Quick Run-Down on Series:

-Publisher: Marvel Comics (Obviously)
-Issue Date:  #1 - May 1984 -- #12 - April 1985
-Beginning Cover Price=$0.75 Ending Cover Price=$1.00
-Written By: Jim Shooter
-Penciled By: Michael Zeck
-Editor-In-Chief of Marvel Comics: Tom DeFalco

"I am from Beyond! Slay your enemies and all you desire shall be yours! Nothing you dream of is impossible for me to accomplish!"

With those words, an entire generation of comic fans were hooked. Marvel Super-Hero Secret Wars (MSSW) is what many consider to be the birth of the Crossover Event, despite Gruenwald's Contest of Champions (COC), which came out 2 years prior. Why is this you ask? Well, to put it simply, it was leaps and bounds beyond (pun fully intended) COC story wise. Characters were fully fleshed out, battles were believable, and events in this series directly impacted core titles of the Marvel Universe. But there was so much more. Please join me in a trip down Nostalgia Drive...

The story of MSSW seems basic enough, at first. The Beyonder is a being with power beyond imagining, a being who can make ANYTHING happen with a thought:
"In his realm, The Beyonder was everything and everything was him...and he was content."
This omniscient being abducts a group a villains and a group of heroes. He then tells them: "I am from Beyond! Slay your enemies and all you desire shall be yours! Nothing you dream of is impossible for me to accomplish!"  A planet is created from pieces of other planets in the Universe and he Beyonder names it "Battleworld" then places the two groups upon the planet to do battle. He provides the combatants with everything they need: bases of operation, vehicles, weapons, and even innocents to exploit if needed. He then studies the heroes & villains in their ensuing struggle. The teams consist of:

Good Guys - The Avengers: Captain America, Iron Man, Thor, Captain Marvel II (Photon), Hawkeye, and Wasp. (At the time, Wasp is the Leader of The Avengers, but despite that fact, Captain America becomes leader of the good guys). The X-Men: Professor Xavier (who can walk in this series, for a reason unknown to me), Wolverine, Cyclops, Storm, Colossus, Nightcrawler, and Rogue. The Fantastic Four: Mr. Fantastic, The Thing, & The Human Torch (no Invisible Woman, she is pregnant at the time). Also included are solo heroes The Hulk, Spider-Man, Magneto (yes, he's on the good guy's side this time), and later Spider-Woman II debuts and joins the group.

Bad Guys - Dr. Doom: Leader. The Wrecking Crew: Wrecker, Thunderball, Piledriver, and Bulldozer. Galactus, Ultron, Kang, Absorbing Man, Enchantress, Dr. Octopus, The Molecule Man, and The Lizard. Later in the series, Dr. Doom creates the villainesses Volcana and Titania, and finds Klaw Master of Sound imprisoned in Galactus's planet eating machine and recruits him.

With a list of players like that, any comic fan would be left drooling imagining the battle about to unfold. But that was just the beginning. There are more twists and turns in this series than an entire season of ABC's Lost. Team members can't trust each other, people switch sides, power of cosmic proportions are to be had, new characters debut, and people even die! What more could you want?

I think more than anything else, this series really examined who these characters are, as well as being an exploration of trust. You got clear-cut views of who was on what side and why. In reality there were actually four factions: The Good Guys, The Bad Guys, The X-Men & Magneto, and Galactus.  The X-Men and Magneto were immediately distrusted by the other heroes, since at the time they were outlaws, as a result they operated mostly without the other heroes, yet still opposed the bad guys team. A quote from Wolverine sums it up nicely:
"Hands off Hawkeye! Cyclops is a jerk, but he's OUR jerk!"
And Galactus is more a force of nature than a bad guy. He saw this as an opportunity to end his endless hunger. Since he felt he was above the petty battle below, he took the fight directly to The Beyonder, but even the cosmic might of Galactus could not overcome the Beyonder's godly power. As a result of his loss, Galactus spent most of the series gathering together his planet-eating machine, his goal was to take the full energy of Battleworld then again attack The Beyonder, fully-powered. Most of the villains immediately deferred to Dr. Doom as their leader in this struggle. I found that quite interesting. The most anti-social, screwed-up, selfish beings in the world still fear Doom and know that he is their superior. Doom is the single greatest villain in the history of comics, and this just proves it again.

Many people site this book as nothing more than a big battle. But I have to disagree. This book showed us that Molecule Man is the most powerful man in the Marvel Universe. It showed us that Doom is capable of anything he puts his mind too, if his ego would just get out of the damn way. It showed us what a prick Professor X could be and what a big softie Colossus could be. This book also debuted the characters Spider-Woman II, Volcana, Titania, and introduced Spider-Man's now famous Black Costume. It also made long-lasting changes to the Marvel Universe such as Thing quitting the Fantastic Four and She-Hulk taking his place, the idea of Magneto being a hero was introduced in this series then was followed up with in the pages of X-Men. Hulk, who at the time had the brain of Banner, began reverting to Savage Hulk in this series which was also reflected in his own book. The Avengers book also had to go on without their core heroes. During this period, Vision took leadership of the Avengers that were left on Earth. This may all seem like "So what, that's how the Marvel Universe works." Au contraire mien friend. Sure heroes teamed-up to take down villains all the time in the Marvel Universe, but up until this point, when the story ended the status quo was mostly returned to normal. This was the first time a story really shook up the Marvel Universe and at the end of series things were vastly different than at the beginning.

THE UNUSUAL SUSPECTS

Vol 2

 

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