Marvel Zombies
| Marvel Zombies | |
|---|---|
 Cover to Marvel Zombies hardcover graphic novel. Art by Arthur Suydam. |
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| Publication information | |
| Publisher | Marvel Comics |
| Schedule | Monthly |
| Format | Limited series |
| Genre |
Zombies in comics |
| Publication date | December 2005 – April 2006 |
| Number of issues | 5 |
| Main character(s) | Zombie versions of Marvel Comics characters |
| Creative team | |
| Writer(s) | Robert Kirkman |
| Artist(s) | Sean Phillips |
| Letterer(s) | Randy Gentile |
| Colorist(s) | June Chung |
| Editor(s) | John Barber Ralph Macchio |
| Collected editions | |
| Marvel Zombies | ISBN 0-7851-2277-X |
Marvel Zombies is a five-issue limited series published from December 2005 to April 2006 by Marvel Comics. The series was written by Robert Kirkman with art by Sean Phillips and covers by Arthur Suydam. It was the first series in the Marvel Zombies series of related stories. The story begins with a virus reaching Earth, turning most of Earth's superheroes (and some civilians) into zombies.
Contents |
[edit] Plot
In the Marvel Multiverse is an alternate Earth designated Earth 2149, which contains alternate versions of Marvel superheroes. The story begins as a zombified Sentry infects the Avengers, after he crashlands in New York. The infection spreads via contact with the blood of the victim, usually through a bite by an infected individual. The zombified superbeings largely retain their intellect and personality, although they are constantly driven by the hunger for fresh meat. Ash Williams of the Evil Dead series gets pushed into earth 2149 where he tries to find the book of the dead, which he believes is the cause of the zombie outbreak. He goes to Doom who informs him that this was not the case. He then commands the book of the dead to reawaken the dead to fight off the zombies so the last people could leave the world. At the same time, SHIELD was trying to make a cure for the virus while simultaneously fighting off the zombies. Iron Man makes a transporter to other worlds. Meanwhile Reed Richards of the Fantastic Four went insane due to the death of his children. In his insanity, he infects his teammates and himself and then spreads the virus to Iron Man. Nick Fury, with the help of Thor, breaks the transporter so that the zombies can not use it to infect other worlds.
The zombie Reed tricks Ultimate Reed Richards into going into his world so that he and the zombie Fantastic Four can go to Ultimate Reed's universe. After rescuing Ultimate Reed, the Ultimate Fantastic Four follow him into the zombie realm and save Reed and the rest of the living people, while Magneto stayed behind to trash the transporter. Magneto eventually learns that the Acolytes and Forge are still alive on Asteroid M. However, before he can reach them, he is killed and eaten (but not before beheading Hawkeye). The Silver Surfer then arrives on Earth and informs the zombies that his master Galactus is on route to devour the planet. The zombies attack the Surfer, who is overpowered and devoured by several of the former heroes: Colonel America (the Captain America of this universe), Iron Man, Giant-Man, Spider-Man, Luke Cage, the Hulk and Wolverine. After acquiring a portion of the Power Cosmic, they slaughter what they think are the rest of the zombies.
The Acolytes return to Earth to find Magneto, but instead discover a still-living Black Panther. The Panther has escaped from the lab of the zombie Giant-Man, who has been keeping him alive as a food source. As a result of several feedings, the Panther is now missing an arm and a foot. After observing the Wasp's head begging for flesh, he reasons that the hunger is more psychological than physical.
