Uncanny X-Men General Discussion

Winged Outlaw · Post by **Winged Outlaw** » Mon Jan 26, 2004 3:20 pm

How absolutely dreadful. Where some appear to see a "loyal adaptation" of Romeo and Juliet, I see all the subtlety of a head on collision. Romeo and Juliet is a template that has simply been DONE TO DEATH. This is certainly the case if you add nothing to the story, which is what we're seeing here.

Uncanny is dead to me until Austen leaves, which is thankfully quite soon.

Maelstrom · Post by **Maelstrom** » Mon Jan 26, 2004 5:09 pm

After seeing the slow-moving, slow-moving, slow-moving, zipsqueel jobs they've been doing on the recent arcs, I'm hoping they don't do the same thing with this one. I don't mind the occasional soap in a comic, as it provides a welcome break from wide-range destruction. (Be reasonable: how sustainable is a universe where Juggernaut destroyes a city block every day? The economic damage and loss would destroy all civilization in a little while....

)

Yes, it distinctly has the Montegue-Capulet look, doesn't it? However, as I recall, that feud didn't have a specific villian. The two houses just hated each other equally, and were equally scummy or nice, depending on your P.O.V. [spoiler] However, in the latest issue, it's pretty clear that the Cabots are serious bad guys. By murdering the Guthrie patriarch sometime in the past, and attempting to wide out the entire clan, they've labeled themselves as utterly unsympathetic. And the sherrif, who just looked like someone trying to keep a lid on things, has now come out as less-than-sympathetic, too, thanks to his keeping mum on the subject.

And I'm also wondering just what the Cabots are going to be able to do that could possibly threaten the Xmen. You've got a bunch of armed humans who know the territory against a superhero group who has fought off alien invasions. Odds, here? [/spoiler]

Northstars Love · Post by **Northstars Love** » Mon Jan 26, 2004 6:45 pm

I enjoyed it. I've always like Romeo and Juliet anyway so for Chuck to use this theme to convey a message that might come forward towards the end of this arc is fine by me.

[spoiler]And the introduction of another angel, Josh, is completely wonderful. I'm glad Warren isn't the only one. [/spoiler]

scheherazade · Post by **scheherazade** » Tue Jan 27, 2004 3:21 am

Originally posted by Winged Outlaw
How absolutely dreadful. Where some appear to see a "loyal adaptation" of Romeo and Juliet, I see all the subtlety of a head on collision. Romeo and Juliet is a template that has simply been DONE TO DEATH. This is certainly the case if you add nothing to the story, which is what we're seeing here.

It's definately been done badly to death. I was worried that this would be a "template" R&J story, but I am impressed that it is gone farther than that.

Austen has added a LOT to the story, I just didn't mention all of that... I mean [spoiler] In the real play, Noone's trying to poison anyone else (they're all poisoning themselves!) The basic feud between them seems to be different (from what we've been told so far about the Guthrie/Cabot feud) And the Guthries and Cabots are hardly "Both alike in dignity" as you can see from the size of the Cabot house. Although he included Rosaline, She is not the exact same character as the play (where she is not exactly a character, as she is only mentioned and never seen.) Julia is no Juliet character, (she's much more feisty! I like her!) And Abe and Jeb are hardly two servants fighting...
[/spoiler]

msgt · Post by **msgt** » Tue Jan 27, 2004 7:02 pm

Like I said before ( I don't know if it was in this thread or another) but this arc is Romeo & Juliet meets Hatfields and McCoys.

I might would have enjoyed this arc if it wasn't the fact that I live in Eastern Kentucy.

Cumberland is near where I live and I have friends there.

Cumberland County is also in the South central part of the state.

Cumberland the town is not in Cumberland County (Cumberland County's county seat is Burksville)

Anyhow getting back on track.. this arc is full of stereotypes.

I wonder has Mr. Austen ever been to Kentucky or to the parts he is writing about??

