What I Bought 12/20/2019 - Part 2

It's Christmas here in the U.S. Hopefully you're having a good Christmas, or you had a good one yesterday, or it's at least a not-terrible December 25th if the date holds no significance for you. Not-terrible days are always nice.

Gwenpool Strikes Back #5, by Leah Williams (writer), David Baldeon (artist), Jesus Arbutov and Guru-eFX (color artists), Joe Carmagna (letterer) - Agh, the real world is so boring and uninteresting! Who wants to hang out with trees, and regular old stone walls. Let her back in!

Gwen's determined to fight Kamala and win this battle royale she made up. Kamala doesn't want to fight, she wants to talk. Boooooo! No talking! Kamala won't accept Gwen's "I'm from a world where you're a comic book character" origin, and instead proposes that instead, Gwen is a mutant with reality manipulation powers. At least she didn't say she's an Inhuman, that would be a real kiss of death. But shouldn't Kamala just go ask Dr. Strange if what Gwen says is true? Gwen pretends to go along with this explanation, but leaves to prepare for her inevitable end.

But wait! Kamala's awful, awful retcon has apparently taken hold, and one of the portal things to Krakoa shows up, so Gwen's a mutant now! And she might get back together with Quentin Quire? Sheeeeeeit, that is a Patsy Walker-level bad relationship decision. Then she says good-bye to the audience because most likely, whatever Gwenpool shows up in her next appearance won't be anything like this.

Also, she acknowledges they never resolved that whole subplot from her ongoing about her brother having gotten lost in the Marvel Universe also. No shit.

I don't see how making Gwenpool a mutant really changes anything. She still has an unusual powerset some writers are probably either going to abuse, or hate because it's too abstract for them. She still believes she's from our world, but is going to pretend she doesn't. Not sure how that's going to work if she's living on an island with a crapload of telepaths. Especially given Hickman's X-Folks don't seem the most ethical to me. Really doubt Pod Person Chuck Xavier is big on respecting the privacy of the people living on the island.

But whatever. The character is still alive (for now), which means someone can come along later and theoretically do something interesting with her. Or they'll let whoever the current version of Mark Millar is (Matthew Rosenberg?) get ahold of her and she'll be given a bad death with no emotional heft that only serves to highlight how hollow and pointless the story it happens in is.

The issue sort of starts out light, Gwen trying to keep all the heroes she put in the VIP booth from getting too angry, and then shifted to sad real fast, since Kamala pretty much treats the whole thing like she's talking to someone with mental illness. Kind of a whiplash, there.

That part where Kamala is rewriting Gwen's origin is kind of wrenching. Great work Kamala, give her an origin where her powers made her so miserable she practically disassociates from reality to deal with them. Super cool. But watching Gwen try to block out the thought balloons it's conjuring up, the nightmares and ugliness, just makes me a little sad. Granting that Gwen didn't really like reality back in our world, it wasn't a nightmare. It just wasn't what she wanted. Putting this over the top of that, I don't know. I guess it fits with most Marvel heroes having tragic origins. Although Kamala and Squirrel Girl don't. Same with a few others. Not sure why Gwen has to go old-school. But the next writer can always ignore it if they want!