Those smiley-face guys from The Right creeped me the fuck out.
I remember reading this as a kid and hating Weezie Simonson's work then. I hate it now, too. But the moment where Illyana puts the gun to the Ani-Mator's head and snarls, "And what do YOU want?" is a classic for me.
Killing Doug was wasteful and foolish, and the way they treated him in that issue and the following (with Zombie Doug) was incredibly undignified.
I believe Marc Guggenheim had plans to actually resurrect THE Cypher (along with introducing a new one) in Young X-Men, but was cancelled before he could get around to it. I hear Doug may turn up in the new New Muties title, but I'm not sure. I thought Ellis' Douglock was a wonderful fusion resurrection, but other writers made him just Warlock again.