Originally, my thinking regarding these weekly War of the Realms updates was to focus in on the crossovers and tie-ins that were important to properly enjoying the overall event. I (almost) always enjoy a good Marvel summer shebang, but in recent years I’ve been frustrated with the confusing continuity of some of these mini-series. Despite reading — or trying to read — every comic remotely related to a given story, I invariably feel that I’ve missed something, resulting in an event experience that feels fragmented and unsatisfying. But given how invested I’ve been in Jason Aaron’s fantastic Thor saga, and how much I love his partnership with Russell Dauterman, I didn’t want to leave anything to chance. I was going to properly enjoy this g-d event, even if it meant buying and reading every one-shot (e.g., Strikeforce), amusing albeit tangential diversion (like Squirrel-Girl), or half-assed shitrag of a limited series (the gawdawful Journey into Mystery).
Hence the nine weeks of labeling all the comics with the WotR trade dress as either essential, recommended, or skippable.
On this particular off-week, however, despite two “essential” reads (see below), I feel like highlighting a book that is fairly inconsequential to the main storyline: Fantastic Four #10 by Dan Slott, Paco Medina, and Kevin Libranda. It’s a one-shot story detailing the early stage of the invasion when Malekith’s forces find their way to Yancy Street. And for those of you who haven’t been reading Slott’s recent FF series, Ben Grimm’s hood is the new operating base for Marvel’s first family.
An impressive stack of books on the new releases rack with that War of the Realms trade dress: eight books in all for week eight of Marvel’s summer event. Thus far, Malekith’s epic invasion of Midgard, the last holdout against his ten-realm conquest, has been a fun and colorful culmination of Jason Aaron’s Thor opus. Some hits and misses this week. Let’s navigate.
We’re less than two months in to Marvel’s big summer event, and the main title just passed its halfway point. This is usually the time when things start to go off the rails, in terms of chronology and flow, or when we start earnestly anticipating each new chapter, tie-in, and side story that develops. Or sometimes both. Secret Empire, Marvel’s wonderfully controversial event of two summers back, suffered from conflated plot events, often making the reader feel as though he or she had missed something, but still managed to push things forward in an exciting fashion. I’m still a little confused by the periphery crapola that surrounded last summer’s Infinity Countdown/Wars, but the main book was a fun, good-looking read.
I was never that big into variant covers. I fell in love with comics in the 80’s, and was then heartbroken during the 90’s when gimmicks, speculators, and reckless rockstar artists ruined the comics retail biz. (I’m okay now; me and comics are back together now for the long haul.) So in recent years, when incentive covers and con exclusives became highly sought after, with prices commensurate with quality art and small print runs, I didn’t really pay attention.
When Marvel kicked off its “Fresh Start” with a boatload of open-order variants for Tony Stark: Iron Man, I emailed my brother with a “collect them all” taunt, fully expecting to be calmly rebuffed. Much to my surprise, he told me to order him one of each. Later that year at SDCC he discovered incentive variants by the likes of David Aja and Alex Ross and, well… he was hooked. (Not just on variants either; little bro is reading comics again. So proud.)
Well, when my brother started seeking out interesting variants, it spurred me to do the same. There is an infectious nature to enthusiasm (one of our guiding principles) that I am happy to foster. Also, part of me hated that he had some super-rare exclusives and I didn’t. So for the better part of a year now, I’ve been dutifully building my own collection of variant covers and, given my commitment to go all-in on War of the Realms, it made sense to add as many of those to my shortboxes as well. And since Marvel knows me (and kindred obsessives), they’ve been releasing a number of “connecting” variants: you can’t have just one variant in a series of connected variants, obviously. War has been no exception. Who wouldn’t want to collect all ten of those Yggdrasil-mapping covers?!
Fearless Defenders #1 (2013)
War of the Realms #2 (2019)
Defenders #130 (1984)
Fear Itself: The Fearless #12 (2012)
Be careful what you wish for, kid. After two somewhat unspectacular weeks of Marvel’s major 2019 event, week three of War of the Realms gives me everything I could have wanted from a universe-wide fiesta. But at such a cost. Oh my, what a cost… [One little spoiler ahead.]
Mayhem, slaughter, and a planet-wide conquest by legions of slavering bloodthirsty trolls, giants, and fire fiends. Funny stuff, right?
I’ll admit. I bought this book for the cover. I’m a sucker for 70’s-style space operas, and anything that reminded me of Captain Harlock and early Heavy Metal was worth a look.
I don’t always know what to think of Nick Spencer. As a storyteller, his concepts and ideas attract my attention, especially given the fact that so much of his work seems to be informed by an acutely attuned social consciousness. His run on Captain America and the subsequent 