And if he has I'd like to know where exactly he visisted because this does not look like East Kentucky to me.

I mean the small town how it was shown by the art looked good. Most small towns look like that.. but thats not what bothers me.

Sure racism exists everywhere but of course its always portrayed in southern places and in places where we think we find "hicks, hillbillys' (these are words I do not find negative usually unless in this context where people use damaging stereotypes).

So I wasn't surprised by that. I am surprised that there hasn't been a reference to incest. But the arc hasn't finished yet. So we'll see.

And the way the characters talk.... yeah a lot of writers get our accent wrong. Austen isn't the first. But this is Kentucky and not Texas.

Our accents are a little more subtle .. maybe a little muted. It's more flat than exaggerated.

It is just frustrating sometimes how different media portray east Kentucy. The main thing is that its always the same old junk and the same old stereotypes.

And usually it wouldn't matter to me. Because hey were used to it by now. I mean here in Pikeville KY we make fun of the stereotypes every year at Hillbilly Days. So sometimes we sorta embrace them to just make light of them.

But its that people actually believe thats the way it is? Or that thats the way it is today is just absurd.

But as usual people will believe what they want to beleive. So thats that.

Also am i wrong or was Sam's dad's death due to him being a miner. A lot of miners get black lung or some medical problem dealing with being a minor.

My dad has worked in the coal industry for years. A lot of people whose families have been here for years probably share that heritage of having connections to the coal boom or the coal industry here.

This really isn't important but there are a lot of things that suggest that the Guthries are from Cumberland (the town in the Harlan area) but I think Claremont has mentioned in Xtreme about the Cumberland river which would suggest the Guthries are from Cumberland County.

But to me it looks like they are in more of the Eastern part of the state than south central.

I believe Rogue who was from Mississippi (correct me if I'm wrong) was cited as being from a fictional county from that state, but the Guthries are actually set in a real County or town.

Mike

Remy_LeBeau · Post by **Remy_LeBeau** » Tue Jan 27, 2004 7:58 pm

Originally posted by msgt
And the way the characters talk.... yeah a lot of writers get our accent wrong. Austen isn't the first. But this is Kentucky and not Texas.

and what is that supposed to mean? maybe you didn't mean anything by it but comes off as a little rude.

Bamfette · Post by **Bamfette** » Tue Jan 27, 2004 9:05 pm

Originally posted by msgt

And if he has I'd like to know where exactly he visisted because this does not look like East Kentucky to me.

wont even bother with the rest of the post, but i am very curious, how is it not LOOKING right Chuck's fault? last i checked, he didn't draw it, Sal did.

and if you read the 'previously' page, it says the town.... and as for the accents, incase you didn't notice, there were degrees of severety from one character to another, so it's not like ALL the characters from around there talked the same. it's like valley girl or surfer accents in California. SOME people talk like that, but not all. I agree, that if taken too far, it can be insulting or funny depending on how you look at it. as a Canadian, Tuke and Rutt (it's Toque! morons.) from Brother Bear (or Doug and Dave McKenzie. same thing, basically.

but i think more people will know the moose...) are so over the top it's funny, but then they're voiced by Canadians, so.:p but i didn't think the accents were too much here. and also remember that even if you don't think you have an accent, others from elsewhere may have a different opinion. back to my Canadian accent. i went years thinking i didn't have an accent at all. I had watched so much American TV, and couldn't for the life of me discern a difference between how they talked and how i talked, so i din't think i had any of the Canadian 'hoser' accent (about, house, etc. pronounced with a long 'o' for instance). until i went to California and people began saying 'you have a lovely accent, where are you from?' and i'm thinking 'what accent?' and then later in San Diego last year, Ryan and C picked on me mercilessly for how i said 'bag' but i still can't hear myself how i talk differently from Americans. :p

msgt · Post by **msgt** » Tue Jan 27, 2004 11:38 pm

Originally posted by Bamfette
Originally posted by msgt

And if he has I'd like to know where exactly he visisted because this does not look like East Kentucky to me.
wont even bother with the rest of the post, but i am very curious, how is it not LOOKING right Chuck's fault? last i checked, he didn't draw it, Sal did.

