Comic Book / Empyre

Empyre is the 2020 Marvel Comics event starring The Avengers and Fantastic Four, written by Al Ewing and Dan Slott.

Teddy Altman, a.k.a. Prince Dorrek VIII, a.k.a. Hulkling, is the son of Kree Captain Mar-vell and the Skrull Princess Annelle. Long foretold by the Skrulls to be the savior of their decimated Empire, the Kree have also proclaimed Hulkling to be a member of their Empire, inheriting citizenship and rank from his father. After being contacted by the Skrull sleeper agent Raksor about a dangerous and insidious threat to their people, Teddy Altman returns to the stars to embrace his destiny as the Emperor of Space, unifying the Skrull and Kree in the book Incoming!. Now he leads the combined armada to their next target: Earth.

The only thing standing in the way of his fleet? The Avengers and the Fantastic Four.

This storyline will lead into the next Cosmic Marvel storyline, King in Black, which follows up on Absolute Carnage.

Preludes

• Incoming! #1
• Road to Empyre: The Kree/Skrull War #1
• Empyre: Avengers #0
• Empyre: Fantastic Four #0

Main Titles

• Avengers/Fantastic Four: Empyre #1-6

Tie-Ins

• Captain Marvel (vol. 10) #18-21
• Empyre: Avengers #1-3
• Empyre: Captain America #1
• Empyre: Savage Avengers #1-3
• Empyre: X-Men #1-4
• Fantastic Four (vol. 6) #21
• Lords of Empyre: Emperor Hulkling #1
• Lords of Empyre: Celestial Messiah #1
• Lords of Empyre: Swordsman #1
• X-Men (vol. 5) #10

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Tropes:

• Acting Unnatural: In issue #4, Teddy, who'd just gone for a quick rest, comes back talking about how suddenly he's all over his previous qualms and has no problem incinerating Earth. Carol and Johnny naturally don't believe it's really him for even a second.
• Alien Invasion: At first, it seems their former friend Hukling, now Emperor Dorrek VIII, is leading an invasion of the Kree and Skrull empires against Earth.
• All There in the Manual: Quoi and the Cotati Swordsman were heroic characters in their previous appearances, and the reasons for their Face–Heel Turn are not explained in the main Empyre series. If you want to know what happened to them, you'll have to read the Lords of Empyre: Swordsman one-shot.
• The Alliance: The Kree and the Skrulls putting aside their eons-long war to unite under their shared heir. After the reveal, Earth's heroes have decided to reluctantly join this coalition for now.
• Amazonian Beauty: Lauri-ell has similar facial features to Carol (albeit blue), but is she ever buff! Carol's a big girl, but her newly found half-sister has such huge biceps and shoulders that when she tries on one of Carol's shirts it rips along those places. Even Jessica Drew can't help but comment on them.
• Artifact of Doom: Wanda created one out of various powerful mystic artifacts in an attempt to atone for M-Day by resurrecting the dead mutants of Genosha. It backfires when she creates a superpowered Zombie Apocalypse instead, which eventually spreads to the Cotati invaders. When Illyana discovers it the pull of its power brainwashes her into becoming a demonic Queen of Zombies.
• The Atoner:
  • The plot of the X-Men tie-in is Wanda being overcome with guilt over M-Day and, following Doctor Strange's advice to try a greater act in penance, attempting to resurrect the mutants killed in the genocide of Genosha. Needless to say, something like that doesn't go well.
  • Both Kl'rt and Captain Glory swear to atone for their misdeeds by Empyre's end. Kl'rt becomes an intergalactic diplomat for using the Pyre and killing billions of Skrulls to stop the Cotati. Captain Glory accepts a prison sentence for his part in R'klll's coup but promises to fight for Teddy if he is ever called on to do so.
• Attack of the 50-Foot Whatever: A Cotatinaught (a zombified plant being) in the X-men tie-in. Meanwhile, in his own tie-in, Captain America leads a platoon consisting of US soldiers and Kree and Skrulls alike against a mountain animated to life.
• Aliens Are Bastards: There is an invading species that is involved in attacking Earth and its heroes but it's not the Skrulls or the Kree: it's the Cotati of all races.
• Big Bad: Hulkling as Emperor Dorrek VIII. Actually the end of issue #1 reveals that the true villain is Quoi of the Cotati, later becoming a Big Bad Ensemble once R'klll reveals herself.
• Big Brother Instinct: At Teddy and Billy's wedding reception, Lauri-ell is totally prepared to start attacking Agent Brand when she approaches Carol in a bad mood.
• Big "NO!": Wanda's reaction to seeing that her attempt to resurrect the mutants of Genosha reanimated them as flesh hungry zombies instead.
• Bittersweet Ending: Earth is saved, the Kree and Skrull empires end their Forever War in earnest with genuine wishes for peace, and the Cotati surrender peacefully after witnessing their champion attempt to murder their own messiah. However, the events have completely broken Quoi, who now fully embraces his father's views on animal life and hatefully vows to his mother that he will eventually try to either tame or cull them once more.
• Body Horror: What the Cotati do to the beings they possess. Not only the person in question is killed, their body has vines emerging from every orifice. Ben (although he survived and never got possessed ), She-Hulk and that poor hapless soldier named Bennett that teamed up with Captain America being the most outstanding examples.
• Book Ends: On a cosmic, almost meta scale. The Forever War between the Kree and the Skrulls began when the Kree massacred the Cotati. And then they ended the war and united...to massacre the Cotati a second time.
• Boomerang Bigot: Quoi despises all humankind and rants about how they're animals, ruled by animal instincts...despite being at least part-human himself.
• Brain Food: Zombie mutants and zombie Cotati share a love of brains. Chewing on a Cotati is a disappointment since they have no brains, but psychic mutants are gonna be sweet eating. When the zombies capture one of the Stepford Cuckoos, they predict her brain will taste like Kobe beef.
