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What Is Cassandra Nova?

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Matthew Fluxington

15:22 / 20.12.03

My theory (and it's a convoluted one, for sure):

The Beast from Here Comes Tomorrow is En Sabah Nur, and he has created Cassandra in the same way that the the "Crawlers" were made - by splicing together the genes of various mutants in order to breed a creature with a desired combination of mutant powers. It never did make sense why Cassie had so many powers, right? It explains why the DNA would be so similar to Charles Xavier. It also explains why on a scientific level, she made no sense to Henry - she is not like anything else he's ever seen because she was made to be unlike anything else that ever was.

I think that Cassandra in the first year is inhabited by En Sabah Nur. He's engineering all of these events - the destruction of Genosha is meant to provoke war and rile Magneto. He wants to kill off and discredit Charles and the school so they can't prevent the new world he's trying to create. I think that En Sabah Nur is also linked to Sublime Pharmeceuticals and the Weapon Plus program - he's using them as well. The whole situation with setting up Magneto as Xorn was a deliberate move on his part, and Magneto was a pawn all along, being used to bring about the...ahem...apocalypse of Planet X.

Cassandra was a construct, and was never intended to last - if you notice, she seems to age rapidly over the course of E Is For Extinction as she uses her powers. By the end of Imperial, En Sabah Nur has left that body, which is merged with Stuff and left to be reeducated by Xavier. This body, I think, is Ernst, and Ernst grows up to become the Cassandra we see in Here Comes Tomorrow.

Another hint: Cassandra makes a point of belittling Scott Summers in #116 and #125, and shows a particularly intimate knowledge of Scott's mind. This was initially understood as being part of the fact that Cassandra was telepathic, but it also can be explained that she knows this because she once possessed Scott's body. When she sends Scott to the "Black Bug Room," Scott is being tormented by scarabs. En Sabah Nur is from ancient Egypt.

So what do you think?

Matthew Fluxington

15:33 / 20.12.03

Also: When Charles is first psychically assaulted by Cassandra, she introduces herself as "the first, the oldest, and the last enemy." This perfectly describes En Sabah Nur - in Marvel continuity, he is the first mutant in history, and as we can see in Here Comes Tomorrow, he is the last enemy. Charles tries to read his mind, but is told that it's all "garbage in there." This could explain why when Jean and Emma enter the mind of the dying Cassandra body to rescue Charles in #121, they find this forbidding landscape full of engineered memories that lead Jean to the conclusion that she is in fact Charles' biological twin and all of that "Mummudrai" nonsense. It was all planted to mislead the X-Men and throw them off from suspecting the true nature of Cassandra.

16:51 / 20.12.03

It all makes sense to me; it also doesn't write out the possibility that ESN jumped into Hank at some point -- which I know you fight against the idea of passionately but which I don't think is totally out of the question.

That said, however, I don't think it'll actually happen -- the sloppiness of PLANET X makes me wonder how coherent Morrison's plan for this bit of the NEW X-MEN story ever was -- but it'd be nice if it did. I shall add my sheer force of will to yours! Do we all need to masturbate or something...? What is the X-Men fanboy equivalent of masturbating? Is it reading the whole run of X-MEN 2099?

gotham island fae

19:09 / 20.12.03

I do like the Cassie-En Sabah Nur creation line, Matthew.

In seeking clues to Henry and En Sabah Nur and their relative possession-relationship. The thing that stuck out to me, though not immediately supportive of either theory, is that Henry has been the big whistleblower on a number of occassions. Two in the first arc of the total three act deal are the Prof's mind in Cassie and the nano-sentinels. Looking again, I am struck with the relative calm of Henry as the X-wing with him and Emma is sabotaged. He finishes a wonderful string of expository derision perfectly and immediately prior to detonation. Coincidence? Possible. He admits paranoia during the murder investigation when I personally can't see anyone blaming Henry. Course, that's prolly just Henry's self-deprecating way.

