History of Marvel Ultimate Universe

Who: Spider-Man, Peter Parker.
What: A superhero vigilante.
Where: Queens, New York.
When: 2003/2004?
Why: Because his Aunt May lives there.
 
TheManWithoutFear said:
Thanks but not quite what I'm looking for. I'm talkin' about the details of Marvel starting it.

Ah...

Newsarama had links back to a series of articles that came out as Ultimate Spider-Man was being planned. Even back when they were going to call it Ground Zero.

It was when they were talking about the 5th anniversary earlier this year. I believe there are some threads in the News forum linking to the Newsarama articles.
 
UltimateE said:
Ah...

Newsarama had links back to a series of articles that came out as Ultimate Spider-Man was being planned. Even back when they were going to call it Ground Zero.

It was when they were talking about the 5th anniversary earlier this year. I believe there are some threads in the News forum linking to the Newsarama articles.
Thanks. *Takes shovel and starts diggin'*
 
This was very helpful. I'm also curious about the bolded section I added. Does anyone know about that?
Ultimate Marvel is an imprint of comic books published by Marvel Comics, featuring reimagined and updated versions of the company's most popular superhero characters, including Spider-Man, the X-Men, the Avengers and the Fantastic Four. However, the characters have new origins, freeing them from the sometimes convoluted back-histories of the original versions which were thought to turn off new readers unfamiliar with their continuity.


The imprint was launched in 2000 with the publication of Ultimate Spider-Man, followed by Ultimate X-Men and The Ultimates in 2001. While some of the series (including Ultimate Spider-Man) were seemingly aimed at younger readers than most Marvel titles, others (such as Ultimates) seem written for an older audience. Nevertheless, the Ultimate imprint as a whole was intended to attract and serve new readers beyond the existing Marvel fan base, although long-time fans have generally embraced the line.

In the early days of the imprint, Marvel Editor-in-Chief Joe Quesada mentioned that Marvel had already published one series set in the Ultimate Universe prior to the imprint's launch. In his typically playful way, Quesada neglected to specify the series in question, although speculation favours Grant Morrison's Marvel Boy, released in 2000.

The stories and characters of Ultimate Marvel have been adapted to reflect the differences between the present and past continuities, most of which were created in the 1960s and 1970s. For example, Ultimate Spider-Man gains his superpowers from a genetically-engineered spider rather than a radioactive spider, and his alter ego, Peter Parker, originally a photographer for the Daily Bugle newspaper, now has a part-time job as the paper's webmaster. Another noteworthy aspect of the Ultimate Marvel universe is that many of the characters are more youthful than their regular-continuity counterparts. In some cases, this is simply a result of taking the characters back to their origins - Spider-Man and the X-Men were teenagers at the beginning of their respective series - but other cases involve more striking changes. In particular, the backstory of the Ultimate Fantastic Four has been compressed so that they gain their powers when Reed Richards, the eldest, is only twenty-one years old.

Furthermore, the imprint as a whole attempts to link the various and diverse titles to a few common themes or events in order to avoid sprawling storylines that do not intersect. The most important elements that overlap with many of the Ultimate titles are the super-soldier project and a genetic arms race that is escalating world-wide. One of the most important factors was the discovery of the frozen body of Captain America, the original super-soldier and the only person whose DNA was fully able to accept the serum. This was a crucial factor in the formation of Nick Fury's superteam, The Ultimates. The Ultimates' first public mission was to take down the Hulk, the result of Bruce Banner's attempt to recreate the super-soldier serum with his own genes. In Ultimate Spider-Man, the genetically modified spider that bit Peter Parker was part of Norman Osborne's efforts to win the military bid for the super-soldier project. Furthermore, Osborn's super-soldier experiments turned him into the Green Goblin and grafted Otto Octavius' metal arms onto his body. Competing efforts to make super-soldiers led to genetic mutations such as Electro and Sandman.

Several storylines across the Ultimate titles have involved the genetic arms race and the commonly held belief that the next world war will be fought with genetically altered soldiers. There is an international test-ban treaty concerning development of super-soldiers, but many countries still maintain undercover genetic projects, such as the abandonned Russian super-soldier project seen in Ultimate Nightmare. Nick Fury has been authorized by the President of the United States to create and enforce laws that regulate genetic modification, the most notable of which is that it is illegal to deliberately alter one's genetic makeup. The mutants in Ultimate X-Men are frequently drawn into the escalating conflict due to their involuntary but highly public status as genetic anomalies.

The characters in this line exist outside of the regular Earth 616 continuity of the Marvel Universe and therefore do not interact with their original version counterparts. Marvel once hinted that a crossover was planned between the two worlds. This crossover was to have occurred in Ultimate Fantastic Four #21 (July 2005), although it turned out that this was a bit of sly misdirection on Marvel's part, as the continuity that they crossed over into in the issue was not that of Earth 616, but a similiar one taken over by zombies. Since then, Joe Quesada has reiterated his earlier claim that the two universes will not cross over as that would signify that Marvel had "officially run out of ideas".

In the Ultimate imprint's first few years of existence, some readers speculated that its great popularity might prompt Marvel to declare the Ultimate universe the "official" Marvel universe, replacing the traditional continuity. However, the strength of this rumor has diminished over time, as Marvel has shown no sign of cancelling either continuity.

Two writers noted for their work in the line are Brian Michael Bendis and Mark Millar. Former president Bill Jemas and Editor-in-Chief Joe Quesada were also deeply involved in the creation of the line. Grant Morrison was also heavily involved in the conception of the imprint, but did not write any titles for it; he seemed to have been most involved in the creation of Ultimate Fantastic Four and was at one point set to write the series, but his departure from Marvel and exclusive contract with DC Comics made this impossible.



On-going titles
Ultimate Fantastic Four
Ultimate Spider-Man
Ultimate X-Men
Ultimates (based on The Avengers, currently Volume 2)
[edit]
Current miniseries
Ultimate Iron Man
Ultimate Secret ("Ultimate Galactus" trilogy, part 2)
[edit]
Upcoming miniseries
Ultimate Extinction ("Ultimate Galactus" trilogy, conclusion)
Ultimate Hulk vs. Ultimate Wolverine
Ultimate Invasion
Ultimate X-Men/Ultimate Fantastic Four, a two-arc story that concludes in:
Ultimate Fantastic Four/Ultimate X-Men
Following up from the events of the Ultimate Fantastic Four "Crossover" arc, a five issue miniseries called Marvel Zombies by Robert Kirkman has been promised
[edit]
Ultimate Marvel Annuals
Ultimate Fantastic Four Annual
Ultimate Spider-Man Annual
Ultimate X-Men Annual
Ultimates Annual
[edit]
Finished series
Ultimate Marvel Team-Up
Ultimate Adventures
Ultimate Daredevil and Elektra (Part One)
Ultimate Elektra (Part Two)
Ultimate Nightmare ("Ultimate Galactus" trilogy, part 1)
Ultimate Spider-Man Super Special (One-shot, conclusion to Ultimate Marvel Team-Up)
Ultimate Six
 
Yes, I've heard about that but I haven't had a chance to pick it up and read it.
 
Yes, wasn't it limited down to Marvel Boy or Trouble?
 
ProjectX2 said:
Yes, wasn't it limited down to Marvel Boy or Trouble?

I've read that Millar said that Trouble was NOT an Ultimate book.
 

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