23 Years Ago, Marvel Revealed How the Universe Might Finally End (And A Lot of Characters Died)

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Marvel Universe: The End spun out of two different stories: Infinity Abyss, which had been Starlin’s return to Thanos and Adam Warlock, his creations, and Hulk: The End. The success of the latter (the former was good but not great and didn’t sell as well as it would have years earlier) meant Marvel was going to do more “The End” stories, with mixed results in the years hence (Fantastic Four: The End and Punisher: The End are amazing; you can skip the others, although the X-Men one is insane in Claremont ways). However, Marvel Universe: The End was different. It was pure Starlin and played off the complexity that the writer had woven into the Mad Titan. It’s a forgotten classic, and it actually did end the Marvel Universe.

Thanos Gets Another, Very Different, Stint as a God

Hulk: The End brought Peter David and Dale Keown back together to tell the last story of the Jade Giant and it was a hit. It was an interesting idea, and fans didn’t expect the House of Ideas to jump right to the end of existence, but that was what they did. Marvel Universe: The End, unlike its predecessor, took place in the present, and introduced readers to Ahkenaten, the ancient pharaoh chosen to rule the space surrounding the Earth, by the Celestial Order, a group of being who tapped into the Heart of the Universe.

Ahkenaten attacks the Earth, and Thanos gets involved. Starlin’s Thanos is a much more grey character, especially after Infinity Gauntlet, so the Mad Titan actually sets out to stop the evil god… and take his power, because he’s still Thanos. He’s able to win, and becomes God with a capital G by stealing the power of the Heart of the Universe. However, he realizes that the universe is going to end and there’s nothing he can do about it.

The universe ends, and her realizes that it has something to do with the way that the dead always come back to life. So, in the void left after the universe, he fixes the fault in existence and uses the Heart to restart the universe, giving readers back the Marvel Universe with a huge caveat: that the dead would no longer come back to life, because if it started again, eventually the universe would end again.

Behind the scenes, Joe Quesada had become editor in chief at Marvel three yeaers earlier and he was trying to fix the Marvel Universe after the problems in the ’90s. He was tired of death not meaning anything and through changing that was a step in the right direction. So, this story was used as a way to close that revolving door. Starlin gave the series his trademark bombast, and his art, along with the legendary inker Al Milgrom, is fantastic. It hearkened back to the heights of Starlin’s Infinity Saga, and helped change the Marvel Universe for several years;for a brief time in the early to mid ’00s, no one was resurrected and death meant something again.

Marvel Universe: The End Lived Up to Its Title In the Most Fun Way Possible

So, Marvel Universe: The End is an interesting piece of Marvel history. It was a ’90s style Marvel event book by the master of cosmic Marvel, using “The End” idea in a new way that would actually change the Marvel Universe. In a lot of ways, it was the origin of the ’00s event cycle. That cycle of events saw books end with a big status quo change that would set the tone for the books after it, this one did that as well. Looking at this comic, it seems like Marvel editorial was testing the event waters with this book.

When it came out, it was reasonably popular, but not a barn burner. 2003 was a pretty big year in comics for Marvel and DC; there were a lot of massively popular books from the best of the best, and Starlin’s return didn’t appeal to everyone. However, everyone who read the book got a cool little throwback story that used Thanos in smart ways, setting him up for Starlin to do a new solo series with him that no one remembers, that also stealthily played a big role in the Marvel Universe for a few years to come.

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