• Brainwashed and Crazy: Man-Thing and Shanna end up controlled by the Cotati, although Dr. Voodoo, Scarlet Witch and Ka-Zar manage to snap them out of their control. Magik ends up possessed by a magical scepter previously left by Scarlet Witch, unleashing her demonic powers against both mutants and zombies.
• Bring Help Back: Cap's mission in his Empyre miniseries: Gather every military force on Earth to help the Avengers defeat the Cotati. He gets trouble with a General Ripper who decides to pull rank on Cap, but thankfully he and other soldiers decide to Screw the Rules, I'm Doing What's Right!.
• Brought Down to Normal: R'klll is rendered unable to transform or shapeshift after Teddy straps the power-dampening mask onto her.
• The Bus Came Back:
  • Quoi, Mantis' son, returns along with his father, the cotati Swordsman in Empyre: Avengers.
  • Captain Glory, of the Lethal Legion from Avengers: No Surrender, and Mur-G'nn, of the Kree-Skrull hybrids who gave Teddy Excelsior back in New Avengers (2015), are part of the Kree-Skrull alliance.
  • Mantis herself returns in issue 3.
  • Quicksilver returns after a year-long absence in the Avengers tie-in.
  • The Unseen (The original Nick Fury) makes a special appearance in the Fantastic Four's epilogue one-shot.
  • Samuel Smithers/Plantman returns during the Avengers tie-in after not being seen in a couple of years.
• Busman's Holiday: Empyre: Savage Avengers has Conan the Barbarian and Venom in Mexico - to see a luchador fight and visit museums, respectively, - before the Cotati decide to invade.
• Call-Back: In an event co-written by Al Ewing, known for his knowledge of Marvel history, yeah, there's these.
  • Empyre: Avengers has Iron Man flashing back to the Kree's Start of Darkness, noting it's what Immortus showed him way back when.
  • Swordsman's reappearance has him and the Avengers going over his history (joined the Avengers, died saving Mantis, sort-of came back as a human-cotati hybrid, conceived Quoi).
  • Quoi's reappearance has him buddying up with Thor, who serves as his honorary uncle, the two having palled up in Avengers: Celestial Quest (not incidentally, the last time Quoi showed up).
  • It's been mentioned since Incoming! that the Skrulls have been acting weird, including blowing up whole solar systems for reasons no-one can figure out. Turns out it was to try and stop the Cotati, but it didn't work.
  • The Cotati possessing She-Hulk's last moments is seeing a Green Door.
• Calling the Old Man Out: When Mantis attempts to appeal to Quoi's humanity, Quoi immediately accuses her of using her powers to manipulate those around her, believing she did it to his father in the past and using the confirmed instance when Peter Quill convinced her to influence the minds of the original Guardians of the Galaxy to form the team.
• Came Back Wrong: Scarlet Witch was so consumed by her guilt over erasing the powers of mutantkind that she tried to make up for it by resurrecting those murdered on Genosha...and accidentally brought them back as zombies.
• The Cameo: During the Wedding Finale, nearly 50 different superheroes associated with the Avengers appear at the reception.
• Chicken-and-Egg Paradox: In Issue #1, Reed Richards is working out whether Hulkling forged the alliance between the Kree and Skrulls, or if the alliance came first and they then made him their leader. He compares it to the chicken-and-egg question, then gets Sidetracked by the Analogy, pointing out that since reptiles lay eggs and birds evolved from reptiles, naturally the egg came first. Sue bemusedly tells him to get back on-topic.
• Chuck Cunningham Syndrome: Despite their strong ties to the Kree, The Inhumans are entirely absent from the event. At the Empyre panel held at C2E2, it was mentioned that Marvel was still giving the Inhumans "a rest" after their controversial push in recent years.
• Cluster Bleep-Bomb: The video trailer, though it's hiding spoilers rather than swearing.
• Colony Drop: Magneto did a series of satellite drops on the Cotati leading the invasion of the Moon's Blue Area.
• Comically Missing the Point: When Brand yells at Carol, Hulkling tries intervening and saying it's not the time and place. The Kree and Skrull ambassadors chime in with agreement...because if they want to argue to the death, the alliance has a specially prepared arena on-board their ship for just such a purpose. The Thing whispers to them to stop trying to help.
• Continuity Nod:
  • The speech the Kree have at the beginning of Empyre: Avengers is a dark mirror of the one Plex, leader of the Utopian Kree, was shown making in Guardians of the Galaxy (2020). Where that one was all about being nice and helpful, the one Tony sees is about killing everyone who's not a Kree.
  • The Skrulls mention activating a pyre in the past to stop the spread of Cotati in several of their occupied clusters. This instance was actually seen in Guardians of the Galaxy (2020) when Nova was attempting to save the Skrulls there before the weapon activated.
  • Seeing Carol Danver's death glare, Tony compares it to, among other things, the look she had when she punched him into a coma, and a time he tried to take a bottle of booze from her, during her drinking days.
  • While fighting T'Challa, Super-Skrull brings up the time he led the Skrull Empire (after the events of Infinity).
  • At the beginning of issue 5, Teddy mentions he's been taking notes from Roberto "Sunspot" Da Costa (from when he and Billy worked for him in the Avengers Idea Mechanics).
  • Thor being Gaea's son and having a degree of access to her power gets a nod in the solicits for his cancelled tie-in, and is important in the final issue as it allows him to destroy Cotati growths across the world.
  • In Aftermath, Roberto makes a flesh and blood appearance, along with the rest of the A.I.M. team, mentioning he brought Champagne Robot with him. Meanwhile, America Chavez chimes in that if Teddy turns evil, she'll bludgeon him with a chair, as she did to Carol Danvers during Civil War II.
