This Is The Thread Where Ex-Fanboys Post The Name Of An Old Character They Liked And Still-Fanboys Tell Them What Happened To Him/Her/It

Ultimate Fantastic Four: Reed Richards, boy megagenius who's buddies with jock Ben Grimm, discovers Negative Zone as teenager without realizing it (he's been teleporting fruit and things to it); recruited by gov't for super-elite private school dealie run by Dr Franklin Storm, father of Sue & Johnny, boss of suspiciously Mole-looking Man; Victor Von Doom is another student at said school. Fast-forward some years to Reed's Negative Zone experiment going wacky wrong, everybody gets weird powers including Ben who's all freaked out and pissed by it. The Mole Man attacks cause he got fired and he has these subterranean buddies, the Four Friends smack him down.

It's typically Bendis Ultimate stuff, very similar to his first Ultimate Spidey arc, which works in some ways -- I like that the FF (who aren't called that yet) need time to figure out what their powers are, much less how to use them, and that their chemistry is going to be different since Sue & Johnny don't really know Ben -- even while I'm not sure how I feel about the team and Doom being in their late teens.

Brief subtlety-ignorant synopsis: Dr. Doom becomes makes pact with demons (involving the death of his true love) to gain magical powers and exact revenge on you-know-who. He kidnaps the Richard's kids, puts them IN HELL, eggs on the FF. FF travels to Latveria, meets up w/ Magick Doom, gets bushwacked. Dr. Strange gets involved, tries to help science-crazy Reed get his magick on. Ends up w/ big battle w/ Doom getting trapped in Hell (& Reed wanting to stay in Hell w/ Doom to make sure he doesn't come back), kids get rescued, as does Reed (against his wishes), BUT:

A) Doom scars Reed's face in a similar way to Doom's scarring, which leads to Reed going off the deep end, and becoming "beneficial" dictator of Latveria, trying to "help" the nation out but only becoming equally dictatorial & nutso
B) Doom pulls the out-of-body trick on the Invisible Girl, mucks around w/ the FF just as S.H.I.E.L.D. shows up & tries to put a kibbosh on these shenanigans.
C) The Thing gets killed in the resulting brou-ha-ha.

BUT, Reed invents a machine to travel into Heaven to rescue Ben's soul, so the FF hop on board, and they end up running into God (who, of course, is Jack Kirby), who allows the Thing to return, erases Reed's facial scars, and everything's copaceticy (except for the fallout of Reed going dictatorial, which means the cancelling of any sponsorships or research grants or any sort of $$$ the FF got for being the FF).

And that's where I took a break (strictly for financial purposes) - I'm really enjoying Waid's run, even if it got a bit hamfisted (during the tender, "Oh, Franklin's been in Hell, what can we do to break him out of his traumatic stupor" moments). This might feed into your anti-Waid arguments re: him fetishizing the "glory days", TT (or whatever your arguments actually are - I shouldn't reference them if I can't recall them), but I think it's good stuff. Warning: Mike Wieringo is the artist, so if you're not a fan of "cartoony" looking dramedy, step away.

OK, #2 - The Flash

(Other David - I know, I know. I meant ex-fanboys of the specific character)

As for the Flash, where to begin, no really, where to begin? He's been through a lot, like dying for example. I think he and Jason Todd (1-900-KILL-ROBIN) are just about the only still-dead, and still-staying-dead heroes, except maybe the original Mr. Terrific (but he'll probably be back soon enough). So the Flash now is what used to be Kid Flash, Wally West. When he started his own series, which is at about #210 right now, he could barely break the speed of sound and was pimping himself out as courier. Then he won the lottery. Then a bunch of other stuff happened and he's faster than Barry Allen ever was now, and he doesn't even need a Cosmic Treadmill to get trans-dimensional (though I'm not sure if there are any other dimensions left, there might be, there's this thing called Hypertime that seems like the old Multiverse we knew and loved, but who can keep track?)(also, he should use the cosmic treadmill anyway, because it's really cool).

