WISHING BOX
Classification: Item of great power from Reality-4290001
Creator: Unrevealed
Users/Possessors: The Norn (of the Great Society)
First Appearance: New Avengers III#19 (August, 2014)
Powers/Abilities/Functions: The Wishing Box was an item of virtually unlimited power that came into existence when the six Planes of Forever Glass were brought together to form a cube. It was its reality's version of the Infinity Gauntlet and could be used to do (almost) anything it wielder wished.
The six Planes of Forever Glass were that reality's manifestations of the six power objects that were known as Infinity Gems in Reality-616. Although it's likely that these Planes also granted their wielders control over Time, Space, Power, Reality, the Mind and the Soul, this has not been confirmed. It also has not been revealed if the different Planes had individual names.
Like the Infinity Gems, the six Planes of Forever Glass were presumably almost completely indestructible.
Limitations: Like the Infinity Gems, the Planes of Forever Glass could presumably only function within their home reality.
Using the Wishing Box to move Earth-4290001 and its entire universe out of phase somehow caused the box to be destroyed.
History: Nothing has been revealed about the origin of the Wishing Box or the circumstances in which the six Planes of Forever Glass had previously been brought together.
(New Avengers III#19 (fb) - BTS) - At some point, the six Planes of Forever Glass came into the possession of the Great Society, the six heroes who were the protectors of Earth-4290001.
(New Avengers III#19 (fb) - BTS) - At some point, the members of the Great Society learned that, due to a contraction in the timeline of the Multiverse, alternate universes were being smashed together, and the points at which they were colliding were the Earths which existed within them. When such collisions occurred, both planets and their universes were wiped out but destroying one of the Earths would enable the other Earth and everything else in those two universes to survive.
(New Avengers III#19 (fb) - BTS) - During one of the earlier incursions that their world faced, the members of the Great Society put the six Planes of Forever Glass together to form the Wishing Box. The Norn then used the box to wish that their Earth and its universe be moved out of phase, thereby avoiding a collision with that alternate Earth. As a result, both Earths and their respective universes survived that incursion but using the Wishing Box in that manner somehow caused it to be destroyed.
(New Avengers III#19 - BTS) - Later, when Earth-616 and Earth-4290001 approached each other during an Incursion, the Illuminati from Earth-616 met with the Great Society to discuss what could be done. When Mister Fantastic asked how they had done something as impossible as moving their Earth and its universe out of phase, the Norn stated that he had used a Wishing Box. The Norn then displayed an image of the box, explained that it had been a cube made up of six Planes of Forever Glass and then revealed that it had been destroyed. Mister Fantastic's reaction to this information caused the Rider to realize that he had seen a Wishing Box before but Mister Fantastic corrected him, stating that he had seen a different manifestation of it in the form of a gauntlet with Infinity Gems instead of Planes of Forever Glass.
(New Avengers III#20-21) - Later, after most of the members of the Great Society had been killed by a monster summoned by Doctor Strange, Namor used one of the Illuminati's many antimatter injectors to create a virtually instantaneous planetary explosion that destroyed Earth-4290001, thereby saving Earth-616 and the rest of both universes.
Comments: Created by Jonathan Hickman and Valerio Schiti.
Inspired by the Infinity Gauntlet created by Jim Starlin, Ron Lim and Tom Christopher.
Some online sources call this power object the Wishing Cube. They are wrong.
Calling the components of the Wishing Box the "Planes of Forever Glass" sounds awkward, especially since I automatically associate the word "glass" with drinking glasses, light bulbs and windows. I found myself thinking of them as "Panes of Forever Glass" instead.
The image of the Wishing Box that the Norn showed to the Illuminati seemed to have edges that were about 3 feet in length. Also, all of the square faces of the cube were transparent and those that could be clearly seen were tinted different colors (i.e., red, green and blue). However, it's not certain if the size and colors of the image were the same as those of the actual Wishing Box. Given that the Infinity Gauntlet had a volume of much less than 9 cubic feet, it seems likely that the Wishing Box was similarly much smaller. Maybe it was actually the same size as Cosmic Cube?
In New Avengers III#3, the Illuminati of Earth-616 assembled the Infinity Gauntlet during their first Incursion and Captain America (Steve Rogers) used it to push the other Earth and its universe away, thereby preventing a collision and saving both planets and both universes. However, there was feedback from this expenditure of energy in the form of a "vibration" that caused five of the gems to shatter. The Time Gem had seemed to vanish instead of shattering but it had actually traveled foward in time as it shattered, enabling it to apparently survive for a while in various future time periods before its destruction was complete.
Although the whole "Time Runs Out" storyline was an interesting read, there were elements of it that I strongly disliked. One of them was the fact that the Infinity Gems, power objects that were supposedly indestructible, could actually be destroyed. I realize that it was necessary for the storyline that the heroes not have an easy way to save their world from the Incursions but it really served to highlight how contrived the whole situation was. Additionally, there's the fact that it had long been established that the gems HAD to exist in order for the universe to exist. So, if that was true, then why didn't Reality-616 come to an end as soon as its Infinity Gems were destroyed? The only explanation that seems plausible to me is that, although they were shattered into seeming nothingness, the gems actually continued to exist as scattered atoms and the presence of these atoms was somehow enough to maintain the existence of Reality-616.