  • Speaking of another Civil War, Tony alludes to the Super Registration Act as an offhand joke, which Cap still seems to be sore about.
• Conveniently Interrupted Document: The bleeps on the video trailer and [[REDACTED]] on the press release.
• Cool Sword: Excelsior, Teddy's magic space sword, which can No-Sell Mjolnir. It's also got a pretty handy friend-or-foe identifier, so it won't harm Teddy's allies.
• Cool Versus Awesome: As the first X-Men tie-in says in big letters on a full page once the plot kicks off: Alien Plants vs. Mutant Zombies. The ending has to amend it: Alien Plants vs. Mutant Zombies vs. Old Ladies.
• The Corrupter: Cotati Swordsman seems to be the one responsible for Quoi's shift in attitude.
• Corrupt Corporate Executive: Detailed in Swordsman's solo issue of Lords of Empyre, one had his company observing the Cotati grove at the temple of the Priests of Pama. When they surge in growth he sends a deforestation crew to acquire samples for study. Quoi tries to appease them with a cutting he engineered with miraculous properties, but the one in charge throws it away because it'd take too long to his liking for that to pay off. Thus a grove of innocent Cotati older than most civilizations on Earth ends up completely destroyed, greatly radicalizing Quoi against humanity and by extension animal life.
• The Coup:
  • Teddy is supplanted by none other than R'klll, his grandmother, with the help of Captain Glory and more unknowingly of Kl'rt.
  • As soon as he's freed, Teddy is able to launch a counter-coup, even getting Captain Glory to switch sides when he sees what kind of a ruler R'klll would be.
• Creator Cameo: Marvel has confirmed that the organ-player and officiant seen at the Vegas Chapel in issue #4 are actually Allan Heinberg and Jim Cheung, the original writer and artist for Wiccan and Hulkling.
• Crisis Crossover: While most of the story seems confined to mini-series and only a handful of full titles, it does involve most of Marvel's mightiest. It's also quite notable for being the first crossover to feature both the Avengers and the Fantastic Four as the main cards.
• Cruel Mercy:
  • After everything's over, Super-Skrull fully expects Teddy to kill him for the part he played in everything (and, again, incinerating Teddy's step-mom). Instead, Teddy tells him he's making Kl'rt an ambassador, forbidden to kill anyone ever again.
  • Thor sends the entire Cotati to a desolate rock out of reach of either Earth or any Kree and Skrull territories. Though he does turn that planet into a paradise world with the remainder of his Gaia power.
• Cultural Posturing: Cotati Swordsman is doing a lot of this, going on about how humans are inferior and violent compared to the Cotati, in a way that's not at all suspicious.
• Dead All Along:
  • Jennifer Walters wasn't using Cotati meditation. She was killed back in issue #1 and implanted with a Cotati a la Alien. It was wearing her skin and speaking with her voice from the very beginning.
  • The real Tanalth the Kree died years ago. The one readers have known has actually been Empress R'Klll all along.
• Deal with the Devil: Multiple Man makes one with the zombie Explodey Boy. Explodey will help against the Cotati and in return he and the other zombie mutants get to eat the corpses of Multiple Man's clones.
• Death Seeker: T'Challa figures this is what's motivating the Swordsman to try and wipe out all mankind, having inherited just a little too much of the original Swordmsan's self-loathing.
• Determinator: Ben Grimm once again. Being beaten bloodied by the possessed She-Hulk, Ben refuses to stay down, his mind constantly wandering back to Jo-Venn and N'Kalla, thus he's fighting for them so they can stop fighting.
• Disproportionate Retribution: The Cotati trying to kill the Kree makes narrative sense, all things considered, given the Kree tried to genocide them first. However, the Cotati's motivation for going after the Skrulls is...the Skrulls instigated the whole thing with the contest for uplifting that the Cotati didn't want and never needed. So now they've written off ALL animal life as incorrigibly corrupt and deserving of extinction.
• Does This Remind You of Anything?: The Kree and the Skrulls are against Billy and Teddy being together because of their prejudice against humans, not homophobia, but the arguments they use echo common anti-gay sentiments (for example, they say that being attached to Billy is childish and Teddy needs to grow up now that he's Emperor, which is similar to the prejudice that being gay is just a phase and when someone becomes "mature" they will couple up heterosexually).
• The Dog Bites Back: After eons of being victimized by the Kree, the Cotati are biting back in a bid to eliminate all animal life. Humanity is included in that category, despite never having done anything to them.
• The Dreaded: The Cotati are understandably nervous about King T'Challa, "The Most Dangerous Man in the World". And quite rightly, since he manages to figure out their true plan pretty quickly.
• Dropped a Bridge on Him: The Skrulls of the Kral system (a bunch of planets the Skrulls have used as an invasion staging ground) were all wiped out by the Cotati as a test of their abilities.
• Dude, Where's My Respect?: Part of Swordsman's start of darkness involves being shunned by his fellow Cotati for now being part animal, even though they all chose for him to do that as part of their plan to usher in the birth of their messiah.
• Dueling Messiahs: In one corner, we've got Dorrek VIII, son of Captain Mar-Vell and the Skrull Princess Anelle, holder of the sword Excelsior, prophesied King of Space (or Hulkling, as he prefers to be called). In the other, we've got Sequoia, the Celestial Messiah, leader of the Cotati in their plan to bring peace to the universe. And no, they're not going to get along.
• El Cid Ploy: R'Klll imprisons then impersonates Teddy in order to ensure that the Alliance would proceed as planned with the Pyre Final Solution.
• Enemy Mine: The X-Men end up teaming up with the old ladies from the Hordeculture.
• Exact Words:
  • When the Cotati manage to plant a portal on Wakandan soil, T'Challa fears they'll send an army through. His answer? They did. A one-man army, to be precise.
