Was Hydra Steve a clone? Is the real Steve a clone? Can someone explain it?

[Michael Watkins]

i think it's a Superman III situation. Stevil is Steve. and Steve is Stevil. Kobik just split them into two beings. in that way, both characters are real and fake.

[MyriVerse]

And by the way, any talk of of the "original body" or the clone is really meaningless in the scope of the larger MU as the whole universe was destroyed and restored in both Remender's Uncanny Avengers run and in Hickman's Secret Wars. So every single person in the universe is a copy at least two times over. No need to hand wring about Cap personally.

And if we're getting that pedantic, Thanos destroyed the universe back in Marvel Universe The End and recreated it. This really happened, folks. It was not an alt-universe. It's the only The End story that actually happened. It's even been referred to in various books since.

[capandkirby]

I explain it like this: the cosmic cube is the master programmer. She has the power to both change reality and control people's minds, so basically she can overwrite reality on whim. Red Skull knew that, having been in possession of the cube at several intervals during his (and Steve's) history. And during Pleasant Hill convinced Kobik, the living embodiment of the cosmic cube, that Hydra's ideals was the right of things and that a world controlled by Hydra would be a beautiful thing. Kobik, having all this power but the mentality of a child, bought into it. So she did what little beings with the power of a god do best. She changed reality and Steve with it. Gave him a fabricated history made up by Red Skull. Meanwhile she kept a back-up copy of the original Steve. Stevil was Steve v2.0 and our Steve was Steve v1.0.

When Kobik realized the truth of things, that a Hydra controlled world was terrible, she brought back the original Steve, Steve v1.0, and restored the original history. But she left Stevil (Steve v2.0) and left Vegas in ruins and Widow dead so that the superheroes would remember the lessons they had come to learn during Secret Empire. Which pretty much comes down to fascism is bad and heroes are supposed to be there for the people, not squabbling among one another. The heroes have lost sight of their purpose, but they realized that now, so it's all good.

...all that said, it will never cease to amaze me how many people are convinced that Marvel can change a comic book just on a whim. The stories are plotted out and scripted in advance by the writer, they then send the outline to the penciler along with a description of what each panel should look like. The penciler makes the sketches. Then the art is sent to an inker and after that, a colorist. Then, after all of that, the letterer gets it, inserting the writer's script. But we're not yet finished, nope, after all that goes to editorial to make sure there were no mistakes and that the comic fits with continuity. This process, as you can tell, is immensely time consuming and has to go through multiple hands. It would take MONTHS to change the ending of an event, especially as most events are plotted out during the retreats, so that the other Marvel writers have a general idea of what is going on so they can either incorporate into their own books, if the event touches their story, or just know for reference. Given all of this, it is EXTREMELY doubtful that Marvel changed the ending to Secret Empire, especially since Spencer, unlike Bendis, met most of his deadlines. The only change Spencer made was adding Omega, because he felt that he needed just one more comic to wrap everything up. But since real!Steve came back in SE #10, not Omega, the ending to Secret Empire was exactly how it was meant to be.

[Michael Watkins]

When Kobik realized the truth of things, that a Hydra controlled world was terrible, she brought back the original Steve, Steve v1.0, and restored the original history. But she left Stevil (Steve v2.0) and left Vegas in ruins and Widow dead so that the superheroes would remember the lessons they had come to learn during Secret Empire.

doesn't make any sense. it wasn't a hero who asked Kobik to change anything. there was nothing that the heroes could do to stop the Vegas attack. they were literally fighting a reality created by a cosmic cube. if she were going to take responsibility for her actions, Kobik could have just undone everything that she did. it makes no sense for an all powerful entity to be tricked into doing evil and only undoing some of the evil to teach the victims about evil.


and did she restore reality? I thought that only Stevil and Madame Hydra knew of the secret Hydra history? they had to re-educate the populace in that history. Zemo didn't remember it.

[capandkirby]

doesn't make any sense. it wasn't a hero who asked Kobik to change anything. there was nothing that the heroes could do to stop the Vegas attack. they were literally fighting a reality created by a cosmic cube. if she were going to take responsibility for her actions, Kobik could have just undone everything that she did. it makes no sense for an all powerful entity to be tricked into doing evil and only undoing some of the evil to teach the victims about evil.

I didn't write it. Spencer did. Take it up with him. And that is exactly what he had Sam Wilson (Sam being the narrator) say, that Kobik left Stevil and Vegas after she changed everything back so that the superheroes would "remember their promise, never again".

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[Snoop Dogg]

The heroes allowed Stevil to come to power by getting divided over Civil War II and just handing everything to good ol' Steve expecting him to hold the ship together. It's also what bites them in the ass during Omega when they lose all legal right to imprison Stevil. It was also probably Spencer's stealth critique of executive overreach since he's said he thinks even Obama overstepped some boundaries. The event taught everyone involved a lesson, and part of that lesson is that reality warping is real bad, guyz.

