"By the way, has Magneto since the 80s been functionally immortal, given that the era of WW2 keeps moving farther and farther into the past?"

In Defenders #16, he fought the defenders and X-Men and was turned into an infant.  Then in X-Men #106 he was aged again by Eric the Red, but to his prime rather than his actual age.

(Which, of course, is precisely what gives us Ian McKellan in the X-movies -- an old actor is needed to portray someone with a connection to the Holocaust. Tho, mind you, they had to cheat and make Magneto a child so his present day self wouldn't be TOO old!)

"In Defenders #16, he fought the defenders and X-Men and was turned into an infant. Then in X-Men #106 he was aged again by Eric the Red, but to his prime rather than his actual age."

It's funny, that kind of answer wouldn't be necessary if the readership of comics turned over every five to seven years or so. the characters would not age and no one would ever notice.

It's insidious, really. Even when specific references are not made, the real world can still intrude. When I was doing JBNN in the early 90s, I imagined the series as being set ten to 15 years in the future, but I didn't come right out and say so. What I did do, tho, because I could hardly do otherwise. Was establish the World Trade Center as a prominent part of the New York skyline. When I returned to the series staying honest meant my story was locked into a timeline that could advance no further than 9.11.2001.

I call it "MAN OF STEEL Syndrome". And usually it walks hand in hand with "Death of Phoenix Syndrome".

**

I sure hope you don't blame yourself for that. The death of Phoenix was really more of Shooters thing than it was yours and Chris's. I have wondered what kind of fallout would have happened if Phoenix had just stayed a villian. No lose of powers thing, she just joins the Hellfire Club and stays evil.

Superman, I don't know what else could have been done with him. The character, in my humble opinion, had evolved to such a point that readers couldn't relate to him anymore. That and he really came off as unbeatable even if you had Kryptonite. Man of Steel made the character more relatable because it brought is human upbringing more into play. Yeah, he's an alien, but for much of his childhood he didn't know that. This was a very needed reworking of the character.

he really came off as unbeatable

...........................

The Hulk is in that same catagory now.

I've said before that as each decade passes, Captain America has missed that much more history before the Avengers found him. At some point, Steve Rogers will have been frozen for a century.