The Marvel Book: Expand Your Knowledge Of A Vast Comics Universe

by Stephen Wiacek

One Marvel book to guide them all.

The Marvel Book charts an exhilarating course through the fascinating, dynamic and awe-inspiring Marvel Comics universe.

Packed with vivid comic book imagery, illuminating infographics and incisive, specially curated essays, this book explores the key concepts, characters and events that have defined and shaped Marvel Comics over the past 80 years. Meticulously researched and expertly written, this discerning guide sheds new light on the myriad wonders of the Marvel Comics universe.

So whether you are a devoted Marvel Comics fan or a casual reader keen to find out more, The Marvel Book is an invaluable roadmap to a boundless comics universe that will encourage you to see it anew.

© 2019 MARVEL

Genres: Comics, Marvel, Nonfiction, Graphic Novels, Superheroes, Reference, Media Tie In

256 pages, Kindle Edition

First published October 1, 2019

Reviews

[Anja von "books and phobia" · Rating 5 out of 5]

Ja, Comics haben es mir angetan. Egal ob DC oder Marvel, die Welten, die Geschichten und die Charaktere haben es mir einfach angetan. Doch als Einsteiger oder nur Filmkenner ist doch manchmal schwierig den Überblick zu behalten. Um so dankbarer bin ich, dass sich andere Personen hinsetzen und Aufstellungen machen, wie ich sie in diesem Buch zu lesen bekam.

Das Marvel-Universe ist groß. Sehr groß sogar, wenn man nicht nur die vielen Charaktere bedenkt, sondern auch ihre verschiedenen Versionen in anderen Universen. Ganz schön viel Stoff der hier kompakt, aber auch interessant zusammentragen wurde und dabei Fans der Comics, als auch der Filme ansprechen dürfte. Das Stichwort ist hier Hintergrundwissen. Wer schon immer mal ein wenig mehr über den ein oder anderen Marvel-Charakter erfahren wollte, ist hier goldrichtig. Besonders gelungen empfand ich dabei die kleinen grauen Listen unter den Bildern der einzelnen Personen, in welcher man grob erfuhr, welche Kräfte, welche Mission und welche Zugehörigkeit der Held, die Heldin oder der Schurke und die Schurkin hatten.

Unterstützt wurde das Ganze vom wirklich sehr angenehmen Schreibstil des Autors, welcher wirklich versuchte selbst schwierige Verbindungen oder Beziehungen verständlich zu erklären.

Auch der Aufbau des Buches hatte mich schnell gepackt. Neben einer interessanten Einleitung samt Bildmaterial ging es Kapitelweise durch das Marvel Universum. Die Aufteilung gefiel mir, da man danach ging, wie der Charakter zu seinen Kräften kam. Ebenso gelungen war das letzte Kapitel, in welchen es um die alternativen Welten ging. Hier fand man dann Charaktere wie Miles Morales, welcher eben in einer Parallelwelt zu Spider-Man wird.

Das bereits erwähnte Bildmaterial war übrigens auch nicht zu missachten. Fans der Comics dürften sich auf originale Bilder aus den Comics freuen, während Fans der Filme mal einen Blick auf den Original-Look ihrer Lieblingsfiguren werfen können. Doch auch ringsherum gab es genug zu sehen, da man wichtige Aspekte auch stets mit Illustrationen festhielt. Also beschweren konnte ich mich nicht.

Fazit:

Egal ob Fan der Comics oder der Filme, dieses Buch zu durchstöbern dürfte vielen sehr viel Freude machen. Neben vielen Illustrationen, gab es viel interessantes Material, das zumindest mich dann hin und wieder noch neugieriger auf einige Charaktere machte.

[Izzy. · Rating 4 out of 5]

FINALLY. this book took me so long to finish but i admit it did give me a lot of needed information. it was very fun to read but also maybe a little too wordy. was a good use of my time? i don’t know! would i recommend? probably not unless you are a complete nerd. that being said i am probably a big nerd for having read this 🤷‍♀️

[RumBelle · Rating 2 out of 5]

Let me start off by saying, that the material covered in this book was of a very broad range, though there were gaps. Many varied topics were covered, and they were wide ranging and interesting. The art, graphics and charts were also very informative and quite well done.

