Secret Empire (SPOILERS)

[Detective 445]

Secret Empire 0 pulls together threads from several different books which constitute the prologue. They are conveniently laid out here:

I only read the Steve Rogers issue and didn’t really feel like I needed to read the rest to follow what was going on in Secret Empire 0. In Steve Rogers 16 we see Cap’s secret plan start to coalesce as Hydra seeks to reassemble the Cosmic Cube without reawakening Kobik and Zemo appears to kill Bucky.

This brings us to Secret Empire 0 wherein it is outlined that the Cosmic Cube was apparently created by American scientists during the World War II era and used to create the reality that we know as the original Marvel Universe.  Hyrdra’s plan is to use Cap to “undo” that “fake” reality and restore the “true” reality in which Hydra conquers the world.  So they appear to be telling us that the entire Marvel Universe is all just one big EYKIW.

On the other hand, we are still getting the intro text page telling us that Kobik has rewritten reality.  In which case this whole Captain Hydra saga is just one big bad dream that can be Bobby Ewinged out of existence at any time.

In the meantime Nick Spencer has started knocking down the dominos that he has nicely put into place over the last year or so.  This isn’t just a bunch of random stuff thrown together to sell a summer crossover. There appears to have actually been a lot of planning that went into this.

Here’s the way it will unfold going forward:

It doesn't appear that there are too many tie-ins or spin-offs, although I suppose that could change but so far I'm on board for the main series and probably Uprising as well.

[Randy Jackson]

When you start playing around with Cosmic Cubes, you can do whatever you want.

[Detective 445]

I suppose the Cube could be used to just undo everything back to a certain point and then start over.

But after reading about the upcoming Generations and Legacy projects (and noticing the similarities to Rebirth) I'm wondering if we might see Reed Richards step into the Doc Manhattan role and just remake everything again. I think he's one of the few characters who actually remembers 616 continuity, so he could conceivably restore it with some tweaks here and there.

[Detective 445]

Secret Empire: Brave New World #1

Didn't DC have a book called Brave New World that spun out of one of their Crisis events?  In any case, this Marvel series looks to be one of those anthology style event cash-in books. Get a bunch of lower profile creative teams together and have them do a sort of pot luck of stories that are tangential to the main event.  In this issue there is a fairly well written "Invaders" story (mostly it's just called that because it features Namor, The Torch and Toro) and a couple of more light hearted tales featuring Gwenpool and Giant Man (an Ant-Man spin off.)  Nothing horrible here but I can't see any reason to recommend it either. It's not essential to the overall Secret Empire story and seems to exist only as a cash-in.

[Jeff of Earth-J]

This week's issue of Comic Shop News (#1564) featured lengthy coverage of Secret Empire as well as quotes from both Nick Spencer and Tom Breevort. Between the two of them, they emphasized twice that the Cosmic Cube will not be used to reset reality and that what's really going on is more complicated than an evil Steve Rogers and a good double. If your LCS carries CSN, do be sure to pick one up.

[Doctor Hmmm?]

Did they rule out a hoax, a dream, or an imaginary story?

[Jeff of Earth-J]

Ha! No, not specifically...

[The Baron]

"You've kept the real Steve Rogers locked up long enough, Captain America! Now my x-ray gun will expose your phoney secret identity to the world!"

[Mark S. Ogilvie]

  If that is the case how is America going to survive as a country?  From what I can tell in the comics you have a large portion of the people who have no problem sending their kids to hydra school to learn hydra history -basically a hitler youth in all but name- a good portion of the population having no trouble with hydra rule, the military and police falling in line and pretty much junking the US constitution and without a reset how do all these people face the people who didn't go along with it all?  For that matter the US has been shown to the world in this storyline as being a pushover for a military take over by a super villain group, how does the rest of the world deal with that?  Then there are all the people who've had relatives vanish into camps or just plain shot, how do they have faith in the American legal system ever again?  Without a reset does marvel deal with all of this or does it just ignore it all and go on to the next event?

Jeff of Earth-J said:

This week's issue of Comic Shop News (#1564) featured lengthy coverage of Secret Empire as well as quotes from both Nick Spencer and Tom Breevort. Between the two of them, they emphasized twice that the Cosmic Cube will not be used to reset reality and that what's really going on is more complicated than an evil Steve Rogers and a good double. If your LCS carries CSN, do be sure to pick one up.

[Jeff of Earth-J]

I suggest you pick up CSN #1564 and read what they have to say. I get the impression they're planning a nuanced resolution. Other than that, I guess we'll just have to wait and see.

[Philip Portelli]

Not to mention that about TWO HUNDRED super-heroes were apparently killed by HYDRA which is amazing since they couldn't kill, say, Jasper Sitwell!

[Randy Jackson]

Works for me.

The Baron said:

"You've kept the real Steve Rogers locked up long enough, Captain America! Now my x-ray gun will expose your phoney secret identity to the world!"

[Detective 445]

I have a tough time believing that the killing of all these characters and the destruction of Las Vegas will just become status quo for the Marvel Universe going forward.  There has to be some sort of corrective measure taken at the end of this story.