Major superheroes/villains who died and have stayed dead - are there any?

Are Cypher and Warlock of the New Mutants still dead?

Banshee is still dead, right?

Warlock was recently in Nova.

Mockingbird is still dead/undead.

Rorschach. That's a bit of a cheat, admittedly.

I made a thread like this a while back - can't remember the title, of course.

I think Steve Rogers is still dead.

By "major" I of course mean characters that who made several appearances in ongoing series, not characters who were written to die right from the start, like Rorschach.

I guess New Warriors characters are by definition minor characters; ditto New X-Men/Young X-Men characters. Also, Runaways characters.

General GLory?

Cypher is coming back Tuomas, In Young X Men apparently

Elongated Man - it's been nearly 2 yrs, right?
Deadman

Kraven the Hunter's stayed down, hasn't he?

Thankfully yes, though I'm not sure it counts fully since I think they had him succeeded once or twice by new Kravens. Not to mention the Ultimate universe one.

I wouldn't count Elongated Man as "stayed dead", really...

Ghosts are dead. You can look it up.

where Elongated Man runs into trouble is the whole "major superheroes" bit.

He's dead, but he's still having adventures, right? (I'm not really reading them, this is just what I've seen/heard in bits and pieces) Not only that, but is there any real doubt that they're eventually going to be fully restored at some point? Come. ON.

Though yeah, he's probably as much a solid B-lister as most of the Super Buddies.

According to Wikipedia Odin (of Marvel) is still dead/in a limbo, and has been do for 20 years. Somehow I thought Marvel would've brought him back, but maybe they actually respect the ending of Simonson's Surtur saga enough not to revive him? Not that this stopped them bringing Jean Grey back, though.

So, it looks like pretty much everyone mentioned in this thread, except for Elongated Man, has come back to life in the two years since I started it. Only in comics.

Elongated Man. I take it this is a DC character?

Yeah, been around since the early 60s, as part of a light-hearted husband-and-wife bantering detective team (The Thin Man DYS). Then his wife got raped and murdered by Dr Light in a big summer crossover - you know, for kids! - and he got sent to hell, or something.

(Possibly raped by Dr Light and murdered by the Atom's wife by shrinking down and stomping on her brain from inside? I don't read any of this shit, just see people talking about it on the internet and some of it sticks)

Banshee is still dead...?

I mean, he did come back, but as a dead dude

Possibly raped by Dr Light and murdered by the Atom's wife by shrinking down and stomping on her brain from inside?

This is pretty much what happened, though it was The Atom's ex-wife, and there were years between the rape and the death of Sue. Plus she was pregnant with Elongated Man's child when she was killed, and EM only found about it afterwards. Oh, and The Atom's ex-wife didn't mean to kill her, it was all just a part of a ridiculously contrived plan to get back together with her ex; said plan also included her faking an assassination attempt against herself, so that the Atom could save her in the nick of time.

Identity Crisis was one of the stupidest comics I've read in years.

They teased it a while back, but the Marvel (Mar Vell) Captain Marvel has stayed dead.

From the last issue of Thor, it looks like Odin is on the way back.

Then his wife got raped and murdered by Dr Light in a big summer crossover - you know, for kids!

I lol'd

They teased it a while back, but the Marvel (Mar Vell) Captain Marvel has stayed dead.

That bit was actually vaguely clever, if I recall - he was a sleeper agent Skrull who only thought he was Marvel.

Yeah, it was nice idea and it was handled pretty well too - he actually decided to stay as Marvel and not return to the Skrulls, Total Recall style. Too bad they decided he needed to die in a heroic sacrifice, it would've been interesting if he'd continued as the proper Captain Marvel.

mildly impressed nobody's been crass enough to bring a dude back from cancer. they've probably spent a million man-hours 'workshopping' it though

Then his wife got raped and murdered by Dr Light in a big summer crossover - you know, for kids! - and he got sent to hell, or something.

jesus, and it used to just be refrigerators they put the women into.

You gotta know that Brad Meltzer (or possibly JT Krul) has a follow-up to Identity Crisis planned where The Atom uses his shrinking ray to make a refrigerator really tiny and then feeds it to a woman and then remote-controlly return it to its original size in a mindblowing inversion of the women-in-refrigerators meme.
http://c1.cleantechnica.com/files/2008/07/p1_fridge2_si.jpg

Very Silver Age.

