A Grand Experiment in Comic Book Worldbuilding in 1993
The early 1990s were the golden age of launching superhero universes. With the decline of the black and white “indie” market in the late 1980s it seemed that the comics field was ready for a new trend, and that trend was superheroes. The immense success of Marvel titles in the early years of the 90s had heralded the rise of the superstar artist and when many of those artists left to form Image Comics in 1992 it sent shockwaves through the comic book world. It seemed as if nearly every existing company in the field tried their hand at a shared universe filled with superheroes and villains at the time and many new publishers sprang up overnight to scramble for the market share. But even in a market overburdened by titles and new players there were still excellent comics to be had, and not everyone took the same rushed and slipshod approach to their new comic book universes.
Enter the Ultraverse.
The beginning
Malibu was a long-established player in the American comics market, having published many fairly successful indie titles in the 1980s and even had moderate success in the 1990s with titles like Ex-Mutants and Dinosaurs for Hire which crossed over with each other. However the Ultraverse was something new entirely for Malibu as not only were the titles interconnected but the creators were actively collaborating to make sure they presented a universe that felt truly shared. The Ultraverse creation mirrored that of Image Comics in that the backbone of the creators involved in the launch titles were disgruntled former Marvel and DC employees (and some from other companies). However where Image had relied on the name recognition of the founders being superstar artists the Ultraverse relied heavily on their writers who all had significant experience with superheroes and who in many cases were very well-liked among older fans.
“The Ultraverse was planned out in a way that was rare to see in comic book universes”
The Ultraverse was planned out in a way that was rare to see in comic book universes at the time. Marvel and DC had obviously grown into shared universes over a long time and were even back then wild and untamed jungles of strange continuity. Image and many other newer publishers had highly individualistic titles with the shared universe aspect as a flimsy afterthought and an excuse for characters to cross over and fight each other. Malibu attempted to follow the lead of the regimented, carefully planned Valiant universe instead where titles would fill different niches in the universe rather than compete for the top dog spot. Thus the Ultraverse planning meetings had a lot of idea sharing and discussion between the creators as they planned out the history of their setting and what each title would accomplish.
The founding titles
The Ultraverse titles shared a common backstory decided upon during these planning meetings which intersected to a greater or lesser extent with each character or team. For example one central conceit of the setting was the Godwheel, an immense flat world the size of a solar system that was once the home of a race of titanic, godlike beings. The machinations of these beings would influence the setting greatly in large and small ways. Another more direct connection was the Entity, an alien techno-organic probe which lay buried on Earth’s moon and which occasionally sent out pulses to the planet below. Each pulse had the potential to awaken the latent superpowers of Earth’s people and thus the Entity acted as a common source for many superpowers. In addition there were other factors such as the existence of “wetware”, a form of implant that could also bestow powers.
The launch titles for the Ultraverse also set out to not overlap too much geographically or in theme. Prime (by Gerard Jones, Len Strazewski and Norm Breyfogle) was the story of a young boy who discovered that he had the power to manifest a super-strong outer “shell” which he used to assume the role of the superhero Prime. The title focused on the young, inexperienced hero aspect and incorporated elements of classic superheroes such as Captain Marvel (Billy Batson). Prime became one of the longest-running Ultraverse titles and the figurehead of the universe in most marketing. By contrast Hardcase (by James Hudnall and Jim Callahan) starred a comparatively experienced superhero who had retired after his entire team was killed in a brutal battle. Now working as a stuntman and actor, Hardcase naturally found himself drawn back into the world of superheroics.
The Strangers (by Steve Englehart and Rick Hoberg) and Night Man (by Englehart and Darick Robertson) were both centered in San Francisco and thus joined Hardcase in the line of Ultraverse characters who mainly operated on the west coast. The Strangers were all given powers by a jolt from the entity while riding on a cable car and the Night Man also received his powers in the same incident when he crashed into the cable car. The Strangers focused on a team of inexperienced but enthusiastic heroes while Night Man adopted more of a noir detective style with a lone hero. Later it would be revealed that Hardcase and his original team were also empowered by the Entity which led to connections between him and the Strangers, which was indicative of the kind of subtle but effective worldbuilding the Ultraverse used.
Some titles were more isolated than others thematically. Mantra was the sole title in the 1993 lineup that focused on the supernatural rather than any scientific background. The title (by Mike W. Barr and Terry Dodson) featured the beautiful superhero Mantra who in reality was an ancient male knight incarnated into a female body was part of a centuries-long feud between two sorcerers. Mantra had its own mythology for the most part but the character appeared frequently in other titles and thus connected in to the universe in other ways. It was also a subversive move from Malibu to have their main solo female superhero be one who grappled with deep issues of gender identity and would probably be categorized as trans today, a story aspect that unfortunately drew mockery from industry press at the time.
