Who is Laura's cousin Megan?

[salinea]

On the latest post from X-23, blackruzsa mentioned Laura's cousin, and pyrotwilight was confused. So I thought I'd do a post about Megan Kinney, who is Laura's cousin, from the X-23 : Target X miniseries.

(6 pages of issue #1, 7 pages of issue #2, 5 pages of issue #3, 7 pages of issue #4, 7 pages of issue #5)

WARNINGS FOR implied rape, abuse and general mistreatment of children; adults being dismissive about complains of the previous; misogynist language; and violence.


Target X has Laura being interrogated by Captain America and Daredevil as a framing device.





The first X-23 miniseries, Innocence Lost, tells how Laura was cloned from Wolverine's cells, and was trained and used as an assassin by the Facility. Doctor Sarah Kinney who was one of the main scientist in charge of the project, ended up being the surrogate mother for Laura and eventually bonded with her and ended up thinking of her as a daughter - which put her in frequent opposition with the extremely abusive and deshumanising practices of the Facility. At some point she was contacted by her sister, Debbie, because her daughter Megan had been kidnapped. Sarah sent Laura on a mission to recover Megan. Eventually, Sarah engineered their escape from the Facility, but died herself. So that left Laura to wander on her own.









I include this page because it kind of annoys me a lot that "X-23" is still the way Laura gets called amongst the x-men. That kind of emphasizes what a suck-tastic job they've done with Laura after she joined them, when instead of helping her getting comfortable with an identity as a human being, they've treated them as the weapon the Facility created, which Laura had been trying to distantiate herself from. Anyway...

When Megan tried to make Laura tell what she just told her about the kidnapping to her mother, Laura lies about it, causing a row. Still Debbie makes sure Laura gets dressed into her signature Goth-y clothing. (wtf with the sexualisation of the 14 yo girl, miniseries? o_o)











So the cousins bond.

However, Laura isn't quite well socially adjusted for high school. She shows off in French class by reciting en français the procedure learned in the Facility for dealing with cops, including bribery and tortures. Interrupts Biology class to correct the teacher about exactly how much blood there is in a human body, and explain which poisons are best to be used without being traced.



They get suspended. Then they run off together, steal a car, and go on a day of having fun, as one does. I'd provide pics, some of which are very cute, but I'm at the limit of pages to give for this issue, so... let's skip to the ending of their day.





No, they weren't.




Of course, the Facility would have stuck someone to watch Sarah Kinney's relatives.









Huho.



There goes Desmond.



Smart.









Honestly, this is one of the most efficiently tense and horrific action scene I've ever read in the comic. I also love how it gets resolved by Megan being smart and quick thinking. The two x-23 miniseries were some of the first superheroes comics I read, so it's a little bit responsible for me being there now. ^_^



Yeah, it kind of goes from bad to worse there, with Kimura, a superpowered agent from the Facility who has long abused Laura coming to attack them. She binds Laura with Adamantium cuffs, and threatens to kill Megan, which Laura manages to save in a gruesomely badass way by cutting her own (cuffed) hand. Oh, and then making the house explode to cover their escape.















And we haven't seen Megan in comics since that either. I wouldn't mind if Laura visited her in her current series ^_^

Comments

[cyberghostface]

O/T but is that Arya from ASOIAF on your icon?

[salinea]

it is!

don't have access to my Laura icon anymore, so i thought I'd use the closest thing in term of character concept :3

[proteus_lives]

It is a bitchin' icon.

"Stick him with the pointy end."

[salinea]

thanks! :D

[espanolbot]

Okay, this was actually pretty good.

[salinea]

Target X is IMHO as yet the best story with Laura in it.

[rordulum]

It's a very good mini, I agree.

So many wonderful moments in here, and it's amazing how much Kyle and Yost made me feel for Laura. All that confusion, self-hatred and anger. The scene where she breaks down in tears trying to get Wolverine to kill her is just heartbreaking.

Plus, the cameos from Cap and Matt Murdock are pretty well used. Cap getting to show some compassion and understanding, even if his judgement isn't entirely sound.

But best ever story with Laura in it? I'm partial to a couple of the New X-Men arcs myself. Nimrod and Mercury Falling.

