''Avengers: Infinity'' is a four-issue

American comic book An American comic book is a thin periodical literature originating in the United States, commonly between 24 and 64 pages, containing comics. While the form originated in 1933, American comic books first gained popularity after the 1938 publ ...

limited series published from September to December 2000 by

Marvel Comics Marvel Comics is a New York City–based comic book publishing, publisher, a property of the Walt Disney Company since December 31, 2009, and a subsidiary of Disney Publishing Worldwide since March 2023. Marvel was founded in 1939 by Martin G ...

. It was written by Roger Stern and drawn by Sean Chen, Scott Hanna, Steve Oliff and Troy Peteri.

Publication history

Writer Roger Stern explained a number of the decisions that went into planning the series. On the diverse team lineup he said, "I just put together a list of Avengers who would be at loose ends, and who would be good choices for a big, cosmic adventure ... with a welcome bit of kibitzing from Kurt Busiek and

Tom Brevoort Tom Brevoort () is an American comic book editor, known for his work for Marvel Comics, where he has overseen titles such as '' New Avengers'', ''Civil War'', and ''Fantastic Four''. He became Executive Editor in 2007, and in January 2011, was pro ...

." The idea of the huge hand "came from the image that Carlos Pacheco gave us in '' Avengers Forever'' #10. Kurt and I had asked him for a shot of a gigantic hand bigger than the star it was reaching for -- and, boy, did he deliver! The story also partly led into the " Maximum Security" storyline.

Plot summary

The cosmic hero

Quasar A quasar ( ) is an extremely Luminosity, luminous active galactic nucleus (AGN). It is sometimes known as a quasi-stellar object, abbreviated QSO. The emission from an AGN is powered by accretion onto a supermassive black hole with a mass rangi ...

receives a distress call from a

colony A colony is a territory subject to a form of foreign rule, which rules the territory and its indigenous peoples separated from the foreign rulers, the colonizer, and their ''metropole'' (or "mother country"). This separated rule was often orga ...

of the alien Rigellians in deep space. The character arrives to find the colony destroyed and a single survivor, the superhero Jack of Hearts, who is in a

coma A coma is a deep state of prolonged unconsciousness in which a person cannot be awakened, fails to Nociception, respond normally to Pain, painful stimuli, light, or sound, lacks a normal Circadian rhythm, sleep-wake cycle and does not initiate ...

. Quasar summons all nearby members of the superhero team the Avengers, and the Thunder God

Thor Thor (from ) is a prominent list of thunder gods, god in Germanic paganism. In Norse mythology, he is a hammer-wielding æsir, god associated with lightning, thunder, storms, sacred trees and groves in Germanic paganism and mythology, sacred g ...

, the Titanian Eternal Starfox, heroines

Tigra Tigra (Greer Grant Nelson) is a superhero appearing in American comic books published by Marvel Comics. Created by writer-editor Roy Thomas and artist Wally Wood (Marie Severin was then brought in to help layout the art), with her early adventur ...

and

Photon A photon () is an elementary particle that is a quantum of the electromagnetic field, including electromagnetic radiation such as light and radio waves, and the force carrier for the electromagnetic force. Photons are massless particles that can ...

, and outsider Moondragon respond. When the heroes arrive on the planet, Moondragon scans Jack's mind and detects a single word: ''Infinites''. The heroes are then attacked by thousands of

robot A robot is a machine—especially one Computer program, programmable by a computer—capable of carrying out a complex series of actions Automation, automatically. A robot can be guided by an external control device, or the robot control, co ...

s, and eventually retreat via ship into space as the artificial life forms seem to be forming from the planet itself. Moondragon continues to scan Jack's mind and learns the robots' purpose is to break down the entire planet into a molten mass. The planet's crust is breached by the robots and as it becomes molten ore, Jack of Hearts wakes and states that the master of the robot hordes has arrived. A spatial rift opens, and a being the size of a planet emerges. The Avengers—at

microscopic The microscopic scale () is the scale of objects and events smaller than those that can easily be seen by the naked eye, requiring a lens or microscope to see them clearly. In physics, the microscopic scale is sometimes regarded as the scale betwe ...

size compared to the entity–breach its head and attempt to reach the

brain The brain is an organ (biology), organ that serves as the center of the nervous system in all vertebrate and most invertebrate animals. It consists of nervous tissue and is typically located in the head (cephalization), usually near organs for ...

to learn more and possibly neutralize it. As the Avengers battle more of the same robots within the entity, Tigra watches as it shapes the molten ore into a cylinder. Several more beings of the same size and scope arrive, bearing similar cylinders, which Tigra assumes are former planets. The group fuses with the cylinders to form a huge circular ring that clamps the

star A star is a luminous spheroid of plasma (physics), plasma held together by Self-gravitation, self-gravity. The List of nearest stars and brown dwarfs, nearest star to Earth is the Sun. Many other stars are visible to the naked eye at night sk ...

close to the original planet the Avengers visited. Another spatial rift opens and an even larger hand appears and begins to drag away the entire

galaxy A galaxy is a Physical system, system of stars, stellar remnants, interstellar medium, interstellar gas, cosmic dust, dust, and dark matter bound together by gravity. The word is derived from the Ancient Greek, Greek ' (), literally 'milky', ...

. The characters retreat from the entity, now part of the colossal ring. Moondragon determines the entire construct is called a ''Walker'', and being dragging away the galaxy an ''Infinite''. She suggests summoning the cosmic entity

Eternity Eternity, in common parlance, is an Infinity, infinite amount of time that never ends or the quality, condition or fact of being everlasting or eternal. Classical philosophy, however, defines eternity as what is timeless or exists outside tim ...

to stop the act. Quasar is able to call Eternity, and the entity wrestles with the hand before travelling with the Avengers to the Dimension of Manifestations, where cosmic entities converse. The Infinites claim they are rearranging galaxies to improve the flow of energy, and Eternity advises them that this would be fatal to all affected life forms. The Avengers each make a case for the sanctity of life. The Infinites explain that they were ignorant of the fact that life could exist on planets. They abandon their plan, and one of them sacrifices itself to restore all destroyed planets. The Avengers are transported back to the now recreated Rigellian colony, which is a paradise as

animal Animals are multicellular, eukaryotic organisms in the Biology, biological Kingdom (biology), kingdom Animalia (). With few exceptions, animals heterotroph, consume organic material, Cellular respiration#Aerobic respiration, breathe oxygen, ...

life has yet to appear.''Avengers Infinity'' #1 - 4 (Sep. - Dec. 2000)

References

External links

* * *
''Avengers Infinity''
at the Unofficial Handbook of Marvel Comics Creators
''Avengers Infinity''
at the Marvel Database Project

,

Comics Bulletin Comics Bulletin is a daily website covering the comic-book industry. History Silver Bullet Comicbooks In January 2000, New Zealand-based publisher/editor Jason Brice founded then named Silver Bullet Comicbooks. During this period, the site ...

{{Avengers publications Comics by Roger Stern