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Via The Hollywood Reporter, Marvel and Abrams ComicArts have unveiled a new graphic novel by Alex Ross, titled Marvel Dimensions. Plot details were kept under wrapped, but the book will revisit the origins of Spider-Man, the Hulk, Iron Man, Wolverine, and more in Ross’s distinctive manner, “before a tonal shift occurs as the narrator and [their] motives are revealed.”
The official synopsis states, “Once this change becomes clear, the book expands into something larger and more surprising. Storylines twist in on themselves, characters behave in unexpected ways, and events ripple across the Marvel Universe with growing tensions. Ross uses the structure of the book to create anticipation and pull the reader deeper into a mystery that keeps widening. Every new sequence reveals another layer, building toward a final act that reframes everything that came before it. A bonus 32-page comic book is included that is pivotal to the storyline.”
The book is a spiritual successor to the two-page origin stories featured in the DC graphic novels Ross created with Paul Dini in the 1990s and 2000s, including Superman: Peace on Earth, and Batman: War on Crime. The pair provided a similar encapsulation of Steve Rogers’s backstory for 2002’s Captain America: Red, White & Blue, and one was featured in Ross’s Fantastic Four: Full Circle (which kicked off Abrams’s MarvelArts line in 2022), but as he explains, other Marvel characters didn’t receive the same treatment.
“I knew I wanted to touch upon Marvel origins in some regard and had thought about that for years, and it never really sparked joy for me the same way as 25 years ago when I did it for DC,” he says. “I would think like, ‘Oh, that’s just gonna be repetitive. You’ve done that kind of thing before. Why would it be new?’ And this is my way of coming up with a very twisted new way of approaching this.”
He elaborates, “It’s meant to be as bonkers a ride for the reader as it could possibly be. You’re getting one kind of entertainment, and then it changes on you midstream and then you’re getting a different art style suddenly, and then you’re wondering, ‘Where’s this going?’ And then the format changes within the book itself, a mid-book format change. All these things hopefully seem to unify and combine and come back together, but it’s meant to be a wild ride that is throwing everything plus the kitchen sink at you.”
He revealed the book will introduce a rough total of 200 variants of different Marvel characters, and that half of the art will contain pen-and-ink drawings, while the rest will feature his signature paintwork. It will be released in hardcover on September 1, and retail at 112 pages for $29.99. In the meantime, the next MarvelArts release, John Byrne‘s X-Men: Elsewhen Vol. 1 (of 3), will arrive in stores on June 23.
English (US)