Some Gambit suggestions

I first became a fan of the X-Men in the early nineties. Along with a lot of you, it was because of the cartoon and the fantastic runs at the time by Fabian Nicieza and Scott Lobdell. And because of the timing, there were two characters I particularly liked. Wolverine and Gambit. And while Wolverine was the one that became the biggest character in the Marvel Universe, Remy LeBeau always stayed my favourite.

I honestly believe that Gambit is potentially one of the most interesting and complex characters in the Marvel universe. For a whole bunch of reasons. And while the last few attempts to launch Gambit as a solo title have involved concentrating on the adventurous side of his persona, with heists a-plenty, I think there’s a lot that hasn't been tapped into for years. In fact, I think it’s money left on the table.

So I thought I’d outline my thoughts on the character – why I find him interesting and why I think it could make for good stories. And also a defence for some of the most loathed aspects of the Gambit back-story that I think could be the basis for an enormously fun run.

The guilty hero

More than any other characters in the same universe, Remy hates himself. That’s absolutely key to his entire personality, and it dates back for decades by this point. And he pushes everyone else to hate him as well.

He’s been raised as a thief. He killed his wife’s brother in self defence. He unknowingly helped cause a massacre. He spent a long time aware that people thought he’d betray his closest friends. And he became Apocalypse’s horseman, Death.

Remy carries around an enormous amount of guilt. And it’s not deeply buried either. He’s constantly aware of it. As far as he’s concerned, he’s beyond redemption.

And yet… he still tries.  Still tries to do the right thing. Still tries to use what power he has to be a hero. In spite of the fact he knows, deep down, he can never atone.

On top of all of that, he’s a character who gets things wrong. He doesn’t just make mistakes, he’s always one moment of selfishness away from ruining everything. He’s completely, constantly, self-sabotaging, because he can’t deal with being happy. Because he doesn’t believe he deserves it.

His superpower is like a reverse Midas touch. He is capable of literally destroying anything he touches. Every relationship he has leads to people hating him – and if they don’t, he’ll do something that makes them stop trusting him.

But here’s the bit I really like. He doesn't realise any of this. Because, along with all of the guilt, he also has an enormous ego. He’s a show-off. And sometimes, he thinks he deserves more than he’s capable of. He looks at others who are loved with jealousy, and he feels the need to outdo them.

His ego veers wildly between non-existent and out of control. Moments of a need to be the centre of attention and moments where he can’t bear to be around anyone who knows him.

For me, this has some mental health connotations, and they’re part of what I think makes his character so rich and interesting. Whether he’s going through highs or lows, the person he’s damaging the most is himself, and his relationships with others.

If I was writing him, there’s something else I’d want to introduce as well. Gambit’s an addict, as far as I'm concerned. He’s a (former) smoker, and we've seen him go out of his way to drink in the past as well. He’s been enough of a flirt and a womaniser that the idea that he might be a sex addict doesn't seem unreasonable. And he’s absolutely an adrenaline junkie – he’s performed heists out of boredom before. And finally, of course, he’s a gambler.

If you could get away with it, I’d take it a step further. Have some substance addiction problems in the background. He’s got enough guilt tearing away at him already – why not have had him hit rock bottom a couple of times in the past? He’s managed to give it up, but by replacing it with other addictions. And this is all part of the reason nobody trusts him.

Remy’s lived. He’s been through it all, and he’s experienced highs and lows well beyond his years. He’s held down by his past, his weaknesses and his guilt. But even if he doesn’t believe redemption exists at the end of his path, he’s going to do his best to be a hero while he’s still here. And he’s good enough at what he does that he can do it with a huge amount of flair.

This is a character I want to read. This is a character I want to get to know. Hell, obviously, it’s a character I want to write. But I've only embellished on what’s been on the pages in the past a little – the vast majority of what I'm talking about here is text, not subtext. But we’re talking about a hugely conflicted, unpredictable character. One that I think could really be a lot more valuable to Marvel than they seem to believe at times.