The original Captain Marvel is still dead right?

But the legend lives on.

http://goodcomics.comicbookresources.com/wp-content/uploads/2007/10/captain%20marvel.jpg

I've always dug the 70s Captain Marvel costume. It would make a much better costume for Marvel Boy or whatever that forgettable code name they gave him in Dark Avengers.

The OG Cap Marvel is dead, but since then at least two of his children have taken up the name and the suit - the first one even had the same "switching between bodies with Rick Jones" gimmick the original Captain had. I think both of the kids have died too, though, and at the moment there is no Captain Marvel, unless Marvel Boy kept the name after Dark Reign was over?

the "switching between bodies with Rick Jones" gimmick was roy thomas making a pretty explicit nod to the Fawcett Captain Marvel

Oh, I guess that explains it! I hadn't given it much thought, I just thought it was a pretty weird power/limitation for a superhero like Cap Marvel to have (and even weirder for Kurt Busiek to give it to his son too), but it makes total sense as a reference to the other Captain Marvel.

I never realized that switch thing before being a reference to the Big Red Cheese, but that being said, it is a total Roy Thomas thing to do.

Oh wow, you guys blew my mind with that connection! Makes SO MUCH SENSE NOW.

Mar-vell is dead dead. Banshee is dead dead. Nightcrawler and Cable are recent deaths with a pretty limited chance of sticking past the two-year mark that Tuomas has given us with this thread.

Janet Van Dyne has been dead since Secret Invasion...clock's ticking!

Oh, and Bill Foster Goliath has been dead since Civil War, not sure how major he is since I never read the old Avengers books.

I was about to say Bucky, but wiki sez they brought him back a few years ago. Ugh.

The Bucky story was REALLY GOOD though!! Like, it was seriously like, a year and a half or two years long bringing him back, which made it feel much more like a genuine event and a story. And there were some neat ideas attached to it, a different read on the World War II material. Nobody's been quite sure what to DO with Bucky since then, but I actually think it's a totally defensible story.

Janet Van Dyne has been dead since Secret Invasion...clock's ticking!

Wasn't there a recent issue of Avengers that revealed she's still alive, sort of, on some kind of quantum level? And that Hank Pym is working on bringing her back? So yeah, her revival will probably happen pretty soon.

It was an ongoing plot thread in Pym's Mighty Avengers (which I sort of liked even though most people were willing to acknowledge that it kind of sucked) and just this week it got pseudo-resolved in Avengers Academy.

I have to say, Thunderbolts and Avengers Academy have shown me that I have missed a gigantic chunk of the Marvel Universe by ignoring The Avengers.

I'd say the MU switched from being X-centric to Avengers-centric about...five years ago? Roughly in the House of M to Civil War timeframe.

wow, the batson = rick jones thing is fucking perfect; why have I never thought of that before

I'd say Janet Van Dyne will be back, there was no body. If I was betting, I'd put it on Ultron to bring her back more than Hank Pym. Ultron hates everything pretty much but The Wasp. I'd think Ultron wouldn't be too happy with the Skrulls for killing her in the first place.

Big Marvel Villains currently dead-

Bullseye - like that one is going to stick considering that The Hand have the body.

Sabertooth - although I think him and Wolverine might be fighting in hell right now.

I think the Abomination maybe just got back from being dead or at least I saw him on the cover of a recent comic.

James Robinson has been on a big killing spree in the DC universe and has taken out quite a few B & C level characters, some of which are kind of a shame. Arnold Wesker - The Ventriloquist is probably one of the cooler ones he aced in that funky Face the Face storyline in Batman a couple of years back. Robinson also killed the 90s villain KGBeast in that same storyline. Later on he killed off with a reset button built in Grant Morrison's JLA villain Prometheus.

Abomination is still dead, but the dead are fighting the living in that Chaos War kerfuffle.

I'd say Janet Van Dyne will be back, there was no body. If I was betting, I'd put it on Ultron to bring her back more than Hank Pym. Ultron hates everything pretty much but The Wasp. I'd think Ultron wouldn't be too happy with the Skrulls for killing her in the first place.

