Ms. Marvel: The New Mutant #2
Iman Vellani and Sabir Pirzada (writers), Carlos Gómez and Adam Gorham (artists), Erick Arciniega (colorist), VC’s Joe Caramagna (letterer), and Tom Muller and Jay Bowen (designers), with Sara Pichelli and Matthew Wilson (cover artists)
Marvel Comics
September 27, 2023
Following another one of Adam Gorham’s (body) horrific dream sequences, Kamala Khan awakens in her Empire State University dorm room. There, she finally tells her best friend Bruno Carrelli about the recurring nightmare she’s had ever since being resurrected on Krakoa. When Bruno points out that the Silver Surfer/Doctor Strange mash-up Kamala has been seeing in those dreams sounds like something out of her fanfiction, she realizes that that’s exactly what Dr. Surfer is. In multiple layers of Ms. Marvel meta, Kamala pulls Carlos Gómez-drawn sketches from a box that also advertises “Kaptain Karachi” and “Galaspider-Boy” (I am not sold on Spider-Boy, especially when there isn’t a Ms. Marvel ongoing, but I would read this one-shot). Kamala and Bruno decide to team up to figure out what’s going on with her dreams.
As Bruno prepares the sleep study, Kamala walks into a predominantly white group of anti-mutant protestors harassing a lone woman of color, who holds a sign that reads, “Mutants welcome! Choose love.” Knowing that Ms. Marvel prompted this protest, Kamala narrates, “Using my powers will only increase their fear. / There’s nothing more I can do. Except watch hate win.” There’s an irony that hangs in the air between her words, her face, and the presumably human hand reaching down to help her up after the mob pushed her to the ground. The college setting and more adult sense of humor are not the only things making this mini feel more grown up than Ms. Marvel, Magnificent Ms. Marvel, or Ms. Marvel: Beyond the Limit: the artists and co-writers Iman Vellani and Sabir Pirzada are all trusting their readers to read between the lines. Kamala Khan can’t do anything yet.
And that doesn’t mean she doesn’t want to. Kamala meets Emma Frost again, this time at the old Hellfire Club. Kamala’s dynamic with Emma is so unlike those she has with Carol Danvers or Tony Stark, who also appears as Mr. Emma Frost. Emma isn’t someone Kamala (or Vellani) has spent most of her life idolizing (a big difference between the character and her actor/writer is that the latter loves Iron Man, not Captain Marvel), and Emma is used to being seen as a villain, even when she has the best intentions. Which Emma very obviously does when she tells Kamala, “Please. Set the misplaced idealism aside and try settling for finding peace within yourself… / …so I don’t have to cradle your body someday. I’m rather tired of that.” Emma’s advice isn’t malicious, it’s just misguided, informed by her own experience (and longer history) as a mutant, which isn’t going to perfectly line up with Kamala’s experience as a “Pakistani-American-Inhu-Mutant” who wants to “change people’s minds,” “set the example,” and “show them that there’s nothing to be afraid of!” As a woman of color working in predominantly white institutions (including comics criticism) with mentors who legitimately care about but cannot wholly understand me, I love this tension. It feels authentic, and it gives Kamala more room to grow. I’m hopeful that this creative team will make it pay off. It and the Orchis plotline.
Orchis’s Nitika Gaiha and Omega Sentinel have played relatively minor roles so far, sending monsters-of-the-week onto campus as they try to suss out Ms. Marvel’s secret identity. Whether in dreams or daytime, it’ll be interesting to see what happens next.