The New Orleans War

Another millstone that’s perceived as being around Gambit’s neck is his background. And it’s easy to see why. He’s a very nineties character in a lot of ways. All trench-coat, long hair and stubble (and this informed far more of my nineties fashion choices than I’d like to admit). But even worse than that… the guilds.

If you’re not familiar with the background of the character, Gambit was an orphan, taken in by one of the criminal guilds that runs the underworld of New Orleans. Specifically, the thieves guild – the other being the assassins clan. He was due to marry the daughter of a major family in the clan, but he killed her brother in self-defence, pretty much guaranteeing the two families would continue to be at war.

It’s complicated, but nor has it been particularly fleshed out. It’s not attractive to new readers, and it’s separate to just about every other character.

But that doesn't mean it can’t be turned into a positive.

Two major criminal groups vying for control of the criminal underworld? That’s something that can be fleshed out. Each of them have their own traditions and histories? And there are families within that are battling as well?

I think there’s plenty of mileage in this. Game of Thrones that shit up. Let’s learn a little bit about who these families are, and let’s trust the readers to keep up. Because the point here is that the more complicated it is, and the more at each others throats everyone is, the more in the middle of the whole thing Remy is. And that’s before you get into how the upbringing has affected him.

Finely balanced battles can be fascinating – just look at the power struggles in shows like Breaking Bad. Make it very clear that the slightest advantage on either side can lead to utter destruction of the other.  Take it from a cold war to full-on hostilities. And in the middle of the whole thing, against his will, is Gambit. Having to play everyone against everyone, without getting himself killed.

But I’d go a step further. I’d introduce other groups in New Orleans – other clans and guilds that are struggling for power. Make sure that Gambit has to step carefully at all times.

And if you really want to shake things up? Bring in an outside element.

How about this? You have a truce meeting agreed between the clans and guilds. For the first time since Gambit’s marriage, there’s the opportunity of real peace in the area. Some of the higher-ups meet together in an hotel.

And then the hotel blows up. We don’t know who did it yet. But the clans and guilds blame each other, and it causes chaos. And in the middle of all of this, there’s a hostile group trying to take over. Wilson Fisk has seen the anarchy in New Orleans, and he sees an opportunity.

So, now, you have a situation where you have multiple factions and groups all against each other. Outright war in New Orleans. And right in the middle of all of it, you have Gambit – both in debt to everyone, but also playing everyone against everyone else, and just desperately trying to keep as many people alive as possible. When he fails, he deals with it badly.

But when he succeeds, when he plays people the right way, manipulating and chancing his way into forcing the right things to happen… he uses all of his darkest elements to show the hero that he can be.

What are your thoughts? Is Gambit a character that could be a player in the Marvel Universe? Do you have favourite Gambit moments? Would you be interested in my take on the character? Or do you think I've missed the mark? Let me know in comments or on twitter.

Black Mass review

Black Mass has been hyped quite a lot, not least as a return to form for Jonny Depp. But it’s also a story about one of Boston’s most notorious crimelords, and one within living memory at that – James “Whitey” Bulger only went on the run in 1995, after all.

So, to start with the biggest selling point – Jonny Depp is a magnetic presence throughout. But you never quite forget that you’re watching Jonny Depp. And that’s a problem. It’s as mannered a performance as he’s given in many other films, but usually, that matches the film better. Here, it’s Depp playing a real person, and that real person never convinces.

There’s a scene where he’s sitting at the kitchen table with Benedict Cumberbatch (who plays Whitey’s Senator brother), and this shows the difference between the two. Cumberbatch comes across as far more natural and believable. Depp is far more mannered and far less believable. 

However… you watch Depp. Your eyes are drawn to him. While it may not be great acting, it’s a hell of a performance.

That’s indicative of a larger problem with the film. It’s ultimately shallow. It’s very much “and then this happened, and then this happened, and then this happened”, and rarely slows down to find out what that means to anyone.

