Was Millar's X-Men Too Over the Top?

Millar wouldn't know the meaning of the word 'subtle' unless it smacked him in the head... er, I mean, tapped him gently on the shoulder.
 
jtg3885 said:
Everything of Millar's is over the top, honestly. Yes, this isn't the real world because you'll (hopefully) never run into a guy that can blow your head off with a laser-eyebeam or pop metal claws from his fists or anything in the real world. But I was under the impression that the Ultimate Universe was supposed to be more realistic. And if that was their goal, Millar destroyed it from the beginning. The technology, the way the government is portrayed, even how Magneto is able to assemble hundreds or thousands of mutants to his cause, in my mind, all unrealistic. I mean honestly, you're on a planet of nearly 8 billion people. Forget Sentinels, if you pissed regular people off enough, they could have loaded up a few nukes on a plane and turned the Savage Land into a giant crater. It just seemed like they were trying too hard to bring the mentality of the 60s and 70s into the present day, coupled with Millar's tendency to try and push his audience as far as possible to see what he can get away with.



So if say... a few Irish-American citizens blew up something, the public would be okay with the government saying, "The Irish are out to get us, so we're going to kill all the Irish in America before they can hurt you"?
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No, because we all know that Irish-Americans are just regular human beings who just happened to have weapons. For mutants, it's a different case because they are living weapons by themselves. Add a case about genetic mutation being linked to violent behavior (which I believe was an anti-mutant study brought up during early UXM) and the possibility of people being born that can potentially cause mass destruction and genocide by themselves, and you've got fodder for government propaganda against all mutants.

Also like I said the only well known organization of mutants during that time was the Brotherhood. The X-Men were only known by little since the X-Men themselves were hiding from Sentinels and they were still busy recruiting members. That is why they only halted the Sentinel project after the X-Men began doing heroics such as rescuing the President's daughter. The Ultimates became the more humane response towards superhuman and mutant threats, after the X-Men were able to gain public sympathy through their actions.

This is more similar in the lines of the how Americans saw the Japanese back in World War II, and how Americans perceived Iraq before they found out that there were no weapons of mass destruction. Majority supported it because they so the greater good, not realizing the depressing collateral damage and inhumanity it would cause, such as the poor kid who gets stepped on by a Sentinel back in the first UXM, or the thousands of innocent lives that were killed in Hiroshima and Iraq.

You have to realize that mutants showed up only recently in the Ultimate Universe in full force, and most people have no idea what they are really like except for what they see in the news. This is different from terrorist groups such as the Al Qaeda, since we already know from previous knowledge that Muslims do not normally behave that way. During the Brotherhood's reign of terror, the public is still forming their image about mutants, and Magneto's actions only worsened their reputation.
 
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cmdrjanjalani said:
This is different from terrorist groups such as the Al Qaeda, since we already know from previous knowledge that Muslims do not normally behave that way.
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Uh, we are talking about the people who fly planes into airplanes, offer $1 million dollar bounties to kill cartoonists, and cause massive riots over cartoons that result in property destruction and senseless loss of life, right? And don't give me the religion bull****. You don't see Christians of any denomination or degree of zealousness rioting because companies print shirts that say things like "Jesus Is A Homo" or "If Jesus comes back, we'll kill him again!"

Now that I'm thinking about it, I'm glad that we don't have Sentinel technology or there'd be Muslim-shaped splat marks all over the Middle East right now and I doubt the American public would be too pissed about it.
 
Uh, we are talking about the people who fly planes into airplanes, offer $1 million dollar bounties to kill cartoonists, and cause massive riots over cartoons that result in property destruction and senseless loss of life, right? And don't give me the religion bull****. You don't see Christians of any denomination or degree of zealousness rioting because companies print shirts that say things like "Jesus Is A Homo" or "If Jesus comes back, we'll kill him again!"

Now that I'm thinking about it, I'm glad that we don't have Sentinel technology or there'd be Muslim-shaped splat marks all over the Middle East right now and I doubt the American public would be too pissed about it.
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HA!!! SO TRUE!
 