[Michael Watkins]

The heroes allowed Stevil to come to power by getting divided over Civil War II and just handing everything to good ol' Steve expecting him to hold the ship together.

Steve wasn't given authority because the heroes were fighting over an Inhuman. that particular conflict did end with Captain Marvel being given greater authority. are you thinking of SHIELD maybe? because the heroes were united enough against the Chitauri threat that they could be cut off from Earth.

It's also what bites them in the ass during Omega when they lose all legal right to imprison Stevil.

there wasn't a law against imprisoning Stevil. to highlight this, the latter wasn't given a trial. they threw him into a secret prison after he lost a fist fight with the other Steve. that's the level that we're operating at.

It was also probably Spencer's stealth critique of executive overreach since he's said he thinks even Obama overstepped some boundaries. The event taught everyone involved a lesson, and part of that lesson is that reality warping is real bad, guyz.

they already knew that. Steve showed up at Pleasant Hill to shut it down. a rogue element of SHIELD was abusing that power and then a Nazi. it's not like the heroes were fighting over the cube.

[Snoop Dogg]

They didn't do anything about Steve becoming Director even though they know what that position entails and how badly it went for Tony out of sheer trust for Steve, they didn't really investigate things that Stevil did like showing up to D.C. at the end of CWII or sending Bruce the gamma packet because they were distracted, they didn't follow up on Red Skull's capture because of how much they trusted Steve, they weren't on top of Bucky's Thunderbolts that had Kobik because lol trust Steve, and the reason they weren't on top of those things is because they were distracted by bigger personal issues and conflicts between each other. There are probably more cock ups to be found.

[Michael Watkins]

I didn't write it. Spencer did. Take it up with him. And that is exactly what he had Sam Wilson (Sam being the narrator) say, that Kobik left Stevil and Vegas after she changed everything back so that the superheroes would "remember their promise, never again".

was the message for the heroes or the public? the heroes were mainly floating in space or trapped in dark force when the rest of the country signed up to be fascists. the U.S wasn't taken by force. Thor might have some stuff to own up to. but that message doesn't make sense. that reads like Spencer was rushed to finish his story.

[Michael Watkins]

They didn't do anything about Steve becoming Director even though they know what that position entails and how badly it went for Tony out of sheer trust for Steve,

Steve wasn't in charge of them. Carol was. Steve, through Sharon Carter, took over SHIELD. and that was after all of the bumbling during Pleasant Hill.

[capandkirby]

was the message for the heroes or the public? the heroes were mainly floating in space or trapped in dark force when the rest of the country signed up to be fascists. the U.S wasn't taken by force. Thor might have some stuff to own up to. but that message doesn't make sense. that reads like Spencer was rushed to finish his story.

As Snoop Dogg so wisely put Spencer was making a point about complacency. I mean, as a reader it made sense to me, in fact, I found myself emphatically agreeing with Sam on the subject (being completely sick of the hero infighting theme), and I'm not even a fan of the event as a whole, so it's not like I'm in a mad rush to defend it.

[Michael Watkins]

As Snoop Dogg so wisely put Spencer was making a point about complacency. I mean, as a reader it made sense to me, in fact, I found myself emphatically agreeing with Sam on the subject (being completely sick of the hero infighting theme), and I'm not even a fan of the event as a whole, so it's not like I'm in a mad rush to defend it.

but it was proactivity that allowed Secret Empire to take hold. think about it.

[capandkirby]

but it was proactivity that allowed Secret Empire to take hold. think about it.

Maria Hill is what allowed Secret Empire to happen, not proactivity. She was told to destroy the cube fragments. She did not. Instead she built an illegal and HIGHLY unethical prison behind everyone's backs with it. And when Kobik wasn't busy with brainwashing criminals to believe that they're actually (but not really) model class citizens and major contributors to society, she was off to engage in a series of chats with her good friend Red Skull who convinced her that Hydra rising to power would be like the second coming. Yet the other heroes being complacent certainly helped Red Skull and Kobik achieve their goals, even if Hill was ultimately at fault. So yes, complacency.

StandOff.jpg

[capandkirby]

And speaking of Avengers Standoff and Maria Hill's culpability, these two panels will never not be hilarious...

StandOff1.jpg

[dreyga2000]

HydraCap is the result of cosmic cube paradox.


HyrdaCap is from an Alternate reality in which Steve Rodgers was indoctrinated into HYDRA. In this reality, the Allies, who were losing WWII to the AXIS/Hydra, created a cosmic cube and used it to create a reality in which the Allies won the war. This reality is 616.

Using magic, HydraCap regained his memories in this new reality, aka 616.

Because of this cosmic paradox both Steve's are real.