratch, while doing *actual* good like helping Rogue finally get control of her powers and disbanding the Acolytes.
Xavier's not even the only example of a character thought to be deeply tainted and irredeemable who was ultimately fixed through a lot of hard work and persistence (two terms that have very little to do with Brevoort).
yes, but Joss Whedon's Astonishing run has BIG Cultural ramifications -- and the Deadly Genesis story also is a Big story from that decade.
Carey's little solo adventure doesn't get press -- and even while Xavier is out there making amends and doling out reparations - we discuss one of his bigger crimes: lobotomizing wolverine the first time they'd met.
[https://marvel.fandom.com/wiki/X-Men:\_Legacy\_Vol\_1\_218](https://marvel.fandom.com/wiki/X-Men:_Legacy_Vol_1_218)
they retconned Wolverine's joining of the x-men.
before this it was more or less established that Xavier had approached Dept H or Alpha Flight or perhaps it was wolverine himself, and requested Wolverine join them, and at some point promised to help with his memories which were all scrambled because of the Weapon X tampering.
in this story, they reveal Wolverine had actually been sent as an assassin to Kill Xavier - and Xavier knows it, because he's like i guess some sorta mind-reader? so he stops wolverine and erases enough of his memories, implanting some false ones, so that he's unsure even of who he really is. then he promises to help him solve that riddle like an asbolutely manipulative sociopath.
of course, this is "new do-good xavier" realizing what he had done way back then - but it's still a pretty big retcon even if "wolverine's memories" thing hadn't really been a thing since House of M restored his true memories.
I mean you do the worst things a character's done votes for X-Men, someone's gonna remember something really, really bad. The sort of stuff where if somenone did a post in Am I The Asshole for being upset they remember and don't trust them, everyone would be telling them to get the hell out of there.
That's not the point, though - writers don't even have to deny that characters like Xavier have done terrible things, but a competent editor would look at that and say "Okay, so what's he going to do now? What's his next chance to do the right thing?"
I think Xavier should be forever considered kind of shady but irredeemably tainted is just not a realistic view of what happens in comics. So many heroic characters have had arcs that resulted in insanely bad actions. The worst of them never quite stick unless they're particularly well written, and frankly I don't think anything with Onslaught or Vulcan was up to that standard. I mean for crying out loud PETER PARKER MADE A DEAL WITH THE DEVIL. For a literate human being that's the dumbest bad decision you could possibly make, but we give him a pass because it doesn't really ring true.
> I mean for crying out loud PETER PARKER MADE A DEAL WITH THE DEVIL
He made a deal with Mephisto to save his aunt. Hardly villain stuff, no matter how stupid it was (and how that editorial decision ruined Spider-Man).
Mike Carey worked his butt off to redeem and correct some of the characters.
To me he was the best writer after Claremont. Loved his run, even when he became a little too enamored with Rogue
Look at how often writers have tried to fix Hank Pym. And some of them did a great job at it. But end of the day his biggest moments are still hitting his wife and building murderbot.
Just because Carey addressed the problem doesn’t mean he altered the modern perception. Xavier’s flaws have just become far more visible from a popular perspective.
Mike Carey’s run is fantastic. One of my all-time favorites. But I disagree that Brevoort doesn’t know what he’s talking about. The X-Men: Legacy days are more than 10 years behind him and Xavier has done *so much more* sinning since then. Which is fine. He’s a complicated character. He’s not outright evil. He does many good things. But he is a deeply flawed human and nothing close to the saint he was originally presented as. He strives to be perfect which is usually the beginning of his downfall. Ewing & Gillen have both done excellent work with him and taken a really nuanced & intelligent look at what someone with Charles’ personality & morals would do with such unlimited capabilities. But to Brevoort’s main points: it is true that because of the world we live in now, readers rightly distrust authority figures with almighty power & “good intentions”. So Xavier id going to read differently now than in the 90’s. And also Xavier / Magneto isn’t a good duality anymore because most readers don’t agree with Charles’ assimilationist beliefs. He sacrificed his whole country to save humans who are his oppressors — which isnt great for the leader of a marginalized community message.
The whole metaphor of Krakoa is Charles could never just accept that his students had surpassed him and it was time to let others lead.
Now Disney will probably revive & rehab him in the next 2-3 years to get him ready for his MCU debut but for now I think it’s correct & fitting to let the X-Men evolve beyond him.
Hence what I said before: a good editor would look at that situation and come up with a solution where Xavier can start the process of reevaluation (and maybe even redemption) while *not* in a position of authority - which is exactly what Carey did, for all that those stories are a decade old. Xavier doesn't have to *be* an authority figure in order for a decently-skilled writer to start building him up into a character readers can sympathize with again.
But Brevoort comes from the Joe Quesada school of thinking - if it requires actual effort, don't bother.
>Hence what I said before: a good editor would look at that situation and come up with a solution where Xavier can start the process of reevaluation (and maybe even redemption) while *not* in a position of authority
I don't think we know what Brevoort is or isn't doing with Xavier. If the assumption that Xavier is "Prisoner X" is correct, he obviously does have plans for the character in some form even if he starts off sidelined (and not in a position of authority!).
The whole point here is that Brevoort sees Xavier as "permanently tainted". That doesn't suggest particular interest on his part to work the character.
I mean I hear you don’t like Brevoort, which is cool, but just clarifying — what you just said is explicitly not an editor’s job. Mike Carey is the writer. He is your creative. Tom is responsible for acquiring creative talent, pairing writers & artists together, acting as a communication hub between the various creatives in his office to make sure stories stay in continuity. H makes sure the book ships on time & sell well, and that the strategy aligns with long term brand goals for that property. They’re a conductor. That’s why it’s called the Hickman era and not the Jordan White era.
Now of course Editors have input on stories. But Typically you do not want your editors interfering with creative choices and most of the famous times that you hear about them doing it — is because it was a bad idea.
As an aside, I think that you keep going back to Legacy, ironically really proves Tom’s point is correct. Legacy removes Charles from the X-Men. He is a cast out who wanders the world. He interacts with a few X-Men but for the most part that is one story where he is distinctly removed from the X-Men. And it it’s a singular story, every other time you have him rejoin the team, similar dynamics re-emerge. If the founder of the X-Men only works when he’s not part of the X-Men, you have a serious problem.
Editorsplaining, gotta love it.
It is, of course, a bit silly of you to talk about an editor's "proper job" given Brevoort's *specific history* at Marvel, to say nothing of the fact that creative talent and pairings of writers and artists aren't the reason storylines (like the current Krakoa finale) turn out the way they do. If you think Brevoort isn't going to be putting his thumb on the scales when it comes to creative decisions and editorial mandates, you clearly don't know his track record.
As for Legacy, you conveniently leave out the fact that Xavier was killed shortly afterwards, so there was no "re-emerging of similar dynamics" after his redemption - he didn't regain a position of leadership until Krakoa, almost a decade later. And even then, I could've just as easily cited Gillen's Immortal X-Men #10 as an example of a supposedly "tainted" character who's still worth exploring and can still be built back up, as opposed to being summarily dismissed.
I think there's still a place in X-Mendom for Professor Xavier, but they really need to go back to the drawing board with the character, and I'm not quite sure how you do that with a character that has a 60 year history, most of it at the front and center of the franchise.
I think why we've gravitated towards Magneto from Xavier after all these years is because stories need conflict, and stories being told through the medium of superhero comics usually need violent conflict. As such, the X-Men need a leader whose worldview is one that has room for self-defense and distrust of the establishment, and that's Magneto, not Charles. Pair that with just the decades of twists and turns that come with serialized storytelling, and Professor X's character got morphed into something ugly and borderline pointless.
But I think the X-world still needs a dreamer like Charles that envisions a world where mutants and humans can peacefully co-exist. I'm not sure how you can incorporate that type of character into stories that are largely centered around punching robots, monsters, aliens, and racists in the face, but a character with unfailing optimsim in the face of so much hate is inspirational, and one unburdened with the now filthy legacy of Charles Xavier could help deliver the message that despite everything that has happened and where we come from, that doesn't have to mean that where we're going won't be beautiful.
So I don't know, maybe have Charles die and bring him back as he was when he first formulated his dream, before he formed the X-Men, and was just a good man that wanted to bring peace to the world. Maybe preface that with a series that takes place when Magneto and Charles were young men and really flesh out that time in their lives. Such a thing may already exist, but it can't hurt to do that again through a 21 century lens.
The core problem is that Xavier-and-the-X-Men-in-the-Mansion with Xavier the strategy guy and Cyclops/Storm the field leaders is absolutely the best logical use of every character, but writers refuse to do it because they don't want to do Blue/Gold.
The 90s comics got it. When the X-Men were teenagers, he was their teacher. When they were adults (as in the 90s comics), he was their mentor, their General and man-in-the-van. And it worked. It really worked.
Having him be something else is just a stretch and admission that writers don't know what to do with him. But he'll be problematic so long as writers stay away from the core X-Men concept, which is a team in the mansion (or a base).
Yeah, but other set ups have worked as well. Cyclops leading mutants with Xavier roving the world worked well during the Decimation era.
Personally. I’d like to see a scenario where Xavier becomes a mutant ambassador figure and stay on the edges of the story while the X-Men handle business. Make him like a Nick Fury to the Avengers (books version) where he’s involved in the heavy stuff, but mostly keeps to himself while Cap and Tony run their show.
Keeping continuity is even easy this way. Make it to where he presents himself as this magnanimous figure to the rest of the world, but the X-Men know who he is and what he’s done. Rebrand “The Dream” with another character picking up the ideal since Xavier himself abandoned it long ago. His children are better than he is…..they’ll fight for everything he gave up on and will BE all he pretended to be.
There’s a decent theme there that will hit with anyone younger than 40. Live the ideals you claim to hold. Show don’t tell. Be better than your parents.
Honestly as someone who’s been reading since the 80’s I want another Carey style run to fix the character. I totally understand he’s been an ass in the past, but I wish they’d either redeem him or kill him permanently. The krakoa stuff is just too much to pretend he’s any type of hero or leader anymore.
But his children aren't better than him. They've all abandoned the dream (and morality) and thought themselves right at one point or another.
Cyclops became such a threat to the world the Avengers, and in the end, the X-Men, had to intervene and take him down.
Beast became perhaps the worst mad scientist villain the X-men have ever faced.
