What is The Marvels?

Kurt Busiek has given us many classic comics over the years. Astro City is a beautiful series that gave us one of the best comic book stories of all time with “The Nearness of You.” He was the man who created the Thunderbolts and blew everyone’s mind with that first issue reveal. He delivered the final, and maybe greatest, DC/Marvel crossover with JLA/Avengers. And who could forget the epic existence of The Adventures of Jell-O Man and Wobbly?

One of his most well-known works is his collaboration with Alex Ross: Marvels. The 1994 miniseries took a grounded look at the Marvel Universe, including the mutant situation, the coming of Galactus, and the death of Gwen Stacy. Just last year, they celebrated the 25th anniversary of the book.

Now Busiek’s making the next step and while Alex Ross won’t be doing interiors, he will be doing covers. This May, Kurt Busiek and Yildiray Cinar will give us The Marvels.

If Marvels was about one man experiencing what he can see of the Marvel Universe, The Marvels is what happens when the story spans time and space and isn’t held back by having to be anchored to one person’s point of view. In other words, this is a series that tells its story through all kinds of Marvel characters, places, and eras. New characters, old characters, even forgotten characters.

The whole thing seems to come off as a cross between Robert Kirkman’s Marvel Team-Up and Grant Morrison’s Seven Soldiers. It’s a big jigsaw puzzle of a story and miscellaneous Marvel makes up the pieces. Busiek’s the guy who gave us the time-travel extravaganza Avengers: Forever, so he’s really the best equipped to pull this off.

Just in the first arc, we’re getting Spider-Man, Punisher, Human Torch, Storm, Black Cat, Golden Age Vision, Aero, Iron Man, Thor, the All-Winner Squad, pre-powered Reed Richards, Flash Thompson, X-Men, cosmic beings, new characters, an obscure character that Peter David created, and, most importantly, Captain America eating a sandwich in the company of Captain Marvel.

Reading that page with a hand on my heart.

So what’s tying all of this together? Apparently it’s KSHOOM! What does that mean? I…I’m not so sure. I figure it’s some guy’s name. Some guy named KSHOOM.

The Marvels #1 will hit in May.

Gavin Jasper writes for Den of Geek and wants Busiek to bring back Johnny Ohm from the Imperfects. Read more of his articles here and follow him on Twitter @Gavin4L