Galactus then arrives on Earth and is attacked by the zombies, but he repels them easily. Giant-Man, Iron Man, and Bruce Banner, Spider-Man and Wolverine create a device that amplifies the powers they gained from the Silver Surfer, and together they are able to injure Galactus. The cosmic-powered zombies fight off zombified versions of several supervillains and then proceed to devour Galactus. Giant-Man, the Hulk, Iron Man, Luke Cage, Spider-Man and Wolverine are then infused with Galactus' power cosmic, becoming the collective Galacti. At the same time this is occurring, the Ultimate Universe version of Reed Richards seeks a cure to the infected Fantastic Four who had earlier crossed over to the Ultimate Marvel universe from 2149. The zombies escape and are defeated by Ultimate Doctor Doom, who is really Reed after they changed bodies. After tossing the immobilized carcasses of the Ultimate Frightful Four, Doom regains his body. Ultimate Doom goes back into his body after Reed takes care of the zombie version of himself, and traps himself in the Zombie Universe because of the Zvilpogghua inside him, which goes into the most powerful being in the room. He then engages in confrontation with the Zombie Galacti. While the Galacti went into the stars for more food, the rest of the zombie race that was not killed by the Galacti came out of hiding.
In the main Marvel Universe (616), Deadpool shows up from the Nexus of all reality, and infects some people that he encounters. A task force is sent to investigate the problem but most of them get eaten. Morbius wants to find a cure and so Machine Man and Jocasta set out to find blood from a human in the Marvel Zombies world. After taking some from Kingpin's wife, Machine Man kills some of the zombies. He then finds out that Morbius is really a zombie and is trying to get every superhero into one room so he can infect as many as posible so they can destroy the Marvel World. Machine Man gets back to the Marvel world, and with the help of Jocasta, kills all the zombies, but the head of zombie Deadpoool and Simon Garth.
The 616 Morbius forms a new group of Midnight Sons and sets off to find zombie Deadpool and Simon. After fighting off zombies, they go and set off to find Black Talon who has Deadpool. The vaccine Morbius made changed the zombie virus into an airborne strain, and also turned Jack Russell into a zombie. Jennifer Kale asked help from Dormammu, who used her to try to take over the storm. Hellfire then got Dormammu out of Kale's body, and Kale and Black Talon cage the zombie virus into the body of Simon, who seems to have killed Deadpool, which we find out is not true in Deadpool: Merc with a Mouth. And in Marvel Zombies 5, Morbius sends Machine Man and the Howard the Duck into other worlds to find a cure to the zombie virus.
Five years later, Forge, the Black Panther and the Wasp return to Earth. The Panther and the Wasp are now equipped with new cybernetic limbs and the Wasp is also lucid once more. They find nothing but plant life as the zombies have long since departed. After a while, they found New Wakanda, and settle for a while. On the edge of the known universe, the Galacti plan to go back to earth and fix a transporter that Reed made. When they get there, however, they discover that the human race is not yet totally extinct. Black Panther was turned into a zombie when someone tried to kill him, and Wasp turned him. The zombies started to fight, because they knew that the hunger was fading; at the end of the book the Hunger has faded completely, and one of the Wakandaians sends the zombies into another world.
The Marvel Zombies lose their cosmic power and begin to suffer from the Hunger again, while Giant-Man plans to spread zombies to every world in every realm. The people who wanted to destroy the zombies formed the New Avengers,and Sandman, with the vaccine from Morbius and Iron Man's nanobots. Under the influence of the nanobots, sandman killed the remaining zombies, but Sentry was thrown back in time by the Watcher which created a time loop as this is the Sentry that started the original zombie outbreak.
[edit] Sequels
An intercompany crossover between Marvel and Dynamite Entertainment, published from May to September 2007 provided information as to the source of the zombie infection in the five-part limited series titled Marvel Zombies vs. The Army of Darkness (Marvel) and Army of Darkness (Dynamite). In July of the same year, a one-shot graphic novel, Marvel Zombies: Dead Days provided more story details, and the zombies also appear in a three-part storyline in Black Panther vol. 3, #28 – 30, although they make their appearance in the last page of #27 first, and encounter the Earth-616 Fantastic Four.
A sequel to the original series, the five issue Marvel Zombies 2, was published from October 2007 to February 2008, and Marvel Zombies 3 a four issue series, commenced October 2008. Marvel Zombies 4 was a four issue limited series published over the summer of 2009, and featured characters from Marvel's horror comics (Man-Thing, Morbius the Living Vampire, Werewolf by Night, and Mephisto among others). Marvel Zombies Return is a 5 issue mini-series begun in September 2009, and is a direct follow up sequel to Marvel Zombies 2. At the end of MZ2, the six remaining zombie heroes are teleported to an alternate universe. MZR tells the stories of where they ended up, as each hero ends up in a different location in a separate universe.
