Banshee finding out that Siryn is his daughter is one of those family developments that changes the meaning of things that happened before either character had a chance to under…

Banshee finding out that Siryn is his daughter is one of those family developments that changes the meaning of things that happened before either character had a chance to understand them. Sean doesn’t know he has a daughter, and Theresa has been growing up under Black Tom’s influence. By the time they meet, they’ve already missed years they can’t get back. The Cassidy family is messy enough before you put that in the middle of it. Sean and Black Tom are cousins, they’re on opposite sides of plenty of trouble, and Theresa’s connection to Tom is much more personal than simply recognizing him as somebody her father fights. He raised her. That makes him important to her even when the things he asks her to do are wrong. Her early appearance with him and Juggernaut makes that uncomfortable situation pretty clear. Theresa is participating in a criminal operation, but she isn’t being introduced as someone with the same ambitions as the adults running it. Black Tom has pulled somebody dependent on him into his own life. Then he helps bring the truth out. His letter is part of how Sean learns who Theresa is, and that gives the reunion another layer. Tom is responsible for harm, but he is also involved in getting her to the father who never knew about her. I don’t think that excuses what he did. It does make the relationship harder to summarize than saying there’s one good relative and one bad relative and Theresa can immediately sort out all her feelings accordingly. The actual reunion in Uncanny X-Men #148 is warm. Sean is thrilled. That matters because the story could easily have made Theresa spend the entire issue proving she deserves a place in his life. Instead, the immediate response is affection, and then they have the much longer job of getting to know each other.