Your most shocking Marvel comics moment

DavidAmaquelin

I was moving some of my old comics today and started to think about all the stories,moments and funny things these comics gave to me.

But what about the bad moments?

I just opened this discussion to share and know which is your sad,dramatic,traumatic, shocking, heart breaking moment from the Marvel comics stories.

For me,as I was a child when I first read it,one of the worst moments is from the "Avengers under siege" saga.When Baron Zemo and the masters of evil assault the avengers mansion and one by one defeat each avenger.Even hit almost to death to Jarvis and Hercules. I never forget those illustrations of Hyde hitting Jarvis....

spidyjedi84

Spider-Man: Clone Saga and Onslaught/Heroes Reborn were the big event when I got into comics originally. I learned to despise the name Howard Mackie for how long it lasted and killing off my favorite of the two Spider-Men. Five years later, we got Ultimate Spider-Man's original run, which ended with Peter Parker's death and Miles Morales. Brand New Day, though, was another horrific, horrific storyline in Spideybooks. A lot of Dan Slott's events sound bad on paper, but have been phenomenal read, though.

Dragon_Nexus

I've only started reading comics lately, but for me it was the first issue of Civil War II where everything goes to hell *immediately* and certain characters are taken out of the story. That was a real gut punch.

But I gotta say, the entire Jane Foster run of Thor was fantastic. That's what got me into comics and it's what's kept me going. When Jason Aaron stops doing Thor after War of the Realms I'm going to have a hard time sticking around, I think...

Dormammu

Spider-Man vs. Wolverine #1

A one-shot starring the title characters; I was 14 years old and they were my two favorites. When Logan popped his claws into Charlemagne and killed her, a woman he obviously cared very much for, it was such a shocking moment. That scene was taken directly off the pages from this issue and put into the X-Men 3 film (when Logan kills Jean).

The issue also had the death of Ned Leeds, who was then revealed to be the Hobgoblin in the very next issue of Amazing. That was a big deal. The Hobgoblin Saga had been raging for 50 issues and his secret identity had sparked more debates than a presidential election, among comic fans, and to this day is my favorite run of any comic series (basically Amazing Spider-Man #238 - #290). 

tfcrazy1980

First one i think of is the death of gwen stacy, that issue and the next are rough, 2nd i can think of is the end of west coast avengers when cap dismantles the team (personal favorite), 3rd is how old man logan came to be, killing everyone because of mysterio and then later his family gets killed by the banner clan, man that was harsh

JaGo

When Magneto ripped the Adamantium from Wolverine’s body. I was a huge Wolverine fan at the time and what’s Wolvie without his Adamantium?!

-JaGo

GrimSkald

This moment.  I was collecting comics at the time, back in the 80s, and Marvel had built up this "Mutant Massacre" as a potentially pivotal event for the X-Men.  Point of fact, two of my favorite characters, Nightcrawler and Kitty, had been struck down hard (though not fatally,) and Colossus moved to intervene:

I mean, Colossus was always a pretty gentle soul up to this point, him being pushed to the point to actually snap someone's neck was ... very disturbing.

Dormammu

GrimSkald said:
This moment.  I was collecting comics at the time, back in the 80s, and Marvel had built up this "Mutant Massacre" as a potentially pivotal event for the X-Men.  Point of fact, two of my favorite characters, Nightcrawler and Kitty, had been struck down hard (though not fatally,) and Colossus moved to intervene..

This was a big one for me as well. The Mutant Massacre was a pivotal turning point for the X-Men that doesn't often get recognized as such. After it was over, it was a long time before the X-Men were whole again. I mean, it was years before Kurt and Kitty returned to those pages. It galvanized the relationship between Storm and Wolverine and turned them (along with Rogue) into the core of the X-Men, the team's heart and soul, finally replacing the original five in the minds of a lot of fans (after 120 issues of 'All New' X-Men).

Great moment, @GrimSkald

Dragon_Nexus

GrimSkald said:

This moment.  I was collecting comics at the time, back in the 80s, and Marvel had built up this "Mutant Massacre" as a potentially pivotal event for the X-Men.  Point of fact, two of my favorite characters, Nightcrawler and Kitty, had been struck down hard (though not fatally,) and Colossus moved to intervene:

I mean, Colossus was always a pretty gentle soul up to this point, him being pushed to the point to actually snap someone's neck was ... very disturbing.

One might almost say...completely out of character.

Malcrof

Thor had been my favorite since i was a kid (late 70's), but the Ballad of Beta Ray Bill has to be the big one for me.  It was the first time i thought that Thor was doing the wrong thing for the wrong reasons.. mind you we had to wait a month for each issue to come in the mail, so it turned out not only fine, but adding Beta Ray Bill to the pantheon of Thors is still one of my favorite endings.. of course after the heartbreak of Thor losing his hammer. 

Colognoisseur

The death of Gwen Stacy was a turning point for Spider-Man and Marvel comics. I remember waiting a month for Issue #122 waiting for the typical comic book resurrection/reset button to be applied. That the death stuck was the beginning of a new era of comic storytelling. 

