After how much of a gruel Marvel’s Civil War was I took a long break from comics, from 8th grade to 11th I dedicated time to Ps3, PC Gaming, and Anime and Manga. At the end of High School I’ve been a regular lurker on /co/ and I began wanting to follow comics again. There was one on-going I read about in articles back in 2010 from Dc that’s been in production for a long time, a comic about DC’s Multiverses suffering an attack by abstract horrors and the many heroes of the multiverse uniting to stop them.
And it has such a fun title, Multiversity. Multiverse a universe pool of universes one so similar or so different from the other, Versity a collection of varieties. Expanding Morrisons ideas from Final Crisis and others and referencing Crisis on Infinite Earths and even Infinite Crisis comes one of the most creative and well written comics of all time, a testament to meta and a love letter to the idea of Hypercrisis(the /co/ originated fan theory). If you love Morrisons Super-Hero stuff you will love this!
The Multiversity issue is basically two issues, with 7 one shots set in-between. Each one shot a story set in one of DC’s 52 Earths with small connections to the bigger picture of the Hall of Heroes and the Gentry. People have their favorites, for me Pax Americana and Mastermen became some of my favorite single issues of the time, for my friends it was Society of Super-Heroes and The Just.
Each issue handled by fantastic artist each putting their all in their issues, Mastermen a good example. Jim Lee really stood out in that issue, while he is to me the main DC artist he can often times appear a little bland. It might’ve been the great inking of Scott Williams, but it really stood out from Jim Lee’s usual work. As did everyone elses, no two books were the same minus Issue 1 and 2 of The Multiveristy.
The Multiversity Issue 1
Multiversity Issue 1 feels like the sequel to Final Crisis, It follows Nix Uotan the Super-Judge who was the quasi main character of Final Crisis and if you ask me one of Morrison’s most important OC’s. It starts off exploring Lice and how life thrives anywhere. Nix is a average shlow late on his rent, he’s vivisecting the Ultra-Comix issue of Multiversity for his comic discussing forum as many believed the comic to be cursed. Once things start to crack, Nix becomes his true form and his stuffed monkey becomes his partner in crime Stubbs.
They respond to an SOS in Earth 7 a universe that parodies DC’s rival Marvel, it had been desolated by the Gentry. Horrific exaggerations of villain archetypes who are out to turn everywhere and everyone into horrors like them. Earth 7’s Last survivor Thunderer(like Thor he is a thunder god but based Australian myths called Wandjina) tries to fend off the monsters only for Nix to sacrifice himself in Thunderer’s place sending him off to call other heroes to help defeat the invaders. There’s more to the story after that mostly in the point of view of Superman of Earth 23 a world where the majority of the league are of black decent(Krypton has a whole other deal about them it’s cool). You also get introduced to Dino-Cop a reference to Savage Dragon, Aquawoman, and Captain Carrot. The comic ends at Earth 8 another Marvel-esque world where their Doctor Doom pastiche Lord Havok brings forth Nix Uotans return, who had been warped by the Gentry and threatens to destroy all.
Each following comic are one-shot stories, all meant to stand alone and maybe be continued by other writers. While the Multiversity have appeared in other books, the only Earth to really get a ongoing was Earth 10 (Which I really wanted). I hope more get made, and I’m still waiting on Multiversity Too.
Issue 2: The Society of Super-Heroes
Issue 2 explores Earth 20 and 40, a world where the main team of Society of Super-Heroes pays homage to adventures of science and pulp comics (note the first allusion to Doctor Manhattan appears here). Every 100,000 years this earth tunes itself with it’s binary cousin Earth 40, where the Society of Super-Villains live. Both are counters to each other and it all ends with a face off among Immortal Man and Vandal Savage. The art of it’s story comes in the genres it’s parading Pulp Science Fiction vs classic Comic Book Horror.
