Oh, gosh, are they okay? (Review)

Today we're looking at Marvel Ruins... What a weird title, what DOESN'T Marvel Ruin?

Anyway, Marvel Ruins is part of an imprint titled "Alterniverse", which was about.... Alternate universes. This is obviously inspired by the book "Marvels" by Kurt Busiek and Alex Ross, however while that one was about exploring the many marvelous characters, this one is about the horrible things that could've happened to them.

So, here's Tales Of The Marvels: Ruins by Warren Ellis, Cliff Nielsen and Terese Nielsen.

The cover shows Phil Sheldon, the reporter from Marvels, walking around the various corpses and bodies of Marvel superheroes like Spider-Man, Kitty Pryde, Hulk, Captain America, Iron Man, and Scarlet Witch. Now I know what to recreate with all my action figures! I just need to find the "Old man with an eyepatch" figure from the latest Marvel Legends line. 

The story begins with Phil witnessing how the Avengers Quinjet blew up. They died. Prepare for me saying the word "died" a lot. 

Instead of me recapping the story, I have decided to recap the horrible fates of the various characters. So, Captain America, Iron Man, Dr. Strange and the rest of the Avengers are fucking dead.

Matt Murdock died at a very young age after various radioactive materials struck him in the face.

Phil meets Wolverine at a bar, Logan seems to be suffering from some kinda bone disease after all his bones were replaced with Adamantium metal.

Bobby Seale and T'Challa were arrested. Clint Barton was executed by a military advisor in California.

At a nuclear test zone in nevada, he sees a bunch of kids. We meet the Kree spokesman, whose face has been badly burnt... The Kree exploration failed after they saw the Silver Surfer's dead body and then they got hit by nuclear projectiles. Oh, Norrin Radd (Silver Surfer) was suffocating in space, so he cut open his body to let his lungs breathe... In space, and then he died.

Professor X is not dead, in fact he's now the president of the United States of America and everyone calls him President X.

Washington D.C. Sheldon meets Nick Fury, whose horrible fate was being white. Nick punches Phil and tries to kill him, but before he can do that, they meet Jean Grey, whose fate was becoming a prostitute. Nick Fury kills her and then he shoots himself. 

Up next is a picture of a magazine cover showing 2 articles. First one is about porn star "Enchantress" supposedly killing her producer with magic, and the second one is about a supposed god (Galactus) being found dead in space.

Over at Chicago, Illinois, Phil meets Rick Jones, who tells the story of how he was saved by Bruce Banner from a Gamma radiation blast. Banner was not so lucky. The gamma radiation had turned him into a mass of green tumors... Oh, this hulking green mass of tumors was still alive and was held by the CIA in a vault under a lake before he probably died. Outside that place, Phil trips over the Punisher's dead body. The issue ends with Phil saying that he doesn't want to die here.

Issue 1 was pretty depressing, but it was okay. This concept is actually kinda cool! 7/10. Next!

The comic shows Magneto but he's probably dead.

The comic begins with Phil talking to Ms. Dalkhöme (Mystique) before she shapeshifts and dies. We're off to a great start here, let's continue. Magneto was a hippie that had incredible magnetic properties before he finally died.

In Texas, he meets the X-Men. Here's the list:

- Scott Summers had to have his eyes removed because he was too dangerous

- Kitty Pryde tried to go through a wall, but she became a solid being and died.

- Nightcrawler is cannibalizing himself.

- Pietro Maximoff had to have his limbs amputated due to being way too fast.

While writing about this, a little girl shows up and invites him to dinner at his mommy's house. What a cute moment.

Later that day, he finds out about a homeless guy that gets high off of mushrooms and calls himself the mighty Thor. He also reports on a lady called Emma Frost, who adopts children and makes them go through surgery so they can get psychic powers... Not sure how surgery could achieve that, but I'll let it slide since she's not really that important.

Over at a cult, he meets Saint John, aka Johnny Blaze. Who performs an awesome motorbike stunt. However, this time he set his entire face on fire, and died.

Over at IDK, he remembers how Bucky Barnes was arrested for cannibalism.

He then meets up with Benjamin Grimm to talk about 4 individuals who tried to investigate the cosmic rays. When they came back, they found Reed Richards, with his organs and bones all stretched out. Johnny Storm was burnt alive, and Susan was invisible, light reflective, which also left her completely blind... That doesn't really matter because she's dead. The 4th individual was Victor Von Doom, who was animal when he went there and mineral when he came back and wearing his intestines on the outside.

NEW YORK CITY, the place where the magic happens. He remembers Peter Parker, a photographer at the Daily Bugle who was tinkering with a radioactive spider. He gets bitten by the thing and before he knows it, he gets infected by a raging mutant virus. He's still alive, but barely. Oh, the virus was contagious, and Phil caught it and died. The end. He never published his book.

Well, wasn't that something special? I guess it was a 7/10. It was just very edgy and that's it, but I really like the premise of this contrasting the story of Marvels.

One question that popped up while reading and writing is why the hell would I want to read a story where all of my favorite characters are horrible abominations of science/nature? It just makes me depressed how knowing that if someone tried to make superheroes in real life, they'd end up like in this comic. I will say that I really liked the concept. Though, I do think it was a little too grotesque. I see Hulk's green tumors in my nightmares.

And now... UNUSED RUINS CONCEPTS:

- Venom: Edward Brock accidentally ate black silly putty and died.

- Spider-Man (Miles Morales): He was bitten by a spider, and his arm got like really itchy, but he got better.

- Quentin Quire: He was too stupid and died.

- The Living Brain: It just didn't work; they tried troubleshooting for hours before giving up.

- Ant-Man: He turned really small, and he was squished, and died. Couldn't think of anything more creative, though I'm sure someone else could pull it off.

- Wasp (Nadia Van Dyne): She was just really cool... AND LIVED.

- Black Widow: Her hair was so red that it was glowing and killed people, herself included.

- Gwenpool: She tried to go into a comic but then died from all the paper cuts.

- Deadpool: He just doesn't exist, thank God.

- Groot: He fell, but no one was around to hear him, so he didn't make any sound and died.

- Thanos: He was a fan of 100 gecs, but he snapped with the infinity gauntlet and turned them into 50 gecs.

That's it for this one, on a much lighter note, I will be doing the big follow-up next time when I finally make full reviews for the first 2 issues of Amazing Spider-Man... + a revamped review of issue 3.