The X-Axis – 15 April 2012
It’s a podcast weekend, so check out the post below and download the show, where you can hear Al and me talk about Secret Service, Courtney Crumrin and America’s Got Powers. Over on the X-books, it’s an extremely quiet week, so I’ll chuck a couple of other books in as well…
Avenging Spider-Man #6 – This is the start of the three-part “Omega Effect” crossover, which also runs through Daredevil and Punisher. In fact, it looks suspiciously like a Daredevil storyline which has sprouted some guest stars in the name of mutual sales-boosting. The story is built entirely around that book’s Omega Drive subplot, in which Daredevil has ended up in possession of a hard drive full of information about the Marvel Universe’s major criminal/terrorist groups. Naturally, they’d like it back. And for equally obvious reasons, the Punisher would quite like it too.
As for Spider-Man… well, he’s got a bigger audience than either Daredevil or the Punisher, so he’s here too. I’m not exactly convinced that this story has an organic need for him to be here, though co-writers Rucka and Waid at least find a role for him as a peacemaker between the other two, and play up the “nobody dies” angle that Dan Slott has been pushing with him in Amazing Spider-Man. I also suspect that from the Punisher book’s point of view, it would have been better to establish Rachel Cole-Alves’ role as the Punisher’s sidekick a little more firmly before wheeling her out into a crossover. But that’s scheduling for you, and again, the story does make good use of the character.
I have more than a little trouble getting my head around the plot logic of the Omega Drive storyline. So there’s this hard drive with information about all the criminal organisations – uh, why not just release it, or at least hand it over to the authorities? The story tries to answer that question – Daredevil claims that as long as he has the drive as insurance, the bad guys won’t come after him – but that’s hardly a very convincing argument. It’s possible, I suppose, that this is deliberate and it’s supposed to be another illustration of Daredevil’s rather erratic thought processes, but if I’m being honest, it comes across more as rickety plotting. I don’t really buy what the heroes want to do with the Drive – I don’t really understand the thinking behind it, frankly – and that’s a big issue.
And yet, and yet… Rucka and Waid write all these characters very well, and it’s an eminently readable issue. It gets by on character interaction more than story, but then if you’re going to do team-up stories, maybe character interaction should be the centrepiece. My head says this wasn’t very good; but I liked it more than you’d think.
Buffy the Vampire Slayer Season 9 #8 – We mentioned the Buffy titles on the podcast this week, so it might be worth expanding on my comment that the book is back on track with the current “season”, particularly given a storyline which could certainly be accused of messing the readers about. (Even the letters page acknowledges “that some readers will feel manipulated by the choices we’ve made”.)
The problem with Season 8 – well, the main problem – was that it was far too eager to exploit the possibilities offered by comics to do stories on a scale that a television budget would never permit. Of course, given the way the TV show ended, any further stories had to shake up the status quo pretty drastically. But Season 8 ended up doing enormous battle scenes and cosmic weirdness and, in doing so, pretty much lost sight of what made the show recognisable. It wasn’t Buffy without the budget limitations; it was the Buffy characters transplanted into a different sort of story entirely.
With Season 9, the book is still wildly different from the TV show. It’s been relocated to San Francisco and (thanks to the previous storyline) most of the world’s magic is now gone, so that spell casting doesn’t work at all, and any new vampires end up mindless. But it’s back to operating on a recognisable scale, it’s back to dealing with a core cast of a sensible size, and it’s re-established the link with the TV show, without turning into a clone.
Granted, you can question the wisdom of a storyline in which Buffy first discovers that she’s pregnant, and then discovers that, no, she’s actually a robot – the latter twist is actually done rather well, but it undercuts the previous few issues rather fundamentally. Mind you, I’m not sure there was any particularly satisfying direction to take a pregnancy arc with Buffy; the three obvious solutions are sideline, abortion and miscarriage, none of which exactly sounds like a barrel of laughs. The real question is whether you wanted to start down that line in the first place, though there does seem to have been an ultimate aim beyond just swerving the readers (namely, to further a theme of whether Buffy should give it all up for a normal life, which runs through the whole of this season). I think they just about got away with it, but I can entirely understand why you might feel differently.
