Board Thread:Policies/@comment-16461120-20190423072234/@comment-61022-20190424022346

I just skimmed through the Days of Anger arc. Please let me know if there are any facts that I missed. However, there are two key points that are telling.

The first, is the fact (in OML #30) Maestro states that he developed his dimensional transportation device from technology he stole from the Doctor Doom of his reality.

Another, this Maestro is able to change back and forth from Hulk and Banner forms.

And the last, and I think the most important, is how this version of Maestro behaves. This Maestro cares about raising the Banners from the OML timeline. He is actually quite upset that Hulk-616 was murdered during Civil War II.

On Ed Brisson's intention of him being the Maestro from Future Imperfect, I think we should take that with a grain of salt. Yes he was the writer, but we've seen instances where what the writer intended and what happened on an editorial level are entirely different. Especially when it comes to characters from alternate realities.

So on my three points.

Doom's Time Machine The Maestro of 9200 did not have access to Doctor Doom's time platform. The rebels that brought Hulk-616 to that reality to fight Maestro. The rebels later used it to banish Maestro to Earth-616 on the day of the gamma bomb and he was atomized. He did come back, thanks to a link to the Hulk, but he was in a much weakened form and was burried under tons of rock and hadn't been seen hence.

The Maestro from "Dystopia 2099" (seen in Spider-Man 2099 Vol 2) did have access to Doctor Doom's time machine. He was also transported to Earth-616. However, from all intents, it looks like it was a one time trip since Strange was the only only one who could activate the machine. Also Maestro kind of last minute decided to go to "the present" and there was no obvious way he could have himself recalls to his era.

As for the Secret Wars/Contest of Champions Maestro.. there isn't any mention of having Doctor Doom's time machine there (kind of a moot thing to bring up given what Secret Wars was about) But also when you consider that he was involved in the Contest of Champions, the reality hopping tech he had access to belogned to the Collector, so supposing that this Maestro managed to escape, I don't think he'd be using Doctor Doom's tech when he has the Collector's on hand.

Transforming back to Banner Form

For the original Maestro, in Future Imperfect it implicitly states that Maestro could not change back into Bruce Banner due to all the gamma radiation he soaked up.

Dystopia 2099 Maestro.. wasn't around long enough for them to really explore if he could change back and forth between human and Hulk forms. The only hint is when Strange 2099 states that Maestro doesn't "dwell on the past" (RE: Banner) and hasn't built anything in some time. Suggesting that he either doesn't want to, or can't transform back into Banner.

Secret Wars Maestro only turned back into human form after he failed to stop Doctor Doom in Future Imperfect #5 and was living out a fantasy where he won. It's not clear if this was because Maestro willed it or if Doom forced a transformation (I think the latter because he also was no longer merged with the Destroyer armor either) He was back to Hulk form when he was recovered by the Collector to be in the Contest (as seen in a flashback in Contest of Champions #6)

Personalities

Maestro-9200 hated Hulk-616 with a passion. He tried to kill Hulk in Future Imperfect and tried to steal his body before he was buried under tons of rock. He didn't give a damn about his past. He beat and imprisoned his cousin, She-Hulk. He had a harem of women and didn't intentionally reproduce. The only woman to bare a child for him was Betty-6 (as seen in Abominations Vol 1) but she only discovered that she was pegnant after Maestro was dead. It was heavily implied in Future Imperfect (given that it was Comic Book Code days) that Maestro only had the women around as sex objects, not procreation.

The Dystopia 2099 Maestro and Secret Wars Maestro were pretty much cut from the same cloth, although their appearances were all too brief to really get that kind of background on them. But they both came from similar realities (and since they were both written by Peter David) I doubt their personalities would be much differet.

Explanations?

Which raises the questions, in order to make the Maestro from OML "be" one of the others well....

Maestro-9200: You'd have to explain how he got out of the avalanche, got access to Doctor Doom's tech, learned how to change back into Banner at will, and why he started to care about the Banner's alt-reality children. That's a lot of speculation.

Dystopia 2099 Maestro: If he can change back into Banner is a big question mark. So that's something that could just be accepted at face value since it wasn't explained one way or the other. However, you still need to explain what the deal was with the time machine he left in Dystopia. And again, his change in attitude.

Lastly Secret Wars Maestro: It seems super unlikely for reason above. But again, Doom tech, changing back into Banner, and his change in personality need to be explained.

My Conclusion:

I think we should handle this like an entirely differnet Maestro since there are a number of issues that, barring further explanation, a lot of the available facts conflict with what is known about the other Maestros.

Unless there is are some details that I'm missing here, I think it's best that we treat him as a different Maestro until a concrete explanation is provided.