Scarlet Witch, The Ultimate Plot Hole


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Since she has total mastery over probably, why does she not just use her powers to instantly fix every major problem she comes across? Is there some sort of limitation to her abilities that I am not aware?


It takes a lot of power for her to do major things, for one. The deaths of others gave her enough juice to tear the world up in Avengers Disassembled and House of M. Preparation time also helps; she can't just say, "Galactus be gone!" and make the Devourer of Worlds suddenly vanish. In a battle with Thor, she needed time to put together the spell to throw him off the planet, for example.


See age of Ultron.

Hero goes back in time to fix a grave mistake and returns to the darkest timeline.

Seems like Scarlet Witch can do the same damage unintentionally.


Lathiira wrote:
In a battle with Thor, she needed time to put together the spell to throw him off the planet, for example.

Which, of course, should have worked for five seconds, until he used Mjolnir's dimension-spanning powers to return. Good Lord, everybody kicks Thor's ass, now. He's become the Worf of Marvel Comics.

"This character's badass. How do we show that?"

"I know! Let's use our shorthand: Have him/her beat the crap out of Thor!"

"Yeah!"

No.


I know how you feel. In Thor's defense, this one time, I'll comment that he was under mind control, so he wasn't thinking quite like his normal self. Otherwise, yeah, Thor needs to start smiting these newbs more often :)


Lathiira wrote:
I know how you feel. In Thor's defense, this one time, I'll comment that he was under mind control, so he wasn't thinking quite like his normal self. Otherwise, yeah, Thor needs to start smiting these newbs more often :)

I've also seen Thor resist with ease one, and with difficulty two, Deviant Brain Mines, and even struggle against a third before settling into obedience. Must have been something impressive to take control of his mind. I don't buy, say, Emma Frost or Professor X doing it, for example.


Well, concerning that dear Wanda, part of the problem is that her powers have always been more or less uncontrolled, that "chaos magic thing"(even if doctor Stange said that there's no such thing as chaos magic, but, hey who trusts Strange, that guy lies all the time!), so she has to focus a lot to achieve even the smallest feat ,except when her self-confidence is high enough, which doesn't happen often(in thee Busiek/Perez era) or when she goes nuts and try to "disassemble" things (which always seemed to me like a weak plot device).

Scarlet witch has always been one ofmy prefered characters and the way Marvel has been handling her since "disassembled" deeply annoyed me, I hope the movie will do justice to her, even if her powers have been greatly altered, which is fine to me, powers are secondary to characters,
and Wanda is a great character!

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Wanda's original hex bolts were plenty powerful, able to shut down anyone with equipment as easily as making stuff jam or break or misfire (up to and including Ultron and Iron Man). Even without equipment, it's as easy as waving her hands to make a car swerve out of control and hit you, or a street weakened by superhero battling collapse under your weight and deposit you in front of an oncoming subway train, or, with absolutely nothing anywhere that could go wrong, not even 'blue ice' or a freak meteorite strike, she could just give you a stroke...

But with this 'No More X' power, which seemed to be utterly effortless when she was doing it, there's no in-story reason at all that she doesn't wave her hand and say 'No More War' or 'No More Cancer' or 'No More Hunger' or 'No More Racism' or 'No More Alien Invasions' or 'No More Incursions.' Obviously, out of story, her actually using this sort of power (that she never had before, and never needed except to serve as a storytelling device, and duplicate something that the High Evolutionary had already done a decade before) to do anything *useful* would be a storytelling nightmare, so she not only had to be given a massive powerup out of the blue, but then written as too crazystupid to actually use it (and for it to not actually work for more than a couple of days on any mutant who had appeared in an X-movie and would be recognized, just the thousands of off-camera mutants nobody cared about anyway).

I would love for Children's Crusade (which had her lose this level of power, only for Rick Remender to put it back without explanation six months later, for no reason at all) to remain canon, and for her to go back to just pointing at people and making improbably bad luck smack them down. That was a crazy powerful power *she already had.*

This plot device / Wanda Ex Machina / wimmen-can't-handle-cosmic-power business needs to die in a fire.


