In every installment of Abandoned Love we will be examining comic book stories, plots and ideas that were abandoned by a later writer without actively retconnng away the previous story. Feel free to e-mail me at brianc@cbr.com if you have any suggestions for future editions of this feature.

Reader Shane V. wrote in to ask about how the incident that left She-Hulk in a coma in Civil War II was dramatically changed after the fact.

Civil War II kicked off in a Free Comic Book Day story in 2016. Written by Brian Michael Bendis and drawn by Jimmy Cheung and Justin Ponsor. It showed a battle between Thanos and Captain Marvel's team of heroes, The Ultimates, along with some heroes from A-Force (a team of female superheroes) and Captain Marvel's boyfriend, War Machine. What we didn't know right away was that this battle was due to a premonition that a new Inhuman named Ulysses saw as part of his Inhuman powers. He could predict the future and he predicted that Thanos was going to attack Project: Pegasus, so Captain Marvel and her friends were there to stop him. War Machine happened to be around and he offered to join in on the attack.

The fight did not go well for the heroes (well, they technically DID capture Thanos, but you know what I mean)...

The reason why War Machine was chosen as the first hero to fall in battle is because he was the hero most connected to the two main players in the event. He was Captain Marvel's boyfriend, but he was also Iron Man's closest friend. Therefore, his death would have repercussions on both sides. For Iron Man, it was that his friend died due to a premonition that Iron Man could not even say was definitively correct and for Captain Marvel, it was that her boyfriend died and that there had to be some sort of greater meaning involved in his death, so his death was a sign that she should keep going and keep using this Inhuman's power to right wrongs before they happened.

However, while we can understand how Thanos punching through War Machine's chest would be fatal, it was a bit unclear as to how just an errant missile from War Machine would damage She-Hulk to THAT crazy of a degree. And yet, when Tony Stark showed up to berate Captain Marvel in Civil War II #1 (by Brian Michael Bendis, David Marquez and Justin Ponsor), she is, in fact, in a coma from the attack...

After Tony and Carol Danvers get through yelling at each other, She-Hulk takes a turn for the worse...

Somehow, this was all just from getting hit by a missile from War Machine's armor. It did not appear to be, like, some special anti-Gammy missile or anything like that. Just a general missile with a normal explosion. It seemed kind of surprising that She-Hulk would go down just like that and sure enough, another Marvel comic book series would drop that whole "she was put into a coma due to a missile" part of the story and give the REAL explanation...

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In A-Force #8 (by Kelly Thompson, Paolo Siqueria and Rachelle Rosenberg), we see the FULL battle, which technically does not outright abandon the initial story, but come on, it pretty clear drops that original story and explains what REALLY happened. Here, She-Hulk was dazed by the missile explosion, but it was from Thanos directly attacking her, just like he did to War Machine, that put her into the coma...

That made a whole lot more sense. Sadly, She-Hulk was the leader of A-Force, so with her out of commission, A-force just kind of fell apart.

Anyhow, thanks for the suggestion, Shane! When I was researching this one, I saw Rich Johnston wrote about this a couple of years ago. Thanks, Rich!

If anyone else has a suggestion for an abandoned comic book plot, drop me a line at brianc@cbr.com!