Every week, we will be examining comic book stories and ideas that were not only abandoned, but also had the stories/plots specifically "overturned" by a later writer (as if they were a legal precedent). Click here for an archive of all the previous editions of The Abandoned An' Forsaked. Feel free to e-mail me at bcronin@comicbookresources.com if you have any suggestions for future editions of this feature.

Today we look at the wedding between Hank Pym and Jan Van Dyne and how Joe Casey later tried to explain away some of the odd behavior surrounding one of the oddest comic book weddings of all-time.

It all began in 1968's Avengers #59, by Roy Thomas, John Buscema and George Klein, when a new hero named Yellowjacket shows up.

The Avengers have been waiting for their fifth member, Goliath, to show up for their morning meeting and he is quite late...





He tells them a story of a great conflict between himself and Goliath that ended with Goliath seemingly at death's door...



The Avengers obviously then try to beat him up but he takes the Wasp hostage and escapes.

While in captivity, her feelings for Yellowjacket take a strange turn...





So when her teammates finally find them, she has shocking news for them...





Man, how great was Buscema with facial expressions?

So the next issue (same creative team, except now Mike Esposito was on inks), the wedding happens. Captain America is rightfully confused...











Hawkeye is captured by the Circus of Crime, who are crashing the wedding (the jerks!). Before they reveal themselves, they first have a giant python burst out of the wedding cake. Black Panther suspects Yellowjacket is behind it...



But later, when the Circus attacks in full force, Yellowjacket has a secret he must confess....



And this, somehow, is treated as "oh, okay, everything's hunky dory!"



Years later, of course, Hank Pym's mental problems were further explored, but at the time, it sure seems weird that Wasp's teammates would let her marry some nutjob off of the street who claims to have killed her boyfriend.

So when Joe Casey got to this point in Avengers history in 2007's Earth's Mightiest Heroes II #5-7, Casey (along with artists Will Rosado and Tom Palmer), shows that the Avengers knew it was Hank right away...





And that a SHIELD mental health expert convinced them it was best to play along with it all...







Therefore, everything from this point on was just the Avengers play-acting (even, I guess, Panther's inner thoughts?).



Jan has a great mini-meltdown with Cap in the next issue...





Nicely done by Casey.

Commenter snell noted that Brian Michael Bendis also tried to retcon the wedding in the Oral History section of New Avengers #7 (the most recent volume). It is...well, odd...





So to avoid publicity you faked the death of your boyfriend and then announced that you're marrying a stranger? And you show up in front of everyone in a hovercraft? To control the publicity? That really does not make any sense.

That's it for this week. If anyone has a future idea for an abandoned an' forsaked, let me know at bcronin@comicbookresources.com