[salinea]

YMMV, as always. I think my favourite New X-Men arc would probably be the one in Hell actually - though that one doesn't have all that much Laura in it. I did like Mercury Falling too. I don't think I did Nimrod (at least if my memories of what arc that is are correct); but I thought Target X worked start to finish in a way those didn't.

[halloweenjack]

This was such a great mini--ditto for the first one.

[salinea]

Innocence Lost is good. Target X is great.

[icon_uk]

That's kind of an awesome story there, and yes, it would be nice for Laura to want to see Megan and her aunt again. Do they allow humans on.... Elysium? (Or whatever they've named the mutant rock land)

[espanolbot]

Amusing if they didn't. Making their paradise away from the persecution they faced elsewhere racially segregated and all.

[icon_uk]

Like Xavier's Academy wasn't for it's entire existence? (Emma was the one who has run human/mutant schools).

[espanolbot]

Kind of hard to go to a school for mutants if you weren't one yourself.

It'd be like going to Hogwarts if you were incapable of doing any magic.

Though both are equally racist, albeit in a conceding way, towards regular people, so they have that in commoin, I suppose.

[darkblade]

I wouldn't say it'd be quite that bad. It's the minority of classes at Xavier's that deal with using one's powers whereas every single thing in Hogwarts is about magic, everything.

[icon_uk]

It was a "School for Gifted Youngsters", the fact he enacted a 100% pro-secret-mutant agenda is sort of my point. How many genius level pupils did he turn away because they weren't mutants?

They're pretty much enacting the same policy on Utopia.

[salinea]

It's Utopia, and no, they're not forbidden (some x-men aren't mutants after all). Then again Laura isn't on Utopia right now. She's in Paris.

[terrykun]

Noriko/Surge threw a royal bitch-fit when post-Wondrabra but pre-vampire Jubilee showed up.

And yet the similarly depowered David/Prodigy gets to stay without anyone batting an eye. *eyeroll*

Dr Nemesis and Dr Rao seem to get passes as well. (FOR SCIENCE!)

[pyrotwilight]

Oh, Dr, Nemesis isn't a mutant? Huh, just assumed he was.

[stolisomancer]

No, he's a mutant. He's actually one of the first mutants, IIRC.

[salinea]

Surge isn't in a position of authority in Utopia. She's a teenage girl with PTSD due to having been a main character during Yost & Kyle's run, which is why she threw a royal bitch-fit to Jubilee. One should not take it as a reflection of the policies of Utopia.

[arilou_skiff]

IIRC they did tell Jubilee not to come, mainly because of the entire "Constantly being attacked by crazy people" factor.

[salinea]

that does make sense with my memory...

Probably not relevant to post Second Coming Utopia though.

[akodo_rokku]

Prodigy did lose his power, but all the knowledge he had previously absorbed was in his subconscious, and he got the Cuckoos to remove the mental blocks that kept him from accessing it back in Messiah Complex. So while he's not powered any more, he is pretty high on the Badass Normal scale. Which is what his power let him be in the first place.

[stolisomancer]

Yeah, they do. Kavita Rao's always there.

[icon_uk]

True, though she is rather a special case, being the only (last I heard) person who could undo mutations, with "The Cure", and so is someone to keep close.

[pyrotwilight]

Neat stuff! Thanks for posting. Weird thing is is I remember seeing this at one point but I've since forgotten about it.

[salinea]

Perhaps at the old comm? There wasn't a Target X tag yet, at least >_>;

[ravenous_raven]

Laura seems so much like Cass here (except for the French and talking in class). They're both introverts, quiet, and seemingly anti-social, but they do try to connect with people even if it's difficult for them. I think that they would both benefit from talking with each other as well as hanging out with great girl friends like Megan and Steph.

[turtlefu]

I agree, which is something that always bothered me about Laura, because they basically made her Cass, but as Wolverine!

I find it kind of unoriginal.

[blackruzsa]

Well to be fair, Cass and Laura are absolutely different in that Laura is more aggressive and less aware of herself. Plus, Laura is much less stoic.

And I'm not sure but when did they expand Cass as a character? Because Laura was made for the tv show and her personality was quite different from the comics.