Ultron was in that issue where they found out about Janet van Dyne's "quantum body", but he didn't seem to care about Janet's fate, in fact he was perfectly happy to replace the nervous system of the body with his own. And he seemed content enough when Jocasta offered to become his bride so he wouldn't kill everyone. That was a pretty odd resolution to the whole plot, though I haven't yet gotten to the issue of Avengers Academy where Doc Casino said the story is continued.

Thunderbird is still dead, right?

yup

I wouldn't call Thunderbird a major superhero - didn't he only appear like in two issues of X-Men?

Dude was one of the defining characters of the Silver Age X-Men and how dangerous their world was! His specter hung over the books for DECADES, even down to his little brother hooking up with the Hellfire Club.

Sure, he was DESIGNED to die, but nobody knew that until he died.

kind of like how Blink became one of the most popular characters introduced in with the Generation X kids, to the point where they brought back an alternate universe version of her and gave her a comic book (Exiles)

Speaking of Gen X, Synch and Skin are still D-E-D dead, right?

Yes, both of them! I'd say Thunderbird just barely counts - walking plot point, marked for death, but it would be a BIG DEAL if he came back because of the impact it would have on his brother and other cast members...maybe?

so are we talking about FF here or no

No way Johnny stays dead, assuming he died at all.

I know, I just heard about that today (me, reading Fantastic Four? A nation turns its head and gags...) and wanted to bump a thread

Kind of unbelievable that this is the first time he's died!

How long was Captain America "dead," about a year? I give it that long. 2 or 3 Future Foundation story arcs and then The Search for Johnny. Also the new costumes are crap.

Aren't they 12 issues away from #600?

I say 1 year.

I'm enjoying Hickman's run so I'll give him the benefit of the doubt on the Johnny thing, but the white uniforms do look a bit silly.

and is spidey now a member? whut? does he only wear the white uniform on ff duties??

Waiting for the inevitable Spider-Man/Wolverine bi-weekly team-up book, because those characters really aren't used enough.

spideys been a ff member a few times prior.
human torch death won't last any longer than a year. issue 600 sounds right.

I think Banshee is still dead. Tho at this point he's kinda the exception that proves the rule and they even had a whole arc in X-Factor where Theresa refuses to accept he'll stay dead bc after all he's a super hero

Banshee was revived briefly for Claremont's wholly superfluous X-Men tie-in for the Chaos War, along with Thunderbird, Moira MacTaggert, the dead Stepford Cuckoos and a couple of Jamie's dupes (inc. the one who died of Legacy). It was basically two issues of "Hey aren't we dead? I guess that makes us perfect cannon fodder!"

fucking Claremont

Wait, Claremont is still writing canon comics? I thought they put him on that WHAT IF I ALWAYS WROTE X-MEN comic and left him there.

Well said, Mordy. Pretty sure he sneaks off to do other things but still acts like that's the basic premise.

Hickman has come up with some interesting ideas on FF, but I don't think he's good at translating them into anything with thrillpower -- at least until the Negative Zone incursion into the Baxter Building.

I like Hickman's ideas but his writing/stories are like watching paint dry. Secret Warriors has a bit more action, but the rest is pretty zzzzzzzz.

I agree with the two above posts, Hickman's has some cool ideas, and I like the way he writes Reed, but his run has lasted something like 20 issues now, he's introduced new plot elements in almost all of them, and none of those things have been resolved yet. I guess it's possible he has some grand design in his mind that is to be slowly revealed in the next 20+ issues, but at the moment it's kinda boring to read about stuff happening on top of other stuff happening without any clear story arc to it.

so basically you are saying he's like Lobdell, only with cool ideas

fucking Claremont

He co wrote it with Louise Simonson who posted online that the edtitors had dictated to them the characters they were and weren't allowed to use.

I dunno, I've never really read anything Lobdell.

Another thing that kinda bothers me in Hickman's run: I haven't read FF for a looong time, so when it first appeared, I had no idea what that weird parallel Earth that's about to sink into a black hole is, or who the characters that inhabit it are. Some of that stuff gets explained later in Hickman's run, but some of it is still a mystery to me. I miss the days when superhero comics used to have big expository panels that explained everything whenever things from earlier in the continuity reappeared. Why don't they have those panels any more? No wonder superhero comics aren't gaining any new readers, if even people like me who are relatively knowledgeable about their past get confused.

