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After more than a year of critical and commercial success, Marvel's Ultimate Universe will be coming to a close this Spring. December 2025's release of Ultimate Endgame #1 signaled the beginning of the end, with the mini-series by Deniz Camp, Terry Dodson, and Jonas Scharf acting as the big finale for the entire line (although it won't be the final Ultimate Universe comic, as we now know). As it turns out, announcing ahead of time that the ultimate endgame was in sight at New York Comic Con 2025 has paid off handsomely for Marvel, literally. 

According to The Hollywood Reporter's Heat Vision newsletter, the sales for Ultimate Endgame #1 were excellent... to the point where they outsold everything else Marvel has released for quite some time. “On Dec. 31, Marvel Comics released Ultimate Endgame No. 1, which marked the beginning of the end of the alternate Ultimate Universe, its line of reimagined heroes such as Spider-Man, the X-Men, Black Panther, Wolverine and more. Insiders tell Heat Vision that the comic is on track to be Marvel's top-selling book of the last couple of years. Sales figures or order figures have not been revealed.”

Some fans feel that there was still plenty more to be explored within the Ultimate Universe, so I can imagine that part of what fueled the stampede of fans to their comic shops on New Year's Eve was their own curiosity about how the hell Marvel was going to wrap up this epic alternate universe. But that isn't the only reason why Ultimate Endgame #1 sold so well last month. 

The Heat Vision newsletter elaborated, "It helps that [Ultimate Endgame #1] has friends in high places. Namely, Robert Downey Jr. and Kevin Feige. Like a modern Willy Wonka hunt, there is a frantic search among fans to find 1 of 1 covers that each man drew for the issue. You see, as part of Ultimate Endgame No. 1’s release, Marvel debuted its first ever True Believers Blind Bag program, which gives fans a chance to pull one of the book’s rare variant covers, along with 500 special hand-drawn sketch covers by some of Marvel’s top artists."

"This includes covers by Downey and [Feige]. Only two of the four Downey covers have been discovered so far. And the hunt for Feige’s continues."

Blind bag incentives have become an increasingly popular trend across comic book publishers in the last year, with Marvel's embrace of the gimmick following its use by Dynamite Entertainment, IDW Publishing, Skybound, and DC Comics; the success of the Ultimate Endgame blind bags have led to Marvel's announcement that the first issue of its upcoming Daredevil relaunch will similarly come with blind bag variants. However, multiple reports have emerged of significant damages to the Blind Bag variants of Ultimate Endgame #1, as can be seen in this Reddit thread where fans report "extreme creasing on the spine... they are definitely damaged," "indents and wrinkles on the front covers," and even "foils peeling off from the Mark Spears blind bags." Distributor Penguin Random House has announced a special return and refund policy following retailer complaints. 

This clearly hasn't dampened excitement surrounding the issue, however - with Downey and Feige's variants amongst two of the most highly sought of all the Blind Bag covers. I think someone should tell Tom King that he should no longer look down upon his own drawing abilities (see: the variant covers he drew for DC Comics), because there is another cover artist at the Big Two who is significantly worse than him: Kevin Feige. 

Get ready for what's next with our guide to upcoming comics, how to buy comics at a comic shop, and our guide to Free Comic Book Day 2025.