New Avengers #24 – This is the first Avengers vs X-Men tie-in issue, and it’s a crossover tie-in of the old school. By which I mean, it’s actually concerned mainly with an ongoing New Avengers subplot about Luke and Jessica and whether they should leave the Avengers to keep their kid safe. The crossover figures into the issue simply as the threat-of-the-week which provides the backdrop. That’s handy, since it avoids Bendis having to advance the crossover plot at all; he simply repeats the bits we’ve already seen from a different perspective and with an entirely different emphasis.
And that’s fine. I’ve got no problem with doing crossover issues that way; it’s certainly better than artificially extending the core plot. Of course, it can get incredibly wearing with something like Secret Invasion, which gave us six months of nothing but bloody Skrull stories, but in something a bit more focussed like Avengers vs X-Men, it’s probably the way to go.
It also means this is an issue that plays largely to Brian Bendis’ strengths as a writer – that is, two characters talking to one another. I remain baffled by Marvel’s use of him on team books, which seem to me to be precisely what he does worst, given an apparent inability to juggle a large cast and give them all something to do. (Characters have a tendency to join Bendis’ Avengers and then do literally nothing for the better part of a year.) Character-driven scenes are his strength, and for a change, he’s playing to that here. It’s one of his better Avengers issues. It does nothing to develop the main AvX plot, but would you really want it to?
Saga #2 – Brian K Vaughan and Fiona Staples’ series is living up to the hype so far. Which should be no surprise, since the hype was mainly “It’s by Brian K Vaughan, it’s bound to be good.” Alana and Marko are still on the run with their new kid, and the various pursuers are starting to close in. The robot officers with TVs for heads – which occasionally flicker into life to show something random and incongruous in mid-conversation – are a fabulous visual. So is the Stalk, whose debut is the main set piece of this issue. As a concept, it could easily be cliche (she’s half-woman, half-spider), but the execution neatly avoids that response. And then the cliffhanger introduces something that seems entirely at odds with the rest of the series so far, but which seems to work as part of the world that’s been established.
It’s the details that give the book its identity and lift it above the crowd. The broad strokes of the story are familiar enough so far, and it would have been easy to cobble the rest together from the overused space opera tropes. Saga is doing the right thing, building as much as it can from scratch and making its elements fresh.
Uncanny X-Men #10 – The second half of the Unit story is a clever little piece of set-up for the Avengers vs X-Men crossover that starts next issue. Although the solicitations give the impression that this is a team-up with the Avengers, it isn’t really; they’re off fighting the rest of the SWORD escapees while the X-Men deal with Unit. The point of the Avengers’ appearance is to get them onto the stage and establish their relationship with the X-Men in advance of the crossover, and it succeeds in that.
But the other purpose of this story (and probably the dominant one) is to get Unit into the cast so that he too can play a role in the crossover. In importing Unit from his short-lived SWORD series, Kieron Gillen is following in a long tradition of writers bringing their favourite characters to a new series when they change assignments. Sometimes it can be a bit forced, but this story establishes a pretty good reason to use Unit: Hope’s looking for somebody to tell her, in clear terms, what the Phoenix actually is, and Unit says he can help. Of course, he would, wouldn’t he?
It’s a nice twist from what the previous issue led us to expect, as Unit’s plans for Hope are a little more long-term than just cutting her up. In fact, she doesn’t seem to have twigged that there’s anything particularly sinister about Unit at all, though the rest of the X-Men have figured it out pretty quickly. Manipulation is Unit’s schtick, but it’s also a change to cast Hope in the dupe role. One of the character’s problems, I suspect, is that in the X-office has tried a bit too hard to make her Little Miss Awesome in an attempt to sell her to the readers as the next big thing; she’s a much more likeable character when she’s allowed to screw up.
