Excalibur #22: "Treasures of Britain"

[alliterator]

"You can't build on something in a satisfying fashion without an awareness of what's come before. I think House of X and Powers of X taught us that, if we didn't already know, right? The combination of a completely fresh take with the presence and prominence of mutant characters and history from all over."
-- Tini Howard



Previously on Excalibur: during the Gala, the UK revealed that they would be cancelling their treaty with Krakoa, as well as partnering with the anti-mutant Coven Akkaba. The coven then sacrificed Pete Wisdom on their alter to bring back Morgan le Fay.

Comments

[mastermahan]

"They're tearing down all the UK gates... we can't go there anymore. I mean, we obviously could go there by plane or boat or Chunnel or take a gate to Ireland and just walk over, but that's what a human would do, so that's beneath our dignity. And yes, you could hitch a ride with a teleporter like Pixie, who is flying above our heads even as we speak, but she's all the way up there, and getting her attention would require effort."

"So really, there's no way back to the UK. Just put it out of your mind, along with other inconvenient questions such as why a couple dozen asshole wizards openly working for a known supervillain can dictate international policy, or how moving Braddock Lighthouse 50 feet offshore makes it belong to Krakoa."

I'll give Tini Howard points for bringing back S.T.R.I.K.E., though. That's a deep cut.

[alliterator]

Tearing down the gates, I believe, is more of a symbolic thing. Like they are saying "We don't want mutants to come here. Stay on your island."

And it's not like the UK hasn't done stupid shit like that before. Case in point: Brexit.

[akodo_rokku]

Having read the issue, I assumed "can't" is meant in the legal/political sense. They're not welcome on the Queen's soil.

[mastermahan]

If that's the meaning, then the issue should really say that. Putting it in the same sentence as "They're tearing down the gates" implies they can't physically get there.

For example, it could also be that's it's not safe for mutants in the UK due to threats of violence and stabby wizards. It could be that Krakoa legally banned mutants from the UK as a response to their quitting the treaty (and the UK ambassador committing ritual murder), which would actually make for a better Brexit analogy. Maybe Pete himself is banned because they don't want to make the resurrection process's existence obvious to Clan Akkaba.

It's not clear writing, and there's no excuse for that.

[deh_tommy]

Pete Widsom probably can’t go back to the U.K. because Coven Akkaba personally murdered him and Krakoa’s trying to keep the resurrection protocols a secret, but otherwise pretty much.

[beyondthefringe]

Tini Howard is going to tell her story with the characters she's got, come hell or high water.

Gambit does things with his powers he's never done before? Check.
Obscure characters retconned to be mutants? Check.
Obscure character revealed to be conveniently dead so they can be revived on Krakoa with the rest of their friends? Check.
Obscure characters given codenames and attributes they never had before, just to fit in with Howard's alchemical storyline? Check.
Characters drastically at opposition with previous portrayals? Check.

I like the return of STRIKE as a nice deep cut reference, and it's true that most of them didn't even have more than a single appearance in comics most modern readers have never even heard of, much less read, but still, Howard really has a tendency to force the story. I've seen her do it in Strikeforce, Excalibur, X-Corp, X of Swords...

[icon_uk]

What's Gambuit been doing that's new, and who's now a mutant who wasn't before?

[thezmage]

I don’t know about Gambit but in the scans right here we have STRIKE be suddenly revealed as mutants and the characters even commented on it (“We looked through the Cerebro files and you’re exactly right. There they were”)

[mastermahan]

This issue has Gambit spot and deflect a sniper's bullet just before it hits him in the head, pick a lock by throwing a charged Tarot card at it, and making a train run by touching and charging it.

I can just handwave the Tarot card as magic, but I have no idea how the bullet deflection is supposed to work. The panels are very unclear.

[alliterator]

"Obscure characters retconned to be mutants? Check."

Betsy was retconned to be a mutant and she was part of the same team as the rest of STRIKE.

"Obscure character revealed to be conveniently dead so they can be revived on Krakoa with the rest of their friends? Check."

The only one retconned to be dead was Alison Double who hasn't been seen since the '80s.

"Obscure characters given codenames and attributes they never had before, just to fit in with Howard's alchemical storyline? Check."

Codenames? Sure. Attributes? No, those are the same.

"Characters drastically at opposition with previous portrayals? Check."

Huh? What are you talking about? What characters are in opposition to previous portrayals?

[scorntx]

Laughin' at the notion the UK is some monolithic entity.
If the ones at Westminster said Mutants were forbidden, five minutes later Scotland would put up a huge sign on the border offering Mutants free room, board and beer.

[icon_uk]

Yeah, that was my reaction too! Nicola Sturgeon would prrobably have a gate planting ceremony in front of Holyrood by 10 o'clock the same day.

Though technically I don't think Scotland can dictate or amend UK foreign policy, that power IS retained by Westminster.

[deh_tommy]

And that’s the crux of what’s really been ticking me off about the Dawn/Reign of X, this whole thing reeks of cultural/identity erasure with the characters and the places they go, and a lot of that is either brushed off or treated like a good thing.

[lordultimus]

Yeah, apparently Tini Howard is under the impression that Northern Ireland is literally the North of Ireland.

[tinygaylaura]

"If the ones at Westminster said Mutants were forbidden, five minutes later Scotland would put up a huge sign on the border offering Mutants free room, board and beer."

No offence meant but this sounds an awful lot like when people were saying "Checks and balances" meant that there was no way Donald Trump could ever do anything THAT bad when he got elected president

[alliterator]

Laughin' at the notion the UK is some monolithic entity.

And where, exactly, have they stated the UK was monolithic?

[sabertoothlotus]

Wasn't Clan Akkaba created by Apocalypse? How did yhat turn into an anti-mutant organization?

[alliterator]

This isn't Clan Akkaba, this is Coven Akkaba. They were created by humans who were rejected by Apocalypse originally.

[deh_tommy]

This is Coven Akkaba, a splinter of Clan Akkaba. They worship Morgan le Fay instead of Apocalypse.

[thezmage]

Seems like a pretty poor sacrifice if Peter's soul is still around to be revived. We know it's possible to kill people forever, why wouldn't sacrificing them to Margan Le Fay do the same?

[scorntx]

Maybe whoever Peter's soul was sacrificed to handed it back.
Given what he's probably done with it, hard to blame them.

"Your sacrifice has been rejected due to insufficient projected return on investment."

[donnblake]

The interaction of Krakoan resurrection with the established metaphysical properties of death, souls, and the afterlife in Marvel are, I think, kind of an open question. Siryn's cycle of deaths at the behest of the Morrigan suggests that identity is maintained for supernatural purposes- dying didn't let a 'new' Siryn off the hook- but also that death with the certainty of resurrection did maintain some metaphysical value.

[tinygaylaura]

I'm not that surprised they screwed up the ritual

This is a cult of racists made up of the kind of people who think seasoning your food makes it too spicy. Morgan Le Fay choosing them for her servants is like Quentin Tarantino commisioning some very specific artwork from Rob Lifield

Their going to be eager and greedy for great results and bitterly dissapointed with what they get

[tinygaylaura]

Now that the racist idiots of Coven Akkaba have let her loose and given that from what we've seen in the past we know she's a complete psychopath with no goals other than "I wonder if the face THIS one makes as they die will make me laugh" I really want Morgan Le Fay to "Reward" her followers the same way a certain other deranged megalomaniac regularly opposed by a snarky anti-hero did after this

"So....

Earthlings

Basically uh....

END OF THE WORLD"

*Voodoo Child starts playing*

[lbd_nytetrayn]

Hollywood Hulk Hogan?