Salutations, X-Fans!
Last week we reached the conclusion of another Volume which, if you've been noting the pattern, can mean only one thing: a break week before the next adventure + a new topic of X-Talk --the conversation which began as a place to share what speaks to me about the X-Men movies, though has grown into a locale to discuss a broader manner of things-on-my-mind-about X-Men! As you can see from the header, this time we're talking "Mutant Cinematic Universe", though not in the way you might be expecting. This is not a personal projection of how things could look once mutants are intro'd into the Marvel Cinematic Universe, this is a fun imagination of What If...? they already had been!
Instead of a Marvel Cinematic Universe previously without mutants, this is one exclusively with, hence "Mutant Cinematic Universe"!
So we're going to take a few of the existing movies and explore them anew!
Beginning with the one I thought of first: Ant-Man.
Ant-Man is a heist movie. So imagine instead of Scott Lang donning the suit to recover the Yellow Jacket suit, it's Jean Grey making use of her mutant abilities!
In an early comic, Jean can be seen using her telekinesis in a lock picking fashion:
Uncanny X-Men # 16
Imagine how she could also use her telepathy to gain access codes, or make security personnel move off site, or unable to see her walking right past like how Jean made herself and others appear invisible to probing eyes in the X-Men: Apocalypse movie.
What I particularly like about this idea besides the fun of it, is how it would showcase Jean's powers in a more precise, smaller scale manner than the intense displays of power I think one might typically associate with her and her type of powers.
Next we'll have Cyclops as the -figurative- Iron Man of this new CU.
Cyclops works as that one person that anchors everything. He even turned the phrase
in a recent comic "I am the X-Men". Though for this, I like him with his less showy side.
He'd be like Tony Stark in the anchoring sense, the foundation and through-character, yet we'd have the subversion of Cyclops being a reticent, committed individual. Ladies may well find him a hunk, but his desires lie singularly elsewhere.
Then we have the powers.
Stark manages a lot with beams, tech and intelligence.
We know Cyclops has his own gifted mind, and who else can do so well with beams,
but the one who can't turn his off?
We could see Cyclops do practically anything with them; offensive, defensive --he could
be technically flying around by using his beam against things to maneuver.
Of course he'll be executing exciting trick shots! There is tech in his visor but the angles are all him.
I just love the idea of a scene drawing attention to that.
Someone assuming the trick shot he pulled off was made with computer calculations and targeting software --while Cyclops just stares at the person, someone like, say, Jean, would clarify: "Actually, that was just Scott."
It's also interesting to consider his character in the context of Civil War, given Cyclops has the intelligence of Tony Stark (different intelligences, but still) and the upstanding disposition of Captain America. So he's like the two that face-off against each other, but in one man, in certain respects.
Which brings us to Captain America.
War / Spy movies. Hand-to-hand combat.
Gotta' be Wolverine.
They also both have catch phrases. Captain America "could do this all day".
Wolverine is "the best at what he does. And what he does isn't very nice."
Which gives us another fun subversion as instead of Mr. Morals, we have Berzerker.
But both are men removed from time; older than they appear. Wolverine is authentically older, while Captain America is technically so. Captain America has to catch up, while Wolverine has seen it all.
There's enough similarity there that I think Wolverine could totally work as the "Captain America" of the "Mutant Cinematic Universe", while enough difference that, as with Cyclops taking Iron Man's spot, it would be a fresh movie (as opposed to how I see Jean Grey
in the Ant-Man heists working more as a character swap within the same premise).
Also, if we're setting Cyclops up as the MutantCU's equivalent of Iron Man, and Wolverine as the equiv. of Cap, then Civil War still happens on similar terms.
Although, of course, with a title change. .
. .Scism!
As with the Civil War movie being more its own thing than a reflection of the Civil War in the comics, this Scism would be different besides the dynamic of Cyclops VS. Wolverine.
I haven't thought out mutant inserts for all the Marvel Cinematic Universe characters, although I did have one more thought relating to Dr. Strange: I'd like to see Cyclops in Kamar-Taj.
The description the Ancient One gives on magic being borrowed energy from other dimensions, brings to mind that second explanation* for Cyclops' powers: that his
eyes are portals to another dimension of endless energy.
So I think it could be a fun movie playing with that as if Cyclops already has some magical connection.
*Those who've read Envisionings Vol.#2 know that's not the explanation I'm working with! I much prefer the original, more physiological explanation. That Cyclops' body metabolizes photon energy that he's then able to exude through his eyes. I mean, Iceman's ice powers aren't because his body is a portal to an ice dimension! ; )
Finally, Storm would take on the mantle of Black Panther. As with Cyclops, this would be figurative, as Storm is a force to be reckoned with all her own. Imagine her as the Queen of Wakanda and just imagine her combating Namor's forces of natural disaster with her own prowess of nature!
And that's the just-in-good-fun "Mutant Cinematic Universe" I have so far, X-Fans! I welcome any of your own "mutant insert reimaginings" of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, and never forget:
Keep Envisioning, Envisioneers!
~
👓Cychtra🧬