Secret Wars #5 Review (w/SPOILERS)

[Omega Alpha]

Very Morrison in your thinking. I would almost think that after reading Multiverity but Hickman hasn't given as much meta in his hints as Morrison did. I am also not sure would allow Hickman to make meta statements on their company while Morrison just does what he wants. But it's an interesting thought and very creative

The editors are very unlikely to notice he's making a meta statement, they let obvious mistakes pass by.

It's certainly a fun idea, but it does require Doom to be wrong about the Beyonders being linear in time, because what with flashbacks, in media res, time travel stories, retcons short of reboot, and so on, from the perspective of characters in the fiction, the creators of that fiction are anything but linear if you think about it.

But they CAN'T travel in time. They can make the story travel in time, the characters, the universe, etc, but the editors themselves cannot.

[Ursalink]

I have to say, I'm mad with this issue because I wanted to see where are all the survivors that Strange scattered through the planet. I really want to know where are the survivors:

1º) The Good Guys:
+ Mr Fantastic:
+ Black Panther: In Egyptia, with Namor.
+ Captain Marvel: In Bar Sinister.
+ Star-Lord: I guess he's in Manhattan, in 616's territory.
+ Cyclops/Phoenix: Killed by Doom, but who said he can't reborn?
+ Spider-Man (Peter Parker):
+ Spider-Man (Miles Morales): In Manhattan, in 1610's territory.
+ Thor (Jane Foster): In Doomgard, classic strategy of hiding a tree in the forest. I guess she will appear in "Thors" and she will try to turn the Thors against Doom somehow.

2º) The Cabal:
+ The Maker:
+ Namor: In Egyptia, with Black Panther.
+ Black Swan: In Doomstadt. Too close to Doom, don't you think?
+ Thanos: The Shield.
+ Terrax:
+ Proxima Midnight:
+ Maximus:
+ Corvus Glaive:

A few things that doesn't fit:
+ Honestly, putting Namor and Black Panther together? It will be a miracle if they don't kill each other or make Doom realize where they are instantly.
+ Thanos in the Shield, I guess he's the same bad guy from the "Siege" collection. Or is he the same one from New Xandar? I'm confused.

Now, I want help to figure where the other ones are. I only have one idea:
+ Spider-Man (Peter Parker) must be in Arachnia, probably to gather his old allies from "Spider-Verse".

Boy, this is really confusing.

[vitruvian]

The editors are very unlikely to notice he's making a meta statement, they let obvious mistakes pass by.



But they CAN'T travel in time. They can make the story travel in time, the characters, the universe, etc, but the editors themselves cannot.

From the characters' perspective, they absolutely can, though. They can go to any past point in Doom's story any time they want, so they could stop him from messing with the Molecule Men in the past if they so chose. They can even change the established past of any character. That they are linear in their own lives in the real world is no disadvantage to them in dealing with fictional characters like Doom.

[jackolover]

It wouldn't work, though, since there are far more than 22 universes represented on Battleworld.

I was referring to the 'No!' part of the post.

[dzub]

Yeah, but it isn't like there's been a ton of action so far. After issue 1, Hickman has spent a lot of time on exposition and interpersonal conflict.

I'd say the amount of action so far has been alright considering the tone of the story.
Issue 1 was all action.Issues 2-4 had their moments too...

speaking of Morrison, i find he's a good events writer.
FC, Multiversity all the issues were good enough to read it on its own.

SW#5 will definitely work great in trade but to wait a month and a half for an issue solely centered around Doom and his family? Nope sorry.

[JamJams]

Did we get an answer to why the multiverse suddenly went from hundreds of thousands of universes to twelve

The Beyonders killing all the abstracts and the Living Tribunal is what crunched the universes.

[jphamlore]

Both Strange and Molecule Man have told Doom to his face that his 8 year run as a god running Battleworld may be coming to an end. And look at the last pages, it obvious to me what is being shown in the art is Marvel is announcing loud and clear the era of Doom as Marvel's top villain is over. The new few years, at least through the next two Avengers movies, will be another era of Thanos as the top villain.

[Iron Maiden]

Both Strange and Molecule Man have told Doom to his face that his 8 year run as a god running Battleworld may be coming to an end. And look at the last pages, it obvious to me what is being shown in the art is Marvel is announcing loud and clear the era of Doom as Marvel's top villain is over. The new few years, at least through the next two Avengers movies, will be another era of Thanos as the top villain.

Maybe for the movies but he really hasn't had that much of a presence in the comics. He simply lacks the versatility. He works on the cosmic level but is he going to show in a Spider-Man story in the Thanos copter again?

[snark^]

The event is called Secret Wars. I'm pretty sure everyone expected fighting. Would be nice to see some.

