Continuity in the Cosmere and Beyond

In a recent podcast episode, Brandon Sanderson and Dan Wells talked about Thunderbolts, the latest superhero team-up from the MCU. Subtitled “The New Avengers,” this movie continues to push the franchise forward in the massive wake of the Infinity Saga, the biggest cinematic crossover event in box office history. Thunderbolts is the next step in Marvel’s set up for Avengers: Doomsday, their next super powered blockbuster. The two authors had a lot to praise about the movie’s treatment of depression, an ending that stands out from other superhero movies, and the returning characters’ stories.

The MCU is the prime example of a franchise where continuity and crossover are commodified. Seeing our favorite heroes change and grow across decades of movies that share a world history is a selling point—and keeping things consistent but telling fresh stories is a challenge that Marvel Studios has squared up against since the beginning. Storytelling in a world of streaming, internet wikis, and movie trailers on your phone is constantly changing, and the scale of the stories being told has grown with these technological advancements. These changes make it easier than ever to stay up-to-date with franchises that cross media boundaries with movies, TV shows, games, books, tie-ins, prequels, sequels, and spinoffs.

I remember the fervor in school hallways after big Marvel movie releases, when I would excitedly discuss the newest Guardians of the Galaxy or Spider-Man news with classmates in the rush between classes. Every premiere, trailer, or teaser brought hours of discussion that became as much a part of the fan experience as the actual movie. From reviewing post-credit  scenes on our phones to reading classmates’ reviews on Letterboxd, we constantly engaged with the Marvel Universe in new ways.

The MCU leads a pantheon of other IPs that have capitalized on the media capabilities of modern audiences. Star Wars is branching to stories outside the Skywalker family to critical acclaim, and DC Comics is expanding into a promising future with their recent reboot helmed by James Gunn, who brought Marvel many of its biggest movie successes. And tucked into the comparatively quiet corner of fantasy fiction, Brandon Sanderson has been writing his own fiction universe into existence, one story at a time.

Enter the Cosmere

While he writes science fiction, thrillers, middle grade adventures, and more, his epic fantasy worlds have long  been Brandon’s grand plan. When he finally got around to writing his first fantasy epic, Elantris, he knew he wanted to tell a large-scale story, and he did just that when he published his next book, Mistborn. The question became how to scale up without alienating readers who picked his books up down the line. So he subtly placed worldbuilding details and complex histories into the background of stories that focused on compelling characters, their individual progress, and paid-off  story promises in each book. With those hidden details, the Cosmere was born: a universe of connected fantasy fiction that shares cosmology and mythos but allows each story and series to stand alone. The stories are all fun and exciting on their own, but their depth and intertextuality create a world that is more than the sum of its parts—much as the MCU created a cultural touchstone worth more than a good night at the movies.

So how did Sanderson build it, why do fans enjoy it so much, and where is it going?

The Building Blocks of a Universe

Elantris was the first book Brandon sold (and the sixth he wrote), but he credits Mistborn as the true beginning of the Cosmere. During our interview, he shared the story of retrofitting Elantris into the Cosmere: “When I was writing Elantris, I didn’t have the Cosmere: I had Hoid. Elantris getting published was odd because then I had six more books during which I fleshed out the Cosmere.” 

Most of those six books weren’t published, but they gave Brandon the time he needed to solidify the ideas that had begun percolating when he decided to go all in on epic fantasy. Mistborn was the one that worked, and within the confines of the Mistborn trilogy he began to truly seed the ideas that would make the Cosmere: the Shards, the Realms, and the magic systems of the Cosmere. And of course, Hoid.

Art by Howard Lyon (c) Dragonsteel

The enigmatic, fan-favorite worldhopper is a staple of Sanderson’s Cosmere stories. Often helpful and always mysterious, he is the audience's best lens into the ancient histories and mythologies of the Cosmere. Keep your eyes out, as Hoid appears on every world in the Cosmere at one point or another. I didn’t notice his crossovers until I finally read Warbreaker, which prompted a full reread of the Stormlight Archive and Mistborn to figure out what else I missed.

The Cosmere has become a beloved intersection of shared details that connect dozens of stories, worlds, and timelines—one that necessitates an in-house continuity editor and keeps a dedicated fanbase constantly updating their wiki.

The MCU has a similar story, with Iron Man originally created to stand alone, with a Nick Fury teaser after the credits rolled. Only months later Marvel released The Incredible Hulk, starring Edward Norton, an oft forgotten MCU movie that turned Iron Man into the first entry in a larger universe; similarly, Elantris launched the Cosmere without originally intending to, and Mistborn expanded it.