Jaelithe wrote:
Lathiira wrote:
I know how you feel. In Thor's defense, this one time, I'll comment that he was under mind control, so he wasn't thinking quite like his normal self. Otherwise, yeah, Thor needs to start smiting these newbs more often :)
I've also seen Thor resist with ease one, and with difficulty two, Deviant Brain Mines, and even struggle against a third before settling into obedience. Must have been something impressive to take control of his mind. I don't buy, say, Emma Frost or Professor X doing it, for example.

It was in Uncanny Avengers. The Red Skull had grafted Xavier's brain into his own. Unlike Xavier, he was happily mind-controlling everyone he could, including Thor. Of course, Captain America managed to resist. That's where I got the part where Wanda said she'd need a big power source to pull off something like 'No More Mutants' again. Not the best story ever IMHO.


Lathiira wrote:
Jaelithe wrote:


I've also seen Thor resist with ease one, and with difficulty two, Deviant Brain Mines, and even struggle against a third before settling into obedience. Must have been something impressive to take control of his mind. I don't buy, say, Emma Frost or Professor X doing it, for example.
It was in Uncanny Avengers. The Red Skull had grafted Xavier's brain into his own. Unlike Xavier, he was happily mind-controlling everyone he could, including Thor. Of course, Captain America managed to resist.

While I respect Captain America immeasurably, I'm not sure I buy that his will is stronger than Thor's.


Set wrote:

Wanda's original hex bolts were plenty powerful, able to shut down anyone with equipment as easily as making stuff jam or break or misfire (up to and including Ultron and Iron Man). Even without equipment, it's as easy as waving her hands to make a car swerve out of control and hit you, or a street weakened by superhero battling collapse under your weight and deposit you in front of an oncoming subway train, or, with absolutely nothing anywhere that could go wrong, not even 'blue ice' or a freak meteorite strike, she could just give you a stroke...

But with this 'No More X' power, which seemed to be utterly effortless when she was doing it, there's no in-story reason at all that she doesn't wave her hand and say 'No More War' or 'No More Cancer' or 'No More Hunger' or 'No More Racism' or 'No More Alien Invasions' or 'No More Incursions.' Obviously, out of story, her actually using this sort of power (that she never had before, and never needed except to serve as a storytelling device, and duplicate something that the High Evolutionary had already done a decade before) to do anything *useful* would be a storytelling nightmare, so she not only had to be given a massive powerup out of the blue, but then written as too crazystupid to actually use it (and for it to not actually work for more than a couple of days on any mutant who had appeared in an X-movie and would be recognized, just the thousands of off-camera mutants nobody cared about anyway).

I would love for Children's Crusade (which had her lose this level of power, only for Rick Remender to put it back without explanation six months later, for no reason at all) to remain canon, and for her to go back to just pointing at people and making improbably bad luck smack them down. That was a crazy powerful power *she already had.*

This plot device / Wanda Ex Machina / wimmen-can't-handle-cosmic-power business needs to die in a fire.

I totally agree with you, Wanda was a good character before, and her powerup/going nuts was to me a cheap device from Bendis to make "his" Avengers. Screwing up a good character was just incidental!

It was much more important for Bendis to bring back the characters he liked (Luke Cage,Spiderwoman to name a few) than to tell a good story.

And that's for me the principal problem of Marvel those last 10 years and what made me almost stop comics, no real direction, only the whimsical actions of people like Bendis and Millar, which in the end paved the need to reeboot the entire line!


Actually, this also occurred with Peter David and his take on the Hulk, where he started healing at a ridiculous rate and thereby laughing at any damage he received, which renders the character wholly uninteresting. (It's also why I find Byrne historically a better writer; while he has innumerable issues of his own, he doesn't give every character he pens a power-up.) Kurt Busiek's also much enamored with the Scarlet Witch ... while his disdain for Thor is on record, and shines through his portrayal of the character as a bruiser with a bludgeon. Too many writers have just enough fan boy in them that they'll write the scene the way they want it to be, rather than as it should occur, even if that requires power-ups and dumbing downs (such as Thor leading with his chin and wading into Superman's heat vision in the JLA/Avengers crossover, rather than employing Mjolnir to deflect or even absorb it and return it as lightning with interest, largely because Busiek hates Thor), rather than the way it should turn out—which is why everyone who needs to be shown as bad kicks Thor ass, the Hulk's strength is now infinite, and Thanos is now defeating everyone this side of The One Above All ... and that's probably coming.