and if you read the 'previously' page, it says the town.... and as for the accents, incase you didn't notice, there were degrees of severety from one character to another, so it's not like ALL the characters from around there talked the same. it's like valley girl or surfer accents in California. SOME people talk like that, but not all. I agree, that if taken too far, it can be insulting or funny depending on how you look at it. as a Canadian, Tuke and Rutt (it's Toque! morons.) from Brother Bear (or Doug and Dave McKenzie. same thing, basically. but i think more people will know the moose...) are so over the top it's funny, but then they're voiced by Canadians, so.:p but i didn't think the accents were too much here. and also remember that even if you don't think you have an accent, others from elsewhere may have a different opinion. back to my Canadian accent. i went years thinking i didn't have an accent at all. I had watched so much American TV, and couldn't for the life of me discern a difference between how they talked and how i talked, so i din't think i had any of the Canadian 'hoser' accent (about, house, etc. pronounced with a long 'o' for instance). until i went to California and people began saying 'you have a lovely accent, where are you from?' and i'm thinking 'what accent?' and then later in San Diego last year, Ryan and C picked on me mercilessly for how i said 'bag' but i still can't hear myself how i talk differently from Americans. :p

Oh we most definitely do have accents here.

And at one time I wasn't aware of my accent. Of course I wasn't. Everyone here talks pretty much the same so to me I didn't even know I had one!

But as I got older I got friends from other places of the US and the world and I Found Oh Yes! I do have an East Kentucky accent!

I never said we don't have an accent here. I was just commenting on the accents portrayed in Uncanny.

The first issue of Uncanny seemed to have gotten positive reviews on the most part on X-fan except from fellow Ky-ers.

So I invited several people from KY that I knew online to my livejournal and we discussed the accents in Uncanny and all the other horrible stereotypes that Austen wrote. We were all in agreement and one of those guys was from Cumberland.

Oh and Bamfette you misread or misunderstood my post. That or I made a mistake (I would have to read my post again)

But I said the little town did look right and that I liked it.

I never blamed Austen for art. I'm not one of those fans that doesn't know the difference betwen writer and artist. Yeesh.

Mike

Bamfette · Post by **Bamfette** » Tue Jan 27, 2004 11:48 pm

it was just that you were saying right above it 'has Chuck ever been here? blah blah, i don't feel like going back and looking exactly...' then right below that, you said what i quoted. it sounded like you were talking about the same person.

and , well, fine. i have never been there, but i din't think the accents were half as 'thick' as they have been shown in the past. i think some of it is how you read it, too. it's written down and to show they have an accent at all, phonetically, it may come off stronger than intended to those that have that accent. there isn't really a way to differentiate between a subtle and 'medium' accent when written since much of it is inflection. a really really heavy accent you can play with it a bit more, i guess, but....

msgt · Post by **msgt** » Wed Jan 28, 2004 12:31 pm

Oh what I meant about if Chuck had ever been here was about how the area and the people were portrayed I wasn't meaning to comment on the look of everything. Cause I liked the look of the small town. It reminded me somewhat of Pikeville (my hometown).

I'm a sociology student. I will have my degree in Soc. ater this semester. So I like to talk about stereotypes and that kind of thing and being from Appalachia I definitely like to talk about Appalachian Stereotypes.

And its a big issue here. LIke when CBS thought about taking a family from Appalachia to do a reality show called The Real Beverly Hillbillies, it was uber controversial here. It was a hot topic that didn't go away and it got national coverage and the show didn't (or hasn't since its been a year or two) come to pass.

I don't know how much everyone would know about how much Appalachian areas have been stereotyped or the stigma that is often attached to being from the foothills of the Appalachian Mountains.
There is a lot of history that I could go into.

