Two of Alan Moore’s most acclaimed comic book stories of all time both ended in complicated conflicts. With the news that there are plans for a V for Vendetta television series, it is important to remember that the conflict in V for Vendetta was a lot more complicated than people tend to remember (especially since the film adaptation changed things). In the original source, the choice is offered between anarchy or fascism. This may seem like an easy choice, but from a practical standpoint, true anarchy is not something that the average citizen would likely be thrilled with, but is it better than living under fascism? Probably, but it’s at least an interesting choice.

Likewise, at the end of Guardianssuperheroes discover that one of their oldest friends has just killed millions of people, but in doing so, he might have saved the world from a nuclear holocaust. Can they really expose his plot once it’s already happened? Wouldn’t that mean that everyone killed died in vain? So Doctor Manhattan, Silk Specter, and Nite Owl all agreed to keep silent about what Ozymandias did, and when Rorschach refused to accept it, Doctor Manhattan murdered him as well.

What Moore is saying, of course, is that there are rarely “clear” decisions in life, and that’s the message Jonathan Hickman also conveys in the finale of Imperial.

Image via Marvel

Imperial Issue #4 is from writer Jonathan Hickman, artists Federico Vicentini and Iban Coello, colorist Federico Blee, and letterer Cory Petit, and it follows the shocking revelation from the previous issue that the Inhumans were behind the manipulation of cosmic events to result in a total overhaul of the Marvel Universe’s cosmic empires.

What major changes to the Marvel Universe are revealed in this series?

In general, much of this series has regressed things back to their most famous status quo. I have a feature called Never Gonna Be the Same Again about how so many major changes in comics ultimately revert to their earlier, more famous status quo. For example, the Thing may have a major scar, and that may be a scenario for a few years, but we all know that eventually the Thing won’t have a scar anymore, because the Thing having a scar is too different from the “classic” interpretation of the Thing, and people ultimately want that “classic” version.

Likewise, in this series we saw the Kree/Skrull Empire broken, and the Skrull Empire now stands on its own again (and so Hulkling, the leader of the Kree/Skrull Empire, is now back on Earth so people can use him for Young Avengers stories again, since he and his husband, Wiccan, were sort of isolated in space as emperor of the joint empire). The Inhumans have taken over the Kree Empire, but that, of course, remains up in the air, as there are a number of forces in the Kree Empire that DO NOT want to be controlled by the Inhumans.

Meanwhile, T’Challa regained control of the Wakandan Empire, and the Shi’ar Empire broke away from the other empires to go off and do their own thing.

Much of this series has simply been about returning things to a familiar status quo. The Kree/Skrull War is one of the most famous storylines of all time, and I imagine Marvel felt they were better off, in the long run, as rivals.

How do the different characters react to the complex conflicts that unfold here?

However, think about it. It’s one thing for us to recognize that it’s mostly about getting things back to “normal” and making certain characters available for other stories (like bringing Wiccan and Hulkling back to Earth, and unencumbered by the whole “ruling an empire” situation), but it’s a whole other thing to be the people who are in the middle of it all.

Here, Hickman talks about something Bob Dylan explored in his song “Sweetheart of You”:

Steal a little and they throw you in jail

Steal a lot and they make you king

That’s basically what we see here. The Inhumans’ actions here are clearly “evil”, but what is war but “villain” when it comes down to it? We’ve seen this debate all the time with stuff like Oppenheimer. Is it ever “justified,” for example, to drop a few atomic bombs on cities to induce Japan to surrender? If you think these actions are justified in the interest of a “greater good”, perhaps it is for a “greater good” that the Inhumans now control the Kree Empire.

This has always been a tricky thing with the Shi’ar Empire, where Lilandra has always been portrayed as a heroic figure, but when you boil the Shi’ar Empire down to its main facets, it never really does well from a macro perspective. But it’s just been a constant presence in the X-Men universe, so we kind of accept it as being essentially benevolent. So that’s what we have here, where a number of our heroes see the situation, see how many people have died for the resolution of this mini-war, and finally say, “Okay.”

Shuri and Star-Lord are two heroes ready to move forward with this new status quo, but Nova can’t live with these sacrifices, and that sets him apart from the others, which will make for a very interesting storyline. Nova spin-off series launched from this event, and also a fascinating new setup for Star-Lord, who must succeed his deceased father, having made the pragmatic decision to accept the actions of the Inhumans, but is it the “right” thing to do?

This series is not intended to give you a definitive answer, it simply shows you the new status quo, and you must decide for yourself.

Federico Vicentini and Iban Coello are fascinating and different artists, so it’s cool to see two VERY different artistic approaches in this story. There are some great action sequences, but I imagine these are the characters people will remember most when they finish reading about this event.

Source: Wonder