In the Showdown! thread, someone mentioned Emma Frost’s secondary diamond skin mutation and how it did not make any sense to him (or to me) and while reading that, I realized I don’t know anything at all about the secondary mutations other knowing that the White Queen (she is still called that, right?) and Angel have them so I thought I’d start this thread and hope someone more knowledgeable might be able to give me the down-low.
Why are these secondary mutations appearing? When did they first start cropping up? Which characters have them? What are they? Are the mutants gaining extra abilities looked at oddly or still accepted as they were? And are all the new powers as odd as the ones Frost and Warrington have developed? They’re a bit odd considering their primary powers.
I mean, really… diamond skin for a telepath? What the hell?
The only one that I am really iron clad sure on is Iceman gaining an ice body. No more flesh for him. In a recent issue, he was knocked into a lake and used the water to enlarge his ice body allowing him to whup much ass.
An earlier issue (the end of the recent Magneto arc) featured Emma having diamond skin. Her psi powers may have been functional. Seems to me she detected Phoenix coming with her psi powers.
As for Angel, no idea where that came from. Did he gain healing powers? If so I may have an idea where it came from. If not, I’ll make something up.
Well, I did a bit of googling, and Ranchoth is right. It started with the Morrison run. He decided he was going to boost the powers of the X-men with the exceptions of Xavier and Cyclops. Jean Grey got the phoenix back fer about five seconds before magneto killed her. Wolverines healing power got boosted. Emma got diamond skin. Angel got some sort of blood based healing power. ( ) Beast became more beast like. Polaris got some sort of dark powers dating back to the issue with Zaladane and the Savage Land.
That’s all the detail I could find, culled mainly from message board posts on other forums. If anyone else has any better data, I’d be appreciative.
It actually started years before Morrison’s run; he just attempted to use the idea in an interesting way. The whole “diamond Emma” and “iceman made out of ice” goes back to '96 or so.
Wasn’t Angel getting turned into Arcangel by Apocalypse a secondary mutation? Or does that not count?
And the Iceman being made out of ice goes back to Earth X doesn’t it, but I realise that wasn’t canon.
Apocalypses transformation of Angel in the bluer, more bad ass archangel doesn’t count since it was an external modification, like Wolverines claws. Though now that I think about it, Beast more leonine appearance stems from his blue fur which was the result of a chemical experiment gone wrong…meh, whatever.
As for Icemans ice body, before he may have been able to turn into solid ice. Now he is stuck there. This happened shortly after Havok and Polaris had their lil wedding spat and Juggernaut joined the team.
I could be wrong about this… but back in the eighties, one of Marvel’s black-and-white magazines did an issue featuring three solo stories about X-Men – a pretty good Jean Grey story, a forgettable Iceman story, and a ludicrous Nightcrawler story.
The cover featured all three X-Men in costume, a really nice painting. In it, Iceman’s leg is translucent; you can see through it.
From what I remember, this set off a firestorm of debate among the fanboys. How could we be seeing through Iceman’s leg? Isn’t he just a guy covered with ice? Hey, shouldn’t we be able to see 'is weiner in there or something?
It was around this time, IIRC, that someone brought up the idea that he not only can create ice from moisture in the air… but he can BECOME ice. Precisely how he does this is unclear.
I’m sure someone will come along and correct me any minute now…
How *did *Beast go from an ape to a leopard or lion or whatever? That completely skipped my mind when posting the OP. Does his feline form give him any more abilities than his primate one did? Or is he just the same Beast with a different body?
As far as I know, it’s the same beast with a slightly different body. If anything, they may have made him stronger/faster. None of the info I could google said anything about different powers for him, but as I said details were slim.
I didn’t think Beasts change was another mutation but from him experimenting on himself? I admit I haven’t been reading X-Men though so my information is second hand.
You’re sort of right. Beast gained the blue fur and trendy wolverine-like hair cut due to an experiment he performed on himself. Now he’s undergone a further mutation becoming more catlike.
I’ve found a good site for all things X-Men. There are detailed power lists, etc.
For starters, most of the new mutations seem to be a result of Sage who seems to have the ability to activate latent abilities.
Angel now can heal people using his blood. They also have to have a compatible blood type. It says he has a mystical sword (?). Oh well, whatever.
Beast now has enhanced healing, pheremones (??), claws, night vision, other enhanced senses in addition to the bouncing beast bit he had before.
Iceman now has the ice body permanently (which means until a new writer comes along). He can also survive as water or water vapor.
Rogue was able to recall any of the powers she had absorbed in the past, but lost the powers as well as her originals in a battle with Vargas. They may have come back though. I’m not sure. I’ve seen her back with the X-Men recently, so I’d assume the powers have returned.
Emma Frost can turn her body into diamond, but cannot access her telepathic abilities in this form.
Those are all the ones I could find on the site. I hope that’s it.
As I understand Iceman’s power, the ice/water/vapor isn’t really a part of him. Like most other energy-based characters (Johnny Storm, Photon, Wonder Man, Graviton, etc.), he has two bodies: a flesh-and-blood one and a plasma energy form. His energy form generates a field of extreme cold and this most conveniently is used on ambient water.
Magneto should have two forms as well, but he doesn’t. I think it will eventually be revealed that he can’t generate magnetic energy, just manipulate what’s handy (i.e. Earth’s magnetic field). When he’s in space, he probably has very little power; it should be revealed that Asteroid M has a nuclear reactor on board and it powers Magneto, not the other way around.
As for Hank McCoy, I suspect within a year or two he’ll gain the ability to mutate into any mammalian form, but slowly. He’ll be a slow-motion Gar Logan. He will drink that mutant cure, like he did back in Amazing Adventures in the 70s, and it will trigger further mutations instead of curing them.
Like I said Krocodil, Iceman is flesh no more due to a secondary mutation. His only form is the ice/water/vapor body. Whether this change is permanent or not depends on the writers, but for now he really is an Ice man.
Wolverine’s claws are an external modification? I thought the adamantium coated bone claws he already had - as shown when Magneto stripped the metal from his skeleton way back when.
I misspoke. :smack: I meant the adamantium was the external modification. You’re right about the claws. He’s always had them. The unbreakable bones and ginsu claws are the add ons.
) Beast became more beast like. Polaris got some sort of dark powers dating back to the issue with Zaladane and the Savage Land.