There's a huge difference between "I don't like X writer's take on a character" and "X writer hates the character".

I've never had a problem with Busiek's version of Thor. Busiek's written Thor more than once, including a solo miniseries. He's said he likes the character.

I'm really not sure where the Busiek hates Thor thing comes from, other than JLA/Avengers - which really isn't a fair test, since everything in that was negotiated between the two companies, not just something the writer came up with off the top of his head.


Jaelithe wrote:

While I respect Captain America immeasurably, I'm not sure I buy that his will is stronger than Thor's.

IIRC, in the old Marvel Superheroes game, they had equal Psyche scores, meaning equal willpower. This is a case where I'd say Cap has an edge, as it's the Red Skull he's resisting. If it were Amora or Loki, Thor has an edge. Either way, neither one should be resisting the Red Skull using Xavier's full mental power is the way I see it.


Lathiira wrote:
IIRC, in the old Marvel Superheroes game, they had equal Psyche scores, meaning equal willpower.

I believe Cap's Psyche was most likely REMARKABLE (30) or perhaps INCREDIBLE (40) in the original version of the game, which I owned. Thor's was AMAZING (50). Most of the modern rewrites have Cap higher, though ... and I have no problem with that. He's Captain America.

I never said Cap's will should be weaker ... only that I don't buy it being stronger. We are talking Thor, after all.


thejeff wrote:
There's a huge difference between "I don't like X writer's take on a character" and "X writer hates the character".

I didn't say "hate." I said "disdain."

Quote:
I've never had a problem with Busiek's version of Thor. Busiek's written Thor more than once, including a solo miniseries. He's said he likes the character.

I've always had a problem with it.

I have never read this miniseries of which you speak, however. Perhaps I'll amend my statements after having done so.

Quote:
I'm really not sure where the Busiek hates Thor thing comes from ...

Gleaned from private conversations with Busiek (though I'm not revealing any state secrets) and those at a message board we both used to frequent, all this almost a decade ago. He's also on record as saying that he doesn't think Thor is bulletproof, which is so far beyond ridiculous I don't even feel the need to refute it. He's been struck by Celestials, Galactus, the Silver Surfer, Mephisto, Superman, Captain Marvel (of both universes), the Destroyer, Thanos, Mangog, et al. If any villain knew that all you had to do to kill the Thunder God was bust a cap in him, well ... as Cris Carter would say, "Come on, man." (I've also read Busiek's justifications for his position, and they don't hold the logical water of a thimble, in my opinion.) Frankly, in my opinion a bullet should bounce off Thor's eye a la the Man of Steel in Superman Returns.

Quote:
... other than JLA/Avengers - which really isn't a fair test, since everything in that was negotiated between the two companies, not just something the writer came up with off the top of his head.

I don't have a problem with Superman kickin' Thor's butt if they go straight at each other. He's Superman, after all. (Same with the Hulk, if Thor leads with his chin as he did with Supes.) I do have a problem with Thor fighting in such a stupid fashion, like wading into Superman's heat vision, etc.

To his credit, Busiek did throw us Thor fans a couple of sops in the next issue, the first when Aquaman and Thor are talking. The King of Atlantis points out that Superman took Thor out, and Thor rather casually says something like, "Ah, but now I've taken his measure. A second bout would like hold a few surprises for the ... Man of Steel." That's pretty much Thor saying, "Hmm. Evidently I could use some of my cosmic powers against this guy and drop him without killing him." Later, when Thor tosses Superman Mjolnir, Superman says, "My God ... the power ... never imagined ... never dreamed ..." In other words, "This guy coulda hit me with this kind of force and never did."

Both beings live in a world of cardboard. Superman simply realized first that Thor could take it, and cut loose more.

Yeah ... I just hated Thor fighting a dumb fight, not that Superman won.


Jaelithe wrote:
Lathiira wrote:
IIRC, in the old Marvel Superheroes game, they had equal Psyche scores, meaning equal willpower.