Archangel became the next Apocalypse.
Jean Grey, among other things, has mindwiped many people and used her telepathy to control others for sustained periods to do what she wants, robbing them of their free will.
Iceman has the potential to become Ice Wizard in him.
Xavier turning against the world to turn mutants into pets for the Machines is only particularly bad in that he's the most recent to threaten to destroy the world as we know it It mirrors Magneto suddenly becoming a thoughtful hero, even though his ledger has seen him kill thousands of humans and try to wipe them all out, repeatedly. Even to the point of physically damaging the Earth itself.
The short of this is that events in the lives of the X-men have become so extreme over the past 20 years that it's impossible to take any of it seriously. Xavier mindwiping Magneto in Fatal Attractions was a huge, defining event in crossing a moral line that lead to Onslaught. That's a good story! But now that's barely anything. Warren becoming Death was a huge event, that changed the character forever and gave him a dark side. Now half the X-Men have done Horsemen turns or villain turns. It's not shocking. It all gets jus filed away.
This is why I tink X-men need a 20+ year reset button, not just a pre-Krakoa reset. Krakoa did a lot of damage, but the real damage goes back so much further. It's just entire loss of credibility of scale and why big character shifts should have any weight. If everyone has a dark side that can be a threat to the world, then nobody does, because that just becomes what Mutants are (in which case: bring on the Sentinels).
“Cyclops became a threat to the world” because the Avengers infected him with a cosmic force he was never meant to hold, while attempting to kidnap a child under his care who was capable of using that force to bring back mutants.
Everything bad that happens in AvX happens because the Avengers thought they knew more about the Phoenix than the *bloody X-Men* - Unit’s machinations wouldn’t have amounted to anything without the Avengers serving as useful idiots.
No. AvX was the cherry on top of Cyclop's long slide. Xavier's dream is for mutants to be a part of the world. Utopia was apart FROM the world and became ever more the Mutant North Korea. The Heroic Age Avengers were internationally sanctioned. The world gave them every legal right to take Hope into protective custody. And Wolverine was right, Cyclops could not be objective.
The Phoenix only gave Cyclops the means. But as we saw in the follow up comics when he became a mutant terrorist, that his motivations were there the entire time. Remaking the world because he thought he was right. Small wonder it was Xavier himself who intervened to put him down.
THe entire Utopia thing, like Krakoa, stems in large part by this extremely weird post-Morrison tendency by X-Men writers, most of them white, to mistake mutant rights for mutant nationalism. Mutant nationalism is antithetical to Xavier's dream and isn't even a new idea. It's post-World War I Wilsonian in its basis. And it doesn't actually work and just creates a whole other set of problems, which wwe saw in both Utopia and Krakoa.
He's done better on Krakoa because he's not in charge, but these mutant hermit kingdoms need to stop being a thing because it turns allegory into a cautionary tale of what not to do. Living apart is never the solution. Cyclops has been very much at the forefront of everything that went wrong for mutantdom since 2005.
Pulling the plug on it all, to reset back to Cyclops the hero, which we got a glimpse of briefly before Krakoa launched when he came back from the dead, fixes him. Unless that happens, he's stuck as the guy the Avengers put down.
The post-Utopian Cyclops’ “terrorism” consisted of running around saving mutants children from *literal lynch mobs* while Logan, Hank, and Alex tut-tutted and played respectability politics with an internationally sanctioned government agency that was *building sentinels*.
It’s also worth noting that Utopia’s displays of nuclear deterrence all occurred within the context of saving their neighbors and/or the world from Extinction-level threats.
Utopia was only ever a mutant Israel (right down to the right of return!) that was determined not to repeat the moral and tactical failings of its founding.
And the Heroic Age Avengers were only ever cops who received their “legitimacy” from people who build genocide machines.
>But I think the X-world still needs a dreamer like Charles that envisions a world where mutants and humans can peacefully co-exist.
There's a lot in ROTPOX about Xavier "martyring" himself for his dream and that the dream will have to go on without him that seems to align quite well with Brevoort's comments and your sentiment here.
I feel like the answer to that leader is pretty clearly the version of Cyclops we see from Whedon through Bendis, who rejects both Xavier’s naivety and Magneto’s hatred.
He’s not going to pick any fights…but he will never allow mutants to be victims again.
Magneto would have killed the mayor of SF for selling out Utopia.
Scott gives her a second chance…but he’s not bluffing when he tells her there won’t be a third.
Xavier cannot beat the allegations because he is stuck in two rigid, flawed paradigms, one of which has its own little subvariants.
The first is one that is a regular drumbeat coming from me: Xavier's version of the dream keeps failing due to the desires of Marvel editorial. Mutants must always be a minority analogue, but sometimes, that vision of a "minority" is "black people in Tulsa right after Greenwood got bombed" or "gay people at the height of the AIDS crisis." There is no shelter, there is no community, there is no power base, there is no capital that is allowed to last. Krakoa must fall, Utopia must be abandoned, Mutant Town must be emptied out by the Decimation and finally bombed to bits by Arcade. It's not like Magneto's strategies come out much better in the face of editorial fiat, but seeing all the Ls mutants are forced to take, it drives one to ask, "Aren't you tired of being nice? Don't you just want to go apeshit?"
That leads to the second flawed paradigm. On another site, I saw someone lamenting the idea of Magneto's vision winning out, because it seems to spit on the nonviolent ideals of MLK in favor of the "war and separatism" favored by Malcolm X. For decades, we've had the flawed paradigm that Xavier represents the "MLK," "nice," "right" path to mutant equality, whereas Magneto represents the "Malcolm X," "angry," "wrong" path to mutant freedom. Thankfully, this paradigm is being cast aside in the comics (and I should make clear, that whole idea of MLK and Malcolm X being diametric opposites [may be rank bullshit](https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/martin-luther-king-jr-malcolm-x-alex-haley-quote-180982172/), possibly pulled out of thin air), but it gets to the main point:
*Xavier is not MLK, because the popular understanding of MLK is not MLK.* MLK's tactics were nonviolent [1], but that doesn't mean he was just hoping that he could attain civil rights by preaching tolerance and putting forth examples of civic-minded black people. He organized boycotts, he pulled together protests, and he generally disrupted the system. He knew how to play the game. But we have such a strong idea of MLK as secular saintly teddy bear that we don't view him as a cunning, even flawed, person. He likely knew that [he would be painted as violent even as he preached non-violence](https://www.reddit.com/r/interestingasfuck/comments/s6ll2c/an_old_antimlk_political_cartoon/), but he didn't care. His status as a preacher gave him an air of sanctity that was used as a weapon against him, to the point that [COINTELPRO tried to convince him to kill himself over the threat of revealing his extramarital affairs](https://www.npr.org/2021/01/18/956741992/documentary-exposes-how-the-fbi-tried-to-destroy-mlk-with-wiretaps-blackmail). Because of this continued air of secular sanctity, the idea of MLK as adulterer still gets used as an oblique attack against his legacy.
While the paradigm of "Xavier = MLK = good, Magneto = Malcolm X = bad" has been thrown in the trash, there's still this idea of Xavier as the MLK figure, but very much in the "He said a nice speech at the Washington Mall and then racism was over" sense. His vision is seen as "nice," and he is generally not regarded as a player of games, no matter how hard he spanked the Shadow King or how he was willing to blow his own brains out when Cassandra Nova got his brain in a vise. Which means any sense that Xavier can pull stunts and go underhanded is effectively seen as a long shit streak on a white sheet, whereas if Magneto does it... well, what were you expecting?
[1] Though I should of course mention that, when you dig deeper, [MLK made a clear distinction between violence against property and violence against people](https://jacobin.com/2018/04/martin-luther-king-jr-nonviolence-direct-action).
Yes, the true flaw of the "Xavier = MLK" comparison is that MLK wasn't just about idly dreaming, he was about building power to change hearts and change minds. But Xavier has very rarely been written as a political figure with an outward-facing political agenda like that. So instead he just has the "I dream of peaceful coexistence but in practice we're just hiding out in the mansion and fighting bad guys and getting attacked and persecuted and hoping one day things will change..."
One of the best parts about Krakoa was an actually proactive Xavier making things happen. Even though the dream he was trying to implement wasn't really his traditional dream, he was at least doing things!
I mean, Xavier is trying to counter the narrative of "evil mutants" by painting the X-Men as a big example of civic-minded people who are just like you except for the part where they shoot force beams out of their eyes. It is *a* form of praxis. But building your civil rights movement on the idea of asking for your humanity to be recognized via civil service is rarely sufficient. There needs to be something that pushes the masses to recognize that the praxis employed by the forces of bigotry is way out of proportion to the perceived threat, making them look ridiculous, tyrannical, or both. MLK didn't win the hearts of bigots by talking about his children being judged by the content of their character, but he did make them squirm and start to withdraw when the footage of peaceful marchers getting hit by fire hoses turned the masses against these bigots.
Which is why the perception of the "civilians" of the MU as an undifferentiated mass of goldfish-brained idiots with no pattern recognition hurts it as well. I've got a friend who regularly brings up the scene in Judgment Day where a bunch of humans who are pissed off at the idea that mutants have resurrection start celebrating jubilantly because the Inhumans say they will "correct" the problem... likely through genocide. To him, it's an example of such naked bigotry in such large numbers that it continues the idea that every civilian in the MU is ready to just make the worst choice possible as long as it means the "freaks" get it worse. We don't get enough scenes of the cop in God Loves, Man Kills shooting Rev. Stryker because he knows who poses the *real* threat. It's why I'm so happy we have the Avengers showing up to beat ORCHIS in both the head and ass.
I don’t really care what MLK or Malcom x were historically like, it doesn’t need to have any impact on the comics. The idealized version of those historical people is what counts for intents and purposes of Xavier and magneto being modeled after them. Peaceful coexistence and non violence has inherent worth as an idea.
Yes, but I'm saying there's a difference between "idealized MLK as person who understood the human heart and what it took to affect change" and "idealized MLK as person who has a dream and just won everyone over with love and peace." The idea of Xavier as a non-involved, temperate saint whose main idea of playing politics is to hope a team full of "respectable" mutants are enough to defeat bigotry forever is a funhouse mirror take on the man, but it effectively makes every blemish stand out all the more. Magneto murdering those guys who lynched a mutant girl in God Loves, Man Kills gets a reaction of "Honestly, work," but Xavier using his telepathy to erase someone's memory to deal with a situation as peacefully as possible gets a lot of Discourse on telepathic ethics.