I still niggle at the dream sequence being 'created'. Though Beast was in charge of Charssie from hir discovery. And it could possibly been one more booby-trap in Cassie flesh. HHmmm.

gotham island fae

19:18 / 20.12.03

So, basically, I'm guessing that though you are right about ESN in Cassie during Exinction, I'd buy that during the beating from Beak, ESN hopped to Beast directly prior to 'Cassie's' sendoff to the Shiar in Charles' body. The next time we see Beast out of the coma is to whistleblow like I said above. And then the gayness comes. After Hank was hurt by Trish, prior to possession.

Curiouser and curiouser, dudez.

Matthew Fluxington

19:22 / 20.12.03

I'm just not buying that Henry McCoy has been possessed, or has been anything but a nice guy through this whole run. I think that En Sabah Nur is simply wearing a body created from Henry's DNA.

Matthew Fluxington

19:23 / 20.12.03

I think that if En Sabah Nur jumped to anyone at the end of Imperial, it was Esme.

Matthew Fluxington

19:26 / 20.12.03

ESN hopped to Beast directly prior to 'Cassie's' sendoff to the Shiar in Charles' body.

That makes no sense, since Cassandra retains the same personality that she had in E Is For Extinction throughout Imperial.

Yotsuba & Benjamin!

20:42 / 20.12.03

That line, "The first, oldest, and last enemy" is definitely the lynchpin to your immaculate theory, Matthew. I wholeheartedly agree, and can definitely buy the planted twin memory. Boy, won't ESN be surprised when Ernst shows up. Or maybe not. He's probably all types of all-knowing and shit.

Matthew Fluxington

21:00 / 20.12.03

Yeah, it's not even a planted memory for Charles - this whole Cassandra thing is news to him. All of the evidence about her being the twin that he killed in the womb was found inside of Cassandra's mind. The one thing they were right about was that Cassandra's conciousness was a disembodied spirit, which is exactly what En Sabah Nur was at the start of NXM continuity.

Matthew Fluxington

21:07 / 20.12.03

I like that following this theory, Cassandra, who was created as a means of destruction, would end up becoming the means of ending all of that and creating peace thanks to the Xavier Institute's reeducation.

03:50 / 22.12.03

When I went back a few weeks ago, I decided that possibly the Cassandra we first see in 'e is for extinction' has changed by the time she actually sees Xavier in person. I tried to figure out how many unaccounted anti-mutant killers there were supposed to be on Fantomex's super-team. I can't remember at this point, but there was at least one missng.

I don't think I believe the theory I came up with now, but I theorized that Cassandra was engineered as a gene-mimicking anti-mutant. At some point (possibly in Xavier's presence, maybe before) she came into contact with his DNA or the remains of the twin. It would explain the adaptive powers she shows at the beginning, like when she modifies her genetic makeup to make the sentinels believe she's a Trask.

08:35 / 22.12.03

i think the mummadrai thing isn't a construct by en-nuh-whatever his name is (is that apocalpypse? i stopped reading x-men in 1990 until GM took over) unless he also duped the shi-ar space empire for hundreds of years, of course he could have just hijacked a convenient myth of their, or more likely we are just filling in for GMs total lack of explaining anything in this run in a meaningful way

as for the 'universe all going wrong' stuff in 150, doesn't that just allow the death of magneto & jean to be undone in the new post GM continuity as the marvel universe returns to business as usual after here comes tomorrow and we can all get ready for the x-men 3 film comic spin offs?

a

10:08 / 22.12.03

I don't but this theory, although some of the alternative explanations seem just as convoluted at this point. We don't know enough yet to work out how Beast might become the Beast, but all I can guess at this stage is that it has something to do with his experiments to counter the effect of the extinction gene. It wouldn't be the first time that one of Hank's genetic experiments has backfired. Hank has been tinkering with U-Man technology from early on in NXM - and had mastered it sufficiently enough to believe he could save Cassandra Nova's body in Imperial. Plus he came up with a kick antidote - which raises more questions than it answers, when did he do this and does this actually point to his involvement in the drug's development.

The Beast in Here Comes Tomorrow seems very like Apocalypse in his speech and costume. That doesn't necessarily mean it is him, I suppose Hank could just have gone all mad scientist. But it would seem odd to mention Apocalypse throughout NXM and have this Apocalyse-like character in the final arc that has no connection to him whatsoever.

