Path: senator-bedfellow.mit.edu!dreaderd!not-for-mail Message-ID: Supersedes: Expires: 27 Feb 2003 09:36:17 GMT References: X-Last-Updated: 2002/11/30 From: racmx@yahoo.com (Kate the Short) Newsgroups: rec.arts.comics.marvel.xbooks,rec.arts.comics.info,rec.answers,news.answers Subject: rec.arts.comics.marvel.xbooks FAQ: 7/7 Organization: Keepers of Frequently Asked Questions, racmx division Approved: news-answers-request@MIT.EDU Followup-To: poster Summary: FAQ for rec.arts.comics.marvel.xbooks--X-Men comic books Originator: faqserv@penguin-lust.MIT.EDU Date: 14 Jan 2003 09:38:49 GMT Lines: 811 NNTP-Posting-Host: penguin-lust.mit.edu X-Trace: 1042537129 senator-bedfellow.mit.edu 3929 18.181.0.29 Xref: senator-bedfellow.mit.edu rec.arts.comics.marvel.xbooks:281096 rec.arts.comics.info:9979 rec.answers:78097 news.answers:244630 Archive-name: comics/xbooks/main-faq/part7 Posting-frequency: monthly URL: http://www.enteract.com/~katew/faqs/ -= REC.ARTS.COMICS.MARVEL.XBOOKS =- Frequently Asked Questions Part 7 Version 2002.04, last updated December 2002 URL: http://www.enteract.com/~katew/faqs/racmxFAQ/faq7.html ------------------------------ Subject: Table of Contents Part 7: COMICS INDUSTRY QUESTIONS * Why did Chris Claremont leave the X-titles? Why did Peter David leave X-Factor? * Are any Marvel staff reading racmx? * What's a dangler? Is it related to a six month gap? * What's a Claremontism? RACMX NEWSGROUP QUESTIONS * Can you explain Paul O'Brien's review grading system? * Why do all those annoying dinos keep on complaining about the X-titles here? If they don't like the books, why do they read them? * What is this Kid Dynamo thing? Where can I find it? * Where can I get scans of comic art? Why doesn't anybody post pictures on the newsgroup? X-MEN OTHER-MEDIA QUESTIONS * How is _X-Men: The Movie_ different from the comics? * What cameos are there in _X-Men: The Movie_? * What other movies or cartoons are there? OTHER RACMXERS WHO MAY BE OF ASSISTANCE HISTORY OF THIS FAQ CREDITS (+) ------------------------------ Subject: COMICS INDUSTRY QUESTIONS Please note: Background information on the creators and the X-titles editorial offices is based on over a decade's worth of interviews, articles, and personal questions, and as such is not directly attributed here. Now that some of Marvel's staff members are on Usenet, they are welcomed to correct and amend any of the answers listed below. --- Why did Chris Claremont leave the X-titles? Why did Peter David leave X-Factor? For this question, the FAQ-keeper is going to try and be as objective as possible, which is tough on a question in which all information has so far come in from interviews in fan press. However, this is definitely a FAQ, and deserves being treated in this FAQ. Here's hoping for objectivity. Chris Claremont left the books he had worked on for almost half his life because of one person, the X-titles group editor, Bob Harras. Claremont had often stressed in interviews how important having an editor who worked well with him on the stories was, and was thankful that all the editors he had had (this was during Nocenti's reign) had been wonderful and talented. Obviously, something went wrong as Harras took over, although the eventual cause was due to problems on both sides. The problems have been revealed in a few interviews. Harras is in a bit of a hot seat in the very competitive, corporate atmosphere of Marvel. One slip of the titles, and he has to explain himself to his superiors. He's therefore always interested in keeping the books popular and selling well, a sensible attitude for any editor. Something that obviously caught his eye was the huge upswelling of fan support for artists of the "Image" type (although they weren't called that back then, since Image hadn't been created yet). Rob Liefeld, Jim Lee, Todd McFarlane, Marc Silvestri, and Whilce Portacio were at the forefront of a style in comics that was very popular at the time. So popular that when McFarlane requested a title to try out his burgeoning desire to write his own stories on, he got one starring the Marvel flagship character, Spider-Man. The Marvel Offices were so impressed with the sales figures coming from these artists that they were willing to do almost anything to keep them. One thing they weren't, though, was to give up some of the money they were making out of selling licensed materials (t-shirts, pins, posters, etc.) done by those artists. For these as well as other reasons, the above artists and a few more fled Marvel in what has come to be called the X-Odus, since so many of them worked on mutant titles at the time. They went and founded Image. For more information, you should ask at rac.misc. How this relates to Claremont leaving, as well as his good friend and fellow X-writer Louise Simonson, is as follows: maybe on his own, perhaps because of pressure from the offices above