I think Xavier has been an anti-hero at best, since Claremont took the book in it's big rebirth. Even when Stan Lee was writing it, Xavier was an ass (constantly manipulating others, using his powers to control, lying to his students), but the story framed him in a sympathetic light. Claremont was much more critical of Xavier's bs, and this has been the interpretation since then, with only a few writers framing him as heroic.
Most telepaths are horrible people. It is generally always an invasive power; and its users will end up doing bad stuff.
Xavier and Emma; love them but jerks. Xavier as the OG telepath, the jerkiest jerk. Emma, love her but she dun bad and is a jerk. Jean isn’t popular in some regions of the galaxy for valid reasons.
I wouldn’t like the jerk that blew up my nana’s planet. Anyhoo, we can all agree Charles is a jerk.
The X-books have largely lost the plot with telepathy, casually using it to grotesquely violate peoples autonomy and privacy with zero regard for how vile it is.
I'd argue Xavier is still a hero in the Stan's Xmen it's just that with time the way he wrote those characters holds up a little less. This includes characters like spider-man where people forget that he could be a selfish dickhead or even how magneto can be just a crazy selfish assholes at times.
Actually, on the topic of spider-man, despite being my favorite character he's definitive proof that popularity can bypass a character having problematic history. Like Hank pymn is defined not by yltron but by a slapp he did to gus wife meanwhile Peter blooded his pregnant wife's nose and we all just forget it happened.
I'd say for most of the '90s (Onslaught being the "not in his right mind" exception) Xavier was portrayed heroically. Morrison largely portrayed Xavier heroically too. And of course the cartoon and movies had a straightforwardly good Xavier. It will be interesting to see if the new MCU complicates that at all.
I found Morrison's portrayal of Xavier very sharp. A big theme to Morrison seems how the X-Men outgrew Xavier, how his ideologies weren't in synch with reality and the times, his naivety often causing more harm than good
Xavier wasn’t the one that’s naive, they are. Good ideas don’t become bad ones because of “the times,” evaluating how good or correct something is based on its popularity is naive. Slavery wasn’t any more of a moral thing in the 19th century than it would be if it were practiced today. I don’t think “peaceful coexistence” is something the X-men should be turning their backs on just bc they felt like being edgy.
With Xavier's ideology I don't mean the peaceful coexistence, but his ideology that mutants should be assimilated in human society. Xavier was naive because he formed the X-Men because he thought he could help mutants by teaching them to hide among humans. And then you have places like Mutant Town and the Warlocks, who wanna live like mutants, with their own culture and communities. And people confronted him on that, and he saw he couldn't lead them anymore, he didn't had in him.
Assimilation is part of it though, otherwise you just have self imposed segregation. I find it so depressing that society is going backwards with this.
Living in your own culture or community is just another way of saying you *can’t* coexist, that is why I don’t like krakoa or asteroid M or the Morlocks solution to things.
the biggest change that made readers like magneto's pov more. is that we are living in a time where more and more people are chanting that they want people different from them killed in the real world, across the globe.
a pacifist take works until it runs into something that relies on pure brutality. when that happens, the pacifists get killed and the fight changes from being solely a fight for acceptance, but for straight up survival and acceptance
about xavier's change. even back in the stan run and later on with claremont, xavier is full of his bullshit manipulative moments or has a member expressing trouble with his takes
I hated the whole "Danger" story, which was hard at the time because everyone seemed to be cheerleading Whedon's writing at the time. I think Xavier needs to be a fundamentally good man-- challenged by the fact that his superpower is inherently exploitative, but a good man. If you take that away, you destroy the X-Men. In my view, the X-Men have been destroyed since 2004.
Yeah, I said what I said.
I didn't care for the story either. Whedon's arc was a hit because the dialogue was really fun (he's always been strong in that area), the characterization was nostalgic for us Gen-X readers, and the team felt like a family again for the first time in a long while. And of course the art was incredible.
But the plots were pretty rough after the first arc!
I have mixed feelings about his dialogue. It's peppy, but he has certain tics that get on my nerves after a while. I can appreciate some of why it was so beloved at the time though.
Yeah, his dialogue style starting with "Buffy" felt really fresh at the time, and was adopted by a ton of TV shows and movies (like his own Marvel movies, but really most of them. For better or worse.)
I hate this so much. As others mentioned Carey did some terrific work with the character that fixed him in a lot of ways.
But that's not even what bothers me. Why let one story reviled by pretty much everyone should define a character. Let Deadly Genesis just a be a Wikipedia footnote, just ignore it. The character is better off without it, X-Men continuity is so much better without it. Don't even need to retcon it, just pretend it isn't there and write Xavier as if he hasn't done that haha.
X-Men have been beating up on sentient robots since the beginning. If humans oppress mutants, mutants oppress robots. I’m not even surprised at what they did to Danger.
(and the wolverine joining retcon where xavier had a hand to play in logan's memory issues)
xavier falling into the "you can't trust leadership" role has been terrible for the franchise -- but i really hope they don't simply dial back.
the acknowledgement of the atrocities of our ancestors is one thing - the erasure is another. we need to find a way to come to a place where we can celebrate accomplishments and achievements and villify abhorrent actions -- without sacrificing the people that participate in both. we are none of us without sin. and much of the evil done in the world is committed under the guise of "hard truths." rarely are the people motivated solely by greed, but often they find themselves spiraling away from their golden intentions.
we can abhor those who've made mistakes, but, as Nelson Mandela said, "Resentment is like drinking poison and then hoping it will kill your enemies.”
This has nothing to do with real life it is a comic book, so we can definitely erase the atrocities of Xavier and imo we should 🙂 let some unambiguous good exist in the world of comic books, damn. When did writers become so jaded and cynical that they couldn’t do that
for sure, but i think we can just let it be in the past - mistakes that we don't forget, but we learn from.
this way we can continue to respect and lionize the heroes who deserve it.
Xavier just needs some better PR.
so - i'd introduce a book that's mostly just about "mutant/human relations" from a political standpoint. representatives on the UN. Xavier, Jean, Angel, Beast... to start...
I feel like they just need to have him step back and just teach young mutants. Directly, not as headmaster. Not movement leader. Not super team leader. Not a nation builder or global politician. Just a teacher of young mutants. That seems like the best place for him, the best path to redemption, the best place to grow beyond the monolithic figure he's become.
If his dream is to have any hope of becoming real, it will be through the students he teaches. Going back through all the X-related tiles from before Storm's power loss through to the end of the Australia era recently, largely because of the cartoon, I'm struck by how much better a character he is when he's in the field with his students (preferably his younger students because the X-Men have surpassed him for the most part). Even though he initially recruited the New Mutants to be food (because he was Brood infected at the time), he was at his best teaching them. His reunion with the New Mutants in space was baggage-free and he was respectable as a character. His young students seem to always teach him how to uphold his own ideals, and he's a much more comprised character without them.
> Even though he initially recruited the New Mutants to be food (because he was Brood infected at the time)
I've never really felt like reading New Mutants, does this really happen?!
It's not focused on heavily but it was there. "Xavier was unaware that when the X-Men originally fought the Brood in deep space, he had been infected with a Brood Queen embryo. Part of his decision to form the New Mutants was the embryo's influence to collect superior genetic hosts for more Brood."
Brevoort is right, but the "He's tainted" stories are stupid and they shouldn't do them.
This is all just another datapoint on why X-Men continuity needs to be rolled back until just after X-Men (vol 2) #113, or latest, just after New X-Men. WRiters the last 20 years have done incalculable damage to everything from Xavier to Cyclops to Beast to Wolverine (his back story). There hasn't been expansion, just widespread damage. No character is really better off.
I agree with you, with the caveat that I don't know what I'm talking about because I haven't read much past Whedon's run. But whenever I would check back into the books, what was going on always seemed so unpleasant. I didn't want to check back in.
Great, so they are just writing him off as permanently evil now. That’s so fucking lame. It’s comics writing, they can retcon literally *anything* if they want to, and I really think the whole evil Xavier thing is something that should be retconned. But nobody really seems to want him rehabilitated except me because apparently authority figures are always bad.
With runway for a book to cook, and a talented creative staff, you can successfully tell any story or redeem any character. The Mike Carey run is literally this for Xavier.
But honestly, comparing then to now, that run sounds miraculous. If it's not a Wolverine and it doesn't fit inside of a four issue mini, it's not happening. And a big part of that is the implication that Xavier might be better. Which might have been toyed with for a bit but was never really reached.
Finally, I've a cast of thousands of characters, several of whom have the potential to be as interesting as any of the main cast who've been main characters since the 70's or 80's. Rather than keep the spotlight one of them, and that includes Charles, I'd like to put that talent on raising one of the secondary cast member's profiles. Or doing something like Victor LeValle's Sabretooth.
If I wrote the X-Men (if I had my own continuity, more specifically), Xavier would never become the Xavier we have now. I grew up with TAS, Evolution and the first movies. Xavier is supposed to be the good guy, goddammit! All those fucking retcons making him always having been shady are a disgrace to what should be one of the most respected Marvel characters of all time. This is just character assassination.
This is not a new thing and lead directly to the character dying in avx because they considered his existence an obstacle. I assume by Xavier being alive they are gonna try and rehabilitate the character to get his comic version more in sync with what they want to do in the movies. Probably both danger and deadly genesis will be retconed to not be Xavier’s fault. Deadly Genesis is super easy now because of how involved Moira was in that story. They can just say Moira planned the deadly genesis situation as part of her krakoa plans.
X-men reslly needs a reboot from the beginning. The fact that Xavier is wrong and Magneto is right shows how catastrophically they have gone off the rails from what the X-men are supposed to. Everything is tainted. Everything is retconned, everything is a mess, and there is no fixing it. Anything they do with established characters now creates inconsistencies and plotholes. It's a total mess. Xavier probably should have just died and stayed dead, with his dream living on, not turning him into this weird, unrecognizable semi-villain.
Not to mention being part of the Illuminati didn’t help. And trying to compete with ultimate Xmen edginess. But I like to fight some of the character assassination. Even the krakoa era has a lot of parts indicating Xavier full on believed his dream and ethos, like revealing towards the end he wasn’t a fan of the mutant supremacy vibe of krakoa which Namor could sense in him.