  • In Fantastic Four: Fallout, the Profiteer attempts to reclaim Jo-Venn and N'Kalla, pointing out that she has a contract with the Skrull and Kree Empires. Reed has just called the Avengers Assemble to defend the kids when Teddy points out the glaring flaw in the Profiteer's contract. It was for the Skrull and Kree Empires, but they no longer exist, so the contract's null.
• Face–Heel Turn: It looks like Hulkling has done this. Though it’s revealed that he only took the throne to stop the Kree/Skrull conflict and he was leading them to take out a threat to the universe. It's actually Quoi who's made the turn.
• Fantastic Racism:
  • The Kree and Skrulls per usual show cultural posturing with each other and racial disdain for humans. They pressure Teddy into publicly renouncing his betrothal to Billy, even though he's a powerful reality warper, because neither side will accept a human "monkey" consort to the throne.
  • The Cotati are shown to despise "meat animals" for their violent, savage ways and seek to exterminate them as inferior life. Like many racists, they are complete hypocrites.
  • It was evil human scientist Wastrel, and not Lauri-ell, who murdered everyone in the Kree-Skrull refugee city. Wastrel was harmed decades ago by the Kree in the crossfire between Captain Mar-vell and another Kree warrior, but he's so obsessed with hatred of the Kree that he'll murder innocent Kree (and Skrulls, even though they had nothing to do with him) just because their existence offends him.
• Fighting a Shadow: In the finale, T'Challa notes this of the original Swordsman to the Cotati variation.
  Black Panther: Strange. Now all I can see is the plant. The poison vine that smothers the good oak...and destroys it. You see...I knew Jacques Duquesne. He was human. So human it killed him. But when he died — he died an Avenger!
• Foreshadowing:
  • The fact that the murders in Incoming involved the use of vegetation would make even new readers be wary of the Cotati when going into this event.
  • In issue 2, Tanalth mentions Ronan was a hero of the Imperial Kree. Except it was the Imperial Kree who brutally experimented on Ronan back in Death of the Inhumans. Ronan was affiliated with the Utopian Kree, something Captain Glory notices. When he confronts Tanalth about this, she reveals her true identity: Skrull Empress R'Klll.
• Gaia's Vengeance: Zig-zagged; The Cotati are driven by revenge against the Kree's persecution of their people, and by extension all of animal life's degradation of plant life. Thor's canceled tie-in miniseries would have detailed him questing for guidance from his mother, Gaea herself. In the climactic issue of the event she is shown to have empowered Thor to fight, as according to him she emphatically does not agree with their motivation.
• Gambit Pileup: By the series' end, the plot resembles a four-lane pileup with a train derailment driven through it. We have:
  • The Cotati plan for galactic domination is to plant a death blossom on Wakanda's vibranium enriched soil, elevating Quoi from a Messiah to a living god.
  • The Kree/Skrull alliance plans to use the Pyre and force Earth's sun to go supernova before the Cotati can plant the Death Blossom. Even if it consumes the Earth in the process.
  • Quoi in turn uses a hidden Earth cult to engineer a mystical "hate beam" to splinter the Alliance and force their soldiers to kill one-another before the Pyre can go off.
  • Which would've suited R'klll just fine anyway, since she was planning to betray the Kree members of the Alliance after her coup-and-switch of the true King, Teddy.
• Genetic Memory: The Fantastic Four tie-in is about a Kree and Skrull pair of children respectively engineered by their people as living archives of the Kree-Skrull war.
• Genre Throwback: Dan Slott and Al Ewing pitched Empyre as a modern re-imagining of the cosmic alien invasion stories that laid the groundwork for much of the Marvel Universe from the 70s and 80s, pulling characters and themes from The Bronze Age of Comic Books, The Dark Age of Comic Books, and The Modern Age of Comic Books.
• Godzilla Threshold: Issue #2 ends with Kl'rt advising Hulkling on using the "Pyre" to end the threat in one fell swoop. It involves killing a star. It's something that neither Kree nor Skrull have ever decided an option until now.
• Gondor Calls for Aid: In the Fantastic Four's main title, Franklin and Valeria call in Spider-Man and Wolverine to be part of their de facto Fantastic Four team, complete with black and blue-themed variations of their costumes. The following issue reveals that Ghost Rider (Danny Ketch) and the Immortal Hulk were supposed to join them, reuniting the All-New Fantastic Four. But they don't show up. Reed isn't surprised and when Logan and Peter get their uniforms, the kids are given new "4" badges to replace their previous "F" and "V" initial ones. Powerhouse and Brainstorm are now official members of the Fantastic Four!
• Green Thumb: To an extreme degree. The Cotati have developed an amplifier that magnifies their plant-controlling abilities to weaponize plant life by making it grow until it completely rips their enemies apart. They use it to decimate most of the Kree/Skrull fleet by making their food supplies massively grow and cripple the ships.
• Gruesome Grandparent: R'Klll not only left her own daughter Anelle to die at the hands of Galactus, she imprisoned and intended to turn her grandson Teddy into a Puppet King.
• Happily Adopted: With Jo-Venn and N'Kalla officially freed from their slavery, Teddy decrees that they will stay with Ben and Alicia Grimm.
• Hate Plague: The plan of the Cotati in the Fantastic Four tie-in. The Priests of Pama will combine the Omni-wave projector with the living archives of the Kree-Skrull War to beam the memories of said war to all the members of the alliance and tear it apart from within with hatred. The heroes undo this with the help of the Genetic Memory of the two Kree and Skrull children the Fantastic Four rescued in the leadup to the event.
• Have You Told Anyone Else?: R'Klll asks the scientists who help her disguise herself as Tanalth whether anyone outside the room knows how she can disguise herself as a Kree. The head scientist says no, then actually asks why she said that. Cut to R'Klll walking out of the room having murdered the lot of them.
