Secret Wars II

Go ahead.

I was just going to say, to be fair, Secret Wars 2 was only nine issues and it was worse.

That's true.

But,

You know, Ted, I don't think we've really mentioned...

And it was actually up week by week against...

Like, the first two Secret Wars 2 came out the same week as Crisis 5 and Crisis 6.

Wow.

80s.

15? Oh, no, there was the 80s, because there were Secret Wars, Secret Wars 2, and then there was Secret War that happened, and Secret War, or was it Secret, is it still Secret Wars? They did another take where it was Battleworld, where it was a bunch of these, like the Ultimate World, and 1602, and it was all chunks of these universes smashed together on Battleworld, and Battleworld was a conglomeration of all these different, and I'm wondering- if they're essentially going to take what they did with the void in Deadpool Wolverine and they're going to kind of play with that.

There's a lot of that stuff that I'm very curious about.

I think for Doom to rise, Magneto has to go away.

Yeah, so we've got all of them.

Hulk, Amazing Spider-Man, Care Bears, Conan, Marvel Age, Secret Wars 2, Alpha Flight, West Coast Avengers, Muppet Babies, Peter Porker, The Spectacular Spider-Ham, Heathcliff, Monsters of the Universe, Ewoks, X-Factor, Iron Man, Marvel Age, the 25th anniversary celebration begins.

Spectacular Spider-Man, Classic X-Men, Fantastic Four, Uncanny X-Men, Cloak & Dagger, Avengers, Captain America, Peter Parker and the Spectacular Spider-Man, I think.

Web of Spider-Man, Conan the King, G.I. Joe, The Transformers, The New Mutants, The Mighty Thor and Daredevil.

... great.

And then we got Secret Wars II.

[laughs]

Well, and it s- it was so weird, too, because, like, Justin and I did all the tie-in issues so, 'cause, so it's like they, 'cause they wanted Secret Wars II to go through everybody's book.

Mm-hmm.

So it's like you were getting how many different writers' interpretation of the Beyonder.

[laughs] What?

It was Rick Jones, and Bradley Clark, and a bunch of the supporting cast.

Did they do

a Secret Wars 2? Yeah.

Yes.

Oh, my God.

I'm excited about expanding the Richards family.

Obviously, both in Secret Wars and Secret Wars 2, right? The Richards children play a big, big role in all of that.

And yeah, I agree.

This is a role that needs some gravitas and has... legs ahead of it for for the continuing stories with where the MCU will go so I think I think that's a very very interesting casting I I it is trying to think of who else he could be playing is tough because he is so young I think that's the thing that I really struggle with is because how young he is as an actor that kind of limits especially in this cosmic universe the types of roles I could see him playing

I can imagine.

Also, in the first issue of Secret Wars 2, where he sliced through the Beyonder, who was in a body, was really shocking to me as a kid.

Bizarrely, despite the gods, monsters, laser cannons, and potential world-ending events, the fact that I conceive of the pain he could create meant that Wolverine's claws felt like the most threatening thing in comics.

Wolverine's healing abilities were also quite educational and inspirational to me as a child.

And subsequently, in later issues, just got his butt kicked by T'Challa.

And then Secret Wars 2, where he hires himself out to the cosmic powers that be to take out the Beyonder, but makes a mistake of enlisting the Thing in his scheme, and that backfires on him.

It's a great Ben Grimm story.

Cool.

And they were all taken to this other planet called Battleworld.

Secret Wars 2 was less successful.

There was another Secret Wars that they had at some other point in time, but this is Secret Wars 3, and this is actually really successful.

Secret Wars 2.5.

Yeah.

This one is much more successful and was a very big deal because, as you'll see once we read the first Secret Wars book, at the end of it, they shut down all of the other publications of Marvel Comics and just focused on these alternate title books, which were very cool and very interesting.