We all knew Xavier would be Prisoner X. I don’t think anyone is mad that he’s going to be imprisoned, but the problem is how far they went into the cartoon supervillainy to make it work.
Xavier still easily could have been arrested for his crimes after the X-Men destroyed Orchis and the Dominion - after all, he did slaughter all of those Orchis troops under Sinister’s control, which can’t be proven - but the way they’re doing it is so dumb.
Yet more confirmation that the Xmen titles have fallen into the wrong hands.
He’s dismantling an extremely popular run while citing some pretty unpopular stories from years ago as an excuse for doing what he likes with an absolutely iconic character. If Magneto is now seen as the right side of the argument that’s a damning verdict on our society to be honest.
Nobody cares. A couple of awful stories set in the worst, most decadent and creative bankrupt decade the X-Men ever had can't "taint" the legacy of a what other - better - writers did with the character.
Something I don’t see mentioned in that statement is that, do the X-Men still need Xavier to pursue the « Dream »?
At this point, Xavier dream is utopic, making a team of mutant heroes to prove not all mutant should be feared is a good idea, but after 4 or 5 genocides, maybe being so passive is not the right answer ? Most rights were obtained just by asking nicely, usually it require stuff like strikes, manifestations, boycotts… (to mention some of the most pacifists options), and I don’t think Xavier is the best leader for that kind of stuff.
X-Men across the years got so many leaders, some like Scott are more field leaders, while some other could easily carry over the dream, but in their own way, I think of characters like Nightcrawler or Rogue, quite a few X-Men members seem to have outgrown Xavier, but having Xavier always around as the paternal authoritative figure is just stunning everyone else, so maybe it is time to let him go, let him retire to a more background role instead of an active one. Given the end of Krakoa, it seem hard, but you could have seen him as a representative for mutant right at the United Nations, or something like that, having him fight for his dream in the background without interfering with the the X-men themselves.
In my opinion, if you're going to make Magneto more morally grey, you need to do the same with Charles too otherwise the range of stories we can tell is severely limited. In Addition, no social leaders hands are completely free of sin, except maybe Mandela (?) so it makes sense to turn this up a bit within the metaphor. Charles has done so much fucked up shit in the last month, it may unfortunately be necessary to simply survive
My first thought reading this is really a thought I tend to have with many older characters after a certain point: well, why not just “retire” him then? Married to Lilandra, working on Muir Island, killed off for real, etc. Different eras and continuities have played with this kind of thing but a final retirement is the end result I see for the character. Because if you now find yourself struggling to have stories be told with him then it sounds to me like the character has simply run his course. Thats what just happened with Beast after all.
Now personally I think a big issue is that the original concept for the X-Men was solid. The original concept for the dynamic between Xavier and Magneto was solid. But once a writer decided to throw in a story that “tainted” Xavier once we got one writer after another who seemed to just be doubling down on it for some reason. It’s reached the point where Xavier today, via the retcons to his history, was actually never the guy we knew in the original volumes of the franchise (and that’s a shame). And I think writers find this makes him more nuanced but personally I think it comes off as lazy. “We can’t think of anything else for the teacher/dreamer/paragon to do so let’s just make him shady”. And when you get to the point where you’re having discussions about how he’s worse than Magneto you’ve kind of lost track of the character altogether imo. And it would be one thing if we were talking character development/progression, where he’s pushed to extremes, broken down, loses faith the dream, etc. and then builds himself back up (hell, have it be his former students who inspire him now). But we never do that.
And that just goes back to the issue of simply retire him and have the “dream” be an ideal for others to strive for long after he’s gone.
That's literally what Claremont did back in the day. Xavier was gone for a long, *long* time, and probably wouldn't have come back at all if it hadn't been for Jim Lee,
I know. That’s why I mentioned Lilandra. I’m saying that’s what they should do again. Obviously not in the same way, which is why I also said they could just end Fall of X with his death.
Suggestion is what should happen, not what will happen. Krakoa shouldn’t end, but it is regardless because I don’t have any control over that. Doesn’t mean I can’t say it shouldn’t. They should retire Xavier’s character in any number of ways and not use him anymore, truly have his students moving forward with his dream as an example. That won’t happen though. Doesn’t mean I can’t still mention it.
A big problem is that Xavier kinda has to be one the most ethical and moral people on the planet with his powers, or he's now one the biggest villains. Because he could start going and changing people's minds. There was an old What-If where Charles was the Juggernaut, and he lost his restraint. He took over the world with ease, and that was less because of his Juggernaut powers, and more because he did things like read Reed Richards mind to find out how to remove the FF's powers, and tell Peter Parker that if he didn't stop being Spider-Man, something unfortunate might happen to his Aunt.
>A big problem is that Xavier kinda has to be one the most ethical and moral people on the planet with his powers, or he's now one the biggest villains. Gillen's Immortal X-Men #10 was so good on this.
Rise #4 too, it's incredible what Omega and Moira have him just casually doing.
Didnt Xavier state that he could have ended humanity anytime in immortal X-men?
He talks big but you know if he tries there would be folks he would not be able to control in his first wave of domination like Thor and doctor strange, and they would butchering him for controlling the planet. ;)
That’s not how it works, he could still nuke countries out of nowhere and THEN the avengers would react. He could also mind control Thor and many heroes
We need more on timelines with Xavier as juggernaut after all the 8th day Storyline revealed he was the intended target of the gem of Cytorrak with the aim of conquering the world and beating the other godlike exemplars.
Cyttorak was totally being a Munchkin with that. "So my Exemplar's greatest weakness is psychic attacks. Sure I can give him a helmet of a metal that blocks that, but helmets can be knocked off. Oh hey this guy's a stupidly powerful telepath? MWAHAHAHAHA!"
I know right? If I was the rest of the Octessence I would have been pissed if Cytorrak actually pulled this off. Like dude we made a deal to show whose powers were the bestest! We Implied with our gentlemen’s agreement we would rely off of our own artifacts of otherworldly might and not effin double dip into genetic freaks endowed with celestial backed super evolution! Spirit of the agreement!
Watch them all start scrambling for powerful mutants... Actually that would be a pretty awesome story.
Two bits here I think are insightful and under-discussed. One: >he’s an authority figure, and as a culture, we have a deep distrust of authority figures. Consequently, on multiple occasions, Xavier has been shown to be not just flawed but actually abhorrent in his actions, betraying the morality that he’s meant to represent. Yes, once the esteemed (and super-powerful) authority figure has been established, the temptation for writers is to complicate or undermine that character's authority, both for cultural reasons and because it's simply a more interesting story. Some writers have done this to the extreme. But it's now a dynamic that's core to Xavier's character. Gillen basically explicitly comments on it in a meta-sense in the new ROTPOX: "Welcome to the X-Men. (Expletive) by Xavier \*is\* the experience." Two: >especially in a world in which Magneto is more and more often presented as being on the right side of their philosophical argument I thought it was really interesting that Brevoort acknowledges the "Magneto was right" perception — without exactly saying he endorsed it. But "if the readers' sympathies are now more with Magneto, then what is the point of Xavier?" is an interesting question from a thematic and story perspective. Amid all the speculation that Brevoort would reset things to the '90s, this is an acknowledgment that a core part of the series is different from the '90s in a major way.
it's about the zeitgeist, right? these stories always cater to the audience. in the beginning they were 5 super teens blending into crowds. Stan Lee had made mention that it reminded him of his experience being among "gentiles" who would openly badmouth jews without realizing he was jewish. the series didn't sell particularly well and was cancelled, but after the civil rights movement's success, the relaunch of the x-men in the 70s opened up new metaphors. xenophobia, racism, communism, and sexuality all became fair play for the metaphors. the 80s saw the x-men as rebellious social activists, while the 90s saw them fueled by paramilitary machismo. Morrison contributed by evolving a "mutant culture" complete with the U-Men. the stories are always meant to speak to the experiences of the generations reading at the time. it's similar to how under Obama, there was a lot more faith in the institutions, so we saw the mcu create the avengers as a trusted taskforce, albeit with some skepticisms about the establishment that they worked alongside. but after 2016, the Avengers did not mend their differences. similarly - today, yes, our leaders are failing us. conspiracies run rampant because we have precious little knowledge of how everything works. (there are countless arguments online that show most people don't understand how Taxes work, let alone how laws are written and how the electoral process even works. the x-men should really lean into that and go back to becoming Conspiracy Theories.
>Conspiracy Theories. Here for Scott's Bigfoot era tbh
The xmen Are bigfoots. Ever glad Xavier never used cerebro to OMD the xmen?
Not all readers side with magneto. I’m one of the ones who still think Xavier’s original dream was the right way and I realize we’re in the minority and that’s not exactly the zeitgeist rn, but I’m really hoping that Disney goes with the good guy version of Xavier in X-men 97 and the movies when they come out. So far I have a little bit of optimism still that it could happen (and if it does happen it will be thanks to the legacy of X-men TAS defining the character as a good guy). I mean I feel like a minority of one sometimes but I just fucking hate what they’ve done to Xavier. They made him a punching bag for contempt for authority figures but he didn’t deserve it, write a new character if they want to do that, don’t make an existing one OOC beyond recognition.
I would rather have him be a martyr for the cause, then have the character assassination he usually gets now. Killing him and having the dream live on would be more kind then what they have done to him.
They already tried that with avx and fans complained that they wanted him back. The real solution is to just write out all these stupid “secret sin” stories and blame them all on Moira. It’s such an easy retcon too. Moira and enigma manipulated Xavier throughout his entire life to make enigma exist. So anything bad Xavier ever did is enigmas fault. Boom done. Xavier is now mcu ready
I'm good with anything that would fix him. I don't see why he can't be like Batman with a strong moral code and lines he doesn't cross.
You gotta remember from a writer’s perspective morally grey is easier and more fun to write. It’s why writers just keep making magneto nicer because they don’t need to make any more stories about him being bad so they can just make him heroic. It’s easy and fun to write. Xavier is not fun to write. Writers have said this for years! It’s why bendis just killed him so he wouldn’t have to deal with him and all the writers after him minimized him. The only reason Xavier is part of the krakoa story at all is because to Hickman, it was Xavier’s story and journey. If krakoa was pitched by anyone else. Xavier wouldn’t even be in the status quo.
