Hope Summers (character)

Hope Summers
Cable #21, featuring Hope as a teenager.
Publication information
Publisher	Marvel Comics
First appearance	X-Men #205 (November 2007)
Created by	Mike Carey Chris Bachalo
In-story information
Alter ego	Hope Summers (born Spalding)
Species	Human Mutant
Team affiliations	X-Men The Lights
Partnerships	Cable
Notable aliases	Mutant Messiah
Abilities	Power mimicry

Hope Summers is a fictional comic book superhero appearing in books published by Marvel Comics. The character first appeared in X-Men #205 in 2007 (Chapter five of the "X-Men: Messiah Complex" storyline), and was created by writers Mike Carey and artist Chris Bachalo during the "X-Men: Messiah Complex" event. She is the first mutant born after the events of the "House of M" and "Decimation" storyline.

Publication history

"Messiah Complex"

Main article: X-Men: Messiah Complex

Hope is the first mutant to be born after the Decimation, an event in which the Scarlet Witch uses her reality-altering superpower to turn all but 198 of the world's mutants into regular, depowered humans. The moment Hope is born, the mutant locating computer Cerebro explodes, and soon afterwards the hunt for her begins.

Hope's town is attacked by the Purifiers, who use information given to them by the time-traveling Nimrod who warns them of her arrival. Although all the children in town are murdered by the Purifiers, the X-Man Cable manages to save Hope. According to Cable, the baby is a Messianic figure destined to save both mutant and humankind. The Purifiers and Bishop, however, believe Hope will become the mutant equivalent of the Antichrist and kill a million humans in an instant. This event will turn humanity against mutants once again and lead into a new era of mutant persecution, creating the dark timeline into which Bishop is born.

Later, the baby is kidnapped by the Marauders and delivered to the mutant Mystique who is disguised as Mister Sinister. Mystique takes the baby and makes her touch the comatose Rogue with the intention of waking her from her coma. The mutant Gambit intervenes and takes Hope from Mystique. Believing the baby has died during her rescue, Gambit is amazed to find not only is the baby unharmed, but also Rogue has been awakened from her coma. After an intense battle between the Marauders, the X-Men and Predator X, X-Men leader Cyclops decides the baby would be better off with his son Cable, and allows him to take her to the future. However, an adamant Bishop decides to track Cable and the baby through time in order to kill her and prevent the bleak future of his own timeline from happening.

Panel from X-Force/Cable: Messiah War #1 (March 2009).
Art by Mike Choi

Into the Future

During one of the first battles with Bishop, Cable's time traveling device is damaged, so he can only jump into the future, instead of the past, when he needs to escape Bishop each time he finds them. After several jumps into the future, it is revealed that Cable has taken her to the secluded safe haven of New Liberty in the future, where Cable marries a woman named Hope, who is like a mother to the mutant baby. Finding relative peace there, he raises her with Hope until she's seven years old. But then New Liberty is invaded by humanoid insects who called themselves the United States Army, later calling themselves humanoid Blattarians. Cable fights them and leaves New Liberty with his wife and her in order to make sure New Liberty does not fall. After spending months in the wasteland, the family is attacked by the president of the insects, whom Hope manages to save her family from by stabbing the insect in his weak spot, since she has been watching Cable fight. Cable questions the president where he finds out that Bishop, in order to find Hope in the future, has destroyed all the continents in the world and left them uninhabitable, except North America, in order to box them in, find her and kill her. Cable kills the president, and the family moves on. The family encounters a settlement, but are met with resistance. Cable takes care of them easily, but not fast enough, as her mother is shot and dies in Cable's arms while she watches. Hope sees Cable bury the closest thing she ever had to a mother and departs with him. After arriving at a church, the pastor asks the name of the child. In that moment, Cable decides to name her Hope Summers, in honor of her adoptive mother.