• Hypocrite:
  • For all his derision of humans, Swordsman is all too willing to hold his own son hostage just to make the Avengers hesitant in attacking when it seems like the battle is lost. This is what ultimately makes T'Challa and the other Avengers decide that he is no longer the Avenger that once sacrificed his own life for everyone.
  • The Cotati in general are pretty hypocritical. Quoi calls Mantis out for psychically pushing the Guardians of the Galaxy to reform even though the event is kicked off by them psychically manipulating Tony Stark into attacking the Alliance for their cause. They also previously rejected Swordsman for being half animal even though they all chose for him to do that to father their messiah, who's (originally) intended to unite animals and plants in peace. They also deride animals for being emotional, cruel, violent, and having a whole laundry list of flaws...all of which they display themselves.
• Ignored Epiphany: Rather than see that his father led him down a dark path and was too far gone to hold any respect for life, Quoi concludes that the only flaw with Swordsman was that his animal humanity corrupted his Cotati identity.
• I'm Going to Disney World!: To celebrate their freedom and victory the Richards kids promise to take Jo-Venn and N'Kalla to Disneyland along with Spider-Man and Wolverine. At the denouement when Johnny asks what took them so long to get to the Moon, Peter answers they had to follow through on their promise.
• Ironic Echo Cut: At the end of the Aftermath special, Captain Glory tells Teddy that he's fine being imprisoned as he knows he's the best warrior and "one day, I'll be all that keeps you alive." Flash Forward to the future of Glory lying dead along with pretty much all of Teddy's circle.
• It's All My Fault: Tony takes being used as a pawn by the Cotati pretty hard.
• It's Personal: After the sheer metric ton of crap the Kree-Skrull alliance, and mostly R'Klll, have put him through, Wiccan points out that, yeah, he's pretty damn focused on stopping them.
• It's the Only Way to Be Sure: After the Cotati destroy most of the Kree/Skrull Armada and launch their invasion of Earth, Teddy is presented with a plan to stop them from Tanalth: sacrifice Captain Marvel to make the sun go Supernova and stop the spread of the Cotati through the galaxy.
• Jerkass Has a Point: While blunt, Abigail Brand is dead right in the Aftermath special in that keeping Alpha Flight, the organization that knows more about alien life and encounters than Earth, out of the initial plans is a key reason things got so bad. In fact, Brand's job is dealing with extraterrestrial threats, so keeping her on a need-to-know basis is the worst thing they could have done.
  Brand: We are not your backup plan. The program cannot function if we're only "in the loop" when the A-list can be bothered to talk to us! If we are constantly blindsided by—-by the idle whims of a celebrity in-group! The second you knew about the Cotati, you should have brought me in. The very second. But, no, your buddies knew better. How many died, Colonel? How many died because seven people decided the fate of the world around a campfire?
• Kick the Dog: R'Klll reveals how she survived Galactus eating the Skrull homeworld, explaining she had a teleportation device which she could have used to save herself and Anelle...but she couldn't be bothered, thinking it was less dangerous to save herself alone. Unsurprisingly, she's not tremendously guilty over leaving her daughter to die.
• Kleptomaniac Hero: He felt guilty about it, but his curiosity got the better of him. So when the chance came, Beast steals one of Hordeculture's gate-hacking devices.
• Legacy Character: Lauri-Ell, who takes over Ronan's mantle of the Accuser, complete with a costume similar to his.
• Locked Out of the Loop: As invoked in Brand's Jerkass Has a Point speech, the decision to keep SWORD out of the initial plans led to scores of problems (if nothing else, they might have been able to warn the Avenges of [ the Cotati's true nature).
• Loophole Abuse: When everything seems settled, the Profiteer tries to take Jo-Venn and N'Kalla away along with all the captured weapons. She smugly says the heroes have no choice as it's all part of the contract she has with both the Kree and Skrull empires, gloating that she's the best source of weapons for both and "neither side will want to lose me." Teddy admits she's right...then literally breaks the contract in half while pointing out to the horrified Profiteer that the Kree and Skrull empires no longer exist as separate entities. They're now one Alliance, which renders all previous contracts void, and "we'll be taking our business elsewhere."
• Love Is a Weakness:
  • Cotati Swordsman's opinion of his feelings for Mantis.
  • R'klll believes this about Teddy and his love for his friends and Earth. She hoped the Pyre would either help him move past these assumed weaknesses or simply serve as a show of strength for the figurehead of the combined empire.
• Love Potion: Hordeculture use a Pheromone-based Love Potion on Angel and other male X-Men to make them into bodyguards and servants. One member laments not having brought something with a similar effect on the female X-Men.
• Made a Slave: Magik as Queen of the Zombies intends to do this is to the X-Men, especially Nightcrawler. Luckily the time on the artifacts runs out and she goes back to normal.
• The Magic Versus Technology War: Generally it's the high tech versus the magical. The Alliance has Kree-Skrull tech including a sun destroying weapon, as well as the Mad Science tech the superheroes use. Against this, the technology rejecting Cotati have swords and bows and don't even bother looting enemies for their guns. It'd be a one-sided fight if it weren't for the Cotati having sorcery and magical artifacts. That said the Alliance aren't really against magic. They do have a sorceress and the Star-Sword, as well as the help of superhero magic-users.
• Mama Bear: Mantis is determined to save her son from the corrupting influence of his dad, even though she acknowledges some of the burden of guilt falls on Quoi as well.
• The Man Behind the Man: Her dialogue in the Avengers epilogue characterizes R'Klll as always being this. First she thought she had "tamed" the Skrull Emperor, only for his actions to throw her plans off the rail when the throneworld got devoured by Galactus. Then, when informed of her grandson, started devising schemes to exploit the legend prophesizing his birth to seize even greater power through both empires of the Kree and Skrulls.