As for Cassandra. I too thought that she must be part of the Weapon Plus programme, whether or not she was originally Xavier's twin. Since the Magneto=Xorn revalation - and also in light of Fantomex's false background/mother - it seems quite possible that the memory of the fight in the womb that Jean uncovered was a fake memory. (Hence Xavier doesn't know who Nova is.) But how the mamundrai (sic) would tie in with Cassandra being purely a Weapon Plus invention is unclear. There was clearly some separate spirit/entity but this was trapped inside Stuff, and I don't see how it could have got out at any stage in NXM. Whether this means there was indeed a twin, of some sort, which was recovered - and enhanced - by Weapon Plus I'm not entirely sure. But as the South American Mastermold was processing mutant body parts, I've always assumed there was a link with the U-Men's organ harvesting.

Back in NXM128 Xavier said that he wondered whether humanity (and mutantkind) were merely pawns in some intelligent evolutionary process, and I think this is what underlies the whole run.

Matthew Fluxington

11:24 / 22.12.03

of course he could have just hijacked a convenient myth of theirs

I think this is it. You know, it's never Cassandra who claims to be a Mummudrai, it's Jean and Charles who are using that as an explanation given the the information that they've been given. It's just the same as when Henry theorizes that she's the first of a whole new species - that's probably not true, but it's the best theory he could come up with given the information that he had at the time.

as for the 'universe all going wrong' stuff in 150, doesn't that just allow the death of magneto & jean to be undone in the new post GM continuity as the marvel universe returns to business as usual after here comes tomorrow and we can all get ready for the x-men 3 film comic spin offs?

Oh yeah, definitely, and I welcome that. I think it's a great idea. I suspect that the undoing of Planet X will be part of the conclusion of Here Comes Tomorrow - otherwise, every other writer at Marvel has a mess to deal with.

I'm Rick Jones, bitch

13:39 / 22.12.03

Fuck em.

The writers of The Authority never had to worry about this sort of thing.

16:54 / 22.12.03

Thinking about it now, the one puzzling thing about the end of Imperial is why there is a Cassandra and a mummundrai, i.e. two separate entities, in the psychic school programmed into Stuff's mind. Does that mean the mummundrai did create Cassandra in the way Jean describes, or that Cassandra was possessed after being created by Weapon Plus, or something else entirely?

Matthew Fluxington

17:03 / 22.12.03

That's the part that's getting me too. It's the big flaw in my theory, too - the Mummadrai, who I think is En Sabah Nur, is clearly inside of Stuff with the mindless Cassandra body. I'm thinking that at some point, En Sabah Nur escapes, and the mind that is Ernst/Cassandra is in fact the reeducated conciousness of Stuff. But this is clearly happening off-panel, which there is loads of precedent for in Grant's NXM, but is still somewhat irksome.

I don't that Cassandra was a product of Weapon Plus, but instead created by En Sabah Nur on his own to house his body for a specific mission. I do think that En Sabah Nur was the man behind the science of Sublime Pharmeceuticals, Kick, and Weapon Plus. When Henry is adding it all up in #150, he mentions the aggression of the humans, which is clearly to do with Weapon Plus/the Sentinels and definitely fits into En Sabah Nur's engineered race war. Or, as Charles thinks of it, a "sentient evolutionary process." I think that's a big tip-off right there.

17:34 / 22.12.03

JLA ended with the people of earth displaying toxic levels of aggression due to the coming and "machinations" of Mageddon, the primal evil of the universe. Hmmmm...

17:47 / 22.12.03

Yeah Flux, I was gonna mention that. When Prof X mentions the sentient evolutionary process in the original Fantomex story it for some reason had serious ringtones of En Saba Nur. Anyone other than me notice that in the preview of Here Comes Tomorrow, when the Beast does his rant Apocalypse is capitalized? Could be 'proper name' capitalization of 'major-event' capitalization. Speculation is all that is.

