Ultimate Universe: One Year In #1: ‘But I believe the world is burnin’ to the ground/Let’s see how far we’ve come’

Ultimate Universe: One Year In #1 – written by Deniz Camp with art by Jonas Scharf, colors by Mattia Iacono, and lettering by VC’s Travis Lanham – serves as both a recap of the first year of the new Ultimate Universe, chronicling the ripple effects caused by The Ultimates, Ultimate X-Men, and Ultimate Black Panther primarily. Each book, along with Ultimate Spider-Man, has detailed a fight against the Maker’s Council, highlighted in this issue as Fury reports to them. Additionally, the issue is also a peek into the future of the still-solidifying reality as it establishes the stakes for the Ultimate Universe’s second year. 

Camp manages to achieve this balance by putting a new (old) character at the forefront of the one-shot, allowing Nick Fury Sr. to be the narrator and protagonist. Working directly for The Maker, and now his Council due to the disposition at the end of Ultimate Invasion, Fury leads H.A.N.D to hunt down potential terrorists, aka potential superheroes. The organization – which stands for Heroic Anomaly Neutralization Directorate – operates from the Beast, a giant helicarrier cloaked inside of an always raging storm that calls down lightning on the enemies of the world order. From there, the agents of H.A.N.D. work to spin narratives and obfuscate truth to suit Maker’s twisted designs.

Throughout the issue, Fury’s past, present, and future are interwoven as he makes his last testimonial. This version of the superspy hues pretty close to his main universe counterpart, with a key difference; apparently, Fury was injured back in 1944 with a bullet lodged in his head. He survived according to the narration, but his conscience didn’t, making for an easy path to hero hunter. Like any line of dialogue or idea expressed by any Nick Fury, that should be taken with a grain of salt due to the cunning mind yet spotty memories. 

Interweaving these moments of firm characterization and gaping holes in history allows Camp to create a dynamic, unreliable narrator. In a fun, recursive twist on the original Ultimate Universe, this version of Fury feels more in line with his 616 counterpart, bringing the troubled spy back to the familiar. As a result, there’s an automatic unease or distrust in the character as he tells the story of his past, compounded by the psychedelic sequences that evoke the character’s bygone era. Camp spells out the ways Fury may have been manipulated by Maker across the universe’s span, making the subtext the text in a way that would make Garth Marenghi proud. It’s a fitting choice for the character and framing story alike, offering a straightforward dilemma before unveiling deeper twists to the concept of Ultimate Fury. 

Camp also utilizes the page real estate and the critical eye of Fury to bring a sharper focus on the Maker’s Council. As the group vie for control and power in the absence of the villainous Reed Richards, Fury makes certain that the infighting and squabbles will only do more damage in the long run. There’s also a palpable tension between Fury, a proclaimed loyalist to the Maker, and the unruly delegates more concerned with their individual power over his return. Now that New York and North America have been split up and redistributed, the hierarchy of power in the Ultimate Universe is in flux, and Camp’s scripting paves that struggle as a defining path forward for the second year of storytelling across the line. 

A direct contribution to that sense of clarity and confusion alike is the art by Scharf. The linework by Scharf (and coloring from Iacono, more on that later) feels in direct conversation with The Ultimates artist Juan Frigeri’s style. Visual clarity and focus on tight blocking are on display in this issue, resulting in an easy-to-follow, modern-feeling aesthetic. Both this book and The Ultimates take that approach to the artwork, feeling modular yet comfortable in their respective corner of the universe. A radical shift in art could have resulted in this one-shot feeling less cohesive to Camp’s other title. 

Just because Scharf grounds the artwork in that sense of reality and visual coherence doesn’t mean the book is lacking in explosive action or pushes on the boundaries of verisimilitude. The spread of the Beast cloaked in storm clouds, Fury’s scrambled memories, and the expression of power by the Council all provide opportunities for the artist to take big swings in the linework and paneling. Each scene trades the pretty uniform, standard flow of boxes on the page for the more expressive splash or 3/4th panel. These moments by nature become more dramatic or elevated in the overall rhythm of the issue, drawing the eye and adding a layer of detail or misdirection to a seemingly straightforward story. Scharf strategically makes the shift in these moments to solidify their importance and to maximize the punch of a conversation issue. 

The coloring in these splash pages follows a similar progression, breaking from the baseline tones for something much more expressive. Iacono gives a cool, sterile shade of blue to a bulk of this issue, signaling the control that Fury exerts. Everything from the sky around the Beast, the H.A.N.D. uniforms, and Fury’s caption boxes, trade in those cool tones. It’s a steady rhythm underpinning the visuals of the issue, making for a read that prioritizes the sense of emotion on the surface. When the book breaks into the splash pages, Iacono gets to break out all the colors, infusing trippy, psychedelic tones to the story. 

Those moments do an excellent job of rooting the audience further into Fury’s fractured perspective. They feel as though they could equally be flashes of the main universe’s superspy adventures or twisted implants from the Maker. It’s the best-case scenario for a callback, evoking the spirit of an established feeling or tone without feeling beholding to or mimicking the original. Like much of the Ultimate Universe, the montage sequence is the perfect alchemy of new and old, taking the iconography or firmament from 616 and transmuting it into something unexpected. 

After Camp’s tale of twisted allegiance and machinations, the book offers a short prologue to the next title in the line, Ultimate Wolverine. Written by Chris Condon with art by Alessandro Cappuccio, coloring from Bryan Valenza, and lettering by Lanham, the book will follow Directorate X, a secret organization in the mutant-populated Eurasian Republic dedicated to utilizing the x-gene as a source of weaponry for the status quo. The short story establishes the sparse origin of Wolverine’s involvement with the organization, as he is twisted into the Winter Soldier. 

Condon’s scripting in the backup immediately taps into the espionage elements of the universe, thanks to the narration by Dr. Alonya Prostovich. The doctor is the de facto leader of Directorate X, playing god with the mutants under the control of the Rasputins. Condon infuses a steely tone to the story through Prostovich’s clinical explanation of the Eurasian Republic and their attitudes to the world. In the same running voice-over, there is no sense of guilt or shame in the breaking and prodding of Logan. It’s explicitly in the short story that this is a Logan seen as less than even an animal, little more than a tool from the chest. 

It’s fitting that Cappuccio’s artwork is paired here, as the thick, heavy shadows lean into both the cloak-and-dagger tone and twisted approach to Logan’s status. Shrouded in abstract shapes and lighting, any vestiges of humanity are missing from the story. Logan is only seen in shadows, via x-rays, or in costume behind a full face mask. It’s an effective way to convey the absence of humanity in the short span of pages. Valenza reinforces that notion by layering on effects and tones that either stand in sharp contrast to the imagery, like a flare on the imaging or by drawing attention to the dissonance of beauty and beast, like on the story’s final page.