X-Men:ReGenesis

[The Bat]

The Story:Refugee mutants from the Age of Apocalypse descend on our world!

I was wondering what you guys thought about this story-line. At first I didn't like the idea at all, but now I'm thinking it could be interesting. We were recently discussing our favorite time travel movies....and it got me thinking about divergent timelines.

I didn't like the idea of the "Age of Apocalypse" Nightcrawler replacing our Nightcrawler(or Jean Grey or any of the others for that matter). But then I thought about it. The Age of Apocalypse was originally created from our(Marvel's) timeline when Legion killed his father Xavier. So...technically, they were the same people up until that exact moment...when Legion created a "divergent timeline". They lived very different lives after that...but does that make then any less "original"?

Thoughts anyone?

[thunderbolt]

I need an aspirin after reading that.

[The Bat]

I need an aspirin after reading that.

[thunderbolt]

And DC and Marvel wonder why readership is leaving like rats off the Titanic. Who in the world could follow that mess?

[samurainoir]

Stuff like Age of Apocalypse and Days of Future Past are generally best left as story lines that don't get continually revisited. Countless stories have returned to both and whichever continuity is left over for them inevitably becomes more confusing baggage in the long run.

Try explaining Rachel Summers without a really complex chart... Add in X-Man as the not quite alt reality Cable and the chart becomes even more ridiculous. Try explaining both Rachel and Cable and their relationship to each other and it's a real mess.

Age of Apocalypse was a really successful experiment by Marvel at Cross Horizontal marketing (along with Maximum Carnage) that we are seeing still play out to this day with things like Blackest Night and Flash Point. I remember reading the tie in preview publication at the time for AoA where Toy Biz was already at work on creating action figures based on the designs of the yet to be released crossover. That was unheard at the time, but Wolverine variant action figures in every wave of X-men toys were selling well.

[The Toyroom]

I've been out of the X-Men loop for years now...I wouldn't even know where to start...

[samurainoir]

Also nifty gold holofoil trade paperbacks at a time when Marvel wasn't really doing much in the way of collected editions.


Plus either the coolest or dumbest action figure Marvel ever made. Ask a kid and let them decide.

[The Toyroom]

I had the AoA Magneto and Wolverine figures...

[The Bat]

I'll admit I'm on the fence about this idea, as it will probably cause more confusion for people with Marvel's already convoluted continuity...but I'm just curious enough to check out the "X-Men:Regenesis" titles before making a judgement.

[ctc]

>And DC and Marvel wonder why readership is leaving like rats off the Titanic.

I dunno.... hasn't Marvel's sales been on the upswing the last couple of years?

>Who in the world could follow that mess?

I think Bart Simpson said it best: "I just like it when he hits stuff." I think for a fan it's easy. Think of how convoluted the comics of your youth were; especially DC: multiple worlds, multiple takes on characters, reprints where sometimes the Flash had a helmet, sometimes not.... and only the barest of explanation. If any. And nobody cared 'cos it was all about the story going on right now. Nobody worried about wether or not this was the "real" Batman, or his son from "Earth-Convoluted" so long as he bopped a baddie. That's why I think the hype surrounding every little change is more a problem than the changes themselves; it puts the onus on the proceedures of making the book, rather than the book.... drawing the reader out of the story before it even happens.

Don C.

[thunderbolt]

^^^ On an upswing after sliding downhill for years.

[ctc]

>On an upswing after sliding downhill for years.

....but still an up; which points to the non-events working. Although I gotta wonder how much of that is fans from other branches of comic-dom.... ie the Japanese stuff.... wandering in. It could be a problem for Marvel again if that's the case, since you'd have an influx of folks for whom dead = dead, and after a couple years the dead = I got better! schtick would wear thin.

I've always been a big proponent of theory.... studying why certain things have the effect they do, and it seems to me that not a lot of comic pros share that view: either amongst the creative folk, or the business end, since you see so much random activity punctuated by EVERYONE jumping on whatever bandwagon seems to be moving at any given moment. Never actually looking into the "why" of any of it.

Don C.