I believe Cap's Psyche was most likely REMARKABLE (30) or perhaps INCREDIBLE (40) in the original version of the game, which I owned. Thor's was AMAZING (50). Most of the modern rewrites have Cap higher, though ... and I have no problem with that. He's Captain America.

I never said Cap's will should be weaker ... only that I don't buy it being stronger. We are talking Thor, after all.

In the original version, Cap had Good Psyche. Which is ridiculous.


Jaelithe wrote:
thejeff wrote:
There's a huge difference between "I don't like X writer's take on a character" and "X writer hates the character".
I didn't say "hate." I said "disdain."

Fair enough.

Jaelithe wrote:
Quote:
I've never had a problem with Busiek's version of Thor. Busiek's written Thor more than once, including a solo miniseries. He's said he likes the character.

I've always had a problem with it.

I have never read this miniseries of which you speak, however. Perhaps I'll amend my statements after having done so.

Thor: Godstorm. Quite a while back and not his best work, IIRC.

Jaelithe wrote:
Quote:
I'm really not sure where the Busiek hates Thor thing comes from ...
Gleaned from private conversations with Busiek (though I'm not revealing any state secrets) and those at a message board we both used to frequent, all this almost a decade ago. He's also on record as saying that he doesn't think Thor is bulletproof, which is so far beyond ridiculous I don't even feel the need to refute it. He's been struck by Celestials, Galactus, the Silver Surfer, Mephisto, Superman, Captain Marvel (of both universes), the Destroyer, Thanos, Mangog, et al. If any villain knew that all you had to do to kill the Thunder God was bust a cap in him, well ... as Cris Carter would say, "Come on, man." (I've also read Busiek's justifications for his position, and they don't hold the logical water of a thimble, in my opinion.) Frankly, in my opinion a bullet should bounce off Thor's eye a la the Man of Steel in Superman Returns.

Strange we never (or at least very rarely?) see that then. I remember him always spinning Mjolnir to block bullets. Why does he bother, if they'd just bounce off his eyes? Plenty of other Marvel Superheroes ignore bullets. Thor doesn't. Busiek may have been the one to say "He's not bulletproof, but it doesn't seem like that was a wild deviation from the way he's always been presented.

Not that he's going to just drop if you "bust a cap in him" either. He's resistant, just not immune.


thejeff wrote:
I've never had a problem with Busiek's version of Thor. Busiek's written Thor more than once, including a solo miniseries. He's said he likes the character.

He's also consistently portrayed Thor as being the most powerful Avenger, which isn't the mark of someone who disdains the character.

Quote:
I'm really not sure where the Busiek hates Thor thing comes from, other than JLA/Avengers - which really isn't a fair test, since everything in that was negotiated between the two companies, not just something the writer came up with off the top of his head.

I think it just comes from people who are still upset that KB doesn't believe that Thor is bulletproof (as pointed out in the responses below). I've been a big Busiek fan ever since Astro City and Heroes Reborn, and I've never seen or read anything to indicate that the man disdains the character of Thor.

Anyway, moving off-topic now.


thejeff wrote:
In the original version, Cap had GOOD Psyche. Which is ridiculous.

That is preposterous.

I could maybe see Cap with EXCELLENT when he's a newb ... but over the years, he would have progressed to at least INCREDIBLE, in my opinion ... and AMAZING is by no means out of the question.


thejeff wrote:
Not that he's going to just drop if you "bust a cap in him" either. He's resistant, just not immune.

I don't have a real issue with Thor blocking bullets because they sting and are an irritant, or with saying that armor-piercing gunfire from a fighter might "raise annoying welts," as Roy Thomas has Thor say in an issue he wrote.

I did have a major problem with the issue (of Black Panther?) in which a sniper hits Thor with a bullet that pierces the skin on his forehead, draws blood and leaves him unconscious.

Frankly, I think it makes far more sense that Thor blocks bullets because no one wants bullets hitting them if they can avoid it, even if all they do is sting.

Oh, and ... Walt Simonson, when I spoke to him on this years ago, said, "Of course Thor is bulletproof; how could he not be?" ... and Simonson definitely and definitively trumps Busiek, in my opinion, as relates to Thor.


Jaelithe wrote:
thejeff wrote:
Not that he's going to just drop if you "bust a cap in him" either. He's resistant, just not immune.

