An All-New X-FORCE blasts into the All-New Marvel Now this week.
Here’s the team breakdown from writer Si Spurrier (X-Men Legacy) breaks from Marvel.com starting with the time-traveling one-man mutant militia known as Cable:
“Cable. As in, the extraordinarily deadly grizzled old war dog and fancier of enormoguns. Slightly grimmer than the proverbial reaper.”
Elizabeth Braddock has evolved in previous X-Force volumes but how does Spurrier see Psylocke and her twisted ex Fantomex:
“Psylocke. Everyone’s favorite British aristocratic psi-warrior transplanted into the body of a nin-ja. Trying her best to quit killing. Not doing very well.
Fantomex. That faux-French buckler of swashes, seducer of all and liberator of other-people’s-property. Smug at a genetic level.”
And then there’s the real surprise: Marrow the Morlock able to pull bones from her body to use her weapons.
“Marrow. The C-lister time forgot. Damaged, crazier than a shark’s shoe, more [expletive]-kickingly awesome than a unicorn made of whisky and explosions.”
Marrow is one of my least favorite X-Men but given what Spurrier did with Legion in X-Men Legacy I’m intrigued to give Sarah another shot:
“It’s funny: one question I get asked quite a lot at conventions relates to bringing back lesser-known characters. Please do more with X, thanks so much for that Y cameo, I’ll literally give you money if you give a speaking part to Z, etc. Every Marvel fan has their own curious favorites—me as much as anyone—and part of the joy of my job is to try and elevate really cool but not-A-list characters into the positions they deserve.
Marrow’s one of those characters—like Chamber and, I know I know I know, Maggott—I’ve always had a weird fascination with. I never really got the opportunity to think about the “why”—what it is about the list of ingredients that make-up that character which make me feel she should be more popular than she is, in defiance of the mass-mind—until X-FORCE came along. She just slotted into place as if this had always been the intention: like she’d just been ca-pering around on the edges of my attention in a holding-pattern, waiting for this opportunity.
She’s, well, she’s awesome. On the surface she seems to be servicing a vaguely familiar trope: a bit crazy, desperate to prove herself, full of pent-up violence. She’s the group’s Kara “Starbuck” Thrace, she’s our Tank Girl. Of course you look a little deeper and there’s a lot going on under the surface: she’s a [expletive]-up, a problem-kid, traumatized, damaged, desperately looking for a place to fit in and be useful. And she’s got a really visual and very unique power-set—which, by the way, is a term I absolutely despise.
You want to get a bit hifalutin’ about it? My feeling is that the best super-powers are not only cool and exciting and visual and different, but operate as subtle manifestations of character traits. In Marrow’s case: this is a character who keeps all her damage, all her bitterness and rage, locked-away and invisible just beneath her skin. And when it comes tearing out it’s used exclu-sively to keep people at arm’s length. We all know someone like that. They’re usually surrounded by people desperate to love them, but won’t let them.
Anyway, that’s the really longwinded way of saying I think Marrow’s been criminally over-looked as a serious, and seriously important character. And I’m aiming to change that.”
Watch for Cable and his new squad in X-Force #1 arriving Wednesday.
By Editor