Was Kang's Earlier Appearance as Rama Tut a retcon? And if so, how early? 1 1

[William-James88]

I'm just wondering how early Stan Lee (if it even was him) decided to have Rama Tut be Kang. The prices of that FF 19 are going up like crazy so it has me thinking that him being Rama Tut is rather early in canon, since it's so widely accepted at Kang's first appearance but let me know.

[Crimebuster]

It's not a retcon, Kang explains in his first appearance in Avengers #8 that he was previously known as Rama-Tut. Stan and/or Jack planned it from jump street. 

 

 

 

Kang and Immortus being the same person is a retcon. There's no suggestion of this in Avengers #10, and I don't think Immortus appeared again until Englehart used both of them in the classic Kang arc that began in Avengers #129, where he tied them together. 

Edited January 25, 2022 by Crimebuster

[MattTheDuck]

It's not super-relevant to this question, but here are some panels from Avengers 25 (Feb '66), in which Doom muses on his "relationship" to Kang

 

[William-James88]

On 1/25/2022 at 1:00 PM, MattTheDuck said:

It's not super-relevant to this question, but here are some panels from Avengers 25 (Feb '66), in which Doom muses on his "relationship" to Kang

 

I love it. Any talk of DOOM is fine by me.

Also, good to know it's not a retcon, now I get why this book is so hot at the moment.

 

Also,  at Stan's note. Man, I have to read some more of these.

[BLUECHIPCOLLECTIBLES]

On 1/25/2022 at 10:00 AM, MattTheDuck said:

It's not super-relevant to this question, but here are some panels from Avengers 25 (Feb '66), in which Doom muses on his "relationship" to Kang

 

Much as I love both parodoxes and Stan, I remember reading a used copy of the FF Annual as a kid and thinking that theory made no sense unless one of them had amnesia.  I was expecting either Kang or Doom to suggest that happened, but neither does   

[MattTheDuck]

On 1/25/2022 at 10:44 AM, BLUECHIPCOLLECTIBLES said:

Much as I love both parodoxes and Stan, I remember reading a used copy of the FF Annual as a kid and thinking that theory made no sense unless one of them had amnesia.  I was expecting either Kang or Doom to suggest that happened, but neither does   

This is basically why I don't like "time travel" kinds of stories.  It's lazy writing where literally anything can happen and then be explained by the time travel.

Assuming he's telling the truth (big assumption), Kang says he and Rama-Tut are in fact the same person.  But if I understand it correctly, Kang had traveled from the future to Rama-Tut's time.  If Doom is also Kang, he would have no "memory" of this happening because the time travel happens far in Doom's future.  If Doom turns out to be the "only" modern version, then he wouldn't have experienced any of Kang's/Rama-Tut's experiences - they won't take place for 1000 years or whatever the time frame is.  Hm.

[William-James88]

On 1/25/2022 at 3:02 PM, MattTheDuck said:

This is basically why I don't like "time travel" kinds of stories.  It's lazy writing where literally anything can happen and then be explained by the time travel.

Assuming he's telling the truth (big assumption), Kang says he and Rama-Tut are in fact the same person.  But if I understand it correctly, Kang had traveled from the future to Rama-Tut's time.  If Doom is also Kang, he would have no "memory" of this happening because the time travel happens far in Doom's future.  If Doom turns out to be the "only" modern version, then he wouldn't have experienced any of Kang's/Rama-Tut's experiences - they won't take place for 1000 years or whatever the time frame is.  Hm.

Also, I totally missed that, Doom was said to be Kang as well?!

Edited January 25, 2022 by William-James88

[BLUECHIPCOLLECTIBLES]

On 1/25/2022 at 12:02 PM, MattTheDuck said:

This is basically why I don't like "time travel" kinds of stories.  It's lazy writing where literally anything can happen and then be explained by the time travel.

Assuming he's telling the truth (big assumption), Kang says he and Rama-Tut are in fact the same person.  But if I understand it correctly, Kang had traveled from the future to Rama-Tut's time.  If Doom is also Kang, he would have no "memory" of this happening because the time travel happens far in Doom's future.  If Doom turns out to be the "only" modern version, then he wouldn't have experienced any of Kang's/Rama-Tut's experiences - they won't take place for 1000 years or whatever the time frame is.  Hm.

In the FF stories there are back stories for both Doom and Kang, and they are clearly portrayed as different people who figure out they're related and then just start inexplicably wondering if they could be more than just related; they might be the same person!  They leap on that hypothesis without either of them positing an idea how it could be so despite their separate back stories.  We see that Doom grew up a gypsy who became Dr. Doom and Kang was a guy who grew up in the 23rd century and was bored with how peaceful things were, then finds his "ancestor's" (Doom) blueprints for a time machine, which he uses to go back to ancient Egypt and calls himself Rama Tut then later calls himself Kang.   Yeah, if Doom went to the future and became the guy who becomes Kang, he wouldn't remember it because it hadn't happened yet.  But it presumably had happened to Kang, so why wouldn't he remember being Doom before he became Kang?   And if, conversely, Kang went back in time to become Doom, then who invented the time machine he discovered and why would Doom not remember he'd been Kang.

I feel I must point out that I am not, as an adult now for several decades, thinking all this up now when I should be working.  

I am simply remembering all the thoughts I had as a nine year old reading old remaindered copies of FF 19 and FF Annual 2, and I am just repeating that now....

...when I shuold  be working

 

 

   

[William-James88]

On 1/25/2022 at 4:52 PM, BLUECHIPCOLLECTIBLES said:

In the FF stories there are back stories for both Doom and Kang, and they are clearly portrayed as different people who figure out they're related and then just start inexplicably wondering if they could be more than just related; they might be the same person!  They leap on that hypothesis without either of them positing an idea how it could be so despite their separate back stories.  We see that Doom grew up a gypsy who became Dr. Doom and Kang was a guy who grew up in the 23rd century and was bored with how peaceful things were, then finds his "ancestor's" (Doom) blueprints for a time machine, which he uses to go back to ancient Egypt and calls himself Rama Tut then later calls himself Kang.   Yeah, if Doom went to the future and became the guy who becomes Kang, he wouldn't remember it because it hadn't happened yet.  But it presumably had happened to Kang, so why wouldn't he remember being Doom before he became Kang?   And if, conversely, Kang went back in time to become Doom, then who invented the time machine he discovered and why would Doom not remember he'd been Kang.

I feel I must point out that I am not, as an adult now for several decades, thinking all this up now when I should be working.  

I am simply remembering all the thoughts I had as a nine year old reading old remaindered copies of FF 19 and FF Annual 2, and I am just repeating that now....

...when I shuold  be working

 

 

   

I love it!

[Jaylam]

It's all Thanos' and the Avengers fault, they screwed up and created all those alternate time lines in those movies.

[gunsmokin]

Avengers 8 occurs 11 months after FF 19. Maybe Jack was playing a long game with Kang’s introduction by Stan certainly wasn’t.

[BLUECHIPCOLLECTIBLES]

On 1/29/2022 at 7:14 AM, gunsmokin said:

Avengers 8 occurs 11 months after FF 19. Maybe Jack was playing a long game with Kang’s introduction by Stan certainly wasn’t.

I don't get what you're trying to say here.

I read FF 19 as a kid but I remember a standout line of dialogue about the time machine having been created by one of his ancestors.  And when he blasts off in his pyramid space ship there is a line of dialogue suggesting other villainous deeds will follow in the future.   There's no point to inserting either of those lines if you're not thinking of bringing the character back as as someone other than Rama Tut (since there were also lines about how "Rama Tut" was just a guise he adopted for his villainous vacation in ancient Egypt.