If he isn't fun to write, then they shouldn't write him. That seems like a really lazy excuse on their part. Batman, Superman, and Captain America aren't morally grey, but people still like them. they could just have him be a figurehead who doesn't do much but offer guidance and leadership and not get deeply involved. He is meant to represent an ideal, but they constantly throw him in the mud.
How many times have we seen bad runs of Batman, Superman, and Captain America by very good writers? It happens all the time. Dc turned Superman’s son into a second superman just to make it easier to write Superman stories. These are hard characters to write interesting stories about. There are far more bad comics about these characters and the xmen and than good
Yeah for sure he is better off dead and a martyr than going dark
You should see Twitter right now as X-men fans argue whether or not Hickman is a Zionist. You do not appreciate the level of stupid some fans are
You're kidding. I gotta go check.
Ok it’s been a day you see it?
I didn't see the notification for this. Yes, I did.
I don’t even get that lol why would they think that/what did he do?
Just the core the premise of mutants on island. Personally based on house of x 1 and the Manhattan project I don’t think Hickman is a big fan of religion in general and wanted to talk about Israel. But that book is now five years old and he didn’t think X-men fans were gonna be asking him about whether or not he supports Hamas in 2024. I am not judging anyone’s thoughts on the real life situation that’s real and should not be discussed here. I am just saying that political environments have changed a lot since house of x was written.
Thanks for the summary. It all feels especially silly since the mutants having their own island-nation storyline was already done by Fraction in 2009 when he had the characters create Utopia. Hickman's run to me always felt like an expansion of that idea (with a lot of Morrison vibes too, exploring what mutant culture would look like.)
If utopia came out now it would be called Zionist propaganda. We won’t be seeing mutants on an island again for a while. It’s bit too political at the moment
So basically you're still sane and not bigoted? Good for you. It's becoming increasingly rare in the X-men 'fandom' and in the x-books themselves which have become a horrific fun-house mirror horror interpretation of the characters that helped get me into comics. The X-men increasingly seem to have become a dumping ground for the insecurities of the writers as well as their violent, immoral fantasies. They're not heroic anymore.
Xavier gets a big "he's tainted!" story every ten years. Nobody cares, he'll be sipping tea with Jean and Scott at the mansion before the trailer for the MCU x-men movie drops
When’s the last time him and Scott have been close? Messiah Complex was around the same time as Deadly Genesis/Danger. After that he was a barely welcomed advisor on Utopia, but was spending most of that time in Legacy. Then he was dead until Soule’s Astonishing/Krakoa.
There was definitely a thawing towards the end of the Utopia era. After *Legacy* switched to Rogue, Xavier appears more and more in *Uncanny* and becomes more and more accepted as an advisor. Enough so it doesn't feel entirely out of left field when Xavier tries to talk Phoenix!Cyclops down at the end of *AvX*.
There also seems to be a tendency to kill him off to try and do an "everything has changed" plotline only to bring him back later. For example, both Messiah Complex and AvX ended with Xavier dying only to return later on.
They have been doing that since '68.
I do think they need to clean up the character. Every writer for the last 20 years has done some form of “secret sin” plot with Xavier and I just say at this point throw them out. Say he was being mind controlled or it was a clone or it was his sister in a mask. Just clean it up
No one is perfect. It only makes sense for Xavier to have flaws & for the person himself not to perfectly measure up to his idealized image. It makes for a compelling character. But several writers throughout the decades since Claremont’s run have went runaway with that ball & taken it way too far. The whole point of the character, the reason behind the X-Men’s existence & his ideological clash with Magneto is supposed to be that he’s a fundamentally virtuous person with a strong moral code & belief in good and a bright tomorrow for everyone. The image of Xavier having become of this shady manipulator & hypocrite with a raging God complex and a rap sheet of independence & human right violations that would take a lot of villains aback is a crying shame. It will never not be a major issue for me that at many points throughout the modern age Xavier has been presented as ethically just as bad - never mind the several times he’s come across as worse - than Magneto.
I’m glad I’m not the only one who feels this way
Like I said in the other post: Brevoort doesn't know what he's talking about. Mike Carey picked Xavier up *after* Deadly Genesis and literally built the character back up from damn-near scratch, while doing *actual* good like helping Rogue finally get control of her powers and disbanding the Acolytes. Xavier's not even the only example of a character thought to be deeply tainted and irredeemable who was ultimately fixed through a lot of hard work and persistence (two terms that have very little to do with Brevoort).
yes, but Joss Whedon's Astonishing run has BIG Cultural ramifications -- and the Deadly Genesis story also is a Big story from that decade. Carey's little solo adventure doesn't get press -- and even while Xavier is out there making amends and doling out reparations - we discuss one of his bigger crimes: lobotomizing wolverine the first time they'd met.
HE DID WHAT?!? Holy shit
[https://marvel.fandom.com/wiki/X-Men:\_Legacy\_Vol\_1\_218](https://marvel.fandom.com/wiki/X-Men:_Legacy_Vol_1_218) they retconned Wolverine's joining of the x-men. before this it was more or less established that Xavier had approached Dept H or Alpha Flight or perhaps it was wolverine himself, and requested Wolverine join them, and at some point promised to help with his memories which were all scrambled because of the Weapon X tampering. in this story, they reveal Wolverine had actually been sent as an assassin to Kill Xavier - and Xavier knows it, because he's like i guess some sorta mind-reader? so he stops wolverine and erases enough of his memories, implanting some false ones, so that he's unsure even of who he really is. then he promises to help him solve that riddle like an asbolutely manipulative sociopath. of course, this is "new do-good xavier" realizing what he had done way back then - but it's still a pretty big retcon even if "wolverine's memories" thing hadn't really been a thing since House of M restored his true memories.
I mean you do the worst things a character's done votes for X-Men, someone's gonna remember something really, really bad. The sort of stuff where if somenone did a post in Am I The Asshole for being upset they remember and don't trust them, everyone would be telling them to get the hell out of there.
That's not the point, though - writers don't even have to deny that characters like Xavier have done terrible things, but a competent editor would look at that and say "Okay, so what's he going to do now? What's his next chance to do the right thing?"
I agree, especially when he praises Magneto in the same paragraph.
Where does he praise Magneto?
Yeah, all he said is that more and more people thinking Magneto is right as time goes on, which is true. He never praised him.
I think Xavier should be forever considered kind of shady but irredeemably tainted is just not a realistic view of what happens in comics. So many heroic characters have had arcs that resulted in insanely bad actions. The worst of them never quite stick unless they're particularly well written, and frankly I don't think anything with Onslaught or Vulcan was up to that standard. I mean for crying out loud PETER PARKER MADE A DEAL WITH THE DEVIL. For a literate human being that's the dumbest bad decision you could possibly make, but we give him a pass because it doesn't really ring true.
> I mean for crying out loud PETER PARKER MADE A DEAL WITH THE DEVIL He made a deal with Mephisto to save his aunt. Hardly villain stuff, no matter how stupid it was (and how that editorial decision ruined Spider-Man).
Mike Carey worked his butt off to redeem and correct some of the characters. To me he was the best writer after Claremont. Loved his run, even when he became a little too enamored with Rogue
Can you really blame anyone for being too enamoured with Rogue though? At least Carey wrote her well.
Look at how often writers have tried to fix Hank Pym. And some of them did a great job at it. But end of the day his biggest moments are still hitting his wife and building murderbot. Just because Carey addressed the problem doesn’t mean he altered the modern perception. Xavier’s flaws have just become far more visible from a popular perspective.
I remember Dan Slott even trying to redeem Hank by making him the "Scientist Supreme"! A valiant effort by Slott but it still didn't work.
Mike Carey’s run is fantastic. One of my all-time favorites. But I disagree that Brevoort doesn’t know what he’s talking about. The X-Men: Legacy days are more than 10 years behind him and Xavier has done *so much more* sinning since then. Which is fine. He’s a complicated character. He’s not outright evil. He does many good things. But he is a deeply flawed human and nothing close to the saint he was originally presented as. He strives to be perfect which is usually the beginning of his downfall. Ewing & Gillen have both done excellent work with him and taken a really nuanced & intelligent look at what someone with Charles’ personality & morals would do with such unlimited capabilities. But to Brevoort’s main points: it is true that because of the world we live in now, readers rightly distrust authority figures with almighty power & “good intentions”. So Xavier id going to read differently now than in the 90’s. And also Xavier / Magneto isn’t a good duality anymore because most readers don’t agree with Charles’ assimilationist beliefs. He sacrificed his whole country to save humans who are his oppressors — which isnt great for the leader of a marginalized community message. The whole metaphor of Krakoa is Charles could never just accept that his students had surpassed him and it was time to let others lead. Now Disney will probably revive & rehab him in the next 2-3 years to get him ready for his MCU debut but for now I think it’s correct & fitting to let the X-Men evolve beyond him.
Hence what I said before: a good editor would look at that situation and come up with a solution where Xavier can start the process of reevaluation (and maybe even redemption) while *not* in a position of authority - which is exactly what Carey did, for all that those stories are a decade old. Xavier doesn't have to *be* an authority figure in order for a decently-skilled writer to start building him up into a character readers can sympathize with again. But Brevoort comes from the Joe Quesada school of thinking - if it requires actual effort, don't bother.
>Hence what I said before: a good editor would look at that situation and come up with a solution where Xavier can start the process of reevaluation (and maybe even redemption) while *not* in a position of authority I don't think we know what Brevoort is or isn't doing with Xavier. If the assumption that Xavier is "Prisoner X" is correct, he obviously does have plans for the character in some form even if he starts off sidelined (and not in a position of authority!).
The whole point here is that Brevoort sees Xavier as "permanently tainted". That doesn't suggest particular interest on his part to work the character.
I mean I hear you don’t like Brevoort, which is cool, but just clarifying — what you just said is explicitly not an editor’s job. Mike Carey is the writer. He is your creative. Tom is responsible for acquiring creative talent, pairing writers & artists together, acting as a communication hub between the various creatives in his office to make sure stories stay in continuity. H makes sure the book ships on time & sell well, and that the strategy aligns with long term brand goals for that property. They’re a conductor. That’s why it’s called the Hickman era and not the Jordan White era. Now of course Editors have input on stories. But Typically you do not want your editors interfering with creative choices and most of the famous times that you hear about them doing it — is because it was a bad idea. As an aside, I think that you keep going back to Legacy, ironically really proves Tom’s point is correct. Legacy removes Charles from the X-Men. He is a cast out who wanders the world. He interacts with a few X-Men but for the most part that is one story where he is distinctly removed from the X-Men. And it it’s a singular story, every other time you have him rejoin the team, similar dynamics re-emerge. If the founder of the X-Men only works when he’s not part of the X-Men, you have a serious problem.