All of these things worked in the books favor, for me.

What did not was the writing style. I felt like I was reading a textbook about superheroes and it was very off-putting. I do not read books like this, books about comics and superheroes, to have them read like college level material I am being tested on! These books are supposed to be entertaining, engaging and fun, not written as if the author, or authors wanted to see how many multi-syllable words they could cram into a single sentence to prove their intelligence.

This book would have been so much more enjoyable if the text, and writing style were not as verbose and overbearing.

[Reading_ Tamishly · Rating 3 out of 5]

Better go for the actual comics and they provide much better information than these series of books.

[marina · Rating 5 out of 5]

Let’s be real I did not finish this. But it was still very informative 😁 🪱🪱🪱🪱🪱.5 worms.

[Taybah · Rating 3 out of 5]

Nice encyclopedia style book of all things Marvel! Would've preferred if it was about the Marvel Cinematic Universe, but it's still cool to see how all the ideas from the shows and movies came originally from the comics. I hope to see some of the new characters I've discovered in the comics to soon appear in the MCU movies one day!

[Mary · Rating 5 out of 5]

A great resource for all things Marvel.

[Tim Pendry · Rating 4 out of 5]

Dorling Kindersley's 'The Marvel Book' turns out to be a very useful guide to the 'vast' comics universe created by Marvel over many decades. What we have here is a mythology more complex than anything created in the Ancient World, the product of thousands of creative minds.

Collating all this information is no mean achievement. The attraction of the book is that it tries so hard to do the impossible - to make this universe coherent. The Greeks could not do this with a much more limited range of material.

Of course, the effort eventually becomes almost insane by the time that we get to the last section ('Alternate Worlds and Divergent Timelines'). Even the authors recognise that having so many heroes constantly die and be revived and having so many variants is taking credibility to the limit.

Nevertheless, the concept of Prime Earth, the cosmic horrors like Galactus, the many levels of cosmic power, the most notable superheroes from Asgard to the team-ups, the characters drawn from both science and magic and the great space adventures are all well covered.

The core Marvel film canon and classic heroes are understandable enough but, of course, we are talking about comic book editors constantly trying to feed a highly volatile market and reaching out to girls, adult fans, minority groups and horror fans. Impossible complexity is written into the project.

It is quite an achievement, therefore, for the Editors to have maintained the illusion of coherence almost to the end. Even if some story arcs have to be alluded to rather than explained, there is enough information here to improve an amateur's enjoyment of films, TV and cultural references.

[Mike S · Rating 5 out of 5]

The newest edition of The Marvel Book, published in 2025, provides a detailed account of the Marvel comic universe's history, from its inception to the present day. The book begins with a discussion of Marvel's creation and evolution, but the bulk of it covers the various characters and settings that have appeared over time. Each character gets a biography that runs 1-2 pages, detailing their history, who they have aligned with, their powers, and their "mission" or goals. There is also a section that discusses the various universes the characters have appeared in, and the differences in the characters from world to world and universe to universe.

The hardcover version of the book is just under 300 pages long (including the glossary at the end). It is a little over 300 pages, including the index. Ultimately, this is a very detailed summary of the Marvel comics. Obviously, it does not detail everything that has happened to every character or every storyline that has appeared in the comics over the years, but it does go through the high points. It is also an excellent read for someone who is a fan of the live-action Marvel projects, but who has not read the comics, because while it does not discuss the cinematic or live-action versions of the characters and storylines, if you have seen the various movies and TV series, it is interesting to see what was and was not used from the comics.

[Joe Stevens · Rating 2 out of 5]

While there are a few differences this is largely a 2-pound version of the 5-pound Marvel New Encyclopedia. Why mention poundage? Well, this book has fewer and smaller pages and the way the book is laid out with huge headlines that take up a third of the first (and sometimes only) page of each entry, there is vastly less information about each hero covered. Hence a hero like Spiderman might receive a defacto 4 pages after layout and pictures in the encyclopedia but he receives one actual and smaller page here for something like an eighth of the information taking the entry from thousands of words to hundreds.
While in the large book, it feels like a solid re-telling and even celebration of old Spidey, here it is a brief blow-by-blow account of his appearances in various crises where he fought with six heroes and against eight villians as each is named with a common spliced sentence. Each important event in his life gets a sentence. So it goes for almost every entry.
Just buy the New Encyclopedia or the Encyclopedias devoted to specific groups or characters. Those have actual fun information as opposed to this dull and poorly laid out attempt to cover everything in a condensed wiki-like manner.