But this is an Uncanny Thread and all I was doing was commenting on the very typical and very stereotypical representation of Kentucky in Uncanny X-men.

And I bet writing acccents are hard. That is true. But I still feel it was too chick. And I believe writers of characters like Rogue have done much more subtle jobs with accents than say Claremont. lol So I think it can be done.

And our state does have more than one accent in the fact that Western Kentucky people don't exactly sound like Central Kentucky people and Central Kentucky people don't sound exaclty like East Kentucky folks (this all generally speaking.) And thats pretty much how the state is divided (kinda like how Californians talk about Northern California and Southern California).

And just like I noticed a lot of Jewish x-fans like to talk about the portrayals of Jewish X-men, I like to discucss how Kentucky characters are portrayed because its something of interest to me

Mike

killer bee · Post by **killer bee** » Sat Jan 31, 2004 5:17 am

uncanny just keeps getting worse and worse. i find myself vomitting from the soap oprea this title has become. but for some reason i cant stop reading i'm addicted to uncanny and its boring, retold storylines.

zati1 · Post by **zati1** » Sat Jan 31, 2004 5:30 am

i don't get how you can hate it so much and yet still be "addicted." why just drop it already if all you do is complain about it?

Bamfette · Post by **Bamfette** » Sat Jan 31, 2004 6:28 am

yeah. i have no sympathy for you if you're reading out of some pathetic need to keep the run complete. you are clearly not the target audience, Chuck was hired specifically to BRING soap to the title. People who have to read even when they don't like it make me want to vomit. Your complaints are old and tired.

*just for the record, before anyone complains about me being overy defensive, or whatever, i am not the one who dished out the warnings. i gave ONE, AFTER consulting with C. dunno where the other 2 came from.

Gaz · Post by **Gaz** » Sat Jan 31, 2004 9:58 pm

I agree. There are hundreds of comics in the world. Don't continuously read one and then come whining to us about how you don't like it without any type of contructive critisism on how you would prefer it, simply how much you dislike it. It's almost hypocritical...

E.M.S · Post by **E.M.S** » Sun Feb 01, 2004 12:52 am

Originally posted by msgt
But this is an Uncanny Thread and all I was doing was commenting on the very typical and very stereotypical representation of Kentucky in Uncanny X-men.

And I bet writing acccents are hard. That is true. But I still feel it was too chick. And I believe writers of characters like Rogue have done much more subtle jobs with accents than say Claremont. lol So I think it can be done.

And just like I noticed a lot of Jewish x-fans like to talk about the portrayals of Jewish X-men, I like to discucss how Kentucky characters are portrayed because its something of interest to me

Mike

I know what you mean, accents are tricky things. Just once I’d like to read about an Irish person without reading things like, “Top o’ the morning to ye.” Funny but I don’t recall my Grandmother talking like that.

Forgive my ignorance as I haven’t read all the X-Men issues but who are the Jewish X-Men? I know Kitty is and Bobbys’ half Jewish (though not practicing) but I can’t recall anyone else.

Originally posted by killer bee
uncanny just keeps getting worse and worse. i find myself vomitting from the soap oprea this title has become. but for some reason i cant stop reading im addicted to uncanny and its boring, retold storylines.

Are you still reading because it’s so bad that it’s good? I stopped reading awhile back, as I honestly can’t stand the writing. Granted that most writers haven’t interested me in the title since Scott Lobdell left but this has been the worse run for me. I don’t like the way the characters are written and I’ve never been much of an soap opera person. So I dropped it and I’m a happier person. As for CC return I’ll wait and see before judging. Though he never did give Bobby much attention, much less positive attention.

Not to mention Warren...

Crawler · Post by **Crawler** » Sun Feb 01, 2004 1:11 am

Taking over the book does not necessarily mean taking over the team. Just about every time the creative teams change, the character teams do, as well.

