Avengers/New Avengers: Time Runs Out (with spoilers)

[Habis]

And this is where our views differ. You think Steve didn't use any SHIELD resources to try and find a solution and was suicidal. I think he likely did and it simply wasn't shown. To me that just makes more sense.

But:

1.-We are neither shown nor told about that. We only see him chasing the Illuminati, nothing more. He doesn't mention trying other solutions even when the Illuminati and Sunspot tell what they have been doing. Call it bad writing, call it being out of character, call it character assassination, but the fact is, nothing tells us that he has tried anything.

2.-If he had been trying and failing to stop the Incursions, shouldn't it make him doubt himself? If he wants to save every Earth without sacrificing any, shouldn't he try to stop every incursion? If he has failed to stop a dozen Incursions, what makes he think that, once he gets rid of the Illuminati and the Cabal, he will success the thirteenth? Does he think that stopping the Cabal and the Illuminati will give him luck? Or maybe he thinks that, once there is nobody saving his ass he will feel extra-motivated and success?

[stillanerd]

I'm not following you exactly, but that's not what Reed and the Illuminati discovered when Black Swan appeared. It's not like they didn't double check what she said and do the math.

What causes the end of the multiverse is when two universes are destroyed, not when an Earth is destroyed. The Cabal only destroyed 14 worlds and saved 28 universes. It's entirely possible 14 million Earths were not destroyed in the same amount of time, and 28 million universes were destroyed -- which is what would have hastened the end of the multiverse.

Regardless, Hickman has changed the rules and the catalyst has taken out most of the multiverse, hastening the end of everything to lightspeed.

What I'm suggesting is that just because the Illuminati and the Cabal prevent an Incursion of the 616 and another universe by destroying an Earth doesn't mean that the 616 and that alternate universe aren't still moving towards each other. What if instead of slowing down the speed of the collapse they've been creating "holes" in various universes just large enough for their Earth to pass through, and as it and their universe squeezed on through those "holes," it destroys everything surrounding that "holes" i.e. those alternate universe? After all, Issac Newton's first law of motion states that "every object in a state of uniform motion continues to remain in that state of motion unless an external force is applied to it." Since they're literally removing an object out of the way, both universes are still moving together, except one is just now slighter "larger" than the other. And the slightly larger universe plows on through the slightly smaller one.

Black Swan never said that you could save the universes by destroying the Earths. That's what the Illuminati thought, because they weren't listening to her fully. Black Swan said that you could stop the Incursions by destroying the various Earths. However, she insisted that there was no way out of what was coming. That Rabum Alal was still going to destroy everything.

Okay, thanks for clarifying that point.

It may be possible that the Incursions carry on after the other Earth is destroyed (although that seems like the kind of thing they'd notice). But I don't think that's why hundreds of thousands of universes died, there was another event that destroyed them, even the ones without an Earth.

Don't forget that there are other Incursions taking place that do not involve the 616 Universe, but between two different parallel universes.

[XPac]

But:

1.-We are neither shown nor told about that. We only see him chasing the Illuminati, nothing more. He doesn't mention trying other solutions even when the Illuminati and Sunspot tell what they have been doing. Call it bad writing, call it being out of character, call it character assassination, but the fact is, nothing tells us that he has tried anything.

2.-If he had been trying and failing to stop the Incursions, shouldn't it make him doubt himself? If he wants to save every Earth without sacrificing any, shouldn't he try to stop every incursion? If he has failed to stop a dozen Incursions, what makes he think that, once he gets rid of the Illuminati and the Cabal, he will success the thirteenth? Does he think that stopping the Cabal and the Illuminati will give him luck? Or maybe he thinks that, once there is nobody saving his ass he will feel extra-motivated and success?

Sure we're not shown. Which forces readers to assume one of two things .... either Steve Rogers is suicidal like you're saying, or a writer in a comic book didn't do a job showing something. I personally find the later more believable.

[Ekie]

So if Swan knows that there is no escape then why is she trying to rebuild her family on another world?

[vitruvian]

I just don't agree that not seeing something happen means it didn't. Especially for this story. Rather I believe not seeing it happen means it's open to interpretation whether or not it did until the story tells us one way or the other.

To me at least it makes more sense to assume that he did. Others may disagree and that's fair too.

And their goals were the same but their methods up to a point were not. That's why he got mind wiped. You can say the same for the Cabal quite frankly.

Let me put it this way... maybe Hickman will play catch up with what else Steve was doing for those months, and we'll see that he went to Asgard and had an audience with Odin, called on his allies from Infinity, took every measure he could to actually work towards saving the universe himself.

