So Iceman is Gay Now

Mazinger-Z

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http://www.cnn.com/2015/04/21/entertainment/ice-man-gay-feat-xmen/


So context: All New X-Men features a past version of the original X-Men (Angel, Beast, Cyclops, Iceman and Jean Grey). Theoretically so they could have Jean Grey stories without resurrecting her back for the fifth time or something. As far as I've been able to understand it (I'm not sure if it's been retconned), these are not alternate timeline X-Men. They've done the "if your past self dies, you will fade away" Back to the Future thing to affirm this.

In the comic, Jean outs Bobby, probably from mind-reading.

Implications: This implies that present Iceman is also gay and handwaving this revelation away with the fact that Iceman has failed relationships with women (never mind the fact that this pretty much describes every unmarried character in comics).

Further implications: Marvel's pulled this sort of thing before. See Spider-Man's The Clone Saga of the 1990s. A minor story from the 70s/80s in which a clone of Spider-Man is made and dies. Cut to the 90s and that clone never actually died, but left because he thought he was the clone. The reveal is that he's actually the original and that the Peter Parker of the 70s/80s and 90s is the clone. So now Peter will retire and the real Peter will take the stage.

This Peter everyone's been reading has, since that story in ths 70s/80s, gotten married to Mary Jane, been in several powerful stories such as Kraven's Last Hunt and that storyline where his parents came back (robots!) He's now about to have his first kid. And now he's not really Spider-Man.

The fans were not happy with that revelation at all. It came across as a slap in the face to everyone who'd been following Spider-Man for decades, that these stories weren't about the real Peter Parker.

Similarly, The Crossing, an Avengers/Iron Man storyline featuring the revelation that Tony Stark had been manipulated by time traveler Kang the Conquerer over the decades as well, mind controlled into being his cat's paw and a traitor for years. Ultimately, Stark was killed and replaced with a time-displaced younger self. Again, not a moment fans of the character really enjoyed. All retconned by the Onslaught/Heroes Reborn thing.

This situation is very similar, in that it takes a character everyone's loved and suddenly throws decades of character development on its head for no really justifiable reason.
 

Thaluikhain

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Well, retcons are like that. OTOH, isn't the reveal that he was in the closet the whole time? That's not really a retcon, is it? It changes lots of things, but doesn't necessarily contradict established - look at her arms! What is she doing there? Did they get frozen in time for a few panels?
 

Fox12

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No, it's okay. He stopped being gay. Because it's harder to be gay then a mutant, and apparently you can only be one.
 

Silentpony_v1legacy

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Wait, aren't they all gay? Isn't that the whole point of X-Men? Being a mutant is a metaphor for being gay.
So how is this news?
 

Saetha

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Yeah I don't see how this matters.

Rectons happen all the time. And a lot of people mix up "gay" with "bisexual" (Or use "gay" in reference to someone who's bisexual) so this isn't even necessarily contradicting his relationships with women.
 

Spanglish Guy

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That's nice for him. Personally I don't really mind this sort of retcon, he can still be the same character only he happens to be gay.
 

Thaluikhain

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Silentpony said:
Wait, aren't they all gay? Isn't that the whole point of X-Men? Being a mutant is a metaphor for being gay.
So how is this news?
Ah, but back in the day, they had to keep it metaphorical because they'd never get away with being open. Nowdays they could if they wanted, but [small]mumble mumble mumble[/small]

Actually, though, I thought that it was just about being gay, but apparently it was also about black rights.
 

Zontar

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Silentpony said:
Wait, aren't they all gay? Isn't that the whole point of X-Men? Being a mutant is a metaphor for being gay.
So how is this news?
thaluikhain said:
Ah, but back in the day, they had to keep it metaphorical because they'd never get away with being open. Nowdays they could if they wanted, but [small]mumble mumble mumble[/small]

Actually, though, I thought that it was just about being gay, but apparently it was also about black rights.
Actually it's in the movies that the Mutants are a metaphor for being gay, in the comics they're a metaphor for being minorities. But of which hold the unfortunate implication that being fearful of gays and minorities is justified given how dangerous mutants are in those two settings.

OT: So I knew about this and the lazy writing that shouldn't have even gone through the head of someone who is working at a place like Marvel, let alone it somehow got through the editing process, but how the hell did they end up being so lazy about it that 6 of the 8 panels on the page are the same of two images just with different text bubbles with nothing of substance to them (assuming there was a text bubble at all)?

My god, can you get any lazier without reverting to black and white?
 

Thaluikhain

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Zontar said:
But of which hold the unfortunate implication that being fearful of gays and minorities is justified given how dangerous mutants are in those two settings.
Oh, definitely. True Blood was even worse at this. All the vampires, which are the stand in for gay people, are being hunted due to being evil monsters the world would be better off without. Not just dangerous, but without any exception that I recall, evil. Though the author seems to think that sexy makes up for evil or somesuch.
 

Silvanus

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Zontar said:
how the hell did they end up being so lazy about it that 6 of the 8 panels on the page are the same of two images just with different text bubbles with nothing of substance to them (assuming there was a text bubble at all)?
Heh, I've got a few comics that pull that. Makes me roll my eyes when I notice it. Kevin Smith's Cacophony did it pretty badly.

