Original Sin #5 Spoilers

[stingray]

I guess I always figured Nick as one of the most down to earth characters in the MU, so the idea of him travelling to other dimensions and gunning down all manner of dangerous lifeforms in his special space suit and top-tier secret weapons, along with saying things like how he's "burned worlds, destabilized galaxies and dethroned gods" as if he's Earth's answer to Thanos is just ridiculous to me.

Yeah, exactly. He was always a real world spy guy, not a cosmic type of character at all. Doesn't seem to fit at all.

[Dusk]

Since he's old, he probably lied about the infinity formula and most of the Nick Fury continuity has been special lmd's taking his place while he's busy with cosmic threats.

Except he injected a version of the formula into Mockingbird to save her life, and his son was born with the formula in his blood. I would guess that he probably ran out a long time ago, since he needs to take regular doses to stop his aging. After all, he has no reason not to take any, given his responsibilities.

Yeah, exactly. He was always a real world spy guy, not a cosmic type of character at all. Doesn't seem to fit at all.

That's cause you missed all of his adventures that took place on Friday.

[harashkupo]

Except he injected a version of the formula into Mockingbird to save her life, and his son was born with the formula in his blood. I would guess that he probably ran out a long time ago, since he needs to take regular doses to stop his aging. After all, he has no reason not to take any, given his responsibilities.



That's cause you missed all of his adventures that took place on Friday.

So what happened on the weekends?

[yeah yeah]

The Skrull invasion should have been weekday and weekend work.

[aquitaine]

I was really enjoying this event up to this point. Like, a lot.

But after this issue Im not sure if I'm even going to bother any more. Fan fiction garbage nonsense completely retconing a classic character for no reason, not to mention the issue not progressing the main story in ANY meaningful way. Disappointed. .

[yet another]

Wow, this issue.

Luckily I don't really care about Nick Fury one way or another, otherwise I would probably be quite pissed with this development.

Hopefully the real story gets to continue in the next installment and this nonsense will be largely put aside. I have a feeling more "revelations" will be coming though.

[HUTHAIFA]

The art has been superb, and I am one fan who appreciates expansion. Nick being the baddest man on the planet works for me. Truly putting some imagination in his world is awesome. This is the MU.This is where Galactus makes frequent visits.We have Eternals,Deviants Atlanteans, Asgardians, and so running around, so the top spy guys list of enemies should be bigger than Hydra. What I love about this crazy comic book world, is that even though the concepts are huge, the rules remain the same, the guy with the most heart and sometimes the biggest gun wins.

[KurtW95]

Okay. Most of the stuff they did here didn't bother me. I did however, not like that they had him already to shoot Spider-Man. And at the last minute decide not to. Also, of course the age thing, which ticks me off. And still no explanation. I hope that's soon resolved and he doesn't stay this way or something worse.

[jackolover]

I wouldn't be surprise if at the end of this Bucky ends up the next man on the wall.

That's not a bad idea.

Fury has certainly been busy.

The interesting part is not that he was able to kill all those big threats to earth, even though it requires some stretch of the imagination. I think the big reveal will be how he learned of these threats in the first place. spoilers:

It seems like the Watcher must have been involved in some way to give 'the man on the wall' information on imminent threats. I don't like the idea of the Watcher consciously cooperating with such a scheme, so maybe Howard Stark or someone else found a way to covertly acquire such knowledge from the Watcher.

end of spoilers

It looks like those 2 agents who stole intel from the Watcher in the Point One, must have been Fury LMDs, and this is how Fury got intel on what Aliens were going to do what. He did it every 3 years of the life of the Marvel U from 1958 to now.

Come to think of it where was this Fury when... well actually when a lot of the things he could have handled were happening?

I think the Unseen Fury went on leave once the Super heroes showed up on the scene, because he could let them handle the Alien invasions. Fury could take care of the side weeds that were unseen, and the heroes could look after the wall, on the whole. And there were gaps of 3 years between getting a thorough intel feed from the Watcher, so he may have missed the Skrull Invasion. The other thing about that Watcher intel in the Point One, is that one agent went for a specific incident, and the other just looked at the most recent events, not going back of forward 3 years, so fury had limited intel about the Events.

From this turn of events, (the killing of the Watcher), you could conclude someone knew Unseen Fury was getting intel from the Watcher, and so wanted to stop the flow. If that is the case, he is drying up Furys intel to either get to Fury himself, or, to blind side Fury of an event soon to occur. It could also point to a rogue LMD Fury, trying to sabotage Fury prime, because he doesn't like Fury.

