For yesterday’s The Pull List, go here.
The Marvels Project #1 – Marvel – $3.99
Score: 7.5
Retroactively changing continuity, or “retconning”, can be a tricky feat. And trying to recon an entire universe’s continuity from the start can be an even bigger feat. This is what the focus of The Marvels Project is. Going all the way back to the very first days of the Marvel Universe to the creation of the first Human Torch, this story looks to bring readers an insight in to the relationships that helped forge the current Marvel world. The issue begins with Dr. Halloway, the man destined to become The Angel (though it isn’t mentioned yet in this series) working with a dementia patient known as Matt Hawk back in 1938.
Hawk tells Halloween about the heroes, villains, gods and monsters that will soon rise and how it all begins in New York City. Coming in one morning, Halloway finds out that Hawk died in his sleep but before he passed on, he had left something for the doctor. Upon opening it, Halloway sees a gun and a note that reads, “From One Hero to Another-” only to realize that Matt Hawk was the Two-Gun Kid, a masked western hero that the doctor had read about for years.
He wonders if the future that Matt told him about could be real. From there, the story examines the origins of Namor’s appearance to surface dwellers as Nazis begin to drop depth charges to acquire Atlantean “samples” and FDR’s involvement in the funding of the first Human Torch. When the Torch is first revealed to the public, there is a huge backlash of man made monsters on American soil. Knowing that the American government will need all the support they can garner with the upcoming hostilities with Germany, the President orders the Human Torch disposed of.
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