• Mass "Oh, Crap!": The X-Men and Hordeculture get this reaction when Magik becomes a demon queen again after picking up three magical artifacts previously left by Scarlet Witch and Dr. Strange.
• Mêlée à Trois:
  • The X-Men tie-in pits the X-Men, the Cotati invaders and resurrected Genoshan zombies (who want to eradicate both), while Hordeculture acting as The Cavalry are not being exactly cooperative.
  • In New Mexico, while the Cotati are repelled rather early on, the Kree-Skrull tensions are rather high, which results in infighting within the ranks, with a group of Avengers (Wonder Man, Mockingbird and Quicksilver) caught in the middle.
• Moral Myopia: Quoi is pretty angry about the Kree and Skrulls working together to kill the Cotati, but he's managing to overlook the slightly important fact the Cotati are trying to wipe out every non-plantoid race in the universe, which is why the Kree and Skrull are trying to kill them.
• More than Mind Control: Empyre: Avengers has Tony, normally a skeptical guy, going all in on the Cotati's words, and his narration even has him noting there's something about their moon garden that's making him act off. Quoi confirms in Issue #2 that the Cotati were mentally manipulating him before the event started.
• Mother Makes You King: Or grandmother in this case, since former Empress R'Klll of the Skrulls, masquerading as Tanalth the Pursuer, intends to use her grandson Hulkling for her own ends.
• Motif Merger:
  • The superhero logo associated with this event is the Avengers' "A" logo overlaid by the Fantastic Four's "4" logo.
  • According to Word of God Teddy's royal cape combines the Kree and Skrulls designs for the same much like the pschent of the Egyptian Empire combined the crowns of Upper and Lower Egypt. To a lesser extent the unified Kree-Skrull army has suits that have the appearance of Kree military uniforms with aesthetic modifications for Skrulls like being in their uniforms' color scheme and space added to the helmets for their pointed ears.
• My Future Self and Me: Zombie Explodey Boy gets a visit from his resurrected self who's living in Krakoa. Live Explodey tells his zombie self that he has improved his relationship with his parents, actually went out with a girl and is living on an island paradise since the day he died in Genosha. Zombie is happy for his new living self and does a Heroic Sacrifice to destroy the undead Cotatinaut.
• My God, What Have I Done?:
  • When the Cotati begin devastating the Kree/Skrull armada, Tony realizes he made a very grave error.
  • Kl'rt and Mur'Gann are both horrified at the fact that they were duped by a fake Teddy.
• Mythology Gag:
  • Issue 3 has an alien army facing off against Wakandans chanting "yibambe", while the alien forces rip themselves to shreds trying to get through Wakanda's forcefield, taken right out of Avengers: Infinity War.
  • Another reference to the film when Quoi and Swordsman arrive via portal to Wakanda's vibranium mound, and Panther says "We're in the endgame now."
• Nice Job Breaking It, Hero:
  • The Avengers unilaterally backing the Cotati ends up being a terrible mistake, as they easily curbstomp the united Kree/Skrull armada, allowing Quoi to take center stage as the true Big Bad.
  • Wanda seeking to atone for M-Day creates an Artifact of Doom that causes a Zombie Apocalypse.
  • Aa Abigail points out to Carol a lot of grief could have been prevented if they kept SWORD in the loop to do their job.
• No-Sell: Ghost Rider uses his Penance Stare on the Kree-Skrull armada to slow them down. But it doesn't work on Captain Glory, who's been gene-modded to never feel guilt.
• Oh, Crap!: The last few seconds the Cotati controlling Jennifer has are spent in terror, as it gets a good look at the Green Door.
• Once More, with Clarity: Empyre #4 reveals that the Young Avengers scene in Marvel Comics #1000 took place after Teddy and Billy's wedding.
• One-Steve Limit: Invoked and defied. When R'klll tells him that she is his grandmother, Hulkling says he didn't realize she was that R'klll.
• Only the Chosen May Wield:
  • Ronan the Accuser's hammer wouldn't work for Tanalth and Reed could only use it as a crude defibrillator, but when Carol takes it, it reawakens its full power.
  • Teddy's sword, Excelsior, responds only to his commands. Except when he teleports it to T'Challa. Then HE can use it too.
• Organic Technology: The Cotati's technology seem to be all modified plants. They have hologram projecting flowers, ships that appear to be made of wood and organic teleportation gates, comparable to the kind used by the Krakoans.
• Paper Destruction of Anger: At the end the Profiteer shows up with contracts signed by the Kree and Skrull empires. Hulkling breaks the datapad in half because not only are both empires defunct, he's in charge of their alliance.
• Paper-Thin Disguise: Empress R'Klll's attempt at playing Teddy is piss-poor. It doesn't fool Carol and Johnny Storm for a moment, and Wiccan only needs to look at a recording of her for an instant to know that he's not looking at the man he loves.
• Parental Neglect: As Quoi points out when they reunite, Mantis has not been the universe's best mom, having left him with his plant dad and made very little attempt to connect with him.
• Pre-Asskicking One-Liner: Zombie Explody Boy to the Cotati.
  ''There were sixteen million mutants on this island who died and about two million of us were vegetarians."
• Preserve Your Gays: Lords of Empyre: Hulkling plays with and lampshades this trope as Teddy goes from a night on the town to surviving multiple assassination attempts. It helps he's superpowered and is surrounded by other powered LGBTQ heroes at the bar.
  Bel-Dan: Protect the Emperor!
  Raksor: Protect the intergalactic savior!
  Krystal M'Kraan: Protect the hot Twunk with the enormous arms!
• Pretender Diss: Black Panther to the Cotati Swordsman, telling him that his plant side has eaten away any vestige of the man who died an Avenger, just before killing him.
• Put on a Bus: Quoi returns, but his girlfriend Raptra does not. When Thor asks, Quoi just evasively says they split up.
