Posted in: Comics, Recent Updates | Tagged: avengers, captain america, HRL, inhumans, marvel, Pins, spider-man, whitewashing

Marvel True Believers Panel: News, Leaks, And Whitewashing

I have been "Making Mine Marvel" for the last three years solely through the Marvel Unlimited Plus program. While only reading Marvel comics this way means I'm generally six months behind the current storyline, it also means I get all the weekly comics (again, six months late) and a large portion of the Marvel catalogue for only $99 per year. It also gets me occasional invites to special events that Marvel holds, including the annual Marvel True Believers panel at SDCC.

This year's panel was moderated by Nick Lowe, Executive Editor for Marvel. Also on the panel were Marvel writers Ryan North, Margaret Stohl, and Marc Guggenheim. 

The panel started with three scenes from the upcoming Marvel's Inhumans. Two of the scenes had pieces that were part of the official trailer shown at SDCC and now available on Marvel's YouTube page. The first featured Triton attempting to save a a newly transformed Inhuman who is being hunted by mercenaries and getting shot himself in the process. We also hear the mercenaries communicate to someone over a radio that they have the target in sight, and the target is actually Triton and not the new Inhuman.

The second scene is a royal family dinner. At the table are Black Bolt, Medusa, Crystal, Karnak, Gorgon, and Maximus. Black Bolt communicates by using sign language and Medusa translating to the table. Maximus questions Black Bolt's decision to send Triton on the rescue mission.

The last scene shows Maximus' coup in progress as his mercenaries attack Karnak and Gorgon. In these scenes you get a full display of their powers.

From their we were shown a variety of upcoming comic book covers and some interior pages. First was Avengers #10, and a scene was shown of the Hydra Avengers, focusing on Scarlet Witch and Vision. From a close up of Vision's face the page pulls into a image of Vision trapped in a cell, leading me to believe that of Vision's mind or consciousness is locked up inside his "brain".

The cover and interior pages of Captain America #695 was shown, with the interior pages seeming to a show a white Captain America with the original round shield fighting what looks like bank robbers. Whether this is Steve Rogers or someone else is unknown.

Next we were shown a clip from the upcoming new Spider-Man premiering on Disney XD on August 19th. The scene featured Spider-Man battling a female character called Sand, who came off as if she could be the daughter of Flint Marko, the original Sandman, and she had the same powers. She also had thugs working with her, including Hammerhead. During the scene, Spider-Man suddenly is covered with a black suit, which has the symbiote powers as displayed in other incarnations, and this quite surprises him.

We were next shown some more covers and pages, but nothing that was entirely newsworthy. Among them was a scene from X-Men Gold #9, with Whiplash attacking Congress while Kitty testifies against the "Mutant Deportation Act." The issue also deals with the never-ending saga that is the Kitty and Peter relationship, as well as the burgeoning relationship between Kurt and Rachel.

The room was then provided with a code to use to get 20,000 points that can be redeemed in the Marvel Insider program. This was very exciting for the room — that is, until anyone attempted to use it. During the audience Q&A, one of the people shared that the code, which should have allowed 1000 people to use it, had already been fully redeemed. Someone in the audience said that the code had been leaked onto Reddit four hours before the panel took place.

One woman complained during the Q&A about the pins being sold at the Marvel booth this year. She claimed that the Ms. Marvel pin was whitewashed and that the Black Widow pin was just a generic redhead. She was quite upset about this. After the panel I went to look at the pins, and it turns out all the pins this year were Marvel emoji-style characters. Below is a picture of the pins in question, and clearly Kamala Khan's skin is exactly the same color as the Caucasian characters featured, while Sam Wilson's Captain America is darker. Whether Black Widow is a generic redhead, that I will let the reader decide on their own.

For further musings from Joshua Stone, you can follow him on the Twitter @1NerdyOne.

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