User blog comment:ADour/The MARVEL UNIVERSE is ENDING!/@comment-4991637-20150121035924/@comment-3245318-20150121041149

Yeah, I'm mainly convinced they won't go for a hard reboot after Secret Wars, because if nothing else, they wouldn't want the New 52 comparison. Individual character continuity will continue as always, though the Earth they occupy will be a new one.

I don't see it as making things less cluttered though. If anything, taking all these characters that used to exist in their own defined boxes and mixing them all into the same box will make things more confusing than ever for years to come. It's not making things "bigger" either, as I've seen some people describe it. If this really means the end of the multiverse then things are just getting infinitesimally smaller. Would Marvel not be allowed to do What Ifs, dimension-hopping, or alternate future stories going forward? Or would they just be reconceptualizing stories like that to fit the new model?