Perhaps, though those big plans might be only short term ones...
Wells spent the entirety of his Hellions run building up to Madelyne's return, with even other books taking up the issue of whether she should be brought back. I doubt all of that was just to kill her off immediately.
As for her relationship with Alex, I doubt it is going to go very well for him. Her anger at being resurrected by request of a Summers suggests she isn't keen on continuing any association with the family. Which is fine with me; she more than deserves the right to cut ties with the Summers/Grey family, and their relationship back in the Outback wasn't deep enough to warrant his obsession with her now. I only hope that their association means that Alex will have a new home with her in New Mutants for the time being (and that we will soon see the return of the Goblin Prince outfit).
I'm not a fan of Alex and Maddy as a couple, just that they'd pushed that all Alex wanted was her back but yeah it won't end well for him...
Alex literally has no motivation or purpose this era outside of Maddie which makes no sense. He didnt get the memo that their "relationship" wasnt real and that she was only using him to get revenge on his brother? They were onl an item for maybe like 2 days and it was heavily implied that he was drawn to her bc she was using her powers to ensnare him. This devotion to her 30 years later doesnt sit well bc he should not only know this but he wasnt heartbroken over her as some lost love that he's never gotten over
Yeah, I can't remember Alex ever mentioning Maddy's name after she died, let alone pining for her. Hopefully someone will pick up on it and turn it into a story beat and not just a random obsession.
You only wear the Goblin Prince outfit for people you truly love!
Honestly, I think it's less that he is pining and more that he's using her as some weird stand in for himself, cause he wants to be redeem for his Axis time and he probably thinks Maddie will relate to that. It's still kinda nonesense, but works better than he still having feels.
Hellions really did nothing to help Alex and his being of two minds thing, he really just needs that to be fixed and then get written well in an important book...
This the Alex having issues helped advance the need to get Maddy resurrected plot, but once she is back I wish Zeb would have fixed Alex too. It is sort of like the WildChild thing he was retconned to fit into a particular box (so was Empath) but after Hellions was over he was put back in the box just like Zeb found him. However Alex was changed in Hellions and wasn't fixed at the end. What is sad is full on villain Maddy saw Alex had issues and tried her best to immediately help him showing a compassion and kinship for him but resurrected Maddy not so much. This more than anything smacked of rushing to wrap up a series. If Hellions, my favorite X-book heck Marvel book of the last 2 years, could only last for 18 issues I hate so many of them were wasted on silly x-wide crossovers that did nothing to advance the stories Zeb was telling.
Jean was talked about by people all the time when she died. When Alex was presumed dead, Lorna mentioned him. If a character was significant enough to another character, they get brought up. Maddie wasnt for Alex. She was around in the 90s and I dont think the two ever intersected. Their "relationship" was a fabrication by her over the course of like 2 days. It wasnt real and he was being played the entire time
This recent thing to me was more of a means to an end kind of thing to get Maddy back, Alex was just the how they did it with little to no regard for him as a character...
TBH every character in Hellions was on the scrap pile, but Zeb turned them into the best book Marvel put on the stands. I am curious if Alex joins Maddy on her latest adventures. Confidant by day, dastardly Goblin Prince by night.