Rictor

Created by writer Louise Simonson and artist Walt Simonson, Rictor first appeared in X-Factor #17 (June 1987). X-Factor owed its early popularity to reuniting the five original main characters of The X-Men; new characters were introduced to the series over time, and Simonson's run introduced Mexican earth-manipulator Rictor as one of several young wards to the senior X-Men characters. In 1988, Simonson spun off these characters into their own miniseries X-Terminators before transferring most of them, including Rictor, to the cast of her other ongoing X-Men title The New Mutants during the "Inferno" crossover event. As part of the main cast of The New Mutants, Rictor also appeared in the crossover events "Days of Future Present" and "X-Tinction Agenda".

Rictor was written out of The New Mutants in issue #98 (February 1991), when artist Rob Liefeld took over plotting for the series after Simonson's departure. Under Liefeld's creative direction, the series was ended with issue #100 and relaunched as X-Force, with substantial changes in team lineup and a new high-octane and gritty tone. Rictor reappeared in X-Force #11, Liefeld's final issue on the series; dialogue scripter Fabian Nicieza subsequently took over full writing duties on the series and had Rictor join X-Force in issue #15 (October 1992).

During his time on X-Force, Rictor also appeared in the crossover stories "X-Cutioner's Song", "Fatal Attractions", "Child's Play" and "Phalanx Covenant", and guest-starred in the Cable series. Rictor remained a main character on X-Force for the duration of Nicieza's run on the series, up to the "Age of Apocalypse" event. Afterwards, Rictor left the team when Jeph Loeb took over as writer in issue #44 (July 1995); Loeb later brought Rictor back in issue #59 (October 1996). The character would remain on the team until issue #70 (October 1997), afterwards reappearing in issue #76 and the 1999 annual.

Rictor would develop a close bond with his X-Force teammate Shatterstar, who had first appeared in The New Mutants #99. From the beginning of Jeph Loeb's run as writer, the characters' relationship was deliberately coded as romantic. However, Loeb's intention to write the characters into a relationship was not followed-up by his successors upon departing the series, and the romantic connection between them was not made explicit.

In 2002, the character returned in the pages of New X-Men as a member of Professor Xavier's X-Corporation. Following the House of M crossover storyline in 2005, which saw the character lose his mutant abilities, Rictor returned to the X-Factor title with Peter David's third volume of the title. X-Factor vol. 3 began with Rictor extremely depressed and suicidal over the loss of his powers, joining as a civilian member of Jamie Madrox (Multiple Man)'s team of superhero detectives, X-Factor Investigations. David's run would explore the character's romantic relationship with Wolfsbane (Rahne Sinclair), as first visited in the Liefeld run, and later made comic book history when the character was reunited with Shatterstar in X-Factor #45 (2009), which saw the two characters kiss. Storylines since, in the renumbered X-Factor #200 and onwards, have focused on the pair's explicitly romantic and sexual relationship. Marvel continued to depict Rictor as powerless until Avengers: The Children's Crusade #6 (2011), in which the Scarlet Witch restored his abilities.

In 2018, Rictor appeared as a main character in the miniseries New Mutants: Dead Souls and as a supporting character in the miniseries Shatterstar.[2]

Rictor is a mutant capable of generating and manipulating seismic energy and creating tremendously powerful waves of vibrations in any nearby object, causing objects to shatter or crumble. When used against objects with a larger surface, the effects are much like an earthquake. Rictor's powers appear to affect organic objects in much the same way as inorganic ones; he is depicted using them to explode a cactus plant in X-Force #25. Rictor himself is immune to the harmful effects of the vibrations he creates. He has expressed reluctance to use his powers in tectonically unstable areas, for fear that he could not control the effects, as when he visited the fictional island of Madripoor, which is located in the Pacific Ring of Fire, in New Mutants #93 (September 1990). In New X-Men #130 Jean Grey also states that Rictor has some kind of telepathic defense against Weapon XII's infestation. In issue #1 of the 2005 relaunch of X-Factor, he is depicted as suicidal, lamenting the loss of his power after M-Day. During the series he talks about how he had some sort of empathic connection with the earth itself and misses it. His powers are restored six years later in Avengers: The Children's Crusade.

During the 2005–2011 period when Rictor was powerless, he worked as a detective. Of the X-Factor Investigations team, he is the most skilled at using computers, a trait he utilized during his time with that agency to compensate when he did not have his seismic abilities.[38] In one storyline during this period, Rictor's body briefly had Terrigen Crystals (as used by the Inhumans) embedded in his back, small fragments left over from when Quicksilver's crystals had exploded.[29] In a confrontation with the Isolationist, Rictor was shown to be immune or resistant to the various powers the Isolationist manifested because of these crystals. Physical contact with Rictor reversed the villain's Colossus-like transformation, a direct assault with Cyclops-like optic blasts had no effect, and an Iceman-style ice construct melted around Rictor. According to writer Peter David, these crystals burnt out subsequently.[29]

• In 2014, Entertainment Weekly ranked Rictor 43rd in their "Let's rank every X-Man ever" list.[39]
• In 2018, CBR.com ranked Rictor 17th in their "20 Most Powerful Mutants From The '80s" list.[40]
• In 2018, CBR.com ranked Rictor 19th in their "X-Force: 20 Powerful Members" list.[41]

Rictor and Shatterstar kiss. Art by Marco Santucci.