• Ret-Canon: Carol finally dons the green and black outfit her MCU version wore when in the Starforce, when she takes up Ronan's hammer.
• The Reveal:
  • Tanalth isn't Tanalth at all. She's actually Empress R'Klll, Anelle's mother, and Teddy's grandmother.
  • Jennifer Walters isn't using Cotati meditation techniques. She was killed back on the moon and a Cotati has been wearing her skin.
  • Lauri-ell, the war criminal that Captain Marvel is supposed to apprehend, besides saying she's innocent, it turns out that she's Carol's half-sister.
  • The Cotati's weapons are so ancient that they predate the Elders of the Universe, Asgard, and the Celestials.
• Rousing Speech:
  • Iron Man gives one, using his armor to emphasize it a bit more.
  • Quoi gives one before massacring most of the Kree/Skrull Armada and announces the Cotati will destroy all "animal worlds" starting with Earth.
  • Teddy gets his own in the finale of Issue #6, rallying the Alliance and telling R'klll what truly makes a person royalty.
• Sanity Slippage: Mantis reveals to Quoi what happened after his conception. The Cotati Swordsman was going progressively insane as he couldn't deal with the animal instincts of his human body and being cut off from the rest of the Cotati.
• Sanity Strengthening: The Cotati give She-Hulk a hammer which, combined with their abilities, restores her to her normal diction and cheerful nature. Jennifer insists she's never felt better, but it's hinted there's something sinister going on there, and it doesn’t help that as she says that, half her face is framed in shadow. Turns out Jen's been Dead All Along. A Cotati sapling has just been wearing her skin.
• Sequel Hook: Two of these, first in Empyre Fallout: Fantastic Four it's discovered that some of the Cotati had golden guns and swords that are far more advanced than anything the Kree or Skrull had, Profiteer looks them over and tells the Alliance that the weapons are incredibly ancient. Nick Fury as the Unseen looks at them and discovers they were from the First Race - a species that predates the Elders of the Universe and Celestials, this leads to Uatu the Watcher emerging from one of Nick's eyes and Uatu promises a reckoning. Then there's the Ironic Echo Cut Flash Forward mentioned above where Captain Glory is dead while a badly injured Teddy mutters that his grandma was right and then Abigail Brand with some heavily armed companions barge in to handle things in The Last Annihilation.
• Shoo the Dog: Hulkling tries to break up with Wiccan to appease the Kree and Skrull into accepting his rule without a "primate" consort. It doesn't take; Billy knows Teddy was doing it just to end a centuries-long war and still loves him, and promises to wait for Teddy back on Earth.
• Shoot the Dog: Kl'rt blew up the Kral system, occupied by generally harmless Skrull dreamers, artists and Loony Fans of Earth media, to try and stop the Cotati's plan. But it was too late.
• Shout-Out:
  Eddie Brock: It's dangerous to go alone. Take this! (hands Conan a dislodged parking meter)
  • The event's Big Bad quotes a certain Scooby-Doo Phrase Catcher after being defeated.
• Solar CPR: Carol, Johnny and Billy teleport to the Sun to combine the powers of the former and defuse the Pyre. Unfortunately, the reaction proves too strong for them to stop until Tony Stark sends reprogrammed unstable molecules to slow the reaction for them.
• Standard Hero Reward: For Billy, it's "save the Earth from the Cotati, get a royal wedding with your Emperor of Space fiance attended by all your superhero friends."
• The Starscream:
  • Tanalth isn't entirely onboard with Hulkling's agenda, manipulating him for her own gain and organizing an assassination attempt on him by like-minded Kree. Then it turns out she's not Tanalth, but Teddy's grandmother R'Klll and actually wants to manipulate Teddy into becoming a more ruthless ruler.
  • Captain Glory admits this is his reason for supporting Tanalth's coup. Once they replace Teddy and put Tanalth on the throne, he would expose her as R'Klll and spark war between the Kree and Skrulls once more.
• Start of Darkness: Lords of Empyre: Swordsman shows that Quoi's started when human workers cut down a prehistoric grove of Cotati, in fact the one his father was born in, even after he gave them a cutting that would have given everything they wanted to cut it down for, simply because it would have taken too long for them.
• The Stinger: The end of the Aftermath special has a Flash Forward of Teddy and the empire falling to a now-militant Brand leading her own squad to "fix" the galaxy.
• Subverted Catchphrase: When Thor frees himself, Cap and Tony from captivity, he smirks at Quoi's astonishment and responds "Verily. I say thee YEA!", an alteration of his usual "I say thee NAY!" shout.
• Super-Empowering: Carol decides to share her Accuser powers with War Machine, Spider-Woman and Hazmat in order to find the real culprit of the destruction of a city her half-sister is accused of.
• Take Up My Sword: Carol Danvers takes on the job of a Kree Accuser, being given the late Ronan's hammer by Tanalth. Carol's new sister Lauri-ell later takes up the Accuser role and hammer as the rightful inheritor.
• Teeth-Clenched Teamwork:
  • The Kree and Skrull Empires may be united under Teddy, but it's clear that it's largely to consolidate power against a common enemy.
  • Teddy still isn't happy with Kl'rt being around, what with Kl'rt having incinerated his step-mother back when they first met.
  • Earth's heroes aren't too happy either about allying with the Kree/Skrull forces, due to the latter willing to resort to more extreme methods to combat their common foes.
  • The X-Men, especially Magik, are in a pissy mood having to work with the Hordeculture against both the mutant zombies and Cotati invaders.
• Tempting Fate: The Priests of Pama had finally achieved their goal, and one of them said "Nothing can stop us!". We leave the rest to your imagination.
• Title Drop: At the end of Issue #1, when Quoi reveals the Cotati's intentions.
  Quoi: For here we plant the seed of the Empyrean! On this planet— we begin our EMPYRE!