But if from now till the end of the storyline we never, ever see this or are even told of it... then there's no reason to think that he did within the story as published. The storyteller has a responsibility to tell the story, and any such efforts are not a part of the story being told until they actually appear in the story. There are only so many gaps the reader can fill for the writer without it being a failing of the writer and the story.

And time is running out.

[vitruvian]

What I'm suggesting is that just because the Illuminati and the Cabal prevent an Incursion of the 616 and another universe by destroying an Earth doesn't mean that the 616 and that alternate universe aren't still moving towards each other. What if instead of slowing down the speed of the collapse they've been creating "holes" in various universes just large enough for their Earth to pass through, and as it and their universe squeezed on through those "holes," it destroys everything surrounding that "holes" i.e. those alternate universe? After all, Issac Newton's first law of motion states that "every object in a state of uniform motion continues to remain in that state of motion unless an external force is applied to it." Since they're literally removing an object out of the way, both universes are still moving together, except one is just now slighter "larger" than the other. And the slightly larger universe plows on through the slightly smaller one.



Okay, thanks for clarifying that point.



Don't forget that there are other Incursions taking place that do not involve the 616 Universe, but between two different parallel universes.

No, I think we're meant to understand that, at the time she was telling them about it, blowing up one Earth did in fact spare both universes (at least for the moment, and it seems she expected it to be longer than a year or two as well), and 'shading the apocalypse' was a viable option for delaying things, if not actually saving anything permanently. Remember, it's not like she was recommending the option, she was deriding it as cowardly.

Why do I think that? Because she wasn't alone in saying or thinking that. Not only did Reed and co think it made sense in terms of what they observed and their math (even if it doesn't make sense to us), not only could they directly observe through the Bridge whether the Earthless universe was actually immediately destroyed or not and said not, but they got the same message about destroying Earths working to spare (if not save) universes from other sources like the Builders, and implicitly from the fact that the Galaktus of that one alternate was doing so. And that's all even apart from the other universes visually retreating from contact when the Earth was destroyed.

[vitruvian]

Sure we're not shown. Which forces readers to assume one of two things .... either Steve Rogers is suicidal like you're saying, or a writer in a comic book didn't do a job showing something. I personally find the later more believable.

We can say he hasn't done it in this story, because this story is what's been published. If we can fill in just anything we like to fill in the gaps, we can say that Doom volunteers at the ASPCA on Tuesdays with just as much reason. Okay, maybe nothing that silly, but still, there are limits.

We can assume that characters go to the bathroom, eat, exercise, watch a little TV, do the more boring parts of their jobs, and so on in between panels and issues, no problem. Based on what they actually say they are doing, we can assume a lot more that is not directly shown. But if it's something that's neither shown, nor told, nor routine, but important to the story, then no, I don't think we can assume that it happened when it's not actually anywhere in the story.

[XPac]

We can say he hasn't done it in this story, because this story is what's been published. If we can fill in just anything we like to fill in the gaps, we can say that Doom volunteers at the ASPCA on Tuesdays with just as much reason. Okay, maybe nothing that silly, but still, there are limits.

We can assume that characters go to the bathroom, eat, exercise, watch a little TV, do the more boring parts of their jobs, and so on in between panels and issues, no problem. Based on what they actually say they are doing, we can assume a lot more that is not directly shown. But if it's something that's neither shown, nor told, nor routine, but important to the story, then no, I don't think we can assume that it happened when it's not actually anywhere in the story.

I wouldn't necessarily assume that Doom volunteers for the ASPCA even though I haven't seen him do it, because in my mind I don't think it necessarily makes sense for him to do it. Conversely, I DO assume Doom goes to the bathroom even though I've never seen him do it because to me at least it makes sense to that he would. That's where our own views are sometimes needed to fill in the gaps. We don't see everything... that IMO does not necessarily mean that if we don't see it, it automatically means it didn't happen.

I would assume that Steve, with the resources at SHIELD he had, would have some sources at least attempt to look into the incursion problem. I don't know that he did and I can't prove that he did, so I've never argued that was the case. That's merely what I assume because AGAIN it makes more sense to me at least to assume that Steve would do that than it would for me to assume that Steve is suicidal as you suggested. Doesn't mean I'm necessarily right... just saying in my perspective that's the more sensible assumption to make. We don't know for sure either way.

