Marvel’s horror imprint just got bloodier. At Friday’s “Marvel Comics: The Midnight Hour” panel during New York Comic Con, writers Jonathan Hickman, Phillip Kennedy Johnson and Benjamin Percyunveiled new covers, designs and plot details for Midnight Universe, the publisher’s grim, shadow-cloaked reimagining of its biggest heroes.
The line’s gimmick is built into its covers with main art in shadow until a reader opens the book, with only debut issues showing their full art up front. Midnight X-Men, Midnight Spider-Man and Midnight Fantastic Four all hit comic shops on October 7, and Friday’s panel teased where each story goes next.
The grisliest reveal belonged to Midnight Spider-Man. Issue #2, due in November, introduces a grotesquely reimagined Doctor Octopus, shown to NYCC crowds for the first time. Johnson said he stripped away Peter Parker‘s trademark humour for this version, which follows an outcast cop investigating a case known only as “the Parker Incident.”
Over in Midnight X-Men, artist R.B. Silva‘s new designs lean into body horror: a Beast whose silhouette suggests a bat, a fungal Iceman, and a Magik redesigned into something strange. Hickman said issues #5 and #6 will dig into the history between Nightcrawler and the mutant hunter William Stryker, and that Scott Summers, better known as Cyclops, becomes the focus of issue #2. Characters who become a Midnight story’s focus don’t tend to last long.
Midnight Fantastic Four writer Percy described his issue as a story about “mad science and cults and hidden realities,” with the team returning from a monolith in New Mexico’s Jornada del Muerto desert, their minds and bodies behaving strangely, possibly warped by a cosmic artifact they can’t remember finding.
Marvel also confirmed details for each series’ fourth issue, all on sale in January. Midnight Spider-Man #4, with art by ScieTronc and a cover by Steve Beach, arrives January 13. Midnight Fantastic Four #4, art by Marcelo Ferreira and cover by Kev Walker, follows January 20. And Midnight X-Men #4, art by Matteo Buffagni and cover by Dike Ruan, closes out the month on January 27. A second printing of all three launch issues, cloaked covers included, arrives October 28 for shops that sold through their first run.
“I haven’t been this excited about a book in a very long time.”
Jonathan Hickman
Whether the Midnight Universe stays an isolated experiment or grows into something larger is still an open question, but Marvel is showing no sign of stopping anytime soon. All three series are available now at comic shops or through Marvel Unlimited.
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