Went through a phase where all the Rogues decided that working together might actually defeat Flash once and for all. Failed, of course. Went into a final climactic battle with Zoom, where Zoom found Wally's wife Linda and caused her to spontaneously abort their twins. Zoom ends up going so fast he is held between time somehow - appears static to the rest of the world. Distraught Linda blames Flash.

Wally does a deal with the Hal Jordan Spectre to make him and Linda forget he's the Flash, and forget the battle with Zoom. He becomes a mechanic at the police dept, but eventually Flash powers start kicking in and he has to acknowledge he's the Flash after all. He decides to tell Linda, who leaves him.

(From memory, this, hence the 'something'-type caveats)

(I wasn't criticizing, Huck, just pointing out that that kind of scope would make an X-synopsis enormous and complicated; which is maybe the appeal of the X-titles sometimes, in a soap opera X-Files Buffy Alias kind of way.)

(... I don't know a better way to phrase that. Like, if Donald Duck got the power of the Phoenix, the Phoenix was still something we knew about before that, not something introduced for the sake of Donald blowing the shit out of Duckberg.)

As far as I can tell, no. It was some sort of manifeset destiny thing or something. It was pretty lame except for the side-effect of getting him out of that terrible, terrible costume. I think one of the biggest reasons I couldn't get into comics in the 90s like I did in the 80s and I am in the Oh-Ohs, is that the costumes and hair were just too fucking lame.
Like Superman with his ridiculous mullet, which wasn't even as bad as Nightwing's coif-from-the-crypt, and I remember Changeling had pretty terrible hockey-hair too.
I'm still not clear on what they've done to Batman. Is it back to the Dave Mazzuchelli (sp??) Year One style or is it different still? Most of the time it looks okay, but the yellow oval was all right too. It even served a purpose. But whatev. Time marches on.

http://images.tfaw.com/coverst/med/g/guygardnerwa2.jpg

Blue Beetle got fat at the end of Breakdowns, about the time Maxwell Lord was shot, brought back to life, then possessed by Dreamslayer before he killed the Silver Sorceress. In the new FKATJL series, he says he has a heart condition, but nothing comes of it.

Likewise Rom - Spaceknight.

(I don't remember if Rom returns in the mini or not, or if they had to keep him missing.)

Anyway, I did just read that Peter David is writing a new Multiple Man title soon.

OMG Tom Gr@nt M0rris0N pwnz!!111!!!1!

And yeah, I'm pretty sure I asked this on rac.dcu and "he kind of disappeared" was the answer. Dazzler showed up later, there was the whole "is Shatterstar their son" question (answer: no), but Longshot himself, I don't think he'd shown back up yet at the time I asked.

(Varmint sounded funnier than varlet.)

(Slightly skewed viewpoint provided by lack of sleep.)

Arguably Swamp Thing had a more specific sense of place -- during some runs -- than mainstream superhero comics with their generic Big Cities As Battlegrounds, but that's only one small specific type of realism.

Mojoworld was like this .. other dimension thing ... Mojo is pretty lame, especially later, but the initial Longshot series is a lot of fun. I'm not sure if it's ever been collected; it used to be pretty expensive in back issues cause of Art Adams, but I don't know if he's still hot shit. (He should be.)

Vertigo & realism: I always thought that the main difference between the Vertigo "universe" (if such a thing exists) and the mainstream DCU/MU was just the absence of superheroes. In Vertigo, ordinary people are far more likely to encounter magic beings/monsters/vampires/Gods/Death as a goth-chick etc. Plus the whole "gritty" thing always seemed to me to be just a translated British aesthetic. Hence more rain, more depressed characters, more Alan Moore rip-offs....anybody who grew up with British TV felt right at home....

I think Vertigo -- and that sort of continuity -- is basically what broke me of being the kind of fanboy I was when I was 10-14 and would figure out how old Flash Thompson was based on his having gone to Vietnam.

