You, yes you, reading this entry right now. Stop what you are doing and get over to the Major Spoilers Forum. While there isn’t a lot of activity, there is some really good stuff there if you just look. Like Hermit’s Miscellaneous Random Irregular Trade Paperback Reviews (The Spirit Vol 21 is his first outing), and StevieCool’s interpretation of what Secret Invasion #2 should be all about.
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Ship Captain America
Ship Captain America: Why won’t anyone fight me?
Ship Vision: According to my records, you’re dead.Ship Captain America: So they don’t fight ghosts?
Ship Vision: No, they are afraid you might be a zombie and infect them.Ship Captain America: So what’s the big deal? Jean Grey came back, like eight times. How many times did I come back?
Ship Vision: So far?
Ship Captain America: Yes
Ship Vision: ZeroShip Captain America: ATTENTION EVERYONE! I AM NOT A ZOMBIE.
Ship Vision: That’s exactly what a zombie Cap would say.
Ship Captain America: Dammit!
Why isn’t StevieCool writing regularly for us? I think he’s a Skrull…
6 Comments
Jean Grey died and came back once! Once dammit!
Cap died and came back at least twice!
Argh!!!
See, now I’m going to have to think about this.
There’s Blue Moon with the FF return, There are the two times death saved her and she sat on a building talking (?), There’s the Xmen/Titans resurrection (maybe not counting in your book, but still a return), There’s the Magento kill with the Endsong return… five off the top of my head.
Cap’s ice was supended animation.
Cap getting old and dying in #300 and the Indian Guy saved him, yeah, I forgot about that.
Or maybe it was when he was Iron Cap. I’ll have to think about that.
I’m counting the shuttle/cocoon return.
I remember her sitting and talking to death in a back up story in Classic X-Men, but that was while she was dead and not a resurrection.
I don’t count the Phoenix Endsong, because she really didn’t come back, it was a tease if nothing else. And the way I understood that mini is that it was never really her, but the phoenix force taking her form.
And the X-Men/Titans, regardless of whether or not it was in continuity, that was Phoenix, not Jean.
I think the key to this debate is separating who was the Phoenix Force and who was actually Jean Grey. Jean “died” piloting the shuttle and came back in a cocoon and died again at the end of Planet X at the hands of Xorneto.
In the end, I guess it could be open to interpretation. I just find it frustrating that if someone wants to illustrate how silly comic book deaths are, they point to Jean Grey and she hasn’t really died and come back that often.
As for Cap, the suspended animation in a block of ice is no different than Jean in a cocoon, Cap was believed dead by the entire world and had at least two replacements over the following decade. Cap also “died” the issue before Operation: Rebirth. Cap also got blown up real good at the end of Jurgens run (issue 50, Vol. 3) to come back for the Marvel Knights relaunch. That makes three “deaths” Cap has come back from.
See, that is why nobody ever wants to tell us geeks and nerds jokes, over-analyzation! LOL
Good job steviecool! Gave me a good laugh for the day!
Actually, that also brings up the same issue we’re facing now – The Jean Grey/Phoenix Force retcon, in many ways is comarable to this Secret Invasion.
I think what really made the Titans/Xmen such a heart-puller is that it was Jean. It wasn’t Scott crying for the Phoenix Force. Darkseid brought her back to life, and she was on the side of the not-angels.
I’m really surprised, given your depth of comic facts, that you don’t consider Phoenix: Endsong as a return. I didn’t perceive that as a death, but a relocation.
Block of ice, coccoon, Superman’s one-use only-life-restoring-healing matrix, I think it counted as a “death” at the time – but when the next issue came out, they un-deathed it.
It’s been a while since I read Phoenix Endsong, so a reread seems to be in order. Since there was no real consequence (silly limited series thinking they mean something), the specifics sort of got pushed out of brain storage. The way I saw Phoenix Endsong was that the Phoenix force came back and inhabited Jean’s corpse. Jean, hanging out with Death in the White Hot Room, came back in spirit to help contain the Phoenix. Jean never really came back from the dead.
It’s also been over 15 years since I read the X-Men/Titans so it looks like I might need a refresher for that one too. I think with this story it really is hard to say wether it really was Jean or not. If we take the book to be in continuity, Jean is technically in a cocoon at the bottom of a lake/river. How would Darkseid be able to resurrect her if she’s not “dead” (notice the use of quotation marks to denote perceived death). So in this case, I believe that Darkseid resurrected Phoenix/Jean. If out of continuity, then it really doesn’t matter who Darkseid brought back becasue it was a one off inconsequential story for fun. Again, I need to reread as it’s been quite a while since I’ve read the story.
They were “deaths” at the time, which is why we are able to debate them.
And Secret Invasion is the ultimate get out of jail free card for Marvel continuity. Wolverine was in twenty places at once? Skrulls. Spidey made a deal with the devil? Skrulls.