Here is an archive of all the past top five lists I've done over the years.

The Age of Apocalypse was a famous X-Men crossover based on the somewhat basic principle of "What if Charles Xavier was killed years before he was able to form the X-Men? With the major ramifications being his friend, Magneto, formed the X-Men instead in honor of Xavier and the battle where Xavier died also woke Apocalypse up before the world had superheroes, so Apocalypse has conquered most of the world." Therefore, since everyone grew up in a world conquered by Apocalypse, the characters were all drastically changed, personality-wise (some a lot more than others). Some of the end results were very cool characters. Here, then, are the top five Age of Apocalypse characters!

HONORABLE MENTIONS

Sunfire

Okay, he's only here at all because of the Joe Madureira costume re-design. But holy crap, what a re-design! You know you have a good re-design when they go out of their way to somehow work your alternate universe re-design into the mainstream continuity (like Alex Ross' cool Red Robin design)...





Iceman

You have to understand that at the time, every other Iceman story was "He could be so powerful, if he only let himself!" So to see him BE that powerful during AoA was nice to see, while still being his typical self...



Nightcrawler

Similar to Sunfire, I'm less interested in how Nightcrawler actually acts in the series so much as I really like the idea of Nightcrawler as a pirate. It's a very clever riff on the swashbuckling Nightcrawler that we saw for so many years in X-men and Excalibur...







Weapon X

Logan is Logan is Logan is Logan for the most part (like how the Gambit of AoA was basically just Gambit), but I had to at least give him an honorable mention for the moment we all hoped was coming as soon as we saw that the Wolverine of this world had his hand blown off by Cyclops...





DAMN, Adam Kubert, you are all sorts of awesome!

Holocaust

A bit of a one-note character, but boy, Holocaust hit his one note REALLY well. They really played the ominous nature of him well. The sort of "Oh crap, Holocaust is here! We are screwed!" aspect of the character.







You can understand why they brought him over to the regular continuity, but I think he never really worked in the normal continuity. He's just TOO powerful and TOO dark. Maybe he'd work in the DC Cinematic Universe. Superman could kill him after he's culled the entire population of, say, Pittsburgh.

Kitty Pryde

Kitty as a wild, almost sadistic instructor of younger mutants was a clever approach. And the claws worked really well on her.







I like that beyond it all, you could tell that she legitimately DID care for her charges, even if she had a messed up way of showing it.

Go to the next page for the last few honorable mentions and the start of the top five!

Quicksilver

I really enjoyed how PURE of a character Quicksilver was in the AoA. We got to see him without the blinders he's spent his whole life putting up in the regular Marvel Universe and the end result is a noble, purely heroic good-natured guy...







Rogue and Magneto

For the most part, I think Rogue and Magneto sort of play the role of the straight men in the series, the solid, happily married heroes who we contrast everyone else's craziness against. That's fine, and I don't disagree with that approach, but it makes them slightly less interesting to me overall. Still, I think they're done well enough for an honorable mention...







Mister Sinister

In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king. Well, in the land of Apocalypse, the Sinister man is actually sort of kind of good. Mister Sinister is certainly not a GOOD guy in this crossover, but Apocalypse and his other guys are so bad that Sinister ends up coming off as sort of sympathetic, which I found interesting.









5. Morph

Changeling was a short-lived X-Men character, best known for impersonating Professor X and then dying during one of Xavier's many "lie to everyone" plans, but in Age of Apocalypse, Scott Lobdell reframes him as basically Plastic Man and when you combine that with Joe Madureira's seemingly limitless creativity as an artist, you get a great character. What was interesting is when we get to see the less humorous side of the character...





4. Colossus

I loved the take on Colossus in AoA where he was a man who TRIED to be a hero, but ultimately, he was just too weak and not willing to make the necessary sacrifices. It's not even that you can even say that what he does here is evil, per se, but it sure isn't what a hero would do. Contrasting with his sister's idealized version of him in the captions? Such great work by Scott Lobdell, Chris Bachalo and Mark Buckingham...







Go to the next page for top three!

3. Beast

Keeping the brilliance, keeping the sense of humor, but making him completely evil? That was just a brilliant approach for the character of Beast, and it is little surprise that he has been one of the longest-lasting AoA characters. He's just way too fun of a villain.





2. Sabretooth

What a bizarrely awesome character! The Sabretooth of this world was a bad guy in the beginning, as well, but turned against Apocalypse and slowly built himself back up as a hero. But with a twist, of course. Dude carries around Wild Child with him on a chain! He's a weird character. But a very cool one. And, of course, Joe Madureira drew the hell out of him...











1. Blink

Was there ever really any doubt? THE breakout star of AoA was clearly Blink, the briefly seen member of what became Generation X who was killed off right away, but then brought back in the Age of Apocalypse as the perfect example of a sweet character who is badass when she needs to be. It's no surprise that most of the best characters from the Age of Apocalypse came from Lobdell and Madureira, who clearly seemed to vibe with the concept more than the others. Madureira's art on Blink was stunning.









That's the list! Agree? Disagree? Let me know (as if I had to say that)!