But yeah, ultimately it was an aesthetic more than anything else, which is a good way to approach an imprint, I think, because it tells you a lot more than a list of shared facts does. But since that first wave, first generation, I'm less and less convinced the imprint has really "stood" for anything.

Kingdom Come was an Elseworlds series, outside continuity. In which the world has basically become over-run by 2nd & 3rd generation superbeings (just like, oh, let me think, oh yes : Image characters) who spend their time having massive and destructive battles across the globe for no apparent purpose and with no regard for mere mortals in their midst. Superman is hiding out in the Fortress of Solitude because the Joker killed Lois and another Hero came along with a harder edge and stole his fanbase (just like, let me think, oh yes : Image characters), Batman has had his secret Identity exposed and lives, crippled, in the batcave, controlling Gotham with gigantic robotic bat-sentinels, Aquaman has retreated to Atlantis with a nice twofinger salute to the surface, Green Lantern lives in space waiting for aliens to attack, the Flash just runs around all day stopping crime but so fast nobody ever sees him etc etc.
Then the Spectre comes along and takes this old preacher behind the scenes as different sides (Lex Luthor & a load of villains, Wonder Woman & a newly enthused Superman, Batman and his mates) plot to stop all the fighting and take over the world.
In a nutshell.
what happens?
A big fight-scene.

Zero Hour was just a big lame cross-over event where they took a big dump on Hal Jordan.

And what's this business going on with the current Wonder Woman? Diana is the original, yes? Who's this Vanessa/Silver Swan, and what's she to Diana?

As for WW, more Whatever Woman.

Is Gen13 perished and gone forever? It certainly would deserve that, but out of sentimental reasons I'd still like to know what happened to them, lame as they were.

What's up with Emma Frost?? And Generation X in general? Jubilee, Banshee?

don't really know about those others.

Covered in last year's Giffen & McGuire reuniting 'Formerly Known As The Justice League', where Maxwell Lord tries to reassemble 'his' JLA/I/E/Antarctica as a money making scheme (obviously). Gets those three (although actually, now I think about it, Ice may not have been in it), Blue Beetle, Captain Atom, Mary Marvel. They save the world and split up but think about getting back together (and another miniseries is in the offing).

Booster was living as the toyboy of an old millionairess, but joins when she kicks him out. Fire was running a pr0n site of her as Fire.

Darleen is Wolverine....

I THINK Moon Knight died (in unceremonious fashion); there was a time, after Steve Engelhart employed him in some wacky West Coast Avengers time-travel shenanigans, that he came back (with his own spiffy title - art by the splendiferous Sal Velluto at first), but then he bottomed out 60 issues later. He might be back in some capacity, though. I vaguely remember (or want to remember) Priest using him in Black Panther...?

PS - DJ = Rebis.

After West Coast Avengers his title was relaunched, never rose above the mediocre, was truly awful when he was given a new costume - armour!! during the period when every Marvel character including Daredevil had to wear armour -and then was put out of its misery.

He pops up in guest-spots in various books every so often. Priest did use him in Black Panther.

I always loved the character for no reason other than the fact that his costume is cool...

Unless you meant Iron Fist? Not sure what the latest scoop on him is, but Iron Fist's origin story, where both his parents are killed by wolves as they push young Danny to safety - very memorable.

Is his father still officially Fu Manchu? I think I remember something about Marvel no longer having the rights to FM and either retconning that or just not mentioning him by name anymore.

Iron Fist had a miniseries recently -- Iron Fist/Wolverine? -- that brought K'un-L'un to Earth or destroyed it entirely, I don't remember which. Boy, that's helpful, isn't it?

Iron Fist has a miniseries running currently, doesn't he? And he appeared in the most recent issue of Daredevil...anyone remember "Heroes For Hire". I think it was called that, anyway...

Why wasn't Iron Fist ever in the Defenders?

(True Confession: I was about to say "he was!" and then realized that was fanfic I'd written.)

I hope these are genuine, and not weird little oh-if-onlies that made it into Amazon's system. None of them have release dates listed.

