Marvel’s relaunched version of the Ultimate Universe has been going strong between its current quartet of titles. Between Ultimate Spider-Man, Ultimate X-Men, The Ultimates, and Ultimate Black Panther, the line’s writers and artists have been gradually sketching new alternate versions on classic characters. But now that the books all roughly half a year or more into existence and have set up their principal cast well enough, it’s time to widen the net just a bit and add more folks into the mix.
To wit, Marvel’s solicitations for the month of September highlights the Ultimate line’s incoming arrivals. The biggest comes courtesy of Jonathan Hickman and Marco Checchetto’s Ultimate Spider-Man #9, which introduces a new incarnation of the Sinister Six led by Kingpin and featuring Mr. Negative, Kraven, Mysterio, Black Cat (here Walter Hardy rather than his daughter Felicia) and Mole Man. Yep, really, the recurring Fantastic Four baddie who’s had some (but not many) tangles with Spider-Man in the main universe. Peter’s got to contend all six of them and the return of Tony Stark, who gave him his powers in the debut issue of Ultimate Spider-Man.
Speaking of Stark, the fourth issue of The Ultimates from Deniz Camp and guest artist Phil Noto will wind back the clock to provide an origin story on Doom. Recall that here, he’s actually the new version of Reed Richards who was tortured by the Maker, an evil variant of Reed from the original Ultimate Marvel. From the cover below and ominous solicit tease of Reed becoming “fixated on the life he should have,” Camp and Noto appear to be giving a look at this universe’s currently absent Fantastic Four, something previously hinted at in the debut issue.
Finally, Peach Momoko’s Ultimate X-Men #7 will introduce a brand new teen girl version of Psylocke looking to aid Armor and her friends in their current struggle. And over in Ultimate Black Panther #8, Bryan Hill and Stefano Casselli are going to fully bring in Moon Knight; the Ultimate version of the character are two men named Khonshu and Ra who can do the fusion dance into a single being that T’Challa and Storm have to fight with while Killmonger and Okoye are tasked with finding more allies. The solicit makes a big deal out of the mystery person the duo come across, so look forward to another character to enter the fray.
There’s a lot of characters coming to the Ultimate Marvel universe, which makes their arrivals all the more impressive in the restraint on hand. Both Marvel and DC tend to launch new initiatives with five or six comics, and that Ultimate Marvel hasn’t expanded yet with new books or even a multi-comic event is surprising, and it helps the four titles on hand feel even more special than the new Ultimate Universe already does. Who knows how long that’ll last, but it ain’t nothing, and color us interested to see who and what these books bring in next.
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