him, Harras was extremely protective of the Image artists on his titles. Somebody, somewhere, was convinced that they were why the titles were selling, and wanted them made as comfortable as possible. The trouble with the Image artists on monthly books, like the X-Men, has been shown: they're all terribly slow, and usually were late. This annoyed Claremont, who was accustomed to working with workhorses like John Byrne and Dave Cockrum. Also, as the Image team started recognizing how much strength they had at Marvel, they started asking for more power. Jim Lee, Claremont's penciler at the time on UXM, in particular wanted more say in how the plot went. Claremont, usually more than happy to co-plot with his artists, didn't like the fact that Lee's idea of co-plotting was that he drew the issue any way he felt like, and then shipped it off to Claremont, usually just under deadline, for him to fill in the dialogue balloons with no say in what would appear in the issue. While the usual practice at Marvel is to have the art made before the dialogue is written (it's a practice that started back when Stan Lee was writing every Marvel book in the 60s, and it's even called the "Marvel Style" comics-writing), usually co-plotting involves the writer and the artist deciding what will be in the issue together. When Claremont complained about this, and the usual tardiness of Lee, to Harras, he was told that his opinions were recognized, and things were being worked on. However, nothing apparently was ever done. Indeed, Harras gave Lee complete plot veto on any new plot lines (it should be noted that Lee did not request anything like that from Harras). This meant that Lee had all effective plotting power on the X-Men title, since he could, if he felt like it, deny Claremont any plot that he didn't like. All of this might seem a bit rude, and possibly Claremont felt that after giving twenty years of his life to this one title, he was entitled to a bit of info as to what, exactly, the editor of that book wanted from his writer. Apparently Harras either never answered, or else didn't answer to Claremont's satisfaction, so after issue #3 of the new X-Men book, Chris Claremont left the X-titles. A sign of the atmosphere he left in was that his departure wasn't even mentioned in the letter columns of the books he had written for sixteen years. Louise Simonson, who had much the same experiences happen to her, left at about the same time. To be frank, Claremont's scripting, plotting, and dialogue had been slipping in his final years, and a sabbatical would certainly have been helpful even in more calm circumstances. With the departure of what was once the most dependable writing corps in the history of major comics, Harras was now free to fill the titles with writers who wouldn't complain so much about the artists who wanted to run the titles a bit more indepth. The first person he got, though, perhaps in an attempt to reclaim some of the "Big Name" marquee value he lost when Claremont left, was old X-Men penciller and co-plotter John Byrne. Byrne, however, was not going to even be given the illusionary title of "writer"; he was just there to script Jim Lee's X-Men plots, and Whilce Portacio's plots for Uncanny X-Men. Byrne lasted only five issues on Uncanny (#281-285), and only two on the new X-Men (#4-5). According to Byrne, he encountered the same troubles as Claremont as scripter of the books. Lee and Portacio were consistently late. Pages were faxed to Byrne hours before deadline for him to dialogue as they came in, often without knowing how the book was going to end because the plotter/artists hadn't bothered informing him. Byrne complained to Harras. Byrne pointed out that in any other DC or Marvel comic, the writers usually got three months to work on one issue (most are done far before then, but that's the usual margin of safety). He didn't mind working a few extra nights and burning the midnight oil, because he liked the X-Men, but all he asked for was at least one month to actually think about the issue. Harras thanked him for his comments, and said he would work on it. No further pages were ever faxed to Byrne for him to script. Having now annnoyed most of the major X-writers of the past to the point that they wouldn't work with him, Harras ended up with Scott Lobdell (a stand-up comedian and comics writer Harras offered the job to at a party) and Fabian Nicieza (one of Marvel's editors) as his main writers on the X-titles. All was looking good until the X-Odus occurred, and suddenly Harras didn't have all the Big Name Artists that had to be so carefully protected. The chances of Harras getting back Claremont and Byrne to write now that the artists who were partially to blame for driving them away were gone was rather slim, so there was an obvious period of scrambling at the X-offices to get creative teams to cover the books. With