cool to see a gay character depicted in a non-stereotypical fashion so that their orientation doesn’t define everything they do and someone like me wouldn’t even know that about them." In the vignette "Abomination" featured in X-Men: Manifest Destiny, Anole and his Young X-Men teammate Jonas Graymalkin have a talk where Graymalkin discusses his past and reveals that he too is gay and was a victim of a near-fatal homophobic attack at the hands of his father. Anole reassures him that he will be all right and the two form a friendship. Lyle Masaki of Logo's AfterElton.com expressed interest in this development, stating that, "[w]ith the small number of gay superheroes out there, camaraderie between gay characters is as rare as same-sex couples." Alternate storylines A scrapped story plot in New Mutants vol. 2 involved Anole committing suicide after coming out at Parent's Day and being shunned by his parents and two closest friends, Josh and Julian for his sexual orientation. The storyline was originally written to take place in issues 8–10. The storyline involved Anole's parents and others becoming outraged when some parents witness his instructor Karma kissing another woman. Anole reacts to his parents' outrage by defending her and outing himself. Rejected and disowned by his parents, he seeks solace in Josh and Julian, but also finds himself rejected by them. This causes him to commit suicide. The story resulted in Josh discovering Anole's body while attempting to apologize for his reaction, serving as impetus for him to reform his attitudes while Julian would maintain what would later be revealed to be a facade of indifference. Northstar, as Marvel's "highest profile homosexual," would be a key character in pointing out Karma's difficulties being accepted because of her sexuality by the students' parents, as well as the absurdity of a gay student killing himself over rejection in a school for outcasts. Weir and DeFilippis stated that in addition to being a message about intolerance, the story would serve as a key factor in redeeming Elixir from his initial introduction as an anti-mutant bigot while solidifying Julian's character as "cruel". Though issue 8 was printed and issue 9 drawn, Marvel put a hold on releasing the issues due to the storyline's controversial nature. Both writers state that ideas to "soft-pedal" the issue were fetched to them, including eliminating Karma's lesbian kiss, having it off-panel, or Northstar never actually stating his