Well…that was all a bit of a damp squib, wasn’t it? After 4 issues inching out a few fairly interesting revelations about the secret history of the Ultimate Universe, the entire series turns out to be nothing more than an extended trailer for Ultimatum. Call me old fashioned, but I like to see an actual story in this miniseries.

Perhaps the biggest slip up is that the retelling of Richard Parker’s past has created a discrepancy in the allegedly tight Ultimate continuity. Peter was old enough to remember his family hanging out with the members of the Brock household, but as Ultimate Origins tells it, his parents were killed in an explosion when he was a tiny baby. I’m generally quite forgiving of apparent errors in continuity, but with the series now over, it seems certain that this is an outright error. Likewise, Ultimate X-Men has its timeline mangled yet again. It’s disappointing, especially when the whole point of the title was to lay out the “planned” history of the Ultimate Universe

If the introduction of the apparent Ultimate Black Panther towards the end seems tacked on, then the appearance of Ultimate Rick Jones is positively nailed unconvincingly onto Ultimate Origin’s forehead. It’s frustrating that a series that started with a fair amount of promise should stumble so badly at the end, utterly failing to wrap up any of its threads. It’s a wellspring of missed opportunities, and represents Bendis’ most genuinely lacklustre effort in some time – it feels more like it was compiled from his story notes than a comic he wrote.

The solicitation for #5 (always a good reference point) utterly screams “rewrite” when it mentions Bruce Banner and suggests a big revelation about his “destiny” despite the fact that the issue as released features neither hide nor hair of him. It seems likely that the series conclusion was reworked to provide a clearer lead-in to “Ultimatum”. Unfortunately, if even Bendis can’t make a crossover seem interesting, then god help us when Jeph “creative nadir” Loeb finally takes the reins.