Wolverine #304 – A coda to Jason Aaron’s run, as a whole bunch of villains from down the years gather in a bar to meet with Sabretooth until Wolverine shows up to cause trouble, and some other characters poke their heads around the door in cameo appearances to bring us up to date on what they’re doing. It’s an issue for people who’ve been reading for the last few years and who’ll enjoy – indeed, who’ll understand – the random cameos that litter this story. The likes of Soulstriker and Dr Rot make one last appearance; Rot, as a dropped plot, gets turned away at the door, though I think upcoming issues are supposed to be dealing with him anyway. Random cutaways show the Mongrels in hell, and Fat Cobra enjoying his new throne.
It’s not really a story so much as a final bow, though even on that level, I’m not quite sure why Daken’s wandering around here (it’s not like Aaron used him, and he’s meant to be dead). And is that Tiger Shark? Really?
The entertainment value here is mainly on the “Oh yeah, I remember that” level, with a horde of artists returning for brief contributions. That results in things like a fight scene starting with Steve Dillon and then throwing in contributions from Steven Sanders and Renato Guedes before returning to Dillon again. Judged purely from a storytelling standpoint, that doesn’t work at all. But then this issue isn’t really about storytelling; it’s about recognition factor and drawing a line under Aaron’s run. It’s reasonably successful on that level, but it has to be said that the horde of cameos and random art shifts pretty much kneecap it as an actual story.
I took Wolverine #304 to be more symbolic than literal. (Both Daken and Wild Child are dead and I really don’t think that even Wolverine could defeat all the villains at the party at once.)
Also, I think that to Dr. Doom, Sabretooth is so far beneath him that he wouldn’t even acknowledge his existence, much less send his regrets about not being able to make it to a party.
I agree with you that it didn’t quite work and as much as I like Steve Dillon I feel he is not a good fit for Wolverine. (This issue gave me flashbacks to Wolverine Origins!)
I thought the cutaway scenes were more effective and had the issue focused on them instead of Sabretooth’s party I think it would have worked better.
The Buffy fake-out was actually executed quite well. And the Slayer dreams did hint that all might not be as it seems. I think that a genuine pregnancy might be further down the line.
Buffy is also about to see a version of herself living the kind of life she currently wants for herself – something mundane and demon-free. It’ll also be interesting to see Spike’s reaction to this since what he wants from Buffy at the moment is a normal relationship.
“Hope’s looking for somebody to tell her, in clear terms, what the Phoenix actually is….”
Aren’t we all…. 🙂
When Bendis is done with Avengers I think I’m going to go back and see if any non fight scenes took place outside if a kitchen/dining room or Dani’s nursery.
Avengers mansion…where Spider-Man and Wolverine go to eat.
Holy shit… I never noticed it, but they DO sit around the dinner table ALOT!
Except when they go to Aunt May’s for wheat cakes and Wolverine gets told to mind his manners. See, it’s funny because she’s an old lady.
I think Uncanny suffers because it’s the all-asshole X-Men team. I wish there was somebody relatable on the team, but anyone who isn’t full of themselves is a cypher. I don’t think the reader should feel like the Sentinels might have a point if they swooped in and took them all out.
I stopped reading Bendis’ Avengers about three years ago. Can’t believe he is still doing the same routine. Why do people continue reading this? Nothing ever happens…
I stopped reading Bendis’ Avengers about three issues into Avengers Disassembled. From what I saw in those three issues, I can’t believe it’s any worse when nothing happens than when something does.
@Jeff
I agree. There’s just no heart to it at all. Wolverine and the X-Men teeters a little too close to goofy for a core book in my opinion, but it’s ten times more entertaining. Uncanny is way too much “Magik, you’re in charge of extraction. Colossus, you’ve got point. Namor, execute Sentinel formation blah blah blah.” That business was kind of neat the first couple of times they did it, but it got old fast. We get it, this is the militant team. Interesting in terms of how they contrast to all previous versions of the X-Men, but not people you really want to read about on a monthly basis. When Sinister is the freaking life of the party you know you’ve got a problem with your superhero team.
