The passage of time in the Marvel Universe

[Slimybug]

I know that this can be seen as something of a pointless issue, as an actual timeline to the MU doesn't mean a lot to some. I remember watching Joe Quesada in person talk about how Franklin Richards was just never going to grow up. But I'd still like to see if there's any sense that can be made of the MU timeline, and see if anyone has any ideas on how much time has passed in the real-world-55 years since FF#1

So here's what I got...

1961 Nov. - Fantastic Four #1 - Johnny is stated to be 16.

1962-1963 - Amazing Fantasy #15 & Amazing Spider-Man #1 - Around this time, Peter is supposed to be 15, which makes him at least 1 year younger than Johnny, depending on how much time passed between these 3 issues.

1963 Sept. - X-Men #1 - Cyclops, Jean Grey, Beast, and Angel are stated to be 18 at this time, while Iceman is 16.


1965 Sept. - Amazing Spider-Man #28 - Peter graduates high school, beginning college 3 issues/months later, in December. So more or less, it seems the comics have been in real time up to now. But Peter stays in college for a long time.

1966 May - Fantastic Four #50 - Johnny Storm begins college. It was previously stated that he had delayed college due to being in the Fantastic Four. If this is still real-time, and he's 1 year older than Peter, that means he put it off for two years, but given how time began to be compressed after Peter started college, it's probably best to state one year, and the 5 months between him and Peter starting could be like a couple weeks.

1968 Nov. - Fantastic Four Annual #6 - Birth of Franklin Richards, and of continuity problems forevermore.

1978 Oct. - Amazing Spider-Man #185 - Peter graduates college, making the past 13 years condensed into 4.


And that's all I got for now. Because I'm not up to date on modern comics, I don't even know how old Franklin Richards is supposed to be. So anything that further gives evidence of concrete amounts of time passing would be awesome.

[Wiccan]

Marvel's passage of time doesn't make any sort of sense at all tbh. Better to just not think that much about it.

[MichaelC]

There is no rhyme or reason to it. Characters even become younger when the plot requires it. They are all whatever age the story needs them to be.

[ZNOP]

I know that this can be seen as something of a pointless issue, as an actual timeline to the MU doesn't mean a lot to some. I remember watching Joe Quesada in person talk about how Franklin Richards was just never going to grow up. But I'd still like to see if there's any sense that can be made of the MU timeline, and see if anyone has any ideas on how much time has passed in the real-world-55 years since FF#1

So here's what I got...

1963 Sept. - X-Men #1 - Cyclops, Jean Grey, Beast, and Angel are stated to be 18 at this time, while Iceman is 16.

In X-Men #1 Xavier does state that Bobby was sixteen yrs old -- but, where in said book was the ages of the other students actually mentioned?

[Mike_Murdock]

Some characters are allowed to grow up, others are not. It depends on what they want to do. The passage of time doesn't progress constantly for all characters and it's not worth expecting it to.

That being said, one that bothers me is that Luna (Crystal's daughter) is apparently younger than her cousin Ahura (Medusa's daughter) even though she was born first. At least families should be consistent (like Franklin and Valeria are).

[Kusanagi]

If you're a teenager you age waaaaaay faster than an adult.

If you're a kid you will either be eternally stuck as a kid or suffer time travel shenanigans.

If you're adult you're in that nebulous Mid 20s - late 30s and never seem to age.

[Darth Phoenix]

Julie powers 5th grade with Franklin about 6 or 7

power pack.jpg

julie power is now like 17 and Franklin pre secret wars is 7 to 9 at at this time total BS that has been annoying me for decades

julie power.jpg

[nitake92]

It's ALWAYS best to think that Franklin Richard or that mutant girl from Worsts X-Man Ever is responsible for the wacky passage of time.

You know...JUST once I'd like to see some sort of crisis that puts everyone in the Marvel U into the age they WOULD be if they aged normally starting from when they were first published.( Like that world Ben Grimm went to once in an FF annual)

[WebLurker]

Wasn't there a recent comic that suggested that reality is constantly rewriting itself to create the floating timeline/comic book time (something to do with important events being "weighted" so they get dragged forward in time, as if Spider-Man was originally bit by the spider in the '60s, per the original comic, but that event, and Spider-Man's history, is constantly shifted into forward, so now, that same event was in the late '90s/early 2000s)?

[Digifiend]

Yeah, that was in Ultimates #5.


Though on average, the timescale is roughly four real world years to one in the comics. So the Fantastic Four got their powers 15 years ago.
Here's how it's worked out: http://marvel.wikia.com/wiki/Glossary:Sliding_Timescale
That ignores Secret Wars though, so another year probably needs adding now.

[Loki]

Some characters are allowed to grow up, others are not. It depends on what they want to do. The passage of time doesn't progress constantly for all characters and it's not worth expecting it to.