I don't have a real issue with Thor blocking bullets because they sting and are an irritant, or with saying that armor-piercing gunfire from a fighter might "raise annoying welts," as Roy Thomas has Thor say in an issue he wrote.

I did have a major problem with the issue (of Black Panther?) in which a sniper hits Thor with a bullet that pierces the skin on his forehead, draws blood and leaves him unconscious.

Frankly, I think it makes far more sense that Thor blocks bullets because no one wants bullets hitting them if they can avoid it, even if all they do is sting.

Oh, and ... Walt Simonson, when I spoke to him on this years ago, said, "Of course Thor is bulletproof; how could he not be?" ... and Simonson definitely and definitively trumps Busiek, in my opinion, as relates to Thor.

OTOH, I'd say that someone from whom a specially designed armor piercing bullet hitting him in the head and knocking him out draws blood but doesn't do any permanent damage is pretty damn bulletproof.

As for "no one wants bullets hitting them if they can avoid it"? That's Superman. He really does just let them hit him.


thejeff wrote:
OTOH, I'd say that someone from whom a specially designed armor piercing bullet hitting him in the head and knocking him out draws blood but doesn't do any permanent damage is pretty damn bulletproof.

And what if it had hit him in the eye? It kind of establishes that he really isn't, because a particularly accurate kill shot might take him down. I don't want Thor vulnerable to The Punisher when he's chased off Galactus. It offends my delicately-calibrated sensibilities.

Quote:
As for "no one wants bullets hitting them if they can avoid it"? That's Superman. He really does just let them hit him.

Not so much with the kryptonite bullets, though.

That's one of the reasons the whole "Superman vs. Thor" thing makes me chuckle. Considering that Thor took ten seconds, analyzed the Juggernaut's powers, neutralized his force field then kicked the crap out of him, I don't think finding a wavelength of energy to which Supes is vulnerable or transporting them to a solar system dominated by a red sun would be out of the question. Superman really does have the ultimate home-field advantage in the Sol System.

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Jaelithe wrote:
That's one of the reasons the whole "Superman vs. Thor" thing makes me chuckle.

The whole fight was a matter of which continuity you want to use.

Superman's vulnerability to magic has been portrayed as him being *not invulnerable* to magic (such as when a vampire only a bit stronger than Batman clawed him open once, since her claws where supernatural). A hit from Mjolnir should hurt Superman the same as it would hurt *me.* (As in, leave a fine red mist that smells like someone burned to death there behind.)

Superman also has super-speed, and is literally *thousands* of times stronger than Thor. If Superman was the 'kill first and ask questions never' sort of dude, he could take Thor apart before Thor even knew he was in a fight.

The JLA/Avengers fight was an obvious compromise. Superman effortlessly annihilating Thor would be unsatisfying. Thor leaving a Mjolnir-shaped hole in Superman by 'accidentally' murdering him would be equally unsatisfying.

Meanwhile, Superman has the sum total of Kryptonian knowledge, *including dozens of Kryptonian martial arts skills,* downloaded into his noggin and can react to and process stuff going on in a fight faster than the speed of light. He's, just as a baseline Kryptonian, a *hundred* times smarter than Batman, can move faster than light (let alone faster than a human brain can process) and can hear bees fart in China *while in outer space.* He never uses any of that.

Thor has been alive and fighting superhumanly potent threats (including giants, evil sorcerers, dragons, fire demons and other gods) for almost 3000 years. He's got more experience at strategy, tactics, leadership, war, armed combat and unarmed combat than sixty Captain Americas stacked on top of each other, and he never uses any of *that.*

Both characters have to juggle the Idiot Ball around their less capable teammates so as not to overshadow them, and not make Justice League / Avengers stories into 'Superman / Thor and his Amazing Useless Sidekicks.'

And for all that, they still had to keep Sersi the hell away from JLA/Avengers, because she could take out the average JLA lineup by pulling a Bavmorda and waving her hand and saying 'You're all pigs!' :)


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Set wrote:
Superman also has super-speed, and is literally *thousands* of times stronger than Thor. If Superman was the 'kill first and ask questions never' sort of dude, he could take Thor apart before Thor even knew he was in a fight.

