Further thoughts on XMA
Alright look, I’m still Bitter about X-Men: Apocalypse because honestly, we had such a good cast set up in First Class and then DOFP killed most of them and now XMA comes along and the entirety of secondary characters get sidelined in favor of Scott and Jean, as if we hadn’t had three freaking movies of them doing…well, basically what they do in Apocalypse which is help each other accept their powers (plus the frankly gross UST moment during Logan’s cameo like??? Ew?? She’s a teen?)
I mean, even leaving aside that putting Charles & Erik forward is putting two cis straight white dudes at the forefront of a franchise centered around minorities, and even gritting our teeth about the part where they’ve grossly defanged Mystique, the movie introduces two of the most beloved (to my knowledge) characters with Kurt & Ororo, characters whose backstory we were waiting for who ended up being sidelined in favor of the JeanScott boner of the studio.
And I mean, the way it’s done is super gross too? Like, my knowledge of comics is limited but I know that Ororo’s backstory is that she was worshipped as a goddess for her powers as well as a respected leader (also was queen of Wakanda at some point)…yet somehow XMA decided the way to go was to turn her into a street rat who makes dust clouds to steal food, who then gets her incredibly powerful powers from the villain?
I’m just so. Angry about this like no? Because honestly, the only explanation I can see for Ororo’s origins in XMA being what they are (where Jean’s power are literally presented with christ-like imagery when she finally lets phoenix out) is that multpile someones, on more or less conscious levels, didn’t want to have a powerful, confident and respected woman of color in its movie and that makes me so freaking bitter it’s ridiculous.
Edited to add a response from
lorata :
She was a street rat in the comics, to be fair, she was orphaned as a kiddo and grew up on the streets. She does become queen later, though.
In response to this post.
This is why it pays for me to keep in mind that I don’t know all that much about comics :P
I mean, I’m not gonna lie, I’m still bummed about the source of her powers in the movie, but learning this does make things somewhat better (to me at least), so thanks for the precision :)
Crossposted from terresdebrume@dreamwidth