And don't give me the religion bull****. You don't see Christians of any denomination or degree of zealousness rioting because companies print shirts that say things like "Jesus Is A Homo" or "If Jesus comes back, we'll kill him again!"
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No, it's the christians that try to redefine the meaning of science.

Christianity is no better or worse than Islam.
 
Korinthian said:
No, it's the christians that try to redefine the meaning of science.
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Wow, you're reaching.

Stay on topic.
 
Korinthian said:
No, it's the christians that try to redefine the meaning of science.

Christianity is no better or worse than Islam.
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At least we know how to make airplanes avoid giant office towers.
 
Just noticed I put 'fly planes into airplanes'. That's it. No more arguing when half-asleep.

I'm half surprised I don't have someone up my butt over that one...

But yeah, if we haven't wiped out half the Middle East by now, I doubt America would support mass mutant extermination.
 
I'm actually pretty offended... Any chance J can get kicked off for good? I mean, GMaster is gone for calling someone a name but JTG's arrogance has once again offended many people. What's the basis?
 
Goodwill said:
I'm actually pretty offended... Any chance J can get kicked off for good? I mean, GMaster is gone for calling someone a name but JTG's arrogance has once again offended many people. What's the basis?
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GMaster was first banned for 2 Days for the name calling, not permanent. But he couldn't handle it and started to create multiple accounts, in which also had very unpleasant names, so that is why he has permanent banishment. As for JTG, the matter is still being dealt with.

So now let's get back to the topic of the thread.
 
(Not) speaking of "over the top", does anyone know what boundaries (if any) were set for the writers by Marvel?

"Make it more realistic" is pretty broad, after all.
 
Fair enough...

To kick start this bad boy, I'll throw in another two bits.

Millar is all for blockbuster hits... Even at the expence of such important things as characterization and reality. The Ultimate Universe was founded on the idea that the famous (and infamous) Marvel characters could live and interact in modern societ just as they did in the 1960's. The Ultimate Universe was also founded on the idea that character's had opportunity in this universe. The UU was a fresh start... But with Millar, I'm not so sure about that. For the whole concept, Millar wrote pretty 616 plots for the Ultimate X-Men, not saying I didn't enjoy them. He was off the wall and, in many cases, further out of reality than 616 had ever gone. I mean a machine that had every single mutant power in its very body? Characters showing up to remove bombs implanted in other characters heads to wrap up an arc? Yeah, he stretched everything too thing in my opinion... I don't really like his writing, although it is enjoyable when he doesn't show off how stupid some of his ideas can be (Most recently in UFF with the Johnny/Moonshine deal). Also, I don't like how he interprets American politics... Sometimes he can be scathing and annoying about it.
 
Well, how the hell could this get any more realistic? Any more and this is will turn out to be nothing but actual real life! That's how you guys are putting it to be. Yes, realism is being thrown in the mix, but realism can only go so far, ESPECIALLY in a comic book!
 
Yes, I understand that this is a comic and there will be a point where reality needs to be altered in order to make it more appealing in a comic book. That's why we gave Peter Parker the ability to shoot webs and scale walls after being bitten by a radioactive spider. That's why there are mutants in the first place... No offense, but I hardly think anyone would want to read a title a band of homosexuals literally fighting for their rights. Not if they can't fly or shoot lasers out of their eyes, anyway. The problem with Millar, though, is that there is no grey area - there's either the heavy politics (Observe the Ultimates and even what he'll be writing in Civil War) and then there's off the wall, dumbed down ideas that litter what we consider now as a smart comic. Warren Ellis had a scientific explanation for the Fantastic Four and even the N-Zone, but Millar on the other hand does these peculiar things without any real thought and leaves it... A time machine now, huh? Why couldn't Beast have thought about that? Perhaps he could've saved himself the embarassment of letting the Brotherhood know Magneto was still kicking. Perhaps Xavier WILL use the time machine and get his ability to walk back. Nice.
 
Religion is an evil topic, boys and girls.

Now, the only way you could get a realistic comic is if it was something like Law and Order or a show like that.
 
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