[salinea]

Cass and Laura have very similar character concept (trained assassin since birth, socially maladjusted in a way you can use for being the speaker of frank, awkward, obvious-but-hidden truth, emotionless girl moe); otoh I think they have very different personalities. Cass has a much stronger sense of self (which is why I can't completely hate David Cain as a father, he was good enough to give her that at least), is much more empathetic, and much less prone to wallowing in self-loathing and self-pity. Laura isn't loquacious, but she's much more at ease with language, of course, has more difficulties relating to people, will still kill if she has to, and is a little bit more prone to the moe fetishization (which is ironic given how fetishist Cass' Batgirl costume is).

[starwolf_oakley]

While not to get all "nature/nurture" have we established to what degree Laura is the way she is because of her programming or the nature of her mutant powers via Wolverine's DNA?

Of course, you could say the same thing about Wolverine. Did the Weapon X "programming" give him his problems or is it the nature of his mutation? Of course, what are Logan's problems? Bloodlust? Berserker rages? A genuine mental illness?

[salinea]

The effect of the Trigger scent to send her in a state of murderous rage was definitely the effect of the Facility conditioning. I don't think we've seen Laura be subject to berserker like rage outside of the specific use of the Trigger scent (which perhaps means that Logan's problems are also due to conditioning, I wouldn't know).

[stolisomancer]

Michael Choi hadn't quite found his feet yet, and you can see it with things like Cap's outfit or that giant damn head on Megan the first time we see her. He really is the secret weapon of the X-23 miniseries, though; he manages such clean art without sacrificing storytelling ability.

It's interesting you made that point about sexualization. It's been a while since I've read the whole thing, but Laura and Megan's outfits in this never struck me as sexual so much as needlessly complex, like the weird confluence of a kid with tailoring skills and a predilection towards the vaguely Gothic. It's one of the things that always struck me as strange about the book upon rereading it, as Megan appears to have an enormous clothing budget for a lonely girl from a broken home.

[salinea]

Might not have found his feet yet, but the art was still pretty damn awesome ♥

I dunno, they look like Gothic clothes, yes. I've no idea how expensive or likely they might be for such a kid as Megan. But corset + short skirt which shows skin on both hips, like she does on the cover of the second issue? That does look sexualized to me. YMMV. Though the rest of the clothes didn't faze me that way.

[rordulum]

Eh, it's almost tame compared to the way Paco Medina drew her in New X-Men.

The only female Marvel character that I can think of who hasn't ever been drawn in an overtly sexualised way is Molly Hayes.... ew.

[salinea]

Yup, but she was 16 in New X-Men. Sexualization of a 16 yo does not hit my "ewww" button as much as sexualization of a 14 yo one does. (though it still hit my "ewww" button, heh)

[auggie18]

Katie Power, maybe?

Somebody pointed out that in one run of the seventies X-men, you can see Jean Grey's nipples through her costume. It was disheartening.

[practicalcat]

It hasn't gotten much better. There was a comic within the last few years where you could see Kate Bishop/Hawkeye's nipples through her costume, which generally tends to look like leather body-armor.

[biod]

Damn those claws look like they hurt. Not sure if it's the torn skin or the smile, but something about that cover makes me squirm more than the usual claws-tear-open-skin.
Yeah, the cover art is sexualized, but I can't find much fault with the clothes in the book itself.

[salinea]

that's cuz I didn't include the panel with the pinup posing :) but i agree, the inner art is much less problematic than the cover.

[blackruzsa]

I LOVED how smart Megan was when she put them in the shower to get the trigger scent off, that struck me back when I read this.

And I loved this storyline. Probably one of the best concerning Laura. They need to bring Megan back, seriously.

[salinea]

yeah, i think that's when I really fell for Megan; it was badass in a very Final Girl way XD

Liu has been good for exploring bits of backstory so far, I hope she remembers Megan and brings her up at some point!

[biod]

That was a seriously intense moment with the Trigger Scent.
If I ever find these minis and the money to buy them I'll be sure to pick them up.

[salinea]

Isn't it!

And, yay! :D

[magus_69]

Semi-OT, but I'm incredibly impressed with the depiction of the border crossing. Why, you ask? Because that is an honest-to-Zod real place. It's Huntingdon Crossing, between Sumas, Washington and Abbotsford, B.C. There's not so many trees on the Canadian side, but the building itself is unmistakable. I like that somebody actually did some research.

[salinea]

Oh, that's neat!

[eyz]

I remember this one!
Liked the concept/premise but wasn't a big fan of the overall plot :/