Maybe the longest storyline that Marvel ever ran, the Legacy Virus cast a long shadow over the X-books that lasted for nearly a decade, beginning in 1993 and being one of the key problems that the mutant race had to deal with for those ten years. Its origins were typically ridiculous - it was created and unleashed by Stryfe, a clone of Cable who was raised by Apocalypse and travelled back in time from 2000 years in the future - the disease targeted people with the mutant X gene and slowly killed them. It was kind of supposed to be a metaphor for HIV/AIDs, although thankfully that parallel was dropped pretty quickly in favour of thinning out the vast herd of X-Men supporting characters. Years later Marvel would do it a lot quicker with the House of M event that left most mutants "cured", which also had some lasting implications. Despite being a huge plot point, and responsible for killing many mutants, the Legacy Virus has since been all but forgotten in the comics, and all the decent characters it disposed of have since been revived. So it goes.
Tom Baker is the Comics Editor at WhatCulture! He's heard all the Doctor Who jokes, but not many about Randall and Hopkirk. He also blogs at http://communibearsilostate.wordpress.com/
