Fanfic: Marvel Woman in "Unlock the Doors" Part 1

NOTE: This story does not take place in Marvel Earth-616 continuity. Let's call this Marvel Earth-7619.

Okay, what's going on here?

All of a sudden I'm fourteen years old again, inside the Central City penthouse belonging to Mr. Simon Williams and Mrs. Wanda Maximoff-Williams (a.k.a. Wonder Man and the Scarlet Witch), baby-sitting their three-year-old daughter, sitting on a very tiny, very uncomfortable chair, playing tea party. I wasn't into tea parties when I was little, so I'm not into it, but I'm trying my best to please the little one, who is adorable and sweet and whose parents are obviously raising her right.

She holds up a plastic tray filled with little plastic cakes. "Another cake?" she asks.

"No, thank you," I reply, "I'm stuffed."

I take a pretend sip of my imaginary tea from a tiny empty cup, and smile. "You put on the best tea parties, Maggie."

"That's MAGDALENE!"

The icily regal voice behind me is unmistakably that of the just-returned Mrs. Maximoff-Williams. I'm shocked and embarassed. I turn around. "I'm so sorry, Mrs. M-m-Maxi-moff-Wil-liams. I promise I won't make that mistake again."

She responds promptly and crisply. "See that you don't."

Suddenly, the room empties of all other people and all furniture. The room starts spinning as I recall how mortified I was at my faux pas, and suddenly a voice that sounds like my own double-tracked with the voice of someone with an unplaceable accent begins talking to me, and my head feels like it's full of cement.

"That's why your application for probational membership in the Avenging All-Stars was turned down. You gauche little fool."

"No, no," I yell, "it was just a little thing."

"And then you decided you'd show them by starting and leading your own team with your friends, the Young Warriors...and all of them but you died during the alien invasion. You failed them. You're a FAILURE!"

Before I can respond, a pair of decomposing hands tears through the wall and zombies stumble in. I scream in horror, then scream louder when I recognize who they are: the other Young Warriors! Namorita, Speedball, Red Raven, Blizzard, and Firestar. All present, all dead, all coming for me.

"NO! PLEASE! DON'T HURT ME! IT WASN'T MY FAULT!"

I cower in a corner, curled up into a ball. Then they disappear. But no sooner is one threat gone than other appears. Suddenly basketballs, soccer balls, volleyballs, and softballs begin dropping out of nowhere until I can't dodge them anymore and I'm all but drowning in them. Then the balls sprout arms, legs, bloodshot eyes, and mouths with sharp teeth. Above my head, a pink cloud appears through which I see all things sugar and spice: dresses, unicorns, dolls, tea sets...

Then the voice returns.

"You never really learned to be a girl, did you? You were too busy trying to be the son that your parents wanted. You tried so hard to please them. But it didn't keep them from getting divorced, now did it? You've never succeeded at relationships, you don't have children -- you're a failure as a superheroine, a friend, a daughter, a woman. You're a WORTHLESS FAILURE!!"

Now I feel like I'm drowning in the ocean. There's no top, bottom, or sides to anything. Just water. Dirty, disgusting, polluted water. I'm drowning, I'm about to surrender my will to live...

When, suddenly, I find the strength inside me to go on and fight back. My words are defiant and proud. "I'm not a kid anymore. I'm not a failure. I'M MARVEL WOMAN!"

I break the bonds that have been holding me and rip off the needles and tubes that have been injecting chemicals into my brain. I open my eyes. I'm back in the real world.

I'm in a high-tech laboratory.

I see the people responsible for my ordeal: a raven-haired woman in her forties, and a girl of about twenty who looks like the woman, except with green hair.

I frown and grit my teeth as I issue my ultimatum. "You have three seconds to tell me what's going on here before I bring this whole place down on your heads."

TO BE CONTINUED

Comic Books: Out With the Old, In With the New

I'm dropping several comics.

I'm dropping Captain America for reasons listed in my previous post.

I'm dropping X-Factor because this month's issue was the make-or-break issue for me. It doesn't look like it's going to return to the quality of the first 24 issues any time soon. In fact, I have a feeling Peter David will be leaving the book before long.

I'm dropping Eternals because it's been a tremendous disappointment, especially the art by Daniel Acuna, who is capable of so much better. There was promise at first that Sersi would be positively portrayed for the first time since she was an Avenger, but it didn't happen.

I'm dropping Captain Britain and MI 13 because, while it's well-done, I still can't get myself to care about anyone or anything in the book.

I'm dropping Ms. Marvel because the stories are dumb and because artist Adriana Melo can't seem to handle a monthly schedule.

On the other side of the coin, I'm cautiously going to start following Thunderbolts when Andy Diggle takes over the writing next month. The 2004 Adam Strange mini was brilliant, and The Losers was one of the few Vertigo books I've ever liked. If Thunderbolts gets good enough, I'll add it to my list.

Once they're on the schedule, I'll definitely be adding a couple books:

*The second Justice League book with Hal & Ollie and with James Robinson writing. I've wanted a Hal & Ollie League since forever (I wish Black Canary could be there too instead of in the flagship Justice League book) and my increasing appreciation of Robinson's Starman (it only took 15 years) makes me more excited about this book than ever.

*Power Girl's solo book, although Gray & Palmiotti have yet to live up to their reputation for me; it'll be great to have Amanda Conner on a monthly book, though.

