A Cockamamie Buncha Ideas Regarding Lindy and the Sentry.

[jlroberson]

A few thoughts set off by this passage in the latest Dark Avengers. There is a scan in this for legality. But I really don't feel like searching for all the other links that are here for what I refer to, sorry, but I'm sure one can find them in the tags...



Bob: that is part of your crazy.

Has anyone ever noticed the black design thing on top could be taken to symbolize, like another warning Bob forgot he was giving(why don't any of them ever listen to those damn tapes?) by the very shape of it, that the Sentry--the tiny S--is inside the Void--much bigger? Look at it. Why is it designed in such a slightly creepy way? It doesn't look like a symbol of justice. It looks like an abstracted representation of the usual template the various shapes of the Void take. Tentacles, fangs, whatever. You could even say the Sentry is in the mouth of the Void. Or that the Sentry is the tongue, in the sense of his voice. Or voices. Of which there may be three or four.

If you count Lindy.

Owen Mercer, the Molecule Man, and all the friends he constructed, who were just extrusions of his own personality. That was always meant, I believe now, as a clue.

That's what Bob is, that's what the Void is, and I do believe that's what Lindy was. Like Owen's friends. In Sentry's case, she was his conscience.

And I've gone back out of curiosity and found nothing about what Bob is like now that wasn't implicit in the original stories up to and including the first New Avengers stories. This would appear to be exactly what had been going to happen that forgetting the Sentry was supposed to prevent.

I've said before here that I think it's going to end up turning out that every wrong, dark and depressing turn, Dissassembled, House of M, Civil War, Secret Invasion and of course Dark Reign(the last decade has been NOTHING BUT EVENTS, though it has at times produced some very interesting and complex stories, in my opinion, that developed corners of the MU, thematically, that probably wouldn't have been possible otherwise), that the Marvel Universe has gone through since the Sentry's reappearance will now turn out to have been the Void subtly making the world worse, slowly, step by step, until he could not be stopped from returning, until Bob Reynolds' mind was so weakened and confused he couldn't resist him anymore.

A world with the villains in charge, so someone self-interested in using him and manipulating him, like Osborn, would feed his addiction to the point where the Void was beyond powerful. A world ruled by those who could neither stop him, nor truly appeal emotionally to the man they once knew(old friends remind you what you are--Osborn only knew the unstable Sentry, and used him cruelly with a smile) At which point he could make the world, as he said, something Bob Reynolds could not live in.

And the beginning of the de-anchoring of the ethical core of Bob Reynolds? The murder of Lindy. I don't mean now. I believe Bob was correct when he said that he, or the Void anyway, murdered his wife in NEW AVENGERS 7. I believe he subconsciously remade her, or the Void did(and made Bob forget he did, let him go through the fear, self-hatred and guilt long enough to loosen the screws in his head), to both start making Bob doubt his sanity--after subjecting him to extreme trauma to take him off-balance anyway--and introduce a tenuous relief, and a serious fear of it happening again. And thus also reintroduce him to something like a feeling of dependency.

I think when LadyUltron killed her, his revival of her was the SECOND time. And that the real Lindy has been dead since before NEW AVENGERS.

And remember: Bob in Jenkins wasn't crazy. He was confused, but not crazy. And he was also willing to have himself defamed if that's what it took to disappear himself and therefore the Void. So, if Lindy is in fact the best of Bob, in a form that is safe(Lindy as Bob imagined her, including how she'd see him--consider the super-guilt complex that Mastermind gave him that started all this) Remember his "funeral" and all the things Reed said. Then consider what Lindy said about Bob being a junkie. And about Bob not deserving the power. The latter is a manifestation of said guilt complex.

After Lindy was, according to him, killed, THEN he was going crazy. In cycles, as he'd explained and warned--and everyone keeps forgetting Bob wants them to stop him. One way or another, both heroes and villains have been giving the Void what it wants.

I now think this was not bad, or off, characterization on Bendis' part, but a deliberate change leading to this. It's development.

Just a cockamamie analysis, but I've been right about this kind of thing before.


...


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Comments

[foxhack]

I agree with this idea and would like to subscribe to your newsletter.

[jlroberson]

I even believe he caused the Scarlet Witch to go berserk, as an attempt to take him out of the world, and it didn't work. Perhaps Lindy died then.

[hyperactivator]

This makes alot of sense. Should we have a no prize week?

[jlroberson]

Did I spot a mistake?

[punishermax]

I like the idea.

It would also make sense by the very idea of what Void is. If we go by the idea that Void is the same entity that killed all the first born in Egypt, and therefore another entity other than God (perhaps a "contracted" entity? Perhaps an Avatar of the Angel of Death?), then perhaps Void's plans become clearer.

