I heard a rumor…

So, I haven’t really kept it a secret that I’ve been following and loving Gerard Way and Gabriel Ba’s The Umbrella Academy. Granted, I’m probably pre-disposed to liking it due to my occasionally obvious fangirling of Mr. Way, but I have honestly found myself enjoying his writing for it’s own sake. In some ways it reminds me of Joss Whedon’s style of writing, which is NEVER a bad thing in my book.

As I’ve been reading I’ve been trying to avoid online fan opinions. Mostly because what occasionally spoils something I’m very interested in for me is the online fandom. And that’s not just fan authors and artists, that’s also just the people who, while discussing the particular work, make utter morons out of themselves.

But last night, after reading TUA #5, I figured I’d leave a message on the Myspace reactions blog, because there was quite literally a panel that made me gasp in shock and stare to be sure what was going on was REALLY going on.

(IN CASE YOU CAN’T TELL, THERE WILL BE SPOILERS BEYOND THIS POINT!)

That was the panel where Pogo had his brains blown out by White Violin. The moment was so sudden and the view of the act was so unflinching (if you haven’t noticed, I like when comics force you to look at what you don’t want to look at. This is one of the reasons I’m a huge fan of the Battle Royale Manga, it does the same thing and presents the violence in such a way to glorify it…because that’s the way it would have been shown to viewers of The Program). And I wanted to leave my praises for that moment.

Stupidly, STUPIDLY, I read the other comments.

This issue contained character death, the new revelation that The Monocle’s monocle is anything but ordinary, the fact that #5 is a killing machine, and more. So what are people talking about?

A one panel kiss between Rumor and Space Boy.

And the reactions are generally: “OMG! RUMOR IS A SLUT! SHE MADE HER BROTHER KISS HER! AND MADE HIM BE IN LOVE WITH HER SINCE HE WAS 8!!!!!”

Right, so…I hate the internet.

1. We are reading the end of the story. We have seen very little of #1/Luther/Space Boy’s previous interaction with #3/Allison/The Rumor. What we have seen, to me at least, did imply that Luther had feelings for her beyond just as his sibling…but that’s all implied. We are missing twenty years of these people’s lives. So as far as we know, Rumor was telling the truth and Space has wanted to kiss her since they were 8.
2. We have no proof that Rumor’s power even still works. She hasn’t used it yet in the series, and the statement she made was in response to Space’s question about “Does your power still work?” Since there is no physical sign/phenomenon associated with Rumor’s powers we can’t say that the powers are why she and Space kissed.
3. If Rumor were going to abuse her powers to get whatever she wanted, so far her character has shown that what she wants is not Space and to return to being a hero. She wants her daughter back. If she were going to abuse her powers to get whatever she wanted, don’t you think she’d have said “I heard a rumor that I have full custody of my daughter again?” Or even “I heard a rumor that my marriage is still going perfectly?”
4. As for the incest angle: We have no proof that ANY of the kids have the same biological father, and we know they do not share biological mothers. So Space and Rumor are biologically half-siblings at worst…at best they share no common ancestry. Also, Space NO LONGER HAS HIS OWN BODY. Therefor, even if they were to have sex (which we don’t even know if they physically CAN) there is no threat of an inbred offspring.
5. Rumor did not make Space “Fall in love with her.” Even if she did use her powers to make him do something he might not have wanted to do? It was a kiss. KISS. That’s all she said. If they continued to embrace after that, it had nothing to do with her rumor. So, it’s possible that RUMOR SAID THAT TO HELP SPACE MAKE THE FIRST MOVE. He isn’t good with people. He wouldn’t have on his own. And if he had been disgusted by the kiss he would have pulled away afterwards.

Of course, I could be wrong. Rumor could have completely manipulated Space Boy into doing what she wanted because that’s how she was raised: as a manipulative liar. That’s her power. Gerard Way has confirmed in interviews that she was forced to grow up as a liar. But at the same time, Way has made enough feminist statements in his time that I don’t believe he would write a female character as blatantly sexually manipulative. This is Gerard Way we’re talking about, NOT Frank Miller (sorry Miller fans, including you Gee, but the man CANNOT write a well-rounded female character to save his life. I respect what he’s done for comics and how he turned the industry around, and as a piece of noir work Sin City is brilliant…but there’s a reason he’s called Frank “WHORES WHORES WHORES WHORES” Miller). Maybe I’m putting too much faith in Gerard, but let’s face it, this is not a man who is inclined to shy away from independent, powerful women.

I rest my case.