In early comics featuring Rictor and Shatterstar together (most notably Jeph Loeb's X-Force), there was a persistent subtext that the two were in a relationship together.[42] Over the 1990s, Rictor certainly developed a close—and somewhat ambiguous—relationship with Shatterstar.[43][44][45][46][47] Although Shatterstar was introduced by creator Rob Liefeld as an asexual killing machine, writer Peter David reflects that the character's "prolonged exposure to humanity" changed this.[42] X-Force writer Jeph Loeb hinted that Shatterstar had romantic feelings for Rictor and was planning on making the two a couple, but he left the title before this could happen.[48] Though the romantic subtext between the characters was never quite explicit in Loeb's series, fans nevertheless picked up on it.[42] Over the course of the characters' appearances, Rictor and Shatterstar's relationship would evolve from a subtext in 1990s X-Force comics to Marvel naming them one of the company's top ten supercouples in 2010.[49] In 2011, writer Peter David won a GLAAD Award for the portrayal of Rictor and Shatterstar's relationship in X-Factor.[50]

In 2007, a joke in Peter David's X-Factor v. 3 #14 features Rictor insinuating to Madrox that he and Quicksilver might have been romantically or sexually intimate, which he later denies only on account of Quicksilver being "evil". This was the first explicit hint of Rictor's ambiguous sexuality. With regards to this scene, as the writer continued to develop Rictor's personal relationships, David expressed the idea that:

[It is] more fun tweaking the fans than actually spelling anything out ... I think it's much more interesting to have Rictor's comments be a litmus test for the agenda of the readers than if you just show him involved in some sort of bisexual relationship.[51]

Although creator Louise Simonson did not conceive of the character as being gay or indeed non-heterosexual, canonically, Rictor has had romances with men and women.[52] In X-Factor v. 3, under the pen of Peter David, Rictor dated both Rahne Sinclair (Wolfsbane)[53][54] and Tabitha Smith (Boom Boom).[53] Although in X-Factor #21 in 2007, Rictor had begun a sexual relationship with Rahne,[54] she later left the team "under abrupt circumstances" because editorial had decided to move the character to another book. This created an opening for David to bring back Shatterstar. David was drawn to revisit Loeb's unresolved Rictor-Shatterstar romance because of fans' requests for Shatterstar to return "and to see Rictor and Shatterstar pick up where they left off."[55] David remarks it was the storyline he got the most requests to write. Because neither character is a "household name", David was given more freedom by Marvel to interpret the characters and write the storyline as he wished; there was no trouble getting the storyline approved.[52] David writes Rictor's embrace of his love for Shatterstar as a maturation for the character, whom he sees "fully committed to the gay lifestyle... honest about it both with others and himself."[52]

In X-Factor #45, in 2009, Rictor kissed Shatterstar.[56] The two characters' first on-panel kiss became the first male-male kiss between two mainstream male superheroes in mainstream Marvel comic book history.[52] X-Factor editor Jody Leheup knew that the kiss would make "a cool moment for the fans" but stated it had not occurred to him that it would be such an important scene to gay and straight comic fans. He also remarked on the need to not over-hype the scene as he and David "really want[ed] things like this to be seen as normal."[52] David felt this was an interesting direction to take Rictor in, which particularly allowed the character—currently, emotionally vulnerable—to deal with the abruptness of Rahne's departure without having to have Rictor so much as break the fourth wall and resign himself to Rahne being in another book.[55] Shortly after X-Factor v.3 #45, Peter David confirmed Rictor's same-sex sexuality in his blog and expressed his desire to develop the relationship between Rictor and Shatterstar further.[57][58][59] In X-Factor #210 (2010), Rictor seems to suggest he has always known deep down that he was gay and was in the closet.[56] Explaining Rictor's prior straight relationships, David compares him to real-life "women who eventually decided they were lesbians had involvements with men that they ultimately considered unfulfilling."[52]

For David, the relationship opened up other avenues for character development in the series. For example, he was able to explore Strong Guy's "liberal hypocrisy":[60] his socially liberal personal values alongside his discomfort around gay people, in that character's reaction.[55] Peter David expressed that he does not want the relationship to become boring by having no problems. However, he wishes to avoid killing off either character; he opines that both characters are too well-established to fall into the pattern of killing off the more minor character to elicit angst in the more major one. One major facet of the relationship is that this is Shatterstar's first real relationship, meaning the two men might want very different things.[60] As David sees it, newly out bisexual Shatterstar is "like a kid in a candy store", whereas Rictor is ready to fully commit.[52] David feels that these issues are interesting because they are new to superhero comic books; he does note, however, that the view he brings to the characters comes from the perspective of a heterosexual writer and his own personal experiences, and might not be the same as that of a gay writer.[60]

• Rictor at Marvel.com