Think of it, Egypt during Moses time blew dicks, slavery of an entire people, God's chosen people to be exact, so the Angel of Death had a big job to do and prestige in that job as well.

But look at it now, conflicts are very much grey areas these days, countries in conflict with no true evil side and the sides that are truly evil are the ones doing the killing, Rwanda, Bosnia, Cambodia, so Angel of Death wants another prestigious job.

So he thinks to himself "Hmmm maybe if I make things shitty enough the big guy will give me the job of cleaning it up! More prestige! More respect! I'm the GOOD guy again!"

So he takes over Bob and, as you said, engineers Civil War, House of M, Secret Invasion, and Dark Reign to craft a dark enough world for him to cleanse.

Siege is basically the reaping of his own work.

[jlroberson]

I like that too. That means though that accidentally Mastermind channeled this through him. That at least what he did to Bob allowed for it anyway, I guess, and the entity got in then because Bob was the most powerful thing. And grew inside him like a spiritual Alien?

[jlroberson]

And it's also a grand expansion of a number of specifically Marvel themes. One would be the old "power and responsibility" theme and the difficulty of humans dealing with both together, never mind separately, things never being perfect in the MU.

And then, the example of what happens when the former is too much for the latter. There's also the "Dark _________" theme, of course. Especially relevant when you consider exactly how Marvel has explained that Jean and the Phoenix who died in 1980 were not the same being.

[cainofdreaming]

Why is it designed in such a slightly creepy way?

Because it's a Shadow ship. Duh.

[jlroberson]

Still, placement and positioning.

[proteus_lives]

I like this. It makes sense that Lindy's been dead since then.

But I fear that the writers are too lazy for it.

[stig]

Bendis has done it before - remember Wanda's ugly children as manifestations of her warring personality?

[jlroberson]

Which mirrors the Sentry's doing the same. You could imagine it being a ripple effect.

[mullon]

I like this. This has been the big twist I've been waiting for since OMD. Unfortunately I don't think Marvel is that good at planning ahead.

[twigcollins]

Unfortunately I don't think Marvel is that good at planning ahead.

Oh god no, not at all, but if it made things better?

I would totally play along that it was their idea all the time.

[starpiper]

This is a really great idea and makes lots of sense. I have little-to-no faith that Marvel will actually go in the direction of a story this cool, but I'm going to put my blue ring on and hope with the best of them. My only thing is that I'm not sure how Disassembled would fit in with the rest, since the Sentry only showed up after the Avengers had split ways.

Oh, would it be too much for me to hope that this could also explain away OMD? ::sighs::

[jlroberson]

>>My only thing is that I'm not sure how Disassembled would fit in with the rest, since the Sentry only showed up after the Avengers had split ways.

I might be incorrect in thinking the first Sentry mini was before Disassembled. (this is all from two years of catching up in the library across the street) However, if it was. then they "forgot" again right before that. While Bob was offstage would be Lindy's first death. Then after all the DA stiff is when he reappears, with them not remembering before as Emma Frost mentions.

>>Oh, would it be too much for me to hope that this could also explain away OMD?

I am not sure but--Remember that Peter is someone close to the old Sentry.

[deepspaceartist]

I always thought that the Void was a part of Bob's mind that Mastermind corrupted, all the small flaws and imperfections present in any person blown up to monstrous levels. I figured that the ressurection of Lindy was the good parts of Bob's mind, fighting to keep the Void under control. But your idea that Lindy after her first ressurection (whenever that was) IS the good parts of Bob's mind is a good one.

I always had the idea that Bob actualy was a Superman-esque boy scout of a superhero, a normal guy stumbling upon great powers and choosing to do the right thing just because it was the right thing. I always figured the Void was either something completely created by Mastermind from all of Bob's self doubts and suppressed selfish impulses, or a recurring villain of Bob's who Wyngarde used as a template for those negative things. The original Void could just be some costumed villain who has retired after one too many defeats, had his mind wiped of being the Void by Bob's crazy, and never recovered it.

As for the revived-Lindy-was-Bob's-good-mind idea, it makes a lot of sense. Like you said, Bob just wanted people to forget the Sentry, he wanted to sacrifice his life in the sense of erasing all memeory of his existence. He's still trying to do that, to save people from the monster Mastermind created from his own mind, but now in the literal sense of dying to get rid of the Void. The GoodBob/Lindy manifestation tryed to do that, first by trying to literally kill his main body, then by using the junkie story to convince people he's not worth saving, and they should kill him before he destroys the world. Even after all the horrible things his darker side given control had done, the part of Robert Reynolds that was an honest-to-god superhero is still in there, fighting to save everyone.