OT: Fine with me; changing stuff is what comics do. If this means he's been in the closet, let's hope they do a genuinely interesting exploration of what that means and what denial can be like, rather than hand-waving the issue.
 

White Lightning

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Wait a second, can't she control peoples mind? What if he's not gay, and she's trying to make him gay? I don't know what to believe anymore...
 

Redd the Sock

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Zontar said:
Silentpony said:
Wait, aren't they all gay? Isn't that the whole point of X-Men? Being a mutant is a metaphor for being gay.
So how is this news?
thaluikhain said:
Ah, but back in the day, they had to keep it metaphorical because they'd never get away with being open. Nowdays they could if they wanted, but [small]mumble mumble mumble[/small]

Actually, though, I thought that it was just about being gay, but apparently it was also about black rights.
Actually it's in the movies that the Mutants are a metaphor for being gay, in the comics they're a metaphor for being minorities. But of which hold the unfortunate implication that being fearful of gays and minorities is justified given how dangerous mutants are in those two settings.
Actually, mutants were devised as lazy writing as Stan Lee was finding it difficult to come up with new ways to create super powered people, hence, they could now just be born with developing powers and leave it at that. The book was originally very much the standard "good vs evil" comic in which you could call Magneto's side the brotherhood of evil mutants without any irony in it. The social commentary and allegory developed over time and has been handled better at some points than others.

OT said it yesterday: bad idea. badly done. use one of the few dozen of gay characters that already exist or at least out a character without 50 years of history to muck with. Dear god, are comic writers taking writing tips from fanfiction now?
 

Zontar

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Silvanus said:
Zontar said:
how the hell did they end up being so lazy about it that 6 of the 8 panels on the page are the same of two images just with different text bubbles with nothing of substance to them (assuming there was a text bubble at all)?
Heh, I've got a few comics that pull that. Makes me roll my eyes when I notice it. Kevin Smith's Cacophony did it pretty badly.

OT: Fine with me; changing stuff is what comics do. If this means he's been in the closet, let's hope they do a genuinely interesting exploration of what that means and what denial can be like, rather than hand-waving the issue.
How Kevin Smith got anywhere beyond his cheap indie movies I will never understand.

Though as for Iceman himself, I doubt they will do anything with this other then have it be a gimmick to sell comics that will be forgotten within a year or two, or outright reverse. This is the young Iceman after all, and the older version of him, who is out there in the same world (because comics) is straight and has had a long list of relationships which seemed to be exactly what he was trying to achieve. Sure they didn't work out, but if every person who had a failed relationship or two was actually gay then that would be most of everybody on Earth.
 

Zontar

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Redd the Sock said:
OT said it yesterday: bad idea. badly done. use one of the few dozen of gay characters that already exist or at least out a character without 50 years of history to muck with. Dear god, are comic writers taking writing tips from fanfiction now?
I think Joe Quesada set a strong precedent for comic books today to be purely the thing of fanfiction of the readers of yesteryear who managed to get into the industry.
 

SweetShark

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Silentpony said:
Wait, aren't they all gay? Isn't that the whole point of X-Men? Being a mutant is a metaphor for being gay.
So how is this news?
With this logic, the Iceman become a normal horny boy for girls and big bad booty!!!
Because is COOL to be like IIICEEEZ!!!!!
 

Zontar

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Johnny Novgorod said:
I kinda expected the discussion would be about this Iceman.

We don't need confirmation on that one, it's already a known fact.
 

PsychicTaco115

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So Iceman is... flaming?

Yeh I used that joke before but I like it, big whoop wanna fite IRL about it?

But yeah, comic books go to really drastic measures in order to keep a status quo

I wonder how long it'll be before they change his/others sexuality again?
 

Tono Makt

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tl;dr : This too shall pass (probably).



It's Comic Books. There is a damn good chance that this might end up being something like a Future Warrior (see: Cable, Rachael Summers, etc.) who used his/her/its mutant powers to reach back across time and turn Robert Drake homosexual to ensure that Robert Drake did not marry (insert female character here) and the two of them create a new Apocalypse-type character, and that the reason that this happened to Bobby "now" (ie: 2015) is that this was the time in history when America and much of the world was accepting of Homosexuality, where he wouldn't be forced to stay in the closet or to marry a woman (like... insert that female character's name here) just to make the world think he's not gay.

But really, he's still straight (well, maybe Bi...) and it was all mind control. For the best of reasons! I mean, much as many would like to go back in time and murder Hitler, wouldn't it just be a bit nicer if they could make sure that Daddy Hitler and Mommy Hitler just didn't meet in the first place, so no Baby Adolph to become the most evil person in the world? Killing them is sort of unfair to them - they were probably very nice parents, who did all they could to ensure their son could grow up to be a good person. So why punish them? Etc. Whatever the new writer wants, when the new writer wants to take over the character. Or the new editor, or the new person who has the power to mandate this sort of change to a character and/or authorize it.

If this does stay as a permanent part of the character, I'm somewhat okay with it. I'm not a fan of Iceman one way or another, and him turning out to be gay isn't an issue for me. But jeez, twitter-folks (as this thread is pretty tame so far compared to some of the stuff on Twitter) - its a comic book. How many times has Jean Grey died? How many different backstories has Wolverine had? Who exactly is the father of Scarlet Witch and Quicksilver? Etc.