Issue 3: The Just
What a great issue, theorized as a sequel to Morrisons All-Star Superman what a great assessment huh! In this dystopia all the Super-Heroes have passed and their children have taken on their mantles. However Supermans robots consistently protect the Earth from any threat big or small, because of this their is almost no danger for them to face, leaving the young heroes to do nothing but live the life of partying celebrities. Things go for the worse when Metamorpho‘s daughter kills herself thanks to a cursed comic book (the very one Nix was dissecting). While everyone grieves by throwing a memorial pool bikini party, Batman and Superman try searching for the mystery of the suicide and learn a dark secret ending with the Superman robots attacking the heroes.
Issue 4: Pax Americana
I have to wonder why Doctor Manhattans needs to be stuffed in the DC universe when Captain Atom of Earth 4 is around but whatever I’m not Editor! Pax Americana was one of my favorites of this whole event, it’s Watchmen set in modern times. But instead of THE Watchmen it’s the characters they’re based off of. Frank Quitely is Morrisons go to artist so there’s an extra sense of care in this book, Captain Atom is speaking to us and the characters on a total other plane. The best part of the comic is that it’s being told FUCKING BACKWARDS, Your sense of time is off the frits in the comic and It’s the only one I know where you can get different emotional reactions from reading it front to back, middle to front, back to front it’s amazing. Also it has one of my favorite panels ever where Atom fucking TALKS to you!
Issue 5: Thunderworld
This comic was spectacular, a fun welcome back to the forgotten world of Earth 5 where Fawcett comics and the classic adventures of Captain Marvel never stopped. Doctor Silvana and his children have United with his many alternate universe counterparts to finally destroy his rival, and he does it in the most hilarious way which involved him creating his very own day of the week. I missed this kind of Billy adventures I wish Morrison did more Captain Marvel stuff like this, one can only hope for the returning adventures of Captain Marvel, boy do I love this art.
Issue 6: The Guidebook
The next issue was one I was hyped for, the thickest of the batch a guidebook to the DC Multiverse. Chibi Batman of Earth 42 where stories like Lil Gotham and other chibi-esque stories go on teams up with Batman of Earth 17 where the world suffered nuclear disaster and everyone faces cosmic threats as atom knights. They both fight against Sivana’s robots while Little Batman explains the many universes in DC’s pantheon. We also get some insight on Earth 51, where Kamandi does some Fourth World digging. We get some insight on the Empty Hand whose been responsible for much of this, and learn a dark terrible secret of our cute little comic counterparts. But most of all we get to see the map of the Multiverse in it’s full glory(That is if you read digital as the paperback made it hard to study). It’s no shocker this was $7 when it came out while the others were $5, it had to pack in so much information.
Issue 7: Mastermen
My other favorite issue explored Earth 10 or Earth X, a world where Hitler and the Nazi’s won the war and took over the world. Overman(This worlds Superman) is the leader of the Justice League Axis and fights against Uncle Sam and the Freedom Fighters who are portrayed as terrorists. Because of how this world is the Freedom Fighters aren’t necessarily portrayed as good guys, they play the rolls of terrorists and destroyed a Oprah house full of people. As intriguing as it all is, the struggle Overman goes through with the guilt he feels about the atrocities that the Nazis did is one of the most well done character arcs I’ve ever seen. If you read Final Crisis you already know that Overman isn’t a very bad guy. There’s so much information to take in, I’m so glad this comic exists and is still referenced in other Earth X stories. Especially in the recent Freedom Fighters comic, which is great go read it- I talked about it on my best comics I read in 2019 post.
Issue 9: Ultra Comics
The cursed comic itself, a meta look into comics and super-heroes and one of the most important yet weirdest, mind boggling comics to come out this decade. Earth 33 is essentially the real world, our world and Ultra Comics who is also us and everyone, he speaks in everyone’s voice and he hears everyone’s thoughts and comments on the comic being read, every forum post, every discussion and youtube analysis. He finds himself in a Post-Apocalyptic New York that has been warped by a time war which constantly warps from present to future… maybe? Ultra finds himself among the Neighborhood guard after saving their leader from monstrous bug forms of the Justice League. Things get fucking insane and the kids don’t turn out as they seem, he fights other DC characters who used the name Ultra and goes back to the start of the book to get strong enough to face the bad guy the Gentry Intellectron who he defeats using the power of Online Criticism, thought, imagination, eventually trapping it in the LAST page, it’s BONKERS and it’s amazing. The book belongs in a museum and if you ask me deserves a blog post on it’s own.
