Uncanny X-Force (Remender/Opena)

[Ultimate Houde]

Craig, you buy it for me, I'll buy it for you.

 

[E]

Craig, you buy it for me, I'll buy it for you.

I want in on this. Someone buy it for me and I'll buy it for you.

 

[Zeek]

I just read this for the first time, up through the Dark Angel stuff. I haven't gotten so absorbed in a comic in a long time, and that's in spite of the fact that I had a tenuous-at-best knowledge of the lore fueling everything. It's just all presented and paced and characterized so well that it's really easy to go with the flow. Fantastic stuff, and I can't wait to read the last couple arcs.

 

[Captain Canuck]

I just read this for the first time, up through the Dark Angel stuff. I haven't gotten so absorbed in a comic in a long time, and that's in spite of the fact that I had a tenuous-at-best knowledge of the lore fueling everything. It's just all presented and paced and characterized so well that it's really easy to go with the flow. Fantastic stuff, and I can't wait to read the last couple arcs.

This will help with some of the lore.

But as for Angel's history: he lost his normal wings when the Mauraders crippled them so badly that they had to be amputated (the Mauraders were a team of mercenary mutants that hunted the Morlocks b/c Sinister paid them to). He went a little crazy b/c of the loss and made a deal with Apocalypse to get new wings. He became Archangel and Apocalypse made him his horseman of death. He was eventually redeemed and I think eventually even cured and turned back to normal Angel again for a while. But then it was revealed that he could still transform into Archangel, but doing so made him lose control a bit and slip back towards his evil persona.

 

[Zeek]

Thanks! But it was actually more the World and Deathlok stuff that had me scratching my head.

And the whole seed thing. So Archangel was always poised to take over for Apocalypse, right? Was that kid used as a replacement for a dead Apocalypse instead because Betsy's psychic therapy was keeping Archangel down?

 

[Captain Canuck]

Thanks! But it was actually more the World and Deathlok stuff that had me scratching my head.

And the whole seed thing. So Archangel was always poised to take over for Apocalypse, right? Was that kid used as a replacement for a dead Apocalypse instead because Betsy's psychic therapy was keeping Archangel down?

Oh, the World was the artificial environment that the Weapon Plus program developed to create mutant killing super-sentinels/super soldiers. Fantomex was born and raised there (he was one of these technorganic sentinels designed to destroy mutants). There had been many iterations of the Weapon Plus program, best well known was Weapon I (Captain America) and Weapon X (Wolverine). Fantomex is Weapon XIII. Deathlok was part of the Weapon Infinity program, which eventually led to the transformation of all superheroes into Deathloks in a future timeline. This was all revealed/retconned into existence during Morrison's run on New X-Men.

As for Archangel and Apocalypse, my understanding was that Apocalypse chose Archangel to be his successor (although I believe this was a retcon too). But Apocalypse's followers didn't know about Archangel being chosen to replace Apocalypse, so they cloned Apocalypse and started brainwashing and grooming the clone to take his place.

The concept that Apocalypse was an agent of the celestials to ensure the evolution of the human race was new to me when I read Uncanny X-Force. So I don't know if the "seeds" were a new thing that Remender introduced or if they come from earlier Apocalypse stories.