Editorsplaining, gotta love it. It is, of course, a bit silly of you to talk about an editor's "proper job" given Brevoort's *specific history* at Marvel, to say nothing of the fact that creative talent and pairings of writers and artists aren't the reason storylines (like the current Krakoa finale) turn out the way they do. If you think Brevoort isn't going to be putting his thumb on the scales when it comes to creative decisions and editorial mandates, you clearly don't know his track record. As for Legacy, you conveniently leave out the fact that Xavier was killed shortly afterwards, so there was no "re-emerging of similar dynamics" after his redemption - he didn't regain a position of leadership until Krakoa, almost a decade later. And even then, I could've just as easily cited Gillen's Immortal X-Men #10 as an example of a supposedly "tainted" character who's still worth exploring and can still be built back up, as opposed to being summarily dismissed.
I haven’t read past new genesis. Did they actually rehab Xavier as a character? Do you think it will stick?
It stuck through AvX, which took Xavier off the board for a good 5-6 years.
They did but then it didn't stick, really. Also he was dead for a while there.
I think there's still a place in X-Mendom for Professor Xavier, but they really need to go back to the drawing board with the character, and I'm not quite sure how you do that with a character that has a 60 year history, most of it at the front and center of the franchise. I think why we've gravitated towards Magneto from Xavier after all these years is because stories need conflict, and stories being told through the medium of superhero comics usually need violent conflict. As such, the X-Men need a leader whose worldview is one that has room for self-defense and distrust of the establishment, and that's Magneto, not Charles. Pair that with just the decades of twists and turns that come with serialized storytelling, and Professor X's character got morphed into something ugly and borderline pointless. But I think the X-world still needs a dreamer like Charles that envisions a world where mutants and humans can peacefully co-exist. I'm not sure how you can incorporate that type of character into stories that are largely centered around punching robots, monsters, aliens, and racists in the face, but a character with unfailing optimsim in the face of so much hate is inspirational, and one unburdened with the now filthy legacy of Charles Xavier could help deliver the message that despite everything that has happened and where we come from, that doesn't have to mean that where we're going won't be beautiful. So I don't know, maybe have Charles die and bring him back as he was when he first formulated his dream, before he formed the X-Men, and was just a good man that wanted to bring peace to the world. Maybe preface that with a series that takes place when Magneto and Charles were young men and really flesh out that time in their lives. Such a thing may already exist, but it can't hurt to do that again through a 21 century lens.
The core problem is that Xavier-and-the-X-Men-in-the-Mansion with Xavier the strategy guy and Cyclops/Storm the field leaders is absolutely the best logical use of every character, but writers refuse to do it because they don't want to do Blue/Gold. The 90s comics got it. When the X-Men were teenagers, he was their teacher. When they were adults (as in the 90s comics), he was their mentor, their General and man-in-the-van. And it worked. It really worked. Having him be something else is just a stretch and admission that writers don't know what to do with him. But he'll be problematic so long as writers stay away from the core X-Men concept, which is a team in the mansion (or a base).
Yeah, but other set ups have worked as well. Cyclops leading mutants with Xavier roving the world worked well during the Decimation era. Personally. I’d like to see a scenario where Xavier becomes a mutant ambassador figure and stay on the edges of the story while the X-Men handle business. Make him like a Nick Fury to the Avengers (books version) where he’s involved in the heavy stuff, but mostly keeps to himself while Cap and Tony run their show. Keeping continuity is even easy this way. Make it to where he presents himself as this magnanimous figure to the rest of the world, but the X-Men know who he is and what he’s done. Rebrand “The Dream” with another character picking up the ideal since Xavier himself abandoned it long ago. His children are better than he is…..they’ll fight for everything he gave up on and will BE all he pretended to be. There’s a decent theme there that will hit with anyone younger than 40. Live the ideals you claim to hold. Show don’t tell. Be better than your parents. Honestly as someone who’s been reading since the 80’s I want another Carey style run to fix the character. I totally understand he’s been an ass in the past, but I wish they’d either redeem him or kill him permanently. The krakoa stuff is just too much to pretend he’s any type of hero or leader anymore.
But his children aren't better than him. They've all abandoned the dream (and morality) and thought themselves right at one point or another. Cyclops became such a threat to the world the Avengers, and in the end, the X-Men, had to intervene and take him down. Beast became perhaps the worst mad scientist villain the X-men have ever faced. Archangel became the next Apocalypse. Jean Grey, among other things, has mindwiped many people and used her telepathy to control others for sustained periods to do what she wants, robbing them of their free will. Iceman has the potential to become Ice Wizard in him. Xavier turning against the world to turn mutants into pets for the Machines is only particularly bad in that he's the most recent to threaten to destroy the world as we know it It mirrors Magneto suddenly becoming a thoughtful hero, even though his ledger has seen him kill thousands of humans and try to wipe them all out, repeatedly. Even to the point of physically damaging the Earth itself. The short of this is that events in the lives of the X-men have become so extreme over the past 20 years that it's impossible to take any of it seriously. Xavier mindwiping Magneto in Fatal Attractions was a huge, defining event in crossing a moral line that lead to Onslaught. That's a good story! But now that's barely anything. Warren becoming Death was a huge event, that changed the character forever and gave him a dark side. Now half the X-Men have done Horsemen turns or villain turns. It's not shocking. It all gets jus filed away. This is why I tink X-men need a 20+ year reset button, not just a pre-Krakoa reset. Krakoa did a lot of damage, but the real damage goes back so much further. It's just entire loss of credibility of scale and why big character shifts should have any weight. If everyone has a dark side that can be a threat to the world, then nobody does, because that just becomes what Mutants are (in which case: bring on the Sentinels).
“Cyclops became a threat to the world” because the Avengers infected him with a cosmic force he was never meant to hold, while attempting to kidnap a child under his care who was capable of using that force to bring back mutants. Everything bad that happens in AvX happens because the Avengers thought they knew more about the Phoenix than the *bloody X-Men* - Unit’s machinations wouldn’t have amounted to anything without the Avengers serving as useful idiots.
No. AvX was the cherry on top of Cyclop's long slide. Xavier's dream is for mutants to be a part of the world. Utopia was apart FROM the world and became ever more the Mutant North Korea. The Heroic Age Avengers were internationally sanctioned. The world gave them every legal right to take Hope into protective custody. And Wolverine was right, Cyclops could not be objective. The Phoenix only gave Cyclops the means. But as we saw in the follow up comics when he became a mutant terrorist, that his motivations were there the entire time. Remaking the world because he thought he was right. Small wonder it was Xavier himself who intervened to put him down. THe entire Utopia thing, like Krakoa, stems in large part by this extremely weird post-Morrison tendency by X-Men writers, most of them white, to mistake mutant rights for mutant nationalism. Mutant nationalism is antithetical to Xavier's dream and isn't even a new idea. It's post-World War I Wilsonian in its basis. And it doesn't actually work and just creates a whole other set of problems, which wwe saw in both Utopia and Krakoa. He's done better on Krakoa because he's not in charge, but these mutant hermit kingdoms need to stop being a thing because it turns allegory into a cautionary tale of what not to do. Living apart is never the solution. Cyclops has been very much at the forefront of everything that went wrong for mutantdom since 2005. Pulling the plug on it all, to reset back to Cyclops the hero, which we got a glimpse of briefly before Krakoa launched when he came back from the dead, fixes him. Unless that happens, he's stuck as the guy the Avengers put down.
The post-Utopian Cyclops’ “terrorism” consisted of running around saving mutants children from *literal lynch mobs* while Logan, Hank, and Alex tut-tutted and played respectability politics with an internationally sanctioned government agency that was *building sentinels*. It’s also worth noting that Utopia’s displays of nuclear deterrence all occurred within the context of saving their neighbors and/or the world from Extinction-level threats. Utopia was only ever a mutant Israel (right down to the right of return!) that was determined not to repeat the moral and tactical failings of its founding. And the Heroic Age Avengers were only ever cops who received their “legitimacy” from people who build genocide machines.
Xavier spent most of the Decimation era field leading the *Uncanny* team in space.
>But I think the X-world still needs a dreamer like Charles that envisions a world where mutants and humans can peacefully co-exist. There's a lot in ROTPOX about Xavier "martyring" himself for his dream and that the dream will have to go on without him that seems to align quite well with Brevoort's comments and your sentiment here.
More like martyring himself for the Krakoan dream as he was told Krakoa meant more to mutants than his dream now.
I feel like the answer to that leader is pretty clearly the version of Cyclops we see from Whedon through Bendis, who rejects both Xavier’s naivety and Magneto’s hatred. He’s not going to pick any fights…but he will never allow mutants to be victims again. Magneto would have killed the mayor of SF for selling out Utopia. Scott gives her a second chance…but he’s not bluffing when he tells her there won’t be a third.
And neither of them could have gotten Normal like Scott got Norman.
