You asked for it! The Psylocke thread

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DungeonmasterJim
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You asked for it! The Psylocke thread

Post by DungeonmasterJim »

Quoting Dennis's question about Pyslocke:

I'm interested in Mr Davis' opinion about what happened to the character Psylocke as he was with her in the very beginning.
Can you tell us what you think of her change from wholesome upper class English girl into ninja death wench?

Dennis
For my own tastes, I always like armored Pyslocke the best. Otherwise, the character is only mildly interesting to me.

Give me Rachel Summers I say! :P

DM Jim[/quote]
MiG

Post by MiG »

Couldn't agree with you more, Jim. When she became that "ninja" thingy I lost all interest in her. She had character back when she was first introduced onto the scene but after the transformation she became one with the teeth gritting, t&a flashing non- entities with no personality whatsoever. Besides, Mr Davis has always drawn beautiful women and she was no exception and I by far prefer his version over any of the following ones.

One of his great advantages is that the characters always seem to be alive when I look at them which apparently most comic artists have a problem to achieve. There's a few others who can but mostly I think they look rather stiff and posing all the time. That's why I loved Excalibur when it came out, wonderful drawings full of life and actually a fun script too as opposed to X- Men which I've never found being fun at all joke- wise. So my guess is that Mr Davis was the one with the sense of humor when the Excalibur series was written because Claremont have never managed to amuse me. Come to that, Psylocke should've been with Excalibur instead, that way she might've avoided that dreadful transformation and been allowed to stay interesting
Alan Davis
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Post by Alan Davis »

I have no idea exactly why Betsy/Psylocke was changed. Her transformation into an oriental (No one at Marvel was ever able to give a definite ethnicity) Elektra clone removed any connection to her original incarnation so she may as well have been a totally new character. In Captain Britain, Betsy was established as the perhaps cliché British Lady heroine whose poise, frills and decorum hid a capable and dangerous ‘strong’ female— not unlike Purdey in the New Avengers TV series or Lady Penelope in Thunderbirds. Her costume and attitude in X-men was supposed to play to that conceit and to be a deliberately uncomfortable fit. Sadly, the idea of character diversity has been lost to homogenization and the notion all characters must be sexy or ‘kewl’.

Alan
ZenoArmani
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Post by ZenoArmani »

I definitely say an amen to that, if not quite for the same reasons. My problem has essentially always been that virtually all female Marvel characters have been portrayed as vicious, arrogant, and patently unlikeable, essentially turning into 'bad guys' who for some unfathomable reason still do good, regardless what they started out as. Spider-Woman now kills a few hundred Hydra agents whenever she needs to went or for fun. Go figure.

Then again it's almost as prevalent among the men. Essentially everyone has to have an enormous kill track, or they're not 'realistic' enough (which of course seems like a redundant concern in books where the laws of physics are non-existent). I thought the recent "Civil War" crossover had an interesting premise, but intentionally skipped around the most important aspect. Rather than incompetent crime-fighters, the big concern should be the mass-murdering psychopaths who set themselves up as jury, judge and carriers of the final sentence, no 'reasonable doubt' whatsoever, while self-titling themselves 'heroes'.
Captain 616
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Post by Captain 616 »

Alan Davis wrote:I have no idea exactly why Betsy/Psylocke was changed. Her transformation into an oriental (No one at Marvel was ever able to give a definite ethnicity) Elektra clone removed any connection to her original incarnation so she may as well have been a totally new character. In Captain Britain, Betsy was established as the perhaps cliché British Lady heroine whose poise, frills and decorum hid a capable and dangerous ‘strong’ female— not unlike Purdey in the New Avengers TV series or Lady Penelope in Thunderbirds. Her costume and attitude in X-men was supposed to play to that conceit and to be a deliberately uncomfortable fit. Sadly, the idea of character diversity has been lost to homogenization and the notion all characters must be sexy or ‘kewl’.

Alan
I think that initially the story Chris Claremont came up with of Betsy being given the opportunity to become the 'warrior' she had maybe often wanted the chance to be in X-Men was fair enough, as a concept. It's a classic 'be careful what you wish for, little girl' kind of scenario. :lol: As with all of the X-Men who had been through changes as a result of crossing through the Siege Perilous it was quite genuinely interesting to see these alternate takes on the characters.

I think what I object to is that, as with all those other characters, the change was never meant to permanent. All the other X-Men eventually returned to some semblance of normal, but Betsy did not. Whether it was Jim Lee's redesign just being popular, or his insistence she stayed that way, I honestly couldn't say. But it does seem odd that she is the only X-Man to have suffered a permanent change.

And then there was the whole Kwannon/Revanche complication, which is a whole other can of worms. The 'homogenization' as you put it was definitely something which put me off a lot of characters in the 90s.

I understand that when Chris Claremont recently brought Psylocke back from the dead he had wanted to do that in her British body, but the editors had said no. As you were working with Chris around that time you might know more than us as to how much truth there was in that rumour.

Either way I think it's very sad. I personally think that the ninja vibe Psylocke has very much run its course. To me it's stuck in a creative rut these days, and I personally think a return to her original body would have been both far more interesting creatively, and also given plenty more options for future development of the character.
Matt Platis
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Post by Matt Platis »

I liked the original Psylocke best.
~Matt
Vyrt
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Post by Vyrt »

Betsy's finest hour was when she was taking on Sabretooth in the X Mansion. She looked everybit the English rose but showed her grit and determination throughout.
Bring back the original Betsy Braddock and let's have no more of this ninja foolishness.
Paulo Pereira
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Post by Paulo Pereira »

I also disliked the change to Betsy. I think it would've worked as a temporary thing, but making it the status quo just sort of ruined the character. However, I of course loved here appearance in EXCALIBUR #'s 55 & 56. Alan somehow managed to characterize her as the old Betsy while staying true to the new look.
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Post by Paulo Pereira »

Betsy's finest hour was when she was taking on Sabretooth in the X Mansion. She looked everybit the English rose but showed her grit and determination throughout.
Well said, Vyrt. And I'm sure a lot of readers were wondering why this Alan Davis fellow wasn't the regular penciler of X-Men at the time.
Vyrt
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Post by Vyrt »

Paulo Pereira wrote:
Betsy's finest hour was when she was taking on Sabretooth in the X Mansion. She looked everybit the English rose but showed her grit and determination throughout.
Well said, Vyrt. And I'm sure a lot of readers were wondering why this Alan Davis fellow wasn't the regular penciler of X-Men at the time.
I think Alan was doing a lot of annuals around that time too so I can understand why he couldn't take on the regular penciller chores.
I used to love the stand alone annuals that Marvel produced way back when, and then they started linking every annual to try to get people to buy all of them. The Serpent Crown was a prime example of this. At the time I bought Avengers, X-Men and a couple of others and there was no way I was going to be drawn in and persuaded to buy a load of other annuals for the sake of what was a prettty crappy story anyway.
Sorry I strayed off topic there. I do apologise.
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