"Messiah War"

In the Messiah War storyline, which ran through Cable and X-Force, Hope Summers was the center of conflict between the forces of Stryfe, Cable, and X-Force. The Messiah War was part of a three-part story that began with X-Men: Messiah Complex. During the Messiah War, Hope was kidnapped by Cable's clone Stryfe, in league with Bishop. Hope watched as Stryfe tortured Warpath until Cable, Wolverine and Elixir came to their rescue. In the following fight, Hope survived along with the rest of X-Force and Cable, though Bishop lost an eye to Wolverine and had his time travel device damaged. When Cable and Hope were forced to time travel again, Hope resisted because she wanted to stay with X-23 and Elixir, with whom she had bonded during the events of Messiah War.

She kicked Cable in mid-jump, stranding herself and Cable two years apart. They eventually reunited, with Hope now an adult.

"Homecoming" and "X-Men: Second Coming"

In the four part series A Girl Called Hope, Hope watches over Cable as he sleeps, and she says "I would come back from the dead to kill them," referring to anyone who would harm Cable, with the Phoenix emblem reflecting in Hope's eyes again as she looks in the fire. As the short series closes, it is revealed that Hope slaughtered many of the evolved wolves in order to keep Cable safe. A promotional image for the event was released depicting two versions of Hope: one angelic, emphasizing her role as a savior; the other as evil and surrounded by the Phoenix Force, depicting her as a destroyer.

During the "X-Men: Second Coming" story arc Hope manifests various X-Men powers such as Armor's psionic armor and Colossus's organic steel and kills Lang and Creed. With the assistance of the X-Men, she eradicates Bastion and shatters the dome surrounding the city. At a celebratory bonfire, Emma Frost notices the flames around Hope take the shape of the Phoenix, and triggers a flashback to the Sisterhood storyline where Jean freed her from Lady Mastermind's illusion after giving her the warning to prepare. Seized with terror, Emma runs to Cyclops to warn him but before she can, Cyclops tells her that Cerebro has found five new mutants that have appeared around the globe.

The Five Lights

After the events of Second Coming, five new mutants are detected by Cerebro, Hope is then tasked with the mission to find and help these "Five Lights". Hope finds the first of the Five Lights in Canada attempting to kill herself by jumping off a building. Hope touches the girl, Laurie Tromette, whose mutation is jump started (a power display similar to Sage's) and she develops an ability to fly. Introducing herself, she also agrees to follow Hope.

Later she is called to Mexico by Cecilia Reyes and Psylocke where the second of the Five Lights lives. This new mutant, a boy called Gabriel Cohuelo, whose speed powers caused him to move so fast he had become invisible to the naked eye. Psylocke taps into Cecilia's powers to create a force field around his room so they would not lose him before Hope Summers could arrive to help. Hope manages to help him gather control of his abilities however it is also revealed that his powers made him age slightly.

Accompanied by Storm, Hope finds the third of the Five Lights praying in a small church in Nigeria, surrounded by armed men who wish to kill her as they believe she is a "witch child", due to her power over fire and ice manifesting. Hope manages to help this new mutant, a girl named Idie Okonkwo calm herself and gather control of her abilities. As Storm and Hope proceed to leave with Idie the men attack, but Idie protects them from harm using her ability over fire and destroys the men's vehicles. She then opens her eyes to reveal her right pupil is blue (ice) and her left pupil is orange (fire).

Later Rogue, Hope, and the Lights arrive in Miami Beach to search for the fourth Light, a boy named Teon, in the hope of having him join the X-Men. Their first interaction with Teon results in the feral boy's misguided attempt at "mating" with Hope. A battle ensues and is promptly finished by Hope who uses her power to tame Teon. From this point, Teon views her as his Master.

Generation Hope

File:Generation-hope-1.jpg

Hope and her team on the cover of Generation Hope #1 Art by Oliver Colpel

In the series Generation Hope, Hope and the four "Lights" along with Rogue, Cyclops and Wolverine travel to Tokyo to find and help the fifth so-called "Light", a mutant boy called Kenji Uedo. Like the four new mutants to emerge since M-Day, Kenji's mutant powers manifested and caused some horrible side effects. He impales his agent with a tendril when the agent pressured him about his contribution for the “Future is a Four-Letter Word” event. He burst through the apartment building and onto the street where Cyclops and Wolverine are investigating. Kenji pulls down the Blackbird carrying Rogue, Hope and the rest of the Lights. Teon takes off after one of Kenji’s tendrils and tears it apart. He releases a girl trapped inside but is utterly ineffective against him.

