A look at just one issue today, another one of my most favorite What If?s of all time. It’s a cosmic tale that features, and destroys, everybody! And, in typical Mark Gruenwald form, we get lots of detail and history.
Mark Gruenwald wrote it and did the layouts, which were fleshed out by a tone of great artists and then inked by Greg Larocque. The story starts with a handy recap of the Korvac Saga, one of the most celebrated Avengers tales of all time (Avengers #167-177). But unlike in the “real” story, where Korvac’s human lover doubted his mad omnipotence, this time she shows only support. This is all it takes for Korvac to mind-control the Avengers and conquer Earth.
An interesting aspect of this issue is that the Watcher of this alternate universe appeals to the other Watchers for help, seeing that Korvac is becoming too powerful, and the other watchers universally vote “no.” We have to assume Uatu is one of the voters, but we all know he meddles in the 616 universe all the time!
The end of the story is a little pat—Korvac uses the Ultimate Nullifier against Eternity and everything disappears. But really, where else are you gonna go with this one?
Obviously, this is not a What If? that ended up coming true.
This is one of the top 10 Mark Gruenwald comics of all time and one of the best single issue comics of all time.