[SPOILERS] Incursion theories

[Swamp Thing 2099]

Rabum Alal is Herr Totenkopf. He's the Wizard of Oz. Whoever set all this in motion -- Isaac Newton, probably -- has been dead for some time and everyone else is carrying on in his name. He's dead, because everything dies, and the multiverse is dying and ideas are dying.

The Avengers have been fighting to stop a dead man for a very long time.

And there's no stopping what's been set in motion.

Additionally, the Rogue Planet will become Battleworld.

[Rosebunse]

Rabum Alal is Herr Totenkopf. He's the Wizard of Oz. Whoever set all this in motion -- Isaac Newton, probably -- has been dead for some time and everyone else is carrying on in his name. He's dead, because everything dies, and the multiverse is dying and ideas are dying.

The Avengers have been fighting to stop a dead man for a very long time.

And there's no stopping what's been set in motion.

Additionally, the Rogue Planet will become Battleworld.

This is one of my favorite theories. It would make the whole thing so senseless and hopeless because then there's no one to fight.

[RandyMcDonald]

This is a very impressive analysis. One point, though.

5. Do the O5 X Men have something to do with this?
Yes, kind of. I think what happened to them was that when Beast took the O5 out of their original timeline (in All New X-Men v1 #1 published on 1/2013), he created a new universe, which is the 2nd incursion in New York, after the Wakanda incursion. Beast notices that the Statue of Liberty has been replaced by a statue of Magneto, which is something that is very possible in a world where the O5 X-Men disappear. Because this Earth is destroyed in New Avengers #5 (published on 6/2013), when Xaviar tries to send the O5 back to the past during Battle of the Atom in Uncanny X-Men #13 (published on 12/2013), it fails because Earth has already been destroyed in that universe.

The O5 couldn't be returned to their original timeline via the time machine that brought them to the present day, but Raze was able to use it to visit their native time. (Or was he telling the truth?)

Again, an impressive analysis.

[krazijoe]

It's Stan Lee.

[vitruvian]

This is a very impressive analysis. One point, though.



The O5 couldn't be returned to their original timeline via the time machine that brought them to the present day, but Raze was able to use it to visit their native time. (Or was he telling the truth?)

Again, an impressive analysis.

Except they're not from an alternate universe, but the actual past of Earth-616. Were that not the case, the fates of Tyke and modern-day Cyke would not be causally linked, as they've been shown to be.

[vitruvian]

so carol and beast accidentally killed a whole universe trying to fight the phoenix? lmao, i'm not surprised.

Unlikely that that was it.

1) Reed has mentioned several times that the initiating event happened on an alternate Earth. Not just an alternate universe, but specifically Earth, therefore the Incursions always having their collision point on Earth.

2) When discussing the risks of the anti-Phoenix Force gambit, it was mentioned that it could nip a newly emerging universe, i.e., one still going through the Big Bang and/or inflationary period, in the bud. Such a universe would not have an Earth within it, as Earth did not form until billions and billions of years later.

3) Even if it did, there would be no event within that universe that kicked things off, and the attempt to stop the PF took place nowhere near Earth.

4) If the Great Destroyer is an actual person, then Hickman has stated it's not somebody we've seen before. An alternate Hank McCoy might qualify, but not the one from Earth-616.

[jiazhouhuaqiao]

This is a very impressive analysis. One point, though.



The O5 couldn't be returned to their original timeline via the time machine that brought them to the present day, but Raze was able to use it to visit their native time. (Or was he telling the truth?)

Again, an impressive analysis.

Xaviar and Raze come from the 616 future, so they are returned to the 616 future which still exists. Remember that the Jean Grey they have with them is the O5 Jean Grey that never returned to the past. So they aren't coming from the timeline that Beast took the O5 X-Men from. The O5 X-Men couldn't be sent back to the Earth they came from (which was destroyed in the 2nd Incursion), but Raze could be send to the future because that is still 616 and still exists.

There could be a different reason why Cyclops and O5 Cyclops are linked.

Also, *if* Hank is the cause and linked to O5 Hank, then that is one possible solution to the crisis...

[jiazhouhuaqiao]

Unlikely that that was it.

1) Reed has mentioned several times that the initiating event happened on an alternate Earth. Not just an alternate universe, but specifically Earth, therefore the Incursions always having their collision point on Earth.

2) When discussing the risks of the anti-Phoenix Force gambit, it was mentioned that it could nip a newly emerging universe, i.e., one still going through the Big Bang and/or inflationary period, in the bud. Such a universe would not have an Earth within it, as Earth did not form until billions and billions of years later.

3) Even if it did, there would be no event within that universe that kicked things off, and the attempt to stop the PF took place nowhere near Earth.

4) If the Great Destroyer is an actual person, then Hickman has stated it's not somebody we've seen before. An alternate Hank McCoy might qualify, but not the one from Earth-616.

Not too get all word lawyer here but...

Reed states a fact that on an alternate Earth, an event cause the early death of one of these universes. This actually has happened many, many times- each time the Ultimate Nullifier is used, for instance. Ultimate Reed stopping the Galaktus Swarm is an example. This causes the multiverse to contract. However, maybe this isn't what causes the crisis. What causes the crisis (I think) is the change to 616's timeline leading to Worldcore creating the super singularity. This explains why Earth becomes the incursion focal point, causing universes to be destroyed by colliding Earths. Perhaps Worldcore is an agent of Oblivion, or perhaps Worldcore was unknowingly corrupted by Oblivion (Maelstrom created a similar singularity, and this ties to Shield because Leonid is an inhuman/ deviant hybrid like Maelstrom).