Claremont gone, the brightest bit of writing in the X-titles had to be Peter David, the new writer on the "new" X-Factor. Easily mixing his standard blend of top-notch humor with good characterization, David was impressing people with how interesting a bunch of once second-rate mutant characters could be. Not even this relationship was a smooth one, however, because David quickly became annoyed by another mainstay of the mutant titles: the crossover. David didn't like the fact that the mutant titles invariably crossovered once a year, often for three or so issues. He also didn't like how he was always given fill-in artists because artist Joe Quesada was never on time with his art (a common complaint apparently). He felt that it was an insult to the reader to have to make do with shoddy art that was rushed out because the regular penciler couldn't be bothered to get his art out on time. Meanwhile, he expressed disgust that the X-Office didn't even want him continuing his main plot during the crossovers. He had to fight and complain just to get one page per issue in of his normal, supposedly ongoing, plot in his own book. Why? The editors said that it was simpler if there was no ongoing plot in the crossovers, because then it would be easier to collect the whole thing in a trade paperback for future resale value without having to edit out those annoying exterior plotlines. David's other complaints (which were listed for the net.community in a resignation-style letter) included the mangled rescripting of a plot device that originally was supposed to detect whether a woman's fetus was a mutant or not (thus possibly opening the option of an abortion), as well as demands about what characters he was supposed to feature in a given issue. A message posted by David to an AOL folder in March 2000 sums it up: Two reasons: I was having to backburner my ongoing storylines every three issues or so to accommodate crossovers (giving it a very dis-jointed feel) and the editors were "taking over" the book in that they were dictating storylines and developments that I felt were going to be damaging (ex: Insert Random as a member of the team and kill off the Multiple Man.) Also they were changing my dialogue unilaterally after I'd turned it in without telling me. So I walked. With that being what he had to live with, David resigned from X-Factor. The usual bunch of scrambling, fill-in teams rushed to fill his and Quesada's shoes (Quesada, like most of the "hot" artists, apparently couldn't be bothered to keep to a monthly standard). As a final note, it's unsure just how much ill-will there still is over the X-Odus fallout. Claremont and Lee, for instance, apparently like each other enough that Claremont wrote three issues of Lee's WildC.A.T.S. comic (hardly a major sign of dislike). Chris Claremont returned to Marvel a few years ago, albeit in a different capacity. He was a Vice-President position at Marvel, in charge of story development across the Marvel titles, and his writing tasks included Fantastic Four and a six-issue run of Wolverine. Evidently Claremont had enough fun on the titles that he decided to come back--the Revolution of the X-titles saw Claremont return as scripter and plotter of the core titles just shy of 100 issues after his departure. Unfortunately, Claremont only lasted twenty issues--ten on each title. He wrote X-Men #100-109, and UXM #381-389. Claremont's second run often emphasized the problem he faced with his run on Fantastic Four: Chris is a fantastic writer once he's gotten steam built up, but he's a writer who needs time to think before putting pencil to page. Given the sudden shift over to full-time writer of the titles (while he was writing the FF), he didn't have time to work out all of the plot dynamics until he was about to leave the main titles. While some of the plots were quite interesting, others left a lot to be desired. The Neo characters were very flatly characterized, the plot with Shadowcat was left on a back burner when the editors wanted the plots to speed up and go in another direction, and the six-month gap meant that characters were neither familiar to the fans coming to the books from the wildly popular X-Men movie, nor to the fans who had been reading through the years. Claremont wasn't fired from the core titles. However, when new Editor- in-Chief Joe Quesada started restructuring the X-Books a year after Claremont's return, he gave Claremont a choice: share the core book writing with one other writer, or move to a single new title that would be separate from the core titles. Claremont opted for the latter. --- Are any Marvel staff reading racmx? Some are. Most come and then go again, though. Some do so because they're no longer involved with the X-Titles, others because they can't keep up with the sheer volume of discussion, and others because they just aren't that interested. Over the past few years, the newsgroup has been visited by the likes of Chris Claremont, Peter David, Keith R. A. DeCandido, Warren Ellis, Jay Faerber, Steven Grant, Larry Hama, Joseph Harris, Rob Liefeld, Scott Lobdell, Fabian Nicieza, Brandon Peterson, Joe Pruett, Ben Raab, Tom Raney, Steven Seagle, Gail Simone, Louise "Weezie" Simonson, Walter Simonson, Robert Weinberg, Anthony Williams, Brian C. Wood, Ethan Van Sciver, and J. Steven York. If you wander over to our sister group, rac.misc, you'll also see Kurt Busiek, Tony Isabella, and Christopher Priest. Still others have participated with rac.