All the issues of Ultimate X-Men I still own - all three of them - involve Gambit. Which is odd, considering I have very little use for the version in the Marvel Universe. There was some discussion of Gambit in the comments section for the 400th episode of Jay and Miles X-Plain the X-Men, and I noted there that Gambit seemed very cool to me when I first saw him. The exploding playing cards, the bo staff (Donatello was admittedly my least favorite Ninja Turtle, but that didn't mean he wasn't cool), and hey! Rogue liked Gambit, and Rogue was cool. I was not yet aware that Rogue's taste in men was worse than her luck in parental figures.
But then it turns out Gambit's been married this whole time, and that seemed kind of sleazy. The longer he was around, the less he seemed a "charming thief", and more a "two-faced conman", jerking Rogue around while flirting with anything he laid eyes upon.
No doubt aided by the fact he only appeared in maybe a half-dozen issues, the Ultimate Universe version didn't go that route. The story we looked at last week, he's kind of a low-level hustler, living on the street, able to use his powers for some flashy tricks to win pocket change or a phone number from a pretty lady, but that's about it. He's nice enough to try to protect an orphaned girl, and to recognize when he's at the limits of what he can do.
Brian K. Vaughn brought him back, a fair bit closer to his Marvel namesake, and he and Rogue took off to be high-class thieves together. Which brings us to this comic, where a successful heist is interrupted by the Juggernaut, who was pals with Rogue when they were in Weapon X. Gambit ends up dying dropping an entire construction site on Juggy's skull, and Rogue absorbs his powers and mind when she kisses him as he dies.
Far as I know, nobody brought him back before the Ultimate Universe got wiped out by Secret Wars (although I read Jonathan Hickman might be bringing it back), so he never got the chance to diverge too far from the cocky guy enjoying stealing stuff with his girlfriend. No Thieves Guild and Assassins Guild stuff, no Belladonna or any of that mess. Sometimes simpler is better.
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