Yeah, the term comes from the supervillain group called the Secret Empire, you stupid idiot.
The one problem with your scenario is the fact that that Kobik changed history and Steve was with HYDRA since he was a child. You also seem unaware that in the comics, Bucky only met Steve when Steve was already Cap, he never met pre serum Steve.
Wow, someone really didn’t like my idea for how to redeem Steve Rogers. If this was twitter, I’d be absolutely sure this was Nick Spencer, but I’ll have to remain in a state of wonder, you incredibly polite anon.
I know there’s no time machine involved in the Red Skull’s plot. But there’s plenty of time machines in the Marvel Universe that could be used to bring back the real Steve Rogers – I just used Beast’s because of the link to All-New X-Men, and because the FF are busy rebuilding the multiverse.
I’ve written about the Secret Empire, I know who they are. But if you don’t understand who Jack Kirby was referring to when he created an evil organization of people who all wear hoods and robes and want to overthrow the U.S government, and why Englehart making Richard Nixon their leader was a big deal, you need to do some reading up on the Klan.
Leaving aside the way that Nick Spencer has played fast-and-loose with whether it’s history or his memories that have been changed, so what? Cap’s still been pretending not to be a Nazi, so that’s the Cap Bucky knows and loves. Or hell, it can be a Bucky from an alternate universe – this is comics, there’s always a way to write around.
Y’know, every time I think that I’m the asshole on the internet, I meet a guy that makes me go “yeah, no, okay, I’m actually fine.”
But my raging narcissism aside… I know I have followers who are way bigger into mainstream superhero comics than I am right at the moment. Can someone explain the time-traveling X-Men thing to me? The only Marvel comics I read are the niche side ones; Squirrel Girl, Ms. Marvel, very recently Unstoppable Wasp. The most “mainline” Marvel books I read are the Thor books, and even those are pretty self-contained.
I know that somehow Beast used time-travel to bring the young versions of the original X-Men forward, which sounds like a great story hook, but also that they’ve been… sticking around? Like, in semi-permanent fashion? How does that work without completely destroying history? It certainly is an original way to do a soft retcon, I’ll give it that much.
I can explain!
In a Brian Michael Bendis written arc, Beast brought the OG X-Men from the future to try to stop Revolutionary Cyclops from doing something really bad (the term mutant genocide is tossed around, but it’s not followed up on), as basically a This Is Your LIfe/It’s a Wonderful Life aimed at getting Cyclops to take a hard look at himself.
Anyway, the kids arrive at the Jean Grey school and hijinks ensue. The Young X-Men fight Cyclops and Magneto, they get weirded out by their older counterparts, Jean massively violates everyone’s privacy, they fight the Uncanny Avengers for some reason, Mystique tries to buy Madripoor, Jean has a fling with young Beast, they fight X-Men from the FUTURE (which is actually pretty damn cool), they hang out with Old Cyclops a bit and get taught by Kitty Pryde, then they get into shenanigans with the Shiar because Phoenix Force, Young Cyclops decides to hang out with his cool space dad for a bit, Young Angel starts dating Laura Kinney, Jean Grey gets trained by Emma Frost for a bit….and then they decide to take some time off on a road trip in a VW Bus powered by Pickles the Bamf.
As for how this works without destroying the timeline, Bendis doesn’t care: as he said, “It’s about your own legacy and being the best version of yourself, and if I go down this road, will I be the best version of myself or will I derail completely?”
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