* regulars on mailing lists or message boards. Some are/were regular contributors, while others posted a single response and never returned. All this means, of course, that posters on racmx should maybe think twice before posting up personal attacks on the creative staff of the X- titles, since, unlike for a long period of Usenet history, they're finally around and a lot of racmxers would like them to continue to contribute to the group. Not insulting people in general is a good policy to aim for, of course. Not threatening them, however, is something that needs to be underscored. Many fans tend to get angry at a creator's treatment of their favorite characters, and may occasionally post (in jest) threats of violence on the newsgroup, i.e.: "Such-and-such writer should be drawn, quartered, and hung for doing this to Wolverine, and if I ever find out where he lives I'll likely do it myself." This is Not Cool. Please don't do it. --- What's a dangler? Is it related to a six month gap? Danglers are the racmx term for juicy bits of storyline that are raised in the comics, and then... never show up again. For example, if Storm receives a mysterious package, and a big deal is made of what might be in the package, and then the package and its contents never show up again, that's a dangler. Danglers happen for a few reasons. Sometimes, a writer is juggling so many plots that he or she neglects to pay attention to one of them. By the time the writer remembers the plot point, it's probably no longer interesting to the readers, so the dangling plot thread is just left to dangle, instead of properly being tied off. In other instances, the editorial staff creates danglers. Sometimes a writer really wants to finish a storyline, but the editors realize that the storyline is dragging and the readers are losing interest. In that case, the plot threads are just dropped while the writer needs to work on new plotlines. A great example of this is the X-Men Revolution arc that Chris Claremont was writing. He had every intention of telling readers what happened to Kitty Pryde after she disappeared, but the editors asked him to take the plotlines in a different direction, so readers will never know where Kitty actually ended up between the space station and college. A change in writers is often accompanied by a healthy amount of danging plotlines. Obviously, new writers have ideas about what they want the X-Men to do, so they usually don't bother to tie up the plot threads that a former writer can't finish before leaving the book. Finally, there's the six month gap. This editorial device has been used a few times by Marvel staff to give new writers a "clean slate" after ending a major storyline or before beginning a new direction for the line of titles. Such a gap was used after the Age of Apocalypse. Rogue had absorbed Gambit's powers just before AOA, but now it was supposedly a few months after everything returned to normal, and the characters had moved away or hit the road to deal with various problems. We never really saw what happened in-between the end of AOA and the beginning of Rogue-on-the-Run; we just knew that Iceman had taken after her. As a second example, the X-Men "Revolution" concept at the time the X-Men movie was released was designed to return Chris Claremont to the team books, as well as letting other writers take over struggling titles. To allow the writers to bring in their own ideas, the first issue of a new writer's plot would feature the teams and characters as if six months had passed. Often, plotlines dangling before the gap were left dangling, and new twists that supposedly occurred "during" the six month gap would sometimes become danglers as well, if the writers didn't get to explain the plot before editors requested rewrites or assigned a new writer to the book. The power switch between Psylocke and Phoenix is one example. Is there a solution to danglers? Probably not. Writing to request an explanation of a dangler might remind the editors that a juicy plot device is available for writers to use, but most of the time the books will take whatever shape the current writers and editors want. --- What's a Claremontism? Most writers who have written many stories have developed a certain cadence and language in their writing