10 Things You Need To Know About Marvel's Secret Wars Retcon
7. They've Been Building To It For A While
Which is a goofy premise, but it's not like it's coming out of nowhere. In fact, Jonathan Hickman has been planting seeds for this whole shebang as far back as his Fantastic Four run in 2010, where Mr Fantastic built a machine that allowed him to access multiple realities to see how they solved problems. Then he started hanging out with his alternate selves... Which eventually lead to the current New Avengers status quo where Mr Fantastic and some other heavy hitters who call themselves the Illuminati protecting the Earth. From what, you might ask? Oh, just from incursions, which is when alternate worlds start trying to exist in the same space as the main one, threatening its destruction. In most cases so far the Illuminati have destroyed the alternate Earths, or else somebody has done it for them. Over the past year, though, Hickman's Avengers titles have been counting down the months until TIME RUNS OUT. Evidently, that time would be when Secret Wars kicks off.
Tom Baker is the Comics Editor at WhatCulture! He's heard all the Doctor Who jokes, but not many about Randall and Hopkirk. He also blogs at http://communibearsilostate.wordpress.com/
