Lateral Thinking

[colonel_green]

Three and a third scans from X-Force #23.


So Rahne's spent a year plus hanging around in a sideplot with her old beau Hrimhari, a Wolf Prince from the Nine Worlds who, courtesy of Thor, has been dropped into the real world.  They've returned to Utopia in the middle of the "Necrosha" story because Rahne collapsed and is carrying a half-mutant/half-werewolf/whatever baby that is killing her.  Elixir is mortally injured, and Dr. Nemesis says there isn't anything they can do to help Rahne, so Hrimhari summons Hela (the X-Men have been having a lot of dealings with her lately) asking her to save them.  Hela says she'll take his soul in exchange, but will only save one, so he'll have to choose between Rahne and the baby.




Clever, Hrimhari, clever.

Elixir hurries over, surprising the rest of the crew in the medical bay, and sets to work on Rahne.



Later, Cyclops orders everybody to go and kill Selene and all her evil henchmen, and Laura gets my favourite line of the week:



I wish a different artist was drawing this, because he really mutes the effectiveness, but the writing can still be sharp.  Given that after this story, they go right into the "Second Coming" crossover and Kyle and Yost are leaving after that, I'm still not clear on where exactly this baby thing is going.
 

char: hrimhari, char: hela, char: wolfsbane/rahne sinclair, char: x-23/laura kinney, char: elixir/josh foley, creator: craig kyle, creator: chris yost, creator: clayton crain, title: x-force, publisher: marvel comics

Comments

[suzene]

Step right up, folks, step right up and place your bets on how quick the kid vanishes! Lost to the timestream? Kidnapped by the X-Men's enemies for brain-washing and accelerated aging? We've got 'em being reabsorbed into the mother on an outside chance -- and that one covers Rahne going cannibalistic again! Step right up!

[colonel_green]

Since he/she's got all that magical lineage, rapid aging is a good bet.

[auggie18]

I'm putting my money on accelerated aging, though I think it'll be more of the goes to the future(or an alternate world)/comes back older kind the X-men are so fond of.

[long_silence]

I hope she has a litter.

[colonel_green]

And there'll be seven of them, and they can all fly for some reason, and one of them is invisible...

[kaileighblue]

Can I vote for re-absorption?

[suzene]

By which method? ;)

[foxhack]

I vote for the Ms. Marvel angle.

Hrimhari possesses the child, Rahne gives birth to him again.

...

ew.

[neuhallidae]

Noooooooo!

[freezer]

I vote the Dazzler route: Rahne disappears for a while after Necrosha, there's one throw away line about the baby (or more accurately, it's absense) and then... PROFIT!

[suzene]

Ah, yes. Also employed by Wendy Pini in recent Elfquest.

Really?

[nefrekeptah]

Employed by Elfquest? When? Pini is usually pretty good about those kind of things.

[xammax]

Is Foley tapping that yet? Laura I mean.

[long_silence]

If Rahne isn't still a member of X-Force post-Second Coming, I assume her baby storyline will be covered in either X-Factor or New Mutants.

[colonel_green]

The weird thing is, she's never actually been a member of X-Force in the book itself. Wolverine said no to her joining in the first arc, but she followed them anyway, and ever since she's basically been recuperating/off with Hrimhari.

[daningram.insanejournal.com]

And yet she's exclusive to the title, no one else can touch her character.

Fucking hell...

[neuhallidae]

Even though I know the kid's probably not gonna last, I still gotta give props to Hrimhari for that move.

[colonel_green]

Hela spent a lot of time setting up that sadistic choice, and he had to go and ruin it. Very inconsiderate.

[q99]

Yea. In that situation characters rarely think with their heads, but he pulled it off well.

[koschei]

Heh, two gods having their sadistic "choose, one must die or both will!" scenarios buttfucked in the same week.

[queenursula]

What was the other one?

[koschei]

Hephestus tried to pull something similar on Herc and Cho

[punishermax]

You ever flip on the TV and you catch the middle of a soap opera you never wtached, and it's completely insane and you have absolutly no clue what could possibly be going on?

Yeah.

I mean, A talking werewolf, some chick with Bike handles on her head, this kid who looks like a greasy Pinocchio.... Whoa.

