Age of Apocalypse

Dr.Strangefate

He Sees You When You're Sleeping. He Knows When Yo
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Okay... I just mentioned this over in the Endangered Species discussion thread, and so I decided to create a thread with my list to celebrate the greatest X-Men crossover of the nineties, and possibly ever... Conceptually, and even how it all played out... Age of Apocalypse isn't just good in that Nostalgiac way, its legitimately one of the most interesting experiments they ever tried with the X-Men's little corner of the Marvel Universe...

TEN REASONS WHY THE ORIGINAL AGE OF APOCALYPSE ROCKS MY SOCKS

10. Bishop - Bishop has never been used as well as he was in Age of Apocalypse... District X came close, but the aged version of Bishop whom after witnessing Xavier's death, simply wandered the world, amnesiatic, watching it crumble under the might of Apocalypse, is a much more interesting "time-displaced" character than his regular incarnation. This also heralded his "Bald" look in the comics, which is miles better than the long curly hair he sported years after his introduction.

9. The Four Horsemen of Apocalypse - Rather than the B and C listers he's been employing for years and years, AoA Apocalypse only had room for the sort of characters that had typically only run against the X-Men one-by-one. Mikhail Rasputin, Abyss, Sinister, and the best new villain to come out of the series, Holocaust, the twisted son of Apocalypse.

8. Iceman in Complete Control of his Abilities : Less human, definitely, and having lost all of his youthful arrogance, the AoA Iceman was one of the team's heavy-hitters in a way the 616 Bobby Drake has never managed.

7. The Design of the AoA Sunfire : 'Nuff Said

6. Bringing back old Forgotten X-Characters : Blink died almost immediately after introduction in 616 (in the New Mutants series, I believe), and who on earth remembers Changeling, with his big stupid purple hat? Morph and Blink, however remained popular enough to give the two starring roles in Exiles (although the Morph in Exiles is a different character, he's based on the same idea of reworking the character), and for good reason.

5. Sinister becoming Cyclops and Havok's surrogate Father - Sinister's obsession with the Summers brothers went back ages in the comics and in this reality Sinister hovered in a gray area between good and evil, planting the seeds of Apocalypse's destruction... I also totally dug Scott actually only having one eye.

4. Dark Beast - Hank McCoy as the Evil Genius and Mad Scientist, testing his sadistic medicine on humans and mutants alike was pure genius on behalf of the original writers... In 616, Beast almost never recognizes the fact that he could have easily become the amoral creature he was in this reality, if Xavier hadn't instilled his dream in him. Dark Beast remains to be one of the most interesting remnants of AoA in the 616 continuity.

3. Apocalypse actually fulfilling his Name - I mean, its the premise of the entire series... Apocalypse won. He was more of a threat during Age of Apocalypse than he ever was before, or ever will be again... This series alone is why I love him as a villain, because its the only series that shows what he is capable of becoming.

2. Sabretooth as a Good Guy : AoA's Victor Creed is one of my alltime favorite characters... In a world without the human masters to cripple his conscience in an attempt to turn him into more monster than man, Creed managed to become more of a Hero than that world's Wolverine could ever become.

1. Magneto's X-Men : It was amazing at how they managed to maintain the dignity of Magneto's character in a world so twisted that he dedicated his life to the Dream of Charles Xavier that Human and Mutantkind could live in peace together. Magneto in this reality is perhaps a better leader than Charles ever was, despite his lack of success, his support of his team, and openess with them is staggering when compared to the secrets Xavier's hidden in for years and years... His relationship with Rogue is also very well written, despite the great difference in age never being addressed all that well.
 
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As one of the few posters on this site who actually read these when they came out I can honestly say it was a very exciting time and probably the longest consecutive time I read X-Men.
 
Okay... I just mentioned this over in the Endangered Species discussion thread, and so I decided to create a thread with my list to celebrate the greatest X-Men crossover of the nineties, and possibly ever... Conceptually, and even how it all played out... Age of Apocalypse isn't just good in that Nostalgiac way, its legitimately one of the most interesting experiments they ever tried with the X-Men's little corner of the Marvel Universe...

TEN REASONS WHY THE ORIGINAL AGE OF APOCALYPSE ROCKS MY SOCKS

10. Bishop - Bishop has never been used as well as he was in Age of Apocalypse... District X came close, but the aged version of Bishop whom after witnessing Xavier's death, simply wandered the world, amnesiatic, watching it crumble under the might of Apocalypse, is a much more interesting "time-displaced" character than his regular incarnation. This also heralded his "Bald" look in the comics, which is miles better than the long curly hair he sported years after his introduction.

9. The Four Horsemen of Apocalypse - Rather than the B and C listers he's been employing for years and years, AoA Apocalypse only had room for the sort of characters that had typically only run against the X-Men one-by-one. Mikhail Rasputin, Abyss, Sinister, and the best new villain to come out of the series, Holocaust, the twisted son of Apocalypse.