You don’t find Storm or Colossus relatable? And I’d say thus far this is the book where Scott is being fairly reasonable.
“Holy shit… I never noticed it, but they DO sit around the dinner table ALOT”
Maybe Bendis sees too many Chuck Lorre sitcoms 🙂
The scene in Wolverine #304, the guy who wants to blow his head off and then the phone rings … I just saw the preview pages, but this is the same as the begining of David Morrell´s thriller Deperate Measures. Has Aaron a liking for such “hommages”?
I totally disagree about Uncanny. Like Paul mentioned, both Storm and Colossus are there. Magik’s actually been really relatable in this book as well (for the first time since she was brought back). And Psylocke’s been in quite a few issues as well.
I think it’s a great book so far.
@David
I’m not saying it’s a bad book. But since you mention it, I’ve not found Storm or Colossus particularly relatable in years. Storm is always written with her high and mighty “By the Goddess!” queen thing, and Colossus is just a stone man. Their greatest character arcs (mainly adapting to American life and life with the X-Men) are long behind them, and neither has been particularly interesting in ages. Both have been written out more than once but they keep coming back. I actually found Whedon’s Colossus kind of interesting because his dialogue was written so differently than it ever had been before (although it didn’t make a lot of sense when it happened because it sounded like someone who wasn’t fluent in English yet).
Think about the All New, All Different team. All of the characters were not only new to us, but new to each other and their surroundings. Truly remarkable and their were a million possibilities. Unfortunately, in nearly 40 years most of those possibilities have been explored. I’m not saying those characters no longer work, but they just seem like placeholders now. Colossonaught is not an interesting direction, I’m sorry. And Storm is doing what Storm always does. See, you just can’t go home again. A new team filled with new characters (who aren’t freaking young X-Men… Marvel, that doesn’t work, get the hint already) could be so exciting. I remember in the late 90’s when they brought in those new three (Cecilia, Marrow, and Maggot), I actually thought there was something there. Cecilia especially, her arc was really well written and I thought for sure she could be a breakout character (go read X-Men v2 #70 and her issues of Uncanny to see what I mean, great stuff), but alas. I even got excited with the Frenzy stuff in Legacy. If done right, they could really do something with characters like that and make them very likable and marketable. But it doesn’t seem to pan out most of the time and then we get the same rosters we’ve always had. I think the problem in terms of the X-Men is the cast is just too damn large (not talking about the number of books although that’s too big too) and no one gets a voice or any time invested. If they pared the entire thing down to two core teams (okay, Uncanny X-Force can stay) with a 50/50 split with old and new characters, I think it could really be something.
But really, with Uncanny, I’ll admit that the revamped Sinister was pretty fun. I like that they’re trying some new things with him and Apocalypse (Genesis actually sort of has my attention even though I originally thought that idea was very stupid. I’ll gladly take it over that goofy Apocalypse from that Milligan story a few years ago).
Sorry if I sound all negative and rambly in my posts. I do enjoy these discussions and like hearing all of your input. I feel that I tend to get things off track easily by sharing my thoughts on older stories and characters, but that’s just what I have to work with.
Wow, yeah: I don’t get love for UNCANNY X-MEN at all. It feels to me like the X-Men by way of a very, very watered-down take on THE AUTHORITY.
It’s become a common observation on the ‘net that the most interesting characters in it are always the villains. That’s ’cause there’s almost no character development among the cast. Yes, we’re reminded now and then of what the characters’ problems are – Magik’s kept in a cell, Colossus is possessed, Cyclops is becoming a bad guy – and it’s all fine stuff that’s checked, so far as it goes… but in 10 issues, none of it has gone anywhere. Or, to put it another way: after $40.00, none of it has gone anywhere.
Shoot, look how the Emma-losing-her-arm situation was handled. It happens, then we don’t see her for four issues, then she pops up fine and Cyclops remarks she should be a little more messed up about it.
