The five most shocking retcons in comics

Retroactive continuity. It is essential to the comic book medium, yet is one of the most controversial methods of storytelling. Some fans hate it, spending their days and nights on forums bitching to whomever will listen to them, while others are willing to give the new status quo a chance. While there have been many high profile successes at retconning, such as Crisis on Infinite Earths, which essentially streamlined 50 years of DC Universe continuity into a single, easy to manage timeline (for the most part), there are other retcons that have shocked readers to their core, or simply made them scratch their heads at the absurdity of it all. This list hopes to compile the most awe-inducing retcons in the long history of comic books, whether it be due to sheer awesomeness or complete lunacy.


5. The Return of Bucky Barnes as The Winter Soldier Sans Arm

Originally: Bucky was assigned to be Captain America's sidekick as a teenager in the midst of World War II, as a way for the military to inspire the youth to join up in the fight against the Nazi menace. Bucky is inexplicably tied to Cap's modern origin, as the pair attempts to disarm a bomb set aboard an experimental plane by Baron Zemo, but Bucky, charged with disabling the explosive, fails to do so. The plane explodes, sending Cap into the freezing water below, where he will remain frozen until he is uncovered many years later in the modern era. More importantly, Bucky is killed, becoming one of those rare characters in comics that is presumed dead forever, never to return.

The Retcon: In Ed Brubaker's Captain America, it is revealed that a Russian submarine came across Bucky's frozen body in the sea, though he was missing an arm, presumably from the explosion. As a result of the incident, Bucky suffers from amnesia and is reprogrammed by the Soviets as an assassin using the codename Winter Soldier. He is given a bionic arm, which allows for superhuman strength and EMP-like powers, and is also put back into "storage", so to speak, when not being actively used. After a confrontation with Captain America, Bucky recovers his memories and eventually becomes a force for good, and is the current Captain America, following the death of Steve Rogers.

The Impact:  Very rarely does a resurrected character, particularly one that is more effective dead than alive (looking at you, Jason Todd), go over well with fans. However, Brubaker successfully manages to use this character to his full potential, reinvigorating fans' interest in both Captain America and comic book resurrections via retconning. The return of Bucky all built towards what seemed to be a well thought out plan by Brubaker and Marvel, leading to the death of Steve Rogers in Captain America #25, with the Winter Soldier himself being the only acceptable replacement to wield Cap's shield. Since his return and taking over the mantel of Captain America, his series has remained one of Marvel's best titles. The depth provided for his return and the dimensions it added to both his own history as well as Steve Rogers' proved that resurrecting a character dead for decades can be done tactfully and with merit.