Heroes Reborn: Remnants #1

History

The one-shot emerged from a coordinated wave of Counter-Earth epilogue specials that Marvel published in late 1999 and early 2000, all tied to the aftermath of Heroes Reborn: The Return (1997–98), in which the Celestials forced Franklin Richards's pocket universe heroes back to Earth-616 and Counter-Earth was left without its champions. Editor Tom Brevoort assembled a roster of writers and artists — including Joe Kelly and Ethan Van Sciver for Remnants — to explore what that abandoned world looked like from the ground up. Kelly, then known for acclaimed runs on Deadpool and X-Men, brought his facility for irreverent comedy to the assignment; Van Sciver, still in the early phase of a career that would later become synonymous with Green Lantern at DC, handled pencils on what was one of his more prominent early Marvel assignments. The issue was released November 10, 1999, with a January 2000 cover date.

Trivia · 8 facts

• First and only appearance of the Remnants team as a unit: Mant (Ernest Sanger, a janitor wearing Henry Pym's abandoned Ant-Man armor), Amazo-Maxi-Woman (the Super-Adaptoid, now sentient and vain), Panther Cub (T'Dogo, a Wakandan valet who took the outlawed Black Panther mantle), Sterling (a Las Vegas man imbued with remnants of the Silver Surfer's Power Cosmic after that hero's death on Counter-Earth), and Miss Thing (a feral Canadian fighter who killed Counter-Earth's Wolverine analog and wears his adamantium skeleton as her costume).
• First appearance of General Darlegung (Counter-Earth SHIELD commander) and the child sidekick Cap.
• Written by Joe Kelly; penciled by Ethan Van Sciver; inked by a large team (Yancey Labat, Scott Koblish, Rodney Ramos, Scott Hanna, John Czop, Mark Nelson); colored by Tom Smith; lettered by Richard Starkings; edited by Tom Brevoort.
• Story title: 'The Day the Earth Got Ill!' — a comedy-action plot in which the Remnants must stop their own founder and mentor, Deadpool (the Counter-Earth Swordsman, who has gone mad after learning Counter-Earth is Franklin Richards's fabrication), from detonating a stolen SHIELD helicarrier's nuclear stockpile.
• Deadpool's apparent death occurs in this issue: he rides a nuclear missile into the Watcher's citadel on the moon, seemingly destroying both himself and Uatu; the explosion tears a rift in the fabric of the universe.
• The team officially names itself 'the Remnants' for the first time within this very issue, having operated unnamed until that moment.
• Published as part of a coordinated batch of Counter-Earth epilogue one-shots (alongside Ashema, Doomsday, Masters of Evil, Rebel, Young Allies, and Doom) exploring the Heroes Reborn world after Earth-616 heroes departed.
• Reprinted in the 2009 trade paperback Heroes Reborn: The Return (ISBN 9780785137481), which collected Heroes Reborn: The Return #1–4 and all seven companion one-shots.

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Variants (1)