There really should be, what, four or five ESSENTIAL DEFENDERS volumes, if I remember the chronology of the good parts right.

Speaking of "Heroes for Hire", anyone else remember the running gag feud between Luke Cage and his coffee machine?

Everything

I was actually thinking about starting a Cerebus precis thread, this might just about be an excuse...

Brief Spider-Man update: MJ is alive, Aunt May knows he's Spidey, Flash Thompson was in a coma (darn that Green Goblin) & is now wheelchair bound, Parker's a school teacher, and he just rec'd a 20-year-old letter from Gwen Stacy POSTMARKED ONE MONTH AGO (or something like that). And Spidey whupped up on some baddies.

(My glossing it over: Dude with Spider-powers shows up, and is all, "Yo P, here's the thing, that spider that bit you: is the radiation what gave you your powers, or did it just kill the spider afterwards, and the spider would've given you powers one way or the other?" I'm suspicious of these modern attempts to remove the embarrassing radiation aspect from superhero origins, but luckily, so is Peter. They haven't yet turned him into Arach-Thing, the Spider Elemental.)

(Note: for the most part, Ezekiel / totem included, I am a fan of JMS' Spidey run; I'm not sure my tone above conveys that, though.)

"Ready to plan the Bank Job, boss?"
"Sure, boys - WAIT! Get Vinnie No-Eyes outta here - NOOOOO! DAREDEVIL!!"

Didn't something like this happen during the Nocenti run?

JMS Spidey : really not to my taste. But then I havent loved any spidey properly since Roger Stern left Amazing waaaaay back when I was a kid. That Roger Stern run was incredible...

"The Shadow Strikes!", a more pulp-based book ran for longer, somewhat bizarrely.

The Shadow made an appearance in Batman's issue #253. DC Comics published a 12 issue series from 1973 to 1975, featuring art by Mike Kaluta and Berni Wrightson. This is considered (and deservedly so) one of the best adaptations. Issue #11 features an appearance by The Avenger, another pulp character. Howard Chaykin tried to update the character in 1986's four-issue The Shadow for DC, with great success. There was another series in 1987, by Andrew Helfer and Kyle Baker, with 19 issues. According to Tim Elliott, "The Baker/Helfer series was probably the best written series among them all, but was cancelled at the request of Condé Nast, not due to weak sales, but they disliked what DC was doing with the character. DC had no choice but to abruptly cancel the series, but restarted with the good but still inferior The Shadow Strikes!, returning the character to the 1930's." It lasted 31 issues, until Dark Horse obtained the rights for the character before DC could renew their license.

Basically she was the daughter of an overprotective Greek millionaire. Matt Murdock dated her in college and he used his secret ninja-like skillz to sneak around her bodyguards and s3x her up. Then terrorists took over the school and captured her and her father, possibly holding him for ransom (can't remember). Matt put on a mask for the first time and did some superhero shit but Elektra's daddy got killed anyway. She decided that THE WORLD IS COLD AND BLACK and went off to become a ninja-assassin-for-hire devoid of emotion. Personally, I think she overreacted.

Who's Matt Miller again?

Elektra is gifted and cursed with kimagure, a limited ability to see the future, but even she can't predict what will happen when she takes her next job

Oh my.

Also, it's v. important to note that she was murdered by DD's arch-wival, Bullseye, resurrected by The Hand, purified of evil by DD, reinfected by The Hand, and was asked out on a date by the Punisher. As we know, in real life, Jennifer Garner would probably scrunch up Thomas Jane by the balls than date him.

Did this happen in the Punisher/Archie crossover?

i wasn't just a fanboy i wanted to DATE HIM! (i wz ten) (so it probably wouldn't have worked out)

Dudes, what happened to the Vision? Is he still all white? Is he still with the Scarlett Witch? (I totally never got that relationship - hot chick and emotionless android, didn't they have a kid?). Haven't kept up with the Vision since the days of Avengers West Coast. Though, I'm reading the Kree - Skrull War TPB at present.

