5 Best Marvel Stories That Were Never Published

Comic books are a medium that is always charging forward. Dozens of new stories are published every month, and they follow a long road to get from a writer’s head to your local comic shop’s shelves, especially when those ideas are supposed to be published by Marvel Comics. These ideas need to fit within the bounds of the universe that Marvel has spent decades building, or at least be an interesting what-if scenario to keep readers hooked. All too often, because of the tumultuous nature of how the pitching process works and the constant pressure of multiple projects, not every idea pitched, even those that were announced and advertised, gets published.

Some comics are promised to fans or writers, only to disappear without a word and never appear again. It’s sad, but that’s the business. Still, just because those comics never made it doesn’t mean that we can’t give them their due. Today, we’re taking a look at five stories that Marvel planned to publish, but never quite made it out into the world. These stories all had potential to be big, but we’ll never see them, and that’s a darn shame. So, without further ado, let’s dive right into Marvel’s best unpublished stories.

5) Marvel Tales: Apocalypse

The 2099 future is a mixed bag, with Miguel O’Hara being the only notable character, but it was almost much bigger. In the mid ‘90s, Grant Morrison and Mark Millar were supposed to pen this miniseries, which would have started a new fire in the 2099 brand and introduced Captain America 2099, Iron Man 2099, and the Avengers 2099. Unfortunately, Marvel’s financial instability of the era made this project fall through, but it’s incredible to imagine what such a legendary team that’s known for its writers’ creativity could have achieved with this setup. 

4) Nightcrawler miniseries by Chris Claremont

Chris Claremont wasn’t just the head writer for the X-Men for seventeen years. He also spearheaded individual miniseries to promote and flesh out several major X-Men. Unfortunately, many never made it to print, and the biggest loss I see is the Nightcrawler-focused comic. Kurt is both top-tier comic relief and one of the wisest emotional cores in Marvel, but he rarely gets the spotlight. This comic could have propelled Kurt into the stardom he rightly deserves, and while its basic plot beats were reused for Uncanny X-Men (1963) #204, it just leaves me salivating for more at the thought of what this series could have done for him.

3) Fantastic Four: Fathers and Sons

The Fantastic Four have always been about family, and this graphic novel would have taken that to the next level. It would focus on the concept of fatherhood, showing us the good depiction with Reed and Franklin, and the abusive, complicated relationship between Quasimodo and the Mad Thinker. It was all about the parallels of fatherhood and what it meant to have that relationship. It would have dove into the then-unrevealed origins of the Mad Thinker and why he made Quasimodo like he had, culminating in what writer Danny Fingeroth called the ultimate Fantastic Four story. The FF’s best tales always have a strong emotional core, and this story had all that and more.

2) Marvels: Cops and Robbers

Marvels is a beloved miniseries that focused on the ordinary person’s point of view as the Marvel Universe evolved into the superheroic land that it is today. Two sequels were planned, featuring Charles Williams and his brother Royal as the stars. Marvels is a truly special series that tackled the growth of the Marvel Universe, and superheroes as a whole, with a grand awe that made it all feel even bigger than it already is. Superheroes seemed almost mythical at times, but the human elements were always present and undeniably the most powerful. Getting more of that would have been incredible, especially because the original idea for this sequel was picked up by Chuck Dixon, of all people, and published as Code of Honor.

1) True Friends

Not to be confused with the eventually released graphic novel X-Men: True Friends, this was Chris Claremont’s original vision for that comic. It would have focused on Kitty Pryde’s friendship with Illyana Rasputin, instead of Kitty and Rachel Summers. Kitty and Illyana have always had a very close relationship that deserves to be explored more, but as the years have gone on, the characters have drifted apart. This series could have not only solidified their closeness, but also given us greater insight into who Claremont wanted them to be to each other. They’re characters who have also flirted with being more than friends, if read the right way, and Kitty is canonically bisexual, so seeing this perspective from Chris Claremont himself would have been incredible.

Which unpublished Marvel story do you wish had hit the store shelves the most? Let us know in the comments or share your thoughts on the ComicBook Forum!

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