Superheroes are constantly teaming up and intersecting these days. With culture chasing the multiversal high, it’s more likely and easier now than ever to bring big names together. But it’s still rare to see a cross-cultural exchange like Marvel’s latest. Ultraman Crossovers take place on the same day – and offer very different approaches to the form and function of the genre.
Today, Marvel Comics and Viz Media have released two different mashups between Tsuburaya’s legendary tokusatsu hero Ultraman and Marvel’s world of comic book superheroes. In the manga section, there are Ultraman: Along came a Spider-Man by Shigenobu Matsumoto and Tomo Hirakawa (translated by Joe Yamazaki); on the western comics side there are Ultraman x Avengers #1, the first of a three-part miniseries by Kyle Higgins, Mat Groom, Francesco Manna, Matt Milla and Ariana Maher.
On the surface, both offer a similar premise: During a round of typical superhero rescue missions, mysterious circumstances catapult a Spider-Man into the world of Ultraman. Which Spider-Man is different—in the manga, it’s Peter Parker, in the comic, it’s Miles Morales—but that’s far from the only different path these two books take with the idea.
In Ultraman x Avengersthe circumstances of the crossover are, of course, inextricably linked to the concept of the multiverse. The reason Miles is drawn into Ultraman’s world is his now inherent connection to the multiverse concept, between his previous time in the Ultimate Marvel universe and years of Spider-Verse shenanigans that were pushed to the side when Reed Richards simply shoves him to another Earth in the multiverse as part of a plan to delay the arrival of Galactus on Earth (stupid trick, Reed!). In There came a Spider-Manit relies on the more conventional tropes of what we expect from isekai-style stories. Here, Peter is mortally wounded in a battle against Doctor Doom, only for both hero and villain to be hit by a train, metaphorically speaking, that takes them beyond the boundaries of realities into Ultraman’s Japan.
What’s interesting about both crossovers is their approach to continuity and understanding of the heroes they’re dealing with. There came a Spider-Man presents us with a Peter Parker who is a sort of hybrid of his movie and comic counterparts – in his world, he fights alongside the Avengers, who look a lot like their MCU counterparts, and he’s still a relatively young man, having lost Uncle Ben and become Spider-Man just three years ago. It’s a vague approximation of Spider-Man, drawn loosely: he’s a superhero, he shoots webs, he wants to save people, and that’s basically all the characterization you need to know. He’s Spider-Man! That’s it, you’re ready for him to meet Ultraman at the end of the second chapter and Shin Hayata to presumably say at some point, “I want to save people too!” Ultraman x Avengersis, meanwhile, wrapped in layers of fascinating context and insight that, while not burdensome, speak to the different ways in which common ground must be found between the worlds of Ultraman and Marvel.
Special, Ultraman x Avengers is in the context of Marvel’s previous Ultraman Comics of the past few years – original stories that took the general premise of the classic Ultraman of the ’60s and put it into a modern, original continuity. The circumstances in which we meet his versions of Shin and his allies in the United Science Patrol are based on the circumstances that arose from these countless comic series, in which Shin and a few close allies eventually split from the USP after it was revealed that their leader, Director Morheim, was an alien in disguise. The episodes of these series are crucial in setting the stage when Miles shows up, and create the initial distrust Shin and his friends feel towards him. It goes on to establish the initial hurdles our united heroes face in dealing with Galactus when the rest of the Avengers finally arrive. Even smaller details like a joke between Miles and Peter – where they suggest that the giant mecha Ultraman Jack, built by Shin’s allies, is not unlike the Leopardon of their Japanese spider friend Takuya Yamashiro, as he appears in various Spider-Vers Comics – is wrapped in layers of understanding and continuity.
As I said, it is not a burden –Ultraman x Avengers‘ debut issue does a good job of catching you up on the Ultraman side of things if you’re not up to date with those comics. The way it uses continuity is fanatical, but not in a detrimental way: you’ll get more out of the book if you’ve read the previous material, but you’ll still have a decent time if you haven’t. It’s essentially just an interesting contrast to the approach of There came a Spider-Manwhere the breadth of the book invites commonalities between the heroes rather than connecting the differences between them.
How much will this affect There came a Spider-Man And Ultraman x Avengers Whether that continues in the coming weeks and months remains to be seen, but having them side by side in the release schedule gives us an interesting opportunity to see how these two forms showcase what makes this type of crossover so exciting in the first place.
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