Ultimate Marvel/Awesome

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.



  • Cap's response upon being asked by a Big Bad to surrender.

Captain America: Do you think this letter on my head stands for France!?

    • Although relativized by Cap at the end of the first Ultimates volume (He called this remark stupid and attributed it to the heat of the battle). Nevertheless it is stated in the second volume of the Ultimates that he does hate France.
    • Which was later parodied by Elsa Bloodstone in Nextwave, who was wearing a European Union t-shirt.

Elsa: Victim? Do you think this letter on my chest stands for America!?

  • Wasp crawling through the Hulk's ear in order to administer a much needed wasp sting directly into his brain.
  • Although later events somewhat change one's view of the character, the first appearance of Ultimate Black Widow included a scene where she jumps across a street in New York between skyscrapers, grabs a sniper rifle in midair that was dropped from a helicopter, and slides to a halt in the building on the other side while taking down the bad guys and saving Hawkeye.
  • Bruce Banner being thrown out of a helicopter to make him turn into the Hulk
    • Closely copied in The Incredible Hulk; again, it was awesome.
  • Ultimates vol. 2's "Grand Theft America" arc has many, especially during the triumphant climax.
    • Captain America bursting free from the grasp of a dozen super-strong foes.
    • Wasp using her "sting" at full size to cave in a bunch of dudes' faces.
    • Iron Man proving that he's still a very good shot, even while drunk.
    • Quicksilver - Getting up after being blasted by lightning four times to launch himself hundreds of feet into the air and save the day by snatching Thor's belt. Evacuating the top three floors of SHIELD headquarters in the blink of an eye. Gruesomely dispatching an enemy speedster in between her last attack on Hawkeye, and Hawkeye hitting the ground (Hawkeye, of course, sees Quicksilver slumped over sweating and asks "Hey, quit messing around and give me a hand here")
      • That wasn't sweat; that was the atomized soup of Hurricane.
      • And speaking of Ultimate Hawkeye, he'd already proven himself a true badass, but working his own fingernails off and flicking them into the faces of his captors causing them to choke while tied down to a chair, and thus allowing him to make an escape, took him to new levels of pure awesome badassitude.
    • Scarlet Witch has two, in separate instances against Loki and Thor:
      • Against {{[spoiler| Thor}}]: "Somewhere there's a reality where you are a baby seal being clubbed to death. I'm going to find it and bring it here."
      • "I'm increasing the odds of someone showing up to kick your {{[spoiler| Loki's}}] ass".
    • Ultimate Thor, while facing down Loki's army of demons without any glimmer of hope, calls down the Bifrost rainbow bridge, the gateway to Asgard, down which storms an entire army of Viking warriors straight from Valhalla. They then proceed to beat the crap out of every baddie in town.
    • Hank Pym...nope, I got nothin'. The Giant Man serum he snuck Janet/Wasp let her have another one, though. Trying to convince the Ultimates he was on their side all along was pretty ballsy, but it's not quite "awesome", in that it was so pathetic that even the robots he was commanding didn't buy it. ("Whatever," one says, shoving his arm through an enemy soldier's chest.)
      • There was that time when Captain America kicked his ass. Hey, it wasn't his, but at least he got to be in a crowning moment of someone.
        • Well, he did create Ultron, which was awesome at the time. Also, he turned giant to save Nighthawk from being burned alive.
    • Bruce Banner revealing that he survived his attempted execution (electric chair? lethal injection? no, a nuke). How did he reveal this? By being stepped on by a robot, transforming into the Hulk, then proceeding to toss the robot - hundreds of times his size, even as the Hulk - around like it was nothing.
      • Also, tearing apart his Evil Counterpart. "YOU THINK TOO MUCH!"
        • He literally punches Abomination's head off!
    • Nick Fury...has many crowning moments of awesome, simply because he is A) Samuel L. Jackson, and B) a "black belt in thinking twelve moves ahead", but none of them were here. Sorry, dude.
      • One such moment occurs in an annual set during the timeline of this story. An assassin is called out of retirement to kill Nick Fury. He is given a special gun, of which only two were made, that can both see through and shoot through walls, the assassin tracks Fury, sets up in a nearby building, and as he sets the scope to point at Nick's exact location, the last thing he sees is Nick firing the other special gun at him. It turns out, Fury put the hit out on himself to draw this assassin out of hiding.
    • The European heroes, led by Captain Britain, who sneak into the country as civilians and cheerfully explain the concept of "secret identity" before opening a can of whoop-ass.
    • Hawkeye taking down a squad of highly trained soldiers by throwing dinner knives and forks. Then after he's captured and tied down, escaping by tearing out his fingernails and flicking them into enemy throats.
    • Finally, an eight page splash panel of everyone fighting an army of orcs and gigantic wolves. And to a lesser extent, the splash panel with just about everyone in the Ultimate Marvel universe kicking ass and taking names from the Liberators.
      • With Quicksilver on every page of the splash, just to reiterate once again how awesome he is.
  • The "Ultimate Galactus" storyline. Oh Warren Ellis, why must you spoil us so?
    • Captain America's speech to the Red Guardian:

