How complete is Marvel Unlimited, and is it worth it for me?

[Venomous Mask]

I'm thinking of subscribing to Marvel Unlimited, but I've heard that there are big gaps for stuff before 2000. As I'm really interested in getting into 90s X-Men, horror titles (Ghost Rider, Nightstalkers and other Midnight Sons titles), late 80s/90s Spider-Man and Venom, Daredevil, Punisher, this could be problematic for me. I did read somewhere that the library is updated weekly; overall, how complete is it, and is it worth it for my wants?

[Mike_Murdock]

It's a great deal with a ton of selection that could keep you satisfied for years, but it certainly isn't complete. I'll try to go through each of the major categories, starting with Daredevil because I'm most familiar with him and it's simplest:

Daredevil - I would say 55% of Daredevil Vol. 1 is collected. If it's in trade, it's here. So the major stories (such as Born Again) are here. That being said, the main gaps are late Gerry Conway/early Steve Gerber Daredevil & Black Widow stuff in San Francisco, anything between the end of Gerber and the start of Frank Miller (on art) not featuring Bullseye, the stuff after Miller until late Denny O'Neil, early Nocenti, early D.G. Chichester, and Karl Kesel. But all of Stan Lee, all of Frank Miller, all of Joe Kelly, and 2/3 of Ann Nocenti are there.

Spider-Man - All of Amazing Spider-Man Vol. 1 is collected. The tricky part are the other books (especially since this is the time period you were asking about). Peter Parker, Spectacular Spider-Man has small gaps, with the largest being 65-80, 112-127, and 230-253, but there are definitely gaps of 1-10 issues throughout. I would still say the majority is there. Web of Spider-Man is missing a bunch: 2-30, 33-41, 62-100, 104-116 being the most obvious. Spider-Man has a big gap between 24-34, 38-50, 64-71, and 75 to the end. But, if you want to read the 400+ issues of Amazing Spider-Man, there are no problems there.

X-Men is in the same boat. I'm not going to spend as much time on this as with the others because I've spent quite a bit of time so far, but all of Uncanny X-Men should be there, but it's missing sections of New Mutants, Excalibur, X-Factor, Adjectiveless X-Men, X-Force, etc. But it also has quite a bit of that.

In short, if you don't mind switching between books when there are gaps, you'll probably never run out of things to read, but there are still things that haven't been filled in yet.

[tliscord]

“Daredevil - I would say 55% of Daredevil Vol. 1 is collected. If it's in trade, it's here. So the major stories (such as Born Again) are here. That being said, the main gaps are late Gerry Conway/early Steve Gerber Daredevil & Black Widow stuff in San Francisco, anything between the end of Gerber and the start of Frank Miller (on art) not featuring Bullseye, the stuff after Miller until late Denny O'Neil, early Nocenti, early D.G. Chichester, and Karl Kesel. But all of Stan Lee, all of Frank Miller, all of Joe Kelly, and 2/3 of Ann Nocenti are there.”

Yeah, always wondered why that gap exists. I loved that whole San Francisco plot with subplots on Natasha’s time as a Russian spy. Colan’s art with inks by Palmer was legendary.

[Venomous Mask]

Thanks alot for the responses. I'm curious, do you know how often MU gets updated? I'm asking since some of the series' that I want to get into (Ghost Rider, Blade) are not complete. I checked the site today, and it looks like a ton of older stuff has been added, so how long do you think it will be before before those other titles are completed, as well as other titles being added like Nightstalkers and the old Spirits of Vengeance?

[Digifiend]

Every Monday. They add the titles released exactly six months ago, plus a batch of older stuff.

[Venomous Mask]

Ok, thanks. Is there anywhere where you can get a heads up about what's going to be added next?

[Iron Maiden]

Ok, thanks. Is there anywhere where you can get a heads up about what's going to be added next?

Not that I've seen. But they typically have a page that is just like the New Releases summary. It tells you what's new in Marvel Unlimited for that week. You'd be surprised at some things you find, like many of the oversized Marvel Holiday Specials, which I used to have a hard time finding in stores. One week they added a dozen or more issues of the old anthology series Marvel Fanfare

Sometimes their alphabetizing is a bit weird. I find a lot of things listed under "the", which is not usually done in sorting.

[9th.]

I might try it out once the free trials start rolling out again. I've been curious about it myself.

[Mike_Murdock]

Ok, thanks. Is there anywhere where you can get a heads up about what's going to be added next?

https://www.reddit.com/r/MarvelUnlimited/

At least tells you what just came out.

[Iron Maiden]

https://www.reddit.com/r/MarvelUnlimited/

At least tells you what just came out.

that just links back to the page I just mentioned on the Marvel Site. It's the Release Calendar section and as you can see it has a separate tab for Marvel Unlimited. Best to just go to the Marvel Release Calendar directly

[Lee Stone]

that just links back to the page I just mentioned on the Marvel Site. It's the Release Calendar section and as you can see it has a separate tab for Marvel Unlimited. Best to just go to the Marvel Release Calendar directly

Great resource.
Also... if you install the app and don't sign in you can still browse the comics to see what's available. I do this every now and then to see if the New Defenders era ever gets added or if the huge gap in Doctor Strange ever gets filled.

[Venomous Mask]

Great resource.
Also... if you install the app and don't sign in you can still browse the comics to see what's available. I do this every now and then to see if the New Defenders era ever gets added or if the huge gap in Doctor Strange ever gets filled.

I just checked that, and that is disappointing. You'd think Marvel would want the catalog for one of the company's biggest characters to be complete as soon as possible.

[Digifiend]

That's just it - he WASN'T one of their biggest characters, until the movie came out.

Heck, I've just read a Simpsons TPB (Unchained) I picked up in the post-Christmas sales, and Comic Book Guy mentions the Guardians of the Galaxy, in an example of a geeky reference. GOTG is now mainstream of course because of their movies, but this comic was originally from 1998, so CBG is referring to the original team.

[Mike_Murdock]

Dr. Strange's popularity waxes and wanes. He was someone you might see in memoriabia in certain countercultural circles for awhile. I'd say, by the 1980s, that was over. People like Daredevil (who reached his peak with Frank Miller and then declined for awhile after) and the Punisher (who fit the times) began to take his place. Of course, the X-Me also began their meteoric rise that lasted for decades at the top.