(x-post)

He co wrote it with Louise Simonson who posted online that the edtitors had dictated to them the characters they were and weren't allowed to use.

lol, so which editor was the Thunderbird fanboy, because the whole thing read like tacky fan-fiction

xp: Tuomas, you never read any of the following:

* The Adventures of Cyclops and Phoenix (4-issue mini-series)
* Alpha Flight vol. 2 #1-12
* Buffy the Vampire Slayer (with Fabian Nicieza) #47-59
* Daredevil #376-379
* The Darkness #23-38
* Excalibur #31, #35-41, #53, #58-60, #68-71, #75-82
* Fantastic Four #1-3, 4-5 (with Chris Claremont, 1998)
* Galaxy Quest #1-5
* Gen¹³ #45-54
* Generation X #1-28
* Ghostbusters: Displaced Aggression #1-4
* Iron Man #1-7 (1996)
* Manifest Eternity #1-6 (Wildstorm, 2006)
* Uncanny X-Men #289-349, 350 (with Steven Seagle)
* Wildcats #1-9 (1997)
* X-Factor #90-95, #106
* X-Men (vol. 2) #6-11, #46-69, #110-113

I don't think so... I pretty much stopped reading superhero comics in the early 90s, when Lee & Liefeld & Larsen & McFarlane & co started dominating the field with their "edgy" art and plots. The last issue of X-Men I read was the last issue Claremont wrote; I'd been getting more and more bored of it during the Jim Lee era, and Claremont quitting was the final straw I needed to quit the X-books. For most of the 90s Vertigo comics were the only current stuff by DC or Marvel I read (except for the occasional non-edgy titles like Starman), and I only came back to superhero comics in the early 00s. So I kinda managed to miss the "dark age" of superhero comics altogether.

Lobdell was only really the "dark age" because he didn't know how to end stories; he liked to pile situation on top of situation and sort of see where the stresses led the story.

Well also he kind of didn't understand how women act, but that's like 80% of comic book writers so I didn't give him as much shit for it as others did.

To Lobdell's credit, some of those are pretty decent.

On the other hand, the rest are some of the boringest emotionally barren comics ever.

Dan waaay OTM on the lack of understanding women.

Also, Lobdell and Fabian Nicieza were pretty much the two main X-Men writers for a while. Um, yeah.

That sort of writing technique is why I've never warmed up to Morrison's JLA as much as to his other superhero stuff... Many of the longer story arcs, like Rock of Ages or World War III, just go like this: stuff happens, other stuff happens, bigger stuff happens, BANG, the end. His shorter JLA stories tend to be structured much better than the long ones.

(xxx-post)

Dan waaay OTM on the lack of understanding women.

It was counterbalanced by his not understanding how men act!

Anyway, Nicieza wrote Thunderbolts and Psi-Force, ergo he gets a lifetime pass from me.

(seriously, once you started viewing Lobdell's run as an extended soap opera farce, it became waaaaaaaaaaay more fun; there were also some really great set pieces like the fight between Psylocke and Sabretooth in UXM #328)

Oh god, remember the psylocke/cyclops love triangle bullshit?

I've tried to read some 90s X-Men comics a couple of times, but usually I've been scared away by the awful art. For someone who grew up reading comics drawn by John Byrne, John Romita Jr., Alan Davis, and Walt Simonson, the 90s were a pretty horrible era for superhero art. Also, since the X-books are so continuity-heavy, and I stopped reading them when Claremont left, I had little idea what was happening, or even who the characters were.

(x-post)

Actually, back in the Silvestri era Psylocke used to be one of my favourite characters, but when she was turned into a bondage bikini ninja for no proper reason except fanservice, that was one of the first times I realized I was getting disillusioned by X-Men.

Actually, back in the Silvestri era Psylocke used to be one of my favourite characters, but when she was turned into a bondage bikini ninja for no proper reason except fanservice

whenever i am tempted to start reading comics properly again, this factoid reminds me i probably shouldn't. i've even enjoyed all the post-brand new day spidey comics i've read, but i know in my heart i could never go back to the x-men again. i stopped reading around the time they went to australia - actually, i think i kept reading a little longer, but i wasn't enjoying it, and didn't really have much of a clue what was going on.

but yeah, ninja pylocke just sounds like the most tragic of wank fantasies made ink.

