A few years back, Marvel writer Brian Michael Bendis took over the reigns of The Avengers stories. He started with blowing them up. Literally. In Avengers: Disassembled, Bendis literally blows up Avengers mansion on one of the first few pages. By the end, the classic Avengers, as comic fans knew them, were no more. Bendis' next step was introducing the New Avengers which would prove a bit controversial. The new team would consist of Luke Cage, Spider-Man, Wolverine, The Sentry, The Thing, Dr. Strange, Sider-Woman, Ronin (Hawkeye in a different costume), DareDevil, Iron Fist, Captain Marvel, and Jessica Jones. Readers began to ask, "can anyone be an Avenger?" Well, as a big fan of super hero team-ups, I loved it! Two of my favorite characters became Avengers! Wolverine and Spider-Man. Anyway, this isn't what today's topic is about.
In June, we're getting a brand new X-Men movie; X-Men: Apocalypse. The character of Apocalypse is quite interesting in himself, but my favorite thing about him is that he would surround himself with 4 elite soldiers he called; The Horsemen of Apocalyspe! The premise was simple enough, each time Apocalyspe would return he would seek out 4 people that would fill the roles of the Horsemen; War, Famine, Pestilence, and Death.
There have been several incarnations of the Horsemen over the years. Since most aren't really worth going into detail about, I will mention the worthy ones before getting to my main topic. Major characters that were chosen as Horsemen:
ARCHANGEL: Formally known as Angel. Warren Worthington III was an original member of the X-Men. He was a blond haired, blue eyed, white dude with wings. That was it. For years! Until Marvel reinvented Angel, had him dewinged and sabotage his own airplane. Instead of doing a kamikaze into a mountain, Angel was taken by Apocalypse who did some comic book sciencey stuff and created Archangel. A much cooler looking character with blue skin and metallic wings. Archangel's appearance as the Horsemen Death was a major shocker in the comics. Great read, great episode of the 90's animated show too.
Hulk: Even the Hulk is susceptible to Apocalypse. For a short time, he was the Horsemen War, before he came to his senses after injuring his friend Rick Jones.
Wolverine: This is probably my favorite Horsemen because it combined two important story lines for me as a fan. It introduced Wolverine as a Horsemen and a bad guy AND gave answer for Wolverine to have adamantium again. At the time, Wolverine was going through some major character changes. In issue #75 he had his adamantium ripped out of him by Magneto. 70 issues later it's revealed that at some point the Wolverine everyone knew had been replaced by a shape-shifting Skrull and the real Wolverine had been captured and brainwashed by Apocalypse to become the latest Horsemen: Death. Apocalyspe forced Wolverine to fight his long time nemesis, Sabertooth (whom also had an adamantium laced skeleton), with the winner to become Death. Wolverine, being the kind of guy he is, decided that he could at least try to fight off Apocalypse's influence while Sabertooth would embrace it, and so he defeats Sabertooth. Apocalypse then strips Sabertooth of his adamantium and gives it to Wolverine.
Other significant members of the group at one point or another: Spider-Man, Gambit, Psylocke, Banshee, Red Hulk, Scarlet Witch, and Daken (Wolverine's son).
Now, being the kind of guy that I am, I've been thinking of and have always thought of who I would choose as MY 4 Horsemen, but I'm opening it up to ALL of Nerdiverse.
I'll start with the Marvel universe: Pestilence - Norman Osborn aka the Green Goblin, Famine - Spider-Man or Deadpool , War - Cable, The Sentry or The Hulk, Death - Wolverine or Captain Marvel.
DC Universe: Pestilence - Lex Luthor or The Flash, Famine - Sinestro or Black Manta, War - Superman or Doomsday, Death - Wonder Woman or Black Adam.
Entire Nerdiverse (representing the ULTIMATE team up): Pestilence - Skeletor (from the Masters of the Universe universe), Famine - Mumra (from the Thundercats Universe), War - The Silver Surfer (from Marvel) and Death - Superman or Black Adam from DC. I'd even throw Wolverine in as Death again.
But who would face these Horsemen and win? How about the ULTIMATE GOOD GUY TEAM UP: HE-MAN, LION-O, BATMAN, THE HULK, WOLVERINE, SHAZAM, WONDER WOMAN, CAPTAIN MARVEL, and led by CABLE!
Now, who would YOU choose to be your Horsemen?
No comments:
Post a Comment