Avengers #41 - Spoilers

[TresDias]

Hmm, sounds reasonable. Quoting this post so I can easily find it again afterwords to compare with the actual turn-out.

Thanks!

I really think this is the answer. I can already hear Brevoort saying "We told everyone at the outset that Battleworld would become the new Marvel Universe -- and then they ran off in some other direction about Battleworld sitting in an empty cosmos being the status quo." Big, satisfied grin included. =P

It's actually rather clever: They gave us the answer at the beginning, but thanks to the unassuming wording and us Marvel fans doing what we do, we heard something completely different.

I will be beyond surprised if this isn't the plan.

[bango]

Hmm, sounds reasonable. Quoting this post so I can easily find it again afterwords to compare with the actual turn-out.

I think TresDias and vitruvian have cracked Hickman and Marvel's plans. I love it!

My only point of conjecture to their theory focuses on Franklin. If he's able to circumvent the Beyonders prize of allowing a single universe to grow from Battleworld, and allows each chunk of Battleworld grow into their own universes, I can see the Beyonders needing to take action in response. I think they'll remove Franklin from the new multiverse and essentially destroy the Fantastic Four as a team.

[graffiX]

Loved this issue! Ultimate Reed is such a great character.

*snip*

Start placing your bets now, people.

Yeah this is what I'm thinking will happen as well.

But my question is what is the 'status quo' post SW of let's say....the X-line (just because I'm a fan)? We know X-Men '92 and X-Men DOFP are two storylines that will be in Battleworld, so let's say X-Men '92 remains after SW. Does the new X status quo post SW begin with the X-Men '92 team (i.e. costumes, characterization up to that point) and go from there? So basically erasing everything that has happened to the X-line from 1993-2015.

I just assume they will be hitting the reset button on some franchises and they even said some fans will be upset afterwards.

[Emma's Midriff]

I learned that when you want to kill a man should not let pride in the way. Black Panther not only failed to fulfill their revenge as it was responsible for the plan's failure to stop Thanos and the other villains.

After that I doubt very much that Namor and T'Challa reach an agreement at the next meeting will be a battle to the death.

Holy crap. I hadn't realized this. BP's cowardly assassination attempt ruined the plan to take out the Cabal.

Have fun explaining that one, T'challa.

[bango]

But my question is what is the 'status quo' post SW of let's say....the X-line (just because I'm a fan)? We know X-Men '92 and X-Men DOFP are two storylines that will be in Battleworld, so let's say X-Men '92 remains after SW. Does the new X status quo post SW begin with the X-Men '92 team (i.e. costumes, characterization up to that point) and go from there? So basically erasing everything that has happened to the X-line from 1993-2015.

I just assume they will be hitting the reset button on some franchises and they even said some fans will be upset afterwards.

I think TresDias and vitrivian are suggesting that each landmass in Battleworld, areas taken from different universes, will become the seeds for the new multiverse post Battleworld. Histories of characters are not reset, but swapping of characters from different universes can occur. It's basically a Marvel Multiverse diaspora. (see Tresdias explanation below because I'm interpreting their theory differently)

It's hard to know what the status quo will be, but Marvel has repeatedly said they will not reset any histories. It does mean they can do some creative juggling across their multiverse. Our 616 mutants can invite the '92 Wolverine and Professor X to the team. Not sure if this would happen, but if it did, it would not erase the fact that in the 616 Cyclops killed Prof X, nor would it erase that Wovie is an adamantium statue. The '92s would just need to cope and learn.

[TresDias]

Well, close. I'm not sure if vitruvian agrees (though I think he will), but I'm suggesting there will only be the one universe, but that the different pieces of Battleworld will expand to create it -- so, yeah, still something of a multiverse diaspora, just with everyone sharing one universe.

You're correct about histories not being reset or merged, though. That way, Marvel gets to avoid being stuck with the "reboot" label since that's apparently a bad word.

[bango]

Well, close. I'm not sure if vitruvian agrees (though I think he will), but I'm suggesting there will only be the one universe, but that the different pieces of Battleworld will expand to create it -- so, yeah, still something of a multiverse diaspora, just with everyone sharing one universe.

You're correct about histories not being reset or merged, though. That way, Marvel gets to avoid being stuck with the "reboot" label since that's apparently a bad word.

ah... I think I'm stuck on the fact that I want to multiverse to expand again. I'll adhere to your theory still with the hope that the multiverse will return.

[jphamlore]

Well, close. I'm not sure if vitruvian agrees (though I think he will), but I'm suggesting there will only be the one universe, but that the different pieces of Battleworld will expand to create it -- so, yeah, still something of a multiverse diaspora, just with everyone sharing one universe.

You're correct about histories not being reset or merged, though. That way, Marvel gets to avoid being stuck with the "reboot" label since that's apparently a bad word.

As shown with what Marvel did with Peter Parker and Mary Jane's marriage, Marvel has a lot of ways to avoid saying the word reboot. As long as the story can in some way be traced back to the original character, Marvel does not consider it a reboot.

Therefore I must conclude Marvel could do practically anything with Secret Wars and not consider it a reboot.

I suggest the surgery on the characters line-wide will wind up being surprisingly modest. For one thing, Marvel is already drastically altering characters such as who is Thor and what is the real origin of Scarlet Witch and Quicksilver without having to have any help at all from a Secret Wars. Also Marvel tends to spread out changes over multiple crossovers so they can sell more books. At the maximum I think something will be done to the Fantastic Four and possibly to Doom. The X-Men I think will be left alone and almost be an afterthought, because there is no indication Hickman is that involved changing the status quo of the major X-Men characters, ever.

