Marvel June 2024 solicitations have been released. With it came a whole slate of announced titles. The Marvel Universe will continue to be dominated by Blood Hunt. Though luckily Blood Hunt isn’t completely taking over what is going on from Marvel’s publishing side. We see beyond their latest big event we got things like the Ultimates return, a new Annual event starting led by Thanos, and more.
With a lot of notable comic books coming out in June from Marvel I’m splitting up the solicitation commentary. This one will be dedicated to the non-Spider-Man and X-Men titles. Let’s take a look at what to expect from the Avengers and other heroes based on Marvel’s June 2024 comic book solicitations.
ULTIMATES RETURN TO ULTIMATE UNIVERSE
The new Ultimate Universe had a completely different start to what the original one did. Rather than rebooting the classic Ultimate Universe, Jonathan Hickman created a new universe in the vision of The Maker. With The Maker manipulating a new Marvel Universe as he wished everything changed. Ultimately while The Maker was defeated the Cabal he created made of global leaders still continued to secretly govern the world. One of their big moves was to shut down Tony Stark and Reed Richards, the Ultimate Iron Lad and Doctor Doom respectively, by taking them, attempt to form the Ultimates to rectify all of The Makers changes to their universe.
Originally it looked as though Iron Lad, Doctor Doom, Captain America, Thor and Sif were killed off by The Makers’ Cabal. Now we know that wasn’t the case. Based on the solicitation for the Ultimates #1 it appears as though Iron Lad, Doctor Doom, Captain America, Thor and Sif evaded the attack on their lives.
The question is if they were alive this entire time what have they been up to while Spider-Man, Black Panther, and X-Men have been getting the spotlight? They may have used the time in the shadows to bring back as many classic Marvel elements back into their continuity. Though how far reaching they could go given the people The Maker eliminated or altered is anyone’s guess.
BLOOD HUNT RACING TO THE FINISH
Marvel’s approach to their latest big event, Blood Hunt, is something that does not have a long shelf life. Because rather than stretching through the end of summer Blood Hunt is set to wrap up after three months. That is at least the feeling that is given off with the pacing of Blood Hunt’s main series set to release its final issue by the beginning of July. Normally Marvel wouldn’t do this for multiple reasons.
The rapid release schedule isn’t too surprising given the subject material. While Blade is a relatively popular character Marvel hasn’t had much success with stories led with vampires as their main antagonist. It makes for a cool story arc in an Avengers or X-Men comic but that is about it. While Blood Hunt does elevate the vampire and monster side of the Marvel Universe, even the company knows it would be asking a lot to keep readers attention for five or six months.
That aside, Marvel is at least dedicating a lot of their June releases to be Blood Hunt related. They are even adding in Wolverine, Jubilee, and Magik to give Blood Hunt some of the X-Men stamp on the event. Though the majority of the tie-ins outside of Avengers, Fantastic Four, and Amazing Spider-Man all being mini-series or one-shots says a lot. Blood Hunt may not have the name value to boost the sales of solo titles like Marvel normally does.
KINGPIN HUNTING DAREDEVIL
Wilson Fisk has been in an odd place since the end of Devil’s Reign. He was no longer the Mayor of New York City. All of the power he had accumulated was gone. Because of that he ended up moving over to the X-Men franchise thanks to his wife Typhoid Mary being a mutant. Fisk even joined the Hellfire Club to start rebuilding his power with new connections.
All of this rebuilding of who Wilson Fisk is now will see him returning to targeting his old nemesis, Daredevil. That’s at least what we see in the Giant-Size Daredevil #1 special as Fisk seems to have gained new supernatural powers. Though we don’t know if Fisk will be targeting Matt Murdock, Elektra Natchios, or both.
Interestingly, the solicitation refers to Wilson Fisk as the Kingpin. That is a title that Fisk let his son Butch Pharris claim. Marvel hasn’t done anything with Kingpin Butch, he didn’t even have a role in the recent Spider-Man “Gang War” storyline. With Butch’s character seemingly being a failed experiment, going back to Wilson Fisk as the Kingpin of Crime is the best call. The Marvel Universe is much more interesting with someone like Wilson Fisk having the authority level of Kingpin. Adding in his new connections to the Hellfire Club and Orchis can make his new run as Kingpin have new layers.
