Celestial wonders: Who are those giant universe-creating beings in 'Eternals'?

Who are those gigantic universe-creating beings in the Eternals movie? Here’s a lowdown on the Celestials. – Photos: Marvel Comics

For the longest time, I have avoided discussing the Celestials, because... I simply don’t understand them. While I know they are extremely large beings that you definitely can’t miss, somehow they just don’t resonate strongly on my comics radar, until they were recently introduced in the Marvel Cinematic Universe via Eternals.

Despite their size and power, the Celestials have only been used in supporting roles.

Now that they are in the MCU, it is time for me to address the gigantic elephant in the room by finally trying to make some sense of these cosmic entities.

Often seen but not heard ever since Jack “The King” Kirby first introduced the concept of these “space gods” via Eternals #2 in 1976, the Celestials have lived their last five decades as passive characters (and creators).

With Thanos being snapped out of the MCU, this leaves room for a larger (in every sense) antagonist. However, the Celestials may or may not be the perfect fill-in, as their comics background does not exactly cast them as top-notch adversaries of the Avengers, Guardians of the Galaxy, the X-Men, or even the soon-to-be-introduced the Fantastic Four.

In the beginning

While Kirby created many characters throughout his lifetime and career, the Celestials were arguably his most complex. They made their debut in 1976 (in Eternals #2), but it took Marvel 40 years (via the pages of Ultimates 2 #6) to reveal the Celestials’ origin and its creator – the First Firmament.

The Celestials made their first appearance in 1976’s Eternals #1. – Photos: Marvel Comics

Before we go further into the Celestials, let’s first talk about the First Firmament, which is an omnipotent intelligence that existed since the beginning of creation itself.

Driven by “boredom”, the First Firmament created “lifeform servants”, which comprised two groups – the obedient ones (Aspirants) and the multicoloured rebels (Celestials).

The Celestials’ act of rebellion was due to their desire to create life and allow the universe to evolve – an act deemed sacrilegious by the Aspirants.

This led to the Celestial War between the Celestials and the Aspirants, which the former won after a significant amount of casualties (it is estimated that billions of Celestials were killed).

The nature of the victory was also suspect, as the Aspirants and their hyper weapon, the Godkiller, were on the brink of victory before an internal rift halted their momentum and enabled the Celestials to stage a comeback.

In addition to defeating the Aspirants, the Celestials also tore the First Firmament apart and spread it from one single universe into the first multiverse (aka Second Cosmos).

The Celestial War was fought between the Celestials and the Aspirants.

Vision of evolution

The Celestial’s evolutionary vision involve a few phases aka visits/Host. The First Host involves seeding a chosen planet. By “chosen”, it means that it meets the Celestials’ fit-and-properness screening.

The second to fourth Hosts involve follow-up visits to monitor the planet’s progress and make the necessary modifications or interventions.

Applying this evolution phase to Earth, the Celestials chose the planet by accident, as they initially came to investigate the disappearance of a Celestial. During their first visit they implemented a special genetic code into the pioneer hominids, and as a result, two subs-pecies were created, namely the Eternals and Deviants.

This weird science also led to the development of benevolent mutations in another subspecies, which we know as Mutants.

The Celestials are so powerful they can even use entire planets as their weapons of war.

Apart from “seeding the Earth”, the Celestial’s first major intervention on this planet happened during the second Host, where they returned and found the Deviants ruling a vast empire across the world and was about to go to war with the human race based on Atlantis.

Unhappy with this, the Celestials destroyed the Deviants’ empire base on Lemuria but inadvertently sunk Atlantis as well. The force of the destruction was so great that it reshaped Earth’s continents.

Gods of war

By the time of the Third Host, Earth was more prepared (or so it thought) for another Celestials visit. Nevertheless, despite the presence of the Skyfathers aka Odin and Zeus, they were no match for the Celestials, who eventually spared Earth by granting the planet another century of existence before the next judgment.

In the rematch, Odin and Zeus came back with more firepower (i.e. the Oversword of Asgard and the Destroyer armour) but they were still no match for the Celestials, resulting in the need for Mother Earth herself to barter a truce via the offering of 12 perfect humans aka the “Young Gods” (see Thor (vol 1) #283-#300 and Thor Annual #7).

Odin tried to take on the Celestial host armed with the Oversword of Asgard and the Destroyer armour.

Comics to cinema

Ironically, the Celestials are not that interesting in the comics, despite having a hand in creating the Eternals, Deviants, Multiverse, Mutants and the Infinity Stones.

Fortunately, they have a more exciting time in the MCU, with the two Guardians Of The Galaxy movies including Ego (aka Starlord’s dad) and the floating mining colony ala Knowhere, which happened to be the severed head of a Celestial.

The floating mining colony ala Knowhere in 'Guradians Of the Galaxy' is actually the severed head of a Celestial.

Apart from Ego, other notable Celestials include Arishem The Judge (who is known as the ‘Supreme Celestial, and is the main Celestial featured in Eternals), One Above All, Tiamut, Exitar The Executioner, Eson The Searcher, Godhead, Zgreb, Celestial Destroyer, Celestial Madonna (not related to the singer) and the Progenitor. The Progenitor’s death on Earth helped “seed” the birth of metahumans, mutants, and other supernatural beings, earning him the title “Father of the Avengers”.

The Next Big Thing

Galactus once singlehandedly held his own against four Celestials and managed to kill one of them.

While Thanos was big enough to take on the entire Avengers, he was tiny compared to the gigantic scale of the Celestials, who average at a height of around 600m. They are so powerful that they can move planets at will to be used as weapons of war (Infinity Gauntlet #5), and can even create and contain entire pocket universes (Heroes Reborn: The Return #1-#4).

Despite these awesome feats, the Celestials (surprisingly) are not the meanest dudes in the galaxy as Thanos (plus Infinity Gauntlet) only ranked them as being at par with Odin, Zeus, the Stranger and Galactus.

Talking about Galactus, he did singlehandedly take on four Celestials (Fantastic Four #602) and killed one in the process! Hence, perhaps the Celestials are just sideshows before the coming of the real big thing.