(Avengers disassembled, disassembled)

In a Vision & Scarlet Witch maxi-series (by Steve Engelhart) (why, yes, I think there was an appearance by Mantis in there somewhere), Wanda "willed" herself pregnant through her "chaos magic". What Bendis did in Avengers Disassembled is reveal Wanda's "chaos magic" to be reality-warping powers, meaning her children didn't exist - this sorta tapped into an old John Byrne West Coast Avengers arc, involving Master Pandemonium & Wanda going "bad" (see also: a good number of Byrne books - Malice, Big Barda doing porn, Marinna & Aurora in Alpha Flight - sexy sexy). There was also some inferred nastiness involving Agatha Harkness' dessicated corpse - I forget if her being alive was part of Wanda's reality power dealie or not. Anyway, Wanda snaps, things go kaflooey, Ultron & the Kree & a whole load of baddies (thanks to warped reality) converge on Avengers Mansion, and everyone (= Hawkeye, The Vision, Ant-Man) dies. Relaunch & disgruntled BMB fandom & multiple covers ensue.

Okay, so it sounds like the suck outnumbered the good, and the New Age shit was too much like a fluffier, more heavily patchoulied version of Steven Grant's already-far-too-patchoulied X-Man. But it started off on the right track.

Man, I wish they'd stop getting things so messed up that they have to start over.

Aunt May knows his secret ID, oh no Aunt May dead! No! Just fake. Aunt May back.

Ezekiel guy shows up with spider powers, "did the radiation cause the spider to give you your powers, or did it just kill the spider who was going to give you your powers anyway?", "huh?", "LOOK OUT, TOTEM BAD GUYS!", "aiiiie", "You are the Spider-Messiah, the Spider-Elemental," handwave handwave, "oh no I am a giant spider!", "now I'm not yay!," "hey I can hear bugs!"

Norman Osborn seduced Gwen Stacy, Gwen Stacy pregnant, Gwen Stacy has magic kids, magic kids angry at Spider-Man.

Wait, were the cosmic powers post-Reilly, or did you miss the whole clone saga? Cause I'm not gonna sum that up.

If you know about Ezekiel and him teaching at high school, I think you're pretty much caught up in terms of anything that'll be referenced -- the Gwenspawn stuff probably won't come up in the miniseries since it's still playing out in the regular monthlies.

Er, what exactly is a spider elemental? Is that like a gigantic ur-spider made up of tiny Mandelbrot spiders?

LOTS OF STUPID STUPID STUPID OUT OF CHARACTER MOVIE-RELATED PSEUDO-RETCONNING CRAP (not done by JMS)

Tep was way too nice about it.

I am Fanboy; hear me wheeze as I climb a flight of stairs.

I should add, though -- and I think David agrees with me, if I remember other threads -- that for all the mockability when you talk about what actually happened, the Spider-comics are better right now than they were for a looooong time (i.e. not just the Spider-clone stuff -- some of which I didn't mind, there was just too much of it -- but the general blandness of what came before it, for most of the 90s).

Oh, speaking of which, Mile High has updated their Marvel Previews (full issue), which include the second issue of the current ASM arc.

If you want primo Jenkins Spidey action, though - w/ art by Mark Buckingham of Fables! in 4/6-panel-per-page mode (so nice) - check out almost anything between #20 & #46 of Peter Parker: Spider-Man. The first few issues in particular - where I guess PP is still dealing w/ MJ's "death" or something - do more w/ Peter's relationship w/ Uncle Ben, & himself, than anything that's come before or since. Also, the few new villains that PJ introduces - including Typeface & a gang of mimes - are charmingly crappy in an Enforcer / Ringmaster / Spider-Slayer kind of way. #46 kicked off a 4-part story w/ PP facing off w/ the GG just in time for the first Spidey flick, & it's where some of the lustre starts to fade. There's one more Jenkins / Buckingham issue (#50), though. (In Spectacular, the best artwork can be found in Damion Scott's 3-issue Lizard story - #11-13, which is followed by a one-off about a boy w/ cerebral palsy & Morbius fully painted - quite nicely, in a Kent Williams / Sienkiewicz way - by Paolo Rivera.)

