I Shouldn't Think About The Sentry, He Makes Me Stupidly Contemplative

I had a little fun at The Sentry's expense last week, because that's one of things I do here. Like griping about Batman and raving about Marvel's cosmic books. To be sure, it was a bit much for Bob to immediately assume that if someone is searching for that generation's greatest hero, they mean him, but that kind of self-confidence seems necessary for The Sentry. He has to believe he's really that good, because if he starts doubting then he becomes less useful, and eventually he's crying bed while Captain America yells at him to get up and come help. It's kind of self-sustaining; if he believes in himself, then he's more effective, which in turn feeds his confidence. If he stops believing in himself, then he falters, which in turn makes him less confident in himself, and so on.

Or maybe it works another way entirely. The rules that govern the Sentry's powers seem to hold steady for roughly the same length of time as Deadpool's attention span. Right now, it may be that confidence is bad because it means he's more active, which encourages the Void, or it makes him less careful, which gives the Void a stronger grip, or who knows what. It wasn't really what I meant to discuss.

That sort of presumption isn't limited to the Sentry, though. Most heroes manifest it to some degree, just by what they do. They throw on a costume and fight crime, evil, injustice, based on their definition of what those terms mean. Even if they enter a situation unsure of who's in the right, they're confident they can sort it out in the midst of dealing with the problem, and that they'll make the right choice. Super-heroes tend to be run up against problems where both sides are right, or both wrong, or both right and wrong, or there are multiple sides and each has arguments legitimate and otherwise. Sometimes the hero can help, sometimes they conclude they can't divine a solution, but they start out believing they can fix things, and past failures don't stop them from involvement in later problems. The hero's beliefs might shift with experience (which is only natural), but they'll still trust in their judgment.

Maybe that's necessary. If the hero isn't sure they know what's right, they can wind up as Hamlet, endlessly waffling over what would be the right thing to do, and by the time they decide, it's too late. The Sentry's maybe just a more obvious example, where his confidence in himself directly relates to whether he'll be able to get the job done*.

* He's not the first or the last, since Cornell went that route with Captain Britain, making his powers tie directly into Braddock's self-confidence, and I think Hal Jordan's been through some stretches where his ring didn't work terribly well in the pre-Parallax days because he didn't trust his judgment.

Then He Flew Back To The Watchtower And Cried

While I was at the comic store today, I took a minute to skim through a copy of Savage She-Hulk #2, the mini-series from 2009 that brought Lyra into the Marvel Universe. I thought she seemed more mature there than she does in She-Hulks, but all she did was fight Jennifer Walters, which is something she's good at. She wasn't trying to be an ordinary human, or avoid detention, situations where she's out of her element. Also, the artist of that issue (either Michael Ryan or Aubrey Sitterson) drew her as having more mass than Ryan Stegman does. That makes her look older, too.

That wasn't the primary thing that caught my eye. Over the course over Lyra's fight with Jen, she mentions she's looking for this generation's greatest hero. Naturally, she can only mean the Sentry. Well, that's what the Sentry thinks anyway. He overhears this, tosses Jen halfway across town, and introduces himself as the person she's obviously looking for. Fortunately for all of us who loathe the Sentry's insertion into the Marvel Universe as everybody's bestest friend ever, Lyra completely shoots him down*. Unfortunately, she shoots him down by stating she's looking for Norman Osborn. Little bit of a whiff there.

It's a reminder of how malleable history is, I suppose. Depending on who writes the history books (or which history books survive) people could actually think Norman Osborn is a hero, rather than a loon who once wanted to be a crime boss but mostly succeeded in wrecking his son's life.

* I think Fred van Lente wrote that sequence purposefully, but even if it wasn't meant as some commentary on the status certain writers were trying to place upon Bob Reynolds, it was still funny.