• Underestimating Badassery: A curious one, where the Cotati play this straight and avert it. They acknowledge T'Challa is the most dangerous man on Earth, and make a very good stab at killing him...then immediately assume he's dead just because they can't feel a pulse, without bothering to be very sure he's properly dead.
• Unwitting Pawn:
  • What Cotati Swordsman calls Hulkling, claiming Tanalth and Kl'rt are the true masterminds of what's going on. Whether he's telling the truth or not...is a good question. Issue #1 reveals that Hulkling already knew that he was only a figurehead but took the job anyway to stop the war and save lives across the galaxy. Then he starts to assert his power over the supposed thronemasters Tanalth and Kl'rt...
  • What the Avengers are to the Cotati, who use their assumption of the Kree and Skrulls being evil so that the heroes would help take down the armada sent to stop them.
• Vagueness Is Coming: During the Epilogue, a seemingly revived Uatu the Watcher warns Nick Fury/The Unseen, that "A reckoning is coming".
• Villain Has a Point: If the Cotati had limited their grudge to the Kree, an empire that had used, abused, and attempted genocide on them in the past, the Skrulls might have even left them to it with a wave and a smile. Deciding to take out every meatbag in the universe made them an Alliance-Level Threat.
• The Watson: Ghost Rider, in Empyre: Avengers #0, being the only member of the team present who wasn't there for all the backstory stuff, allowing everyone to explain what's going on to him (and there's a lot to explain).
• We Have Reserves: The Cotati, thanks to their biology, and the fact they really do have reserves. They can throw wave after wave of troops at Wakanda, but it only takes one of them touching the soil for them to win.
• Weapon of Mass Destruction: The Alliance has the Pyre, a star killer.
• Wedding Finale: Empyre: Aftermath, an epilogue to the series, ends with a proper royal/superhero wedding for Teddy and Billy. Cap, Tony and Thor reminisce about their fallen friend, Captain Mar-Vell. Carol Danvers and Abigail Brand of Alpha Flight have a falling out (with the Kree and Skrull officiants offering to let the two use laser swords to settle the fight). Teddy exercises his royal power and locks up Captain Glory for his coup and makes the Super-Skrull a diplomat to atone for his use of the Pyre. And R'klll prophecies that Teddy's Empire will not survive his kind ways. And apparently it will be ended by none other than Abigail Brand.
• Wedding Smashers: During the wedding, Abigail Brand nails Carol Danvers with an Elemental Punch for not informing her about the Cotati. This ratchets up the tension in the wedding until Carol apologizes for keeping her out of the loop.
• Well-Intentioned Extremist: The Cotati supposedly want to bring peace to the universe, which sure doesn't sound bad...but it involves eliminating animal life, as they believe it to be the cause of strife across the universe.
• Wham Shot:
  • The final page of Empyre: Avengers #0 has Iron Man doing a speech on how the Avengers are united and will fight the coming invasion, "no matter who gets in the way"...and then we see the Fantastic Four part of the Kree/Skrull fleet. Though this turns out to be a case of Never Trust a Trailer.
  • Hulkling manages to stop Mjolnir with his sword, Excelsior.
  • Empyre #1 ends with the Kree/Skrull Armada crippled by the Cotati (with a LOT of help from Tony Stark) and Quoi announcing their intent to kill all animal-based life. One assumes that humans are included on that list...
  • Tanalth transforming into R'klll, Queen of the Skrulls and Teddy's grandmother.
  • The revelation that Jennifer Walters was killed by the Cotati back on the moon and the Hulk in the comics was one of their own "seedlings" wearing her form.
  • The final splash page of Empyre #4: Teddy and Billy aren't engaged. Dorrek VIII, King of Space, Emperor of the Unified Kree and Skrulls finally got hitched to Wanda Maximoff's son in a Vegas chapel!
  • Issue 6, as the combined Avengers, Defenders, and NATO confront the Cotati in Wakanda, Thor unleashes the power of Gaea through Mjolnir to remove the Cotati growths across the whole world.
  • Fallout ends with Uatu the Watcher apparently coming Back from the Dead.
  • Aftermath ends with a future vision of Teddy's court apparently massacred as Abigail Brand looks on from a portal to assist the dying Teddy.
• What the Hell, Hero?: Abigail Brand slaps Carol for forgetting to call Alpha Flight. She lays into Carol for not informing Alpha Flight about the Cotati or the Kree/Skrull alliance, pointing out that if the organization had known that there was an alien species hidden on the moon they could’ve acted quicker and saved more lives. She condemns Carol's policy of merely treating Alpha Flight like backup that only needs to be kept "in the loop" whenever the Avengers decide to do so and promptly quits.
• Wins by Doing Absolutely Nothing: Almost. In the X-Men sidestory, it turns out Dr. Strange was able to modify Wanda's spell so it will expire in 30 days. The Cotati vs Mutant Zombie fight was on the last day and during the final hours. The X-Men could have not shown up and would still win.
• You Are Better Than You Think You Are: The Fantastic Four get a dose of this, reminding them they they are also Avengers.
• You Are Too Late: After Captain Marvel, the Human Torch and Wiccan rescue Hulkling and confront the latter's impostor, R'klll tells them the Pyre has already been triggered.
• You Have Failed Me: The Priests of Pama were promised by Quoi to be spared the purge of animal life in exchange for carrying out their task. They failed, and are punished by him by being gruesomely turned into trees.
• You Have Outlived Your Usefulness: Tanalth arranged for some Kree troops to try and kill Teddy. Once they'd failed, she kills them to tidy up the loose ends.
• You Will Be Spared: As thanks for their role in their ultimate victory, the Cotati offer to spare the Avengers from their genocide of all animal life to bear witness to their believed utopia afterwards. Naturally, they're told to shove it.

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