Hope attempts to make contact with Kenji in order to complete his transformation but he seemingly avoids her touch. She presses on after him and encounters him within his apartment. She tells him she’s there to help and he explains how his “throat slid out of his neck and danced like an eel when this began” and NOW she’s here to help. He turns around and grabs Hope and a large explosion follows. It turns out to be telepathic message. Then she falls from the sky and Gabriel saves her although she's unconscious. Kenji is blasted away by Idie and Cyclops and Wolverine try to kill him but Hope awakes and with the lights tries to make contact with Kenji and she is successful. She passes out from strain.

Later, she and the five lights travel to Utopia, where they all decide to stay to hone their powers. After Doctor Nemesis examines Hope and four of the lights and determines the specifications of each of their powers, Hope and Gabriel share a kiss during a moment of privacy. Soon afterwards, after training the Lights to use guns, Magneto introduces Hope to his "old and dear friend," Charles Xavier. Hope takes issue with Charles calling his school a "School for Gifted Youngsters," thinking that it just increases the line between human and mutant. Instead, she suggests that a better future would dissolve the "us and them" mentality all together.

While in one of Emma Frost's classes, Hope decides that what she is learning isn't useful to her, and she leads the Lights out of the classroom. Frost tries to stop them, but Hope just tells her to stay out of her mind and out of her way. Back at her quarters, Hope gets a letter from Hank McCoy, telling her that while most of the people on Utopia are good, they will still try and craft her in their image, and that her best course of action would be to leave. Spurred on by the letter, Hope goes and talks to Wolverine, but Logan simply tells her that she's not a fool, and he wants to keep Hope at arm's length for her safety. Hope then goes to see Cyclops, whom she tells that she will welcome his support, but he should stay out of her way; if any of that changes, Hope and the Lights leave Utopia. Cyclops accepts this agreement, telling Hope that he isn't a jailor and that she and the Lights are welcome to come and go however they like.

A Sixth Light is located in Germany, and Hope and the Lights hurry to get there with their new liaison Shadowcat, where the German Authorities have cordoned off a hospital. Gabriel quickly tries to enter the hospital to scout the area, but he falls unconscious before he is able to enter it. Laurie is sent to retrieve Gabriel, but likewise falls unconscious. Teon rushes to retrieve them both, but seems somehow unaffected. Hope deduces that a telepath is at work, and that Teon is somehow immune to it. Kenji states that he also has somewhat of an immunity to telepathy, and hooks a cord from his body into Hope and each of the Lights to share his immunity. The group (sans Idie, who has stayed outside with Shadowcat) enters the hospital, and finds hundreds of people unconscious on the floor. They search the building, and find the Sixth Light, who is revealed to be a baby still in the womb of its mother. The baby is terrified to leave the womb, and rises all of the unconscious people into a zombie-like state to protect it. Additionally, it extends its influence to the area outside of the hospital, bringing Shadowcat and Idie, amongst others, under its control.

Laurie breaks off from Kenji's protection, and she is able to get Idie out of the area of influence by flying straight up. Laurie and Idie then rush back down to the building, and are able to hook back into Kenji's protection before they are taken control of. Kenji then plugs into the Sixth Light's mother so Hope can talk to the child telepathically. Hope and each of the Lights try to talk to the child, but all are rejected one after the next. However, Teon is able to talk to the child, using simplistic language to convince it to embrace life. The child is then born, and Hope's touch suppresses the child's X-Gene until its older. The celebration is cut short, however, as the group leaves the hospital; Shadowcat tells them that Teon's parents have sued for custody of their son.