The best performance in the film by a country mile is Julianne Nicholson’s, and it’s squandered. She plays the wife of an FBI agent (Joel Edgerton) who grew up with Bulger, who sees the effects of the corruption of her husband. She plays it well and subtly, and was the only character in the movie that I ended up caring about. But she’s in about five scenes, and her story is played out in shorthand. It never feels like her story either – it’s there to enhance the men’s stories only.

This is what separates it from achieving the sort of connection that Goodfellas made. In that, the stories felt real and felt like they had real impact. We were made to care about the characters more, so as the degradation hits them, it matters to us.

In Black Mass, the film is so concerned about showing us what happened that it skips over taking the time to make us care about why it’s happening. That’s a scripting issue, and it may be one that’s occurred because it’s been hamstrung by having to keep close to what actually happened.

There’s an example of this in the opening, actually. The opening focuses on Kevin Weeks (Jesse Plemons, who you may remember as the creepy Todd from Breaking Bad) turning informant on Bulger. As a result, the first ten minutes are all about him, which make you think that the film is going to focus on him more throughout… but it’s not his story. He’s a background player in the film. But he’s a background player that took a large real life action, so he has to be there. In a film more removed from the recent past, he’d probably have been combined with another character (likely W Earl Brown’s portrayal of John Martorano), and the film probably would have been better for that.

All this said, the film’s actually pretty good. It’s brilliantly shot throughout – every fifth shot looks like it could have been the movie poster. And while I have issues with the plotting, almost every individual scene is fairly strong and giving some more-than-capable actors plenty to do.

The problem is that this could have been this generation’s Goodfellas, and clearly wants to be. But it falls short. It’s worth your time, absolutely, but I doubt it’ll stick in your mind years later.

Dentophobia - Fear of Dentists - #OctoboPhobia short story

The light is glaring into my eyes as I sit back in the chair, my mouth open, while the dentist prods and checks through my mouth.

“Okay, you’ve got a bit of an infection,” he says. “Just here…” He touches the end of the small metallic stick against it and a jolt of pain jumps through my mouth like electricity.

“Ah!” I say, involuntarily.

“You’re going to need a root canal,” he says, pulling his fingers away from my mouth and angling the light away from my face.

I’m relieved at the light being moved, but immediately apprehensive about the root canal. “I’ve heard they’re painful,” I tell him.

“They used to be” he says, looking at my x-rays. “Now, though, we can kill the infection before we extract the root, so it’s not as bad. Back in the day, they used to go ahead with it when it was at its most painful.”

“Oh,” I say, stupidly. I’m still nervous, the hairs on my arms rising.

I’m getting married next month, which is why I’m here. I promised her that I’d come and get the full check-up. Even though I’ve not been to the dentist since I was 16. I avoid them.

It’s easy enough to avoid, most of the time. For the most part, tooth pain doesn’t last. It’s more an irritating twinge, without serious pain. Even when it gets properly painful, a mixture of painkillers and alcohol not only usually helped, but they also meant that nights out were fun.

But I promised. We want the wedding photos to be perfect and she wants me – for just one day – to be perfect as well. So I’m here, proving just how much I love her.

Before I met her, I was a mess. Drinking every night to get through to the next day, and just going out of my head at the weekends on anything I could get my hands on.

And the women. I never thought I’d be able to be satisfied with one woman. Every night, if I wasn’t drinking, I was doing my best to make sure I woke up in someone else’s bed.  Most nights, I failed, but every now and then, I’d reach one of the few times I didn’t utterly loathe myself. Some I saw more than once, but most I never saw again. I just treated them like bodies. Warm bodies, with presumably some past and home life, but not ones I ever cared about.

But then her. The one least likely, with the quiet demeanour, the brain I could never match and even the daughter that I loved just as much. The one who made me change everything. Eventually. I’d strayed once or twice, but even that had fallen by the wayside. A few problems here or there, but I’d decided to make it work.

And eventually, that brought me here. I’d been given a family, and even if I didn’t want to come to the dentist, if Sarah asked me to, I did it.  

“How do you kill the infection?”

