. . . and Time, the Rushing River . . .
- by Roy Thomas, Don Heck, and Werner Roth
- Comic Book
- Superhero
- YA and Up
- Definite Time Travel
- English
- “. . . And Time, the Rushing River . . .” by Roy Thomas, Don Heck, and Werner Roth, in The Avengers Annual 2 (Marvel Comics, September 1968).
After the Scarlet Centurion waylays the Avengers on their way back from the 1940s, they find themselves in an alternative 1968 where the five original Avengers stayed together under the thumb of the Scarlet Centurion.
The story includes flashbacks and previously unknown explanations of the team’s previous trip to the ’40s in Avengers #56, and at the end of the story, Goliath uses Dr. Doom’s Time Platform to banish the Scarlet Centurion back to his time—and we think this is the only time travel that actually appears in the story (apart from the flashbacks). We don’t know what happens to the alternative 1968 (now known as Earth-689, but the traveling Avengers return to the universe that we all knew and loved in the 1960s (a.k.a. Earth-616), with their memory of the whole affair wiped by the Watcher.
The story includes flashbacks and previously unknown explanations of the team’s previous trip to the ’40s in Avengers #56, and at the end of the story, Goliath uses Dr. Doom’s Time Platform to banish the Scarlet Centurion back to his time—and we think this is the only time travel that actually appears in the story (apart from the flashbacks). We don’t know what happens to the alternative 1968 (now known as Earth-689, but the traveling Avengers return to the universe that we all knew and loved in the 1960s (a.k.a. Earth-616), with their memory of the whole affair wiped by the Watcher.
—Michael Main
Time is like a river! Dam it up at any one point . . . and it has no choice but to flow elsewhere . . . along other, easier routes!
Tags
(63)
- Time Periods
- Circa AD 1940 to 1949: in a flashback
- Circa AD 1960 to 1969
- Timeline Models
- Branching Timelines: We don’t know whether all of the Marvel Earths are branching timelines, but Earth-689 appears to have been intentionally created as a branch by the Scarlet Centurion.
- Time Travel Methods
- Time Ships: Tut’s sphere
- Time Tethers: Doom’s platform
- Themes
- Cannot Return to Where You Already Exist: Cap does exist twice in the 1940s, but Black Panther says, “Time is like a river! Dam it up at any one point . . . and it has no choice but to flow elsewhere . . . along other, easier routes!” And Hawkeye says, “When we became solid [back in the ’40s], Cap threw the laws of time all haywire . . . by existin’ in two places at once!”
- Self-Visitation: Giant Man and the Wasp
- You Will Remember Nothing!: The Watcher is the memory wiper.
- Fictional Tags
- Angel · Archangel (Marvel Comics): in a flashback
- Ant Man · Giant Man · Goliath
- Avengers (Marvel Comics Team)
- Beast (Marvel Comics): in a flashback
- Beetle (Marvel Comics): in a flashback
- Black Knight (Nathan Garrett, Marvel Comics): in a flashback
- Black Panther (Marvel Comics)
- Captain America
- Cyclops (Marvel Comics): in a flashback
- Daredevil (Marvel Comics): in a flashback
- Dr. Doom (Marvel Comics): in a flashback
- Dr. Doom’s Time Platform
- Dr. Octopus (Marvel Comics): in a flashback
- Dr. Strange (Marvel Comics): in a flashback
- Earth-689 (Marvel Comics): first appearance
- Electro (Marvel Comics): in a flashback
- Enchantress (Marvel Comics): in a flashback
- Executioner (Marvel Comics): in a flashback
- Hawkeye (Marvel Comics)
- Hercules: in pin-up only
- Hulk (Marvel Comics)
- Human Torch: in a flashback
- Iceman (Marvel Comics): in a flashback
- Invisible Girl · Invisible Woman (Marvel Comics): in a flashback
- Iron Man (Marvel Comics)
- Magneto (Marvel Comics): in a flashback
- Mandarin (Marvel Comics): in a flashback
- Marvel Girl · Phoenix · Dark Phoenix (Marvel Comics): in a flashback
- Marvel’s Numbered Earth Realities: Earth-689
- Melter (Marvel Comics): in a flashback
- Mr. Fantastic: in a flashback
- Mr. Hyde (Marvel Comics): in a flashback
- Mole Man (Marvel Comics): in a flashback
- Nick Fury: in a flashback
- Parallel Universes or Dimensions: This issue may be the first explicit appearance of a parallel Earth-689 in a Marvel comic,. It wasn’t yet called Earth-689, but the 689 later came from the publication date of September 1968 of this issue.
- Quicksilver (Marvel Comics): in a flashback
- Radioactive Man (Marvel Comics): in a flashback
- Rama-Tut · Scarlett Centurion · Kang · Immortus · Iron Lad
- Rama-Tut’s Time Sphere: in a flashback
- Red Ghost (Marvel Comics): in a flashback
- Red Skull (Marvel Comics): in a flashback
- Sandman (Marvel Comics): in a flashback
- Spider-Man: in a flashback
- Sub-Mariner: in a flashback
- Thing (Marvel Comics): in a flashback
- Thor
- Unicorn (Marvel Comics): in a flashback
- Wanda (Marvel Comics): in a flashback
- Wasp (Marvel Comics)
- Watcher (Marvel Comics)
- Zemo (Marvel Comics): in a flashback
- Groupings
Variants
(1)
- “. . . And Time, the Rushing River . . .” by Roy Thomas, Don Heck, and Werner Roth, in The Avengers Annual 2 (Marvel Comics, September 1968).
Werner Roth (pencils)
Vince Colletta (inks)