"Yeah, I'm gonna fight you. You know why? Because I fought besides Russians during World War II. They were good and decent men, and they made terrible, painful sacrifices to save their country. And to see their country then turn around and put monsters in prisons with nuclear landmines... to see people like you, proudly complicit in this nightmare... Yeah, I'll fight you. You've waited forty years for me in this hellhole, I feel it'd be impolite not to kick your head in."

Red Guardian: Do you know what this place did? It made us proud. It made us glorious. It made us strong and it taught us there was no shame in a union. Because it took a Union to make us.
Captain America: That's - <unf> That's the mistake crazy scum like you always make. Fighting's not about pride. Fighting's not about glory.
(Captain America grabs a pointed object from his surroundings and stabs his opponent in the heart)

Captain America: Fighting's about winning.

    • Later on, Ultimate Falcon(a scientist with Army training) defeats Ultimate Colossus(an iron-plated mutant strongman) with Fridge Logic. "So... if your eyes are made of metal... how can you see?" *eyepoke!*
    • The Mythology Gag that introduce the Devourer of Worlds' designation is a nice touch.
    • We meet Ultimate Captain Marvel. Even before we see he has superpowers, we are shown how awesome he is:

Colonel North: Gentlemen, be seated. I'd like to introduce our core team on the Asis rocket - Doctor Sutton, Doctor Binder, and Doctor Lawson. If Doctor Lawson will give us his time.
Philip Lawson (Captain Marvel): I'm sorry, I was just looking at her.
Major Carol Danvers: Excuse me?
Philip Lawson(Captain Marvel): (pointing out the window) The rocket. Didn't see you there, Major. Sorry.
Colonel North: Doctor Lawson is, of course, a civilian, and should probably be forgiven. If not by me.

      • Then he beats the crap out of a giant alien robot. It tells him that his armour will not be sufficient. His response? "Shut up. I can do anything I like." And then he blows it up.
        • And while delirious from the exploding robot, he gets arrested by the soldiers on the base. He tries to talk his way out of it by claiming to be Spider-Man. He doesn't get away with it, but goddamn, it took guts.
    • The Fantastic Four get recruited over the phone, and they're told there will be an aerial escort. As they get onto the ship, they gush about how great it will be to work with the Ultimates, and whether Thor or Iron Man is cooler. Then they launch. They can't see any aircraft. Then they look up. It's Thor and Iron Man.
    • Reed Richards' line as the spaceship takes off.

"I never get tired of this feeling."

    • Hawkeye shoots one alien soldier with an arrow. The alien's three squadmates turn around. Hawkeye shoots all three at once:

Hawkeye: Well, they die like people, at least.
Captain Marvel: They are people. I'm one of them.
Hawkeye: So its good to know you'll die like people too.

    • Remember Reed Richard's "I stayed inside like a good little nerd" speech from Rise of the Silver Surfer? Well that's in here too, except he delivers it to Ultimate Nick Fury. Yeah, that's right - he talks trash to Sam Frigging Jackson.
      • Even better, it was done here first - the speech was so awesome that they used it in the film.
    • Misty Knight insists she was attacked by a bald hitwoman, who was pronounced dead over a decade before. Captain America doesn't believe. She tells him to kiss her ass. Then she stops this mysterious woman from fleeing the scene of the crime when a satellite dish gets bombed on the Helicarrier:

"Bald. Alive. And running around on your little flying fortress seconds after something blows up. Get Captain America up here. I have something for him to kiss."