Granted, the biweekly schedule is probably making it feel like all these subplots have been ticking over WAY longer than they truly have. But I’m much more into actively progressing character work than action, and there’s just precious little of that to be found in UNCANNY. WatXM is pretty packed with it, though, and I’m enjoying it, so I guess Marvel really is publishing different strokes for different folks.
The best thing that could happen to the main line of X-Men books – that will never happen – is for them to be taken down to one, maybe two books. Drop Astonishing, drop X-men, drop Legacy and give us Uncanny and Wolvering/X-men. Not only that, they need to decide on a manageable team for each book and the rest of the characters need to be put out to pasture for a two or three years. No guest appearances, no updates – just make the majority of them go live their lives somewhere else.
For me, so many of the X-characters are on the stage right now, just to be on the stage right now. And some of them are on two or three stages or more, at the same time. Everything just feels so hum drum.
When there was just Uncanny (and the New Mutants for a while) it was so cool when Ice Man or Havok and Polaris would show up – because you hadn’t seen them in a few years. OR when Angel joined the team – it didn’t work out, but it was nice to see a change in the line up. Now – characters MIGHT disappear for a few issues, but they show up somewhere else sooner rather than later.
I was a very lapsed X-Men reader (stopped with Trial of Magneto in original #200) but skimmed drips and drabs over the years (like when I thought it was my job when I worked at a LCS) or some tangentially related stuff (like the Wisdom mini or Ellis’ Excalibur).
I started again in earnest with Brubaker’s run and/or Joss’ first arc. I think the combination of Gillen and Aaron is a nice pair of writers doing different things with roughly the same template.
On a completely different matter, I loved the return of Courtney Crumrin. How long ago was the last TPB? I don’t even remember. :>
Colour didn’t really bother me.
Now, can we get some new Andi Watson?
@Mike
“For me, so many of the X-characters are on the stage right now, just to be on the stage right now. And some of them are on two or three stages or more, at the same time. Everything just feels so hum drum.”
Yep. And House of M was concocted because Quesada felt there were just too many mutants. Does anyone else find it ironic that the number of mutant characters appearing in the X-books absolutely exploded after M Day? The same goes for mutant characters being created (which they initially said wouldn’t happen). Oh, and every relatively major (and that’s being generous) character was repowered or at least given some ability within a year. And there’s five X-Men books, not counting X-Force, X-Factor, etc.
There never was a problem with too many mutant characters. There’s probably one now. Good call, Joey Q.
@Dan
To be fair (?), Marvel’s edict these days seems to be, “every character we ever created and did something with is active again,” barring a few continuity-heavy examples. They’ve almost completely shied away from attempts to create new characters and are trying to get the most out of all of their Handbook entries. On one hand, that means every book features at least one “fan favorite.” On the other, that means there’s no dramatic arc to their existence, and they’ll exist in this perpetual state of not going anywhere for the foreseeable future.
But then, you know, the ’80s ended a while ago, as did all semblance of progression among corporate-owned characters, so let’s not delude ourselves into thinking that’s a possibility anymore.
“They’ve almost completely shied away from attempts to create new characters”
I always saw this as a way to sidestep the nasty creator´s right issue. As tired as the superheroes have become, what would happen if somebody created a character which indeed would become the next Wolverine in popularity? Or the next Batman? A lawsuit in the making, regardless of the contract at the time? When was the last time Marvel did a NEW character with a No.1 like they did in the past? Sure, books like Dazzler or Darkhawk were not very successful, but they tried. Nowadays you get the new Captain Marvel.
DC isn´t any better at this, but at least they have Vertigo.
M-Day was a lazy idea, not very well developed. Like most of the events of the Quesada era. If they had followed the concept logically, you would have indeed have only two X-books. And the premise of AvX would be much more interesting.
Did Gravity appear anywhere else before they gave him his own short-lived series?