Do I think it's fair for someone to say that because we didn't see it, it automatically means it didn't happen? Sure. Again, all I am suggesting is that for ME PERSONALLY it's easier to assume that a comic book writer didn't do a great job of showing everything than it is for me to assume Steve is suicidal, especially if the story is implying that Steve represents life. Not that I necessarily would need the story saying that for me to assume Steve isn't suicidal... regardless of what this story says, I wouldn't believe that personally. But hey... that's just me.

[vitruvian]

I wouldn't necessarily assume that Doom volunteers for the ASPCA even though I haven't seen him do it, because in my mind I don't think it necessarily makes sense for him to do it. Conversely, I DO assume Doom goes to the bathroom even though I've never seen him do it because to me at least it makes sense to that he would. That's where our own views are sometimes needed to fill in the gaps. We don't see everything... that IMO does not necessarily mean that if we don't see it, it automatically means it didn't happen.

I would assume that Steve, with the resources at SHIELD he had, would have some sources at least attempt to look into the incursion problem. I don't know that he did and I can't prove that he did, so I've never argued that was the case. That's merely what I assume because AGAIN it makes more sense to me at least to assume that Steve would do that than it would for me to assume that Steve is suicidal as you suggested. Doesn't mean I'm necessarily right... just saying in my perspective that's the more sensible assumption to make. We don't know for sure either way.

Do I think it's fair for someone to say that because we didn't see it, it automatically means it didn't happen? Sure. Again, all I am suggesting is that for ME PERSONALLY it's easier to assume that a comic book writer didn't do a great job of showing everything than it is for me to assume Steve is suicidal, especially if the story is implying that Steve represents life. Not that I necessarily would need the story saying that for me to assume Steve isn't suicidal... regardless of what this story says, I wouldn't believe that personally. But hey... that's just me.

Believe me, I'd much prefer it if Steve actually trying to do something productive was shown, or at least hinted at in a word balloon or two somewhere. And I already acknowledged that there are plenty of ways in which we can or even need to read between the lines (of the panels), didn't I? But when it's something that's really this important to understanding both the actions and the motivations of a fairly major character in the story... that's when it becomes something that is actually important for the writer and artist to explicitly either show, or tell, otherwise there's no part of the story actually telling the reader that it's the case and no reason to think that.... and any story should give you all the pieces that are important to understanding it.

Since the moral dilemma and debate is central to this whole story, whether or not Steve is actually doing anything in pursuit of his moral goal of saving the universe ethically seems to me like one of these things that is vitally important to show or tell in the course of the story. If he's not 'actually' doing anything (air quotes because of course as a fictional character he's not actually doing anything), that argues that his stated ethics and goals are not the ones he actually lives by, which undercuts his side of the argument and paints him as this petty old guy more motivated by vindictiveness than saving lives. If he is, and Hickman isn't bothering to show or tell us that, that's a major part of the story simply not being told. I'm not honestly sure which option is worse.

[TresDias]

And this is where our views differ. You think Steve didn't use any SHIELD resources to try and find a solution and was suicidal. I think he likely did and it simply wasn't shown. To me that just makes more sense.

Well, it also makes more sense that he would have backed off the Illuminati and let them get to work if he was trying alternate sources of help and came up empty. =P

Not that I'm saying it isn't likely he tried to find help. I think it is. Just pointing out that Steve hasn't been operating on "what makes more sense" in quite some time.

And even Black Swan was consistently saying that even if there was no permanent solution for safety, that if a universe's Earth was gone, it was safe from Incursions, at least for a good long while. The end of everything might still be inevitable, but not in the short term. She never suggested that the Earthless universes were dying almost as quickly as those in which Incursions proceeded to completion, nor would her looking for a safe place to clone her family make any sense if she thought that every place would be gone within a year or two anyway. She also never said that 'shading the apocalypse' didn't work, only that she considered it a cowardly and contemptible option as opposed to freely sacrificing Earths to the Great Destroyer in return for a reprieve for the rest of the universes containing them. So, even the most pessimistic voice in the characters' ears wasn't saying that the end of everything was this imminent, and even Black Swan had the rules changed on her by this point.

As for other parts of the story, true, Reed did say that if a solution was easy, it would have been found in multiple other universes... but not easy is not the same as impossible. The characters in the future were saying nothing could stop it, but then again they were standing right there, so clearly they had a history in which the universe had survived... not to say that history couldn't be wiped out by screw ups in the present, but such a history had to be possible in order for them to have one.

I still say this would be a thoroughly nonsensical assumption on their part.