style. Chris Claremont is very well known within comics circles for his trademark phrases, which are called "Claremontisms" by the fans. As with all trademark phrases, some beome tired cliches after a while, but others remain fond memories of past stories and characters. Do you recognize any of these Claremontisms? * Ah'm nigh invulnerable when Ah'm blastin'. * Back off, bub. We take care of our own. * Bub * Bunky * By the white wolf! * Comes with the uniform. * Cripes! * Da, Tovarisch! * Flamin' muties! * Flamin' _____! * Goddess! * Heart's Desire * Hidey-hole * I am _____! * I love you. And I, you. * I possess you, body and soul! * I'm the best there is at what I do. And what I do... isn't very pretty. * It was sweet of you to worry. * It wouldn't be polite to disappoint them! * Me an' mine. * Me and my big mouth. * No quarter asked, none given * Not today, and not by you. * Our own fate, our very lives, they're nothing. * Selfsame * Sugah * Take your best shot! * That fact alone makes them deadly beyond imagination. * The focused totality of her psychic power! * Ungaublich! * We did none harm, yet harm was done to us. * Wolverine! Fastball special! * Yum! ------------------------------ Subject: RACMX NEWSGROUP QUESTIONS These questions pertain more to the newsgroup than to the actual comics. --- Can you explain Paul O'Brien's review grading system? Here it is, in Paul's own words: A+ - unequivocally recommended. A - highly recommended. A- - Could be better, but still recommended. B+ - Worth a look. B - Fine if you like that sort of thing. B- - Passable. C+ - Unsatisfactory, though not actively bad. C - Badly flawed; for fans only. C- - Bad; for completists only. D+ - You'll wish you hadn't bought this book. D - You'll wish you'd never even read this book. D- - The creators wish they'd never even read this book. It should be noted that the review grades vary depending on a number of factors, including Paul's mood when reviewing the title. And no, there is *no* grade of F. The UK grading system generally doesn't use F; work that bad isn't accepted for a grade at all. Paul doesn't, hasn't, and won't grade a book F. Perhaps a book so vile doesn't exist. If it does, Paul certainly wouldn't bother to review it. --- Why do all these annoying dinos keep on complaining about the X-titles here? If they don't like the books, why do they read them? The answer to this is as diverse as the fans it's asked to, and the question usually comes up once every three months or so on the newsgroup. Realizing that this answer is going to be hopelessly generalized, most older X-fans still follow the book because of the loyalty generated by Claremont during his original run. Many of them grew to care about the characters in the book during his run, and out of some sort of perverse curiosity, care deeply when they are mismanaged as they are currently perceived to be. Dropping the book, of course, would send the "message" to Marvel that they no longer agree with the direction the X-titles are heading. On the other hand, a feeling like "If you don't vote, you don't have the right to complain" also comes over some of them. And every small bit of good comics that sneaks through fuels their memories of how much they once loved it, and keeps them around for more. It may be that they're now grown up, and wouldn't have liked the original Claremont stories if they were coming out now. It may be that they're just following them out of curiosity, because a few comic books aren't much to keep up on with a professional paycheck. They may even prefer the stories as they are now. In any case, older X-fans who are still reading the book should be assumed to be getting some form of enjoyment from it, or else they would probably have dropped it long ago. It should also be noted that there is one particular breed of dino, who don't read any of the books, but feel qualified to post on racmx because they were once big X-Men fans, and will happily fill in information on the older comics and the characters that appeared in them to the newer fans. Finally, many of the dino population have good friends who post regularly to racmx, and hang around to share in their virtual community. --- What is this Kid Dynamo thing? Where can I find it? Kid Dynamo is a fan-fiction written by once-netter Connie Hirsch, which deals with the New Mutants in the days just after Magneto took over the School (right after New Mutants #52). A very good story by any standards, most people who have read it have granted it automatic status in official Marvel history, vastly preferring it to the eventual rise of Cable and the appearance of X-Force, or at least delaying that inevitable occurence by including Kid Dynamo. You can find Kid Dynamo on the Fonts of Wisdom Bootleg page. The URL is http://home.att.net/~lubakmetyk/bootleg.htm . The fanfic is very long, by the way; 12 full-size