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

[exiled]

This can't be right, as the multiverse was stable for billions of years before there were any Molecule Men. Back to the drawing board!

There is no drawing board. Since it is obvious what you think is wrong. :-)

[exiled]

Indeed I don't see a problem with it just being a matter of "Killing a molecule Man is almost impossible. That has to have some serious ramifications." Especially when he now has a multiversal dimension to consider. Until this issue I probably would have argued that it is impossible to kill Molecule Man.

I wonder if Hickman will address the delay in the destruction of the universes with an incursion that Thanos and the Black Panther noticed?

[marcbret1987]

As an aside, I think its interesting the council of Reeds never discovered multiversal collapse. Incursions should have been well underway by then...

Quite true. Given that its Hickman's own story I hope this is covered at some point.

[marcbret1987]

Also worth mentioning is the big Cap - Tony reveal that Tony "knew all along" that there was no hope. This is completely ludicrous considering there was no possible way for him to know that there was no hope, and the sentence itself is nonsensical, considering we know that Doom has been doing some stuff to oppose the Beyonders and that things are going to happen with Battleworld.

I am only quoting this, but unfortunately I must say that I quite agree with you in pretty much all of the points, specially about using over-complicated language. About last point, the supposed "reveal" by Tony felt... yeah, ludicrous is the right word without resorting to things like saying its BS.

[JSY]

So every universe has a Molecule Man, and that Molecule Man will blow up the universe. We know where 616 Molecule Man is but where is 1610's?

[marcbret1987]

Looking at theoretical particle and astrophysics will, I think, explain the nature of alternate realities outside of time travel a little bit better.

In quantum mechanics, the Schrödinger wave equation explains the probabilities of a quantum particle's location and momentum. When the particle is observed, the wave equation "collapses" and the particle is no longer a wave probability, but a discrete particle.

Some scientists believe that each possibility that particle has is actually played out, but in different realities. I'm not sure if anyone has directly tied this in with the fact that the math in quantum mechanics also allows for self-contained universes to spontaneously arise.


...anyway, different choices along a given decision tree can account for alternate realities without time travel. That is essentially a "What If?" Story.

But I agree there doesn't really have to be an obvious branch point for alternate universes to arise. This could be analogous to evolutionary convergence, where two species evolved similar structures or functions but by different paths. Like bat wings and bird wings; steam punk iron man and 616 iron man

That is a very long shot. In QM there are Feynman's path integrals which are essentially a way of accounting for all the possible paths of a particle when doing calculations. The interpretation that the many different paths refer to different universes is just that, an interpretation, I would not say it naturally arises from the maths. In the context of String Theory, which I know next to nothing about, I heard that somebody interpreted the fact that you have tonnes of possible solutions as many different universes, all with its own tiny variations of the physical laws.

[Melab]

Who's looking at this as an in-universe event rather than an out-of-universe formatting of continuity?

[Biclopcicle]

I think there were indications that some of them may have discovered it, there were vague references to something similar, not to mention the story of 'crushing' a Beyonder using Sol's Anvil. It's just that escaping/stopping the Mad Celestials was more urgent at that point in time.

It's interesting that the Council of Reeds was responsible for the culling of Dooms that gets mentioned in this issue as well, though.

Yeah true there is some leeway there where they could have been dealing with it off-panel. Someone could definitely "No-prize" it in there

[Biclopcicle]

The Hickman FF story had many mysterious cloaked threads including the Council Of Reeds not bringing in 616 Reed on the truth, (note most Infinity Guantlets were missing), as well as calling them Mad Celestials who were attacking them. We really don't know the full story behind that. Even Doom never found out about Incursions when he was creating his Doom Planet with an Infinity Gauntlet.

A bridge was built so Reed could fix everything, and in his computer query findings, he strictly stuck to realities that had good outcomes concerning the Reed, Tony and Pym combination. Reed never asked the computer to see how the world ends. The council of Reeds may have come across Incursions doing similar enquiries and looking more broadly about all issues. They could have tried many ways to stop Incursions and in the process Beyonders and Ivory Kings were disturbed, as well as Celestials. For all we know the council of Reeds were destroying Earths, and there used to be millions of them. Once the Celestials killed most of the Reeds, the process stopped? The last surviving Reeds built a Sol's Anvil which was capable of destroying an Earth. We all assumed they were doing that for another purpose, but now with the benefit of hindsight, there could have been a different purpose.

Future Franklin Richards told Cap in OS that Incursions couldn't be stopped, so Franklin and the Council of Reeds may already have known that, and were sitting on that fact to not cause a panic in the Multiverse.

Definitely agree with above, good summary of Hickman's F4/FF run.

However, when they "crushed" a Beyonder, they say he was from universe (xxx)." That makes me think that a) they didn't know Beyonders were multiversal beings b) it was a child Beyonder unique to that reality or c) Hickman had not yet invented the Ivory Kings

[Biclopcicle]

That is a very long shot. In QM there are Feynman's path integrals which are essentially a way of accounting for all the possible paths of a particle when doing calculations. The interpretation that the many different paths refer to different universes is just that, an interpretation, I would not say it naturally arises from the maths. In the context of String Theory, which I know next to nothing about, I heard that somebody interpreted the fact that you have tonnes of possible solutions as many different universes, all with its own tiny variations of the physical laws.

