Today I kick off a new series of reviews in which I review "Marvel's Mega-events". I will be reviewing the major crossover events of Marvel in sequential order, starting from the classics and working towards the modern age of a crossover every summer. I doubt I will actually review EVERY event Marvel has ever done (there are several I have never read and never intend to) but I hope to at least cover all the major ones, and some of the smaller ones like Schism and Shadowland. I won't, for example, be reviewing Secret Wars II or all the Infinity Gauntlet sequels.
Anyways it was obvious to me that I had to start at the big one, the one that started it all, Secret Wars. Secret Wars was the first company-wide crossover of its kind, featuring all the Marvel heroes. The story was conceived by Jim Shooter as a way for Mattel to sell toys; the name Secret Wars was literally selected because Mattel determined that kids responded well to the words "secret" and "war". So for all of you complaining that today's events are only ploys to make money, Secret Wars was the biggest money-making scheme of all.
The plot is about what you'd expect from a big toy-selling event, all of Marvel's heroes and all of Marvel's villains are teleported to "battle-world" by the Beyonder so that they can fight because...well just because. Seriously the only reason they are fighting is because the Beyonder says they have to, and the victor is granted their heart's desire. This takes up a full twelve issues.
Since I've pointed out how stupid the plot is, you're probably expecting me to rip this story up, but you'd be surprised how unimportant the plot really is. It's just an excuse to get all the characters together, but that's not necessarily a bad thing. This is one of the few times in comics when I've actually thought that it was pretty cool to see all the Marvel heroes working together. Most of the time a crossover doesn't really impress me just because the characters are there, but this one actually does. Something about seeing all of the heroes forced to work together against an alliance of the greatest Marvel villains just really works, and I'm not sure I can explain why.
This story really shouldn't work, but it does. One of my favorite parts about this event is how will each group is included, particularly the X-men. In recent events the X-men are usually left out or only briefly mentioned, but here they are just as important as the rest of the heroes, and we don't really see that very often. I also love how Galactus is handled, he's so much more powerful than everyone else and there's a lot of tension built-up before they have to take him down.
Some of my personal favorite moments include Spiderman vs the X-men, Thor vs all the baddies, Doom vs Beyonder, and everybody vs Galactus.
There are some negatives though. The art is by no means bad, but it is very dated, which I suppose is to be expected. Being a Hulk fan, I was a bit disappointed with his portrayal; other than one mountain lifting scene(which, admittedly, was pretty cool)he doesn't really do much considering how powerful he is.
There are a few things that seem strange to read today, like Iron Man being Rhodey rather than Tony, and Captain Marvel being a woman, but that's not the writers fault. One thing I did think was extremely poor was Colossus' romance with an alien girl who can't even speak English. Colossus falls in love with her and forgets all about Kitty Pryde for no other reason than that he thinks she's hot.
I also must admit that I thought the final confrontation with Doom was a bit anti-climactic, although the big battle with his monstrous guards was awesome.
Overall, Secret Wars is an entertaining event book that still impresses with its comprehensive use of all the popular Marvel heroes and villains, although the actual plot is a mere contrivance to get all the characters together. Basically, its a big stupid blockbuster with all your favorite characters, and I love it.
9/10