Gravity has showed up quite a lot over the last few years, just not in a starring role. Beyond, Fantastic Four, Avengers – the Initiative, Fear Itself – Youth in Revolt…
Come on guys, Marvel introduce new characters all the time. Look at Generation Hope, Runaways, New X-Men, Livewires, Avengers Academy, (red) Hulk, Skarr, X-23, Wolverine & the X-Men, Agents of Atlas, Sentinel etc. Lots of new characters are created but not all of them take off.
New things just don’t take off. That’s why we’re seeing multiple versions of Hulk, multiple versions of Wolverine, multiple versions of Iron Man & multiple Avengers Teams. Nobody wanted to read Loners. Nobody wanted to read Runaways. Nobody cared about Agents of Atlas.
And out of all those you listed above, who was the biggest breakout of them all? X-23, a clone of Wolverine.
Well, part of the problem seems to be the rapid changes in direction. They introduce Gravity… and he’s gone almost immediately. Same with Arana. Same with the new Scorpion. Same with the Loners. Same with the Young Allies. Same with the Howling Commandos.
Are these series disappearing because they’re genuinely unpopular? Or are they disappearing because they’re not promoted properly. You could argue they tried to give the Agents of Atlas, X-23, and the Runaways a push, but have they really being promoted properly?
That’s fair. Promotion is often poor, but is it any worse than for say, Namor, Gambit or any of the other recycled properties? You know what? I’d struggle to name a series I think has been promoted well regardless of the age of the character.
They seem to be trying with academy. They gave Atlas, which i loved, plenty of chances, including minis with the avengers AND xmen, and it didnt catch.
You want to make new characters work? Get a high selling team book with fan favourite characters, like the avengers. Keep the cast to a minimum. Allow new character space to breathe, don’t shove them front and centre for an arc and show us how wonderful they are then forget about them again. Keep them around in the team for some time, without being overbearing. Eventually, they become a mainstay, and you can retire an older hero to let another new hero in. I loved Ares during Bendis avengers run, and I probably would have followed that character elsewhere had they moved him on after seige instead of killing him off.
That’s how Claremont’s X-line up went from being what it was During the phoenix saga to what it was during inferno.
But then, people just hate everything these days. It’s impossible to make a good comic and a good character because the audience isn’t happy to go along for the ride anymore.
Oh… and the character I was describing in the first part of the first paragraph was Armour.
To be fair to Uncanny, one reason it hasn’t done much is because it had to wait for the big AvX crossover. Whatever happens in that book will definitely affect the Uncanny team. Now, obviously Wolverine’s team/school is involved in well, but less so. I think the school will go on relatively unchanged by the crossover. But Cyke’s team is front and center. They really just chose a bad time to renumber Uncanny (making it feel like it was going in a Bold New Direction).
I do think though that having so many X-books hurts the ability to do big stories though. Because you’ve got so many characters spread out over so many different titles, it really limits what you can do in each one individually. They need to have self-contained stories that don’t change the characters. You can’t do something crazy with Storm in X-Men or Psylocke in X-Force because they’re both being used by Uncanny, etc.
Obviously Marvel just wants to sell as many comics as possible, but if they wanted to tell the best STORIES possible, they would cut the line down to Uncanny, Wolverine and the X-Men, Uncanny X-Force and X-Factor.
“New things just don’t take off. That’s why we’re seeing multiple versions of Hulk, multiple versions of Wolverine, multiple versions of Iron Man & multiple Avengers Teams. Nobody wanted to read Loners. Nobody wanted to read Runaways. Nobody cared about Agents of Atlas.”
Another big reason for this has a lot to do with the demographics of comic book readers. Comics aren’t for kids anymore, or at least, kids don’t read them. I’d say a large portion of readership for these titles (as well as the people on here) are probably guys in their mid to late twenties, thirties, and fourties. Guys who have been reading for years be it continuously or on and off. When we’re all dead I think the comics industry will go with us because I don’t know where the hell they’re going to get their fans from. People don’t like to accept this for some reason, but I really think it’s true. Nostalgia (and the movie/business end of things) is the real reason nothing ever changes. It’s never going back.
