Marvel Comics Legacy & January 2018 Solicitations Spoilers: Marvel Changes Previously Announced Plans As Avengers Titles Contract For 4 Month Weekly Event Starting w/ Avengers #675

News, Top Story

Marvel Comics Legacy and January 2018 Solicitations Spoilers follow.

When Marvel Comics announced Marvel Legacy via its homage covers it announced Avengers related ongoing series with new covers homaging classic ones.

Avengers.

Uncanny Avengers.

USAvengers.

Champions.

Occupy Avengers.

I do not recall seeing an Occupy Avengers homage cover, but if missed it please let me know.

Avengers: No Surrender.

While have seen some formal Marvel Comics solicitations for some of the above series, Marvel has announced through media partners its plans for a 3-month 4-month, 16 issue, storyline called Avengers No Surrender beginning in January 2018’s Avengers #675 and culminating in March April 2018’s Avengers #690. So Uncanny Avengers and USAvengers are no longer ongoing series from January 2018.

My suspicion is that Avengers #675 will be solicited for the second week of January 2018, a five Wednesday month, to then have Avengers #690 come out on April 25, 2018 since Free Comic Book Day 2018 (FCBD 2018) is on May 5, 2018 next year.

Marvel’s post Avengers No Surrender plan could then be part of Marvel’s FCBD free offerings.

Despite news reports stating Avengers: No Surrender is a three month event, that is impossible if the finale is in Avengers #690; that totals 16 issues beginning in Avengers #675. Unless Marvel releases more than one part of Avengers No Surrender weekly this would have to be a four month event.

Each Avengers issue will be written by Mark Waid, Jim Zub and Al Ewing with art by Pepe Larraz in January 2018, Kim Jacinto in February 2018 and Paco Medina for March 2018. Marvel is hoping all three artists will work on the last four issues presumably in April 2018. It also appears that Mark Wade is also contributing to the writing effort.

It is believed that Avengers: No Surrender will include characters from:

  • Avengers
  • Occupy Avengers
  • Uncanny Avengers
  • USAvengers
  • Champions

No word on other Avengers teams:

  • A-Force
  • Agents of Atlas (1950’s Avengers)
  • All New, All Different Avengers
  • Avengers Academy
  • Avengers A.I.
  • Avengers Forever
  • Avengers Next
  • Avengers West Coast
  • Avengers 1959
  • Dark Avengers
  • Mighty Avengers
  • New Avengers
  • Secret Avengers
  • Young Avengers

What is known is that all “active” Avengers will be included in the event including new retconned founding Avenger Voyager.

She is now a founding Avenger from Marvel Legacy #1 as you can see on the famous Avengers status adorned on the Alex Ross cover above for Avengers #675.

The statue used to look like this…

…sans Voyager.

Marvel Comics’ Tease.

Marvel Comics Senior Vice President and Executive Editor Tom Brevoort issued a statement indicating the following:“The Earth has been stolen! That’s the kickoff to the wildest Avengers epic ever put to paper, a widescreen adventure with a massive cast and an unlimited budget. Avengers past and present will be called upon to cope with a threat spanning out of the pages of MARVEL LEGACY #1. And like that oversized special, there’s a huge character return or two along the way that fans have been asking for—and one that they didn’t even know they wanted!

More from Marvel: “From Falcon to Black Panther to the mysterious Voyager, NO SURRENDER will see an appearance from every current Avenger – those we know and love and those we’ve never heard of. But what happens when Lethal Legion and the Black Order battle their way across the Earth? Most importantly, how will this new incarnation of Earth’s Mightiest Heroes come together to fight one of the biggest threats the world has ever seen? This is just the beginning, but there’s so much more to come.

More Marvel Teases

Broovert also teased the following in a recent interview:

  • Two contentious groups of villains in Avengers: No Surrender that are rampaging across the surface of the Earth. One of those is the Black Order, Thanos’ minions who were introduced in Infinity, and the other is a brand new incarnation of the Lethal Legion made up of some new villains and a few old familiar faces who have been somewhat overhauled.
  • …I’ll say you may be seeing more of them [Avengers 1,000,000 BC] even before No Surrender in other places.
  • [The story POV characters are…] Boiling it down to the sort of three-headed hydra (no relation!) of these three Avengers teams, the leaders of the three squads are Sam Wilson, Rogue, and Roberto Da Costa – in essence the leaders of the three functional Avengers teams in Avengers, Uncanny Avengers, and U.S.Avengers…
  • Rogue is a big part of the story. The Human Torch plays a big role. The Red Hulk gets his moment. And there are probably at least a few characters you won’t expect to see in there. We mentioned Red Wolf in the FOOM story, so all of the remainder of the Occupy Avengers will have a role to play. Lightning is a big part of the story.
  • I can tell you [Voyager] she’s the most important character in the Marvel Universe that you don’t remember – but you will. And you’ll remember her by the time Avengers #676 comes out, the second part of No Surrender… There’s a scene in there that lays out quite concretely exactly who she is. Her identity will be revealed…
  • I will tell you – because it fills me with immeasurable glee – that her secret identity, her real name, is Valerie Vector.
  • …there’s no reason not to tell you that Kobik has no connection to Voyager whatsoever. I’ll give you that one.
  • …in a certain way Avengers: No Surrender will be like the “Avengers Disassembled” of this era of the team. And after that – and again, it’s not exactly this, but it’s kinda like this – we’ll follow that up with the New Avengers of the next era. Not literally – but in spirit.
  • Avengers: No Surrender is designed to create a big, apocalyptic finish for the current incarnation of the team and lead to the next iteration of the Avengers.
  • …this is definitely the kind of big story you can expect in “Legacy.” The main thing that we’re not going to be doing are those kind of, bringing all the heroes together, touching every corner of the Marvel Universe, one core title with lots of tie-ins and mini-series capital-E “Events.”
  • But part of the motivation for No Surrender and for those kind of event stories, is to do something that fans can get excited about getting into shops and picking up every week, so we very well could see this kind of model applied to that kind of thing in the future.
  • …I can tell you Wolverine has a big role to play in the Marvel Universe in comic books coming up, though [perhaps not in Avengers: No Surrender].
  • >Uncanny Avengers and U.S.Avengers have several issues coming out leading up to No Surrender that will tell big “Legacy” stories and set up the teams coming together for this crossover.
  • I’ll reiterate what I said before: Avengers: No Surrender is an Avengers story unlike any we’ve ever told. This is a huge, monumental story, and it’s coming out on a weekly basis. It’s the kind of incredible adventure that people have been asking for, and it’s going to deliver in epic ways.

Avengers #675 Solicitations.

    AVENGERS #675

    Written by MARK WAID, AL EWING and JIM ZUB

    Art by PEP LARRAZ

    Regular Cover by ALEX ROSS

    Wraparound Lenticular Cover by MARK BROOKS

The covers by Mark Brooks for Avengers #676, #678 and #679 were interspersed in this article.

Fun times.

John is a long-time pop culture fan, comics historian, and blogger. He is currently the Editor-in-Chief at Comics Nexus. Prior to being EIC he has produced several column series including DEMYTHIFY, NEAR MINT MEMORIES and the ONE FAN'S TRIALS at the Nexus plus a stint at Bleeding Cool producing the COMICS REALISM column. As BabosScribe, John is active on his twitter account, his facebook page, his instagram feed and welcomes any and all feedback. Bring it on!