It has been 42 years since Marvel Comics released the crossover event that changed comic books forever and could end the Marvel Cinematic Universe as we know it. Marvel has a massive crossover event every year, and in 2025, there were actually three running almost all at the same time. That included One World Under Doom, Empyre, and Age of Revelation. It might be hard to believe, but until 42 years ago, these events were unheard of, and most major events happened in a regular run of Marvel Comics, such as how the Kree-Skrull War storyline was mostly contained to The Avengers comics.
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However, that all changed on January 24, 1984, when Marvel Comics released Secret Wars #1. This was an exciting moment, and Marvel readers had never seen anything like it before. Most of the main Marvel heroes and villains were involved in the miniseries, and Marvel changed many comics’ storylines based on what happened in this monumental event series.
Marvel’s First Real Crossover Appeared 42 Years Ago
When Secret Wars started, it shook up the entire Marvel Comics community. Readers had no idea what was going on, and the way Marvel did it was revolutionary. At the end of all the main comics in December, heroes found a mysterious portal, and when they went through, they were gone. In January, comics began coming out, and there were major unexplained changes. Spider-Man had a new black costume that he could control mentally.
The Fantastic Four had She-Hulk as a new team member, and The Thing was gone completely. The X-Men were different, and the biggest thing to note is that Marvel didn’t explain anything except that it was the fallout from the miniseries that was about to start called Secret Wars. Fans had to read the new series to find out why these changes happened and what it all meant.
Of course, this was also the first-ever Marvel Comics crossover event series, something that happens all the time today. In this case, an alien being called The Beyonder brought all the heroes and villains from Earth to Battleworld to fight each other. The winning side would get a prize involving a granted wish. Beyonder wanted to understand humanity, and this was all a game for him. This included some heavy hitters, as the villains even included Kang, Doctor Doom, and Galactus. This was a massive event, and it changed everything in Marvel Comics.
There was a sequel that came a few years later that never came close to matching the original series. However, 31 years after Secret Wars shook up the Marvel Comics world and helped create the idea of the company-wide crossover event, a real sequel arrived in Secret Wars in 2015. Here, Doctor Doom killed the Beyonders’ race and used their power to recreate Battleworld in his own image and save some of Earth’s population after the Incursions to live under his rule as God Emperor Doom.
It is this sequel series that the upcoming MCU releases, Avengers: Doomsday and Avengers: Secret Wars, will be based on. While the original Secret Wars changed several comics, the 2015 sequel changed everything, and it looks to reboot the entire MCU as well when it ends. While the movies will play off the later series, it was the miniseries that launched 42 years ago today that laid the groundwork for these changes.
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