I remember coming back to the books right when they were resolving the Psylocke/Kwannon plot and being all "... the hell???"

Ninja Psylocke doesn't really bother me at all though, mostly because Betsy at her core always had that type of icy killer personality but never had the physical stature to back it up before that mind switch (which btw happened shortly after my first comics hiatus; I basically missed Inferno through right before the Phalanx Covenant)

wasn't she always doing that ninja thing when she was in her DARK PERSONALITY or am i misremembering my old issues of excalibur?

I don't remember any "dark personality" that would've preceded the ninja era... She was kidnapped by Mojo who gave her new eyes (that were actually cameras so the folks at Mojo's world could enjoy her and the X-Men's adventures as a TV show), but that's the extent of any "darkness" that I can recall. And she certainly didn't have any ninja powers before she was turned into a Japanese bikini babe.

is it true that this ethnic transformation was a power of the Mandarin's ring? if so, did they explore it more, like have him changing tabby cats into siamese cats?

Also, I don't think Psylocke had anything to do with Excalibur before she turned into a ninja (IIRC back then Excalibur still thought the X-Men had all died while fighting the Adversary), so maybe you're remembering some later plot development?

(x-post)

X-Men Annual #11, published in 1987 (which I have a near-mint copy of in a box in my parents' house, brag brag) shows Psylocke's deepest wish is to become a super warrior; the ninja thing was a reasonable extension of that.

Also, in UXM... 213? Psylocke is attempting to fight off Sabretooth by herself and her ongoing inner monologue is all about how she wished she had more physical powers so she could beat Creed into a pulpy smear, plus when they went to Australia she revamped her costume into body armor so she could get more physical in battles.

Betsy wishing she could beat the shit out of people has been as much a defining characteristic as purple hair; transforming her into a character that could do that was not a stretch nor was it totally out of left field.

Well, TBH I found the wank fantasy part of her new characterization more disturbing than the fact she became a ninja. Though to be honest, I thought the physical combat being her weak point (I remember that annual too) was an imperfection that made her character more interesting, what with her powers being purely mental and all. Kinda like Xavier being bound to a wheelchair. I don't think she was an interesting character as a ninja; with most superheroes being expert martial artists regardless of their powers, I thought it was kinda interesting to see one who wasn't good at fighting, and who knew it.

I guess like Batman, Cap was technically not dead. I'd file the Human Torch under that one, you see him get overwhelmed, but that's about it.

"Hickman's has some cool ideas, and I like the way he writes Reed, but his run has lasted something like 20 issues now, he's introduced new plot elements in almost all of them, and none of those things have been resolved yet. I guess it's possible he has some grand design in his mind that is to be slowly revealed in the next 20+ issues, but at the moment it's kinda boring to read about stuff happening on top of other stuff happening without any clear story arc to it."

That's pretty much it. There has been some cool stuff and quite a bit happenened, but I don't see how it is all going to fit together. It might all work out, but there are more plot points on the stove than you can shake a stick at. One thing left dangling from the beginning, especially if you didn't read the Secret Invasion Mini Hickman did before taking over the regular title, that story took place in the Negative Zone and one of the dangling plot points is that they left Johnny's ex-wife Skrull Lyja in the zone. I figure that is one that will probbaly come back in the long run. I still have no idea how that whole part with Nathaniel Richards is going to tie back into the main story line at all.

I was onto Secret Warriors for the first year or so, but I lost interest after that dumb issue where Phobos breaks into the White House. That one was a total turkey and shouldn't have gotten past an editor. I was picking it off the shelf and just kind of quit cold right there.

Bad thing about anyone that does these mega storylines that never really conclude is that you are pretty much playing with fireworks, as at anytime there could be some fall out or something go funky and then the writer is off the book and it is never finished. There is a thin line between being epic and just having an ongoing soap opera with a story no true beginning, middle and end.

I think that is where Claremont went off the rails, none of the story lines ever ended after a while.

