Ringing in the New Year for many people includes college football, and to celebrate the occasion, Marvel and ESPN have partnered to bring together comics and the New Year’s Six. New promotional art for these bowl games places the participating colleges mascots in a tribute to Marvel’s Secret Wars. This classic comic has an iconic cover and it’s exciting to see a collision of worlds via this promo.
Marvel Super Heroes Secret Wars #1 released in 1984. Its cover was illustrated by Michael Zeck. It features Marvel’s iconic heroes, bringing together many of the company’s major teams. The heroes included on the original cover are Iron Man, Hulk, Spider-Man, the Human Torch, Storm, Captain Marvel (Monica Rambeau’s iteration), Nightcrawler, the Thing, Colossus, She-Hulk, Hawkeye, Rogue, Cyclops, the Wasp, Captain America, and Wolverine. Now, these heroes have been replaced with college mascots.
On Twitter (and Instagram), ESPN College Football shared the crossover art for the New Year’s Six, as well as the original cover being paid homage. The New Year’s Six include the Rose Bowl, Sugar Bowl, Orange Bowl, Peach Bowl, and Fiesta Bowl. They are part of the NCAA Division I Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS). Unfortunately, neither Marvel nor ESPN has provided the artist who created the promo, and a signature is not present on the art itself.
The New Year’s Six tribute cover features Swoop, the red-tailed hawk mascot from the University of Utah, the Fighting Irish from the University of Notre Dame, and Pistol Pete from Oklahoma State University. Swoop flies, taking Iron Man’s place, while the Fighting Irish can pull off a mean Hulk. Pistol Pete takes Peter Parker’s place in a fun name swap. The next row places the University of Cincinnati’s Bearcat (the Bearcats’ mascot is named Bearcat) in Nightcrawler’s place, Ohio State University’s Brutus Buckeye in Captain Marvel’s, and the University of Pittsburgh’s panther, Roc, in Colossus’ place. In the places of Hawkeye, the Thing, and She-Hulk are Bruiser the bear from Baylor University, the Michigan State Spartan named Sparty, and a football player representing Ole Miss (Mississippi University).
Ole Miss’ mascot has changed over the years. The school’s mascot is officially the Rebels. However, the school has faced mascot controversy in the past. As such, the school has had alternate official mascots, including Rebel the black bear and currently, Tony the Landshark. Strangely, the official mascot was not included in this promo nor was his predecessor. This makes the replacement of She-Hulk rather lackluster on this occasion. The final row includes Uga the bulldog from the University of Georgia as Cyclops, Big Al the elephant from the University of Alabama in Captain America’s spot, and fittingly, the University of Michigan Wolverines’ mascot, Biff, in Wolverine’s place.
These mascots have all assembled for their respective games, though this will be less of a cooperative effort than the Avengers present within Secret Wars. Nonetheless, this is a really fun homage. Even the corner box has its own twist, presenting the various bowl game logos in place of the faces of Marvel’s heroes. While the worlds of comics and sports don’t blend all the time, more promos like this one from Marvel and ESPN would be exciting to see in the future. After all, Marvel Comics has a lengthy history of events and characters to draw inspiration from; Secret Wars and its cast is one gathering of many.
