The Abandoned An’ Forsaked - Did Scarlet Witch Just Forget That She Had Kids?

CBR

By Brian Cronin

Published May 18, 2016

In their latest look at notable comic book retcons, CSBG sees what, exactly, is the deal with Scarlet Witch and her forgetting her children.

In this feature we examine 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, based on a suggestion by reader Marios (and also commenter Mikhail) we look at what exactly was the deal with the Scarlet Witch's kids and whether she remembered them or not.

At the start of his run on Avengers West Coast in issue #43, John Byrne highlighted the fact that Wanda's probability-altering powers gave her the babies that she had with the Vision, not magick, as was first thought...

Later that same issue, her babies disappear...

Wanda is NOT pleased at this...

Nor is she when the NEXT governess has the same problem...

The NEXT governess just lies about it...

Eventually, in Avengers West Coast #51, a resurrected Agatha Harkness explains what is going on...

And in a twisted scene, we meet Master Pandemonium with the twins...

And he reveals the truth in the following issue...

And Agatha Harkness spells it out to the Human Torch (who had recently joined the Avengers) and the widow of Toro, Torch's former sidekick...

Finally, the Avengers defeat Master Pandemonium, but Wanda's kids are totally gone. Agatha explains more...

So the whole story ended on a pretty major note there, right? Her entire memory of her kids was wiped out of her mind!

This was abandoned pretty quickly by incoming writers Roy and Dann Thomas, who took over the series with Avengers West Coast #61.

In Avengers West Coast #71 (by Roy and Dann Thomas, David Ross and Danny Bulanadi), the team goes up against a villain who is really just a big baby (literally). The Scarlet Witch has an idea on how to comfort the kid...

In Avengers West Coast #75 (by the Thomases and Herb Trimpe), she makes another mention of her kids...

The big one, though, came in the 1992 Avengers West Coast Annual (#7) in a short story by Roy Thomas, Al Bigley and Mike DeCarlo), where Wanda opens up an alternate reality by mistake with her hex bolts...

So that's settled then, right? Or IS it?

Go to the next page to see what happened next!

In Avengers #503 (by Brian Michael Bendis, Olivier Coipel and Danny Miki), after someone mysterious has torn the Avengers apart in the previous three issues (including destroying the Vision and killing Ant-Man and Hawkeye), we get a flashback to see what started it all, as it all began when the Wasp lets something slip she shouldn't have...

this then drove Wanda to snapping...

Cutting back to the present (pencils now by David Finch), Doctor Strange is on the scene as the Avengers let him know what's going on, and they explicitly mention how Wanda's memories of the kids were erased...