“It’s just an injection,” he said, picking up a syringe and readying it.

I tried not to think too much about it. My fear of needles was not playing well with the idea, but it was outperformed by my fear of a painful root canal.

“Then we do the root canal?”

`“No, that’ll need to be in a few days, while this takes hold. It’ll be fine though – you won’t even notice.”

“Okay,” I said, thinking of Sarah.

I open my mouth and look up at the ceiling, not looking at him hulking over me, reaching down into my mouth and pushing the needle into my gum, then pressing down on the plunger.

I know that the needle is something I should barely feel, although it pushes against the root of my tooth. I know that, but I feel the hardness of it, pushing unnaturally into my mouth.

“It won’t take long,” he says. And then he chuckles. A deep, dark chuckle.

I feel a prickling sensation spread across my face and I pass out.

I wake up, my head pounding. I try to move it, but I can’t. I can feel something against my chin and forehead keeping it still.

I’m sat down. I can feel that. I try to move my hands up to my head, but they are prevented by a large, thick leather strap on either armrest. It’s the same with my ankles.

As I struggle against them, I realise that there’s another strap – a larger one – wrapped across my waist.

“What the hell?” I try to say, but my words come out wrong. Like I can’t form letters, my tongue too big and clumsy for my mouth. “Whu hu hehh?”

“You really don’t remember me, do you?” He says from somewhere behind me. I try to turn, my eyes still taking in my grimy, dark surroundings.

“Iduhd….I duhndnuh…”

The wall is covered in something that look like egg containers, but black. Lots of them, covering from floor to ceiling.

“No reason you should, I suppose,” he says. His tone is conversational. He could be describing what’s gone wrong in the engine of his car.

“Wuh… wuh…”

“To you, I suppose, she was just a one night stand in some hotel somewhere. A one night willing fuck that wouldn’t leave you alone.”

“I… I duhn….”

“I wonder if that’s why you chose her. From watching you over the last few months, you have enough going on in your own house, with Sarah and little Lizzie. You don’t need another relationship, do you?”

“I.. inevuh….”

I can hear something metallic behind me, grinding against something else.

“I mean it’s all good for you, obviously. You get to have your fun and then walk away from it all.”

He walks in front of me, across to another table, but doesn’t make any eye contact with me. 

“Pluh….” I say.

“Maybe she told you her real name. Maybe not. It doesn’t really matter. Because she left me.”

“I dih… dihn” He starts rummaging around the table and the drawers next to it.

“But I found her again. And I made sure that she’d never do it again.”

“Nuh! Nuh! Pluhs!”

“And that just meant that I had to find you. This took a long time, you know.”

With his back to me, he makes a low, deep noise. I realise he is laughing.

I try to speak, and try to shout, but all I can make is grunting, incoherent noises.

He turns to me, the dental drill whirring.

“You’re underground. I had this room soundproofed, just waiting for you.”

He laughs again, it becoming more high pitched as he moves towards me, or maybe that’s just the whine of the drill.

“Don’t be afraid to scream.”

He moves the head of the drill against my tooth, and pushes down slowly. The vibration in my skull is as deep as the noise is high.

Somewhere I am screaming. Somewhere he is laughing. But the whine of the drill is all I can hear.

Decidophobia (fear of making decisions) - #Octobophobia short story

The announcement has been overdue for months.

“You’ve tested the radio,” The daughter says to her father.

“I’m testing it again,” The father replies.

The noise is irritating her and setting her off. “There hasn’t been anything for weeks. It’s broken.”

“The system’s down, that’s all. “

“It’s broken,” she says and walks away from the room.

The whirring of the generator and the static of the radio are too much for her. She goes to the area of the bunker that’s been cordoned off to give her some privacy and lays down on the campbed. She tries to think of somewhere else.

Anywhere else. Anywhere on the other side of the door.

She tries to sleep.

The father tinkers with the radio still and tries not to think about his wife. Tries not to think about everybody else.