I think they have gone too far with Nick Fury; if we accept all he has told, it detracts from the importance of every other hero, since a single competent man with enough technology was doing their work a million times better than all of them combined.

I think we can agree, Fury couldn't do that. Once the threats began to occur at an increasing rate, and the more public the threats they were, it was wise to stay hidden and let the super heroes handle it. You could make an argument that the rise of the Super Heroes was a blessing in disguise for the Unseen Fury. Now there were more hands to do the job, and nobody still knew Fury was on the wall. It would surmise that even if the Skrull Invasion and World War Hulk did succeed, or the Age of a Ultron, that Fury would have a plan in place to do something about it. In AoU, Fury didnt though, did he?

[jackolover]

I was thinking that too, more so because of the way the 'encounters' were all loosely set up but the party all just happened to end up back together at Fury's space station because the DM did not want to wait for them to figure it out before reading out the big info dump.

While I cannot say I am not enjoying this series, for what it is, I really don't like the idea of how Fury is this cosmic enforcer. Partly because it puts him in the same class as Dark Phoenix and Thanos but also because it does not really add anything to his character. While it all fits and even answers who was protecting the Earth before superheroes showed up 14 years ago (thanks, sliding time scale) the bit with Spider-Man was odd. It kind of read like an issue of What If?, which is probably why Marvel came up with the original series in the first place.

Nice insights there.

I don't think we can put Nick Fury, the Unseen, in the same class as Thanos, or a Dark Phoenix. He was a single man who could go out hunting on a Friday, and try to clean up something looming on the horizon. He'd have no chance against Incursions for instance. He failed to identity a Skrull invasion by undetectable Skrulls, or the Phoenix swooping down from space, or the Builders doing the same thing. There are limits to his abilities when it comes to really big cosmic threats. Fury seems to be content to hide in the background and pick off a victim while the threat is still undecided.

To me, Unseen Fury is a single agent who could stave off an Alien invasion with alien bombs placed strategically. He is a last envelope, outside SWORD, but why SWORD and TIME were created, to capture sudden attacks he was unaware of. We have always suspected Nick Fury harboured secrets more than we were told. He must be. That it turns out to be this widespread is not a surprise, but the scope is a surprise. I am glad that Nick was doing this sort of stuff all along. It shows me where Nick disappeared too his whole life, and now I know this is the extent of the secrets. (maybe not). But even Woodrow McCord had to ask in the end, was it worth it? Which is a disturbing question to ask about saving the Earth. Nick Fury answered that question when he took the job, and Woodrow McCord answered that question when he gave his life to the job.

I see further answers have come about Howard Stark, who not only hunted threats alien or local for SHIELD, but who had dealings with an Alien robot about his adopted Son Tony Stark as well. Now we learn further, that Howard Stark was bankrolling Woodrow McCord in a venture of the Wall, we have no idea when it started. Was it in the War, before the War, and was there other Guardians of the Wall before Woodrow McCord as well? See, this all opens up hidden histories of stuff never touched upon about what it means to be the Earth in the MU. Yes, SHIELD stopped Galactus from Eating the Earth in the 16th Century, and Brood Invasions in the Egyptian Empire, but why did there have to be someone manning the wall in secret? You also have the portal of Thorndrake in the Secret Avengers having been in existence in 1865 so the presence of this sort of stuff has been around a long time. It just required the next Man to take up the mantle as Woodrow McCord came to the end of his tenure. And what a tenure it must have been. Did he have weapons trained on Jim Hammond in 1939, or Namor? These are things that could be answered and have yet to addressed?

I think, if this the central tenet of Original Sin, that Fury is the Unseen, Man on the Wall, that this is a worthwhile revelation in the Event. It is a really big thing, and ties to so many things that are still hidden.

[jackolover]

Fury's dying and he needs successors, and he doesn't trust any one person. So he's found a committee and is introducing them to the job.

Isn't it obvious Marvel plans a followup comic to Original Sins?

That's an interesting take on the story. I was seriously thinking Fury was meant to die in this series, because Marvel dedicated a full issue to exposing Nicks secret life, and they were going to appoint a successor. Winter Soldier would be the obvious choice, because he is an outcast, and won't be missed, and has the skills to carry out this mission.

I guess I always figured Nick as one of the most down to earth characters in the MU, so the idea of him travelling to other dimensions and gunning down all manner of dangerous lifeforms in his special space suit and top-tier secret weapons, along with saying things like how he's "burned worlds, destabilized galaxies and dethroned gods" as if he's Earth's answer to Thanos is just ridiculous to me.

