'The Marvels' comic series will feature a 'smorgasbord of heroes' spanning from street-level to cosmic
In 1994, Kurt Busiek and Alex Ross released 'Marvels' - a look at Marvel's history from a layman's perspective. It became an instant classic, a grand summary of everything that makes the Marvel Universe what it is. Now, in what Marvel has called "the most ambitious series to hit the Marvel Universe," it has been announced that Busiek and Ross will reunite for 'The Marvels,' joined by Yildiray Cinar on art.
In an exclusive interview with Marvel Entertainment, Busiek talks about the series, its history and teases a few things that readers can expect.
"There’ll be popular characters of today, there’ll be obscure characters from long ago - heck, there’ll be story threads that take place in the past, or possibly the future," said Busiek. "We’re not limited to just the present. And there’ll be new characters, too, from the street-level to the cosmic. There are three new marvels in the first issue, although a couple of them are only seen for a panel or so. But we’ll get back to them."
The series is already set to feature big names such as Spider-Man, Captain America and the Punisher. In addition to its new characters, the series will also feature more obscure characters from Marvel's history, like the Golden Age Vision, and more current, but still lesser-known ones like Aero.
"I’d say “the sky’s the limit,” except in the Marvel Universe, there’s a lot going on beyond that sky. And it’s all open to us," said Busiek.
Cinar will be handling art on the series. "For THE MARVELS, we knew we needed someone who could draw whatever part of Marvel we threw at him, from gritty mean-streets stuff for a Punisher scene to hi-tech Super Heroes with the Avengers to cosmic oddities and ancient history and more," said Busiek.
Ross will be a part of the team as well, doing covers for the series, as well as designs for some of the many characters appearing in the book. The interview also included a few preview pages from the comic, including a cover from Ross and a page drawn by Cinar and inked by Richard Isanove that sees Captain America and Captain Marvel enjoying sandwiches in the park.
Fans are already excited for the series. A user on Twitter shared the above preview page, and writes, "If this page is indicative of what THE MARVELS is going to be like, I'm ordering six copies of every issue. Carol likes Minor Threat. Steve is reading Tolkien and talking about whole foods. This is what I want from comic books."
Another fan writes, "For the first time in a decade or more, here’s a Marvel book I’m absolutely going to be picking up. This looks appealing to me (a 52 year old comics fan.)"
'The Marvels' #1 releases in May, wherever comic books are sold.