“Obviously Marvel just wants to sell as many comics as possible, but if they wanted to tell the best STORIES possible, they would cut the line down to Uncanny, Wolverine and the X-Men, Uncanny X-Force and X-Factor.”
I get that about selling the most comics, but I wonder if it really works. Paul has talked for YEARS about Marvel bunching up their books and shipping an absurd number of them in a single week, only to ship nothing the next. The market is flooded and with as expensive as these things are, how many fans really buy them all? Everyone knows which X-books “count” (Uncanny, WatXM, and to a lesser degree Legacy with the longtime fans) and which ones are completely pointless (Astonishing and Adjectiveless). You couldn’t get me to buy either of those two. I’m not saying if they cut the line down that I’d go out and buy three copies of Uncanny each month, but… shit, I don’t even know what my point was. Maybe I’m still pissed because Generation X was canned because Marvel wanted a leaner line. Yes, I know I bitched about young X-Men books, but that one was kind of something. 🙂
Not only is X-23 a Wolverine clone, she was created for an X-Men animated series. People apparently liked her there, so she was brought into the Marvel Universe.
I wouldn’t really call characters like Red Hulk or Red She-Hulk new characters either.
The original Matt is right about the potential for team books to push new characters, but even there Marvel messes up. New characters are too connected to writing teams. A writer comes onto a book, and he brings in his favorite characters, reshapes existing characters to his liking, and maybe creates some new characters. Any new characters tend to either come off as pointless background filler or some over-pushed Mary Sue, instead of some acceptable middle ground. Then the next writer comes along, jettisoning any new characters and supporting cast that he doesn’t like, in order to bring in his own. And the new writer reshapes the characters to his own liking. Etc.
Individual writer runs don’t matter much, and the characters they introduce tend to matter even less. Said characters either end up in limbo after that writer leaves, or they get radical makeovers.
And even if the creators don’t change, you still get Marvel edicts to change books for some movie tie in or event or line shake-up.
Can someone explain to me why the companies have given up on the newsstand market? I’ve never really heard a good answer. If they want to get kids to read again, that seems by far the best way and kids don’t care if something is new or not.
Jeff: Try these links:
http://www.jimshooter.com/2011/11/comic-book-distribution.html
http://www.jimshooter.com/2011/11/comic-book-distribution-part-2.html
http://www.jimshooter.com/2011/11/first-this-one-more-thing-about-mass.html
The third one in particular might be the most relevant.
@DanLichtenberg I too am also still nursing a grudge over the cancellation of Generation X and the general misuse/killing of the characters…at least Hush is being used and Chamber is back (sort of) although his post M-Day depowering was a massive fail in how his powers worked…
Would like to see a story where repowered Chamber bumps into Champocalypse and they find out that the Apocalypse looking Chamber was merely his corpse powered up…but since Frank Tieri and Joe Casey seem to be the only ones interested in using the character….
“The original Matt is right about the potential for team books to push new characters, but even there Marvel messes up. New characters are too connected to writing teams. A writer comes onto a book, and he brings in his favorite characters, reshapes existing characters to his liking, and maybe creates some new characters. Any new characters tend to either come off as pointless background filler or some over-pushed Mary Sue, instead of some acceptable middle ground. Then the next writer comes along, jettisoning any new characters and supporting cast that he doesn’t like, in order to bring in his own. And the new writer reshapes the characters to his own liking. Etc.
Individual writer runs don’t matter much, and the characters they introduce tend to matter even less. Said characters either end up in limbo after that writer leaves, or they get radical makeovers.”
This is largely the case. The other issue is that they ended up getting added to the wider cast and shunted into the background rather than being a replacement for an exiting cast member. If the Fraction run had’ve kept the Whedon line up and featured no other characters, then Armour would have recieved more storytime, essentially being the Kitty replacement (and it took 25 issues without her being pushed as “the next cool thing”), rather than being just another face to sprout a one liner with one of those annoying Fraction Captions.
