New Universe

New Universe was a former comic book imprint of Marvel Comics.

In 1986, in honor of Marvel Comics' 25th anniversary, editor-in-chief Jim Shooter made an attempt to launch a New Universe line of comics. As opposed to yet another alternate crossover-prone universe, this was to be a fully separate world consisting of its own continuing characters and stories. It was planned to be more realistic in its depiction. There would be no aliens, gods, hidden races, mythological beings, magic, or supertechnology. Superhuman characters and powers would be limited. Characters would be quieter and more subdued in their activities. This is in direct contrast to the traditional Marvel Universe which always proposed to take place in a mirror of the real world where public knowledge of superheroes, supervillains and their activities has miraculously little effect on business as usual for the average person.

The limitation of fantasy elements and the low-key nature of the characters' activities in the New Universe made it more feasible to seem like "the world outside our window".

The original line of New Universe titles included:

• DP-7 (Displaced Paranormals 7) (32 issues, one annual)
• Justice (32 issues)
• Kickers, Inc. (12 issues)
• Marc Hazzard, Merc (12 issues, one annual)
• Nightmask (12 issues)
• Psi-Force (32 issues)
• Spitfire and the Troubleshooters (13 issues; renamed Spitfire from issue #8; renamed Codename: Spitfire from issue #10)
• Star Brand (19 issues, one annual)

The New Universe was heavily marketed, but faced substantial problems. Shooter had planned to recruit top creators, but this became unfeasible when Marvel's corporate owners unexpectedly reduced his available budget. As a result, many of the pitches were handled by others. Certain books lacked focus as creative teams were swapped. Some critics argued that many of the "innovative concepts" were derivative of existing superheroes (Star Brand, for instance, was accused of having borrowed its basic premise from Green Lantern). Shooter was also involved with complex politics at Marvel Comics (which eventually led to his firing), and thus could not pay much attention to the line. Eventually, four of the titles were cancelled: Kickers, Inc., Merc, Nightmask, and Spitfire.

In an effort to save the line, Mark Gruenwald revamped the line and got John Byrne to write and do breakdowns on Star Brand. They ended up removing some of the more fantastic elements from the line and in a few cases doing radical revamps - the premise of Justice, for instance, was revealed to be a hallucination which had been artificially induced in the protagonist.

With this revamp, the writers also allowed for major catastrophic events which could not have occurred in the Marvel Universe, such as the sudden obliteration of the city of Pittsburgh in The Pitt (one issue) and the war with South Africa in The Draft (one issue) and The War (four issues).

Despite all of this, sales were poor and the imprint was abruptly discontinued in late 1989 after a total of 172 comics had been published. There was talk about releasing one-shots but nothing came of it.

In subsequent years, Mark Gruenwald brought New Universe characters into the Marvel Universe, first via appearances in Quasar, then in the Starblast miniseries; technically, these characters still exist in the Marvel Universe. The Starblast miniseries ended when the Stranger used the Starbrand to move the Earth of the New Universe into orbit around his Labworld. The characters remain mostly forgotten to this day.

Parody

The New Universe was the subject of much derision in comic fandom, both before and after its debut. In particular, the character of Star-Brand (and New Universe prime mover Jim Shooter) were parodied in DC Comics's series Legends, in which a faux Star-Brand bearing a strong physical resemblence to Shooter boasted that he had 'the power to create a new universe' in his hands. Guy Gardner used his power ring to restrain the villain, who - in trying to free himself - blew off his own foot.pt:Novo Universo (Marvel)