There are also two ideas that are linked. The Romanov AI tells Natasha that ideas are dying:

AVENGERS v5 #31:
ROMANOV AI: People, and more importantly ideas, are dying.

This could be referring to the cosmic Abstracts such as Living Tribunal, Infinity/ Eternity and Death/ Oblivion. We also have many examples of the idea that Earth is on the verge of cosmic ascension (such as The White Event) which will happen once humanity merges with AI (referred to in Secret Avengers as the Singularity). So perhaps the reason why Worldcore wants to perfect itself by purging Planet Ultron is once it becomes perfect, it will ascend into being a cosmic Abstract, perhaps replacing one of the previous cosmic Abstracts. Worldcore refers to itself as an idea. This ties to Secret Avengers and the conclusion of the Descendants storyline. Hammond (The Torch) destroyed the Orb of Necromancy because he felt it was wrong for the Singularity to occur by eliminating humanity:

Secret Avengers v1 #37:
HAMMOND: Not like this. We will not erase humanity to write our future.

We have also many other references to the cosmic Abstracts, such as Stark finding the Living Tribunal's M-Body in New Avengers, and Black Swan and other agents claiming to serve "necessity", which may be a reference to Eternity. So one of the cosmic Abstracts, perhaps Infinity or Death, is dying, and Worldcore seeks to take its place. Or maybe the goal of collapsing the multiverse is to reduce the Living Tribunal to a single universe allowing the Tribunal itself to be destroyed and replaced. Maybe the endgame is to collapse the two timelines, one culminating with Worldcore and the other with an ascended Franklin, and then Franklin and Worldcore merge to birth a new cosmic Abstract.

[graffiX]

Wow, great write up! Thanks for taking the time to research all of this and put down your thoughts.

Although someone mentioned earlier, and I agree that this is all Hickman-contained. It would be cool to think that Bendis and Remender helped (albeit in a small way) to Hickman's epic ball of yarn, but I think that is giving them too much credit. It would take a lot of collaboration between all of them and I just don't see that happening.

However, if Hickman is just taking those stories by those writers (and others) and making them fit into his overall story.....then wow. He would be like the GOAT of comic writers.

[Tazpocalapse]

Great post. Do you think that the Earth(s) that were destroyed in the Uncanny Avengers run factors into any of this?

[ThiefHookUps]

Other than Ultimates, Secret Warriors, Fantastic Four, and FF, my reading of most of these comics has been minimal and I'm not looking forward to Secret War at all, but I thoroughly enjoyed reading your theories of the incursions. It's damned impressive that you were able to parse the relevant data from all of these different issues. Are you a fast reader? This was really great fun to read. I'm looking forward to applying what you've included here with the way things play out. And the subsequent posts from other members have been fun too so thank you for posting this ..er.. post!

Also, I got a good laugh out of how after you reread over a hundred issues, quoted, analyzed, and theorized relevant snippets of writings within them, and typed it all up to in a document so long it had to be done in multiple posts solely for discussion on this forum, that somebody still had to post a single sentence correcting you on one minor naming error. And it wasn't even your error since it was in the actual book. Good stuff.

[jiazhouhuaqiao]

Great post. Do you think that the Earth(s) that were destroyed in the Uncanny Avengers run factors into any of this?

I think Remender's Deathloks are going to be a part of the endgame, and possibly Kang, possibly Fantomex, possibly elements from the Otherworld story. Hopefully the Twins will be back as well.

I don't know if it's a coincidence or not, but we have had three Darwin bubbles now: The World (where Fantomex was made, also where AI research was conducted by Brian Bradock's father James to recreate The Torch's technology), Archangel's Tabula Rasa, and Ultimate Reed's City of Children.

[Iron Maiden]

Do you guys think we will see an appearance of the Council of Reeds?

will the Illuminati ask for their help?

Unless they formed a new one, most of the Council were killed by the Mad Celestials. There were a lot of corpses around their Citadel when Doom picked up his Infinity Gauntlets. Four escaped through their Bridge to Earth 616. IIRC two of them merged to become the new Supreme Intelligence and one was killed in the follow up attack by the Mad Celestials while Doom survived. I think one was killed by the Universal Inhumans. Now I have to go back and check on that!

Since the other Reeds were lobotomizing all the Doom's they came across, I wonder if that could have accelerated the rate of the incursions too, along with the loss of any of the Council members whose Franklins had not been born yet.

[Montressor]

Fascinating thread...I admit to not having read the entire series, but this thread has really piqued my interest (I employ a similar storytelling style in the writing I do on the net). If I understand correctly--beings like the original Human Torch actually have their origins in something much bigger and grander in scale? I always found it difficult to swallow that such a complex android could be built in 1939 (though I love the concept, he's my favorite Marvel character).

[JSY]

Black Swan serves Rabum Alal and we know Rabum Alal is the Great Destroyer who caused the collapse of the universe to begin. Do we have any evidence that he (it?) is still alive?

We know Rabum Alal started the great destruction process, but logically, to survive it, he either had to do so from outside his universe or do it from within and be capable of surviving the destruction of his universe. Since we know the destruction started on Earth, it's likely he had to be in that universe and on Earth, though not impossible that he destroyed it from the area outside his universe.

What if the Swans are continuing the work of Rabum Alal, who started the great destruction and died doing so?