Scarlet Witch #1

[history79]

"I've been talking to Jason Aaron about making sure that she isn’t just a female Doctor Strange. There are differences even between her and Doctor Strange so that her magic is different; I'm really making a point of stressing that there's a female energy that connects with a certain kind of magic. As a sort of shorthand, I'm calling it 'witchcraft,' but there are literally areas of dimensions that she can go to that Doctor Strange wouldn't be able to go to, because he's a man."

- James Robinson

Comments

[nyadnar17]

Between the art and the borderline misandry I find myself fairly disinterested...but then again maybe I am not the target audience.

[espanolbot]

Interesting, seems to be a grittier version of Paul Dini's Zatanna series (famous superhero/magician helps police solve occult crime).

Though the tones are vastly different.

[korvar]

"But I am more than the sum of those mistakes. I am better than that."

That sounds uncomfortably like someone who thinks they don't have to pay for their mistakes, or even think to hard about them.

[redmagpie]

I got the feeling she meant she was trying to move on from them? I mean Wanda's been stuck in the past narratively because of those mistakes for years now. Here she's trying to do good and be better than she used to be.

[tcampbell1000]

Magical characters are a tough sell to begin with: magical characters still best known for killing the Avengers are somewhat more so.

[redmagpie]

What? I mean she's talking about how witch hunting tended to target women more than men. And it did.

[obsidianwolf]

So basically Robinson is adding gender essential-ism to marvel magic. No thanks I won't be reading.

[lordultimus]

So, not a fan of Wheel of Time, I take it?

[obsidianwolf]

I'd say I'm not since I've never had any desire to read it.

[cyberghostface]

If they're going to go there with the Salem Witch Trials at least the accusers were also predominately women.

[speedingtortoise]

Beyond the Salem Witch trials though, thousands of women were murdered as "witches" in Europe for a variety of reasons, one of the biggest ones being that the Church and establishment sought to essentially keep women in their place. So I'd say there definitely is a strong link between the historical oppression of women and the hunting of witches.

[bruinsfan]

Also, wasn't Agatha Harkness one of the witches in Salem? Who actually were practicing real witchcraft in the Marvel universe, though perhaps not in a malevolent fashion. (Though based on the past behavior of inhabitants of New Salem, I'm not confident about assuming benevolence for any of them except Agatha herself.)

[bruinsfan]

In the real world, sure. In the historical Marvel Universe the practice of magic, summoning demons, etc., has been a real thing for at least 20,000 years. And given the apparent demographic ratio of evil wizards to good from titles with magic as a major element, it's entirely possible that witch hunters were performing a valuable public service.

[lieut_kettch]

There's always been a blurry line between where Wanda's mutation ends and her magical training begins. So this seems to say that Wanda is innately able (through her mutation) to call upon the magical energies that trained witches and wizards are also able to utiiize.

[bruinsfan]

And sweeping under the rug the fact that Wanda's mystical powers are a gift from an elder demon god that planned to make her its host body and take over the world.

[coldfury]

I picked this up, but I wasn't particularly pleased by it. The idea that 'witchcraft' is somehow separate from normal sorcery that would be Dr. Strange's purview...

It feels like the author came up with a 'Magic is broken" storyline he wanted to run with, but then a colleague asked him "Well, if magic is broken, why isn't Dr. Strange fixing it? Why is it the Scarlet Witch who's suddenly doing it?" Struck with no answer, he decided to go with the witchcraft route.

Like... if this was a standalone indy piece I think I'd have a lot less of a problem with it. Using a modern magic adventure to as setting to examine historical and current attitudes to women is fine, but this has to sit within the confines of Marvel continuity, and then it starts to chafe.

Like if there's a Women's only witchcraft, is there a men's only Dudecraft? Why or why not? Why the retcon to chaos magic? What are her powers again, anyway? Does she have a relationship with Billy & Thomas?

This is all muddled. I know modern comics likes to keep things like 'powers' as vague as possible for the modern reader, but after the Magneto retcon and this setup I find myself with a character that has very little to do with the old Scarlet Witch, and I find myself asking why I should care about her.

[chrys]

My thoughts exactly.

[coldfury]

Especially since she's not a mutant any more! I think. She's just an High Evolutionary experiment now, right?

[shingi70]

Actually Magic is broken Doctor Strange as well, Doc tries to cast a spell and its as if the source of magic doesn't exist anymore.

All Robinson isn't point out that Just Witchcraft is different. In his Uncanny Avengers story he proposes that while to others all magic is the same to actual users magic differs on frequencies based on type, culture, and how its preformed.

[laughing_tree]

"In the real world, sure."

That's where I think your statement should end. We're talking about real-world oppression here. No offense, but it would be incredibly icky to use Marvel's fantasy elements to turn it into justified oppression, as you're suggesting.

[laughing_tree]

It sounds like you want Marvel to have a consistent, uniform approach to magic across its books, like there often is in, say, an urban fantasy series. But I don't think that's feasible when, unlike the typical fantasy series, you're dealing with so many different writers and titles. More than that, I'd argue it's not *desirable* when each book has its own distinct themes, narrative needs, and they even often take place in different sub-genres. As I see it, across a range like that a consistent interpretation to magic is no more desirable than insisting an issue of Punisher portray the same level of sci-fi tech as a Fantastic Four.

[sindra]

I was following you up until you used "icky". Can't take any discussion seriously when a term I haven't heard since grade school gets used like that.

Sorry....pet peeve of mine. Been seeing it too much lately.

[laughing_tree]

Well, I was trying to be polite and avoid using more loaded or negative terms...

[arilou_skiff]

It's somewhat more complex: While overall more women than men were executed, that wasn't a universal pattern. (Finland and Estonia saw mostly men executed, for instance) Nor were outbreaks of witch-hunts particularly tied to the strenght and position of the local church (Spain had only a few sporadic accusations, most of which were dismissed, Italy had very few, but then again so did Britain)

[arilou_skiff]

The accusers tended to be primarily women in most cases, though plenty were children as well. It's not just a Salem thing.