Marvel Universe Live Prelude (Promo Comic)

Background

This comic is marketing material for the "Marvel Live" show touring North America from July 2014. According to the promotional blurb offered by Feld Entertainment (the show's creators):

Marvel Universe LIVE! Is a mind-blowing live-action arena experience, featuring the greatest Marvel super heroes and villains.

Marvel Universe LIVE! will captivate audiences with an authentic and original story that brings more than 25 Marvel characters together on one epic quest. The story is framed around the battle over the Cosmic Cube, the source of ultimate power and one of the most feared and coveted treasures in the Marvel Universe, that has been shattered into pieces by the Mighty Thor in order to prevent it from falling into the wrong hands. With the pieces scattered across the globe, Thor’s villainous brother Loki devises a scheme to clone its powers, inciting a threat that could not only decimate Earth but also obliterate the Universe.

Clearly the writer of their promotional blurb doesn't speak English well enough to know the difference between "which" and "that" (hint: one is a restrictive relative clause, the other is non-restrictive). But that's no reason to be rude about their comic! We'll have to look inside the comic itself for those kinds of reasons...

Story Details

There are sixteen pages in the comic, of which 12 pages provide a single short comic story with one simple job – tease the major stars of the show, and introduce the Cosmic Cube.

In the story, we enter the scene just in time to see the Avengers (including Spider-Man) snatch victory from the jaws of defeat in their battle to seize the Cosmic MacGuffin. Iron Man and Thor both want the cosmic cube... perhaps it is too dangerous for either to hold. Absolute Power Corrupts, and all that.

Of course when it comes to being twisted by the desire for power, nobody knows that better than Loki. Yeah, good old Loki turns up (disguised as Hawkeye) and swipes the cube. But where does Loki go next? Which Hawkeye is the real Hawkeye? Can the Avengers protect the cube from Loki? Will there be special effects, stunts, bikes, trucks and lots of martial arts and flashing lights?

You BETCHA!

General Comments

The comic itself is trivial and shallow. But what did you expect? This is purely a marketing brochure and a background introduction to anybody who doesn't know Iron Man from Spider-Man.

Speaking of Spider-Man, he gets his fair share of panels, establishing his primary attributes: i.e. He's smart, he's a snappy talker, and he shoots webbing. All the other characters get to demonstrate a couple of fundamental qualities too, giving you all the information you need to go enjoy the show.

Overall Rating

It's a silly comic story. But it is professionally done, as it should be since the credits all go to regular Marvel creative and production staff. I'll give the story itself Three Webs purely for not being worse than it had to be.

As for the show, the same seems to apply (judging by all the Facebook comments). Silly story, terrible acting, but lots of dirt bikes and trucks and fireworks. Plenty of guys in spandex performing kung fu fighting while laser lights flash and dry ice fogs the stage. Target audience seems to be 7-10 year old boys. Not much for the adults from the sound of it.

But you can always go and find out for yourself, can't you?! There are shows scheduled through most of 2015 (shutting down for July/August in Summer) and then also into the first few months of 2016. Tickets seem pretty reasonably priced for a live action spectacular, being in the $30-60 range for adults with kids for $16 or so (all prices ex. fees and taxes I presume). We'll try and send one of our staffers along and have them write a more detailed review for the site.