Icey · Post by **Icey** » Sun Feb 01, 2004 1:33 am

Storm, Bishop, and Sage are all comfirmed to be moving over here (Uncanny), so its pretty obvious that the teams will be changing. My guess is this is the book that the X.S.E. plot will move to.

Warbird · Post by **Warbird** » Sun Feb 01, 2004 4:07 am

I'm really not all about the Romeo and Juliet thing at all. However, when I look past it, I like the rest of the story alot. Good old fashion family fueds are usually a good time, sans pathetic love angle.

did any one else find it amusing that [spoiler] Loran and Logan are both present? I mean, not the most stable team members. It could get very interesting once the Cabbots try to take them out. Unless I didn't get it, Lorna's little mental problem was never fully resolved. [/spoiler] There's major potential for a temper melt down. That could be amazing!!!

E.M.S · Post by **E.M.S** » Sun Feb 01, 2004 4:19 am

Originally posted by Crawler
Taking over the book does not necessarily mean taking over the team. Just about every time the creative teams change, the character teams do, as well.

I know, but I have heard over at Comixfan that Archangel is suppose to go over to Excailber (sp?) I think that Bobby might go over to New, as CC never used him much.

Crawler · Post by **Crawler** » Sun Feb 01, 2004 5:24 am

Yeah. The lineups seem to be up in the air at this point, not only to us, but to the creative teams.

Last I heard, it was growing increasingly frusterating for them not knowing what's going on.

Winged Outlaw · Post by **Winged Outlaw** » Sun Feb 01, 2004 5:33 am

Originally posted by killer bee
uncanny just keeps getting worse and worse. i find myself vomitting from the soap oprea this title has become. but for some reason i cant stop reading i'm addicted to uncanny and its boring, retold storylines.

Well, if you're looking to quit, my friend Joel came up with a very good method of boosting your willpower. First, bring a pen with you to the comic book store every week. When you make your selection, jam it thusly into your leg. Do this even if Uncanny X-Men isn't there. Its all the more necessary to remind you of the horrible pain of actually reading the comic when an example isn't right there in front of you. Keep that up for a month, and from then on you'll curl up in a fetal position shivering if someone even mentions the word "Uncanny" again.

That or, you know, stop reading it. Take that extra $3 per month and buy some ice cream instead.

To the person who told me that Chuck was actually adding stuff to the Romeo and Juliet template, I've got to disagree. He's added one or two minor details, which has done nothing to put a different spin on this rehashed plot. I can already tell you how its going to end. The angel dude and the chick are gonna fall in love. The families will disagree. Someone will end up dead. At least one or the other lovers will then wind up dead. And only then will people learn their lesson, though they would've saved us a lot of pain by simply paying attention when they first heard this story in the tenth grade.

Of course, the more relevant lesson here is to stop reading this book until these kind of stories stop.

The Drastic Spastic · Post by **The Drastic Spastic** » Sun Feb 01, 2004 5:35 am

How are they supposed to get books ready if they don't even know who they have? Laaaaaame.

E.M.S · Post by **E.M.S** » Sun Feb 01, 2004 8:13 pm

Very. I may not be a professional writer but I know I couldn't come up with a story, much less a good one, if I didn't know what characters I was using. I'm dreading the first plots will read bad because they were rushed.

scheherazade · Post by **scheherazade** » Sun Feb 01, 2004 10:59 pm

Hmm... Well, I was just thinking what I would do in that situation, not knowing what characters I'd be writing. If it were me, I'd think about doing a story either focusing on an outside conflict (ie. new bad guy needs to be defeated kind of conflict, rather than inner conflict) Or write about a character that wasn't in dispute. ... would mean good things for some of our more neglected favorites...

mightiest_mortal · Post by **mightiest_mortal** » Wed Feb 04, 2004 9:03 am

Ne 1 else find the "Logan was here" on the last panel a bit cheesy

hehehe