In a nutshell (as to how Spidey "changed"): There's this super-powered lady. Called the Queen Bee. Her origin has something to do w/ Captain America & WWII, I think - I skimmed over that bit. Cap & Spidey team-up to fight her, though Spidey goes off half-cocked, ignoring CA's advice to take things slow. Spidey gets sucker-punched (figuratively) by the Queen Bee, & is kissed. This kiss, over the course of a few issues, triggers some unpleasant changes in PP - he starts to grow bristle-like hair, his eyes become more spider-like, etc. (This leads to a really godawful set of pages where Mary Jane gives PP shit, clueless ditz style, for trying to use this "I'm changing!" thing as an excuse to skip out on attending a friends' wedding. A Trekkie Klingon wedding at that. "Oh, come on, Peter, it'll be good for you to get some fresh air!" "DAMN IT, WOMAN, I'M TURNING INTO A SPIDER - F*** THE TRIBBLES!")

Of course, PP's metamorphosis kicks in at the wedding, he scampers off, begins sprouting spider-legs & stuff, & runs back to the Queen Bee before turning into a full-blown spider under her control. Some plot denouement happens (with Cap explaining to Nick Fury what the Queen actually is), and meanwhile Spidey's in the QB lair spinning a cocoon as part of his neverending metamorphosis. Eventually, PP hatches from the cocoon, and learns that he makes his own web & he can hear / communicate / become one w/ the bugs. (That latter thing / power, I assumed, was an extension of JMS' work re: the Spider Totem, but I really have no clue.)

So, yeah, the Spidey titles have come a long way from Maximum Carnage & all the parent / symbiote clone hoohah. But they've been kinda scuffling for the last little while. (I can't WAIT for Dan Slott's mini! Also, Reg Hudlin's supposed to be doing some Spidey work, too!) (I don't know why I psyched about RH doing Spidey, since I don't know what kind of funny book writer he is!) (Whatever!)

But now. Two story arcs in a row involving Previously Unrevealed Facets Of Peter Parker's Past that come back into his life blah blah blah ... I don't trust writers who get into ruts of using those kinds of stories. They ring false, and they ring lazy: I've had plenty of dramatic and interesting things happen to me that didn't require someone from twenty years in my past resurfacing, and even the most significant and self-shaping events of my past don't consciously spring to mind and invite flashbacks very often. People just don't really work that way, and characters who are written that way feel like characters the writer is trying to tilt in his own direction -- injecting some past he created himself into the character's backstory as a way of adjusting the rear-view mirror and the angle of the seat while he's settling into the driver's seat.

Which makes it a particularly finicky and odd thing to be doing several years into a run, when you ought to be comfortable enough with a character to give him the stories that people twenty years from now will be drawing on. This metal skin revenge of the nerds thing isn't it.

Sorry, I missed this.

Umm... the Omega Men have been hiding out on a research station, on the run as terrorists after they freed Seer from the Spider Guild by causing wanton destruction. They just happen to be hiding on a research station near where Rann used to be, which is where Adam Strange finds them.

The rest is all Adam Strange plotifying, including references to an Omega Event - which may be 'Crisis II', given that we know the Adam Strange mini is going to lead into it.

Oh, and Doc's about to be eaten by a big monster.

The Rann/Thanagar war looks definite.

Or it could just be a cash-in like Millenium or Joker's Wild.

OH THE IRONY.

Also, what's up with that bald loser being Mr.Miracle*? Where's Scott Free, Oberon, Big Barda?

* srsly I might warm to the character, he doesn't seem too bad a guy, but he just seems to be drawn to *look like* a total wanker.

This week's 52 has an appearance by Little Barda. Yes.