LordRayne

Stark sitting over Cap's body, delivering a heartfelt monologue at the end of Civil War.

Colossus emerging from the dead in the Joss Whedon X-Men run. Also in that storyline, Kitty saving the world by phasing the bullet.

grenadier

• Guardian's death in Alpha Flight #12.  Total shocker, especially before we knew such things were coming because of the Internet.  Shocks in general are harder to come by now, since the Internet generally spoils them ahead of time.
• Spider-Man unmasking in Civil War.  You kind of figured it would get undone by the end of CW, but then it didn't.  That was the new status quo for the Spider-Books for almost a year and a half until OMD hit the reset button.

GrimSkald

Dragon_Nexus said:

GrimSkald said:

This moment.  I was collecting comics at the time, back in the 80s, and Marvel had built up this "Mutant Massacre" as a potentially pivotal event for the X-Men.  Point of fact, two of my favorite characters, Nightcrawler and Kitty, had been struck down hard (though not fatally,) and Colossus moved to intervene:

I mean, Colossus was always a pretty gentle soul up to this point, him being pushed to the point to actually snap someone's neck was ... very disturbing.

One might almost say...completely out of character.

Hmmm.  There's a fine line between "character development" and "changing the character entirely."  I kind of see this as the former - he had been pushed to the psychological brink by the carnage he had seen all around him (the X-Men became involved because the Marauders were quite literally slaughtering the Morlocks. they had seen a lot of dead bodies by this point,) and then two of his best friends were cut down, one of whom was a girl he had romantic feelings for (which was a mistake on Claremont's part, I think, but that's another story.) I could see his code against killing evaporating in a white hot rage.  I'm pretty sure that's what we're looking at there and that's what makes it a great moment.  Regardless, though, I see what you mean and I see how someone could see that as yet another character becoming edgier against their nature.

On the other hand, he was essentially taken out of the comic right after, so we never really got a chance to explore his feelings.  Handled well, that could be have been some top shelf storytelling.  As it was, he reappeared RL years later, noticeably more jaded and ruthless - it wasn't long after his reappearance and the whole "Grail" thing that my own interest really started to flag.  I stopped collecting X-Men not long after that.

DAZ0273

Some great moments listed here. I was a massive fan of the Roger Stern Avengers so "Under Siege" is a fantastic choice.

I was also pretty shocked by the Death of Jean DeWolff in Peter Parker, The Specatacular Spider-man 107-110. Not only was it brutal and at the BEGINNING of the story, it also gave us a side of Spider-man we hadn't seen since Gwen died and also an interesting insight into the differences between Spidey and Daredevil.

However in terms of seeing a hero hit rock bottom and the complete and utter delight of the villain responsible, very little compares to "Born Again". Matt is delirious and paranoid, hallucinating and attacking the manager at the dive hotel he is staying in after Kingpin has destroyed his apartment, career, reputation and you see how fragile a hero can be. He isn't suffering from an illusion by some supervillain or under the influence of drugs - his life has been destroyed "by a few phonecalls" and suddenly Matt falls apart. Of course that it is his former girl who is the catalyst is even more shocking. Finally, the absolute evil of the Kingpin is never on greater show than here. He destroys Murdock because, to paraphrase, he is a "good man".

DAZ0273

GrimSkald said:

Dragon_Nexus said:

GrimSkald said:

This moment.  I was collecting comics at the time, back in the 80s, and Marvel had built up this "Mutant Massacre" as a potentially pivotal event for the X-Men.  Point of fact, two of my favorite characters, Nightcrawler and Kitty, had been struck down hard (though not fatally,) and Colossus moved to intervene:

I mean, Colossus was always a pretty gentle soul up to this point, him being pushed to the point to actually snap someone's neck was ... very disturbing.

One might almost say...completely out of character.

Hmmm.  There's a fine line between "character development" and "changing the character entirely."  I kind of see this as the former - he had been pushed to the psychological brink by the carnage he had seen all around him (the X-Men became involved because the Marauders were quite literally slaughtering the Morlocks. they had seen a lot of dead bodies by this point,) and then two of his best friends were cut down, one of whom was a girl he had romantic feelings for (which was a mistake on Claremont's part, I think, but that's another story.) I could see his code against killing evaporating in a white hot rage.  I'm pretty sure that's what we're looking at there and that's what makes it a great moment.  Regardless, though, I see what you mean and I see how someone could see that as yet another character becoming edgier against their nature.

On the other hand, he was essentially taken out of the comic right after, so we never really got a chance to explore his feelings.  Handled well, that could be have been some top shelf storytelling.  As it was, he reappeared RL years later, noticeably more jaded and ruthless - it wasn't long after his reappearance and the whole "Grail" thing that my own interest really started to flag.  I stopped collecting X-Men not long after that.

I'd like to think that Claremont had some sort of longer planned arc for Colossus based around the Mutant Massacre but it never happened. Unfortunately, I think he got sucked up in the "grim n gritty" era when MM came out and just having the X-Men be more hardcore was simply pandering to the way things were going. He had already made Storm into somebody willing to stab an opponent through the heart and turned Kitty into a ninja so I really feel by this point his self control over who the characters are had given way to a desire to just make everybody the Punisher. You only have to look as far as when Havok shows up just after the MM and we have Pyslocke declaring that the X-Men should kill him before the Mauraders do!