    • Professor Xavier tries to interface with Gah Lak Tus and gets mind-pwned. So on their next encounter, he links himself with pretty much the entire human race and then goes back.

"Hello Gah Lak Tus. Remember me? I've brought six billion of my friends."

      • Cue Gah Lak Tus spazzing out.
    • Reed Richards saves the day by firing an alternate universe's big bang at the Gah Lak Tus. Even though it saved all of humanity, both he and his girlfriend view this as an abomination against nature and science.
      • Mind you, pretty much any time Warren Ellis writes Ultimate Reed Richards, expect him to do something awesome.
    • And Nick Fury's incredible hubris on the last page is somewhere between this and Tempting Fate.
  • In a timeline narrowly avoided by Ben Grimm, everyone on Earth save Ben himself gains superpowers thanks to some seemingly benevolent aliens. Unfortunately, it's revealed that the same pill that gave everyone their abilities is also killing them. Ben is the only one who didn't take the pill and, as such, is the only survivor when the aliens hunt down and kill the remaining superpowered humans and mutants. Unfortunately, the alien's power is to copy that of every superhuman within a hundred miles, and he's just killed them all, leaving him alone with one very pissed off Ben Grimm who may not have any powers, but he does have rage. Cue Awesome.
  • And over in Ultimate X-Men, we have such delights as Colossus pile-driving a car into Betsy Braddock/Proteus to kill him, Wolverine eliminating romantic rival Cyclops by dropping him off a cliff, Cyclops surviving with several broken bones by eating - among other things - insects and his watch strap, and Cyclops' verdict on Wolverine's actions: telling him 'You're off the team' just after turning him into a steaming pile of meat with an optic blast.
  • Cyclops tricking a Sentential into picking him up, then pressing a button on his hand to unleash a full optic blast in it's face is one of the first in the series.
  • In Ultimate Fantastic Four, Doctor Doom (controlled by Reed Richards) confronts the zombie Fantastic Four from Marvel Zombies. He takes special precautions to not get infected by the virus, and uses his strength and powers to beat them all in only a few pages.
    • Doom's reaction to finding himself stuck in the Zombie universe is priceless.
  • Aunt May using Godwin's Law on J. Jonah Jamerson during a serious bout of Bad Boss -itus. Actually, almost everyone we are supposed to root for gets one in that issue.
  • I kinda liked the "big, scary hammer" moment in Ultimates Vol. 2, Homeland Security, but that's topped by Cap manipulating Hulk into eating Herr Kleiser and destroying the Not-Skrull ships. I know it's Character Derailment, especially following the "you think this letter on my head" bit, but if I was jerking one of the most powerful beings on Earth around like a dog on a leash with nothing more than schoolyard-level lies, I'd be grinning too.
  • Ultimate Power has quite a few:
    • Narrator: There are some things you never see more than once in your lifetime. And as Nick Fury looked out the window of the helicarrier, he knew that this was a least five of them.
      "...damn."
    • Scarlet Witch: "To set my powers against hers might cause... well, for lack of a better term, an implosion of natural laws... it could potentially tear this world asunder and destroy it."
      Nick Fury: "...it's not my world. Now get the hell out there."
    • Nick Fury loading up to go and turn the tide in the Marvel Universe heroes' favor, featuring enough guns and ammo clips to make Cable proud.
      Random grunt: "Whoa..."
      Nick Fury: "Sir."
      "Whoa, sir!"
      "Better."
    • And finally, Thor's rematch with Hyperion. Keep in mind, in the whole of the Supreme Power universe, Hyperion is regarded with a mixture of awe and horror for his sheer power.
      Thor: "ENOUGH!" *cue lightning* "Now, Hyperion, you will learn what it is to bring forth a god without mercy."
      Thor strikes Hyperion so hard that for the first time ever, the Supreme Power Hyperion bleeds.
      Zarda: *catches Mjolnir in mid-swing*
      "We have our own gods without mercy. And goddesses."
      Thor: "THEN I SPIT ON YOUR GODS. I AM THOR. GOD OF THUNDER!"