Saturday, January 20, 2024

Captain Britain Wields Psi-knife in X-Men Unlimited Infinity Comic #127


X-Men Unlimited Infinity Comic #127
Written by: Steve Orlando, Steve Foxe
Published: February 19, 2024


Category: , , ,

18 comments:

randybear said...

I think Betsy should also be Psylocke. There are multiple Wolverines, SpiderMen, and tons of red headed mutants that look and have powers similar to Jean's.

Also both characters have their bases it wouldn't take from either and people would have their pick.

Enough of this CB rubbish

January 20, 2024 at 8:03 PM
House Braddock said...

Foxe says he has about 7 issues worth of Captain Britain material, that’s roughly 13 weeks of Betsy incoming!

January 20, 2024 at 8:03 PM
Daud Rotama said...

Betsy as Captain Britain is not the problem. Kannon as Psylocke is also not the problem. It's the corporate mandate that lost sight of what mutant metaphor is all about that everyone needs to blame. Other than that, in the future I'd love to see Kannon as more of an empath (with her name being fixed into its correct spelling and her using just her name alone, not Psylocke anymore) while Betsy uses more of her psychic powers (and reusing the name Psylocke for, like, secret missions of some sort).

January 21, 2024 at 2:03 AM
Nate X said...

But Betsy as Captain Britain is the issue. Captain Britain doesn't sell. No one really cares about Captain Britain and the Arthurian stuff. It just doesn't click in X-Men comics. Betsy as CB means she will be stuck in comic book limbo for months, becoming more and more irrelevant because the general public just doesn't care about it.

January 21, 2024 at 2:26 AM
Daud Rotama said...

...what comic still sells like hotcakes in this decade anyway? Sorry for sounding nihilistic, but most comic book readers who are fans of the X-Men today will just be the fans who grew up with them and less the people who just recently discovered them. They're not in the movies yet, or animated shows, so truly to me complaining about how Betsy will be in comic book limbo simply means...nothing. Once she's promoted to the movies, that's when there's gonna be a push to the larger part of general public. Now? Let her be Captain Britain; just need her not to abandon her original codename.

January 21, 2024 at 5:40 AM
X-Man said...

Eh I disagree @Daud.

I think possibly if she had become Captain Britain, but got to wear whatever costume she wanted and had been confident from the beginning then possibly.

The problem is while some did enjoy her (and Tini's version of her which they are more than welcome to), CB for Betsy.. a lot associated with her being written terribly out of character.

Kwannon fares better as Psylocke in terms of she still was a ninja as Revanche, just was in Betsy's body. She also used psychic powers at the time (though they were Betsy's powers and Betsy retained then when Kwannon died, gaining her full telepathic strength back).

Even Kwannon makes no sense wanting that codename as many associate it with Betsy and Kwannon wants her own identity, just like many associate CB with Brian, and makes no sense Betsy wants CB when trying to also forge her own identity. I rather Betsy had gotten the sword and became Captain Avalon if anything.

I think overall CB hurt Betsy. Jordan White basically admitted this and based on the overall overwhelmingly positive reaction to seeing Betsy in her Dissembled Psylocke gear (and this isn't even "Asian ninja Psylocke as a lot kept saying that is all we wanted), it imho supports this because they associate that Betsy as someone who was capable and a Bada$$.

I'm sure CB is great, but imo not for someone with Betsy's personality. She's never been the "Superman" type (more Batman i guess lol), and so it just seems off watching them try to force her personality to match it .

Even the Cerebro cast guy noted excitedly (during when Betsy was taking down Arthur I think without the CB powers), that we now saw that underneath how she was acting for her new job as CB, we saw the "Real Betsy" was still there underneath.

But see to me him saying that imo just proved what we had all been saying, that Betsy was being written extremely out of character. He was trying to explain that it was on purpose due to her CB obligations.

That may make sense, but the readers still have to read "out of character" Betsy for the majority of the time.

It'd be like Storm deciding the best way to defeat a group of men is to flirt all the time like Emma would, it may make sense storyline wise, but no one is going to want to see Storm with that personality all the time, even if we know its fake and the "real Storm" is underneath there.

The same thing with Betsy and CB for me.

So for those reasons, I do think CB really is a problem for her. Especially if it continues to isolate her from the rest of the team/friends. Betsy hardly was even on Krakoa lol. Always in Otherworld smh lol.

Anyway sorry for the long post. But hopefully Betsy has great stuff coming up that all her fans will enjoy.

January 21, 2024 at 10:55 AM
X-Man said...

It depends on how she's written. The only way any changes happen is by being vocal (and sales I guess) imho.

I truly believe that is how she still has her butterfly & knife.

Isn't this like a digital only comic though? Or did I misinterpret that?

If so, I'm not really stressing this one either way lol.

Just gonna cross my fingers for good Betsy stuff.

January 21, 2024 at 11:15 AM
Rahsaan said...