[Tyler James · Rating 3 out of 5]

A fun book that enhanced my knowledge of the Marvel universe. Pages and graphics are put together well and keep things fun and interesting with each turn of the page. As someone who has a pretty good understanding of the universe, this helped to fill in some of the gaps of some of the lesser known heroes and events. Although, I will say that some of the sections were hard to decipher if didn't have any knowledge of it to begin with.

Overall, a cool book for people who are into the Marvel universe. I'd say it's even a decent way to learn the basics if you are someone who is thinking about diving into the universe and all it's movies, shows, comics, books, etc.

[Dennis Te · Rating 5 out of 5]

Marvel history book summarized

A nice history of Marvel: character descriptions, hero groups, Marvel events (creations, destructions, rebirths), etc but in a very summarized form. Since this is a summary of Marvel, only your prime heroes and a few prime villains get their profile/history explained. A good book for those who want to learn about the history of Marvel comics in a clean descriptive manner, without including much of the decades and decades of story telling.

[𝒜𝓇𝒾𝒶 · Rating 3 out of 5]

Provides pretty basic important details for lots of the characters. I get it covers lots of characters so they have to condense it, but so much important stuff is left out, and some characters I’m personally interested in weren’t included, like speed and wiccan, but it covers so many of my faves. Maybe better for a beginner who is interested in starting comics to give a brief introduction to everyone.

[Brian Jackett · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book, while highly detailed and covering a wide variety of the Marvel universe, was written almost like a history book. It felt like it treated the comic book history too seriously and tried to reconcile inconsistency. I enjoyed reading about characters and more, but have found other books doing a better, more human job at it.

[Matthew Fleming · Rating 4 out of 5]

It's hard to imagine a more comprehensive guide to this world and its major stories (although there are more visually striking ones). Most of the core stuff is here, but there are many notable omissions of popular characters who've had their own titles, which doesn't bother my son but somehow did me (flashback to 20 minutes ago, me yelling "Where's Jamie Madrox?!").

[Timothy Burbage · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a really good encyclopedia on marvel things. It goes far more in depth for the multiverse and space. A nice introduction to lots and lots of different characters and ideas. It covered all of the famous names, plus some ones I didn't know like Moon Girl

[Denis Howard · Rating 5 out of 5]

Good but the only error that eight-year old Wren found was that the Infinity Stones were colored like the ones in the movies and not the actual comics! This is not really a big error but he thinks they got that wrong in Marvel Ultimate Alliance 3: The Black Order, too!

[Abigail Jose]

Slowly read this book to expand my knowledge in the Marvel universe since my only knowledge is from the MCU. Although, this only scratches the surface of the universe, I think this is a great beginner's crash course if someone is like me and wanted to learn about each character, team, etc.

[Elliot · Rating 3 out of 5]

Vaguely interesting

[AllBookedUp · Rating 3 out of 5]

It's a very through book about ALL the Marvel characters: superheroes and Villains. Too much for me to handle. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

[Roger · Rating 4 out of 5]

Informative overview of all things Marvel, would love more details but there's only so many pages.

[Candy · Rating 2 out of 5]

Nothing special

[Pongsak Sarapukdee · Rating 3 out of 5]

You will get some information about the marvel characters, just for basic information.

[nimmat · Rating 5 out of 5]

i didn't read it all because if you look at the fucking book you will just if you read it all BUT LIKE IT WAS RLLY GOOD like i read a lot of it

[Shawn Sanders · Rating 4 out of 5]

Good overview of the MCU. It's a great prep for the upcoming multiverse!

[Sean]

Neat coffee table book

[L-J Johnson · Rating 5 out of 5]

Everything this fangirl could want.

[Marianne · Rating 4 out of 5]

Informative. Organized in a fun way that made it easier to grasp the entire ridiculous underpinning of the Marvel universe.

[Abbey · Rating 4 out of 5]

Dense

[Andrew Ceyton · Rating 2 out of 5]

I finally quit this. I give in.