Ultimate Origins

Infobox future comics|

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caption = Cover to "Ultimate Origins" #1
publisher=Marvel Comics
date=June 2008 - October 2008
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mini=y
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run=5
main_char_team=
writers=Brian Bendis
artists=Butch Guice
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sort=Pagename
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"Ultimate Origins" is a comic book limited series published by Marvel Comics, scheduled to be released in June 2008. ["Comic Shop News" #1060; October 2007] It falls under Marvel's Ultimate Marvel imprint. It will be written by Brian Bendis and illustrated by Butch Guice. It is intended to be a "chapter in the development of "Ultimatum", a crossover event scheduled to begin in September 2008.

Jeph Loeb has stated in an interview with Comic Book Resources: "What "Ultimate Origin" is going to do is sort of tell us how it all began. ... The Ultimate Universe isn't very old, so this isn't a cosmic story. You're not going to see the birth of a planet. What you'll see is how the superhero community was introduced into the human population. So you'll learn the importance of things like the Super Soldier program, which has been hinted at in "Ultimate Spider-Man" and "Ultimates" 1 and 2. Now, Brian is going to connect the dots." [ Richards, Dave [http://www.comicbookresources.com/?page=article&id=10995 CCI: Ultimate Changes: Loeb Talks "Ultimatum" and Ultimates 3"] , Comic Book Resources July 28, 2007]

Plot summary

The story opens with Spider-Man confronting a deranged Bruce Banner, who tells Spider-Man in desperation that "it's all connected." General Ross arrives, and despite Spider-Man's attempts to defuse the situation, Banner transforms into the Hulk and escapes.

In 1942, at the Battle of Tenaru, an American super-soldier (a normal GI dressed in a special uniform) rallies his men in the face of a Japanese onslaught. However, the soldier is shot and killed, his blood staining the American flag. A photograph of this image is released around the world, and then-President Roosevelt demands a true super-soldier from his advisors, rather than a normal soldier wearing a special uniform.

A year later, during the invasion of Sicily, three soldiers, (American privates Fisk and Nicholas Fury, and Canadian soldier James Howlett), attempt to loot a house. Military police arrive to arrest them, and all three are subdued. Fisk is grazed by a bullet, while Fury and Howlett, despite the latter's protests that he's Canadian, are shipped off to separate unknown locations.

Fury is selected to be the next test subject for Project Rebirth, as his bloodwork most closely matches that of subject 22, the most successful of the previous test subjects. He is injected with a serum that gives him super-strength, which he uses to free himself and the other prisoners, who then escape. The scientists who were working on him let him escape, deciding that they have all the information that they need for now. Elsewhere, Howlett awakens in a tank of water inside the Weapon X complex. He escapes the complex, but is fatally shot as he nears freedom. Miraculously, Howlett's wound heals completely and he is recaptured. Dr. Cornelius, Weapon X's head scientist, explains that in attempting to create their own version of Captain America, Weapon X accidentally discovered a genome that, when genetically altered, grants the person carrying it various abilities based on their DNA. He calls these altered humans “mutants", (with Howlett as "Mutant Zero"), and states that mutants will be how humanity survives. ["Ultimate Origins" #1 (June 2008)]

The story then flip-flops between Captain Carol Danvers at Project Pegasus finding the Ultimate Watcher and the events leading to the birth of Captain America. Project Pegasus is discovered as a government-issued warehouse for objects with mysterious origins and, usually, mass destructive value.

Steven Rogers, with a bad limp, is recruited by Dum Dum Dugan into the Supersoldier Program, Project Rebirth. Through many different treatments, Steven Rogers is reborn as the ultimate super soldier and leaves Gail behind to start his life in World War II.

Later, as Magneto is in his teens, he visits Weapon X and sets Wolverine free, letting him know that his name is James. When Magneto's mother tries to stop him, he murders her and proclaims that he hopes there "is a hell." Before his mother's death, she justifies her work with Weapon X by declaring that she only wanted to find a cure for Erik and the others.

Even later in Magneto's life, he reads a book published by Charles Xavier and is determined to meet him. Showing up in the class that Xavier teaches, they soon realize that Charles's mind powers do not work on Magneto. They discuss the theories involved with having mutananity accepted and eventually relocate to the Savage Land, where Magneto's brotherhood is waiting to be trained by the two.

Retcons

Ultimate Origins provides a soft retcon for several stories originally presented within the various Ultimate imprints.
*Nick Fury had displayed no indication of possessing any super-normal abilities except when he got his arm back in Ultimate Power after losing it in Ultimates 2.
*Doctor Cornelius is portrayed in Ultimate X-Men as being a middle-aged man, certainly not an adult during WW2.
*In Ultimate Spider-Man Fisk appears to be a middle-aged man, and does not appear to have been an adult during WW2 although it is not specified in Ultimate Origins that it is the same person or someone related.
*In Ultimate X-Men, Magneto wears a helmet to protect Xavier from reading his mind. In Ultimate Origins, Xavier can't read Magneto's mind when he wasn't wearing it.

References

External links

* [http://www.comicsbulletin.com/reviews/121250681664223.htm Review of "Ultimate Origins" #1] , Comics Bulletin
* [http://www.comicbookresources.com/?page=user_review&id=151 Two] [http://www.comicbookresources.com/?page=user_review&id=152 reviews] , Comic Book Resources