Ultra Comics is about as meta as a comic could get, maybe even more then that. The art is stupendous and the character designs are awesome. Ultra Comics is one of the most unique characters ever and I hope we can see him some more in due time (despite the ending.)
I wouldn’t blame you for thinking this comic was up it’s own ass and sniffing it’s farts, or even for not making a lot of sense(They make comments on that). It can deffinitly seem that way, but this comes from the writer of Flex Mentallo and that comic is a drug fueled trip. There’s so much that can be discussed about this comic and how Morrison thinks, it’s all Hypercrisis man it’s nuts.
Issue 9: The Multiversity Issue 2
This is how it ends, after almost a year of amazing one shot stories we finally reach the finale the SECOND issue of Mutliversity. After finding the warped Nix on Earth 8 the heroes back at the hall call upon more from the many earths to stop this threat. Many of the horrible events that we’ve been observing have all been crisis happening at the same time.
The Multiversity is formed as Hellmachine of the Gentry attacks the hall and sends his Lice Pilots to attack. Eventually thwarted by Captain Marvel spearing him with the mechanic rock of eternity created by Sivana back at Issue 5. The heroes get summoned to fight the warped Nix back on Earth 8 while he tries to unleash the Gentry onto the world. It happens anyway but they are easily defeated by the coming waves of Multiverse Super-Heroes and eventually punched by every Flash ever it’s great.
Nix changes back to his normal form after being blinded by Aquawoman and helps the heroes as the Multiverse Monitor and Super-Judge. Afterwards all go back to Earth 7 where Thunderer was originally from. The Gentry have made it their home and we meet the dreaded Empty Hand who has been responsible for all this from the start. There’s a lot to take in here if you ask me(Like how his silhouette kind of fits Ultra Comics himself, something I didn’t notice until re-reading for this blog). He is far too powerful for them and dismisses them back to the hall of heroes. As it is currently, the Gentry are still around causing nonsense and Earth 7 has been turned into a world of disaster and horror.
The comic ends with the Heroes deciding to stay together as a Multiverse threat response unit. They all are grateful for Monitor as his sacrifice brought them together and ultimately stopped the Gentry from destroying more and more worlds. Offering Nix a gift of thanks, he only asks for $800 to pay off this months rent.
Thunderer remains with them on the ship, and all is well from then on. The Multiversity would come back for many Multiverse related stories in the DC Universe and The Gentry’s last sighting was in the DC Metal event and from what I gathered the Multiversity appeared in Snyder’s Justice League story.
It’s 2019 and I’m wondering what I think was the best comic run of the decade. It wasn’t a long thinking process mind you, Multiversity touched on themes and topics I was interested in. It had my all time favorite writer on board and had about 20 artists working to the best of their abilities, we got to see worlds not normally explored by DC and explanations for many old Elseworld stories. We got great insight for many great characters and we got an amazing one shot with Ultra Comics.
As of 2019 the sequel Mutliversity Too and the Flash spin off story have yet to be made. According to Morrison he’ll get to it eventually, so maybe in a decade or two. Mutiversity has been worked on for a long time as well- It’s a lot of work when you have multiple artist on a project especially when you try to work on their time as well as with yours. I’m also not sure how grueling Morrisons writing system is, for now it’s best to enjoy Multiversity as it is and appreciate their cameos in other crisis level stories. Hopefully more of these Earths get explored and explained. The Guidebook had about 6 earths yet to be logged, and before the crisises the universes of the Young Justice cartoon and Frank Millers Dark Knight were in that field- not anymore…. as of yet.
Hilariously enough we did get a new Earth in the pantheon during DC Metal. It’s revealed that Earth 53 is one where Apes rule the earth and everyone’s a Monkey. Funny right. Well that’s all that can be said about one of my favorite comics by one of my favorite writers.
Enjoy your New Years, and remember DON’T READ THAT COMIC.
Cartoonist's Man-Cave 