Great post other than the above, which is untrue on both points.

Thor possesses super-speed to a vast degree. It's another of those powers he just rarely if ever uses, unless a speedster attempts to take advantage of him. He's dropped Quicksilver with no effort, grabbed Hermes in mid-flight, gone toe-to-toe with the Silver Surfer (both of whom are almost certainly faster than Superman) and been described by both Hela and Adam Warlock as being literally able to move faster than the lightning he commands ... so a Superman attempting kill Thor with super-speed would be in for a large and painful surprise.

Like Superman, Thor's strength is functionally immeasurable. We have seen him perform feats like reversing the World Engine and lifting the Midgard Serpent into space, and since it's established in Marvel that Jormugandr weighs, I believe, a third as much as the Earth, I don't think even Superman can lift "thousands of times more" than—what's the Earth's weight ... 6.6 sextillion tons?—than Thor. He managed to overcome the weight of twenty planets when Umar pinned him with that weight via magic, so ... while I have no problem believing that under a yellow sun he's slightly to somewhat stronger than Thor, because that's his schtick, but ... thousands, hundreds or even dozens of times stronger? No.

It always boils down to what the writers want, of course.


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Well, you've certainly convinced me... I now want Scarlet Witch to erase both Thor and Superman from existence (shortly before she erases herself).


Pillbug Toenibbler wrote:
Well, you've certainly convinced me... I now want Scarlet Witch to erase both Thor and Superman from existence (shortly before she erases herself).

Will that rid us of Elizabeth Olsen, too?


I think that it boils down to a lot of Avengers stories that are echoing XMEN stories without respecting what took place before. Dark Phoenix and the Dark Scarlet Witch story during Act of Vengence, they do similar things to the Dark Phoenix Saga even paralyzing teammates... The same is true of the A v X storyline. Also what I don't get is that the Avengers or other teams have no problem making the XMEN accountable for things they don't do the same to their own members. Wanda performed genocide and the Avengers rush to her defense when the XMEN show up.

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Elrawien Lantherion wrote:
Also what I don't get is that the Avengers or other teams have no problem making the XMEN accountable for things they don't do the same to their own members.

Just like how the X-Men totally let the Shiar Imperial Guard execute Phoenix after it blew up 11 billion asparagus people on D'bari?

Oh wait, they *also* fought to protect their friend, who had committed not just a figurative genocide, but an *actual* genocide.

How evil of them, to act even worse than those awful Avengers!

Quote:
Wanda performed genocide and the Avengers rush to her defense when the XMEN show up.

Genocide is a strong word for that. Her power, which changes things *retroactively* (meaning that none of those ex-mutants would *ever* have been mutants, and so wouldn't even know that anything had changed!), wouldn't have killed anyone.

Instead of a bunch of (ex)mutants inexplicably died (inexplicably, since her power *went back in time* and made them not be mutants, which means that any ex-mutant who fell out of the sky because they couldn't fly, or drowned because they lost their water-breathing mutation while a mile underwater, was already in the process of committing suicide, since, thanks to the No More Mutants retcon, *they never had the power to fly or breath water,* meaning that, by being a mile in the air without any means of getting up there or staying up there (since they *never* could fly), they must have just jumped out of an airplane without a parachute, for some reason).

Hard to hate on the Avengers for not blaming Wanda for doing something that her powers simply couldn't do, and that, even at the time, was portrayed inconsistently. As months went by, and the word 'genocide' got tossed around more and more, suddenly, more and more mutants were retconned into having died on that day, even if that was utterly impossible. And even that wasn't 'bad' enough. Eventually her power somehow affected every multiverse that ever was, even if we've already seen mutant-filled futures of dozens of other universes, and her spell wasn't even powerful enough to affect all of the mutants *in her universe*, since any of them that had their own books, almost 200 of them, totally skated free of her 'multiverse affecting spell.'

And then the Life Force 'Doom's fault' retcon. A desperate Author's Saving Throw that read like fanfic, but I didn't mind it so much, because it was attempting to make a silk purse from the utterly inconsistent mess that was Decimation. ('Decimation,' like genocide, a word being wildly misused during this event.)

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