chapters. It takes a while to read. It's worth it. (You can also find it on the http://www.csua.berkeley.edu/~tsang/kd/ or http://ebonbird.tripod.com/kiddynamo.htm sites.) --- Where can I get scans of comic art? Why doesn't anybody post pictures on the newsgroup? Well, besides the fact that it's illegal under copyright law to republish other people's artwork without their permission.... While it's perfectly possible, and commonplace, to post scanned artwork to Usenet, it's not always a nice thing to do. The main reason is that some people like to read their newsgroups using an off-line newsreader, which downloads all the articles (and attached binaries) at once and lets them read the postings without being hooked up to a modem. Obviously, it's an inconvenience for them to have to download several megs of binary graphics images if they aren't looking for them. If you're looking for comic art on Usenet, the newsgroup alt.binaries.pictures.cartoons is the closest thing you're going to find--but be forewarned that X-Men art very rarely, if ever, finds its way onto that particular group. Outside of Usenet, the Where Can I Find It? FAQ has a listing of web pages and ftp sites with digitized comic artwork. ------------------------------ Subject: X-MEN OTHER-MEDIA QUESTIONS NOTE: These questions pertain to the movie and cartoon versions of the X-Men, not to their actual comic-book incarnations. --- How is _X-Men: The Movie_ different from the comics? There are many, many ways that the movie is different from the actual mainstream continuity of the comics. For one, the school has far more mutants in it than the casts of Uncanny, X-Men, Generation X, and the Hellions/New Mutants/X-Force kids combined. The team in _XM:TM_ consists of Cyclops, Jean Grey, and Storm, all led by Xavier. In movie continuity, Cyke and Jean are not yet married (though they share a room in the mansion), and Jean is a doctor. Wolverine and Rogue first meet in Canada, instead of meeting when Rogue runs away from the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants and comes knocking at Xavier's door. A few other things must be noted about Rogue. First of all, in the regular comics Rogue has the powers of flight and invulnerability, which she gained from Ms. Marvel in the classic Avengers Annual #10. She's also had her distinctive white stripe from the get-go. Furthermore, the Rogue of the comics has *never* revealed her real name on-panel, and it's strongly believed that if anyone knows it other than Rogue's original parents, it would be Mystique (Rogue's foster mother) or Destiny (Mystique's long-time companion). The villains and supporting cast also have changed. Toad probably received the most changes to his character, and all are improvements. The Toad of the comics was always an Igor-like hunchback to Magneto, and usually did little more than jump around uttering annoying lines. The Toad of _XM:TM_, however, can climb walls much more efficiently, has a strong tongue that can grasp items, and a rather nasty ooze. --- What cameos are there in _X-Men: The Movie_? Quite a few cameos of (and homages to) familiar characters appear in _XM:TM_. They are: * Bobby: Bobby Drake is Iceman, an American adult who can create ice and snow from the moisture in the air, and travel on created ice- slides. He was a founding member of the X-Men. (He has lines.) * Kitty: Kitty Pryde is Shadowcat, a Jewish-American teenager who can phase through walls and short-ciruit any electronics she passes through. She's currently an X-Man. (She has lines.) * John: St. John Allerdyce is Pyro, an Australian adult villain who can control, but *not* generate, any fire or flame. He was a member of Freedom Force and the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants. (He has lines.) * Jubilee: Jubilation Lee is Jubilee, a Chinese-American teenager who can make colorful fireworks and small explosions. Known for her yellow jacket, she's currently a member of Generation X. (She has no lines but can be seen in the same two classroom scenes as Kitty.) * Colossus: Piotr Rasputin is Colossus, a Russian adult who can turn his entire body into organic steel. He's an artist, and is currently an X-Man. (He has no lines but can be seen in the opening mansion scenes sketching near the lily pond and basketball court.) --- What other movies or cartoons are there? There have been quite a few attempts to cash in on the X-Men craze in other media. A quick rundown: * _Pryde of the X-Men_ (1989)(TV) _Pryde_ was the first attempt to make an X-Men cartoon. Characters include Cyclops, Wolverine, Colossus, Xavier, Emma Frost, Toad, and the Blob. It's really a failed series pilot that was repackaged for video sale. Notable for thin plot and poor voice casting, it uses an Australian accent for Wolverine. It runs 30 minutes and is pretty bad. * _X-Men_ (1992)(TV) This is how it should be done. The