Jess Nevins was keeping annotations for 1602. Don't know if they are up to date, but they are here.

What I've been looking for is a bio sheet on the original Marvel versions of the characters (including Snowbird, because I want to look at her story again). Someone linked to a good site, but I can't find it again. If anyone else cares,here's Marvel's very incomplete list, and here's a fan's list.

I am so confused by 1602.

Michele, me too, but at least I'm also entertained. And-- cartoon Neil! Wee, surly cartoon Neil!

I am so confused by 1602.

Is it a storyline issue or a Marvel Universe issue, because if it's the former (not sure if this counts as spoilery or not)#6 answers a lot. Most of my MU knowledge comes from watching the cartoons and reading a big paperback book that had the first issues of several of the comics in it. (I believe it had X-Men, Daredevil, Iron Man, and the Silver Surfer in it. Don't recall if it had any others.)

The new issue exposits a lot, but it doesn't make sense. Like, how is Thor the secret of the Templars? And what's with the flying non-monkeys?

So I guess it's Marvelverse stuff.

Like, how is Thor the secret of the Templars? And what's with the flying non-monkeys?

Yeah, I went "Huh?" when the maguffin turned out to be Thor's walking stick. They do sort of handwave an explanation about the Norse sending it to the Templars, but it seemed a big time asspull to me.

The non-flying monkeys are patterned after the Vulture, who was an old Spiderman villain, although I don't recall much about him. I don't think he was ever a Doom minion.

Michele, according to Issue 6 the flying non-monkeys were part of a breeding program of either Doom's or his father's. Wasn't it the same kind of creature that tried to kidnap Virginia in one of the early issues?

Well, they've been having trouble with the weather, so Thor is useful there. Also, being able to turn into Thor is pretty damn nifty ability from a combat perspective, but one you wouldn't want to really use unless you really have to as a devout Christian, him being a "pagan" god and all. We already knew it was something easily overlooked from when Doom got all happy about the glowy orb thing. It was kind of a "Wha?" for me, but I got over it pretty quickly.

I think the "vulture-flyers" as Doom called them working for him were just an easy way to incorporate the Vulture villain into the series, rather than anything to do with the Doom from the normal Marvel Universe and also gave him a defense against flying foes, which Doom would know existed from his experiences with the Human Torch and the rest of the Fantastic Four.

I missed Peter. Just didn't seem like 1602 without.

There were a few asspulls in this one, I thought. Why the previous shake-the-place-down attempts had never released Invisible Grrl; how Matt and the old dude just got out when they wanted to (same seisomological issue, or actually an architectural issue - pretty poor castle construction), etc.

I could've done without the insta-Thor stick, but I liked how the old man was really the treasure.

Actually, the mystery character that showed up in this issue? The way he showed up was the exact same way that the character appeared in the early issues of the character's own series. Admittedly, that origin had been left behind back in the mid80s, possibly even sooner but since Neil said he was using 60s characters, using that character's original origin makes sense.