N IS FOR 'NO MORE MUTANTS' (#AtoZChallenge)

Hello, WORLD!! Smokkee here, again, talking about the MCU, again. You knew I would be. We're less than two weeks away from 'Age of Ultron', and I'm still high off that 13 episode rush Netflix provides called 'Daredevil'. So it's safe to say yes, Marvel's Cinematic Universe is still on my brain. Actually, make that Marvel in general since I've reverted back to reading comics again, a habit I thought I kicked for good more than a decade ago. OK, so I've had a few relapses here and there but I thought I was done with them for the most part.

I'm glad I wasn't. I saw some interesting things happening in the comics that just might make there way to the big screen or, if nothing else, might affect what happens in the MCU in the next few phases. For instance, the next Captain America standalone film is called 'Civil War'. I thought the Avengers 2 would be where this storyline made the leap from the comics to the big screen. I was wrong about when it would make that jump but I correctly guessed right here it was coming, eventually. 

Amazing Spider Man #698

Now I got another prediction for you. This one starts with the death of one of Marvel's biggest names: Spider-Man. He 'dies' in Amazing Spider Man's 700 issue. They 'killed' arguably their most famous character right in between both of the Marc Webb-helmed Amazing Spider Man films. 

OK, maybe 'dies' isn't the word to use. It wasn't like they completely 'killed' Spider Man; the 'Dying Wish' storyline had a dying Doctor Octopus finally get the best of Spider Man by switching bodies with him right before he died. Over the course of the next year (the time between the releases of ASM movies 1 and 2) we saw Ock trying his best to be a better Spider Man than Peter Parker ever was, with Marvel even replacing the Amazing Spider Man title with the name Ock was calling himself: the Superior Spider Man.  

Of course the real Peter Parker came back eventually, just in time to save Ock, one of Spider Man's

The look on Gobby's face when he realizes the real Spider Man is back: priceless.

arch enemies, from defeat at the hands of Peter's main arch nemesis, Green Goblin. More accurately, he came back in time for him to be Spider Man when ASM 2 was released, but that's not the point. It should be noted that the ASM films aren't part of the MCU (at least not yet). The right to use Spider Man in film was licensed by Marvel to Sony Pictures at that time. I think that's the real reason Marvel killed him off in the first place because now Spidey is now cleared to be a part of the MCU thanks to this deal between Marvel and Sony Pictures.       

The only reason I brought any of that up is not too long after that, Marvel killed off another insanely popular character. And this character is one we thought was almost unkillable. And this character is DEAD dead for sure, having died via suffocation. And this one hasn't came back yet even though I doubt he's gone for ever but at least we get to see Hugh Jackman play him a few more times in the future if he is.
 



Yep. RIP, Wolverine.





Now, it should be noted here that Wolverine and his fellow X-Men characters are also licensed out by Marvel, as was Spidey to Sony Pictures, to 20th Century Fox. 20th Century Fox also owns the rights to the cinematic version of Marvel's other well known superhero team, the Fantastic Four. The Fantastic Four is one of Marvel's longest running properties and they have a movie due out as well, the trailer for the movie was just released yesterday.  

So what does Marvel Comics do to help promote this new film for one of their longest running properties? They canceled the whole Fantastic Four comic book series! It's slated to end this month at issue 645. Why? probably the same reason why they killed Wolverine and possibly Spider Man. To eventually get the film rights to these properties back. Based on all of these happenings, I'm willing to bet Marvel's next course of action most likely can be summed up to these three words. 
 
"No more mutants."
That was uttered by none other than the Scarlett Witch, a mutant herself, at the end of Marvel Comic's 2005 company wide crossover event, 'House of M'. 'HoM' led to the 'Decimation' which seen almost 90% of the mutants in Marvel Comics lose their power. 'HoM' followed the 'Avengers Disassembled' storyline. 'AD' basically focused on the Avengers being manipulated by events caused by the Scarlett Witch's hexing ability and winds up being the reason the Avengers disband for a short while. 'AD's main characters besides the more popular Avengers were the Scarlet Witch (who causes the events), Dr Strange (who figured out who was behind these events), Vision and a bunch of versions of a villain named Ultron. With Scarlett Witch, Ultron, and the Vision set to appear in Age of Ultron and Dr Strange slated to have his own film in MCU's Phase 3, notice that most of these characters are now set to debut in the MCU in the near future.

You see the problem with the MCU using that storyline right now?

Since nobody has seen AoU yet, who's to say that it doesn't follow the Avengers Disassembled storyline? There was a company wide cross over event called Age of Ultron but I doubt seriously that this is the basis for the MCU film because it's biggest characters, the ones who have the most impact on the story, are Hank Pym (who'll debut in Ant Man, the last film of MCU's Phase 2), FF's Sue Richards, and multiple versions of X-Men's Wolverine. 

In the comics, the Avengers Disassembled storyline led directly into some of the best storylines Marvel has put out in recent times like the aforementioned 'Decimation', 'Secret Invasion', 'Planet Hulk', 'Dark Reign', and ended with the beginning of Marvel's Heroic Age. Another storyline from this period is the one that stands out for obvious reasons: 'Civil War'. In fact, 'Disassembled' almost directly leads into Civil War the same way were being told the MCU's AoU leads into the MCU's version of Civil War.

Which brings me to Phase 3's movie lineup. Dr Strange is slated to be the second of the Phase 3 films, which are kicked off with Civil War. You know what the last film in Phase 3 is slated to be? Inhumans. Now if you ask me why this is huge news, it's because the Inhumans are being set up in the comics as the replacement for mutants. No more mutants, remember? The only difference between mutants, whose film rights are owned by 20th Century Fox, and the mutants are the fact that mutants are born with there abilities while Inhumans are just humans who've been exposed to this stuff called Terrigan Mist which gives them basically the same abilities mutants have. And they are NOT licensed to 20th Century Fox. And we're meeting them right now too. Remember this scene from Marvel's Agents of SHIELD second season episode aptly titled 'What They Become':

That's the same Skye we met in the first season but now she has powers thanks to that mist.  She has since ran across more Inhumans, all with various powers. Bottom line is right now is a great time for Inhumans but it isn't a good time to be a mutant in Marvel Comics and it'll probably be like this until Marvel gets those movie rights back...

 If Marvel being willing to cancel one of their most popular and longest running books, as well as kill off one of their most popular characters, and are now trying to push these Inhumans as their next big thing, aren't all connected to who currently owns which movie rights, then I have no idea what's going on. Marvel's comics are all gearing up for this year's company wide story arch 'Secret Wars' as we speak. The biggest news that I've heard about this upcoming event so far are of Spider Man's One More Day storyline getting amended (FINALLY!!) and of the X Men being sent to a whole new world of their own, which Marvel is backtracking on as we speak.


Whatever, Marvel. As long as they continue to tell great stories, both in comics and in film, us fans won't care one bit. Wait, yes we do. You'll see how much we care in my next post, which just wrote itself since I'm sure you don't know what One More Day is or how ridiculous it is or even how it's a huge slap in the face to most Spider Man fans.

BRB. I promise.

Smokkee Singleton