Marvel Absolutely Everything You Need To Know (A Madman Re-Read)

I've been re-cataloging my comic book collection into a new, hopefully more dependable database. It's been a lengthy, often times tedious, process. Going into my second year of working on this project, I've begun focusing on my graphic novels. That's how I came across this book for a re-read. (And yes, I know that this book is NOT a graphic novel.)

My first read was back in 2017. So a lot of the factoids I previously glossed over, had been essentially forgotten. Especially a lot of the more recent stuff. The more established lore of the heart and soul of the Marvel Universe, I pretty much know like the back of my hand. So I felt I'd benefit from a second glance at Absolutely Everything You Need To Know. True, this book is almost a decade old, published in 2016. That means there's a lot of material that's not even covered here like the coming of America Chavez, Spider-Gwen and Gwenpool. You will not learn about 'The Reckoning War', 'Extreme Carnage' or 'The Death of Doctor Strange.' Readers shouldn't even expect recent anthropomorphic fan favorites Alligator Loki and Jeff, the Land Shark here. 

DK did release an update. But that was in 2019! There's just too much newer stuff that won't be found in this book. If you're a newer reader of comics, you'll learn a lot about the foundation of Marvel Comics. If you're a more established reader looking to get caught up on what you've been missing in recent years, you are out of luck. And I would say that it's not just 2016-present that you will miss out of of you read this edition. I feel like the years 1995-2010 were just glossed over. Deadpool is barely even mentioned. Same goes for Blade, Ghost Rider and even your favorite team of mutants. Yes, the X-Men, arguably Marvel's most popular franchise, only get 4 pages out of over 250+ focused on their exploits. It really feels like the Avengers are the Star attractions of this book.

Avengers heavy exploits such as 'the Civil War,' 'the Age of Ultron' and 'Secret Invasion' are given a prominent place inside. Be glad the authors and editors included those episodes here. Without them, I don't think Wolverine or She-Hulk would even be mentioned in this book. I've not read the reissue of this book. But I'm hoping that instead of trying to revise the information in the first print, DK would have made the 2nd edition more of a compendium of overlooked characters and recent Marvel events. 

Also, despite this book focusing on alternate Earth's and timelines, you will not find anything on Marvel's impressive backlog of comics based on licensed franchises such as Star Wars, GI Joe or Transformers. 

Once again, my biggest peeve with this book was the format. I appreciate that they tried really hard to jam pack as much information and factoids into every 2-page feature. But I hated how they formatted it. Some paragraphs would be printed sideways. The data flow had no set pathway. Everything was so random, I'm pretty sure I missed something. 

Some 2-page spreads were entirely flipped on a 90 degree axis. Instead of reading about the history of Thor and Loki like you would hold a traditional book, their article was formatted in such a way that you had to read it like you were looking at a Playboy Playmate centerfold. I'm so very glad when I got to those segments of the book that my wife didn't assume that I was looking at some dirty pictures of the Invisible Woman or something. 

I enjoyed the read. Lots of knowledge to be gleaned. An amazing assortment of thrilling artwork from over 80 years of Marvel Comics history. Though trying to navigate it was like walking through a labyrinth without a map, a torch and assurance that the Minotaur isn't secretly about to pounce on you. I think it's time to pass this on to another reader. I just hope that the used bookstore that I am gonna trade this in at doesn't think that it's a reference book that is too out of date for readers.

Worth Consuming!

Rating: 7 out of 10 stars.

Marvel: Absolutely Everything You Need To Know

Barnes & Noble has an exclusive variant cover
that boasts Spider-Man.

   Marvel: Absolutely Everything You Need To Know promises readers to give them the complete inside scoop on the Marvel Universe. But this 240-page chronicle doesn't even come close to scratching the surface.
    Let's look at the positives first:

• It's a DK Book and they do amazing work. Their volumes are like museums in a book. If you need a guide getting around a city or state or particular topic, they are folks you trust to make sure you have arrived. 
• The illustrations are rather stunning and there are some really great factoids that I have wondered about for years and finally got answered.
• For someone who loves Captain America, he's very well covered in this book. The Avengers are also main features.

     But sadly, I think I have more negative things to say than good. 

     First of all, there's a lot of wasted space. At least 20 pages are comprised of splash pages of epic battles with no words. That really trims the book down to about 220 pages. I've read some books about Marvel that take 220 pages just to examine the history of how Atlas Comics in the 40s became Marvel in 1961! So a lot of history is glossed over.

Each 2-page spread looks like a museum display.

     Marvel has gotten a lot of flak over the past 5 years in how they have handled their properties licensed to other movie studios. I'm talking mainly about X-Men and the Fantastic Four. Both entities are virtually non-existent in this book. Wolverine, who was Marvel's most bankable character from the early 80s until about 2010 is mentioned maybe twice. 

       But I also found it odd that many of the characters that Marvel has decided to make the focus of their enterprise in the 21st century are for the large part overlooked. The In-Humans, seen as the poor choice to replace the X-Men, really only get 2 pages devoted to them. Ms.Marvel, Kamala Khan, only gets a 2 sentence blurb on the Captain Marvel page. And where the heck is Deadpool? I don't think he's in this book at all! (This book was found in the children's section, so maybe DK decided to tone down the violence. But it didn't read like a kids book!)

     The lay-outs are also a weak point. Several are presented in a pin-up fashion, meaning you have to turn the book sideways in order to read it. There's even 1 segment where you have to read the book upside down!

An example of the book's odd formatting.
I did not doctor this in any way.

     If I was going to give this book a new title, I would call it "Marvel: Everything New Readers Absolutely Need To Know In Order to Read Current Marvel Comics." I know that in the past couple of years, Marvel wiped out their original 616 universe in the pages of the Secret Wars. But it's not like everything reset to zero. If anything, it just molded the comics to be more like the Marvel movies and I think that's what Marvel and Disney told DK to do when crafting this book: only tackle things that are relevant to the company's plan for the heroes of the Marvel Universe.

     DK has rights to license DC Comics properties. Though I do not see plans for a volume such as this one, I hope if DK does produce a DC Comics version that the publisher will not be bound to Marvel's parameters. There is so many ways that DK can improve and if anyone from DK reads this review, I hope they will take this Madman's critiques and complaints to heart.

     An informative volume that focuses less on the company's illustrious 75 year plus history and more on the events of the past 15 years of their cinematic universe.

     Worth Consuming

     Rating: 8 out of 10 stars.

Avengers: The Ultimate Guide

WORTH CONSUMING!

DK (this book’s publisher) does excellent work. Their travel guides are essential to take with you.

So if you want to learn about the team that is the Avengers, but afraid to commit to a 500+ issue title before hand, this guide is essential to guide you along.

It answered many of my questions about characters and storylines. So if you want to know just what’s up with the Disassembled and Ultimates storylines, there are very detailed, yet brief entries about both.