Snap Into Marvel: Arishem Is Here To Stuff Your Decks

First Comic Book Appearance: The Eternals #2 (August 1976)

First Multimedia Appearance: Eternals (2021) voiced by David Kaye

Powers: Near unchartable power on a cosmic scale, including god-like invulnerability and omnipotence, and near-immortality. 

Comic Book Chronicles

Known as Arishem the Judge, he is the leader of the four Celestial Hosts on Earth, which studied and manipulated the evolution of life on the planet. As a result, Arishem oversaw the creation of the Eternals and the Deviants. When the Celestials returned to Earth for the second of their visits (or “Hosts”), he triggered the Great Cataclysm in response to the Eternals’ ignorance of humanity and the Deviants’ enslavement of it. In the process, the nation of Atlantis sank into the ocean. Which means that, without Arishem, we wouldn’t have Namor.

While technically not the only Celestial capable of rendering judgment on a planet (notably, Progenitor, who was resurrected by the Eternals and Avengers and then proceeded to wage a war of on humanity in AXE: Judgment Day, could do it), it’s more or less Arishem’s thing. A presumed fan of Siskel and Ebert, he delivers his verdicts via a single thumb up or down to denote whether a planet has passed his judgment. In one of my favorite original X-Factor stories, the underrated “Judgment War“, the team is transported to a planet in the throws of final judgment by Arishem. After being scattered amongst various factions on the planet (the “we have powers and are pretty” ruling class Chosen, the “we have powers and are traditionally unattractive” Rejects, and the “let’s burn it all down and start over” Beginagains), the group reunites, bringing together at least some elements of the warring factions in the process. The unified planet proceeds to blasts Arishem’s thumb with the Phoenix Force by way of Cyclops’ eye beam just as he’s about to render his judgment. This buys the world a respite, with Arishem vowing to return and judge again later.    

Later, during Jason Aaron‘s Avengers run, Arishem and the rest of the Celestials are attacked and killed by the Dark Celestials (aka Celestials infected by the insect-like Horde, the threat the Dreaming Celestial communed with Makkari in an attempt to avert during Neil Gaiman‘s Eternals miniseries). In the process, Arishem’s head is hurled to Earth to herald the arrival of the Dark Celestials. But don’t worry, in the course of the Avengers’ battle with and eventual defeat of the Horde, Arishem and his Celestial companions were resurrected, making him free to render judgment across the cosmos once more.

Fit and Finish 

While the “main” Arishem card is — like the rest of the cards this season — inspired by the Eternals film, this is less of an issue. In part because he’s still “a big red guy” and that captures the essence of his look regardless of the details. Also, as a Celestial, he already has a somewhat nebulous look that can vary based on artistic interpretation. There certainly is a “standard” Arishem comic book look, but it’s less iconic than the looks of some of the other characters this season. 

More importantly, at least two of the immediate variants feature Arishem’s defining characteristic, his big ol’ judgy thumb. 

Form and Function

True to his status as a god-like Celestial, his Marvel Snap card is on a whole ‘nother level from all the other cards, as the only 7 cost card in the game. Bigger than all the 6 cost “Big Bads,” including Galactus, only Death (the personification of a concept bigger than the Celestials from which even they cannot escape) costs more than Arishem. In exchange for that cost, we get +1 energy every turn (thereby enabling you to actually play Arishem at some point). But in a nod to the Celestials’ role in seeding and manipulating new life across the Marvel Universe, he also shuffles an entire decks worth of random cards into your hand along with that extra per-turn energy. It’s like the District X location in card form. 

On the one hand, gaining extra energy is a HUGE bonus, allowing the player to break (or at least greatly bend) one of the foundational rules of the game. On the other hand, the sheer randomness and, more importantly, number of extra cards makes taking advantage of that extra energy more difficult. There are several suggested archetypes for Arishem — Thanos or Loki, for example, two deck types which routinely require the player to deal with extra cards and/or a certain element of increased randomness. As such, cards like Quinjet seem like no-brainer inclusions in an Arishem deck. 

But it’s important to note: any card that goes into an this deck has greatly reduced odds of ever being played, let alone being available to play at the right time. As a result, cards which take advantage of having extra energy (like Sunspot and She-Hulk), cards which don’t need to be played to add value (M’Baku and Makkari), or cards benefiting from having lots of cards in hand (Devil Dinosaur and Blob) may end up being better “I hope I draw these” inclusions to salt into your extra large hand in and among Arishem’s randomly inserted one.

As such, Arishem seems poised to be more of a “fun” card than a meta-definer; a random number generator type of card (not unlike Sersi, who has found a few places for herself despite the random nature of her ability). It’ll be interesting to see if any of the deck builders out there come up with a consistent enough assortment of cards to both take advantage of the extra energy and mitigate the extra large hand size to make Arishem a meta archetype. I’m also curious to see how he plays in Conquest, where the randomness will make it harder for your opponent to counter your deck in repeated match-ups. And if Arishem does become a fixture of the meta, don’t be surprised to see a surge in popularity for Darkhawk. The card which will benefit the most from playing against someone who starts off with 24 cards in their deck. 

All in all, while Arishem may not be the most important card of the season in terms of defining the meta or aiding the climb to infinity, he may well end up being the most fun.