Thread by @AlexandraErin

Another thought about this week's episode: the Wong stories in #SheHulkAttorneyAtLaw are doing a good job of illustrating just how much the legal system in the MCU is not prepared to deal with things like the open existence of magic.

https://twitter.com/AlexandraErin/status/1568200538759610370

This was something I had wondered about, along the same lines as trying to adapt Civil War in a version of the MCU without decades of history of open superhuman activity and hundreds of characters. The She-Hulk solo books focused on superhuman law are in a very different world.

We know from stuff here and there going back to the first Thor movie that the history of magic on earth is old and from more recent things (especially the inclusion of family magical histories/traditions turning out to be real in multiple MCU properties) that it's continuous.

But we can surmise that until recently and particularly the Battle of Earth there hasn't been major, globe-shaking magical upheavals in the age of mass media and social media. Now the Mystic Arts are just a fact of life...

...to the point where Dane Whitman (in Eternals) can jump to the not completely unjustified if incorrect assumption that his girlfriend is a sorcerer and he's stumbled into a Bewitched situation.

But while US-based legal authorities are appeared to take and accept the testimony of Wong, Sorcerer Supreme, that he borrowed one of their ultramaximum security super inmates for his own purposes against the inmate's will, but have literally no power to hold him accountable.

Like, not even getting into thorny issues of if Wong is the head of state of an unrecognized city-state, or a citizen of Nepal, or both... unless they have intel about the significance of his ring, there's no real way to keep him in a cell even if he could be subdued.

And if they did manage to hold the Sorcerer Supreme, they have no way of keeping his location secret from magic without their own equally powerful magic*, and no way to keep the assembled masters of Kamar-Taj from extracting him.

*I'm going to posit that Darcy Lewis has enough experience with the intersection of magic and physics that she could maybe whip up some kind of electromagnetic interference field that would shield a place from scrying, but would they think to ask her?

And even if they bring Dr. Lewis in, somebody in Kamar-Taj would be smart enough to guess that Wong is probably in the high-tech prison with the anti-scrying field in it, and then the US is at war with sorcerers when the world knows sorcery helped save the universe from Thanos.

So sorcery, embodied in the person of Wong, the Sorcerer Supreme, is just this 900 pound gorilla that can portal in and out of the courtroom as it pleases and the legal system has little choice but to either roll with it or admit that it has absolutely no handle on the world.

I don't know that we actually have a canonical answer on the status of the Sokovian accords, their legality, and their applicability as part of US and international law. My best guess/interpretation is that the Widowed Avengers stepping up during the blip severely weakened them.

And then the presence of "enhanced individuals" from across time and space, including the previously unassuming but unassailable nation of Wakanda and the hidden de facto city-state of Kamar-Taj, at the Battle of Earth... I'm sorry, you wanted the Ravagers to show their papers?

Nobody who showed up to fight to save earth (and the universe) stopped to ask permission and any earthly government would have a hard time making the case to their own people that they should have, which makes it feel right that the accords would effectively be a dead letter.

But at the same time it seems like Damage Control feels like they have the right to investigate and detain superheroes for being superheroes.

But at the same time it's not like a person can superhero without breaking some law, especially when the law is subject to discretion.

Like, Kamala running across city rooftops on visibly not-fully-stable energy platforms could be argued to involve trespassing, damage to public and private property, and whatever "creating a nuisance" and "creating a danger" laws a motivated prosecutor can find.

Plus add in the general erosion of civil rights post 9-11 enhanced with the vibes of the Sokovia accords and you have authorities who can (try to) disappear any superbeing they find convenient to try it with, using the magic words of "national security".

With the rumblings of mutants (their definite existence in the cinematic multiverse, the metal claws bar brawl headline on Jennifer's browser screen, and Kamala's secret origin)... I really hope we get another series of She-Hulk after their existence is opened up.

Honestly, as I'm thinking my way through this... it actually feels right to me, for the classic X-Men storylines and vibe, to have mutants be a secret that breaks open after the Battle of Earth, after the human-shaped mountain in the Indian Ocean, etc.

Because we've got an established superhero fandom, we've got Damage Control visibly going after newbie heroes adjacent to marginalized communities that they feel like they can conveniently contain, we've people knowing about magic and gods and monsters...

...and we've got cities and nations that have been devastated by "superheroics" within a grateful world/nation, and it feels like this is a space in which a community of superbeings Hidden Among Us could enter and face a backlash mixed with uncertainty mixed with optimism.

And to clarify a point in this tweet: Kamala is part of the Muslim community Damage Control was targeting, but they didn't know who she was; the proximity was enough to make her seem the right mix of dangerous and disposable.

https://twitter.com/AlexandraErin/status/1568237552112439296

Which, I think that's an important part of the subtext of Ms. Marvel. Damage Control hasn't been going after Daredevil or any other non-Avengers New York vigilantes . And they're definitely not taking on the Avengers or Avengers-adjacent heroes.

I think a big part of the reason they went after Ms. Marvel and the Clan Destine is: they feel the need to justify their existence/budget/jurisdiction/scope by capturing and detaining superbeings, but it needs to be someone they can get away with locking up without public outcry

...now I'm imagining Val Cooper being added to the MCU as part of Damage Control, maybe a bit of a Mulder on the existence of a genetic line of human mutation that predisposes people towards superhuman abilities.

Maybe she gets put in nominal charge of a nominal division to focus on that, to keep her quiet and also stifle her ambitions (she sees her theory as a way to climb the ladder) and then when it turns out she's right about an "x-factor" she's Janie-On-The-Spot.

I should stop actively headcanoning this so I'm not disappointed with whatever they do instead.

Anyway, my big point here re: mutants is that there's space in the MCU for them to be a scapegoat and focal point for the misgivings and mistrust and grief people have about superbeings and for the need of government agencies to be seen to Do Something About It.

Like the Eternals, they weren't part of the Battle For Earth and have been existing in hiding among humanity, probably fighting their own battles among themselves and using their powers for convenience, amusement, and self-enrichment.

And there's more of them than of Eternals.

If the X-Men don't exist yet or didn't exist until recently, or they did not exist as a "superhero team", it could be that their formation/reorganization into such a team is a conscious step to try to step into the light in a format people might be ready to accept.

There was a thing I really liked in J*ss Wh*don's take on the X-Men, where Cyclops decided to bring back team uniforms and go help fight off a kaiju attack downstate in the big city because, basically, people like superheroes more than they like mutant paramilitary squads.

Which didn't work out well for them because the Fantastic Four was already on it (fighting big monsters is one of their things) and the optics was the X-Men clashing with New York's first family.

Another 21st century take on the X-Men that I like is the idea that they're a volunteer search-and-rescue/emergency relief organization.

Which is one of the less Be A Cop ways to superhero, and something I wish Superman movies included more of.

https://twitter.com/AlexandraErin/status/1568242634749087748

I think the Amazing Spider-Man movies and the Sony/MCU Spider-Man (particularly the first one, about Peter trying to stick close to the ground as a "friendly neighborhood Spider-Man") did well is showing Spider-Man's focus is on helping/saving people, not "fighting crime".