Ultimate Spider-Man returns with Hickman and Checchetto

Amazing Fantasy #1000 art by Marco Checchetto
(Image credit: Marvel Comics)

One of the first titles of writer Jonathan Hickman's new Ultimate Universe has been announced, and it's the same one that started the original Ultimate Marvel line way back when: Ultimate Spider-Man.

Hickman will launch a new Ultimate Spider-Man #1 in January, alongside artist Marco Checchetto, fresh off his long Daredevil run with writer Chip Zdarsky. Marvel hasn't revealed any further details of the new Ultimate Spider-Man #1, but the publisher promises that more will be announced during October's New York Comic Con.

(Image credit: Marvel Comics)

The original Ultimate Spider-Man kicked off in 2000, with writer Brian Michael Bendis and artist Mark Bagley reimagining Peter Parker's origins, supporting cast, and villains in a more contemporary setting. 

A whole Ultimate Universe spun-off from Ultimate Spider-Man, with its own separate continuity alongside the mainstream Marvel Universe. Many elements of the original Ultimate Universe influenced the early MCU, particularly the casting of Samuel L Jackson as Nick Fury, as he was the visual model for the Ultimate version of the character in comics.

The Ultimate Universe ceased to exist in 2015 with the landmark story Secret Wars (also written by Hickman) which brought Miles Morales, Peter Parker's successor as Spider-Man in the Ultimate Universe, into the mainstream Marvel Universe.

(Image credit: Marvel Comics)

Hickman and Checchetto have actually created one Spider-Man story together before, the short story 'You Get It,' from the Amazing Fantasy #1000 anthology. In that story, Peter Parker encounters a whole Spider-Verse of other versions of himself, who all commiserate with the tragedies he's faced in his life and the struggles of being Spider-Man.

The new Ultimate Spider-Man #1, and the entire new Ultimate Universe it kicks off, will spin out of Hickman and artist Bryan Hitch's current Ultimate Invasion limited series.

Stay up to date on all the new Spider-Man comics Marvel has planned for release.

George Marston

I've been Newsarama's resident Marvel Comics expert and general comic book historian since 2011. I've also been the on-site reporter at most major comic conventions such as Comic-Con International: San Diego, New York Comic Con, and C2E2. Outside of comic journalism, I am the artist of many weird pictures, and the guitarist of many heavy riffs. (They/Them)

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