Right. People have taken the many paths as a "many universes" perspective. But on top of that, there is a mathematical reasoning behind a multiverse. I have a manuscript that I saved, can't remember which journal it was published in. I'm not a theoretical physicist, so if anyone would like to clarify further, feel free.

My only point was that you could see how a SciFi or comics writer may get an idea fro branching realities without the use of time travel

[jackolover]

I sincerely doubt Hickman will use any of the threads from Bendis' run. Or any other writers for that matter. My impression is that thing about the time-stream being broken will be simply brushed aside as if it never happened.

So what was that Bendis wall chart stating "Infinite Futures" all about? Was that coincidence, or more likely Marvel already had Hickmans plan mapped out all along? Look at that Bendis map and tell me that isn't the end of the Marvel 616 right there, just as Hickmans done it?

[marcbret1987]

Right. People have taken the many paths as a "many universes" perspective. But on top of that, there is a mathematical reasoning behind a multiverse. I have a manuscript that I saved, can't remember which journal it was published in. I'm not a theoretical physicist, so if anyone would like to clarify further, feel free.

My only point was that you could see how a SciFi or comics writer may get an idea fro branching realities without the use of time travel

Well, I am an experimental particle physicist, so I do know some theory but of course not at that level,. Though, one thing I can say is that, given the lack of experimental constraints for these kind of theories (e.g. at the moment no one has really proposed anything that can be verified in an experiment on that front), there are tonnes of different interpretations/crazy theories. So, while somebody might have found a mathematical reasoning behind the existence of the Multiverse and published a paper about it, that doesn't mean that its true or even accepted by the rest of the theoretical community. Truly, if you search for theory papers online, you can find tonnes of WTF stuff.

About the 2nd point, yeah, sure, definitely agree with that.

[marcbret1987]

So what was that Bendis wall chart stating "Infinite Futures" all about? Was that coincidence, or more likely Marvel already had Hickmans plan mapped out all along? Look at that Bendis map and tell me that isn't the end of the Marvel 616 right there, just as Hickmans done it?

If you want to think that is the case, go ahead. Seeing Infinite futures there does not make me relate that to anything I see in Hickman's avengers run, much less the end of the Marvel 616 universe. What I see there has more to do with the plot point about the timestream being broken which he brought about in AoU. Besides, the story in which the wall appears is the one where the Avengers travelled to the future to see their kids fight against Ultron, with Kang interfering to defeat Ultron and nearly destroying the timestream already at that time, so it seems to me that it's simpler to relate it to that than to anything else.

I would also argue that Avengers #5, the comic in which that wall appears, was published around September-October 2010. Bendis would still write the Avengers regular series for a couple more years and then publish AoU in 2013. I really doubt Bendis would be aware (or anybody else for that matter) of what would be happening in 5 years. The only thing I can say is that originally AoU was supposed to release at a different time, and that this screwed with plans Bendis had, leaving the event to be the mess we all remember.

[Biclopcicle]

Well, I am an experimental particle physicist, so I do know some theory but of course not at that level,. Though, one thing I can say is that, given the lack of experimental constraints for these kind of theories (e.g. at the moment no one has really proposed anything that can be verified in an experiment on that front), there are tonnes of different interpretations/crazy theories. So, while somebody might have found a mathematical reasoning behind the existence of the Multiverse and published a paper about it, that doesn't mean that its true or even accepted by the rest of the theoretical community. Truly, if you search for theory papers online, you can find tonnes of WTF stuff.

About the 2nd point, yeah, sure, definitely agree with that.

Thanks for the input. Always appreciate a real world perspective on sci fi type stuff. Agree, the math leaves a lot of wiggle room for theorization, but doesn't make it all that likely. hopefully things like LHC will answer some of these questions

[Sangreal12]

As an aside, I think its interesting the council of Reeds never discovered multiversal collapse. Incursions should have been well underway by then...

Not too surprising. Reeds can certainly develop tunnel vision when working on something. Also, there were like 150 Reeds. With infinite multiverses, the odds of any of their earths experiencing an incursion are minuscule until the universe count is pared down. Plus Reed would need to be on Earth, but those guys spent most of their time in the pocket universe since they had no family lives.

That said, I'm not sure the council was unaware that something was going on.

The culling of Dooms as an undertaking is pretty far outside the typical behavior of Reed Richards. Certainly there were some bad seeds in the council, but I can't help but feel that most Reed's would work towards a solution that did not involve lobotomizing Doom. So what could spark this behavior?

ZZ Top Reed explains to 616 Reed that "You don't know it yet, but you'll learn that there is no greater threat in the universe than Doom -- His appetite is unmatched. He will never break. He will never yield."

If the council discovered Doom traveling the multiverse with crazy black and white ladies, seeking out Molecule Men to kill, I can imagine their reaction would not be, "Wow Victor, you're doing the right thing." It would be more along the lines of "What are you up to Victor? Killing the multiverses Owen Reeces!?! Trying to get his powers for yourself? Oh Forget it. /lobotomy collar."

This could also help explain the religion aspect of Rabum Alal and Black Swans. Doom would not only need to shroud his machinations from the beyonders, but he probably had to hide from the council of Reeds as well, so he turned himself into a myth with fervent zealous soldiers prototecting him.

Additionally, the building of a sol's hammer and using it to kill a beyonder may be evidence they were aware (of perhaps a very small part) of what was going on.

To firmly cement my crazy conspiracy theory I propose that Universe-2012 Galactus attacked that universes Earth in order to destroy it and spare the rest of the galaxy.