That would have been 'Secret Fights'. There's more to war than just individuals and units lining up and happy-slapping each other. There's politics, deception, manoeuvring of forces, spying, more deception, misdirection, etc. We're getting mountains of fisticuffs, zapping and MODOK in all the tie-in minis, but it looks like Hickman is keeping the main book for all the stuff that drives all the conflicts. There's nothing wrong with that.

[jphamlore]

Maybe for the movies but he really hasn't had that much of a presence in the comics. He simply lacks the versatility. He works on the cosmic level but is he going to show in a Spider-Man story in the Thanos copter again?

Dan Slott is apparently going in the direction of making Peter Parker the next Tony Stark and upping Parker's game. Knowing nothing of the story-line, this suspiciously seems to me like Slott has realized that Parker had to be upgraded to become a peer to villains such as Norman Osborn, and I suppose Doom, or the Maker playing the role of the new Doom.

[Conway]

Honestly the best part about the recent Marvel events is that they are making z-list villains so important. They took Orb and Owen Reese from nobodies to top threats in the universe without taking away from other heroes, villains, or their past history.

[Master of Sound]

Does anyone have a cleu on who those stone figures are at the wall where Thanos is?

[Spideyparker75]

The funny thing about people saying it's boring or slow or an easy issue to skip is that, once this is collected, it'll probably read fantastic and nobody will notice this section was slow. The trials of writers writing for the collected editions. :/

I hate to say it but unfortunately a lot of series across the board are ultimately written with the trade in mind. Which leads sadly to issues that dont read well on their own but are great as part of the bigger picture.

[The Fury]

Correct, Secret Wars.

That would have been 'Secret Fights'. There's more to war than just individuals and units lining up and happy-slapping each other. There's politics, deception, manoeuvring of forces, spying, more deception, misdirection, etc. We're getting mountains of fisticuffs, zapping and MODOK in all the tie-in minis, but it looks like Hickman is keeping the main book for all the stuff that drives all the conflicts. There's nothing wrong with that.

I'm basing it on the original Secret Wars, it was secret because only those involved knew about it. But no, that is true and the tie ins. I'd like to see a bit more in the main book is all. I'm sure we will in coming issues, a good Phoenix Doom showdown would have been great due to what Phoenix is but that was reduced to a rant of mutant supremacy and 'Snap'.

[The Fury]

There is another way to think of the Beyonders that I think Hickman has hinted at even in the most recent issue of Secret Wars. The Beyonders are actually meant to represent the creators at Marvel. I posted this theory in another thread but I'm putting it below. (NOTE: I'm sorry for the length. I wanted to connect it through a link but I'm not very tech savvy and I just wasted 20 minutes trying to figure out how to do it without success. New to the boards so I'm sorry if this is bad etiquette.)

...//...

If you choose to interpret Secret Wars in this way then the series ironically becomes the opposite of what so many people thought Marvel was doing. Not only is Secret Wars not a reboot, it is actually a refutation of that idea. The creators may be trying to reboot the universe but the characters refuse to go along. Consider what Cyclops says in SW 1: "You can't kill an idea. It always comes back. Resurrected. Or reborn...into a different form." That pretty much sums up what is happening to the MU right now. (End of original post)

Now that SW5 is out I think there is further evidence to support this theory. Here is the Molecule Man's description of the Beyonders: "They built whole universes. Random ideas given form. They tested them. They twisted life into every shape possible, they pushed it as far as it could go... And then they got bored with life and started loving the idea of death. Sometimes you've tinkered all you can...and the only thing left to do is to tear it all down and start over."

I'd be interested to hear what everyone else thinks. It could be I am reading too much into what Hickman is doing. However, when you add it all up I think this interpretation is definitely a possibility. Thoughts?

By that idea, he is representing the creators at Marvel as malevolent beings? Bit harsh.

The Cyclops line about an idea into a different form worries me however. If you take the analogy that Beyonders are representation of the Marvel writers and artists, editors, whoever. An idea created by One Above All (Lee and Kirby) was the X-men. In the early 2000s instead of rebooting the universe, starting again, Marvel tried a new approach, they created the Ultimate line of comics, an entire new universe with the same characters but slightly different. This works with your analogy. What worries me is what happens after all this, if the Beyonders do represent creators then considering the characters are still there, so are the Beyonders. If you consider things with be 'in a different form', it means the characters we like ARE actually dead and what we get after SW will be a dodgy amalgam of those characters instead of the ones we actually like.

It's some clever thinking, mind you. Although I like the idea of simplicity in comics writing.

Sadly, I think this story has a lot of plot holes (like Living Tribunal meant to be the embodiment of the Multiverse, no LT, no multiverse). I think this is too complicated, too many variables, Beyonders creating universes from scratch is a bit far beyond say the creation of the Savage Land. The scale is off, if they could create entire universes and play with them, why create something so small just to study evolution? They have entire universes to do that.




... cut down your post a bit to fit.