In 2006, the October issue of Wizard magazine featured a one-page Marvel Zombies comic by artist Sean Phillips called "Eat the Neighbors." It parodied Hostess Fruit Pie advertisements featured in Marvel titles in the 1970s which showcased Marvel superheroes defeating villains by offering them snacks. In this instance, Spider-Man, Captain America and Iron Man serve two children as "Hostees Meat Pies" after the children mistake them for legitimate superheroes.
Another humorous one-shot comic book was also published in 2007 featuring the alternate universe animal hero Spider-Ham and titled Ultimate Civil War Spider-Ham Crisis. Spider-Ham accidentally crosses over into Earth-2149 and becomes, as J. Michael Straczynski puts it, "Undead Ham".[1]
[edit] Collected editions
There are several trade paperbacks collecting the various stories:
- Marvel Zombies (collects Marvel Zombies #1-5, hardcover, 136 pages, August 2006, ISBN 0-7851-2277-X)
- Marvel Zombies (collects Marvel Zombies #1-5, softcover, 136 pages, October 2007, ISBN 978-0-7851-2014-8)
- Marvel Zombies: Dead Days (collects Ultimate Fantastic Four #21-23 "Crossover" and #30-32 "Frightful", "Marvel Zombies: Dead Days" and Black Panther (vol. 3) #28-30,[2] 272 pages, April 2008, ISBN 0-7851-3232-5, softcover, February 2009, ISBN 0-7851-3563-4)
- Marvel Zombies vs. Army of Darkness
- Marvel Zombies 2
- Marvel Zombies 3
- Marvel Zombies 4
- Marvel Zombies Return
- Marvel Zombies 5
- Marvel Zombies Supreme
Other related collections include:
- Marvel Zombies: The Covers (by Arthur Suydam, hardcover, 104 pages, November 2007, ISBN 0-7851-2908-1)
[edit] Merchandise
There is a range of supporting merchandise based on the characters. Diamond Select have produced Marvel Zombie Minimates,[3] action figures [4] and a number of mini busts.[5]
Wizkids Heroclix has had appearances of Spider-Man, Captain America, Hulk and Wolverine as Chase figures in the Supernova expansion. In the Mutations and Monsters set, there was an Iron Man, Giant-Man, Spider-Man and a Galactus Powered Wolverine. There was also a Janet Pym bystander token in the Mutations and Monsters set. In The VS System TCG[clarification needed], the Marvel Zombies have 3 cards in the tournament Promo set, Age of Apocalypse. If you won the tournament where they came from, you would get a copy of Spider-Man as a Zombie. If you come in second place, you would get a card of Captain America. All participants got a copy of the Marvel Zombies card. The zombies in the game had a unique theme in destroying themselves to activate an effect. At the end of the turn, they would return to play.
[edit] References
- ^ Newsarama.com: JMS ON SPIDER-HAM
- ^ Black Panther (vol. 3) #26-30 collected in Black Panther: Four the Hard Way, October 2007, ISBN 0-7851-2655-3
- ^ Marvel Zombies Minimates Boxed Set
- ^ Diamond Select turns Marvel Zombies into action figures, Newsarama, February 9, 2007
- ^ DST Brings Captain America Back from the Grave
[edit] External links
- Marvel Zombies at the Grand Comics Database
- Marvel Zombies at the Comic Book DB
- "Marvel Zombies: The Book of Angels, Demons & Various Monstrosities" at the Comic Book DB
- Marvel Spotlight: Marvel Zombies at the Comic Book DB
- Official website
- Marvel Zombies on Myspace
- Talking Marvel Zombies With Robert Kirkman, Newsarama, October 3, 2005
- Marvel Zombies full cover gallery
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