Superhero comics: What insane story/character developments do avid followers take for granted but would blow the minds of anyone only peripherally aware of them?

We're missing that the main Hulk book is now stars Hercules, and he has spent the past few months pretending to be Thor.

hahaha, i didn't know about that second bit

And Zeus is now a child and is Herc's sidekick (sorta).

Also that half the issues being published now don't even feature Thorcules, but his former sidekick, a kid named Amadeus Cho who technically shares the superhero name Mastermind Excello with a character who appeared in two issues of a comic published in the early '40s.

All of which helps make The Incredible Hercules one of the only superhero books worth reading.

yeah i have to admit i dig Cho and Herc too

I dunno, Superman not being present in any of his monthly titles works if you're reading all of the Supes books. It definitely makes sense in terms of the overarching story (Kryptonians banned from Earth, Supes keeping an eye on New Krypton to make sure they stay in line). I think the books are pretty nicely paced, but there's definitely some decompression taking place. They read better in big gulps.

wow, a lot of this stuff did kind of blow my mind

I think Hulk nuttiness lost the ability to blow my mind back when he went gray (the She-Hulk stuff comes close, though).

(ps I am totally fronting here because LMBO @ "the Rulk")

Yeah, that's the kind of dumb shit that occasionally makes me embarrassed to read superhero comics. Rulk. Jeeeesus.

All we need now is a Hulk/Scooby-Doo crossover and my life will be complete.

Scooby is possessed and tears out Shaggy's throat until Shaggy is resurrected by the Phoenix

Actually Disney crossovers are much more likely. Anybody want to take bets on when that DELICIOUS SYMMETRY overflows from the kettle?

If Disney were smart they would cull this freakish mindblowingness in favor of closer, commercial movie continuity. smart and heartless and moneygrubbing. I have faith that they are at least two of those three things!

If anyone has proven they could not give a shit about comic books, it's Disney.

fwiw i am half wondering if you guys are making all of this up so yes

you have blown my mind

Yes, 'Rulk' is the only semi-mindblowing thing to me in this thread. I'm pretty convinced at this point that Loeb has complete contempt for comics and everyone who reads them.

I guess if he's turned sienna, he'll start being mopey?
If he's blue, he'll put on weight?

I think Hulk is very interesting for a long-running superhero character, because he's never really had proper status quo, has he? He's been grey, he's been green, now he's apparently red (though wasn't there a red Hulk some time in the 90s too?), he's been intelligent, he's been stupid, he's been a good guy and a bad guy, and sometimes he just wants to be left alone, he's been separated from Banner and united with him again (wasn't Rick Jones Hulk for a short while in the 80s?). As far as I know he isn't associated with any city or area like most superheroes are, and the only constant supporting characters he's had are Betty Ross and Rick Jones. (Are they still around, by the way?) So it seems writers are much more free to do weird shit with him than with most superheroes, because there's no real status quo he always needs to return to, like Superman or Spider-Man need to.

I'd say status quo is definitely green, stupid, angry, just want to be left alone Hulk. Because every time he starts to branch off into other hulks, evolve, get smart (see Planet Hulk/World War Hulk to now, again) he reverts back to the Hulk of olden days. He definitely suffers from a lack of lasting character change as much as Spider-Man or Wolverine (though I wonder how long it'll take them this time to revert him back to feral).

Bear in mind before you get all fanboy outrage on Rulk it is completely silly and tongue-in-cheek, especially compared to recent Hulk exploits. I mean, they point out how stupid the name is in the comic, and for god sakes, Rulk PUNCHES OUT THE WATCHER for basically comedy hijinks in his third or fourth issue. (Ok I admit there's no way I'd be amused if I was actually paying for the comic.)

I would buy a monthly comic called "Rulk PUNCHES OUT THE WATCHER"

Rulk's war on peeping toms will never end!

Scooby is possessed and tears out Shaggy's throat until Shaggy is resurrected by the Phoenix

that is a whole lot of throat-tearing

forks you really gotta see it -- the Watcher actually does his whole opening splash page narration bit, followed by page two GIANT PUNCH'D IN THE FACE, it's kinda amazing

scans plz?

http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_Gd8NBIma-zo/SGVQShCogZI/AAAAAAAAELc/4cyFQrI28Yc/s400/Hulk+4+-+punchesOutWatcher.jpg

hahaha wait

lol forever! that is unbelievable; i have to have that as my avatar

OW!

Thing is that the Rulk isn't Banner at all, I guess there is a big mystery of who it is (probably Glenn Talbot back from the dead, I guess). Banner got shot up with some stuff at the end of the whole World War Hulk and right now he cannot become 'the Hulk'.

The gray Hulk stuff when he became Mr. Fixit that Peter David did is awesome. I also really liked the Planet Hulk stuff. That wasn't the first time they had shot the Hulk into limbo though, as Dr. Strange shot him into mystical limbo when Bill Mantlo was writing the book for a couple of years back in the 80s. I think the

The Arizona desert where the Hulk was born is pretty much the biggest home locale for the character. One of I think most brilliant things about the Hulk is how he just jumps around and doesn't even fly.

Ravid Ranner?

It would be awesome if Rulk turned out to be David Banner from the TV show instead of Bruce Banner from the comics. Head-slappingly stupid as that sounds, it would fit right in with Loeb's writing.

has he done that sort of thing before?