This Is About The Nicest I Can Be When It Comes To The Sentry

So, I hear the Sentry died in Siege this week. Nicest

Audience: Yeah, woohoo, *whistling, enthusiastic clapping*

Course, he'll probably be resurrected in a couple of years.

Audience: Boo! Hiss! Get outta here with that, you goombah!

"Goombah"? Then before we could truly enjoy being rid of him, Marvel released Sentry: Fallen Sun, where all Marvel's heroes (except the cosmic ones, because they have important work to do) gather to talk about how wonderful and special the Sentry was to them. Including Rogue, as it's revealed the Sentry was the first person she was physically intimate with.

Audience: Oh come on! Seriously?! *assorted groans*

The Rogue thing seems like all kinds of a bad idea, especially just tossing it in there as some throwaway piece to once again demonstrate how much the Sentry means to everyone. Was it supposed to make readers like Bob more? "See, he was so important to Rogue, she's crying! Doesn't that make you like him?" I think the answer to that would be a resounding "No!" In fact, what say we all agree that never happened? Really, the X-Men weren't even at the memorial service. Nope, much too busy trying to save Hope and mourn Nightcrawler (a character who actually merits mourning, even if, as an X-Person, he'll probably be back soon enough.)

I'd like to think within the issue, there was one character at least thinking, if not saying it aloud "We are so much better off with him dead." I know, one shouldn't speak ill of the dead, but I think it'd be fair. Bob was off his rocker, and insanely powerful. He could bring people back to life without even realizing it, which is terrifying when you realize that means he could do the opposite just as easily. He certainly had the power, but he didn't seem to have the mentality to handle being a hero. Some folks just aren't cut out for the heroic life, and so maybe the most responsible thing they can do with their power is not use it. The more he saved the day, the closer he moved to the point where he was the problem.

In the one and only D & D campaign I took part in, we had a goblin shaman with a wishing orb. It came in handy when one of our party would be so thoroughly killed there was nothing left of him to resurrect (happened more often than you might think). Partway through the story, we did something that disrupted the orb's connection to the goblin's gods, which meant now every time he used it, there was a chance it would explode, probably killing us all. The chance increased every time he used it. Still, the folks in the party had the goblin using the orb regularly, even for stuff we could do otherwise. Our top fighter lost their super-awesome sword at the bottom of the bay when our ship was struck by a meteor. We could have grabbed a rowboat, rowed out there, I'd cast a spell to allow breathing underwater, and the meat shield swims down and grabs his sword. Would have taken longer, but there's no risk of lethal explosion.

The Sentry makes life easier, since he can smack down Terrax in under a minute, but using him only brings them closer to the point where the Void's on the loose, and that's worse than Terrax. Better to keep the Sentry gone (or buried in Bob's mind, or whatever), and find another way, which the heroes in the Marvel Universe had done for years anyway. I mean, wasn't that part of the point of his first mini-series, the Marvel Universe doesn't need a Silver Age Superman, it'll chug along just fine without him?

So maybe it would have been better to have one of the Avengers or the FF point out, "You know, we really should have left Bob alone. Being the Sentry wasn't good for him, and we should have been more aware of it." Would it have made a difference? I really don't know, largely because I'm still not clear on the whole deal with Bob/Void/Sentry. I don't see how it could have hurt, though.

It Sounds Good In Theory, But . . .

I'm reading Agents of Atlas #2, Temugin has shown up and is busting Jimmy's chops for not using Venus to keep the Sentry under their control. Let's set aside for the moment the logistics of how Venus was going to accomplish that*. Let's think about the Sentry as an Agent of Atlas. Sure, it seems like a good idea, the Sentry having the power of a million exploding suns and all, but the track record suggests that your team doesn't really benefit that much from having him.

- While on the New Avengers, the primary threat he helped with was the Collective, which was moving towards Genosha, with the Avengers trying to halt its progress. The Sentry was right there fighting, but they failed to even really slow it down.

