The Ultimates 1 Review

Hello again my friends and welcome to another installment of Avenger November! Today its time for the first review of two of the Marvel series The Ultimates. I have decided not to do a review of Ultimates 3 it was just too awful and poorly done for me to repeat any of it, even the art sucked. Anyways without further adieu here’s the review of The Ultimates 1.

Alright, so we start with Nick Fury, who is now modeled after Samuel L. Jackson, having lunch with Bruce Banner (The Hulk). He talks to him about how he’s been handling the Hulk and asks if there have been any “episodes” lately. Through Bruce’s response we find out that he’s on some kind of drugs that help keep his emotions and the Hulk at bay. Fury then asks how his progress is coming on the new Super-soldier serum (the formula that created Captain America) and Bruce replies that the closest thing they have to any significant results is that of the Hulk(green version). In this Universe the Hulk was created by an experimental serum instead of radiation from an atomic bomb, just wanted to point out the difference. Any who Fury then tells him that the government will fund his research on the condition he keeps the Hulk restrained. He then says that they are putting a team of special scientists and heroes together at a S.H.I.E.L.D. base. He mentions that this team will include Hank Pym (Ant-man/Giant-man), who at this point has the helmet allowing him to talk to ants and control them but cannot shrink down yet. And Jan Pym (Wasp) who can shrink down, shoot stinging laser blasts and has wings. He also mentions that Tony Stark (Iron Man) has allowed The Ultimates to have him and his Iron Man armor in their team. We find out that Betty Ross (Bruce’s usual love interest, and still is here) is in charge of P.R. for The Ultimates and is, pardon my language, a total psycho bitch. She only cares about image, treats Bruce like dirt and has reeeeally weird fetishes (like getting turned on by Bruce when the Hulk eats an alien, WTF!). She asks if they had any luck getting Thor on board. We see a scene in which Bruce and Fury are trying to enlist Thor in some snowy place, I forget where. Anyways Thor is a green peace radical hippie and says he refuses to join the military industrial complex and kill for oil blah blah blah. He then shows off his lightning summoning powers from his hammer Mjollnir and that’s the end of their talk. Hank now settled in conducts an experiment on himself and through it becomes giant…and naked, it happens a lot.



So now Hank has Giant-man powers and is now a hero on the team. Then Fury announces that they’ve found the Captain America frozen in the ice.

They revive Cap and he freaks out, understandably so having been frozen in the 40’s. He lays the smack down on nearly everybody in the hospital room thinking he’s been captured and then jumps out the window. Suddenly Giant-man in an attempt to stop him uses his massive hand to nearly high-five him to death by smashing him! After they’ve calmed him down, he agrees to join the team. Now on to their first mission.

The Ultimates have had no crime to fight and people are getting angry about the government spending billions of dollars on them. This inspires Bruce to mix the Hulk serum with Captain America’s blood and inject it into himself, that and the fact that Betty is on a date with Freddy Prinze Jr. Anyways he Hulks out into the more powerful gray Hulk and goes on a murderous rampage killing hundreds of people. (This is where I begin to give my low marks and bad reviews on this comic) The Ultimates are called into action. They arrive on scene and Hulk is climbing a building to get to Betty saying if Bruce isn’t man enough for her then Hulk is and is basically threatening to rape her. Giant man smashes Hulk into a wall but then gets completely owned by the Hulk who threatens to use his head for a toilet bowl -_- (see image below)


Then Jan appears on scene, by the way Jan is very smart she has a double PhD and not to mention powers and what’s her plan for dealing with the Hulk…



Yeah she just flashed him ugh this is getting harder to write. The Hulk then remarks that he is incredibly horny and that he’s going to get her *someone please help me stop reading this* Cap comes in and wails on Hulk a bit but not well enough. The whole fight is resolved when Thor lets loose with a massive lightning bolt and lays him out. They take Bruce into custody and so on.

They keep the Hulks alter ego of Bruce a secret so that the people won’t demand his death and that no negative light will be cast on the Ultimates (classy). Afterwards we see Hank and Jan preparing for a celebration party. Hank with his inferiority complex plus the fact that he just got owned is feeling touchy and pissed. Jan makes one small comment and Hank flies off the handle and through their arguing we find out Jan is an actual mutant who lays eggs and eats bugs (gross and interesting) and then Hank hits her, hard, bare in mind this happened in the regular universe too, only difference is Hank goes way beyond one smack. Jan hits him back and he starts to really beat her, she shrinks down and then Hank sprays her with bug spray nearly killing her and when she flies off to hide, he has his ants attack her causing her to be hospitalized and near death.

Now we are going to do a quick summary on the things we’ll find out about these characters in this comic. Tony is an even bigger alcoholic than in the regular universe. He has to get wasted just to pilot the suit and womanizes like crazy also the only reason he’s helping is because he has an inoperable brain tumor and figured he’d do something worthwhile before he died.. While mentioning Tony I want to mention Jarvis. In the movies Jarvis is a computer, in the comics he’s a human butler very loyal to Tony, and in the Ultimates he is still a butler but is gay and lusting over almost every member on the team and is nothing but sarcastic to Tony. Bruce is neurotic and beyond whipped and the Hulk…ugh, well you already saw what the Hulk was like. The two mutants Quicksilver and Scarlet Witch have pretty much done nothing up to now and kind of wont, at least in this comic. Jan is really easy; she gets around a lot trying to seduce a lot of people. Cap is great but can be a total a-hole and Thor is an annoying hippie who sleeps with countless groupies, so yeah not exactly the best heroes. I’m going to breeze over the next half of the comic because it’s actually pretty awesome and has some killer action that I can’t do justice with words so I recommend you read it for yourself. It has aliens, a conspiracy involving their influence over WWII and large scale fights. But to sum up we are introduced to Clint Barton aka Hawkeye, who in this is an agent of S.H.I.E.L.D. and a total badass and not to mention the most likeable character. He’s a family man, loves his wife, kicks butt and whips arrows like nobodies business, and Black Widow, also an agent of S.H.I.E.L.D. They attack this corporate building that is actually full of aliens in disguise and it makes for some really epic action. We then have a war involving S.H.I.E.L.D., the Ultimates, and the armies versus the alien armada so yeah check that out.

Now for my overall review, I personally don’t like this comic, I think it’s awful. The characters are uninspiring, trashy, d-bags, violent, and ridiculously promiscuous plus the dialogue is crap. What I will give it though is it has great story ideas, it’s just executed poorly and I love the costume designs and changes…well most of em. Cap’s new suit in the present looks lame and Iron Man looks like a fisher price toy but otherwise many of them look great and more realistic. Where I give this comic the most credit though is the art. Bryan Hitch’s artwork is probably my favorite comic art. It has detail and amazing range and at some points is just downright beautiful. All in all I give it an 2.5/5. Check it out but be ready to have to push through a lot of crap.

Well that’s my review of Ultimates 1, in a day or so I should have Ultimates 2 up which so far has been much better. Thanks again for reading and sharing my pain.

Odd Avenger signing off.