The fact that that the Norn stated that he had used "a" Wishing Box instead of "the" Wishing Box suggests that there were somehow more than one of them. Perhaps there were more than just six Planes of Forever Glass and any six of them could be used to create a Wishing Box? Or maybe there were only six of those Planes but the number of ways in which they could be arranged to form cubes meant that these cubes were somehow different from each other?
Since they were counterparts of the Infinity Gems, one would expect that the Planes of Forever Glass would have the same origin story as the gems. This would mean that the Planes were the reincarnation of the might of a nameless entity of limitless power from before recorded time who had been the only living being who existed in any and all realities. This solitary being had eventually chosen to put an end to itself and it was from its ashes that all of the then-current reality, in all its many forms, had risen. I've always assumed that Jim Starlin meant this event to be the Marvel Universe's equivalent of the Big Bang but I don't know if this was ever confirmed in-story or not.
In any event, this first origin story for the Infinity Gems subsequently
underwent two significant revisions, the first of which was the revelation that there had originally been SEVEN
Infinity Gems. The 1995 Avengers/UltraForce crossover introduced the Ego Gem which had been separated from the
other six and lost in the Ultraverse, thereby depriving the other gems of their gift for independent action. When all
seven Infinity Gems were reunited as one, they transformed into a purple-skinned female humanoid who called
herself Nemesis and was obsessed with creating a universe. Nemesis was only stopped when Dane Whitman used a
version of the Ebony Blade to shatter the Ego Gem, releasing a vast creative force that caused the Black September
event. Of course, the fact that the Ego Gem originated from the Marvel/Malibu merger would suggest that it, like
everything else from Malibu, is no longer considered completely canon in the Marvel Universe.
That's
not quite accurate...Marvel just doesn't have the rights to use those
characters...it doesn't mean the events didn't happen--Snood
At this point, I feel that I should mention that I have always been EXTREMELY irritated by the fact that some online sources claim that Nemesis was a reincarnation of that original solitary being whose soul was split into the Infinity Gems after it committed cosmic suicide. Why? Simply put, because that idea is so COMPLETELY WRONG!!! The Omniscient Narrative in UltraForce/Avengers#1 states VERY clearly that "Nemesis" is an operating system whose function is to create universes but needs a "controlling influence" to do so properly. Since such an influence was not part of Nemesis, that means that she was not the original god-being or, at least, not all of him/her/it. As Contrary put it, "the gems were once somehow part of a creature capable of building universes." The fact that the most important word in that sentence is "part" is something that too many people have overlooked.
The second, more recent revision was presented in the 2019 Infinity Wars miniseries when Loki passed through the barrier beneath the Quarry of Creation and entered the "original universe" (perhaps the First Cosmos?) where he found Celestials surrounded by countless Infinity Stones which he later accused them of casting into other universes. If true, this origin would seem to DEFINITIVELY disprove the origin that was presented in the Thanos Quest#2.
Anyway, since the Ego Gem is now being ignored and the origin of the Infinity Stones has been disputed, this suggests that the origin of the Planes of Forever Glass, being alternate versions of the Infinity Gems, is also now somewhat muddied. In the wake of these disputed origins, I really hope that some capable writer will, one day, establish the real origin of the Infinity Gems...all SEVEN of them.
It has been noted that the story of the all-encompassing entity from whose ashes arose reality in all its forms is somewhat similar to that of the First Firmament, the embodiment of the First Cosmos that ever existed. Both entities were incredibly lonely and in both stories reality came into being after their deaths. Of course, a massively significant difference is that the First Firmament created lesser beings (the Aspirants and the Celestials) to serve it, and it was the resulting war between them that shattered its "body" so that the pieces of the First Cosmos could later come together to form the Second Cosmos, the first Marvel Multiverse.
The members of the Great Society were Sun God (Zoran), the Rider (Wayne), Boundless, Doctor Spectrum (Nenet), the Jovian and the Norn. They were analogues of, respectively, the DC super-heroes known as Superman, Batman (Bruce Wayne), the Flash, Green Lantern, the Martian Manhunter, and Doctor Fate. All of these DC heroes were members of the Justice League, except for Fate, who was a member of the Justice Society.
Profile by Donald Campbell.
CLARIFICATIONS:
The Wishing Box has no known connections to
images: (without ads)
New Avengers III#19, page 10, panel 2 (main image)
Appearance:
New Avengers III#19 (August, 2014) - Jonathan Hickman (writer), Valerio Schiti (artist), Tom Brevoort with Wil Moss
(editors)
First Posted: 12/11/2021
Last updated: 12/11/2021
Any Additions/Corrections? please let me know.
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