Trip down memory lane: The "What if?" series

[Johny Cee]

Did anyone else ever pick up the old "What if?" series Marvel used to put out?  One of my favorite one of's back in the day.

Basically, the premise was to follow up some Marvel Universe wide event with a short story where things didn't turn out all rosey. 

The one that immediately leaps to mind was,  in a run off to the "Inferno" event (Dark Pheonix, demons invade Earth, things get messy) they had a story where the demons won.  A last remnant of heroes are fighting a last stand in a cellar,  with only a few big names surviving.  Spider-man, Dr. Strange, Mordred (Strange's arch-nemesis, who pitched in), Human Torch, a few others.

And they have to fight a load of possessed former heroes including Wolverine (who gets charred by Torch) and Hulk.

Especially neat for the fact you saw alot of heros go boom.

This would be an comic I might pick up.

[Margalis]

I picked up a couple issues but it seemed very spotty in general. The quality seemed to run all over the place. For example I had one where Kraven killed Spider-Man (or something like that) and it was just deadly boring. It's the type of thing I picked up on a monthly basis instead of subscribing to it.

[Shockeye]

I've got a large number of these issues in storage somewhere. Even the not so great ones I enjoyed.

[HaemishM]

I haven't read many of the new What-Ifs they are putting out, but in the old days, there was a lot of good writing in those. Yeah, it was variable, and fell back on the "last desperate heroes against the Apocalypse" scenario, but many were good. I think as Marvel started hosing us down with event after event book showing an alternate X-Men timeline (see Age of Apocalypse) the need for What If was lost.

[Margalis]

One of my favorites ones was from the mid-90s:

What if Spider-Man was really a clone?

That rocked!

[Johny Cee]

I haven't read many of the new What-Ifs they are putting out, but in the old days, there was a lot of good writing in those. Yeah, it was variable, and fell back on the "last desperate heroes against the Apocalypse" scenario, but many were good. I think as Marvel started hosing us down with event after event book showing an alternate X-Men timeline (see Age of Apocalypse) the need for What If was lost.

Ugh.

That got tired fast.

"Hey look!  Another Mad Max scenario where the rest of the Marvel Universe doesn't matter!  But don't worry,  WOLVERINE is still alive and kicking ass!"

Fuck...  What if the Silver Surfer killed the X-men? would be great...

[Velorath]

I've got a couple good ones with Conan in the modern day Marvel U, the What If Spider-man had remained Captain Universe, and What If Captain America had Formed the Avengers, among others.  They were entertaining because they could break away from the status quo in a way the main books couldn't.  It's worth mentioning that the currently running Marvel series "Exiles" is a lot like What If, except with a team of mutants that travel to each alternate reality.

[Llava]

I had a few.

I always thought the Watcher looked too much like Xavier, but with a really big head.

Some were interesting.

"What If Spider-Man Joined The Fantastic Four" was one.  Feh.

"What If Professor Xavier Had Become The Juggernaut?" was the best.  He was buried under the crumbling mountain, and Cain Marko escaped. Magneto took the lead as the driving force behind the mutant community... and led them to slaughter. Ice Man was killed in this fight, along with a bunch of other well known mutants.  Xavier finally emerges from his prison, uses his mental powers to figure out what's happened lately, tracks down Magneto, and kicks him out.  He then forces his way into the UN and says "Mutants are in charge now.  Anyone got a problem with that?"  He leads them all to a world where humans are second-class citizens, and Cyclops leads a "police" group to enforce the Nazi-like law of the land.  Magneto and Cain Marko join forces to work up a way to depose Xavier, and they take advantage of Cyclops' discontent with the unfair rule. They use Cyclops, Jean, Quicksilver and Scarlet Witch (the latter two don't seem to know they're Magneto's kids) in a plot to lure Xavier to a particular base, where they will confront him about his unjust rule.  Just as Cyclops feels he's getting through to Xavier, Magneto gives the command to "push the button", which causes an explosion.  During the time of the debate, Magneto had lifted the base into outer space, the explosion launched Xavier out and away from Earth.  All the rest managed to save themselves.  And, because heroes are the way they are, everyone but Magneto and Cain Marko feels real shitty about the whole thing.  The final tagline was, as you see Xavier hurtling through space, "Nothing can stop the Juggernaut."

[DevilsAdvocate]

The two I liked were:

 "What if the Fantastic Four had never been?" Ben Grimm doesn't join, he is branded a monster and like 5 or 6 people that eventually became heroes, like Peter Parker, are diverted from their fates. It was neat in a "look at all the things that could change " sort of way.

The other I liked was the "What if the X-men lost Inferno?" story mentioned above. Inferno was my introduction to the X-Men so it was neat to see how the story could have been different.