Comics: Secret Wars - The End to Everything I Love?

"The Ultimate Universe, the Marvel Universe, they're going to slap together. Imagine two pizzas: They're going to combine toppings, some toppings are going to drop off. And that is the Marvel Universe moving forward. It's more than the Marvel Universe and the Ultimate Universe, it's all the universes you can imagine. That is the Marvel Universe going forward."

That's Axel Alonso describing the premise of Secret Wars, the next big event from Marvel that will apparently force their two main universes together creating a whole new universe in the process. Now I don't know about you but hearing the news was bad enough before that awful pizza analogy - I mean since when does the phrase "slap together" inspire confidence? 

For several years now universes in Marvel's multiverse have been threatening to collide, at least partially as a result of all the times the heroes have screwed around with time travel. Secret Wars is brought about when the main Marvel universe collides with the Ultimate universe, which was created to be a world free of all the years of continuity. Additionally over the years the Ultimate universe has made more drastic changes than the main universe, one of the most significant being  killing off Peter Parker and replacing him with the half-black/half-Hispanic Miles Morales (a Spider-man I actually prefer to the original at times). 

Supposedly Secret Wars will leave only world left and who knows what will be ditched in the process. I can't see them outright replacing Peter with Miles, but at the same time there's no way them removing Miles all together wouldn't anger his fans. So does this mean two Spider-men will exist, or will Miles be made into a lamer character, almost a sidekick to the main one. 

And who knows what it will do to the X-men, a favourite franchise of mine. In the Ultimate universe mutants are in a much worse state, being forced into total hiding for fear of being cured by the government - with many of my favourite characters having taken this cure and gone off to live normal lives. Professor Xavier, Cyclops and Wolverine are long dead. 

On the other hand in the main universe, the X-men have been split into different factions for years, with Cyclops recently having become a fugitive after killing Professor Xavier (while possessed, it's complicated). The other faction are dealing with the death of their leader, Wolverine, with Storm seemingly stepping in to fill this role. It's easier to see how these two worlds could be combined. Most likely they will stick to the different factions idea but Cyclops' team will become merged with the Ultimate team somehow, the idea of a cure being reintroduced. I would definitely prefer this to forcing me into a comic where most of my favourite X-men are dead or out of the picture, an alternative I greatly fear. 

Captain Marvel is a character I can see them bringing over one hundred percent from the main universe. I mean they're planning to release a movie about her soon heavily based on that series  and she doesn't even have powers in the Ultimate universe! In less than 2 years Captain Marvel has gone from being a hero I didn't know a thing about to one of my favourites. I would be distraught if they changed her series even a little bit. That kick-ass blonde just stole my heart, as kick-ass blondes often do, see my love of Buffy, Starbuck and the new Thor for more proof.

Speaking of the new Thor, how will this change affect her? She is a recent addition to the Marvel universe with many storylines promised from Jason Aaron, revealing her identity along with the secret that forced the original Thor to become unworthy of his hammer. In particular Thor Odinson's secret is one that has been stated will be revealed slowly. Not knowing who she is makes it hard to know how she'll fit into the new universe, presuming she has a place at all. I can always hope that Marvel will allow these stories to flourish and not toss out a brilliant new addition, but who's to say what will make it through this event, if anything even does. 

Fan theories mostly revolve around the idea that this relaunch is all geared towards bringing the Marvel comics more in line with the Marvel films. That would seem to suggest throwing out anything different about the comics. Goodbye new female Thor, you need to be a man again so movie viewers won't be confessed by your breast. A black Spider-man, he looks pretty white on film. And I'm assuming Cyclops will just have no place in the comics whatsoever, with every series becoming centred on Wolverine? 

In the last few years Marvel have made such great strides towards diversifying their comics (although high-profile LGBT characters would still be a great addition!), it would be such a shame if all these changes were removed just to create a universe that people can read having just seen the latest superhero blockbuster. 

All this rebooting news is something that as a longtime Marvel fan I cannot stand by. It feels like a betrayal of trust from a publisher that has run in the same continuity for over 75 years. If they are prepared to throw out years of great stories just to appeal more to movie fans, then they had better be prepared to lose my readership.