#fred duncan

[movalise]

[movalise]

[rei-ismyname]

A few days late; but the Black Womb Project creates a context where Xavier spent the first decade or so of his life, raised by humans working for the U.S government, who knew about his mutation and saw it for its potential to help humankind. Which has fascinating implications for the school and the X-Men project, that have never really been dug into. Even the X-Men's early FBI liaison turned out to be the liaison to the project.

That's a good point. My God, there's been so many backstory additions over the years that it's hard to keep them straight.

If I recall correctly, Xavier didn't learn about Sinister co-opting Black Womb until later in life. Being that close to the government in his formative years with both his father and stepfather involved had to have an effect on young Xavier. Cain, too. You'd think being experimented on by your parents and Sinister as a child would be a huge turnoff, but he probably felt special. I don't recall how much Chuck actually remembered about the whole thing. He had memory issues for other reasons during the Carter Rykling incident. Maybe he blocked it out.

That extensive history doesn't really come through at all in Xavier and Fred Duncan's early dealings, though he did give him a lot of latitude when looking for Cyclops and Xavier certainly had a close working relationship with him. The amount of information shared about the then secret X-Men is proof of that, with the team even briefly disbanding on his orders.

I think there's something to be said about generational attitudes towards the government, especially the intelligence sector. The Comics Code prevented negative portrayals of law enforcement, there was usually just one bad actor pushing a hostile agenda, as opposed to institutional corruption and treatment of minorities.

Duncan seemed to have unusually good intentions towards the X-Men and mutants in general. There's his brief association with project Wideawake, though he refused to help Gyrich after the X-Men raided and destroyed the records on mutants. AFAIK he went private after that and was an ally before his death. Carl Denti is another story. I'm kinda rambling here but you're absolutely right - the implications are fascinating. Definitely something I'll revisit once I've refamiliarised myself. His early access to and collaboration with the government feels like a marker of privilege, along with his wealth and general respectability, but I daresay there's more to it.

Thanks!

[waitingforthet]

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[ndscottsummers]

Children of the Atom #3

[ndscottsummers]

some familiar faces in children of the atom #1

[ndscottsummers]

X-Men v1 #46

[ndscottsummers]

X-Men v1 #46

i like this bc there’s a footnote referencing agent duncan’s appearance in scott’s backstory and yet still no one bothered to check what his first name is