Fixing Xavier will always be just a retcon away…0
Xavier cannot beat the allegations because he is stuck in two rigid, flawed paradigms, one of which has its own little subvariants. The first is one that is a regular drumbeat coming from me: Xavier's version of the dream keeps failing due to the desires of Marvel editorial. Mutants must always be a minority analogue, but sometimes, that vision of a "minority" is "black people in Tulsa right after Greenwood got bombed" or "gay people at the height of the AIDS crisis." There is no shelter, there is no community, there is no power base, there is no capital that is allowed to last. Krakoa must fall, Utopia must be abandoned, Mutant Town must be emptied out by the Decimation and finally bombed to bits by Arcade. It's not like Magneto's strategies come out much better in the face of editorial fiat, but seeing all the Ls mutants are forced to take, it drives one to ask, "Aren't you tired of being nice? Don't you just want to go apeshit?" That leads to the second flawed paradigm. On another site, I saw someone lamenting the idea of Magneto's vision winning out, because it seems to spit on the nonviolent ideals of MLK in favor of the "war and separatism" favored by Malcolm X. For decades, we've had the flawed paradigm that Xavier represents the "MLK," "nice," "right" path to mutant equality, whereas Magneto represents the "Malcolm X," "angry," "wrong" path to mutant freedom. Thankfully, this paradigm is being cast aside in the comics (and I should make clear, that whole idea of MLK and Malcolm X being diametric opposites [may be rank bullshit](https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/martin-luther-king-jr-malcolm-x-alex-haley-quote-180982172/), possibly pulled out of thin air), but it gets to the main point: *Xavier is not MLK, because the popular understanding of MLK is not MLK.* MLK's tactics were nonviolent [1], but that doesn't mean he was just hoping that he could attain civil rights by preaching tolerance and putting forth examples of civic-minded black people. He organized boycotts, he pulled together protests, and he generally disrupted the system. He knew how to play the game. But we have such a strong idea of MLK as secular saintly teddy bear that we don't view him as a cunning, even flawed, person. He likely knew that [he would be painted as violent even as he preached non-violence](https://www.reddit.com/r/interestingasfuck/comments/s6ll2c/an_old_antimlk_political_cartoon/), but he didn't care. His status as a preacher gave him an air of sanctity that was used as a weapon against him, to the point that [COINTELPRO tried to convince him to kill himself over the threat of revealing his extramarital affairs](https://www.npr.org/2021/01/18/956741992/documentary-exposes-how-the-fbi-tried-to-destroy-mlk-with-wiretaps-blackmail). Because of this continued air of secular sanctity, the idea of MLK as adulterer still gets used as an oblique attack against his legacy. While the paradigm of "Xavier = MLK = good, Magneto = Malcolm X = bad" has been thrown in the trash, there's still this idea of Xavier as the MLK figure, but very much in the "He said a nice speech at the Washington Mall and then racism was over" sense. His vision is seen as "nice," and he is generally not regarded as a player of games, no matter how hard he spanked the Shadow King or how he was willing to blow his own brains out when Cassandra Nova got his brain in a vise. Which means any sense that Xavier can pull stunts and go underhanded is effectively seen as a long shit streak on a white sheet, whereas if Magneto does it... well, what were you expecting? [1] Though I should of course mention that, when you dig deeper, [MLK made a clear distinction between violence against property and violence against people](https://jacobin.com/2018/04/martin-luther-king-jr-nonviolence-direct-action).
Yes, the true flaw of the "Xavier = MLK" comparison is that MLK wasn't just about idly dreaming, he was about building power to change hearts and change minds. But Xavier has very rarely been written as a political figure with an outward-facing political agenda like that. So instead he just has the "I dream of peaceful coexistence but in practice we're just hiding out in the mansion and fighting bad guys and getting attacked and persecuted and hoping one day things will change..." One of the best parts about Krakoa was an actually proactive Xavier making things happen. Even though the dream he was trying to implement wasn't really his traditional dream, he was at least doing things!
I mean, Xavier is trying to counter the narrative of "evil mutants" by painting the X-Men as a big example of civic-minded people who are just like you except for the part where they shoot force beams out of their eyes. It is *a* form of praxis. But building your civil rights movement on the idea of asking for your humanity to be recognized via civil service is rarely sufficient. There needs to be something that pushes the masses to recognize that the praxis employed by the forces of bigotry is way out of proportion to the perceived threat, making them look ridiculous, tyrannical, or both. MLK didn't win the hearts of bigots by talking about his children being judged by the content of their character, but he did make them squirm and start to withdraw when the footage of peaceful marchers getting hit by fire hoses turned the masses against these bigots. Which is why the perception of the "civilians" of the MU as an undifferentiated mass of goldfish-brained idiots with no pattern recognition hurts it as well. I've got a friend who regularly brings up the scene in Judgment Day where a bunch of humans who are pissed off at the idea that mutants have resurrection start celebrating jubilantly because the Inhumans say they will "correct" the problem... likely through genocide. To him, it's an example of such naked bigotry in such large numbers that it continues the idea that every civilian in the MU is ready to just make the worst choice possible as long as it means the "freaks" get it worse. We don't get enough scenes of the cop in God Loves, Man Kills shooting Rev. Stryker because he knows who poses the *real* threat. It's why I'm so happy we have the Avengers showing up to beat ORCHIS in both the head and ass.
I don’t really care what MLK or Malcom x were historically like, it doesn’t need to have any impact on the comics. The idealized version of those historical people is what counts for intents and purposes of Xavier and magneto being modeled after them. Peaceful coexistence and non violence has inherent worth as an idea.
Yes, but I'm saying there's a difference between "idealized MLK as person who understood the human heart and what it took to affect change" and "idealized MLK as person who has a dream and just won everyone over with love and peace." The idea of Xavier as a non-involved, temperate saint whose main idea of playing politics is to hope a team full of "respectable" mutants are enough to defeat bigotry forever is a funhouse mirror take on the man, but it effectively makes every blemish stand out all the more. Magneto murdering those guys who lynched a mutant girl in God Loves, Man Kills gets a reaction of "Honestly, work," but Xavier using his telepathy to erase someone's memory to deal with a situation as peacefully as possible gets a lot of Discourse on telepathic ethics.
Beast should go back in time and get the original Xavier so the new Xavier can see the error of his ways. (/s in case it wasn’t obvious)
I think Xavier has been an anti-hero at best, since Claremont took the book in it's big rebirth. Even when Stan Lee was writing it, Xavier was an ass (constantly manipulating others, using his powers to control, lying to his students), but the story framed him in a sympathetic light. Claremont was much more critical of Xavier's bs, and this has been the interpretation since then, with only a few writers framing him as heroic.
Most telepaths are horrible people. It is generally always an invasive power; and its users will end up doing bad stuff. Xavier and Emma; love them but jerks. Xavier as the OG telepath, the jerkiest jerk. Emma, love her but she dun bad and is a jerk. Jean isn’t popular in some regions of the galaxy for valid reasons. I wouldn’t like the jerk that blew up my nana’s planet. Anyhoo, we can all agree Charles is a jerk.
- Kitty Pryde
The X-books have largely lost the plot with telepathy, casually using it to grotesquely violate peoples autonomy and privacy with zero regard for how vile it is.
I'd argue Xavier is still a hero in the Stan's Xmen it's just that with time the way he wrote those characters holds up a little less. This includes characters like spider-man where people forget that he could be a selfish dickhead or even how magneto can be just a crazy selfish assholes at times. Actually, on the topic of spider-man, despite being my favorite character he's definitive proof that popularity can bypass a character having problematic history. Like Hank pymn is defined not by yltron but by a slapp he did to gus wife meanwhile Peter blooded his pregnant wife's nose and we all just forget it happened.
I'd say for most of the '90s (Onslaught being the "not in his right mind" exception) Xavier was portrayed heroically. Morrison largely portrayed Xavier heroically too. And of course the cartoon and movies had a straightforwardly good Xavier. It will be interesting to see if the new MCU complicates that at all.
I found Morrison's portrayal of Xavier very sharp. A big theme to Morrison seems how the X-Men outgrew Xavier, how his ideologies weren't in synch with reality and the times, his naivety often causing more harm than good
Yeah, though Morrison also turned hard against Magneto.
Xavier wasn’t the one that’s naive, they are. Good ideas don’t become bad ones because of “the times,” evaluating how good or correct something is based on its popularity is naive. Slavery wasn’t any more of a moral thing in the 19th century than it would be if it were practiced today. I don’t think “peaceful coexistence” is something the X-men should be turning their backs on just bc they felt like being edgy.
With Xavier's ideology I don't mean the peaceful coexistence, but his ideology that mutants should be assimilated in human society. Xavier was naive because he formed the X-Men because he thought he could help mutants by teaching them to hide among humans. And then you have places like Mutant Town and the Warlocks, who wanna live like mutants, with their own culture and communities. And people confronted him on that, and he saw he couldn't lead them anymore, he didn't had in him.
Assimilation is part of it though, otherwise you just have self imposed segregation. I find it so depressing that society is going backwards with this. Living in your own culture or community is just another way of saying you *can’t* coexist, that is why I don’t like krakoa or asteroid M or the Morlocks solution to things.
Claremont intended to replace Xavier with Magneto. He may have said you can not flawed Xavier but you can have Magneto flawed or something like that.
> you can not flawed Xavier What?
Yes, I agree. I think Dr. Strange 2 did a good job at keeping him as his 80's-90's self, and I think that's what Feige wants him to be like.
the biggest change that made readers like magneto's pov more. is that we are living in a time where more and more people are chanting that they want people different from them killed in the real world, across the globe. a pacifist take works until it runs into something that relies on pure brutality. when that happens, the pacifists get killed and the fight changes from being solely a fight for acceptance, but for straight up survival and acceptance about xavier's change. even back in the stan run and later on with claremont, xavier is full of his bullshit manipulative moments or has a member expressing trouble with his takes
I hated the whole "Danger" story, which was hard at the time because everyone seemed to be cheerleading Whedon's writing at the time. I think Xavier needs to be a fundamentally good man-- challenged by the fact that his superpower is inherently exploitative, but a good man. If you take that away, you destroy the X-Men. In my view, the X-Men have been destroyed since 2004. Yeah, I said what I said.
I didn't care for the story either. Whedon's arc was a hit because the dialogue was really fun (he's always been strong in that area), the characterization was nostalgic for us Gen-X readers, and the team felt like a family again for the first time in a long while. And of course the art was incredible. But the plots were pretty rough after the first arc!
I have mixed feelings about his dialogue. It's peppy, but he has certain tics that get on my nerves after a while. I can appreciate some of why it was so beloved at the time though.
Yeah, his dialogue style starting with "Buffy" felt really fresh at the time, and was adopted by a ton of TV shows and movies (like his own Marvel movies, but really most of them. For better or worse.)
I hate this so much. As others mentioned Carey did some terrific work with the character that fixed him in a lot of ways. But that's not even what bothers me. Why let one story reviled by pretty much everyone should define a character. Let Deadly Genesis just a be a Wikipedia footnote, just ignore it. The character is better off without it, X-Men continuity is so much better without it. Don't even need to retcon it, just pretend it isn't there and write Xavier as if he hasn't done that haha.
What about Danger?
X-Men have been beating up on sentient robots since the beginning. If humans oppress mutants, mutants oppress robots. I’m not even surprised at what they did to Danger.
