Murphy's Multiverse

Tag: X-Factor

  • 12 Days of X-Mas: Day 3, Polaris

    12 Days of X-Mas: Day 3, Polaris

    The X-Men are coming to the Marvel Cinematic Universe and Marvel Studios has no small task ahead of them in making sure that the iconic team can lead the franchise in Phase 7 and beyond. Marvel Studios is also sure to make every effort to separate their adaptation of the team(s) from what came before. To celebrate the 12 Days of Christmas, we’ve decided to put together a list of which characters might play a key role and how Marvel Studios can ensure nobody will confuse them with their Fox counterparts.

    The Mistress of Magnetism

    As is the case with a lot of female characters written in the 60s, 70s and 80s, there are some parts of Lorna Dane’s comic book history that would be better off left in those pages and left out of any adaptation of the character into the MCU; however, Fox made a poor decision by leaving Lorna out of their live-action films entirely. Though not one of the original five members of the X-Men, Lorna was brought on board in the first wave of recruits beyond the five giving her a longer history with the team than Wolverine, Storm, Rogue and Kitty Pryde. Fox may have stayed away from Lorna because of the identity of her father: Magneto. That’s a mistake Marvel Studios should actively seek not to replicate.

    While Scott Summers and Jean Grey are the foremost mutant power couple, Alex Summers and Lorna Dane aren’t far behind. Focusing on Alex and Lorna, both individually and as a couple, allows Marvel Studios to explore all sorts of fascinating parallels and differences between them and their more famous family members. Though she’s the daughter of a terrorist and one of Marvel’s most compelling and complex villains, Lorna grew up free of his influence (indeed she didn’t know he was her father until later in life) and is one of the X-Men’s great leaders and heroes.

    Lorna and Alex are to X-Factor and Jean and Scott are to the X-Men and Marvel Studios will almost certainly allow multiple mutant teams to exist simultaneously within the MCU. Beyond X-Factor, however, Lorna played a major role on the mutant paradise of Genosha, the House of M and one other part of the X-Men mythology that Fox completely ignored: Shi’ar space! Along with Havok, Lorna had a major arc in The Rise and Fall of the Shi’ar Empire and War of Kings as a new recruit of the Starjammers, led by the father of Scott and Alex Summers and involving the third Summers brother, Gabriel.

    Given the scope of Lorna’s history in the comics and the fact that Fox left her sidelined, she seems as good a bet as any to not only join the ranks of the mutants in the MCU, but become a leader and key player as they expand beyond Earth-bound stories. Of course, there’s also plenty to explore with her parentage and plenty of built-in drama once she learns who her father is. Come to think of it, Marvel Studios could probably get a lot of mileage out of the children of Magneto and Xavier, mileage that Fox chose to ignore entirely.

  • 12 Days of X-Mas: Day 2, Havok

    12 Days of X-Mas: Day 2, Havok

    The X-Men are coming to the Marvel Cinematic Universe and Marvel Studios has no small task ahead of them in making sure that the iconic team can lead the franchise in Phase 7 and beyond. Marvel Studios is also sure to make every effort to separate their adaptation of the team(s) from what came before. To celebrate the 12 Days of Christmas, we’ve decided to put together a list of which characters might play a key role and how Marvel Studios can ensure nobody will confuse them with their Fox counterparts.

    The X-Factor

    One of Fox’s most mysterious decisions in rebooting their own X-Men franchise in 2011’s X-Men: First Class was the choice to make Alex Summers the older brother of Scott and a member of Xavier’s first team of X-Men only to sideline him fairly quickly. Without being able to access the depths of Simon Kinberg’s mind, it’s impossible to know why Alex was underutilized but it really just seemed like Fox didn’t have a long-term plan for him. That’s good news for Marvel Studios because it allows them to make the easy choice to introduce Alex alongside Scott and then set him on his own path; a path that sets him on course to become the leader of his own team: X-Factor.

    Telling the best version of Alex’s story means having him separated from Scott. Rather than being given the advantages provided to Scott by Xavier, Alex’s struggles with his self-confidence and his emerging powers result in an alpha-level mutant whose lack of control makes him fairly dangerous. Ultimately though, like Scott, Alex is a born leader and allowing him to grow into his powers and then put together his own team would be a fantastic way to set him apart from Lucas Till’s forgettable version.

    Among its many failures, foremost of Fox’s foul-ups was that it never allowed its X-Men universe to grow and evolve beyond the core X-Men teams. The comics are loaded with mutant teams outside of the X-Men: X-Force, Excalibur, Generation X, hell even X-Statix all exist. Other than the brief assemblage of X-Force in Deadpool 2 and the ill-fated New Mutants, Fox stayed away from these teams. That means Marvel Studios can (and almost certainly will) dive headlong into developing them and Havok’s X-Factor should be one of the first and most important. While the team was originally just Scott’s X-Men working with the government, Alex put his own squad together and that squad is among the most memorable and powerful versions of X-Factor to have existed.

    Marvel Studios would be wise to let Alex grow into a leader of X-Factor and ultimately come into opposition to his brother and his more authoritarian approach to leadership. Though the brothers can’t harm one another with their powers, they could certainly go toe-to-toe and break out the fisticuffs should Havok still be around long enough to see his brother cause a schism among mutantkind. Marvel Studios certainly loves brother vs. brother drama. Beyond that, a Havok-led X-Factor team provides a fantastic way to grow the mutant-corner of the MCU beyond the adventures of the core and introduce some other incredibly important characters who were criminally underused by Fox: Polaris and Jamie Madrox. Whatever it is Marvel Studios has planned for the mutants, they should certainly make room for a proper portrayal of Alex Summers.