- With the Mighty Avengers his best moment was, I guess, punching Ultron long enough Ares could shrink down, sneak inside and wreak havoc, though I'm not sure the Sentry was even aware of the plan. Or it was when Bob brought his wife back from the dead without even knowing it.

- His track record in the big events isn't stellar either. During Civil War, his big moment was beating the Absorbing Man and then registering, except then he flew out to the Moon for alone time. In World War Hulk he did fight Hulk until they both exhausted their energies and reverted to their civilian identities, but as soon as Rick Jones got stabbed, Banner Hulked up again stronger than ever, and Iron Man as forced to stop him with the power of SATELLITES! Then in Secret Invasion, he ran and hid out by Saturn for the duration.

And other than the last sentence, none of that deals with his various mental problems (like when Cap had to yell at him to quit crying in bed and come help fight the Collective). The point is, for a character as powerful as he is, his teams never seem as effective as you think they'd be, and the Sentry's various issues make him an unstable and unreliable team member. Yet Norman Osborn seemingly couldn't wait to get Bob on the Dark Avengers and acting as his personal bodyguard. Which is when I had a realization:

The Sentry is the Terrell Owens of the Marvel Universe.

Terrell Owens, for those of you who aren't pro football fans, is a pretty good wide receiver who seems to wear out his welcome on team after team, yet there's always another team ready to pick him up. Owens usually puts up good stats**, he's tall, strong, fast enough, and he stays healthy, having played fewer than 14 games in a season once (and we'll get to those circumstances in a moment). In 2004, he fractured his fibula late in the regular season, but trained diligently so he could come back for the Super Bowl, which he did, and he performed pretty damn well (9 catches, 122 yards). Purely based on his performance on the field and his skill (though he has issues with dropping passes), Owens is a #1 WR, and there are probably only a handful better. But San Francisco was actively shopping him***, the Eagles cut him, and the Cowboys decided they'd rather take a $10 million cap hit for him not to be there, than keep him. This is the Dallas Cowboys, run by Jerry Jones, the man who can't seem to have enough stars, and seemingly loves any spectacle that keeps the spotlight on the 'Boys, and he decided it was better to get rid of T.O.

Why? Because Owens eventually (whether intentionally or not) becomes a disruptive force on his team. He feuded with Steve Mariucci in San Fran over playcalling, and at one point stumped for Tim Rattay to remain starting QB over Jeff Garcia - who was only a Pro Bowler 3 times during the years he and T.O were teammates - because Rattay could throw downfield more. Or Owens thinks it's productive to criticize Garcia's sexuality for some reason. After a almost entirely positive first year in Philly, things were stirred up when he maybe directed some criticism at Donovan McNabb, after Donovan seemed to wear down late in the Super Bowl (Owens contends it wasn't aimed at McNabb), and wanting to restructure the contract he signed the year before****. The next season was the only one he played fewer than 14 games, and that was because the Eagles grew fed up and suspended him, then deactivated him for the rest of the year. In Dallas, he complained about not getting the ball enough, and said Romo and tight end Jason Witten were having secret meetings in their hotel room to draw up plays just between the two of them. The problem is, regardless of how true any of his grievances might have been, airing them to the media doesn't seem to help the team, if for no other reason than because the other players then have to field endless questions about it*****. Maybe Owens tried handling things privately without success, maybe he doesn't believe it causes problems, or that it helps more than it harms, maybe he doesn't care, I don't know. Either way, things always seem to be jumping for a team when Owens is around, and for better or worse, it's part of the package when a team picks him up.