That being said, one that bothers me is that Luna (Crystal's daughter) is apparently younger than her cousin Ahura (Medusa's daughter) even though she was born first. At least families should be consistent (like Franklin and Valeria are).

Unless something has radically changed about Ahura in a recent story I haven't heard about, Ahura is Medusa's son, not daughter. As for their aging, who has claimed Ahura is older? If a comic has actually stated that, then the writer and editors messed up. However, if it is just how they have been drawn, then it comes down to kids maturing at different rates, and doubly so when dealing with ones who have Inhuman genes.

Julie powers 5th grade with Franklin about 6 or 7

power pack.jpg

julie power is now like 17 and Franklin pre secret wars is 7 to 9 at at this time total BS that has been annoying me for decades

julie power.jpg

In the picture in question, Katie Power was 5 (her age had been explicitly stated), and Franklin was 4 - Katie didn't like Franklin at first, and taunted him for being a baby because he was younger than she was, but her siblings countered this by pointing out he wasn't really much younger. At this point, Franklin had been around in the real world for about 16-17 years (debuted at the end of 1968, joined Power Pack in 1985), so doing a 4 real years = 1 Marvel year worked pretty well.

Julie Power was 10 at the time she got her powers. She was 17 when she joined the Loners - her still being a minor was a plot point. That was 2007, 23 years after her debut. By the 4 to 1 rule of thumb, that should only be 5.75 years, not 7, but it is a loose rule, plus we can fudge a little - she might have been nearly 11 when she got her powers, and only just 17 in Loners, moving it closer to 6 years having passed. Alex was 12 when he debuted, and was 18-19 when he joined the Future Foundation. Jack was 7, so he would have been 13-14 when all of Power Pack turned up in Fantastic Four a few years ago, while Katie would be 11-12. In both cases, their depiction on the cover fits well enough with those ages.
e8751a60fb7f81054deb95449bb52f82.jpg

As for Franklin, he'd be around 10-11 in that image, which doesn't seem too much of a stretch, especially when you factor in both how much variation there can be in the appearance of kids of that age, and that Franklin has been aged to adulthood and deaged, meaning his chronological age and physical age don't necessarily match.

[Mike_Murdock]

Unless something has radically changed about Ahura in a recent story I haven't heard about, Ahura is Medusa's son, not daughter.

Damn it, I don't know how I screwed that up. Son, not daughter.

As for their aging, who has claimed Ahura is older? If a comic has actually stated that, then the writer and editors messed up. However, if it is just how they have been drawn, then it comes down to kids maturing at different rates, and doubly so when dealing with ones who have Inhuman genes.

It's about how they're drawn, yeah, but it's pretty dramatic of a difference. And I'm talking pre-Secret Wars. The time travel shenanigans post obviously justify an age difference then. Leaving aside the art, the fact that Ahura was selected to fight because he's old enough while his cousin was left behind is either a comment on age, an odd sexism thing from a culture that doesn't tend to do that, or maybe a comment on one being the crown-prince, but it certainly seemed to be an age thing:

AhuraLuna.jpg

Hell, I think an argument could be made that Luna is getting younger post-Secret Wars:

AhuraLuna 2.jpg

[JKtheMac]

Yeah, that was in Ultimates #5.


Though on average, the timescale is roughly four real world years to one in the comics. So the Fantastic Four got their powers 15 years ago.
Here's how it's worked out: http://marvel.wikia.com/wiki/Glossary:Sliding_Timescale
That ignores Secret Wars though, so another year probably needs adding now.

The editors have clearly abandoned the four year rule. It was always wonky, but now it is so out of kilter it won't help predict anything so it's officially defunct.

Galactus above is pretty much spinning the editorial line.

[Loki]

Damn it, I don't know how I screwed that up. Son, not daughter.



It's about how they're drawn, yeah, but it's pretty dramatic of a difference. And I'm talking pre-Secret Wars. The time travel shenanigans post obviously justify an age difference then. Leaving aside the art, the fact that Ahura was selected to fight because he's old enough while his cousin was left behind is either a comment on age, an odd sexism thing from a culture that doesn't tend to do that, or maybe a comment on one being the crown-prince, but it certainly seemed to be an age thing:

AhuraLuna.jpg

Hell, I think an argument could be made that Luna is getting younger post-Secret Wars:

AhuraLuna 2.jpg

Ahura is definitely looking older than his chronological age, given he was born AFTER Power Pack debuted and yet looks like he's in his early teens. I guess the only in-universe explanation is that he's maturing faster because of his mutated Inhuman genes.

[Mike_Murdock]

Well, no, the explanation is that they've never been consistent and never will. Unless you want to say that Luna doesn't get that fast aging because she's only half-Inhuman?