[darkknightjrk]

I know--I would like to get more into the X-books, but...woah.

[lamashtar]

There's usually only about 2 or 3 pages of the soap opera--the rest is all hack hack hack cut slash murder murder murder. That might drive you away or might be exactly what you want in a book..

[colonel_green]

In their defence, the talking werewolf and the "chick with bike handles on her head" are from the Thor mythos.

[okkult3000]

That's a pretty weak attempt by the colorist to add a bra on X-23 in post-production. It's like a weird reverse tan line.

[q99]

It is. I wasn't sure what it was supposed to be. Is it, like, a light see-through mesh?

[darkknightjrk]

Aren't there slightly transparent bras out there? Not denying that it could be a bad coloring job, but still.

[sinisterlink]

There are transparent bras but it looks to me more like the artist just didn't draw a bra on her but it got added on badly later on. Like maybe they thought it wouldn't be super appropriate for a young girl to be bra-less while changing in a room with a bunch of guys so they just slapped a little band across the back. lol. Kind of stupid either way since wearing a strapless bra into combat probably would not be very supportive.

Looking at the pic again, maybe she isn't wearing anything at all and the line on her back is just a shadow cast onto her skin. *shrugs*

[colonel_green]

The colouring of Crain's art is often like that, so I don't think it was retroactively added it.

[crabby_lioness]

Awesome wolf-dude is awesome in an Old School Fairy Tale/Mythology Way. Which is pretty awesome.

Since relgion is a hot topic this week...

[silverzeo]

I wonder how Rahne is feeling now... being a Catholic girl having a Norse demi-god baby out of wed-lock.....

Re: Since relgion is a hot topic this week...

[darkknightjrk]

Well, it'll make her next confession REALLY interesting then.

Re: Since relgion is a hot topic this week...

[colonel_green]

She's not Catholic, she's Presbyterian.

Re: Since relgion is a hot topic this week...

[icon_uk]

And they'd be even MORE down on her situation.

[sinisterlink]

I love how practical Laura is. lol

Also, sucks to be Rahne right now.

Elixir: Rahne! You're okay now...
Rahne: Um, why am I naked except for a sheet?
Elixir: ...because I totaly healed you and the baby is fine...
Rahne: The WHAT?
Elixir: ...even though it seems to be some sort of crazy hybrid baby like in the Twilight books...
Rahne: BABY?
Elixir: ...but it totally won't break your spine like in those books because I'm sharing it's strength with you so you'll be alright...
Rahne: Where is Hhrimhari?!
Elixir: ...even though your boyfriend just got taken away by some crazy chick in green...
Rahne: Oh crap, Hela.
Elixir: ...but it's totally alright because he said he loves you and that he'd find a way back from whatever horrible place he's at now. :D
Rahne: D:

Oh, and I totally just remembered that Elixir and Rahne used to have a thing for each other. That makes this scene soooo much weirder.

[sianmink]

This will go fine until the baby claws its way out of Rahne's belly and Logan sees and instantly falls in love with it....

[sinisterlink]

Extra points if Logan falls in love with it and the baby is a boy. lol

[arilou_skiff]

Yeah, I remembered that halfway through the scans.

[icon_uk]

I imagine that sort of rules out a Rahne Doug re-pairing now he's back, which I'm fine with as they never made that interesting a couple.

On the other hand I can see some fun when the litter arrives, and Uncle Doug is left to babysit, with and him instantly translating wolf-kid babble into English like that episode of the Simpsons with Homer's half brother invention of the baby-interpreter.

"I want what the dog's eating"
"I have soiled myself…how embarrassing."
"The pitch is insufficient for "burp me""

[daningram.insanejournal.com]

What, Doug can't date a pregnant Rahne?

Hell, given the originality that writers have been displaying, I'd bet good money that Rahne and Doug hook up inside of 18 months.

Not something I want to see happen, mind, but new plots are pretty hard to come by, it seems.

[nothingbutcake]

Is that Tattoo? Is he back?

[long_silence]

Do you mean Ink from Young X-men? As far as I know he's still in a coma (though he did show up through an artist's error during the Utopia storyline).

This is the Vanisher, Teleford Porter, a classic X-men foe.

[nothingbutcake]

Ah, okay, thanks.  I thought the tattoos there were off.