It would make as much sense as mowing through a red traffic light in an intersection every day while road work is being done on the street that runs perpendicular, and taking this to mean that you will always be safe doing this. Sure, for so long as that road is closed, you're going to be fine a foot into the intersection; or two feet; ten feet; and so on, all the way across the marked boundaries of what qualifies as the intersection.

When something solid is actually crossing through again on the lanes that run perpendicular, though, it's not going to work out so well.

We can be pretty sure that future doesn't incorporate interference from outside its own timeline until after they've actually crossed paths. Unless there are signs of "Secret Wars" that I overlooked (entirely possible).

[XPac]

Well, it also makes more sense that he would have backed off the Illuminati and let them get to work if he was trying alternate sources of help and came up empty. =P

Not that I'm saying it isn't likely he tried to find help. I think it is. Just pointing out that Steve hasn't been operating on "what makes more sense" in quite some time.


I still say this would be a thoroughly nonsensical assumption on their part.

It would make as much sense as mowing through a red traffic light in an intersection every day while road work is being done on the street that runs perpendicular, and taking this to mean that you will always he safe doing this. Sure, for so long as that road is closed, you're going to be fine a foot into the intersection; or two feet; ten feet; and so on, all the way across the marked boundaries of what qualifies as the intersection.

When something solid is actually crossing through again on the lanes that run perpendicular, though, it's not going to work out so well.

We can be pretty sure that future doesn't incorporate interference from outside its own timeline. Unless there are signs of "Secret Wars" that I overlooked (entirely possible).

Steve WOULDN'T back off if he believed they would use bombs to destroy inhabited planets if they couldn't find another solution... that was the one issue he really disagreed with. Obviously we as viewers came to realize that they ended up being on the same page as Steve as far as not using the bombs (minus Namor) but he didn't know that. Once Steve learned that (and once they mostly agreed to surrender afterwards) working with them again became a non-issue.

Of course you can argue Steve's stance about not using the bombs on inhabited worlds doesn't make sense if they don't have an alternative... but that's the sort of impractical thinking I actually WOULD expect from Steve.

Make no mistake, I do think Steve had poor priorities. I think he made his share of mistakes like everyone else in the story. And on top of all that, I STILL believe that using the bombs made sense given what the characters knew (or didn't know) at the time. I just don't and frankly can't buy the notion that some posters suggested that he's suicidal. I think it's the exact opposite... I believe he wants to save everyone. I don't think he necessarily acted in a manner which best achieved that goal, but that doesn't mean it wasn't actually his goal. It just means his execution was flawed... and frankly the writing of the book in this regard was flawed as well.

[XPac]

Believe me, I'd much prefer it if Steve actually trying to do something productive was shown, or at least hinted at in a word balloon or two somewhere. And I already acknowledged that there are plenty of ways in which we can or even need to read between the lines (of the panels), didn't I? But when it's something that's really this important to understanding both the actions and the motivations of a fairly major character in the story... that's when it becomes something that is actually important for the writer and artist to explicitly either show, or tell, otherwise there's no part of the story actually telling the reader that it's the case and no reason to think that.... and any story should give you all the pieces that are important to understanding it.

Since the moral dilemma and debate is central to this whole story, whether or not Steve is actually doing anything in pursuit of his moral goal of saving the universe ethically seems to me like one of these things that is vitally important to show or tell in the course of the story. If he's not 'actually' doing anything (air quotes because of course as a fictional character he's not actually doing anything), that argues that his stated ethics and goals are not the ones he actually lives by, which undercuts his side of the argument and paints him as this petty old guy more motivated by vindictiveness than saving lives. If he is, and Hickman isn't bothering to show or tell us that, that's a major part of the story simply not being told. I'm not honestly sure which option is worse.

Maybe you're right and marvel has changed their views on Steve, deciding that he's a petty old man more motivated by vindictiveness than saving lives. Again, I can see why people would intepret him that way. I just don't believe marvel or the author is actually telling that story. I'm simply choosing to interpret the character and marvels overall intent differently. Though I could be wrong. Time will tell I guess.

[vitruvian]

Steve WOULDN'T back off if he believed they would use bombs to destroy inhabited planets if they couldn't find another solution... that was the one issue he really disagreed with. Obviously we as viewers came to realize that they ended up being on the same page as Steve as far as not using the bombs (minus Namor) but he didn't know that. Once Steve learned that (and once they mostly agreed to surrender afterwards) working with them again became a non-issue.