And for all Owens' skill, his teams never win the big one. That's certainly not all on him, he's just one player, and the 49ers did win some playoff games (which they haven't managed since he left, though I'm not certain Owens' absence is the cause of that), and he gave the Eagles the receiving threat they needed that first season, and they made Super Bowl, even if they didn't win. So he can help a team, but so can the Sentry. If nothing else, The Sentry seems useful at standing there trading punches with the Threat O' the Day while the rest of the team figures out how to actually defeat it. Plus, there was the time he beat the Super-Adaptoid by letting it absorb his power until it developed its own Void and had a nervous breakdown. Even so, his teammates have to be aware that he could flake out on them and fly to Saturn at any moment, or make them dead with a thought, (If he can resurrect his wife that way without realizing it, I still contend it can work the opposite way, and that would certainly weigh on my mind if he was around me). With Owens, his teammates have to be aware that at any moment T.O may say something controversial about their QB situation, or the playcalling that they'll have to hear about for the next week (or weeks).

But there's always someone else lined up, ready to give them a chance, whether its Norman Osborn or the Buffalo Bills. I guess we'll see if this is the one that works.

{Postscript: I'm aware that the Sentry was effective in the Age of the Sentry mini-series, which suggests he's just better off working alone, or with a sidekick, dealing with his own unique threats, rather than on as part of a larger team. I'm not certain what the equivalent to this would be for Owens. An individual sport, like tennis or golf, where he'd just have a caddy?}

* Wouldn't she have to keep singing to Sentry constantly? I know she's a siren made human, but even she'd have to take a breather eventually, right? And this is the Sentry we're talking about. He'd probably spontaneously develop immunity to her powers at some point.

** In 13 seasons, he's had 7 seasons with at least 75 catches, 9 years with at least 1000 yards, and 9 years with at least 10 touchdowns.

*** Though they kind of botched it by possibly waiting too long, to the point Owens was a free agent and could go where he pleased. It was a whole mess of a thing, and I'm still not clear whether the 49ers could actually trade him or not. I guess they could, since they did get a draft pick and a D-lineman from Philly for Owens.

**** I'm actually a bit sympathetic to players on this, since the league is set up where they can be cut any time the team chooses, and whatever money was left on their contract, they mostly don't get. I imagine they'll be looking into changing that when they get to the collective bargaining again, don't you?

***** I'm not going to get into how much it might hurt the team, because hell if I know. Heck, it might even help, if they can make it into an "Us versus Them" thing, with everyone outside the clubhouse as "them".

To Do Nothing Is Also An Option

Question for today:

Why does The Sentry save the day?

When he does, he knows that those lives which didn't end because of his actions, will be taken somewhere else by his other half, The Void. He saves 300 people in an earthquake, Void takes 300 lives somewhere else. Throwing The Void into the Sun at the end of the last mini-series was only a stopgap solution, right? He's just giving the Void an opportunity to wipe out an entire a country when he returns, isn't he? {Having looked at Wikipedia, The Sentry apparently told the Void he can balance himself now, but what does that mean? He's going to do the evil himself? he's going to stick to doing small good deeds that won't have large repercussions? Cripes, here come the Sentry-induced headaches again}

Has it been discussed how Sentry justifies doing the hero bit currently, knowing what he does? It's one thing to be Spider-Man on patrol, and turn right and save a person leaping from a burning building, when he could have turned left, a saved a mugging victim from getting shot. It's quite another to save a person, knowing that your other half is going to kill someone precisely because you intervened and prevented the death of some person. I suppose that's part of The Sentry's metatextual aspect.

Really though, it's not Bob Reynolds fault (is the Sentry still Bob Reynolds? Or is The Void Bob Reynolds? Man, I could not follow 70% of that last mini-series). Captain America and Iron Man were the guys who just had to track down Bob Reynolds, and they just had to make him part of the New Avengers, which leaves ole Bobby in the position of having to help the save the world, or else he's letting down the Sentinel of Liberty. And how many people can do that?

Hmm, I've just had a horrible vision. Earth being attacked by the Annihilation Wave, Hulk, The Void and Onslaught (listed in the order of the potential threat as I perceive it. Any force which currently has Galactus as weapon sits at the top) simultaneously. That would be ugly, though it would be the perfect time for a massive "reset" event, if The Powers That Be were to deem one necessary.