Also, I don't think Psylocke had anything to do with Excalibur

pretty sure she was in excalibur from the first issue, no? back when she was dressed in pink, and had grey hair...

i don't know, it was a long time ago. i thought the mutant massacre was masterful, but after that, the x-verse became so morbid and dull.

hang on, no, she wasn't. misremembering hugely.

I just read last night that Hickman has a 60-issue FF run mapped out.

hm. i really remember some alan davis run of something where psylocke was an evil persona. maybe captain britain?

I think you're thinking of Sat-Yr-9?

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/0/05/CourtneySatyr9.PNG/220px-CourtneySatyr9.PNG

Right you are! I'm just surprised I remember ANY of this nonsense.

and wasn't Jim Lee to blame for ninjapsylocke?
http://goodcomics.comicbookresources.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/11/Psylocke-Jim-Lee-Trading-Card-620x412.jpg

I guess it's easy to mix up the earlier Captain Britain stories with Excalibur, since they were both drawn by Alan Davis and both featured a lot of the same characters. Initially, Excalibur was pretty much a continuation of Captain Britain, wasn't it? IIRC Claremont had written CB before X-Men, and Betsy Braddock was originally created by him.

Also, wasn't Betsy herself Captain Britain at some point?

I always assumed the ninjafication of Psylocke was Jim Lee's idea, yeah. From what I've gathered, towards the end of the Lee/Claremont run Lee's influence had gotten pretty big, he was essentially plotting the stories, and Claremont just added the dialogue to stuff he'd already drawn. Kinda like how Stan Lee worked with Kirby and Ditko in the 60s.

Hmm, I just read Captain Britain's Wikipedia entry, and looks like Captain Britain himself and the whole CB series was created by Claremont and Herb Trimpe. I didn't know that! Since CB initially only appeared Marvel's UK comics, I assumed he'd been created by Britons.

lol herb trimpe; i never liked his "writing" or "art" even a little bit but he was kind of the Marvel Candide: always around major moments
at least until they chucked him: http://www.hulklibrary.com/hulk/info/news-herbtrimpefired.asp

^that times piece is really sad tho'

The only Trimpe I could ever tolerate was his Hulk work with a heavy overlay of John Severin. During my time away from comics, I picked up an issue of FF Unlimited that he'd drawn, and it was the most horrifying looking piece of shit -- I thought, "this company desperately needs to die right now."

claremont and trimpe were chosen to do captain britain 'cos they both had brit connections - claremont was born in england, and trimpe lived in the uk for a while in the early 1970s.

don't think trimpe did any writing, strictly a penciller irrc. he was one of those marvel vets who were pretty much told to draw like rob liefield in the 90s, and yeah the results were supremely hideous. don't mind his early work on the hulk even prior to john severin giving him the once-over, tho the trimpe/severin hulks are def his career highpoint (some gd roy thomas stories, too.)

John Severin could do no wrong, imho. Improved every book he ever touched.

Trimpe Hulk is great.

During my time away from comics, I picked up an issue of FF Unlimited that he'd drawn, and it was the most horrifying looking piece of shit -- I thought, "this company desperately needs to die right now."

ahahhahaha YES - - - I remember being reallllly underwhelmed by the art in FF Unlimited #2, the one with the Inhuman royal heir...bluuugh.

don't think trimpe did any writing

I'm pretty sure he both wrote and drew some issues of G.I. Joe Special Missions. Don't know about anything else.

I haven't been reading Fantastic Four for a while, but apparently Torch is back... So what does that leave us with? Wasp is still dead, I think. Was Elongated Man resurrected with the DC reboot?

Poor Ralph seems dead or never to have existed as far as I can tell.

Torch never died at all.

He totally died, several times! And then got regenerated. Credit to Hickman for a clever solution, though it wasn't entirely original. (Sir Richard Burton's escape-by-repeated-suicide method in the Riverworld books comes to mind.)

THE FRANCHISE CANNOT DIE. THE FRANCHISE IS IMMORTAL. LONG LIVE THE NEW FLESH.

I forgot the bug resurrection. My bad. For some reason in my head he was just captured.

I'm about a year behind on X-stuff, but I think Nightcrawler's still dead? Although Cable's back already, so I wouldn't say that definitively.

