Today, see Loki's short (but eventful) visit to the Ultraverse along with the Infinity Gems!
In every installment of “If I Pass This Way Again,” we look at comic book plot points that were rarely (sometimes NEVER!) mentioned again after they were first introduced.
THE ROAD TO THE ULTRAVERSE
This whole thing started in late 1994 when Marvel Comics purchased a rival comic book company, Malibu Comics, along with Malibu's popular superhero line of comic books known as the Ultraverse. This was right around the time that the comic book speculator boom of earlier in the decade was crashing down to Earth, which led to Malibu having to sell to Marvel. Marvel tried to improve the sales of the Ultraverse by starting a series of crossovers with the Marvel Universe and the Ultraverse.
However, the problem was that while sure, no one really cares if Spider-Man has a team-up with Prime or if Wolverine teams up with Night-Man, but that's a lot different than saying, "What if your character moves to the Ultraverse PERIOD?" So when it came time to send a few characters over to the Ultraverse, the pickings were pretty slim. Luckily for the Ultraverse, there was one major villain who wasn't really doing much at the time. This move was hyped up by a major house ad that appeared all over the Ultraverse titles and presumably in some Marvel comics, as well.
One of the other ways that Marvel tried to get Marvel readers to care about the Ultraverse was through the use of the Infinity Gems (now known as the Infinity Stones because of the Marvel Cinematic Universe). They had been the focal point of the hit crossover, Infinity Gauntlet, and had led to an ongoing series, Warlock and the Infinity Watch, where Adam Warlock had a group of his friends and acquaintances each guard one of the Infinity Stones so that they could not be brought together to form a new Infinity Gauntlet.
However, the villainous vampire from the Ultraverse, Rune, managed to steal the Infinity Stones right out from underneath the Infinity Watch. This led to Silver Surfer/Rune (by Glenn Herdling, John Buscema and Bill Anderson) where the Living Tribunal enlisted the Silver Surfer into getting the Infinity Stones back from Rune, but in the end, the gems were lost into the Ultraverse.
And guess who showed up in the Ultraverse in Godwheel #3 (by Mike W. Barr, George Perez and Jason Temujin Minor) looking to take advantage of this poor, Thor-less universe that now had a bunch of Infinity Gems in it?
Yep, you guessed it!
LOKI PLAYS 'GOTTA CATCH 'EM ALL
Loki then began to make appearances in a number of Ultraverse titles looking for the various Infinity Gems. Here, he suckers Hardcase into giving him one in Hardcase #23 (by James Hudnall, Tim Hamilton and Phillip Moy)...
However, during this period, Black Knight and Sersi ALSO ended up in the Ultraverse, which I wrote about just last week.
The Ultraverse equivalent of the Avengers was called the Ultraforce and in Ultraforce #8 (by Marv Wolfman, Hank Kanalz, George Perez, Keith Aiken and Mark Morales), Black Knight showed up in New York City without Sersi. He meets the Ultraforce and helps them out on a mission and in the next issue (by Wolfman, Kanalz, John Royle, Chris Alexander, Jeff Whiting and Stephen Baskerville), he agrees to join the Ultraforce, while continuing to look for Sersi...
Sersi, though, we saw in the previous issue end up in Africa, acting all evil-like. And we see why, as in Ultraforce #9, she is possessed by one of the missing Infinity Gems...
ONE OF THOSE CLASSIC "USING HEROES AS PAWNS" STORIES
Grandmaster ALSO entered the Ultraverse looking for the Infinity Gems and he found Sersi in Avengers/Ultraforce #1 (by Glenn Herdling, Angel Medina and MC Wayman) with the other Infinity gems along with the shocking revelation that there was a seventh Infinity Gem! The Grandmaster and Loki then entered into one of those classic deals where they would force the Avengers and Ultraforce to fight each other on behalf of Loki (the Ultraforce) and Grandmaster (the Avengers)...
After they fought to basically a tie (these things always end up in a tie), Loki was "given" Sersi, but it turned out that Sersi was actually possessed by the mystery seventh Infinity Stone! After she wiped the floor with the other heroes, the mystery gem then gave up her possession of Sersi and revealed itself as a now sentient combination of the seven Infinity Stones as a being known as Nemesis! Nemesis then seemingly destroyed the Ultraverse!
In reality, she had actually just merged the Ultraverse and the Marvel Universe into one combined reality, with the Avengers and Ultraforce combined together in Ultraforce/Avengers #1 (by Warren Ellis, George Perez, Paul Neary and Art Thibert). Eventually, the merger was discovered and the heroes eventually unmerged and then the two groups teamed up in a massive attack on Nemesis to try to get her to put right what she had put wrong. She was a bit of a heady new god, though, and her instinct was to just destroy this plane of existence period, but Black Knight essentially sacrificed himself to break up the new combined Nemesis into her composite Infinity Stones while also rebooting the Ultraverse and sending the Avengers back to their reality as if nothing had happened...
So Loki was back in the Marvel Universe without any memory of the whole ordeal. However, you have to admit that the house ad DID tell the truth, as Loki's involvement in the whole affair DID eventually lead to the reboot of the Ultraverse, which was a pretty darn big deal. Granted, it was just the last gasp of the Ultraverse, as it lasted about another year before shutting down for good, but hey, roughly a four year run (1993, 1994, 1995 and 1996) is longer than many (many) shared universes!
If you have a suggestion for a future edition of I Pass This Way Again, be sure to drop me a line at brianc@cbr.com!