On Utopia, Cyclops and Evangeline Whedon both believe that the case for Teon's custody is hopeless. Hope, however, remains confident that they will keep Teon because it's his choice to stay, and instead focuses on getting code names for the Lights. Gabriel chooses "Velocidad", which is Spanish for "speed," while Hope insists that "Hope" is already her code name. Kenji tosses around ideas such as "Derivative" and "Rei" (Japanese for "Zero," and a reference to Rei Ayanami from Neon Genesis Evangelion) before settling on simply "Zero." The group chooses "Primal" for Teon, and Laurie remains with "Transonic." Idie decides to no longer use the "Girl Who Wouldn't Burn," and decides to go by "Oya," in reference to Yoruba Goddess of Fire and Magic.

As the group gets ready to leave for court, Hope walks in on Zero working on a painting of her, which he quickly destroys because she saw it before it was ready. Several witnesses take the stand, including Primal's mother who gives a heartfelt testimony about wanting her son back. After she leaves the stand, Primal himself rushes the stand to give his own testimony, which is surprisingly well-spoken and deep. He explains that he is no longer sentient in the way that everyone else is, and that he sees the modern world through his primitive instincts. Give him a refrigerator and he will eat the food inside in the order necessary to satisfy his nutritional needs; give him a court room, and he will give the court a well thought speech to get his needs. He requests that the court recognize his hyperinstinctive intelligence the same way it recognizes robotic and alien intelligence. He also hopes that his parents understand that he is happier now than he has ever been. Primal wins the right to stay with Hope on Utopia, but Zero wonders if he is actually happy, or if he is just lying to stay with Hope. He talks with Transonic about how Hope has changed them all, and they both agree that something isn't right about it. Zero reveals that "Judas" was another code name he was considering spitting back at their "messiah" Hope, and Transonic wonders if they can both be "Judas."

In the United Kingdom, a boy named Zeeshan is talking to his friends about how difficult it must truly be to be a mutant, especially if you get an "uncool" power. Almost immediately afterwards, Zeeshan's X-Gene activates, and Hope and the Lights begin to head towards Zeeshan, whose skin has started to melt off of his body. One of Zeeshan's friends takes pictures and videos of Zeeshan, and post them online, quickly getting thousands of hits. Greatly saddened, Zeeshan takes a steak knife into the bathroom to kill himself. All of the Lights feel this, and Transonic jumps out of the plane to get to Zeeshan quicker; its too late, however, as Zeeshan is already dead. Hope yells at Zeeshan's friends before returning to Utopia. Four weeks later, an enraged Zero is seen outside the building where Zeeshan's friend lives. He is about to kill him with a drone, but is stopped by Wolverine, who tells him that "It gets better, kid."

After X-Man's return to Utopia, Hope had initially refused to even speak to him, due to X-Man's connection with her surrogate father Cable. However, when X-Man puts himself in harm's way in the Danger Room testing his newly restrained powers, Hope saves him and offers to teach him some non-power based combat techniques. X-Man agrees, and the two start training.

Writer James Asmus recently confirmed that the series will end with issue #17 in March.

Fear Itself

In the Fear Itself crossover event, Hope is part of Cyclops' "Plan 2" in defeating Kuurth, the Breaker of Stone, who is leading his trail of destruction to San Francisco. Cyclops gathers all of the mutants of Utopia behind Hope, and gives her free rein to use any and all of their powers to remove Kuurth's telepathy-blocking helmet. Hope is successful in doing this, but is rendered unconscious from the stress of using all of the mutants' powers. Unfortunately, this plan is unsuccessful, as telepathy is revealed worthless against the Worthy. Kuurth simply continues his march of terror helmet-less, walking past the unconscious Hope.

Hope is later shown in Utopia's infirmary, along with Emma Frost, who had been telepathically injured by Kuurth when Hope removed his helmet. Emma is shown having a nightmare about the Phoenix, who feeds into Emma's fears that Cyclops will never love her as much as Jean. This Nightmare Phoenix manages to convince Emma that Hope is Jean reincarnated, and tells Emma that she knows what to do. Emma, in a trance like state, takes her pillow and heads towards Hope, about to smother her to death. However, she is stopped by Namor. They then kiss afterwards.