Actually 52 has a hell of a lot of threads pointing to some major Fourth World-related developments: so far we've seen Intergang, Adon, Devilance, a couple of Apokoliptians in the interim Titans, etc., and there's a reasonably convincing argument about that Supernova is actually Lightray.

JUSTICE, LIKE LIGHTNING, SHALL EVER APPEAR TO SOME MEN HOPE AND TO OTHER MEN FEAR.

Last time i looked at the Outsiders they were doing undercover black op shanans in africa

stopped reading at issue 60 cuz i got a girlfriend

loved this comic when i was 15

http://robot6.comicbookresources.com/2015/02/idws-chris-ryall-commissions-custom-rom-hardcover-set/

i am prepared to answer marvel universe questions here.

I'm hugely confused as to what's up w Quicksilver, based on an appearance I kinda read in a Peter David X-Factor. He's full-on evil now and his main power's using his speed to time-travel?

I don't know what's been up with him within the last couple of years, but he was among the mutants depowered by his sister after House of M (an event which he was complicit in bringing about, so he was already a bit less than heroic at that point). He then used Crystal to finagle his way into the Inhumans' terrigen mist chamber and stole some terrigen crystals, which he used to artificially repower himself and a number of other ex-mutants (with decidedly unsexy and occasionally fatal results). His own new power was, yes, something confusing which involved sending himself a short way into the future in a way that seemed like super-speed to outside observers. Having already made himself a pariah among earth's heroes (largely among those like Spider-Man who remembered the events of House of M and realized how shitty their current lives were in comparison), he ultimately wound up inadvertently delivering the crystals into the hands of the US government and sparking off a small war with the Inhumans. Oh, and he also damaged his daughter via artificial terrigenesis, so basically the Inhumans kinda hated him, too. And then he went to Mutant Town and started his spree of artificially mutant-ing people and X-Factor tried to set themselves up as a bulwark against his nonsense.

I don't know. It's been a while. Most of this stuff is contained in Son Of M, Silent War, and the first couple years of David's X-Factor reboot, so it's pretty easy to catch up on.

Oh, also, he had actually embedded a bunch of terrigen crystal fragments in his flesh, which gave him the ability to induce his half-assed version of terrigenesis on ex-mutants and sparked his whole M-Day Messiah trip.

Thanks, that explains a lot.

Plz update me on Kitty Pryde. I know she is (was?) dating Starlord. Is she tangible again? Is she making appearances in any of X-books?

Most recently, Wanda nearly killed Quicksilver in her attempt to kill Magneto (when the pair of them found out he wasn't their dad).

Kitty Pride is tangible, but then most of her time with Starlord has been by hologram. She's with him in space at the moment though, and she must be in at least one X-book because GotG are in nearly every Marvel book at the moment, including some of the X-books and 'Guardians of the Galaxy & X-Men' which is the core book of The Black Vortex.

Kitty was working at the school but, after the original X-Men were brought forward in time and ran off with Scott's rebels, she went after them to keep an eye on them

Most recently, Wanda nearly killed Quicksilver in her attempt to kill Magneto (when the pair of them found out he wasn't their dad).

There's been some speculation that a lot recent plot developments in Marvel comics are because Marvel Studios wants to get all the characters they can get to be part of their own movie franchise, so that the studios who have the film rights to X-Men and Fantastic Four can't claim them. So Magneto not being the dad of Quicksilver and Scarlet Witch would be a way of distancing those two from the X-Men/mutant franchise, so that they are firmly in the Avengers franchise. The same applies to mutants becoming Inhumans (because Inhumans are part of the Avengers franchise) and stuff like that. I'm not sure if all this is true, but if it is, it's kinda sad.

That all seems very likely. (See also the cancellation of FF and the internal memo that no new characters were to be created in X-Men.)

There's some sort of mission w/Uncanny Avengers or whatever they are called now with Wanda & company tracking down the High Evolutionary, who is now on one of whatever other-earths is still around (maybe the one last seen in FF?) with the implication he knows the real background of the twins.