Things I Think About #19

You know what I would have liked to have seen in House of M? Instead of just widespread loss of mutants, a widespread loss of telepaths, primarily the more powerful ones.

But, how would that work with the Scarlet Witch, you say? I say, why does it have to be her behind it at all? How about Jamie Braddock, Junior, the brother of Psylocke and Captain Britain? He can warp reality, and the X-books have been hinting at something big coming up with him anyway, so why not move it up a bit? He could be trying to make a perfect world by, I don't know, altering the reality within people's minds, altering their perceptions, and thus that alters reality (mind over matter I suppose). Telepaths could either be extraordinarily sensitive to it causing their minds to collapse from seeing all these different minds perceiving a "perfect" reality, or they could be a threat to the plan, by using their abilities to reassert the "true" reality in people's minds. Though I would have to demand that he wear some freaking pants, please! Sorry ladies.

For that matter, what about The Sentry? It's already been established that he has psychic abilities powerful enough to make the entire world forget about him, and to a certain extent seems to be able to alter the way things are to suit what he believes them to be. Hell, use him for that, it'd make him a lot more interesting than he is currently. Oh, I'm sorry, I guess that would be The Void, that would do something like that. Whatever, six of one, half-dozen of the other.

I know that they did this in Earth X, where the Skull's telepathic abilities manifested, and at that moment, every telepath died. I'm not suggesting that, but I think on a lesser scale it would work in a situation where there was a reason for it (namely, telepaths interfering with some crazy/evil person's plan to make the world the way they want it, as opposed to Wanda just concluding mutants are the problem with everything, so she wipes them out, except for the ones Dr. Strange protected, and oh yeah, a few others for some reason or the other), that many of the more powerful telepaths would be removed from the board, so to speak.

The way I figure it, the top-level ones probably have their minds in other peoples' minds pretty much constantly. Just a little bit, and they probably aren't even aware of it. The more powerful the mind, the more minds they're in. It just a unconscious relaxation, letting their minds flow a bit. So if the reality altering occurred quickly, which would be prudent, a telepath could be subjected to multiple realities before they knew what was going on, doing severe damage to their sanity. That leaves them as less of an immediate threat, but a prudent evildoer would still eliminate them, just so they don't pull themselves together and mess things up later. Man, that sounded a lot better when I thought it up. Irregardless. . .

Granted I'm biased, as I'm just really sick of telepaths, and the idea of them bothers me, but I still think that done right (and isn't that always the caveat?), it would be much better than what actually took place. Honestly, the number of telepaths in the Marvel Universe is pretty ridiculous, especially in relation to overall numbers of mutants. It seems like you wouldn't be able to walk down the street there without bumping into one. And there doesn't seem to be any real reason genetically why that's how it is, which could be due to the lack of clarity when it comes to what's behind the X-gene and how powers are transmitted to children (discussed in earlier posts here and here) . And in nature, there are occasional catastrophes, that cause extinctions specific to certain types of organisms, while sparing others. For example, if a meteor hits a planet, and throws lots of dust in the air, competitive advantage goes to beings lower to the ground, where there's less soot, and more clean air. Likewise, if someone is altering the perceptions of every person on the planet, with the alteration perhaps changing from person to person, it's probably better to not have part of your mind in other people's minds.

Of course it would never happen. Too many telepaths are high-profile in Marvel, and like I mentioned a few days ago, Cable is one of Avi Arad's favorite characters, while also being possibly the most powerful telepath actually moving around right now, given Jean Grey seems to be incapacitated - not dead! never dead! - at the moment, and Xavier's nowhere to be seen. For the record, I devised a potential way for Cable to dodge it, one I think could be exclusive to Cable, and would work with the current plot of his book, so I have that base covered.

Oh yeah, and afterwards, there actually would be fewer mutant books like Joey Q said there would be, instead of just fewer mutants.

What can I say? I like to play "What If?".