X-Men: Schism

Hope watches news reports of Sentinels gathering after Quentin Quire's attack on the U.N. alongside Cyclops, Wolverine, Emma Frost, Magneto, and others. She is perturbed by the prospect of an oncoming attack and muses that such situations always end with dead mutants because people are always afraid of them. Later, after Oya and Transonic leave with several of the X-Men to attend the opening of a Mutant History Museum, Hope and Velocidad go on a date. The date appears to be cut short, however, as the new Hellfire Club attacks the Museum, and defeats most of the X-Men. Hope and Velocidad arrive at the Museum to discover that Oya has "saved the day" by "murdering" most of the Hellfire grunts based on Cyclops' orders to do what she thought was necessary. This causes Hope to chastise Transonic for losing her head during the battle and leaving Oya in that position, but Transonic explains that she is not a soldier except when Hope is around to influence her. Zero asks Oya if she is okay, but she horrifies Hope and the other Lights by asking if there is anyone else she needs to kill.

X-Men: Regenesis

Hope was not ok about the fact that both Logan and Scott want Oya to leave with Logan but after a conversation with Transonic she accepted. Hope also asked Pixie not to leave as her team needed a teleporter to avoid being too late to help other Lights, just like when they were too late to help Zeeshan the seventh Light when his X-gene activated.

Avengers: X-Sanction

Before Cable can fire a round into Red Hulk's head, he hears a voice screaming "No". To his surprise it's Hope and Cyclops who were brought by Blaquesmith to stop him. Hope immediately hugs him and pleads to him to stop trying to take out The Avengers. Cyclops feels that Cable has lost control of his mind due to the techno-organic virus. Cyclops attempts to free The Avengers only to be held at gunpoint by his son Cable as he explains why it has to be done. Hope intervenes by saying she is grown and can make her own decisions. Cable states the mission has been compromised due to the fact that Hope wasn't supposed to be there in the first place.

Powers and abilities

Hope Summers is a mutant with an ability of unspecified limits to manipulate and mimic the genes which are responsible for superhuman mutation.

This ability is primarily manifested as mimicry of the superhuman mutant abilities of those near her, however, she has demonstrated additional powers. When she was born, she unleashed a massive psionic pulse that destroyed Cerebro. She also proved to be immune to Rogue's newly lethal absorption power and her touch erased all of the previous memories and abilities Rogue had absorbed, including those of the Hecatomb. She also cured Rogue of the Strain 88 virus. During Messiah Complex when the Three-in-One tried to search for her when she was kidnapped by the Marauders, she was able to block and disrupt Cerebro from finding her.

Hope Summers can also mimic mutant powers at their utmost capacity. However, she generates power levels that are potentially dangerous to people and the environment around her. Prodigy describes her as a metaphorical "voodoo doll" of the mutant race. In the "Messiah War" storyline, after mentally scanning her, Stryfe hints that she has the same powers he does (telekinesis and telepathy), and is potentially far more powerful than he is. Her ability to mimic the powers of other mutants is restricted by the fact that they have to be "near enough" to her to mimic. When near Cable, Hope showed some telepathic and telekinetic powers at her command by stopping a bullet fired at her by Bishop. She then generated extremely powerful energy blasts that overloaded Bishop's own ability to absorb projected energy.

She can also jump-start a newly-emerging mutant power though to an undefined extent.

Collected editions

Title	Material collected	Publication date	ISBN
Generation Hope: The Future's a Four-Lettered Word	Generation Hope #1-5	June 2011	0-7851-4719-5
Generation Hope: Schism	Generation Hope #6-12	January 2012	0-7851-5242-3
Generation Hope: The End of a Generation	Generation Hope #13-17	May 2012	0-7851-5244-X

External links

• Hope Summers at the Comic Book DB (archived from the original)
• Hope Summers (Cable's wife) at the Comic Book DB (archived from the original)