Body-only appearances

Discuss chronologies for characters in the main "Marvel Universe"

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Body-only appearances

Post by Somebody »

Right now, there are two explicitly-noted sets of body-only appearances in the MCP. And both are done differently:

The Professor X/Cassandra Nova swap in Morrison's X-Men is done with normal appearances in the entries of the character who appears in mind, but separate PROFESSOR X'S BODY and CASSANDRA NOVA'S BODY chronologies to avoid having an appearance of their bodies in their chronologies when they're not in it.

On the other hand, the appearances of Daytripper's mum in her body are included in both chronologies, with "(Body only; possessed by Margali Szardos)" notes beside the relevant issues in Daytripper's chronology, and " (in Daytripper's body)" notes in Szardos'.

Could these maybe be rationalised into one form of note?
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Re: Body-only appearances

Post by Enda80 »

The inestimable Don Campbell pointed out that Loki usurped Odin's corpus for several issues of Thor, as well as an issue of the Infinity Gauntlet.

http://www.chronologyproject.com/wwwboa ... s/4186.htm

Note, this is not a dead link, it still works.
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Re: Body-only appearances

Post by Col_Fury »

Generally speaking, if only a character's body appears it's a BTS. If a character appears disguised it's a full appearance.

With Daytripper & Szardos, I would say switch Daytripper's entries for those two issues to BTSs. It's only her body appearing, controlled by Szardos. Szardos I would think should be full appearances, as it's Szardos appearing in the disguise of Daytripper's body. If needed, add a |cf| somewhere.

Xavier is listed as BTS for the issues his body has a chronology for. Nova is listed as BTS for those same issues in her chronology. Nova's body is also listed for those same issues. Without checking the books or the Archives, I'll take a stab and say the reason their bodies have chronologies is because is a strange beast. Leave it as it is.

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Re: Body-only appearances

Post by Russ Chappell »

Col_Fury wrote:Generally speaking, if only a character's body appears it's a BTS. If a character appears disguised it's a full appearance.
As I understand what we're talking about here, it's actually the opposite. See below.
Xavier is listed as BTS for the issues his body has a chronology for. Nova is listed as BTS for those same issues in her chronology. Nova's body is also listed for those same issues.
That's purely coincidence, though. Xavier is listed as BTS because his consciousness is controlling another body; there's no correlation to his body appearing in those books at the same time. The same applies for Cassandra Nova. Nova was (behind the scenes) controlling Professor X's body (which was seen on panel). Professor X was (behind the scenes) controlling Nova's on-screen body.

Generally speaking, if a character's body appears, it's an actual appearance, regardless of where their consciousness is (see, for instance, the cases of comas, or corpses). If a character A's mind is controlling character B's body, then character A receives a behind-the-scenes appearance, and character B receives a full-fledged appearance.

I'm not sure offhand what reasoning led to our listing these appearances by Professor X and Cassandra Nova the way we have; this seems to be an ordinary body/mind swap, and we would normally just list them both as regular appearances, without the need to distinguish between "body" and "soul" appearances. Anyone out there have a better memory than I do?


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Re: Body-only appearances

Post by Somebody »

Administrator wrote:Generally speaking, if a character's body appears, it's an actual appearance, regardless of where their consciousness is (see, for instance, the cases of comas, or corpses). If a character A's mind is controlling character B's body, then character A receives a behind-the-scenes appearance, and character B receives a full-fledged appearance.
Even when it's fully known from the start (both to readers & the other characters) that character A is in character B's body? (actually, in the instance I'm thinking of - ANNCONQ 5-6 - this part doesn't matter, since Ultron spends at least part of both issues in a body styled after his own, as well as Adam Warlock's. It's Warlock's listing I needed clarification on, since only his body appears in #5 - it's not a body swap, his soul's just thrown out - and this seems to have provided it)
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Re: Body-only appearances

Post by Russ Chappell »

Somebody wrote:
Administrator wrote:Generally speaking, if a character's body appears, it's an actual appearance, regardless of where their consciousness is (see, for instance, the cases of comas, or corpses). If a character A's mind is controlling character B's body, then character A receives a behind-the-scenes appearance, and character B receives a full-fledged appearance.
Even when it's fully known from the start (both to readers & the other characters) that character A is in character B's body?
Don't really see where that would matter. If Dr. Doom's mind is inhabiting Reed's body, and both the reader's and the rest of the FF know it, but we don't actually see Dr. Doom, then Doom would receive a BTS appearance, and Reed would be full-fledged.


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Re: Body-only appearances

Post by Somebody »

Okay. It just seemed a tad strange that if (e.g.) Prof X remote-controlled Cassandra Nova and thus "her" words and actions were actually his using her body, it's an OP; but if he's actually in her body doing the exact same stuff, it gets the lesser ("trumped by OP") BTS, rather than the greater full-appearance. I just wanted to be sure I had you right :)
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Re: Body-only appearances

Post by Russ Chappell »

Somebody wrote:Okay. It just seemed a tad strange that if (e.g.) Prof X remote-controlled Cassandra Nova and thus "her" words and actions were actually his using her body, it's an OP;
No...

It might be a VO, but that's another discussion.

OP is literally there, but off-panel. Let's say that the Human Torch is in one panel of a story. He's eating lunch at the table and he says "Hey, Ben, would you please pass the jelly?" We don't actually see the Thing at all, but we can assume that Ben is right there, sitting next to Johnny, just off camera, or off panel.


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