I agree with what many of you have said regarding Captain Britain and the Arthurian lore. It makes my eyes glaze every time. And while I live seeing the focused totality of Elizabeth’s telepathic power in that image above, that Union Jack armor kinda clashed with it. 😅

Daud is accurate though regarding sales. Comic book sales in general across all genres and publishers are abysmal. My comic book dealer recently expressed to me on the adversities he faces making a profit with a brick and mortar store, because hardly anyone is buying. He credits it to online media like Substack. Personally speaking, I find it to be largely boredom with the content. I find I get much more enjoyment and mental stimulation from reading a science-fiction novel or other fiction novels than I do comic books at this point. Especially, superhero ones. The writing by and large is better and I think the lack of images forces my imagination to engage in a way that comics don’t offer. Daud hit the nail directly on the head for me when they said that many of us are engaging still out of pure nostalgia. For me that seems to be true. That I’m having difficulty letting go completely of this media I used to love but now doesn’t seem to serve me much at all. I think I keep hanging on in hopes that something will reignite my former passion. Hickman’s House/Powers/Inferno did but nothing else has sine. Not even Immortal and Red which are the only books I can sometimes get through. I literally have a whole pile of X books that I keep trying to read but grow bored whenever I try. I’m currently stuck in the Sins of Sinister crossover and can’t get through it. And I can’t tell you the last time I watched any MCU content other than What If… (which I’m also growing bored of).

I think Marvel and DC may very well be nearing extinction. At least in the way that we know them.

January 21, 2024 at 2:24 PM
Rahsaan said...

And regarding science-fiction film and television, I find that way more interesting than the MCU. For example, I’d much rather watch shows like Foundation, Stranger Things, Invasion than the MCU or DC superhero content. I think a lot of the redundancy of the genre is why people are checking out in droves. It’s kinda sad for me as an X-Men reader going back to the late 80s. The one silver lining is that I finally do walk away for good, my pockets will thank me.

January 21, 2024 at 2:33 PM
Nate X said...

@Daud X-Men, Immortal X-Men, X-Men, and X-Force continue to perform well, evident by their sustained publication beyond just five issues, unlike the Captain Britain series. I personally prefer seeing Betsy associated with an X-Men comic, allowing us to read her adventures monthly. This is more appealing to me than having her as Captain Britain, potentially stuck in limbo, becoming irrelevant, and ultimately forgotten.

It's widely known that Disney movies or series don't significantly impact comic book sales; there's no substantial increase. Moreover, it's clear that in the MCU, Brian is set to be Captain Britain, not Betsy. Therefore, the argument about her movie promotion is irrelevant in this context.

We've endured four years of this. There hasn't been any positive outcome with Betsy as Captain Britain. It has only harmed the character in terms of exposure and characterization. This cumbersome mantle has done her no favors.

January 21, 2024 at 4:23 PM
randybear said...

You beat me to it. There are several xtitles that sell in the top 50 each month. CB #1 barely cracked the top 100 and quickly plummeted further down the charts with each issue. Comics don't sell well these days that's true but KoX and BBCB were massive failures on the sales charts.

January 21, 2024 at 7:32 PM
Daud Rotama said...

I actually wouldn't mind seeing Storm flirt with men, only to show them who's the boss. That image is kinda funny. But, yeah, I understand your points. I also want to read more stories of Betsy in the coming years. I don't know when did she become my favorite character, but she is just so fascinating to me. The idea that you could take down enemies mentally while not even needing to step too close to them...Jean wishes!

January 22, 2024 at 12:27 AM
Daud Rotama said...

Hot take, I think the psychic knife should stuck with Kannon. I like Betsy's psychic sword much better. Also, it would be really cool to separate their powerset even further if Betsy's psychic sword is the one that cannot harm people physically but can fvck you up mentally when she uses it on you. Meanwhile, Kannon's knife should be able to hurt physically because it'll be kind of an evolution to her latent empathic abilities. I remember when Jenny Ransom (in the original Genosha storyline) was described as an empath and the Genegineer said that they would modify her mutant powers into cutting stones instead of emotions. Something along that line.

January 22, 2024 at 12:33 AM
Daud Rotama said...

Thank you for agreeing with me. I feel that the only way to solve such problem is to, somehow, integrate digital medium of selling comics into stores that still sell books and comics physically...but then again I think that's already being done by many places and, well, people will just buy what they've already liked I guess.

January 22, 2024 at 12:36 AM
Daud Rotama said...

It's crazy because superhero comics used to and still are including science fiction-y elements to their stories/events. However, maybe it's because they're superhero comics that they just have to get super complicated with the superheroism stuff? Idk.

January 22, 2024 at 12:39 AM
Daud Rotama said...

I think Knights of X and Betsy Braddock: Captain Britain failed commercially partly caused by the poor reception to the relationship of both Betsy and Rachel too. I mean, I remember seeing an article online about how the pairing doesn't make sense, and obviously there were specific publications that leaned into the conservativism of it all (homophobia, sexism, etc.). The story of each series was interesting, but the Otherworld stuff was not everyone's favorite stuff. I also didn't care about it that much.

January 22, 2024 at 12:44 AM
Kiki M. Ishola said...

The psychic knife can only make Captain Kettle somewhat of a fierce Betsy badass. It's a memorabilia of how good Betsy used to be as Psylocke. And since Marvel keeps refusing Betsy her heritage the sales will keep nosediving. Your example with real Storms and Wolverines hits home with Betsy and Psylocke cause she took a Mojo mockery of a name and turned it into a brand name with her personality and courage.

Revanche got nothing to do with the Psylocke legacy she just was an image tweak on Betsy's wholesome character. Revanche only brought the ninja baggage into Betsy's life without which she could still thrive taking notes by her hot Disassembled return.

January 22, 2024 at 3:24 PM
randybear said...

Agreed. What made Betsy interesting as a ninja was the contrast between what she could and wanted to do versus her outward appearance and demeanor. Now Psylocke is just a stoic ninja. Cool. 😎

January 22, 2024 at 5:54 PM

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