Sounds like bargain basement imitation BKV plot twists

The thing is that Loeb is terrible as far as ideas go and the only way his writing really works is when an actor can successfully make you ignore the bullshit inherent in it (see Heroes S1) or when he basically says "yes, this idea is shit, laugh at it" (The RULK, apparently).

His Ultimates run was actually a worse concept than David Banner as Rulk.

Hank Pym is under house arrest at Ultimates Mansion. One of Pym's Ultron robots drugs him and leaks a sex tape of Stark and the Black Widow to the Internet. These distract from the robot's fatal shooting of the Scarlet Witch. Magneto abducts Wanda's corpse and retreats to the Savage Land, where he is confronted by the Ultimates. Pym and Wasp discover the truth about the Ultron robot, which has adopted the identity of Yellowjacket and uses the Ultimates' DNA to create a series of android duplicates. Although the true Ultimates destroy their android counterparts and Yellowjacket, Quicksilver is apparently killed by Hawkeye. The Wasp then invites Pym to return to the Ultimates, and he accepts. The mastermind behind the robot's plot is revealed to be Doctor Doom.

yikes

ha, yeah that looks like the kind of thing I would've plotted out in junior high on the inside cover of a social studies book

One of Pym's Ultron robots drugs him and leaks a sex tape of Stark and the Black Widow to the Internet.

I mean what the fucking fuck

Magneto abducts Wanda's corpse and retreats to the Savage Land

exeunt, pursued by a bear

That summary misses Captain America masquerading as the Black Panther for no particular reason I remember. Just more wha?

The first rule of drama is that if you show an ultimate nullifier in the first act, it will be shot by the end of the comic.

And then read a summary of Ultimatum. What Loeb did to the Ultimate Universe makes me feel uncomfortable just for knowing.

Hawkeye helps Hank Pym search for the Wasp, but they discover the Blob eating her corpse.

This kind of sums up the ickyness that is Ultimatum.

Deaths

* Angel - Killed and partially eaten by Sabretooth. (Ultimatum #4)
* Beast - Drowned. (Ultimatum #1)
* Blob - Head bitten off by Hank Pym. (Ultimatum #3)
* Cannonball - Blown up by Madrox. (Ultimatum #3)
* Captain Britain - Blown up by Madrox. (Ultimate X-Men #100)
* Cypher - Presumably blown up by Madrox, shown alongside other casualties (Ultimate X-Men: Requiem)
* Cyclops - Shot in the head by Quicksilver. (Ultimatum #5)
* Daredevil - Found dead by Spider-Man. Presumably drowned. (Ultimate Spider-Man #131)
* Dazzler - Drowned. (Ultimatum #1)
* Detonator - Tortured and killed in the Savage Land. (Ultimatum #3)
* Doctor Doom - Head crushed by the Thing. (Ultimatum #5)
* Doctor Strange - Killed by Dormammu after his body is constricted, causing his engorged head to explode. (Ultimatum #4)
* Emma Frost - Blown up by Madrox. (Ultimatum #3)
* Forge - Tortured and killed in the Savage Land. (Ultimatum #3)
* Franklin Storm - Drowned. (Ultimate Fantastic Four #58)
* Hard-Drive - Tortured and killed in the Savage Land. (Ultimatum #3)
* Hank Pym - Blown up by Madrox. (Ultimatum #3)
* Juggernaut - Hit in the eye by a poisonous dart shot by a Sentinel soldier. (Ultimate X-Men #99)
* Longshot - Tortured and killed in the Savage Land. (Ultimatum #3)
* Lorelei - Killed by Wolverine. (Ultimate X-Men #100)
* Madrox - Killed by Wolverine. (Ultimate X-Men #100)
* Magneto - Decapitated by Cyclops. (Ultimatum #5)
* Nightcrawler - Drowned. (Ultimatum #1)
* Polaris - Blown up by Madrox. (Ultimatum #3)
* Professor X - Neck broken by Magneto. (Ultimatum #2)
* Psylocke - Listed by Marvel as dead, shown alongside other casualties (Ultimate X-Men: Requiem)
* Sunspot - Blown up by Madrox. (Ultimatum #3)
* Syndicate - Dead after one of his heads is blown off by William Stryker. (Ultimate X-Men #99)
* Thor - Surrendered his soul to Valhalla. (Ultimatum #3)
* Toad - Listed by Marvel as dead, though his death was never shown.
* Wasp - Cause of death unknown; corpse partially eaten by the Blob.(Ultimatum #2)
* Wolverine - Killed by Magneto after the adamantium is ripped from his skeleton.(Ultimatum #5)

I know I keep saying it, but this is TOTALLY the kind of shit me and my friends plotted out in junior high.

I hear ya. Sadly, Loeb isn't in junior high; he's 50-something.

chaining who killed whom is kind of hysterical

Basically, after much foreshadowing, Dr. Doom's masters, the Marquis of Death and his apprentice, arrive on earth. The Marquis mocks Doom's failures and opens a portal to the Cretaceous period, dropping Doom there to be eaten alive by dinosaurs. Once the Fantastic Four have defeated the Marquis, Doom reveals that he was in fact the Marquis's new apprentice all along, having survived millions of years by using the dark arts, and has now become significantly more powerful, posing a greater threat.

Last plotline in Millar's FF. This was far more wtf when you were reading it in floppies tbh.

So wait, Dr. Doom is now Bruce Wayne now? WTF.