X-POSITION: Marjorie Liu & Daniel Way - My Questions Asked!

I know I've been doing a lot of ranting lately, comparing Hope Summers (aka Jean Ripoff) to no fewer than fifteen different kinds of diarrhea. I apologize to those who are sick of hearing my graphic depictions of the entrails I want Jean ripoff's brains to read once Bishop comes back from the future and gives her a Columbian neck-tie complete with her tongue ripped out through her throat. While I may not be done spitting on her eventual grave, there are still plenty of X-books that I enjoy reading. X-23 by Marjorie Liu is one of them. This past week she and Daniel Way were the subject of CBR's X-POSITION.

X-POSITION: Marjorie Liu & Daniel Way

Now I've had little to complain about with X-23. Marjorie Liu has taken the character a long way in only seven short issues. X-23 has been a science experiment, a messed up teenage girl, an X-man, a member of X-Force, and a whole host of other problems that make her just slightly less crazy than the girls I dated in high school. X-23 still has plenty awesome to offer as recent stories have set the stage for an eventual clash with Daken, Wolverine's metrosexual son who makes Lady Gaga look modest. I'm looking forward to seeing X-23 give Daken the kind of torment that doesn't give him a boner. As such I submitted some questions for the X-POSITION and they ended up getting asked.

MarvelMaster616 is also curious about Weapon X and some of Laura's conditioning. What can you tell him about the following:

1) Since the beginning of the "X-23" series, there seems to be a lot of emphasis on Laura being a teenage girl and not just a mutant or a product of Weapon X. Now that she's trying to find her own way, what exactly would you say she's looking for? Does she have any idea? Or is that something she's still trying to figure out?

Liu: I don't think she really knows what she's looking for. Who does? She's always lived in a very controlled environment. Very regulated and structured. And then, the first time she was on her own, it was a disaster. She killed people, became a prostitute -- I mean, come on. This kid has had a rough life.

Now she's a little older, maybe a little wiser and she wants to know who she is -- because she doesn't know. Is she just a killer? Is that all she's good for? Can she move past her conditioning and be something more? Or is it enough for her to be a soldier? What makes her happy? 

2) In the second issue of "X-23," there's a moment where Logan is talking to Laura about him being a father figure to her and her being a daughter. Is this relationship dynamic going to come back up once their paths cross again? The ‘Hellverine' arc sort of derailed it.

Liu: You bet it's coming back. I'll also be exploring Wolverine's double-standard when it comes to his care of Jubilee versus X-23. Actually, I'll sort of be hammering it over the head. I'm not very subtle, sometimes.  

3) Why do you think X-23 and Daken are so different despite being the offspring of Wolverine?

Liu: That's a hard one. Both were raised in radically different environments. Clearly, I think X-23 had a more difficult life than Daken and yet, she's not a sociopath. She is, however, emotionally shut down -- and can be a stone-cold killer. If she had been raised like Daken? Who knows?

Way: Here's the easy, non-academic answer: different creators. Few people know this, but my inspiration for Daken's characterization was actually the song "We're Only Gonna Die" by Bad Religion.

Overall, I've little material with which to make poop jokes this time around. Marjorie Liu seems to have a solid handle on X-23. She's not approaching this series the same way as her previous series. She's basically guiding X-23 down a very uncertain path and providing plenty of awesome along the way. The prospect of X-23 meeting up with Wolverine and a non-Twilight vampire in Jubilee adds even more potential for gut busting awesome. Yet I would still argue that about a quarter of the girls in my high school graduating class went through less insanity.

While the other X-books give me so many reasons to shove my head into a deep fryer, X-23 offers a great deal of comfort in that it's a solid and consistent book that tells the story about a great character who is still coming into her own. With plenty of events to look forward to in the near future, I'll definitely be tracking this comic in my blog and in my LSD trips! Nuff said.