I actually took upon myself the perilously time consuming task of re-reading that series again top-to-tails. I was so surprised how well it read as a maxi-arc. In rereading it considering everything you can see everything creeping into place from the very first arc. There were alot of "anomalies" that don't seem so strange now, but there are alot that are still unanswered. Twice in the series, beast is at his desk doing something, and he just perks up like he's had an epiphany of sorts, and walk out of his room. There are other quirks like that, alluding to all sorts of off panel activity. Things I'm sure will be wrapped up in Here Comes Tomorrow. It all worked quite fluidly though. Even the Fantomex stuff, in that it functionally brought us E.V.A.

E.V.A. is MY question regarding this whole thing. If you read the end of Assault, into the beginning of Planet X, you see how much grant leaves off panel. Scott and Fantomex are plummeting back to Earth, over the pacific somewhere. Fantomex is saying that something has happened to E.V.A. but Scott is more concerned about Logan. When Beast and Emma go to save them, just as Emma picks up that Scott know about a traitor the ship blows up. WE never see what happens to Scott and Fantomex. The next time we see them they're at the mansion, after E.V.A. picked up Beak.

So how did Scott and Fantomex get back to the mansion, and how did E.V.A. escape her torture chamber in Assault on Weapon X? Didn't they explode her?

And I guess we can assume that Phoenix helped telepathically co-ordinate that attack on Magneto.

I thought Cassandra Nova was just the body of stuff that learned enough to take back its form and contribute to society type thing. I thought that she was basically the end result of Prof. X's teaching inside of the artificial mind. Now that I read that over, it seems reeealy flaky, so, yeah, what the hell is she??

Imaginary Mongoose Solutions

19:37 / 22.12.03

Also: When Charles is first psychically assaulted by Cassandra, she introduces herself as "the first, the oldest, and the last enemy."

Reads like Groff Birth Trauma stuff to me.

Matthew Fluxington

19:53 / 22.12.03

Yeah, but if the En Sabah Nur theory is correct, then it was a cleverly worded bit that was designed to be true for the deception of the "murdered twin" story and the eventual truth.

Ever since the beginning, I've always been a bit wary of the "Cassandra is evil twin who was never born" thing. There's a huge gap from that point up to when Cassandra appears in South America in #114, and I think that was intentionally left vague. If she really was Xavier's bodiless twin, then what the hell was she doing for 40/50/60 years? Where did she get a body? Why did it have all of those powers, as well as Charles' DNA? How did she know so much about the Sentinels? Why is she such an expert about genetics and evolution? How would she be connected to Sublime Pharmeceuticals and the U-Men? It only fits together logically with the En Sabah Nur explanation. Unless there's something else...

20:50 / 22.12.03

As much as I don't think the Cuckoos have anything to do with time-getting-fucked re:150, they do have a bit to do with the state the Cassandra/Ernst/Stuff/En Sabah Nur is in. Do they really have something to do with Weapon Plus? How did they come up with the plan of trapping Cassandra so easily?

I feel slight flaws in the En Cassa Nova theory, but otherwise it feels sound, Matthew. Good job!

21:01 / 22.12.03

THe force of gmoz himself outwith th x-men hiiting like a rock within his run ?

09:18 / 23.12.03

Wasn't Apocalypse retconned in the late 90s into being an evil spirit? So I suppose he could be what the Shi'ar refer to as a mummundrai. I said after NXM128 you could see the mummundrai and the Phoenix force as opposing elements of the intelligent evoluntionary process, one bringing chaos and destruction, the other creating order.

Matthew Fluxington

11:31 / 23.12.03

Wasn't Apocalypse retconned in the late 90s into being an evil spirit?

There was never a "retcon." At the end of the last big Apocalypse story, he lost his body and possessed Scott. Ever since, he's disembodied.

11:59 / 23.12.03

If she really was Xavier's bodiless twin, then what the hell was she doing for 40/50/60 years?

At the end of the day, GM has come on board and created this character, the reason I like his run is it seemed to not be bogged down with what had happened pre NXM#114.

I think the En Sabah Nur thing sounds good, mainly because it explains a lot. But whatever happened to Cassie's original body. She gets shot up in E for Extintion, puts Charles in hers and takes over Charles body for Imperial. She is then disembodied and goes into Stuff, and is trapped. But what happened to the original body??

