Anytime Jonathan Hickman announces a new Marvel series he is working on it is an instant must-buy. Hickman has continuously shown he delivers some of the best comic books Marvel has produced in the modern era. With Ultimate Invasion Hickman is returning to a leftover plotline from his Secret Wars event with The Maker, the Ultimate Universe version of Reed Richards, being at the forefront of the event. Given the event’s name, Hickman looks to have some big plans for the Ultimate Universe possibly returning. What are the plans for the latest Marvel event? Let’s find out with Ultimate Invasion #1.
CREATIVE TEAM
Writer: Jonathan Hickman
Artist: Bryan Hitch
Inker: Andrew Currie
Colorist: Alex Sinclair
Letterer: Joe Caramagna
SYNOPSIS
Two months after The Maker (Ultimate Reed Richards) breaks out of Blaakguard Building, Black Panther and Reed Richards discover this fact when investigating the wreckage of Damage Control’s building. Gathering the rest of the Illuminati (Iron Man, Black Panther, Doctor Strange, Namor, Charles Xavier, and Black Bolt) Reed reveals he discovered that The Maker stole various items from Wakanda, Krakoa, Attilan, Stark Enterprise, Baxter Building, Atlantis, and Sanctum Sanctorum.
As the Illuminati discuss what to do The Maker pays a visit to Miles Morales. The Maker offers Miles the chance to return home (the Ultimate Universe). Miles turns down the offer but The Maker leaves a business card behind for Miles to contact him if he changes his mind.
Sometime later the Illuminati confront The Maker, who has finished creating his portal. The Illuminati are shown to be too late as The Maker is able to activate and go through his portal with no problem.
On Earth-6160, The Maker stops that universe’s Peter Parker from ever becoming Spider-Man by stopping the spider bite while acting like he was helping Peter. End of issue.
REVIEW
Timing is everything and not even Jonathan Hickman is immune to this fact. That is shown as Ultimate Invasion #1 is a comic book that is coming at a time that the story is way too late. Maybe if it happened a year or two after Secret Wars it would’ve been an impactful read. But it taking place in 2023 is too late to get bought into the story.
The big problem that Hickman runs into is that there is a lack of build-up to Ultimate Invasion. What has always made Hickman’s Marvel work special is that he takes the reader on a journey with an eventual strong payoff. Ultimate Invasion goes against all that as it just randomly as there was zero build-up to this event happening.
The random nature of the event is seen throughout Ultimate Invasion #1 with how The Maker is portrayed. As hard as Hickman tries to sell The Maker as a big event villain the writing is done in a way that’s just hoping the reader has knowledge on the character. The opening is an example of that with how Ultimate Reed Richards conducts his monologue to show his genius. It just falls flat, especially if you are a reader who did not know about Ultimate Reed Richards being the Maker.
The mainline Reed Richards and Black Panther even forgetting about The Maker is further proof of how this story isn’t being treated seriously. The Maker has been such a forgettable villain in the last eight years that it’s more surprising that he was still around and didn’t just disappear during Secret Wars. This is too bad because we have seen The Maker in stories like Absolute Carnage. Not bothering to at least reference The Maker being a presence in the Marvel Universe since Secret Wars is a rare swing-and-miss by Hickman.
The rush to sell the reader on The Maker is further exemplified by how the battle between The Maker and Illuminati is framed. This was a point in the story where Hickman and Hitch could’ve showcased how Ultimate Invasion is a game-changing event. Things like showing how The Maker opening a portal in the middle of New York City was impacting the entire city would be something. But it was all self-contained and didn’t hit that big event feel you would expect from this type of scene.
That said, what did work was the final words exchanged by Reed Richards and The Maker. Reed being honest that if had a redo with how he would’ve erased The Maker from existence at the end of Secret War fueled their rivalry. This is the spark that was needed to sell what The Maker was doing had a reason. It was a little too late but still effective because of how Hickman wrote Reed’s dialogue and The Maker’s response.
Another spot where the ball was dropped was how Miles Morales was brought into the story. The way the scene was written felt like Miles was forced to make an appearance by editorial. It just did not read like the natural next step in the plot by The Maker, even when he tried to convince Miles otherwise. It’s a plot element that may become better, later on, depending on what role Hickman has Miles play in the story. But as of now, just like the rest of Ultimate Invasion #1, this scene was just off.
The one saving grace for Ultimate Invasion #1 was the epilogue. Breaking from expectations that The Maker was going to the Ultimate Universe we see that is not the case. Instead, The Maker goes to a completely different Marvel Universe that is neither Earth-616 nor the Ultimate Universe. Instead, as we see with the teenage Peter Parker and Liz Allen portrayal, we are in a new universe. This could hint that The Maker is looking to create a Marvel Universe and that he has a hand in how things will go. Stopping Peter from becoming Spider-Man is an example of that. The epilogue does just enough that even with the disappointment in the rest of this first issue that sells at least picking up Ultimate Invasion #2.
For all the problems with the story we at least got Bryan Hitch’s great artwork to lift up Ultimate Invasion #1. While the story lacked the build, in terms of look Hitch does all he can to give a big event feel. We see that with all the detail in every panel. The double-page spreads show why Hitch’s artwork is always worth the wait.
FINAL THOUGHTS
Ultimate Invasion #1 is a rare swing-and-miss by Jonathan Hickman. The story is taking place at a time that is way past its expiration date. Hickman does all he can to sell The Maker as a big event threat but all attempts fall flat. If it weren’t for the epilogue this would be a complete failure of a start to Marvel’s latest big event.
Story Rating: 3 Night Girls out of 10
Art Rating: 8 Night Girls out of 10
Overall Rating: 5.5 Night Girls out of 10