DAZ0273

grenadier said:

• Guardian's death in Alpha Flight #12.  Total shocker, especially before we knew such things were coming because of the Internet.  Shocks in general are harder to come by now, since the Internet generally spoils them ahead of time.

Ha! It is pretty funny that you picked this one!

Actually, the above WAS spoiled! Peter David who at the time was working in the sales department at Marvel was promoting Alpha Flight at some event (I think to retailers) and handed out pages from an issue after #12 - #12 had not yet been published (I guess #13 was the book David handed out pages from?) which showed a dream sequence where Heather is suffering a nightmare and it is pretty obvious who it was who got killed in #12. John Byrne famously went berserk, hurling a chair across a room and this is the basis of the grudge between him and David that was still going strong in the 2000's (and quite possibly still now!).

DAZ0273

Malcrof said:

Thor had been my favorite since i was a kid (late 70's), but the Ballad of Beta Ray Bill has to be the big one for me.  It was the first time i thought that Thor was doing the wrong thing for the wrong reasons.. mind you we had to wait a month for each issue to come in the mail, so it turned out not only fine, but adding Beta Ray Bill to the pantheon of Thors is still one of my favorite endings.. of course after the heartbreak of Thor losing his hammer. 

Walt Simoson's Thor run is such a fantastic read. When Hela destroys Thor's face later on it was also honestly the first time I could recall a hero being disfigured in such a way.

Quebbster

I will just leave this here: http://daveslongbox.blogspot.com/2005/05/mighty-thor-362-marvel-comics-1985.html

GrimSkald

Quebbster said:

I will just leave this here: http://daveslongbox.blogspot.com/2005/05/mighty-thor-362-marvel-comics-1985.html

Heh, I didn't mention that because it wasn't really "shocking."   Instead it was a incredibly well-crafted story that gave a character who ranged from villain to thug to joke a beautiful and heroic end.  It is one of the best redemption stories in comics, IMHO, just not "shocking."

"They sing no songs in Hel, nor do they celebrate heroes - for silent is that dismal realm and cheerless, but the story of the Gjallerbru and the god who defended it is whispered across the Nine Worlds... and when a new arrival asks about whom even Hella bows her head, the answer is always the same...

"He stood alone at Gjallerbru."

.. and that answer is enough."

GrimSkald

DAZ0273 said:

GrimSkald said:

Dragon_Nexus said:

GrimSkald said:

This moment.  I was collecting comics at the time, back in the 80s, and Marvel had built up this "Mutant Massacre" as a potentially pivotal event for the X-Men.  Point of fact, two of my favorite characters, Nightcrawler and Kitty, had been struck down hard (though not fatally,) and Colossus moved to intervene:

I mean, Colossus was always a pretty gentle soul up to this point, him being pushed to the point to actually snap someone's neck was ... very disturbing.

One might almost say...completely out of character.

Hmmm.  There's a fine line between "character development" and "changing the character entirely."  I kind of see this as the former - he had been pushed to the psychological brink by the carnage he had seen all around him (the X-Men became involved because the Marauders were quite literally slaughtering the Morlocks. they had seen a lot of dead bodies by this point,) and then two of his best friends were cut down, one of whom was a girl he had romantic feelings for (which was a mistake on Claremont's part, I think, but that's another story.) I could see his code against killing evaporating in a white hot rage.  I'm pretty sure that's what we're looking at there and that's what makes it a great moment.  Regardless, though, I see what you mean and I see how someone could see that as yet another character becoming edgier against their nature.

On the other hand, he was essentially taken out of the comic right after, so we never really got a chance to explore his feelings.  Handled well, that could be have been some top shelf storytelling.  As it was, he reappeared RL years later, noticeably more jaded and ruthless - it wasn't long after his reappearance and the whole "Grail" thing that my own interest really started to flag.  I stopped collecting X-Men not long after that.

I'd like to think that Claremont had some sort of longer planned arc for Colossus based around the Mutant Massacre but it never happened. Unfortunately, I think he got sucked up in the "grim n gritty" era when MM came out and just having the X-Men be more hardcore was simply pandering to the way things were going. He had already made Storm into somebody willing to stab an opponent through the heart and turned Kitty into a ninja so I really feel by this point his self control over who the characters are had given way to a desire to just make everybody the Punisher. You only have to look as far as when Havok shows up just after the MM and we have Pyslocke declaring that the X-Men should kill him before the Mauraders do!

Yeah, his writing definitely took a turn after that, there was a lot more sloppiness in his characters, IMHO.  I tend to think of the X-Men's heyday as around 150 to 210ish of "Uncanny X-Men," but that could just be my own bias talking.  I'm pretty sure the first issue I bought was "Wounded Wolf," a fairly good stand-alone Wolverine story, somewhere around 205 I think?  But I went backward and really liked the stuff before I started more than the stuff after.