Secret War (comics)

Not to be confused with Secret Wars.
Secret War

Captain America as featured on the cover of Secret War #3, art by Gabriele Dell'Otto.
Publication information
Publisher Marvel Comics
Format Limited series
Genre
    Publication date February 2004 – December 2005
    Number of issues 5
    Creative team
    Writer(s) Brian Michael Bendis
    Artist(s) Gabriele Dell'Otto

    Secret War is a 2004 - 2005 five-issue comic book limited series published by Marvel Comics. The series is written by Brian Michael Bendis and painted by Gabriele Dell'Otto. It is loosely based on classified operations told to Bendis by an anonymous high-ranking officer in the United States Intelligence Community during Bendis' childhood.[1]

    The storyline involves a large-scale super-hero crossover featuring Marvel characters such as Spider-Man, Captain America, Wolverine, Daredevil, Luke Cage and Nick Fury fighting a wide array of super-villains who have received hi-tech armaments from a mysterious benefactor.

    The first issue was published in April 2004, and though intended originally as a bimonthly publication, it faced long delays. It was completed with issue five's publication in December 2005.

    The aftermath of the series was explored in stories in The Pulse and Bendis has gone on to use many of the same characters in his New Avengers titles. This event begins an eight-year-long series of cross-over events ending with Avengers vs. X-Men.

    The storyline in Secret War is unrelated to the original Secret Wars and Secret Wars II crossover limited series which Marvel published in the mid-1980s, although its title is clearly inspired by them. Those stories received their own spiritual successor in Beyond!, published in 2006.

    Bendis has noted that Secret War is connected to the "Secret Invasion" storyline, in which Skrulls have infiltrated several institutions of Earth.

    Synopsis

    In 2003, Nick Fury, Director of the international security force S.H.I.E.L.D., uncovers a secret plot by Latverian Prime Minister Lucia von Bardas to fund a group of B-List supervillains with advanced technology, presumably that of previous Latverian dictator Doctor Doom (who was trapped in Hell at the time), as a means of wreaking terror on American soil. Fury immediately takes his findings to the President of the United States but is denied the authorization requested to overthrow the post-Doom Latverian government due to its sponsorship by the U.S. Government. Fury is enraged at what he sees as the same pre-9/11 security complacency inviting disaster yet again.

    Fury recruits Captain America, Spider-Man, Daredevil, Black Widow, Luke Cage, Wolverine, and superhuman S.H.I.E.L.D. agent Daisy Johnson in a private attempt to covertly overthrow Latveria.

    A year later, a mass reprisal is unleashed across New York City, leaving Luke Cage in a coma as Fury and a cadre of NYC heroes face off against a cyborg Von Bardas and her hi-tech army. The reprisal is revealed to be a trap for New York's superheroes when Von Bardas arms a high-tech bomb linked to the technology provided to her supervillain army.

    The cyborg Von Bardas is destroyed by Daisy Johnson, the bomb is disarmed, and the supervillain army is defeated and arrested. Captain America immediately demands answers from Nick Fury about what happened. They are soon joined by the X-Men and Wolverine, who attacks Fury until Johnson informs him that the man before him is a Life Model Decoy, and that the real Fury already departed. Through the L.M.D., Fury reveals the invasion of Latveria and the fact that the heroes (with the exceptions of S.H.I.E.L.D. agents Black Widow and Daisy Johnson) were brainwashed afterward. Nick Fury then informs the heroes that this is the last time they will see him and that he hopes those involved in his plot will understand that what he did was necessary.

    His replacement as Director of S.H.I.E.L.D., Maria Hill, discovers the particulars of the story through her interrogation of Agent Johnson in the present-day framing device of the story.[2][3][4][5][6]

    Cast

    Heroes

    Supervillains

    Tie-ins

    In addition to the main five-issue series, there were a few other comics that tied in with the storyline. Secret War: From the Files of Nick Fury was a handbook-style one-off publication that featured S.H.I.E.L.D. profiles of all the main characters, written by Mike Raicht. These profiles are presented with the five issues in the Secret War hardback and paperback collections, and include a list of heroes that Fury recommended be sent in if his stealth attack failed and a large-scale assault was required (Hawkeye, Spider-Woman, Punisher, Ms. Marvel, War Machine, the Hulk and the Sentry), and a list of heroes who Fury contemplated including in the original mission but rejected for various reasons (Cyclops relied on his team too much, Fury had doubts about Doc Samson's ability to come through in a crunch, the Falcon lacked the right kind of power, Iron Man would ask too many questions even without the issue of bringing in someone who relied that heavily on technology against the Tinkerer, the Thing was too visually distinctive, Kitty Pryde lacked the right mentality, and Fury couldn't trust Mystique or the Purple Man).

    The Pulse #6–9 featured an original storyline which runs parallel to and intersects with the main series (it was meant to last five issues but when the last two issues of the mini-series were delayed Bendis decided to remove some content from the tie-in in lieu of spoiling the main event). This storyline was collected separately in its own paperback (The Pulse Volume 2: Secret War). Bendis has also stated that part of the Secret Invasion storyline has its beginnings in the Secret War publications, as he had been planning that event for several years.

    In other media

    Video games

    References

    1. ↑ Bendis, Brian (2006). Secret War. Marvel Comics. p. By Anonymous hardcover introduction.
    2. ↑ Secret War #1 (April 2004)
    3. ↑ Secret War #2
    4. ↑ Secret War #3
    5. ↑ Secret War #4
    6. ↑ Secret War #5 (December 2005)
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