After ‘Age of Ultron’ ended, the road to ‘Infinity’ began. Spinning out of the events of ‘Avengers’ and ‘New Avengers’, the next big Marvel Comics crossover event from the amazing creative team of Jonathan Hickman and Jim Cheung is set to kick off next week and we now have our first look at issue number one.

Marvel.com recently unveiled the first three pages of the upcoming series that will see the Mad Titan known as Thanos come after the planet Earth when it’s guard is down. And if these events seem familiar at all to you, then you might recall ‘New Avengers’ #6. Editor Tom Brevoort explains that it’s important that we see this unfold again, but from another angle:

“This was the moment in which [the Illuminati] crossed the Rubicon and did an awful thing. It was the point that they actually went from trying to find more civilized and scientific ways of solving the problem to having their backs up against the wall and having no other recourse but to destroy a world.

It was the first world that’s been destroyed by the Illuminati, and the Avengers by extension, and that is significant.”

If you haven’t been keeping up with ‘New Avengers’, some of the world’s most influential heroes have gathered because there are literally worlds coming apart and if the pattern continues, then our Earth is next. So, to try to stop the incursions from happening, but their options have run out. Of course, to be fully caught up on all of that, it would be best to pick up Hickman’s very dark run on the title, but to see what Brevoort is talking about, you can check out the pages below, followed by the synopsis for the story:

‘Infinity’, the six part blockbuster comic event of the summer, brought to you by the star studded creative team of Jonathan Hickman, Jim Cheung, Jerome Opena, & Dustin Weaver, takes fans to every corner of the Marvel Universe, and beyond! Earth has been marked as an “Avengers World”, protected by Iron Man, Captain America, Thor and more from the deadliest threats facing humanity. A powerful and destructive race is on a collision course with Earth and the only thing in their path is the Avengers! But even Earth’s Mightiest Heroes realize the one hope of defeating this dire threat is to unite every great hero across the cosmos…because only with a united Avengers Universe is there any chance of survival!

With our heroes at the other end of the universe, who is left to protect Earth? Enter Thanos, the galaxy’s most ruthless threat and an unparalleled force of brutality who brings order to the chaos of life through murder. The greatest threat to the Mad Titan’s work—and perhaps the universe’s greatest hope—is something he created leaving no world safe. Earth’s last hope may lie in the hands of a man who can level cities with a single whisper – Black Bolt, king of the Inhumans. But can the fearsome leader of a race hated and feared by his world, lead his people against Thanos? If they fall, so does the Earth—and the entire universe with it.

The Biggest Heroes. The Biggest Threats. The Biggest Sacrifices. This is Marvel’s INFINITY.

Chances are that we’re likely to get some huge consequences from the Illuminati’s actions in the upcoming series, especially if someone is rooting around in Black Bolt’s head. What do you think will happen when it all hits the fan when ‘Infinity’ #1 comes out? Let’s hear your thoughts, theories, and expectations in the comments.