And really after thinking about that, I kind of hope Bob gets a happy ending. Either being freed from the Void permanently, or finally dying and taking it with him.

[jlroberson]

Consider if the Void was another thing before, a real villain, and then maybe one day, that was the first time Bob killed. He may have already had a susceptibility to nuttiness, and perhaps his guilt at killing for the first time made him feel undeserving.

So, like he created Lindy as a compartmentalized safe place for his good side--him as he imagines Lindy would see him--he created the Void to keep himself chastened. So this could all have started the first time Bob killed a foe, realized that he was capable of it, and that if he could kill that one, he could kill them all, and realized what would happen if he let that keep going. So he created the vast and unstoppable Void as a device to limit and chasten him, because the more Bob's the Sentry, the more Void there is, right? But he has to think of it as different, and separate, or else it doesn't work. Like with Lindy. So that follows its logic, with that kind of power and that kind of evil. A monster Bob creates out of a bad way to deal with a good intention. Turns it tragic.

And consider too: does Mastermind seem to you like the kind of guy who, when stumbling across something like that in Bob's mind, might have simply found a way to take advantage of it, and then take full credit anyway?

[cmdr_zoom]

It's a brilliant idea, but logically, it would require the writers and editors to actually change the tone once this all comes out and the Void's influence is removed.

Same problem on the other side of the fence: okay, if all of this bleak dark depressing $^#@ is the fault of an actual character, why is it still going on?

Blaming unpopular (in certain quarters) editorial decisions on in-universe factors is scapegoating. Continuing to do the exact same thing (because of sales, or editor mandate, or whatever) is trying to eat your cake and have it too.

... okay, so I admit that mostly I'm bummed that the promise of "now things will be brighter and better and MORE FUN" has not come to pass, and probably never will. Dark sells. Gorn sells. We're gonna bring back shiny heroic uncomplicated gee-whiz Barry Allen, just so we can make him all grim and angsty and modern. WHY?

[jlroberson]

>>logically, it would require the writers and editors to actually change the tone once this all comes out and the Void's influence is removed.

Think of it more like: it would give them THE OPPORTUNITY to change the tone.

Basically, I believe this gives them the chance to not only clean up anything they wish, but changes what could be just an absurd series of crossover events into something more like an epic, built up slowly over time. What I've done here is trying to give them an escape hatch, not least of which would be: I'm very tired of crossover events. To reveal something like all this was the reason all along would be a win-win: an ass-saving for Marvel in one of the only ways that would make a lot of their fans happy.

[sethgray]

My problem with this theory is that if something was intentionally corroding the world away from what it should be, shouldn't the Phoenix Force step in to stop something like that?

[stolisomancer.insanejournal.com]

That isn't what the Phoenix Force does, and there are no wielders of it currently on the planet anyway.

[flidgetjerome]

I do really like this theory.

I'm just wondering where Scout fits into all of it. Is he even still in continuity?

[jlroberson]

Well, look what happened to him.

Another reason for Bob to feel undeserving. If Bob is the Void.

[halialkers]

And to make matters even simpler, turning the heroes into people barely distinguishable to the villains, thereby neutralizing the potential threat by virtue of Black and Grey Morality.

[comicoz]

I like the idea, and ever since I read it posted in the DA15 or Siege3 (I forget which) post, I think I can see the validity.

However, because I am uber cynical, I have a feeling that your guess, while it would work awesome and be great story telling, will be as accurate as the guesses people made about Matrix Revolutions. That's not a slam on you, it's a slam against writing living up to our hopes.

[shadowpsykie]

I really hope the next big story is called "Phoenix vs, Sentry: Light vs. Darkness,"

THAT would be an EPIC fight,

Phoenix: You are the one with the power of a million exploding suns?
Sentry/Void: Yes, I have killed gods, created life, and destroyed godly cities.quake before my power.
Phoenix: Oh how cute, I eat suns for breakfast, and once, when i had a bad day i destroyed a solar system.... you can run now if you wan.

[jlroberson]

And SHE ate her broccoli too.

[alienist]

...Oh, I really, really hope you're right.

Can we blame Bob for One More Day too?

[fifth11]

This would blow my mind with amazingness. It really would. Especially with all the little details like the 'S' being so small in the construct of his home.

But like you and cmdr_zoom were talking about, the tone of the MU would have to change. Maybe they could just lay off it for a while, put out some fun, happy comics--maybe with cute, squishy art-- and then gradually bring some darkness back in. But because of the flood of squishy happy comics, the darkness would have potency again. Not eye-rolling not-again bored-now darkness, but seriously page-turning interesting darkness.