Warning: Spoilers for Guardians of the Galaxy #9!One member of the Guardians of the Galaxy has to thank the multiverse for her latest power upgrade. Readers have noticed that throughout the latest Guardians series, Mantis has new powers linked to multiple personalities. With each change in her emotions—from happiness to anger and everything in between—comes a new persona with its own powers and costume.
No explanation has been given for this new change until Guardians of the Galaxy #9 by Collin Kelly, Jackson Lanzing, Kev Walker, Walden Wong, Matt Hollingsworth, and VC’s Cory Petit. The issue reveals that Mantis’ powers are connected to the multiverse. It also gives meaning to a new costume of sorts that explains how each change in Mantis’ arsenal works.
Mantis wears Dress, a sentient costume that works like a symbiote, drastically changing her personality and outfit. Considering everything she has been through in the comics these past few years, it’s no wonder why Mantis feels like she needs Dress in her life and why she uses it the way she does. This reveals how Mantis uses Dress to help her find herself.
Mantis Uses Her New Powers to Grieve
It all dates back to a prophecy that was first uttered in ’80s-era Marvel Comics that a perfect Celestial Madonna would mate with the perfect Cotati male to give birth to a Celestial Messiah. Mantis was soon revealed to be that Madonna and in time, she gave birth to Sequoia (also known as Quoi or Q). Sequoia’s father would later raise young Quoi alone with the Cotati of Tamal, leaving Q to grow up without his mother in his life, and thus he “turned out to suck.” During 2020’s Empyre event, Quoi leads the Cotati on an invasion of Earth with an intergalactic assault against the Kree, Skrull, Wakanda, and animal life as a whole.
In Guardians of the Galaxy #9, Gamora asks Mantis point-blank what’s been up with her lately, to which Mantis explains how she’s still grieving over her son. Having to deal with the ramifications of Groot seemingly becoming a villain for a year hasn’t helped her mental state either. Getting ahold of Dress has made things easier for Mantis, because Dress connects to other personalities she has from other universes. Surfing the “multiversal personality bank” helps her feel whole, as if she has a choice about who she becomes.
Mantis Has a Wholesome Solution for an All-Powerful Garment
The revelation itself is pretty massive, not only in providing context for Mantis’ frequent personality switches, but in revealing how one sentient garment can be connected to the multiverse, in turn connecting Mantis to becoming other versions of herself. The fact that one piece of clothing is powerful enough to connect to the wider multiverse ideally asserts it instantly as one of the most powerful instruments in all of Marvel. There are countless things different characters could use this for, but the fact that this Guardians of the Galaxy member uses it to become the person she wants to be when she needs it is honestly heartwarming.
