Posted in: Comics, Marvel Comics | Tagged: alan davis, Alan Moore, dave thorpe, marvel, Marvel 616

Marvel 616 Is Named After A Town In Siberia

Marvel will be launching their Marvel 616 TV show on Disney+. But what does it actually mean? You will find lots of explanations online, but only one website, Bleeding Cool, actually thought to ask the man who invented it, Dave Thorpe. Even though he never actually put it into print…

Once upon a time, in 1981, Dave Thorpe was writing original Captain Britain comic strips for Marvel UK's monthly Marvel Superheroes title, drawn by artists Alan Davis and Paul Neary. A world away from previous Captain Britain stories, these were surreal, satirical, allegorical and political tales, which weren't that appreciated at the time. He lasted a year, before he was replaced by Alan Moore who amped up the weird – but Thorpe did create a number of concepts on the Captain Britain comics which were then taken up by Alan Moore. Mad Jim Jaspers, Saturnyne, The Crazy Gang, the Jaspers Warp – and the idea that the Earth Captain Britain was fighting on, was designated 616.

It was a joke. DC Comics had Earth One, Earth Two and Earth Three – so this Earth that Captain Britain was on was Earth 616. While DC Comics had Earth 1, Earth 2, Earth 3, Dave Thorpe put Marvel Comics further down the dial.

Previously I'd only heard Alan Davis paraphrase what Dave Thorpe meant by the numbers. So, fresh out of the cinema, I thought I'd ask Dave directly. Talking to me today, he explained where it all came from.

 616 was the worst of the parallel Earths that was holding the others back from achieving the shift forward to the next evolutionary stage, which is why Saturnyne turned up to administer the evolutionary fluid to its population. 666 = number of the beast (Crowley). It would have been too obvious to use that. I chose 616 = 666 – 50. Why 50? a nice round number, but the school in the world's coldest town in Siberia closes when the temperature reaches -61.6 degrees Fahrenheit. It's an extreme tipping point.

Marvel 616 was named after the shutdown temperature of a town in Siberia. From the man himself. Who currently has a young adult SF novel, Perfect Girl in the works, and you can find more of his more recent work here.

The phrase 616 wasn't published in the comic when he wrote it, but this was meant to be the parallel universe in which his Captain Britain was fighting. When Alan Moore began writing the Captain Britain strip, he took on the idea of the Omniverse and created the Captain Britain Corps. During which, in an issue of UK magazine Daredevils #7, he used the numbers for the first time, now stating that the parallel universe Dave described above was to be designated 238 and that the Marvel Universe, in which Captain Britain originally resided and returned to, was to be 616.

Chris Claremont was a big fan of Alan Moore's work. putting Alan's version of Sir James Jaspers into Uncanny X-Men #200, alongside Roma – though his plans for The Fury and James Jaspers changed into Nimrod and The Adversary over copyright disputes. But  when he put together the comic Excalibur with Alan Davis and picking up on a number of characters from both the X-Men and the Captain Britain worlds, he included Dave Thorpe's Crazy Gang and Saturnyne. With the pandimensional Cross-Time Caper, the numbers 616 began to pop up. And other Marvel Comics engaged in dimensional travelling storylines used the same number for the Marvel Earth.

Decades on, this had become quite the trope, editorial had spoken out their hatred in using it, despite many creators' love for the phrase. So a few years ago, creators were given a last hurrah, to use it, get it out of their systems on stories such as Spider-Verse (which led to the movie) and Infinity/Time Runs Out, culminating in the Secret Wars comic that destroyed the 616 Universe and then recreated it as Prime Earth.

But you can't keep a good number down. It keeps popping up – it was all over the Spider-Man: Into The Spider-Verse movie, it's now been stated (erroneously) as the designated MCU dimension by Mysterio in Spider-Man: Far From Home and there the new Marvel TV series called Marvel's 616 coming up,

"Marvel's 616"is an anthological documentary series exploring the intersection between Marvel's rich legacy of stories, characters and creators and the world outside your window. Told through the lens of a diverse group of filmmakers, each documentary will dive into the rich historical, cultural and societal context that has become inseparable from stories of the Marvel Universe.

You can't keep a good 616 down… say, I wonder if Dave will get thanked for that one?

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