Kamala Khan Gets…Genus Swapped?

The world of comics continues to get more and more confusing lately. It seems when Disney took over Marvel and LucasFilm everything went to crazy and this latest bit of news is no different.

They’re genus swapping Ms. Marvel.

When Disney bought Marvel due to the success of Marvel Studios and wanting to have content for their Disney+ streaming service, they ran into a problem. Back when Marvel was desperate for cash they sold movie rights to a number of different studios. One of them was the X-Men, who went to Twentieth Century Fox, with mixed results. Some movies were good, some were bad, and that included two failed attempts to adapt the “Phoenix Saga” rather close together. That meant Disney couldn’t make X-Films and not wanting to promote something that benefited a rival (they would make a deal with Sony) someone had a “brilliant” idea. By “brilliant” I actually mean “rock stupid”. “I know, let’s use those Inhumans and make them the mutants and what they stand for thematically and tone down the mutants. This was not well received for what would be obvious reasons if you cared about the property you own, and Disney doesn’t because comics are only good for making TV and movie fodder without having to create something new and actually put effort and trust into something.

Now that Disney owns Fox and the rights to the mutant side of the Marvel universe in movie form are back with them, the fans are itching to see mutants in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, despite what the MCU has become as new creators seem to care even less about the comics or continuity or shared universes or good content. And since only two Inhumans made it out of the comics past a certain movie, one of them is about to become a mutant. Yes, they’re changing Kamala Khan, aka Ms. Marvel, into a mutant. Let’s track this stupidity.

As I said, the reason is obvious. Remember The Inhumans ? Because Disney wishes you didn’t. The film was a total failure. Not only did the concept as presented raise way too many questions about where these supposed immortal saviors of Earth were during the various invasion of the Avengers movies (aliens, robots, aliens again) but nobody really liked the story. I haven’t seen it but I haven’t seen a lot of praise for it outside of the usual suspects who like anything with a gay person or non-white character in it. Because why should they be characters people like. No, just being there should be enough no matter how much the story sucks because it’s not like they care about the story or good characters. Sorry, gay black men, but you don’t need to have GOOD stories about you. Just be happy they exist at all. Don’t be a gay black Oliver Twist.

So the movie failed, and Disney wanted to sweep them under the rug. This became a problem when they wanted to appease the Muslim community with their only well known superhero, Ms. Marvel. No, I don’t believe she’s the first Muslim superhero, even in the Marvel Universe. I’m pretty sure there was already a Muslim member of one of the X-groups but Google is flooded with websites insisting she’s the first and the Marvel Database has a list so long that trying to go through it all would make this article late, and I’m already behind my personal schedule. So I could be wrong but at the very least she’s the first with her own ongoing series, if not her first solo title. However, much of her “success” comes from those who celebrate her religion and the fact that she’s a huge superhero fangirl, both of which being how she was sold to the Marvel readership. Either way, of course she was getting her own show.

In the comics a burst of the Terrigen mists, the source of the Inhumans’  inhumanity and gifts, got loose into the world. Spreading across the planet various people were turned into Inhumans, one of them being Kamala Khan. She gained the ability to “embiggen” her limbs into a stretchy state (not as malleable as Mister Fantastic, she mostly just stretches her limbs and makes her fists really big) and could even shapeshift under certain conditions. This all changed in the webseries and before you yell at me I call her show a webseries because Disney+ is on the internet, not a TV network, though the show will be airing on ABC thanks to the current writer and actor strikes plus the upcoming MCU team-up of the Ms. and Captain Marvels of comics. It doesn’t matter if the three stars of The Marvels weren’t all using the Marvel name in the MCU, like Monica Rambeau, Captain Marvel in the comics only. At any rate the showrunners decided to ditch the comic’s powers in favor of a bracelet that created energy constructs or something, cutting any ties to the Inhumans, or rather the failed movie. Meanwhile she’s used her actual powers in various animated appearances like Marvel Rising and Spidey & His Amazing Friends.

Basically it’s all a mess. In the comics she’s an Inhuman with stretchy powers and in the MCU she’s just a girl with a strange, possibly alien bracelet, with a hint that she MIGHT be a mutant according to what I read about the season finale. This may mean the MCU plans to use her to introduce mutants into the MCU, making her really important to mutants in that continuity. The comics however do not reflect this and being the source material you’d think the show would try to reflect it. You’re apparently new here. I’ve mentioned more times than I can link to that Disney looks down on the comics because they’re so low on the media pecking order that exists in the Hollywood community. So the comics need to change for them, not the other way around.

And thus the recent death of Kamala Khan in the panned “What Did Peter Do?” story arc of the Spider-Man comics sees her killed off after the cancelation of her comic…which I’m sure will come back with a new #1 pretty soon given how Marvel currently operates. Change the creative team and suddenly it needs to relaunch. If they used the old volume system some Marvel titles would be in volume #100s by this point and the legacy numbers somewhere in the #1000s. All signs are pointing to Kamala being resurrected, but as a mutant. And by “all signs” I mean an actual press release.