8. Iceman in Complete Control of his Abilities : Less human, definitely, and having lost all of his youthful arrogance, the AoA Iceman was one of the team's heavy-hitters in a way the 616 Bobby Drake has never managed.

7. The Design of the AoA Sunfire : 'Nuff Said

6. Bringing back old Forgotten X-Characters : Blink died almost immediately after introduction in 616 (in the New Mutants series, I believe), and who on earth remembers Changeling, with his big stupid purple hat? Morph and Blink, however remained popular enough to give the two starring roles in Exiles (although the Morph in Exiles is a different character, he's based on the same idea of reworking the character), and for good reason.

5. Sinister becoming Cyclops and Havok's surrogate Father - Sinister's obsession with the Summers brothers went back ages in the comics and in this reality Sinister hovered in a gray area between good and evil, planting the seeds of Apocalypse's destruction... I also totally dug Scott actually only having one eye.

4. Dark Beast - Hank McCoy as the Evil Genius and Mad Scientist, testing his sadistic medicine on humans and mutants alike was pure genius on behalf of the original writers... In 616, Beast almost never recognizes the fact that he could have easily become the amoral creature he was in this reality, if Xavier hadn't instilled his dream in him. Dark Beast remains to be one of the most interesting remnants of AoA in the 616 continuity.

3. Apocalypse actually fulfilling his Name - I mean, its the premise of the entire series... Apocalypse won. He was more of a threat during Age of Apocalypse than he ever was before, or ever will be again... This series alone is why I love him as a villain, because its the only series that shows what he is capable of becoming.

2. Sabretooth as a Good Guy : AoA's Victor Creed is one of my alltime favorite characters... In a world without the human masters to cripple his conscience in an attempt to turn him into more monster than man, Creed managed to become more of a Hero than that world's Wolverine could ever become.

1. Magneto's X-Men : It was amazing at how they managed to maintain the dignity of Magneto's character in a world so twisted that he dedicated his life to the Dream of Charles Xavier that Human and Mutantkind could live in peace together. Magneto in this reality is perhaps a better leader than Charles ever was, despite his lack of success, his support of his team, and openess with them is staggering when compared to the secrets Xavier's hidden in for years and years... His relationship with Rogue is also very well written, despite the great difference in age never being addressed all that well.
I love you....


I completely agree with these reasons and hell, I think I also would keep the same numbering. Maybe put Iceman #1, but that's just my fanboy side. :p
 
I'm still waiting for the X-Men to tell another story that could rival this one. AoA is easily my favorite X-Story and the massive amount of characters were all handled brilliantly.

Sunfire became a favorite character of mine.
Apocalypse became a villain I respect (despite never living up to this story again)
Kitty Pryde with the arm blades was SO COOL when I first read that, made me consider how much damage she really could do if she was amoral.

This was just a brilliant crossover and it even made me buy X-Men Legends 2 (which did an alright job of capturing it as a game and staying non-reader friendly)....this is the reason I'm an X-Fan.

Although, I didn't buy that second series thing Marvel released a year or two ago. AoA was a story that wrapped up beautifully and any continuation of that story completely spoils that ending.

SPEAKING OF WHICH Magneto tearing Apoc apart....that was bad ***.

Blink fighting Holocaust after she thought he killed Mr. Creed...brilliant!

God, that book had so many good things going for it (not so much the Gambit book in space, but that's more because I never agreed that the X-Men should be in space unlike the Avengers and Fantastic Four).

God, just typing about this makes me want to read this thing again.
 
Yes, to this day, this is my favorite X-Story of all time. I also think they shouldn't have done the 10 year anniversary, but whatever.

Also this is something people can say "I liked what Loeb wrote here!" for what he did write. :wink:

I have never read this before.

I feel like I should
Everything has been collected in 4 volumes, $30 a piece. Well worth it. Of course, you can find deals in places.
 
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I need to get new copies.

God this story kicked my *** when I first read it.
 
the only thing I hated about it....what Piotr did to Kitty....
 
This arc, coupled with the X-men saturday morning cartoon, is what got me consitantly buying comics for the first time. There was minimal continuity I needed to know to get into the arc, and in general, it was lots of fun.

I even liked the 10 year anniversary comics-especially those that were more flash-backs than what happened later.
 
Man I need to get this. After buying Morrison's New X-Men Omnibus, Astonishing X-Men, and Kirkman's run in Ultimate X-Men I'm wanting to get back into the X-Books. This and Endangered Species should do just fine.
 
Man I need to get this. After buying Morrison's New X-Men Omnibus, Astonishing X-Men, and Kirkman's run in Ultimate X-Men I'm wanting to get back into the X-Books. This and Endangered Species should do just fine.

Get the Hardcover of Brubaker's Uncanny X-men Shiar arc. It's so amazing.
 

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