As much as Fury rattles off these achievements, you can't take it as he was as effective as a Galactic God. He may have done a few of those things, but he certainly isn't capable of shooting Thanos and Galactus to death.

What I find hard to understand is that Fury can travel inter dimensionally, but SWORD can, can't they, so maybe not a problem? I would still think you would be rattled by the strange science of those other dimensions, which would give a normal human vertigo and they'd freak out.

Wow, this issue.

Luckily I don't really care about Nick Fury one way or another, otherwise I would probably be quite pissed with this development.

Hopefully the real story gets to continue in the next installment and this nonsense will be largely put aside. I have a feeling more "revelations" will be coming though.

Maybe not any new revelations. We've come 5 issues in and it looks like an inside job, by somebody who is already in front of us. It could be Fury himself that is the shooter, or maybe Fury has already appointed the next Unseen and this guy is the shooter, but I don't see it being someone else, this late in the piece. I think it could be the Winter Soldier is the Unseen, from this already.

Okay. Most of the stuff they did here didn't bother me. I did however, not like that they had him already to shoot Spider-Man. And at the last minute decide not to. Also, of course the age thing, which ticks me off. And still no explanation. I hope that's soon resolved and he doesn't stay this way or something worse.

I don't think Nick Fury realised Spideys spider sense, so that shot would never hit Spidey.

The thing about the appearance of the Heroes, is that Fury could have got intimidated by the whole scope of how many there were. Nick starts off in 1958 as the Unseen on the Wall. Next, he's the leader of a premoidal Avengers group in 1959. Then in 1961, sees the appearance of humans with super powers, and Nick overhears one species has already commented on the fact it would be harder, if super beings were on Earth. Then, as these super beings do appear on Earth, Nick is a little relieved that now he has a better chance.

[KaleRylan]

That entire flashback could have really been condensed into one page. The whole alien fight and death of McCord was worthless. And this whole cosmic assassin role for Fury really makes no sense and doesn't fit at all with anything, ever. To accept it, we have to accept that he's done a lot of loafing on the job for decades.

This is my problem with the whole thing, and really with huge retcons in general. If his whole job is to protect Earth from alien invasions and beyond, where was he during all the alien invasions that the X-men, Avengers, and FF have fought off? Dealing with other, scaaarier alien invasions?

Personally, not only do I think this makes no sense and on a thematic level undercuts literally every hero in the MU, it also strikes me as the kind of plot development that would arise out of two nine-year olds having an argument about comics

[KaleRylan]

Nice insights there.

I don't think we can put Nick Fury, the Unseen, in the same class as Thanos, or a Dark Phoenix. He was a single man who could go out hunting on a Friday, and try to clean up something looming on the horizon. He'd have no chance against Incursions for instance. He failed to identity a Skrull invasion by undetectable Skrulls, or the Phoenix swooping down from space, or the Builders doing the same thing. There are limits to his abilities when it comes to really big cosmic threats. Fury seems to be content to hide in the background and pick off a victim while the threat is still undecided.

To me, Unseen Fury is a single agent who could stave off an Alien invasion with alien bombs placed strategically. He is a last envelope, outside SWORD, but why SWORD and TIME were created, to capture sudden attacks he was unaware of. We have always suspected Nick Fury harboured secrets more than we were told. He must be. That it turns out to be this widespread is not a surprise, but the scope is a surprise. I am glad that Nick was doing this sort of stuff all along. It shows me where Nick disappeared too his whole life, and now I know this is the extent of the secrets. (maybe not). But even Woodrow McCord had to ask in the end, was it worth it? Which is a disturbing question to ask about saving the Earth. Nick Fury answered that question when he took the job, and Woodrow McCord answered that question when he gave his life to the job.

I see further answers have come about Howard Stark, who not only hunted threats alien or local for SHIELD, but who had dealings with an Alien robot about his adopted Son Tony Stark as well. Now we learn further, that Howard Stark was bankrolling Woodrow McCord in a venture of the Wall, we have no idea when it started. Was it in the War, before the War, and was there other Guardians of the Wall before Woodrow McCord as well? See, this all opens up hidden histories of stuff never touched upon about what it means to be the Earth in the MU. Yes, SHIELD stopped Galactus from Eating the Earth in the 16th Century, and Brood Invasions in the Egyptian Empire, but why did there have to be someone manning the wall in secret? You also have the portal of Thorndrake in the Secret Avengers having been in existence in 1865 so the presence of this sort of stuff has been around a long time. It just required the next Man to take up the mantle as Woodrow McCord came to the end of his tenure. And what a tenure it must have been. Did he have weapons trained on Jim Hammond in 1939, or Namor? These are things that could be answered and have yet to addressed?