Debuting in “Ms. Marvel: New Mutant”. Personally I don’t think it’s too bad. The bolt still references her favorite hero, looks like an X-outfit, and they kept the scarf, but it’s not HER outfit.

Ever since Kamala Khan took up her mantle as Jersey City’s greatest hero, fans have come to know her as an Inhuman. A Champion. An Avenger. And now, for the first time ever, fans will know her as…an X-Man! This August, Ms. Marvel will return for her most pivotal and defining chapter yet, and it all kicks off with an all-new comic book series: MS. MARVEL: THE NEW MUTANT!

Announced exclusively by Entertainment Weekly, MS. MARVEL: THE NEW MUTANT will be a four-issue limited series co-written by Iman Vellani (Kamala Khan in Marvel Studios’ Ms. Marvel) and Sabir Pirzada (DARK WEB: MS. MARVEL), Marvel Studios’ Ms. Marvel) and drawn by artists Carlos Gómez (ROGUE & GAMBIT) and Adam Gorham (STAR WARS: DARTH VADER). Covers will be drawn by Marvel legend Sara Pichelli, known for her stunning and acclaimed work on titles such as ULTIMATE SPIDER-MAN.

Having the actress who plays Kamala in the live-action works (bet the voice actors from the various cartoons aren’t getting that deal) is clearly stunt casting. There have been a rash of celebs making their own comics lately, but in most cases (JJ Abrams and his son doing a Spider-Man story aside) those were indie project of varying quality. This an official actor doing an official book in continuity, though she will be working with a writer who has written the Ms. Marvel comics in the past.

“This was way scarier than joining the MCU for me,” Vellani told EW. “Those projects feel like they live in their own dimension, so I guess I can separate myself easier. But you can hold a comic book! I’ve never written anything before in my entire life, but I have read many comics, so I just wrote what I would want to read. I was given a very professional tool to write what is essentially my own fan fiction.”

“It was actually a very humbling experience to work with Iman, because she knows her comics even better than I do, and that is saying something,” Pirzada added. “She was throwing out references to specific comics that came out before either of us were born. She has a very great eye for what makes for a good sequence on the page as drawn by an artist. It was very impressive to me to see her throw out all these references to different artists that she’s been following through the years.”

This sounds like the usual spin pandering but as I recall the fact that Vellani was herself a huge Marvel fan already was something that was brought up when she was cast for the show. something the Marvel Studios producers now frown upon, as shown by recent comments by one of the producers that they only want people who have never heard of the comics. She got in just in time I guess. Knowing more about Marvel Comic history than people working at Marvel Comics is rather sad though.

After Kamala’s heroic sacrifice that saved the world in AMAZING SPIDER-MAN, Ms. Marvel’s tragic death sent heroes across the Marvel Universe in mourning. The Avengers, Spider-Man, Champions, and beyond came together to remember Kamala and Ms. Marvel’s life and legacy. But not all was as it seemed. Fans will finally start to learn the truth about Kamala’s mutant and Inhuman identity in the upcoming X-MEN: HELLFIRE GALA #1 one-shot later this month!

“I want to make it very, very clear that we are not reconning her Inhuman origin. That’s a part of Kamala’s identity that Marvel editorial and myself would very much like to keep and protect,” Vellani shared. “Our book will absolutely reflect all those core themes of identity that the Ms. Marvel comics have consistently explored — only now there’s a whole new label that Kamala has to learn to accept. It’s going to be pretty crazy.”

After being brought back via Krakoan Resurrection Technology, Kamala is shocked to learn she is mutant. But before she has a chance to come to terms with this revelation, the catastrophic FALL OF X will throw her world into chaos…and a secret mission on behalf of the X-Men.

Does that mean that they’re going to turn the Inhuman into a mutant and put her on the team? Given the whole fight between the X-Men and Inhumans when the mist got loose and Cyclops was worried the mist was a danger to mutants, I see that ending poorly. It won’t help Cyclops’ case given the current status of the mutant arm of the Marvel Universe, where they’re all hanging out on their own nation not doing much unless one of them wants to kill a bagger for using plastic. (Seriously, look up “Nature Girl” sometime.) He was also friends with her back during that time displacement nonsense and it would be a way to see his friend again given that mutants have cut themselves off from the world and Disney would love to go back to using mutants because they have the movie/TV/web rights and the Inhumans failed to make them money–due to a terrible story but nobody in Hollywood seems to understand that.

So I can see why this is happening but it doesn’t make it any less dumb. This is just property to them and it’s not surprising they don’t care enough about the comics or the people who made these characters popular enough to become movies and shows by their fandom to do them justice. The writers want to tell their stories, not the characters’ stories, and the studio just wants money and praise from their peers. Could we get good stories out of this? Perhaps, but it would be in spite of the studios and shenanigans, not because of them.