Marvel Clarifies Secret Wars Plans & Hints At What Is Beyond

Big changes are coming to the Marvel Universe this May as Marvel unleashes Secret Wars unto the masses. Everything you know and love about your favorite characters is about to be turned on its head courtesy of writer Jonathan Hickman and artist Esad Ribic. Not only will the event have major ramifications in the Marvel Universe, but Marvel's entire publishing plans as well. We spoke to Marvel's SVP of Sales & Marketing, David Gabriel about what fans can expect and what to look forward to. Not only that, but we have a ton of new art to show you, including new variant cover by Skottie Young.

Before we dive deep into Secret Wars, I wanted to ask about books that will be ending during the event. There have been many new titles announced that will be happening during the event, but what are fans supposed to make of the "Everything Ends" teaser Marvel released?

It means that there will be a “616 finale!” and that means exactly what many fans have suspected – everything ends. We’ve been saying it over and over again but at the core, Battleworld IS the Marvel Universe when Secret Wars #1 hits in May. But before that, there will be a number of titles reaching, what we’re calling, a “616 finale,” ending those stories and characters as you knew them – for now!

So for now, here are the titles that will be reaching their 616 Finale over the next few months:

All-New Captain America
All-New Ghost Rider
All-New X-Men
Amazing Spider-Man
Amazing X-Men
Angela: Asgard’s Assassin
Avengers
Avengers World
Captain Marvel
Cyclops
Deadpool
Elektra
Fantastic Four
Guardians 3000
Guardians of the Galaxy
Hulk
Inhuman
Iron Fist: The Living Weapon
Legendary Star-Lord
Miles Morales: Ultimate Spider-Man
New Avengers
Nightcrawler
Nova
Rocket Raccoon
Secret Avengers
Spider-Man & The X-Men
Spider-Man 2099
Storm
Superior Iron Man
Thor
Uncanny X-Men
Wolverines
X-Men

Secret Wars is unlike any event ever published. It’s not just an event with a few tie-ins, it’s an entirely new publishing line, an entirely new television network’s fall line-up if you will. It’s not unlike what was done in the 1990s with Age of Apocalypse. Even then, that was just the X-Men titles. But this is so much more. The entire Marvel Universe will be affected in some really shocking, really surprising ways. And that’s just the beginning of the fun!

There are a few different banners that these Secret Wars books are carrying. Between Battleworld, Last Days & Warzones!, how did you decide which book got what banner?

It came out of a desire to make it as easy as possible for fans and retailers to digest. Axel [Alonso] sat with creators and editors last year and asked them all what kinds of stories they wanted to tell. In talking to Jonathan [Hickman] about the nuts and bolts of Secret Wars and with the individual teams on how their stories fit in – we carefully crafted those three different banners of titles.

But let me break it down:

-LAST DAYS titles are creators bringing their stories to their natural conclusions before the destruction of the Marvel Universe. What would you do if you knew it was your last day on Earth? What would your favorite Marvel characters do? Bringing it back to the television analogy, these would be the newscasts!

-BATTLEWORLD titles are almost like our regular monthly titles. The core continuity. These books are what’s happening in the Secret Wars Universe and the continuity of Battleworld. How do these territories all co-exist? How do they work? These books will tell you all you need to know about what’s happening during the event. In the TV season analogy, these would be the primetime shows.

-WARZONES! are the building blocks of the Marvel Universe, event level stories all on their own. While these are mostly self-contained, they’re also grand pieces of continuity from Marvel’s past and new spins on existing favorites. All of which are laying foundations for a new Marvel Universe. Each of these stories can be read on their own, but you can bet that each of these titles is going to have a big effect on the future of the Marvel Universe post-Secret Wars. Finally in the TV season analogy the Warzones! titles would be the Oscars, Grammys, Super Bowl, and the Saturday Night Live 40th anniversary special rolled into one!

Another short and easy way to remember that: LAST DAYS are the Past, BATTLEWORLD is the present, and WARZONES! are the future.

Looking at Secret Wars as a larger publishing plan, comic fans will definitely see similarities between this event and like you mentioned earlier, Age of Apocalypse. Given what came at the end of AoA, can fans expect something similar for Secret Wars?

Remember, at the time Age of Apocalypse was one of the most unique story/sales marketing programs ever attempted in comics. I think we can all agree 20 years later it was a rousing success still talked about today. Age of Apocalypse left a long shadow on the X-Men franchise for many years and effects from that story are still in play. You can expect Secret Wars to behave the same way, only amplified exponentially.