SCARLET WITCH RETURNS TO SOLO ADVENTURES
Marvel is certainly having a different way in how they approaching their investment in Scarlet Witch. While they are doing their regular approach of new #1 comic books with Scarlet Witch as a lead they are making sure to keep on Steve Orlando for all the relaunches. This commitment to Orlando does show Marvel at least trust his vision for how to establish Scarlet Witch beyond the Avengers comic books.
As a fan of Orlando’s work on both Scarlet Witch titles thus far I do not hate this. At this point I understand that Marvel is going to rely on relaunches to boost sales numbers. With Orlando sticking around as the writer we at least know there will be a consistent creative direction for Scarlet Witch. Having a consistent creative direction that’s good and interesting can help to eventually lead success with word-of-mouth.
Given what Orlando has done so far we can expect to see more of Scarlet Witch dealing with the magic side of the Marvel Universe. The solicitation for Scarlet Witch #1 certainly teases this to be the case. Which will only strengthen a side of the Marvel Universe that has a ton of potential that is normally saved for only Doctor Strange to explore.
UNCLE SCROOGE IS BACK WITH MARVEL
Easily the biggest surprise out of all the titles we see in Marvel’s June 2024 Solicitations is the announcement of Uncle Scrooge and the Infinity Dime. This is a title that I was not expecting to see published by Marvel. Thus far, Disney hasn’t gone to Marvel for publishing comic books for their other brands except for Star Wars. Disney has partnered with Dark Horse, IDW, BOOM! Studios, and others over the years. That now seems to be changing as Disney remembers they do have a comic book publisher.
Based on this it does seem that Uncle Scrooge and the Infinity Dime will be an experimental title. Depending on how well it sells to expectations this could either be the start of Marvel publishing more Disney related comics or just a one-off.
Marvel is certainly making sure to have one of the industry’s biggest creators on this title with Jason Aaron on board as the writer. Aaron is certainly a big name for comic book fans to latch onto a Disney comic book. Though given Aaron’s writing style it’ll be interesting to see how he writes a story around Uncle Scrooge, who usually is about fun adventures.
DEATH OF ODINSON?
The solicitation for Immortal Thor #12 is certainly ominous. The way it is worded it does sound as though Thor will have to make a big sacrifice in order to overcome Utgard-Odin’s challenge to him.
That said, the wording is careful to not specifically say Thor will have to sacrifice his life. Instead the teaser in Immortal Thor #12 states it will be a story about “and the Odinson’s end.” That specific wording could mean that what we could see is the end of the Odinson family name.
This development isn’t all that surprising given that Thor has been All-Father of Asgard for quite some time. Like Odin and Bor before him, what we could see is Thor starting to create his own family name. Given his predecessor’s naming style, Immortal Thor #12 could mark the start of the Thorson family name. If that is the case we could see Thor, through his spiritual adventure, remember his love for Sif or Jane Foster.
THANOS SEARCH FOR THE INFINITY STONES
In recent years Marvel has had a different approach for their Annual comic books. Rather than doing one-shot comic books for their ongoing titles they like their Annuals to have a general connection to each other. We saw that with the 2023’s Contest of Chaos and 2021’s Infinite Destinies crossover events that where told over the course of their slate of Annuals for those years.
Now it appears they are doing this again in 2024 as a new crossover event titled “The Infinity Watch” will begin in Thanos Annual 2024. Based on the Thanos Annual solicitation this crossover looks like it’ll be giving us the payoff to the story started in Infinite Destinies of actual people holding the power of the Infinity Stones. This is a story that Marvel hasn’t done much with other than a few appearances by Star in Captain Marvel.
What The Infinity Watch crossover hopefully does is return the Infinity Stones back to normal. Mostly because Marvel completely dropped the ball with the current iteration of the Infinity Stones being people that didn’t catch on in any substantial way in-continuity or sales wise. Marvel already has an out with this as Nick Klein did give Thor a future vision of Thanos controlling a Symbiote Infinity Gauntlet at some point in the future. The Infinity Watch story can begin laying the seeds for that future vision coming to pass, setting up the big 2025 crossover event.