They killed Nightcrawler, then pulled in the AoA version of him to add to X-Force

Huh. Lame. If they really just wanted to half-heartedly fill the fuzzy blue elf void, isn't Nocturne still floating around out there somewhere?

I think she was last seen off with the Exiles? dunno tho

didn't even know nightcrawler was dead

yeah, he died saving Hope Summers' life from a super Sentinel

I would've spoiler-proofed that revelation if not for the fact that it happened a couple of years ago, which means we're no more than a couple of years from it being reversed like every X-death which proceeded it.

wait, Banshee is still dead

there's a running grim joke about it in X-Factor that pops up every now and then

I'll give 'em that. And Thunderbird. And I was gonna say Maggott, but I forgot that he was finally resurrected after years of incessant fan outrage.

they brought Thunderbird back for Necrosha briefly but he's gone again (actually I can't remember if Banshee came back for that, too) (apparently he did)

I want a villain to resurrect a fan favorite character only to disintegrate them immediately to show what a badass he/she is.

That was kinda the deal with the aforementioned Necrosha. Only a couple of the slew of resurrected characters made it out alive.

who the hell is hope summers?

scott's kid with jean?

Hope is the first mutant born after the "no more mutants" crap. She's rescued by Cable and brought up in the future by him. She takes his last name as her own.

oh hey, can someone update me on kitty pryde? last i checked she was unable to phase back into existence (bc of the bullet incident). is that still true? has she been in any badass comics i should read since she got back to earth?

For Kitty I would read the Wolverine and the X-Men comics. She's a teacher at the new institute. And she's back to normal Kitty now. I think. But I don't know how.

man i'm so far out of the loop, don't know what anyone's talking about anymore
i stopped after gmoz

the marvel online pass is catching me up.

you can find out how her powers went back to normal on Wikipedia; I won't spoil since EZ is currently reading

Thanks Dan!

I don't mind if you spoil it though. It'll be quite a while before I find out because I'm trapped in an Infinite loop in Starlin's subconscious.

i stopped after gmoz

Dude, that was eight years ago. That's, like, eighty in X-plot development years. I'm behind about a year and I feel like I have no idea what's up currently.

The question is why would you want to read? But then I'd been reading X-MEN on and off since 1981 so maybe I have a different view...

You can get away with killing off some of the X-men, except the originals and the 70s originals (for the most part), as they got like 200 characters. Crazy thing is that there are X-men fans that are die hard for Boom Boom or Forge or Strong Guy or Polaris.

that's the first time I've thought of Strong Guy in like a decade and a half

Strong Guy was recently killed, then resurrected without a soul, btw

Man i need to stay away from the MU

it was written by Peter David so it's actually been pretty entertaining

Trust Dan. He knows things.

haha oh man, are you up to date with what's going in in X-Factor right now because that phrase is currently an automatic YIKES

(btw if anyone is considering looking at X titles these days, most of the gold is in the periphery, particularly X-Factor)

Really enjoyed his second run on X-Factor, then lost track of it around 2009 when they were changing artist every month. Worth catching up?

well... yes and no

If you like the characters, it's absolutely worth it; I don't think anyone does team dynamics quite like PAD and he does an excellent job of juggling a large cast of very distinct, memorable personalities.

Having said that, some of the actual plots can get eye-rolly, but the actual character work within them is always excellent, plus he does a great job of interweaving stories and following through on consequences/ramifications.

I also recommend these X-titles:

New Mutants (again, mostly for the characters)
Wolverine and the X-Men (I love Bachalo's incomprehensibility, and a lot of the writing is genuinely funny)
X-Men Legacy (TEAM ROGUE, plus Frenzy is turning into an interesting character)
Uncanny X-Force (now that the book has direction and a smaller, more focused cast, the stories they've been telling have been outstanding, particularly the build over the first 19 issues)

There are other characters who are obviously writer faves and whenever they pop up as featured players in a story, they are great 90% of the time (Magik and Colossus are the reasons to read Uncanny X-Men, for example, and Pixie is basically great wherever she appears even if none of the artists can agree on how old she is).

I know she's somewhere between 8 and 24, but I've never been able to narrow it down any more than that.

is layla miller still around?

