WARNING: The following contains spoilers for Marauders #11, by Gerry Duggan, Stefano Caselli, Edgar Delgado & VC's Cory Petit, on sale now
The superhero genre is full of characters who've been killed in some ridiculous or unexpected way, only to be restored in a method that's even more bizarre. The Marvel Universe has seen resurrections brought on by time-travel, alternate dimensions, and pure magic, especially in the world of the X-Men.
It took 18 attempts to revive Kate Pryde after her death in Marauders, meaning Shadowcat may have just broken a Marvel record to become the character with the most resurrections.
HOW MANY TIMES DID KATE PRYDE REALLY DIE?
The X-Men were no strangers to death and resurrection, even before their time on Krakoa. The frequency of how often the mutant heroes of the Marvel Universe "died" only to be restored in some way had even become an in-universe fact, such as when Siryn refused to believe her father's death was permanent following X-Men: Deadly Genesis. Since the discovery of how to use the powers of the Five in concert to revive any fallen mutant with a perfect copy of their mind, the X-Men have become increasingly cavalier about the threat of death.
The Five -- Eva Bell, Elixir, Proteus, Hope Summers, and Goldballs -- combine their powers to essentially create a resurrection machine. Goldballs's small golden orbs are actually eggs, which can be used to incubate a new body. Proteus uses his reality-altering powers to make the eggs viable. Exlir uses his healing abilities to jump-start cellular growth within the eggs. Tempest uses her time-manipulation to age the mutants to their desired age, at which point the mindless mutant body breaks free of the pod. With Hope Summers using her powers to amplify the abilities of the others and coupled with a powerful psychic using Cerebro to download psychic copies of their entire history and psyche into bodies, essentially allowing the X-Men to respawn after any death.
Many major X-Men have died multiple times over the years, with the likes of Cyclops, Wolverine, Jean Grey, Cable, and especially Magneto suffering some fatal fate only to be retconned to have survived or to be fully revived by some unique means. But the presence of the Five means the X-Men are even more willing to lay their lives on the line, with an entire team of notable mutant heroes sacrificing themselves to try and stop the construction of a new Master Mold orbiting the sun. Each death just results in the Five creating a new version of the fallen hero. However, Kate Pryde's natural instinct to try and phase through barriers instead of fighting it meant that her mindless bodies never tried to break free of the pod. Instead, they remained inside and drowned inside.
But during the last planned attempt, Emma Frost made sure to be present and had the necessary epiphany to try and help Kate phase through the pod instead of breaking her loose. This allowed her to finally be alive long enough to have her memories and mind restored, meaning this was finally a full resurrection. But that also means all the former ones were technically successful as well; it's just that the X-Men didn't realize Shadowcat's powers would require an additional step in the process, meaning all 17 other Kate Prydes ended up being actually reborn, just to die right after.
Before this, Shadowcat had actually been one of the handfuls of mutants who hadn't actually died. Instead, her previous demises had either been a fake-out concerning the Morlocks, as well as the time she spent trapped within the Breakworld World-Breaker weapon she phased through the Earth. But now, she can technically give herself an extra 18 deaths to her total resurrection count. It's notable enough for Nightcrawler to take particular attention of the number.
If we count each failed resurrection as their own death, Shadowcat may have just jumped to the front of the line in terms of Marvel heroes who've died the most. Even other notable figures who've died multiple times (such as the Hulk, especially in his new Immortal Hulk incarnation) haven't hit that high of a number, that quickly. Shadowcat currently stands as the most resurrected figure on Krakoa and potentially Marvel Universe as a whole. Though, given Quentin Quire's recent track record, he could sneak up on Kate and take that mantle from her pretty quickly.