cartoon cast includes Xavier, Cyclops, Jean Grey, Rogue, Gambit, Wolverine, Jubilee, Storm, Beast, and a whole host of villains along with Magneto. The voice casting was very well done, the plots were generally stable, and the series touched upon many other X-Men and Marvel characters in its 5-year stint. While continuity wasn't always in line with the comics (the most obvious examples being Morph's inclusion and the not-quite-right attempt at the Phoenix Saga), the characterization was great. * _Generation X_ (1996)(TV) The first live-action adaptation of the mutant franchise was this TV-movie. The villain of this story is Russell Trask, played by Matt Frewer (of _Max Headroom_ fame). Trask is a scientist out to use mutants to advance his schemes. When he finds out that old adversary Emma Frost is teaching a bunch of mutant teenagers, he decides to kidnap her students to use in his attempts to control the world by controlling everyone's dreams. Characters included the familiar Emma Frost, Banshee, Jubilee, M, and Skin, a weird version of Mondo, and new characters Buff and Refrax. It had a few moments, but was generally miscast (a white girl as Jubilee?) and poorly plotted. A sequel was planned in 1999 but never made it to production. * _X-Men_ (2000)(Movie) A well-done live-action foray into the X-Men and mutant politics, this movie was well-received by fans. While the continuity is off, and the costumes are black leather, the overall acting, effects, and characterization are spot on. Notable performances include Patrick Stewart as Xavier and Hugh Jackman as Wolverine. Chock- full of small homages and cameos for fans, the movie was well- received by the non-comics moviegoing public. * _X-Men: Evolution_ (2000)(TV) This cartoon series features Cyclops, Jean Grey, Rogue, Nightcrawler, Shadowcat, and Spyke as teenaged high school students. Mystique is the principal of the school, which also includes such students as Toad and Quicksilver. ------------------------------ Subject: OTHER RACMXERS WHO MAY BE OF ASSISTANCE Okay. You've tried ALL the above. You've gone through every site on the net. You've even created your own, just to say you searched it. You've posted your question to racmx, even, and you didn't get an answer (well, actually, that isn't too surprising). What Can You Do? You can do the last resort: emailing friendly netters! The following is a list of racmxers who have, out of the goodness of their hearts, agreed to be accessible net.help on any of the following topics. Please note that the only payment these people are receiving is the warm glow of seeing knowledge safely passed on, so please be polite and appreciative of them. If you aren't, they'll stop answering questions. And we don't want that. Anyone who would like to be on this list can contact the FAQ keeper. Please include an area of expertise that you'd be willing to field questions on. And while it seems logical, please include your preferred email address in your summary of your talents--you'll be surprised how often this is forgotten. The listkeeper will tend to only put names here that are recognized as netters who have been around long enough to know that they know what they're talking about, but feel free to ask to be put on. This is mainly to insure that any questioning newcomers won't get shuffled off to some joker. Here are the Friendly Folk, in their own (slightly edited) words: * Kate the Short (racmx@yahoo.com) and Aardy R. DeVarque (rgfdfaq@yahoo.com) I've been on the newsgroup since early 1993, and now keep all of the FAQs for the newsgroup. Aardy is my husband, and he has been around almost as long. He keeps the Exhaustive Completist's Supplemental X-Men Checklist and Annotated Index (that is, all appearances of X-men outside of X-titles, one-shots, and limited series), though it hasn't been updated in a number of months. Our collection of X-titles is massive. We have complete runs of Uncanny X-Men from Giant-Size #1 to the present (and many issues from the original run), New Mutants, Excalibur, Generation X, X-Force, X-Factor, (New) X-Men, X-Treme X-Men, and most of the current-continuity X-titles, as well as a number of one-shots and limited series. We've dropped Cable, Deadpool, and Wolverine. We own tons of the old "crossover" issues and and cameo appearances in other titles. Aardy's best for the research while I usually deal with the internet resources. * Chris R. Barry, aka 23yrold3yrold (cbarry@pangea.ca) My love of the X-Books and characters stems from it's history, so I have a huge and rapidly expanding collection going back to Giant Sized X-Men #1, though I've only been reading since 1997. My books of choice are Uncanny X-Men, X-Men, Wolverine, Excalibur, X-Force, X-Factor, Cable and Generation X. And X-Man just because. In other words, the main stuff. I may not know the super-obscure, but I got the mainstream history. Still