Comic Book of the Week: Captain America #42

This issue of Captain America is, just like the previous 41 issues, a well-written, well-drawn, expertly crafted superhero comic, and it seamlessly ties up all the plot threads from the past three-and-a-half years.

So why am I dropping the book?

Blame Civil War and the subsequent death of the original Captain America, Steve Rogers.

Civil War, of course, turned the Marvel Universe into a fascist state and committed character assassinations on Tony Stark and Reed Richards. But the damage to Captain America, the character and the book, was more insidious. Civil War ended with the poorly motivated surrender-to-the-authorities of the anti-fascism Captain America. Immediately afterward, in Captain America #25, Captain America was publicly gunned down; the shooter was eventually revealed to be one of his closest allies (in more ways than one), Sharon Carter, who was being mind-controlled by a cabal of villains headed by Captain America's arch-nemesis, the Red Skull. Over the next year-and-a-half, James Barnes a.k.a. Cap's WWII sidekick, Bucky, and latterly the vicious Winter Soldier, became the new Captain America, complete with a gun! A harsher Cap for harsher times, we were told by Marvel's spin-doctors. I don't buy it -- I think Cap should be a shining symbol of the less-harsh options, ESPECIALLY in harsher times. Meanwhile, Sharon Carter was revealed to be pregnant with Steve Rogers' child, leading to further victimization by the villains and a miscarriage. Ugly stuff, no matter how well-crafted.

Now, understand, I had no problem with the basic concept of Steve Rogers being replaced. Back in the mid-90s, the late writer Mark Gruenwald wrapped up his long run on Captain America with an interminable story about Cap slowly dying. At the time, I was hoping that Cap might be replaced by Rachel Leighton, a.k.a. Diamondback, a reformed costumed villainess who, in an eerie parallel with Sharon Carter's future fate, became Cap's lover and was victimized by the forces of evil. I knew it was a long shot because the majority of the audience for superheroes is male; even today, with more fangirls and female creators than ever before, the audience is still mostly male. So, in the end, Cap survived, Mark Waid took over the writing and wrote out all of Gruenwald's supporting cast, and brought Sharon Carter back from the dead (she had first appeared in the 60s, before being killed off in the 70s.) Fast forward to 2004 and, after many, many, many false starts, Cap's book was relaunched with Ed Brubaker writing and the great Steve Epting (Avengers, Aquaman, Crux, El Cazador) drawing. I came in with issue #18 and caught up with the previous ones thorough trades. It was great stuff: Brubaker was doing Cap stories that were up there with those of Roger Stern, Steve Englehart, and his personal favorite, Jim Steranko. And Epting was Epting, one of the modern masters of sequential art. Little did I know that Civil War and its repercussions were just around the corner. While I don't consider myself a fan of Sharon Carter, I actually held out hope for a few issues that she, and not James Barnes, would become the next Captain America. But it wasn't to be. In one of the most anti-climactic passing-of-the-torches, Barnes inherited the Cap identity, and Carter was reduced to vengeful victim, with the implication that the "vengeful" part made it okay -- and it doesn't.

I kept buying the book mostly for Epting. But the recent announcement that, after #42, Epting would begin alternating story arcs with Luke Ross, provided me with a welcome excuse to drop the book.

Let's face it: in pop culture, sometimes good craftsmanship just isn't enough.

R.I.P. Paul Newman

Another icon of the cinema has left us, after a long battle with cancer.

My favorite movie of his was The Sting. His character in it was so wonderfully wily.

Little known fact: comic book artist Gil Kane "cast" Newman as Green Lantern Hal Jordan, one of my favorite superheroes.

He will be remembered not only for his performances, but also for his charitable work and for proving that showbiz marriages can last.

My condolences to his widow, Joanne Woodward, another fine performer, and to the rest of his family and friends.

Fringe: New J.J. Abrams show

I missed the first two episodes, because I'm completely out of the loop for the new TV season. Thank goodness for Wikipedia (now where's my money, Wikipedia?) Saw the third episode last night. Not bad, but not great either. The show's about an eccentric research scientist (John Noble), his grown son (Joshua Jackson), and an FBI agent (Anna Torv) trying to blow open a conspiracy that appears to be funded by a mega-corporation. Noble is an excellent mixture of endearingly childlike and creepily sociopathic, but Torv is wooden and Jackson (looking five times as old as he did in his Dawson's Creek days) is incredibly annoying. But there's real potential here. The first thing they need to do is kill off Jackson's character as a sweeps stunt.

Delta Goodrem and Silverhawks

No connection, they're what's on my mind and I thought they'd look funny together in the same phrase.

Seriously, though, Delta Goodrem's "In This Life" is a great syrupy guilty pleasure of a pop song (and thankfully free of pseudo-punk and/or pseudo-hip-hop posturing). And the first set of Silverhawks DVDs is due in only three weeks.

Judge Anderson: Shamballa TPB

If you like comic books, you must buy this trade paperback. It collects the best of the Judge Anderson stories by the definitive Judge Anderson creative team of writer Alan Grant (L.E.G.I.O.N., Batman) and artist Arthur Ranson. By turns spectacular, thoughful, dark, and witty, this is a prime showcase for the talents of the always underrated Alan Grant. Judge Anderson started out as a fairly one-dimensional action heroine, but Grant made her three-dimensional, worthy of standing next to his great L.E.G.I.O.N. heroines Stealth, Strata, and Lyrissa & Lydea Mallor. Grant's Judge Anderson is intelligent sequential sci-fi at its finest.