She is, and she still knows stuff, but she's becoming less cryptic about it and it's kind of a big unhappy mess for all of the characters involved (but not the readers, fortunately)

I'm not caught up yet with X-Factor. Probably a year behind.

The Madrox mini that predates this version of X-Factor is one of the best Marvel books in the past decade.

i'm also a year or so behind on X-Factor. i kinda got off-board when they did that weird time-travel sickly old Dr Doom storyline which was pretty bleh imho.

Dan is all this stuff up on MARVEL PRIME or whatever the hell their online archives are?
I swear I would have bought that four times over if it worked with ipad

a lot of it is. You can browse MDCU. You should be able to browse what's available here: http://marvel.com/digital_comics

If you have any specific questions I'm happy to check through my subscription.

There is some doofer that lets you watch your desktop on the iPad. Maybe that would work. Hassle, though.

They're usually about 12-14 months behind. So Uncanny X-Force is available through issue #8. X-Factor has 80 issues, up through #227 that came out last November.

Once the next Mac OS comes out I'll be able to mirror my desktop on my tv. I can't wait to read GIANT SIZED X-MEN.

xp to chuck: yeah, onlive might work.

I'm also at least a year behind at this point, which turns out to be a monumental problem with this many titles...and my poor neglected x-blog too! Someday! Someday!

I was enjoying PAD's nu-X-Factor for quite a long time, feel like it really started to drift plotwise at some point though. New Mutants I was LOVING, and not just because that cast was all my childhood friends..

X-Factor is the only Marvel I read--consistently entertaining and clever stuff, though occasionally the ideas don't quite come off.

I know this is a shot in the dark but some of you are on the train, what do you think about the current Avengers vs. X-Men storyline going on?

I went in expecting it to be total rub and it still might be, but there have been some things that could be interesting depending on how it plays out especially the whole parts with the Kree and Iron Fist, which seem to be tacking into some of the waters that Hickman has been laying out in FF and in SHIELD. It is still kind of a disjointed read, but I am curious where it is going or at least how those threads play out. The team that Cap sent out into space is one of the odder and really more interesting Avengers teams in a long time. In a Marvel way, kind of reminds me of the Animal-man/Starfire/Adam Strange/Lobo story arc from 52.

Man, I would actually like to see Marvel just bite the bullet and do one of these things as a totally integrated series like 52.

I'll read them in a year when they hit MDCU. Who is on the crazy Avengers space team?

Thor
Hank McCoy (The Beast)
Captain Britain
Ms. Marvel
The Protector (aka Marvel Boy)
Rhodey (War Machine)
Brunhilda the Valkrie

okay, that's pretty crazy.

Oh. Took me a second to realize that wasn't a list of deceased characters. I thought Marvel had been a lot busier in the past year than I realized.

Well technically, Thor did just recently get over dying and Tony Stark has just faked Rhodey's death in the Iron Man current storyline.

So, apparently Nightcrawler is still dead? Pretty surprised no one has resurrected him yet.

And Xavier is dead too, now; I wonder if that's gonna stick? On the one hand, he's a pretty major character, and he has died and been resurrected before, hasn't he? But on the other hand, they seem to have moved the Xavier/Magneto conflict to be between Cyclops (and his crew) and Wolverine/Kitty (and the X-school) now, so maybe they feel Xavier isn't needed anymore?

Well, Bing's front page spoiled the big Batman ending (X dies). Thanks!

Well, according to Uncanny Avengers, Xavier's brain is currently grafted on to a version of the Red Skull, so he's certainly not coming back in that body

tuomas, if kitty is the only character i have any interest in reading about, what comix is she appearing in atm?

more people than tuomas know that! she's in wolverine & the x-men as a lead teacher and will be in the new adjective-less X-Men

As discussed in the other thread, seems like Captain Marvel is the only answer to this question that will not change... Mostly because everyone agrees it would be in bad taste to bring back a character who died of cancer.

Dibny came back in the interregnum of posting on this thread btw, albeit rebooted.

Which Dibny? Or both of them?

Both.

wut

Gail Simone brought them back as part of Secret Six in the Rebirthiverse (and it's been a long time since I typed that).

Ralph was undercover as a mob heavy, Sue turned up in about #8 after Ralph had broken cover and was moping about being away from her.