MAJOR disasters, invasions, and battles on Marvel Earth

Discuss chronologies for characters in the main "Marvel Universe"

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Spider-Man
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MAJOR disasters, invasions, and battles on Marvel Earth

Post by Spider-Man »

I need some help for a project/potential story I'm working on. I'm trying to come up with a list of all of the MAJOR events that've taken place on Earth in the Marvel Universe. I'm not talking about things like your run-of-the-mill supervillian attacks, because that'd encompass practically every Marvel story that ever existed. I just want the really BIG events, the kind of things that'd make the history books. Things like the Stamford and Soldier Field incidents, the Skrull Invasion, the Siege of Asgard, and so forth. Contrary to the subject title, they don't neccessarily have to be disasters or battles; things like Atlantis or Asgard being recognized as independent nations or Earth's first official diplomatic meeting with an otherworldly race would count too. Natural disasters (or events that would seem like natural disasters to most people) are fine too, as long as they're sufficiently major. Practically every other magic-based storyline has an unnatural storm or blizzard accompanying the threat of the week, but world-shaking events (like the various cataclysms that Charon's presence caused in Slott's first Mighty Avengers arc) would make the list.

Note that I'm only looking for events that happened on Earth and are known to the general public: Cosmic events might be more important in the grand scheme of things, but the general populace of Earth rarely if ever finds out about them. The same goes for events that were either reversed so that they never happened in the mainstream Marvel timeline (like Kulan Gath taking over the world and destroying all modern technology) or were forgotten due to some kind of psychic or mystical alteration of people's memories (like the Sentry/Void going on a worldwide rampage and killing over a million people). Most of those alien invasion stories in the early Marvel books, where the aliens were defeated before anyone could find out they were here or got written off as a hoax, wouldn't make the list for the same reason.

Bonus points for events that aren't from major crossovers: The famous stories are easy enough to look up, but the obscure ones are a lot harder to find information about, even if they'd be just as important in-universe. For example, I remember back during the Clone Saga the Jackal murdered an entire small town in upstate New York and I don't think any other comic ever referenced it again, but for the people of Marvel Earth that had to be a tragedy AT LEAST on par with what happened at Stamford.
John Simons
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Re: MAJOR disasters, invasions, and battles on Marvel Earth

Post by John Simons »

When you mentioned big attacks that are never referenced again, the first thing I thought of was Kang vaporizing the entire population of Washington DC at the tail end of Busiek's AVENGERS. Then he took over the world and rounded up heroes into internment camps, not that you would know it from any of the other Marvel titles.
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Re: MAJOR disasters, invasions, and battles on Marvel Earth

Post by Spider-Man »

Thanks. It's not quite complete but it's way more extensive than I'd expected Wikipedia to be. This should make a very good starting point.
John Simons wrote:When you mentioned big attacks that are never referenced again, the first thing I thought of was Kang vaporizing the entire population of Washington DC at the tail end of Busiek's AVENGERS. Then he took over the world and rounded up heroes into internment camps, not that you would know it from any of the other Marvel titles.
Yup, that is pretty much EXACTLY the kind of thing I'm looking for. Thanks for the info!

Anyone else have any similar examples?
wolframbane
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Re: MAJOR disasters, invasions, and battles on Marvel Earth

Post by wolframbane »

I would also suggest to get the handbook Blockbusters of the Marvel Universe. It list most of the mahor events in the MU. I would also suggest picking up the new History of the Marvel Universe in the next few weeks.
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Re: MAJOR disasters, invasions, and battles on Marvel Earth

Post by loki »

Fear Itself: Fellowship of Fear lists events that increased the fear levels amongst the world's population prior to that storyline, pretty much all of which would fit the bill for what you are asking.
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