Beast being Apocalypse, well the only clue I got was his colour - white, Apocalypse was white??

Our Lady of The Two Towers

12:19 / 23.12.03

Gee, imagine how disappointed I'd be if I got to read #151 without knowing beforehand about Cassie being involved...

Matthew Fluxington

12:36 / 23.12.03

But what happened to the original body??

Check #126. It died.

Beast being Apocalypse, well the only clue I got was his colour - white, Apocalypse was white??

Um, not really. He's a black man who always wore purple and blue armor in his previous appearances.

And Flowers, we've been posting spoiler warnings. It's not our fault you didn't heed them. This thread in particular has a pretty huge spoiler warning in the abstract.

12:47 / 23.12.03

There was never a "retcon." At the end of the last big Apocalypse story, he lost his body and possessed Scott. Ever since, he's disembodied.

Are you sure? I thought he started out as an immortal mutant who could change his appearance, but then there was a mini-series set in the future where he transferred his essence into different hosts to sustain his existence. The latter would fit more with the mummundrai theory.

Matthew Fluxington

13:02 / 23.12.03

Oh, if that's the case, then okay. I never read that miniseries, and I think you're right. He's definitely a disembodied spirit, though.

13:04 / 23.12.03

I think you're right, Quireboy. In the horrible Twelve storyline, it was news to everyone to see an old man, possessed by an evil spirit completely encapsulated in armor at least a foot thick all around. The armor fell to the ground, the old man died, and the evil spirit went into Cyke to create that weird Apocaclops thing.

Back to Cassie Nova, what was her purpose? To destroy 16,000,000 mutants and all that the Xavier Institute loved and felt responsible for. Her plan was to hijack Xavier's mind, thereby ruining the Shiar Empire (another race superior to humans) and returning to destroy the minds of all mutants. This does not sound like Apocalypse's agenda, but Weapon Plus's. Apocalypse wasn't into genocide, unless it fit his survival of the fittest mantra. It's Weapon Plus that wanted to kill all mutants. And their Super Sentinels team didn't have a female on it, did it. Nor did it seem to have a Xavier-type mentor character. Perhaps Cassandra was meant to be the Prof. X of the Super Sentinels.

Nova obviously possessed gene-mimicking powers. Never a trust a girl with gene-mimicking powers who says she's your twin sister. I doubt she is. I think she's a Super Sentinel.

But I still think En Sabah Nur fits in somewhere.

13:31 / 23.12.03

I think you've hit on why I'm as yet unconvinced about Cassandra being Apocalypse, Quimper. But the counter argument is that the strongest mutant in Genosha - Magneto - did survive. And the attack prompted his counter-attack, which nearly resulted in all-out inter-species war. My vague idea is that while Weapon Plus and Magneto were exploiting one another, they didn't realise they were merely pawns in a larger game.

I was thinking whether the villains in New X-Men could be linked to the four horsemen of the Apocalypse: chaos, pestilence, famine and death. There's been plenty of death (Genosha), pestilence (nano-sentinels), and chaos (the riot), but no famine that I can recall.

Matthew Fluxington

13:41 / 23.12.03

I don't think En Sabah Nur is motivated by a "survival of the fittest" mantra per se, but a mad desire to sieze control of evolution and play God. He wants to have absolute control of life on earth. I think that his interest has been in engineering these race-war conflicts in order to clear the page so that his genetic creations can become the dominant species on the planet and be subserviant to him. In Here Comes Tomorrow, we have a world in which humans are just about gone, and mutants are struggling to survive alongside newer species created by The Beast/En Sabah Nur.

Part of why I think that Cassandra is not so much a pawn of Weapon Plus is that a) her dialogue is just way too much like En Sabah Nur, there's all kinds of clues in her behavior that lead me to believe that's who she was and b) I think that having Weapon Plus have too much of a role in her actions overcomplicates matters, and all of the answers thus far have been decidely simple.

Matthew Fluxington

13:42 / 23.12.03

Again, I think the Black Bug Room was a big hint.

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