The food won’t last forever. They both know that, but he has a more realistic idea of how much is left. He knows how quickly it will realistically work out. He hates to see her hungry, but if there’s one thing he can do while they’re stuck down here, it’s to keep her alive.

They don’t have much privacy or space, but they have some. They have some dividers for their own spaces, but they can always hear each other.  That’s the bit he finds the most difficult. They’re cut off from everyone else, but they are never entirely by themselves either. Instead, he knows that he irritates her now more than any human being ever has, even while he knows that she loves him.

He tries not to think of the door.

Slowly, he goes through every frequency on the radio, testing both ways. He repeats the phrases as he does and waits for responses.

Like he does every day. For months now.

The daughter eventually stands up and walks to the bunker door.

“What are you doing?” The father says to her.

“The radio’s broken,” she says. “We’ll go crazy if we’re down here.”

“What if it isn’t safe?” He says.

“Then we’ll… we’ll…”

“This is why we wait for the announcement.”

“What if the announcement never comes?”

The father doesn’t say anything. All his answers have fallen apart. They’ve been down here too long.

“We need to leave,” the daughter says, weeks later.

“We can’t,” the father replies.

“What do we have if we stay here?”

“What if it isn’t safe?”

“We don’t have a choice,” she says. “We’re running out of food.”

“No, we’re not,” he says. “There’s still enough.”

“We’re running out of options, then.”

“Then that’s enough to keep us alive.”

She nods. “Keep us alive, yes. But this isn’t living. This is just waiting. We don’t have a choice. We need to go outside and find out.”

“We might die if we do.”

“We will die if we don’t.”

She looks at the door. “It won’t take long,” she says.

“We cant,” says the father.

She walks up to the door. “We don’t have a choice.”

“Of course we do.”

“We don’t know how bad it is out there.”

She smiles sadly. “We may never know.”

The father pulls back, nervously.  He watches her for a moment, then sits at the table where they’ve been eating the same four meals for days.

“I know,” he says.

The daughter stops. Her hand just in front of the door handle. “Really?”

“Yes,” he says. “But if we go out… if the radiation is bad…”

“Wouldn’t you rather know?”

“…we can fix the radio.”

The daughter shouts now. “We’ve tried fixing the radio! We’ve been trying for weeks to fix the radio! There’s nothing!”

He hangs his head. “We should wait. We don’t have a choice.”

“There’s always a choice,” she says.

“But taking it may kill us,” the father responds.

She steels herself and then places her hand onto the door handle. The metal, like the door, like the walls, like the table, like the campbed, is cold.

“Don’t do it!”, the father shouts.

She holds her hand on the handle. All she needs to do is push down and then pull.

That’s all she needs to do.

But she hesitates.

TO OPEN THE DOOR CLICK HERE

TO WAIT CLICK HERE

OPENING (#Octobophobia Decidophobia ending)

She feels the heat first. The clouds are dark and heavy, with only the smallest fragments of daylight making it through.

“Come back in,” the father pleads.

She ignores him and takes some shaky steps forward. The air is acrid and thick. The ground feels hot underneath her feet.

He feels the heat now behind her. “Is it… is it… okay?”  He moves towards the door.

She looks around her, trying to see in the darkness. The air is hurting her eyes, burning like chlorine.

“I… I don’t know,” she says.

Her eyes slowly, painfully adjust.

She can see for miles. Rubble, dust and death is all that there is.

Bringing her hand to her eyes, she rubs them. It helps with the stinging a little bit.

“Is there anyone there?” the father asks.

“No,” she says. “There’s nothing.”

She begins to walk.

Waiting (#Octobophobia Decidophobia ending)

She takes her hand off the handle and crumbles to her knees. It is the last burst of momentum that she had and she knows it.

The father puts his hand on her shoulder. “We’re better waiting,” he says. She believes him.

The announcement will come, surely.

But it never does.

They wait for months, but eventually the generator fails. Without it, the air filtration stops working.  

It takes time.

Slow, painful time.

When things you love stop being yours...