[EuphemismForSex]

T'Challa made the typical super villain mistake (not saying that he is a super villain but that he fell into the same pitfall they usually make). He placed a hero in a death trap then began monologuing.

Of course it was going to fail.

Good, then he can stab Namor again.

[jphamlore]

As an example of how modest the Secret War changes might be, it would appear that at least the Ultimates and 616 Universes are being merged. So replace the Odinson with Ultimate Thor? No need. Leave Ultimate Thor in the Negative Zone and let him be discovered by the new Fantastic Four. And leave the big changes to Asgard(ia) for Marvel's usual timetable of pushing writers to helm main event crossovers, in this case, this being Jason Aaron's turn. Let the next much more modest crossover be Jason Aaron's Malekith / Dario Agger Ragnarok attack on Asgard(ia) and Midgard.

[jphamlore]

I think TresDias and vitruvian have cracked Hickman and Marvel's plans. I love it!

My only point of conjecture to their theory focuses on Franklin. If he's able to circumvent the Beyonders prize of allowing a single universe to grow from Battleworld, and allows each chunk of Battleworld grow into their own universes, I can see the Beyonders needing to take action in response. I think they'll remove Franklin from the new multiverse and essentially destroy the Fantastic Four as a team.

I can only add my additional applause for the splendid synthesis of vitruvian and TresDias of what Marvel may intend with Batteworld. Well done!

[rukkis]

Well, close. I'm not sure if vitruvian agrees (though I think he will), but I'm suggesting there will only be the one universe, but that the different pieces of Battleworld will expand to create it -- so, yeah, still something of a multiverse diaspora, just with everyone sharing one universe.

You're correct about histories not being reset or merged, though. That way, Marvel gets to avoid being stuck with the "reboot" label since that's apparently a bad word.

Love this theory. A possible twist on it is that the GD does not exist and this is a natural repeating phenomena. The expansion of Battleworld into the new universe would be akin to the big bang. Every time travel, etc branches of a new universe until the multiverse reaches saturation. At that point the incursions begin. That's why time travel is so dangerous as stated in AoU. The Celestials could even be the survivors from the last Battleworld.

[bango]

Love this theory. A possible twist on it is that the GD does not exist and this is a natural repeating phenomena. The expansion of Battleworld into the new universe would be akin to the big bang. Every time travel, etc branches of a new universe until the multiverse reaches saturation. At that point the incursions begin. That's why time travel is so dangerous as stated in AoU. The Celestials could even be the survivors from the last Battleworld.

When Marvel first announce Battleworld, I also felt like the incursions were a reverse big bang of sorts. Eventually, the collapse would give way to a new big bango and the 616 universe (it will always have that designation) would expand and birth new universes along the way. I think vitruvian and TresDias have a solid theory, so I'm sticking with theirs for now.

Also, Celestials as the victors of the previous contraction/Battleworld is a great idea.

[Braun Rodman]

But did even this issue show us the Earthless universe immediately ceasing to exist with its Earth? I didn't think so. Certainly blowing up the other Earth seems to remain an option, at least for buying time, since they have time on Earth-616 for Reed to run down everything the Illuminati have been trying for the last eight months, so clearly that universe didn't immediately crumble.

I wonder if the action will come back to the Multiversal Avengers and Strange and the Black Priests in time for Thor and the others to be present on Earth-616 to get sucked into Battleworld. Or would the Black Priests' little haven in the white void between universes remain viable after the last Incursion, so they could enter Battleworld in their own time from there



I think you're being too charitable to the Galactic Council in terms of how charitable they'd be with the evacuation. They were already talking about Earth being more trouble than its worth before Infinity (never mind that Gladiator at least should know that without Earth mutants, the M'Kraan Crystal would have eaten everything because of the Shi'ar emperor he used to serve), so they'd have been just as likely to just write the population off as SOL in a Vogon-like way. But still, when it seemed that 'shading the apocalypse' bought you at least a few years of extra life for the rest of the cosmos, this response would have made sense. Now that the clock seems to be ticking faster, it no longer really does.

I'll say again, though, I will be ticked if Hickman never bothers to reveal how the Earthless universes are still dying, especially now that they seem to be doing it so quickly. Are they suffering a variant version of the Incursions? Are they just accelerating madly towards heat death and their natural end*, with suicidal stars only the first symptom (even though we've only seen that so far in a universe that's kept its Earth)? Is the Great Destroyer just batting cleanup with an Ultimate Nullifier?

*I find this option kind of intriguing. Consider, if the rate of entropy and therefore the passage of time sped up equally for everything and everyone within a given universe, so that the universe got to heat death and the end in what would look like hours or days to an outside observer, could that mean that the inhabitants actually got to live out all that time, so that from their perspective the universe lived its normal life span? Generations winking in and out in the blink of an eye, stars going through their life cycles, everything winding down at the same rate?

very late to the thread on this dunno if it's been talked about more but in an interview about Multiversity Morrison kinda gave a wink and a nod saying he needed to get his comic out or Hickman would jump him...so maybe you're right and it involves hypertime and each universes realative time is sped up to end when their earth is destroyed

[Knives]

Anyone else excited to see the look on T'challa's face when he realizes how badly he screwed up?

I'm certainly hehe.

I will not go into the merits of the fight between them to not initiate a discussion among fans Avengers and X-mens fans but the two have committed terrible mistakes and betrayed the trust of friends. Honestly the two are very similar and not only because both are kings.

We can not forget Black Bolt.

T'Challa made the typical super villain mistake (not saying that he is a super villain but that he fell into the same pitfall they usually make). He placed a hero in a death trap then began monologuing.

Of course it was going to fail.

You are correct in fact we always doubt deaths in comics but for some reason I really believed it was the end of Namor perhaps because I believed it was a perfect trap.