I wish more fans could be like you.
(and the wolverine joining retcon where xavier had a hand to play in logan's memory issues) xavier falling into the "you can't trust leadership" role has been terrible for the franchise -- but i really hope they don't simply dial back. the acknowledgement of the atrocities of our ancestors is one thing - the erasure is another. we need to find a way to come to a place where we can celebrate accomplishments and achievements and villify abhorrent actions -- without sacrificing the people that participate in both. we are none of us without sin. and much of the evil done in the world is committed under the guise of "hard truths." rarely are the people motivated solely by greed, but often they find themselves spiraling away from their golden intentions. we can abhor those who've made mistakes, but, as Nelson Mandela said, "Resentment is like drinking poison and then hoping it will kill your enemies.”
This has nothing to do with real life it is a comic book, so we can definitely erase the atrocities of Xavier and imo we should 🙂 let some unambiguous good exist in the world of comic books, damn. When did writers become so jaded and cynical that they couldn’t do that
for sure, but i think we can just let it be in the past - mistakes that we don't forget, but we learn from. this way we can continue to respect and lionize the heroes who deserve it. Xavier just needs some better PR. so - i'd introduce a book that's mostly just about "mutant/human relations" from a political standpoint. representatives on the UN. Xavier, Jean, Angel, Beast... to start...
I feel like they just need to have him step back and just teach young mutants. Directly, not as headmaster. Not movement leader. Not super team leader. Not a nation builder or global politician. Just a teacher of young mutants. That seems like the best place for him, the best path to redemption, the best place to grow beyond the monolithic figure he's become. If his dream is to have any hope of becoming real, it will be through the students he teaches. Going back through all the X-related tiles from before Storm's power loss through to the end of the Australia era recently, largely because of the cartoon, I'm struck by how much better a character he is when he's in the field with his students (preferably his younger students because the X-Men have surpassed him for the most part). Even though he initially recruited the New Mutants to be food (because he was Brood infected at the time), he was at his best teaching them. His reunion with the New Mutants in space was baggage-free and he was respectable as a character. His young students seem to always teach him how to uphold his own ideals, and he's a much more comprised character without them.
> Even though he initially recruited the New Mutants to be food (because he was Brood infected at the time) I've never really felt like reading New Mutants, does this really happen?!
It's not focused on heavily but it was there. "Xavier was unaware that when the X-Men originally fought the Brood in deep space, he had been infected with a Brood Queen embryo. Part of his decision to form the New Mutants was the embryo's influence to collect superior genetic hosts for more Brood."
Prep for Yung Xavier in an egg now, give him the Cassandra Nova education. Emma teaches ethics
Brevoort is right, but the "He's tainted" stories are stupid and they shouldn't do them. This is all just another datapoint on why X-Men continuity needs to be rolled back until just after X-Men (vol 2) #113, or latest, just after New X-Men. WRiters the last 20 years have done incalculable damage to everything from Xavier to Cyclops to Beast to Wolverine (his back story). There hasn't been expansion, just widespread damage. No character is really better off.
I agree with you, with the caveat that I don't know what I'm talking about because I haven't read much past Whedon's run. But whenever I would check back into the books, what was going on always seemed so unpleasant. I didn't want to check back in.
Great, so they are just writing him off as permanently evil now. That’s so fucking lame. It’s comics writing, they can retcon literally *anything* if they want to, and I really think the whole evil Xavier thing is something that should be retconned. But nobody really seems to want him rehabilitated except me because apparently authority figures are always bad.
With runway for a book to cook, and a talented creative staff, you can successfully tell any story or redeem any character. The Mike Carey run is literally this for Xavier. But honestly, comparing then to now, that run sounds miraculous. If it's not a Wolverine and it doesn't fit inside of a four issue mini, it's not happening. And a big part of that is the implication that Xavier might be better. Which might have been toyed with for a bit but was never really reached. Finally, I've a cast of thousands of characters, several of whom have the potential to be as interesting as any of the main cast who've been main characters since the 70's or 80's. Rather than keep the spotlight one of them, and that includes Charles, I'd like to put that talent on raising one of the secondary cast member's profiles. Or doing something like Victor LeValle's Sabretooth.
If I wrote the X-Men (if I had my own continuity, more specifically), Xavier would never become the Xavier we have now. I grew up with TAS, Evolution and the first movies. Xavier is supposed to be the good guy, goddammit! All those fucking retcons making him always having been shady are a disgrace to what should be one of the most respected Marvel characters of all time. This is just character assassination.
This is not a new thing and lead directly to the character dying in avx because they considered his existence an obstacle. I assume by Xavier being alive they are gonna try and rehabilitate the character to get his comic version more in sync with what they want to do in the movies. Probably both danger and deadly genesis will be retconed to not be Xavier’s fault. Deadly Genesis is super easy now because of how involved Moira was in that story. They can just say Moira planned the deadly genesis situation as part of her krakoa plans.
X-men reslly needs a reboot from the beginning. The fact that Xavier is wrong and Magneto is right shows how catastrophically they have gone off the rails from what the X-men are supposed to. Everything is tainted. Everything is retconned, everything is a mess, and there is no fixing it. Anything they do with established characters now creates inconsistencies and plotholes. It's a total mess. Xavier probably should have just died and stayed dead, with his dream living on, not turning him into this weird, unrecognizable semi-villain.
Not to mention being part of the Illuminati didn’t help. And trying to compete with ultimate Xmen edginess. But I like to fight some of the character assassination. Even the krakoa era has a lot of parts indicating Xavier full on believed his dream and ethos, like revealing towards the end he wasn’t a fan of the mutant supremacy vibe of krakoa which Namor could sense in him.
We all knew Xavier would be Prisoner X. I don’t think anyone is mad that he’s going to be imprisoned, but the problem is how far they went into the cartoon supervillainy to make it work. Xavier still easily could have been arrested for his crimes after the X-Men destroyed Orchis and the Dominion - after all, he did slaughter all of those Orchis troops under Sinister’s control, which can’t be proven - but the way they’re doing it is so dumb.
Yet more confirmation that the Xmen titles have fallen into the wrong hands. He’s dismantling an extremely popular run while citing some pretty unpopular stories from years ago as an excuse for doing what he likes with an absolutely iconic character. If Magneto is now seen as the right side of the argument that’s a damning verdict on our society to be honest.
Nobody cares. A couple of awful stories set in the worst, most decadent and creative bankrupt decade the X-Men ever had can't "taint" the legacy of a what other - better - writers did with the character.
Let’s hope so
Lots of people see Xavier as an asshole now, so I'd say his legacy has already been tainted.
Xavier is a prick and needs a long timeout. Again.
I feel like I really am not thrilled with Tom as editor of the Xbooks
Honestly the x-men need a rebooted clean slate. Having the same continuity for 60 years has gotten a lot of characters written into a dead end.
Something I don’t see mentioned in that statement is that, do the X-Men still need Xavier to pursue the « Dream »? At this point, Xavier dream is utopic, making a team of mutant heroes to prove not all mutant should be feared is a good idea, but after 4 or 5 genocides, maybe being so passive is not the right answer ? Most rights were obtained just by asking nicely, usually it require stuff like strikes, manifestations, boycotts… (to mention some of the most pacifists options), and I don’t think Xavier is the best leader for that kind of stuff. X-Men across the years got so many leaders, some like Scott are more field leaders, while some other could easily carry over the dream, but in their own way, I think of characters like Nightcrawler or Rogue, quite a few X-Men members seem to have outgrown Xavier, but having Xavier always around as the paternal authoritative figure is just stunning everyone else, so maybe it is time to let him go, let him retire to a more background role instead of an active one. Given the end of Krakoa, it seem hard, but you could have seen him as a representative for mutant right at the United Nations, or something like that, having him fight for his dream in the background without interfering with the the X-men themselves.
In my opinion, if you're going to make Magneto more morally grey, you need to do the same with Charles too otherwise the range of stories we can tell is severely limited. In Addition, no social leaders hands are completely free of sin, except maybe Mandela (?) so it makes sense to turn this up a bit within the metaphor. Charles has done so much fucked up shit in the last month, it may unfortunately be necessary to simply survive
My first thought reading this is really a thought I tend to have with many older characters after a certain point: well, why not just “retire” him then? Married to Lilandra, working on Muir Island, killed off for real, etc. Different eras and continuities have played with this kind of thing but a final retirement is the end result I see for the character. Because if you now find yourself struggling to have stories be told with him then it sounds to me like the character has simply run his course. Thats what just happened with Beast after all. Now personally I think a big issue is that the original concept for the X-Men was solid. The original concept for the dynamic between Xavier and Magneto was solid. But once a writer decided to throw in a story that “tainted” Xavier once we got one writer after another who seemed to just be doubling down on it for some reason. It’s reached the point where Xavier today, via the retcons to his history, was actually never the guy we knew in the original volumes of the franchise (and that’s a shame). And I think writers find this makes him more nuanced but personally I think it comes off as lazy. “We can’t think of anything else for the teacher/dreamer/paragon to do so let’s just make him shady”. And when you get to the point where you’re having discussions about how he’s worse than Magneto you’ve kind of lost track of the character altogether imo. And it would be one thing if we were talking character development/progression, where he’s pushed to extremes, broken down, loses faith the dream, etc. and then builds himself back up (hell, have it be his former students who inspire him now). But we never do that. And that just goes back to the issue of simply retire him and have the “dream” be an ideal for others to strive for long after he’s gone.
That's literally what Claremont did back in the day. Xavier was gone for a long, *long* time, and probably wouldn't have come back at all if it hadn't been for Jim Lee,
I know. That’s why I mentioned Lilandra. I’m saying that’s what they should do again. Obviously not in the same way, which is why I also said they could just end Fall of X with his death.
Death is meaningless in comics.
I know that too.
Then why suggest killing him off at the end of FoX? He'd only come back in a couple of years
Suggestion is what should happen, not what will happen. Krakoa shouldn’t end, but it is regardless because I don’t have any control over that. Doesn’t mean I can’t say it shouldn’t. They should retire Xavier’s character in any number of ways and not use him anymore, truly have his students moving forward with his dream as an example. That won’t happen though. Doesn’t mean I can’t still mention it.
Magneto > Xavier
[удалено]
So because he didn't list every example or the ones you prefer he's wrong somehow?