KMC Forums - Complete epic of the AoA

if we're talking about the same thing, you mean those books that are compiling all of the AoA issues from '95-ish into a three- or four-book collection, yes?

the Age of Apocalypse was an "alternate reality," a rewriting of the 616 reality, that began when Legion, Xavier's son, went back in time to kill Magneto. Storm, Bishop, Iceman and Psylocke followed him back, Betsy psi-linking the four together, and all four riding the chronal wave on Legion's coattails, as Bishop had absorbed some of Legion's chronal energies. They appeared there, mostly amnesiac, and it wasn't until Cable came back through the timestream thanks to the Shi'Ar that they remembered their mission. They attempted to find Legion and stop him from killing Magneto, but they got there fractions of seconds too late, and Xavier threw himself between David and Magnus, dying in Magneto's place. This caused a horrible warping of the timestream, as Legion had killed his own father and thus, couldn't have been born. Psylocke, Storm and Iceman were lost to the timestream, but Bishop remained as he himself was a chronal anomaly.

Basically, besides a few Tales of the AoA stories, the plot jumps forward some twenty years to when Apocalypse is making his final bid for global domination. He's already conquered North America, with no Xavier or X-Men to stop him, and he's about to attempt taking the rest of the world. Most of Asia and South America are already wastelands, as well as parts of Africa. The major players in the series are Apocalypse and his people, the X-Men founded by Magneto, and the Eurasian Human High Council. The X-Men oppose Apocalypse from within, the HHC opposes him from the outside.

skipping the details, Apocalypse begins expanding his sea wall, planning on having it sweep across Europe and destroy the whole place. The HHC has sent nukes through the sea wall and plan on detonating them from within the US, stopping Poccy once and for all. Coincidentally, at the same time, the X-Men storm Apocalypse's citadel in a fight to the finish. A couple people die, but Illyana Rasputin, Destiny and Bishop make their way into the M'Kraan crystal, through time, and they stop Legion (in the past,) just before the bombs fall (in the present.) Also, Magneto killed Apocalypse. [Technically, it makes absolutely no difference the time it would take Bishop to stop Legion, so long as he kept Xavier from dying, as the subsequent warp in the timestream would've set things back to normal anyway.] Legion died. The timestream was repaired, and everything went back to normal with Bishop only retaining certain faint memories of the AoA passed from his elder self [the double-chronal anomaly] to his younger self [who came back through time in the first place.] Also, Sabretooth and Blink would make their way into the Exiles title, and Dark Beast, X-Man, Holocaust and Sugar Man would all make their way to the repaired 616 universe. Dark Beast and Sugar Man made their ways through the M'Kraan crystal, appearing 20 years in our universe's past, and X-Man and Holocaust disappeared in a flux of energy caused by Nate's psionic energy, Holocaust's energy form, and the energy of a sliver of the M'Kraan crystal. That's about it.

Technically, Dark Beast was never meant to make it to the 616 universe, as he'd plotted coordinates into the M'Kraan Crystal via a teleportation portal, but Quicksilver screwed them up at the last second and should've atomized DB. Go figure.

there was an anniversary series of the AoA, written ten years after the original series came out ('95-'05,) but occuring immediately after the nuclear fallout at the end of the first story. It was horrible, completely inappropriate, and it ignored a lot of AoA continuity. i won't bother summarizing it, except for saying it's not worth the money, ink, paper or time put into it.