It’s a strange feeling when something stops being yours.

Superhero comics and wrestling have been two hobbies that have been mine since the early 90s. I’ve been obsessed with both for decades.

When I started watching, both were aimed fairly firmly at me. Boy hobbies very much aimed at boys. And as I grew up, my tastes in both matured, and they continued to be aimed at me, with the (relatively) clean cut Bret Hart and Batman replaced by the stubblier and more violent Wolverine, Gambit and Stone Cold Steve Austin. Aimed squarely at me and people like me.

And recently, this has changed. Because they’re no longer aimed at me. I have a fairly major and specific complaint about this. They’re aimed at girls. Not even women. Girls.

That’s not the complaint. Let me give some context first.

The latest issue of Ms Marvel came out yesterday. Now, Ms Marvel, if you haven’t heard, is a superhero. She’s also a teenage Muslim girl named Kamala Khan, who has to juggle saving people with hoping that her strict family don’t find out. It is one of the best comics Marvel have put out in years, and one of the best comic books of the last decade. It’s funny, heartfelt and smart.

And Kamala has created a fandom that’s brand new. Just look at this letter (left) in the latest issue from a little girl called Charlotte.

This, believe me, is not the usual level of letters that you see in comics. Absolute adoration for a great character by a little girl. And treated in response warmly and without mocking.

This isn’t my complaint. I’m getting to it though.

Wait. Let me explain with some wrestling stuff. I’ve written before about problems with racism and homophobia in wrestling, and at some point, I’ll address sexism, but this is a bit different.

This is Bayley. She is the NXT (WWE’s smaller league feeder division) women’s champion. Unlike the past ways women have been treated in wrestling, she’s been main eventing. And she’s been having a series of great matches. She’s also wholesome, cute, wears headbands and shirts with ‘I’m a hugger’, which sell enormous amounts already.

She's throwing a hug to the audience. And because they love her, theyre throwing it right back.

This is Izzy. She’s Bayley’s biggest fan and comes to lots of the events dressed as her.

Again, it’s fair to say that this is not your typical wrestling fan.

Izzy gets emotionally into it to a huge degree. She’s young enough that this is real for her, and Bayley is her absolute hero. When Bayley was fighting Sasha Banks (an arrogant ‘heel’) in one of the best matches of the year, Sasha started teasing Izzy.

Now that's a heel.

She even stole her headband, reducing Izzy to tears.

The most horrible thing to ever happen in wrestling.

Bayley fought back, finally celebrating. Izzy’s reactions throughout the match told the story almost as well as the women in the ring.

Twitter and Tumblr may have got a bit emotional.

And the following day, she forgave Sasha (who also gave her the flowers in the background).

I have never seen anything like this in wrestling before.

Nor in comics.

And this is my complaint.

What the hell took so long?

There’s nothing to gain by limiting your audience. Nothing. When you look at anything – be it movies, books, horror, wrestling, comics, or (and yes, this is a big one) videogames – the longer that it’s purely aimed at young (and, in my case, not so young) men, the longer it becomes a defensive monoculture.

A monoculture that gets defensive and sarcastic, in places like wrestling forums I’ve seen, where Bayley’s repeatedly criticised for not being attractive enough. Because a lot of fans still think that it should just be for them.

A monoculture that ends up just like Gamergate. One that will abuse people for not liking things the right way. Not allowing them to even be fans in their own way.

I can understand wanting to keep part of a culture to yourself. There’s a level of ownership, which can give a sense of control – a control that can often feel lacking in other parts of life. Sometimes, this can be a positive, but the longer it goes on unchecked, it can go from affirmation to a strange “I am special because I like this” approach. It becomes exclusion rather than expansion.

When I look at Izzy and Charlotte, fans of things that I love at an age that’s younger than I ever got into it, I’ve found myself oddly emotional. There’s something rather wonderful about this, and about seeing some of the things that I love opening up to new audiences – ones that couldn’t be much further away from me.

This isn’t mine any more.

And that’s a wonderful thing.