Brandon Sanderson’s Background: Why Magic Has Rules

Sanderson is famously an outliner. He’s said he tends to outline about ten thousand words for every hundred thousand in a finished book. He’s been planning the Cosmere since publishing Elantris. The Cosmere’s individual stories for characters and ideas have come over time, and you can see the discovery process in many of Brandon’s annotations for Elantris. Once Mistborn and Elantris gave him the foundations of the Cosmere, Brandon started plans for an epic series spanning more than thirty interconnected novels.

With that plan, Sanderson had a structure for the many forces at work in the Cosmere. Along with the universe-scale worldbuilding, Sanderson set rules for himself regarding the use of magic to keep narratives coherent and to earn story beats. These Laws of Magic give each magic system in Sanderson’s worlds a sense of balance and make the magic feel almost scientific—the characters extrapolate new uses for their powers at the same pace as the readers. Audiences know that Batman can’t stand up against Superman in a fight, but put them in a detective contest or introduce kryptonite to the situation, and you start to develop interesting conflicts where previously there were no stakes. Kaladin’s skills and Vin’s Mistborn abilities are introduced and then expanded on, and when the characters find clever ways to use their abilities, Sanderson has earned the “aha” moment. When enough of those stack up, you get a whirlwind climax that makes magic feel tangible—a finale so inevitable that fans have labeled it “the Sanderlanche.”

I remember reading Elantris, the Stormlight Archive, and the original Mistborn trilogy in the early 2010s. From the Sanderlanche discoveries at the end of each book to the finale of Words of Radiance, I was captivated by the worlds of the Cosmere even before I even recognized the connections. It was a conversation between classes during my sophomore year of high school that clued me in to the greater story at play, bringing together the threads that I hadn’t even begun to guess at. 

The Cosmere Today

From the outline and outset, the Cosmere has come a long way. A cameo here and there and a subtle throughline have connected the Cosmere’s 17 novels, a number of short stories and novellas, and a comic book (and this count will probably be out of date with the Stormlight RPG launch, adding an entire branch to the Cosmere canon—but more on that later). Today the franchise measures over four million words. The two flagship series, Mistborn and the Stormlight Archive, have become pillars of modern fantasy.

[Sanderson Flat Lay or an image from the Secret Projects Campaign (link to store?)]

Words of Radiance is the best-reviewed book on Goodreads and Brandon’s Secret Project Kickstarter (four books, three of which were Cosmere standalones) was the highest-earning Kickstarter crowdfunding campaign of all time. Brandon’s company, Dragonsteel, puts on an annual convention called Dragonsteel Nexus that attracts ten thousand fans a year. The books have inspired cosplays, fanfiction, TikTok skits, and YouTube careers.

Just as two decades the MCU has built up a culture and community around the world, the Cosmere means more to fans than just books to reread and look forward to. And the return on investment for fans who do dig into the details is accelerating: recent books like Isles of the Emberdark and The Sunlit Man tease a future for Brandon’s cultures and characters that has deep implications for fan favorites like the Stormlight Archive. Emberdark in particular gives readers a glimpse at Sanderson’s plans for Cosmere stories far down the line. The blend of Brandon’s complex magic systems and the cultures who use them pushes the stories into a science-fantasy future that he has earned with years of detailed worldbuilding.

The Future of the Cosmere: There’s Always Another Secret

Brandon is working now on Ghostbloods, the next Mistborn trilogy, set in the Cosmere’s computer age. With analogues to 1980s culture, espionage, and technology revealed in the recent first look, we can anticipate big shake-ups for characters’ uses of Allomancy and Investiture on a global scale. If the evolution between Mistborn and The Alloy Of Law are any example, the Scadrian spy thriller will be well worth the three-year wait.

In the meantime, Sanderson’s teams are busy. Brotherwise Games has been his partner during the development of the Cosmere RPG, a tabletop role playing game that connects readers to the worlds they love in new ways. Fans can tell their own stories set within their favorite worlds with the RPG’s Stormlight release later this year. Coming soon after that, the game will expand to encompass the world of Mistborn and beyond.

Who knows what Brandon is cooking up behind his writing desk? Cosmere fans already have a lot to look forward to in the three years before Ghostbloods. If you want to be the first to know when Team Dragonsteel has cooked up more Cosmere fun, keep an eye on our social media channels, newsletters, and YouTube channel; and look forward to lots more fun right here on the Cognitive Realm.