Of course you can argue Steve's stance about not using the bombs on inhabited worlds doesn't make sense if they don't have an alternative... but that's the sort of impractical thinking I actually WOULD expect from Steve.

Make no mistake, I do think Steve had poor priorities. I think he made his share of mistakes like everyone else in the story. And on top of all that, I STILL believe that using the bombs made sense given what the characters knew (or didn't know) at the time. I just don't and frankly can't buy the notion that some posters suggested that he's suicidal. I think it's the exact opposite... I believe he wants to save everyone. I don't think he necessarily acted in a manner which best achieved that goal, but that doesn't mean it wasn't actually his goal. It just means his execution was flawed... and frankly the writing of the book in this regard was flawed as well.

It all hinges on whether he actually did a single thing to try to save the world, or not, and we haven't seen him do that yet. If it gets to the end of the story and we still haven't seen it, then he didn't and his execution wasn't just flawed, it wasn't something he tried to do at all. If we're eventually shown some actual effort on his part, then we can judge whether it seems to have been a high priority for him.

Honestly, I think he becomes kind of despicable as a character in this story if he didn't constantly place the highest priority on saving lives and spend more of his effort and time on saving the universe than on hunting anybody down, so we would have to see a whole lot of effort on his part in order for him to be redeemed, considering we haven't seen any (since the Infinity Gauntlet, of course) so far. And since this is part of what determines who a reader is going to interpret as on the right side in this story, it's not something that can really be assumed or glossed over.

[vitruvian]

Well, it also makes more sense that he would have backed off the Illuminati and let them get to work if he was trying alternate sources of help and came up empty. =P

Not that I'm saying it isn't likely he tried to find help. I think it is. Just pointing out that Steve hasn't been operating on "what makes more sense" in quite some time.


I still say this would be a thoroughly nonsensical assumption on their part.

It would make as much sense as mowing through a red traffic light in an intersection every day while road work is being done on the street that runs perpendicular, and taking this to mean that you will always be safe doing this. Sure, for so long as that road is closed, you're going to be fine a foot into the intersection; or two feet; ten feet; and so on, all the way across the marked boundaries of what qualifies as the intersection.

When something solid is actually crossing through again on the lanes that run perpendicular, though, it's not going to work out so well.

We can be pretty sure that future doesn't incorporate interference from outside its own timeline until after they've actually crossed paths. Unless there are signs of "Secret Wars" that I overlooked (entirely possible).

It's not just an assumption, though, it's what they're told by their initial source of information on the Incursions, and what Reed says he believes to make sense based on his math, and what they observe through the Bridge, and what the ancient and advanced Builders believe based on their actions... if any of these sources of information were telling them that even if you destroyed an Earth, the universe that used to contain that Earth was still doomed to have suicidal stars and wink out of existence within a year or so, such that 'shading the apocalypse' was not just cowardly but pretty much fruitless, then the story needed to tell us that.

As for the future.... I would maintain that since it was the Time Gem that sent everybody to those futures, Cap alone to the furthest one, that makes it the actual future of the 616 universe, not a distinct or different timeline, for one simple reason... Infinity Gems don't work outside their own universe, so if it can get you there, it has to be the same one. And in those futures, even though they can change once our protagonists come back to the present and start messing about with additional information, somebody who looks at their history for the last however many years simply can't look back and say, "On this day, this universe was destroyed (and never recreated)", because then they wouldn't exist to be looking at the history books, any more than we could say the same about the universe having been destroyed in, say, 1000 CE.

Now, if what you're saying instead is that when you travel to the future inside a single timeline, you're essentially 'rolling forward' the date in that one universe, but not moving in time relative to folks in any other universe, or the impending Incursions, then perhaps that makes some sense... although that has some interesting implications, like if the Exiles or the Squadron Supreme or whoever were to choose that moment in their own current universe to cross over to the 616 universe, would they arrive in the present day of 2014, or in the future that Cap was 'presently' visiting? And has that always been the case, that interuniversal travelers like the Exiles might 'land' differently depending on whether Doom was taking a jaunt with the Doomlocks on? Plus, while characters like Kang and Immortus and Franklin might understand that that was how it worked... doesn't this mean future angry Hawkeye would have lived through a history where the Incursions just stopped coming the day Cap took his trip to the future, without any intervention on anybody's part? And if that's the case, what would it be that Stark screwed up such that he wants Cap to kill him? Because it wouldn't be blowing up other Earths or allowing the universe to die if the Incursions weren't happening....

[TresDias]

Yeah, your last paragraph is what I mean.