Another corner of the Ultraverse was focused on corporate-funded superheroics achieved through technology (such as the “wetware” mentioned earlier). Prototype (by Tom Mason, Strazewksi and David Ammerman) was this universe’s take on Iron Man, a corporate-sponsored power armor user who began as little more than a replacement pilot after the injury of the original wearer. The Solution (by Hudnall and Darick Robertson) featured four mercenaries fighting an underground war to reclaim the company of their leader, Tech. Solution was perhaps the most quintessential 90s team that the Ultraverse had with that covert action team feeling you got from many Image titles. The Solution and Prototype often intersected as did the Solution and Hardcase (since those titles shared a writer) and threads of corporate politics and shady dealings formed a backbone for this side of the universe.
Some other titles included Freex (a kind of riff on the X-Men) and Solitaire (a Punisher-esque story of a vigilante avenger by Jones and Jeff Johnson) and then you have the real oddball titles. Firearm (by James Robinson and Cully Hamner) eschewed most superheroic clichés and focused on a normal man hunting down supervillains with little more than his wits, guts and guns and thus in many ways was a precursor of things to come. And Sludge (by Steve Gerber and Aaron lopresti) was essentially a second go at the Man-Thing character that Gerber had written at Marvel, here reimagined as the victim of a strange unearthly drug. Sludge didn’t intersect too much with the rest of the Ultraverse but did contribute one of its most iconic villains, Lord Pumpkin (who outlived his nemesis and title by many years).
Crossover and consequence
The greatest stunt of the Ultraverse was the strange four-issue miniseries titled Exiles (not to be confused with the later Marvel title). Heavily advertised as an ongoing, Exiles had begun life as a title in the Ex-Mutants universe but had been retrofitted into the Ultraverse. The first issue was partially rewritten despite being finished (writers credited were Tom Mason, Dave Olbrich, Chris Ulm and Steve Gerber) with Paul Pelletier providing the art. However during the planning meetings the idea had been raised to have one of the launch titles end unexpectedly with the death of the protagonist(s), a death that would never be reversed. Exiles was selected for this role and thus in issue four most of the team died while one member (Amber Hunt) was cosmically empowered and began directly communicating with the Entity on the moon. This stunt of ending a well-selling title in order to drive a point raised a lot of commentary and was meant to show off how seriously the Ultraverse would treat character death.
As 1993 turned to 1994 the Ultraverse saw its first company crossover. Spinning out of Exiles, Break-Thru centered around the heroes of the world being called to the moon by the Entity (using Amber as its conduit). The crossover issues themselves saw writing input from virtually all the active writers to make sure each character spoke in voice that was genuine to their solo titles and legend George Perez provided the art. In addition each title had a crossover issue which was more or less connected into the main story. It was a logistically impressive feat and actually read very smoothly for an event comic, especially in contrast to many other events of the same era. Following the crossover the characters went back to their independent lives but with some new twists to their status quos thrown in.
During the year the Ultraverse titles also began featuring back-up pages by Chris Ulm and master artist Barry Windsor-Smith featuring an ancient vampire named Rune who had come to the present to feed on the energy of ultra-beings. Rune would get his own title soon after and became one of the most universally liked books of the line. It also built towards the next crossover, Godwheel. While promising, however, this was sadly the beginning of the end for the universe and the company as a whole. Malibu’s publisher had been in talks with both Marvel and DC and ultimately chose to sell the company wholesale to Marvel, which meant that the Ultraverse went from an independent universe that played only by its own rules to a secondary setting to the Marvel Universe overnight. As a result of this Godwheel featured Marvel characters visiting the Ultraverse which heralded a deluge of Marvel crossovers in 1995 and ultimately saw the departure of most of the original creators and the rapid decline of the line in 1996. The final Ultraverse title was published in 1997 and we have barely seen a trace of the promising world or its characters since.
Final word
The Ultraverse in 1993 offered a compelling, dynamic but also unified world filled with diverse superheroes. It was a world that had something for everything regardless of what they wanted, be it supernatural adventure, a noir detective story or a high-stakes superhero title. The thought put into the setting gave it an edge over many other offerings at the time but unfortunately the titles were often dismissed as cheap imitations of Marvel, DC or Image titles or as “extreme” examples of 90s excess (which in reality was very rare in the line). Marvel’s buyout then ended the line’s potential prematurely and now due to legal issues Marvel is unwilling or unable to even reprint the original titles.
Yet the legacy of the Ultraverse lives in with those of us who gave the titles a shot at the time and found a fun and cohesive superhero world filled with colourful and original characters. And who knows, perhaps one day the Ultraverse can live again?