gotta catch up on my New Mutants back-issues, though.... * Dwayne MacKinnon (dmk@freenet.carleton.ca) This man loooooooooooves Alpha Flight. Nuff Said. * Blair Maynard, aka Doody Family (doodymp3@esatclear.ie) My very own special area of expertise is obscure Wolverine guest appearances in other Marvel books and a heap of Wolvie-related awful one-shots and mini-series. I also have a scary interest in Scott Lobdell, as I have most of his run on the x-books. Also, if you have AoA questions I should be able to answer them. * Samy Merchi (samerc@mash.yok.utu.fi) I'm proficient in all X-books published from 1975 to July 1999. My favorite stuff includes anything by Claremont, the X-Men's Australian period, Peter David's X-Factor, Claremont's New Mutants and Fabian Nicieza's X-Force. All X-books are my areas of expertise, but I'm especially knowledgeable with the New Mutants, X-Force and Sunspot. * Dan Miller (millerdan@earthlink.net) I *have*, readily available, several hundred issues of X-Men, virtually complete from about six years back through about Davis' run, plus back issues. Also, I've been on racmx for six years or so and remember too much of what I've picked up. :) * Paul O'Brien (paul@esoterica.demon.co.uk) I'm a total continuity geek, me. You name it, I probably remember it. Unless it's something to do with the Brood, or early X-Factor, or the insanely convoluted pre-X-Men history of Wolverine. And don't even ask about Alpha Flight. Other than that, there's a pretty good chance I know it... ------------------------------ Subject: HISTORY OF THIS FAQ RACMX is the latest in a line of newsgroups dealing with the X-Men. The prior incarnation was rec.arts.comics.xbooks, and its sage was David R. Henry, who originated it. The original FAQ was broader, with more information on more things, like netiquette, the video games, neat X-Men resources, and all the publications about or involving the X-Men. Much of this FAQ is still his work. Kate the Short took out the resources and the netiquette, and made two different FAQ's out of them which she maintains independently. Jane Griffin did a whole pile of work after taking over for DRH, adding several new questions (and answers), integrating issue numbers, separating out the list of X-Men publications, and producing the first official HTML version. She and Kate worked together to reorganize much of the FAQ as it grew. Marty Blase maintained the FAQ after Jane left. After almost two years of dormancy, Kate decided to take on the darned thing again. She's been the FAQ-keeper since summer 2000. Be nice and help her out, okay? ------------------------------ Subject: CREDITS (+) (UPDATED 12/02) This FAQ could never have remained as up-to-date as it is without the contributions of the following people: Amethyst, Arbitrator, Ken Arromdee, Charlie Ball, Chris Barry, Belascoamo, Cami Benham, Billy Bissette, BlakGard, blank blank, David Bredenberg, D.A. Brooks, Brian Caffrey, Chris Campbell, Eric T-Rex Chastain, CleV, Hilton Collins, Russ Cullins, Judy Daniluk, Peter A. David, Keith R.A. DeCandido, Nick Demmon, Brian Doyle, Steven Dumont, Mike Ellis, Aaron Forever, Brian Fried, Marc-Oliver Frisch, Tom Galloway, Eivind Gladheimstreng, Addison Godel, Robert Gruhn, David Goldfarb, Thomas Heil, Joe Helfrich, Jeremy Henderson, Christian Henriksson, Chris Holly, HooksX, Matt Hutchins, Andrew Ingle, ivan2000, Rivka Jacobs, Marie Javins, jinx, Joey/HBWolf21, Rick Jones, Joe Krug, Large n Incharge, Mike Lavin (aka "Greenstool"), Carol Dawn Lee, Hosun Lee, Diane Levitan, Jacob Levy, Peter Lidkis, Sean Lightner, Jim Longo, Johan Lundstrom, Peter Luzifer, The Main Man, Douglas Mangum, William May, Jennifer J. McGee, James McGhee, Sonja Mendoza, Pietro Meroni, Brucha Meyers, Danny Miller, James Moar, Fabian Nicieza, Toby Nieboer, Andrew Oakley, Paul O'Brien, Laura M. Parkinson, Al Patterson, Pecadilo, Martin Phipps, Piercey, Lord Populous, Shane Potter, Prosh, Joanne Puchalik, queenB, Deepak Ramani, Maryann Robbins, Ryan Royce, Justin Samuels, Liisa Sarakontu, Chris Schumacher, Amy Sheldon, Clara Showalter, Gail Simone, Louise Simonson, Walter Simonson, Christian Smith, Eric Stieglitz, Tilman Stieve, The Stirge, Swpwarrior, Chris Sypal, Terrafamilia, tphile, Jon Trouten, Jeremy Turner, UltimoV, uplink, Sean Walsh, Alasdair Watson, Craig Welsh, Gregory Whittaker, Mitchell Wietz, and James Willer. Special thanks go to Jane Griffin, for keeping the FAQ in excellent working order; Marty Blase, for helping keep the entire newsgroup sane and enjoyable; and David R. Henry, without whom, I assure you, this would not have been possible. And hugs to Aardy R. DeVarque! *** The End! *** Compilation Copyright 2000-2002 by Katharine E. Hahn SEND ADDITIONS / CHANGES / DEAD LINKS / MOVED LINKS / UPDATES TO: Kate the Short, racmx@yahoo.com (mailto:racmx@yahoo.com) -- Kate the Short * http://www.enteract.com/~katew/