The Ultimate Universe is coming back to Marvel Comics, with the House of Idea's greatest alternate universe spinning out of Ultimate Invasion. Known for its immense popularity during the early 2000s, the Ultimate Universe paved the way for the Marvel Cinematic Universe, so much so that most movies tend to adapt elements of the 616 comics and Ultimate in tandem.
The Ultimate comics updated Marvel heroes for a modern audience, but some characters were handled questionably and others were incredibly controversial. This has given the Ultimate Universe something of an "edgy" reputation, especially when it comes to its most notorious and violent moments. For as contentious as these elements ended up becoming, that often-morbid darkness is exactly what defined the Ultimate Universe's identity and made the comics worth reading.
The Ultimate Universe Was Marvel's Edgiest Timeline
In the case of Ultimate Spider-Man, the Ultimate Universe was mainly a way to update and modernize classic Stan Lee/Steve Ditko Spider-Man stories, giving the character an alternate universe fresh take after the tumult of the 1990s. For other characters, however, the Ultimate Universe was meant to do away with the more comic booky elements that had accrued in the 616 shared universe. Ultimate X-Men honed in on the sci-fi angles found in both the Fox X-Men movies and Grant Morrison/Frank Quitely's New X-Men, doing away with alien Sh'iar and some of the team's more outrageous elements. The book also frequently featured darker interpretations of the X-Men's relationships, which matched up perfectly with how other characters were reimagined.
The Ultimates were initially the Ultimate Universe take on the Avengers, the likes of which weren't very popular going into the 2000s. Mark Millar/Bryan Hitch revamp of the team recast them all in the era of reality television and the War on Terror. The usually chipper Captain America was much more likely to throw a punch or insult the French, while Scarlet Witch and her brother Quicksilver had a much more... "loving" relationship than usual. When juxtaposed alongside a much higher propensity for graphic violence, cannibalism, and even spousal abuse between two superheroes, the Ultimate Universe made for a world almost all too close to the one "outside your window." Some of these details have now become punchlines, with many lambasting poorly-received storylines such as Ultimates 3 and Ultimatum. There was definitely a tendency to go a bit too far in order to show how "adult" the material was, but this sort of thing (in moderation) shouldn't be excised from the Ultimate Universe line relaunch as it helped develop a distinct identity independent of the rest of Marvel's line-up.
Pushing the Envelope Will Make the Ultimate Universe More Relevant Than Ever
Unlike the more unique 616 Universe, many elements in the Ultimate Universe were meant to clearly mirror real-world situations. For instance, it's obvious that the president that Magneto attacks in Ultimate X-Men is George W. Bush. Since then, mainstream comics from Marvel and DC have taken more political bends to varying degrees of success and nuance. A good way to handle such topics in the future might be through the Ultimate Universe, which was ripe for such stories from the get-go. This more topical touch could be combined with its signature sense of "edge" to create a universe that's notably distinct from the mainstream Marvel Universe.
Such a scope should include the concepts that the Ultimate Universe originally dealt with, namely in how it handled magic and other such narrative devices. Thor's magic was nothing like that of the mythological Walt Simonson Thor run, while Doctor Strange was never really a factor at all. Likewise, cosmic stories barely existed, which gave the impression of a grounded universe where major events had lasting consequences instead of merely being forgotten by the next crossover. If that means characters got brutally mauled or killed, it was just the nature of the beast, and something that shouldn't be forgotten in the relaunch. Such storytelling provides for organic ways to alter the status quo, and in the case of the Ultimate Universe, said status quo should never be static.