I think, if this the central tenet of Original Sin, that Fury is the Unseen, Man on the Wall, that this is a worthwhile revelation in the Event. It is a really big thing, and ties to so many things that are still hidden.

I like this. But I don't think this is exactly what the writer had in mind. I DO think the writer is implying that, through technology or gumption, or whatever, that Nick Fury did deal with Thanos-level threats. It's not as much of a revelation if it's just like 'I dealt with the little stuff compared to you guys.'

But this take on it makes me feel better about the whole thing and if nothing directly contradicts it going forward, I'm going to take this as my canon for this situation. That Nick Fury, the Unseen, was a kind of last-ditch effort of resisting an insane universe, and SHIELD, SWORD, and TIME were sort of set up for the same reason, and then one day, sort of out of the blue, superbeings began to walk among us in great numbers, and everything changed. That's a version of history I can enjoy. Like I said, I don't think that's what the writer intends, but thanks to you it's how I'm taking it.

[Bucky]

I'm as big a Nick Fury fan as they come. I love the fact he is the "guiding hand" of the Marvel Universe, so to speak. That he is the ultimate super spy whose actions can be felt everywhere, but nobody even knows it. I think this is just an extension of that, but taking it to a cosmic level. I'm not a 100% on board with this, though. It seems, like many of you are saying, that it's far fetched to think that Nick has the ability to kill a planet or something like that. That just sounds silly.

I do like the idea that he tackles problems before they can develop, even if it is at a cosmic stage. I think that's somewhat reasonable and goes along with the character. Nick doesn't like to be reactionary, he likes to make it so problems don't happen at all. But perhaps they are taking it too far and they're turning Fury into this weird demigod. What is this nonsense that the bullets he's using can take out Thor? I mean, why does he have this technology, but nobody else does? I think they're pushing past common sense and reason.

I do think he's looking for a successor. I'm really on the fence if I want it to be Bucky or not. I was hoping it would be Nick Fury Jr or Coulson. I realize they're new characters, but the movie-verse often times dictates what happens in the comics. But Bucky being the "man on the wall" or even just normal Nick Fury kind of sucks because Nick Fury's character works best when he is used sparingly, I think. Especially if he's combating terrestrial threats, cosmic threats, and magic-related threats. That's a lot to do. So, fingers crossed Bucky walks away from this in-tact.

Overall, I don't want to condemn the book for ruining Fury's character, but I'm concerned. I'm worried that they're going to paint a picture of Fury that just doesn't make sense. I don't know if he's going to die, take the Watcher's place, or (and I don't see anyone suggesting this) he'll get healed up/de-aged and start kicking even more ass. I was really enjoying this series. It had all the characters I really love. Now I'll be looking forward to the next issue with real concern rather than excitement.

This is my problem with the whole thing, and really with huge retcons in general. If his whole job is to protect Earth from alien invasions and beyond, where was he during all the alien invasions that the X-men, Avengers, and FF have fought off? Dealing with other, scaaarier alien invasions?

Personally, not only do I think this makes no sense and on a thematic level undercuts literally every hero in the MU, it also strikes me as the kind of plot development that would arise out of two nine-year olds having an argument about comics

I got the feeling that what Nick has been doing is more along the lines of nipping things in the bud before they can get anywhere. I also got the feeling that there are so many problems that he can only catch a few and only before they spiral out of control. If one slips by his net, then the heroes are there to take care of it. I understand what you're saying, but I think what Nick is doing is all about preventing things from happening rather than reacting to them happening. All about early intervention.

[People Of The Earth]

The thing about the appearance of the Heroes, is that Fury could have got intimidated by the whole scope of how many there were. Nick starts off in 1958 as the Unseen on the Wall. Next, he's the leader of a premoidal Avengers group in 1959. Then in 1961, sees the appearance of humans with super powers, and Nick overhears one species has already commented on the fact it would be harder, if super beings were on Earth. Then, as these super beings do appear on Earth, Nick is a little relieved that now he has a better chance.

This is the thing that annoyed me the most with this issue: the date period.
The FF were retconned into repelling Galactus for the first time around the years 99-00's in MA#9, with the Age of Marvels starting around this same time period.
So, how does that fit continuity-wise then ?
Or is it another case of editors going AWOL on the titles/events they oversee ?