Small centralised core cast, and cycle out characters. 12-15 issues would (should!)be plenty of time to cycle out a character (I don’t think Angel lasted that long when he attempted to join the Claremont X-men) – except for when it’s 2 six issue stories. The problem THERE makes it feel like they were around for 2 days. I’ve read Bendis Avengers from NA#1 to Seige (including Mighty, Dark and events like HoM, Civil War, Secret Invasion and Utopia) in matter of weeks and it seriously feels like Iron Man was director of SHIELD for 5 days.
Newstand issues had to do with the distributots and pirive per unit, as they were discussing regarding the .99 books.
There are still actusl newsstands that caryy comics. There are a couple in MD. And barnes/noble still carires comics.
@The original Matt
Pointless trivia: Angel was added to the team because Byrne wanted him on the team. That’s why he doesn’t last that long on the team after Byrne’s departure…
“The problem THERE makes it feel like they were around for 2 days. I’ve read Bendis Avengers from NA#1 to Seige (including Mighty, Dark and events like HoM, Civil War, Secret Invasion and Utopia) in matter of weeks and it seriously feels like Iron Man was director of SHIELD for 5 days.”
I’ve found this a big problem with recent Avengers issues. They make it seem like very little time passed between Siege and Fear Itself. Then after Fear Itself it’s pretty clear that the whole Osborn story does indeed only take a few days, and as soon as it finishes AvX begins (dialogue does suggest something like 3 days passes after that story). When are Spider Island, Cap and Iron Man’s solo series, all of Hawkeye’s non-Avengers appearances, Schism…supposed to have happened?
I suppose it’s down to how over-decompressed Avengers is. But even then, it wouldn’t be all that difficult to just work out you need to write in the odd “a week later” here and there.
@Jeff F: The basic answer is that newsstands aren’t generally interested in stocking comics because they could make more profit selling something else. Attempts in the past to reach the newsstand audience with low-price titles have failed in part because they don’t provide the newsstands with enough profit margin to justify ordering them in the first place.
Comics retreated to the direct market essentially because their declining readership meant they were no longer a sufficiently attractive proposition for newsstands to stock.
Back to the issue of nobody buying new titles and so the companies push multiple iterations of exisitng characters. Couldn’t the argument be the other way around. If I like X-Men and there are a dozen titles I’m less likely to try a new book becuse i spent a lot of money just keeping up with X-Men. If there were one X-Title a week, I would have been more likely to try soemthing like Agents of Atlas. I know when I first started readinf comics I was happy to plunk down an extra 50 cents on an interesting looking cover. Plunking down 4 bucks on Part 1 of 8 is less likely.
@Paul: Got it. That makes sense.
I doubt most X-readers buy all issues.
Personally I only get 1-3 titles at a time depending on what they’re currently about.
@The original Matt
Mentioning Armor makes me think that maybe Marvel is missing another way to introduce new characters, through other media.
X-23 was created for the X-Men Evolution cartoon. She became popular there, and was later brought into the Marvel Universe. She had a bumpy start, being part of the terminally delayed NYX, and bouncing around other titles without an established personality. And to be fair, the MU version of the character had a completely different personality than the cartoon.
Armor was established the “hard way”, but features prominently in the X-Men anime. Not a big surprise, that a Japanese created cartoon meant for airing in Japan looked at the X-Men and said “None of them are Japanese. But there is this kid/supporting character that is Japanese, so lets make the story about her.” Still, it can’t really hurt Armor’s profile that she was a major character in a season of an animated X-Men series. (Okay, it might not help much, considering how weak the Japanese-made Marvel series have been, and how many liberties they’ve taken with the properties.)
“That’s how Claremont’s X-line up went from being what it was During the phoenix saga to what it was during inferno.”
Claremont drove me away post Mutant Massacre after he replaced half the team with Havok, Dazzler, Psylocke and Longshot. I stuck around for a little while to give the new guys a fair shot, but ultimately I guess I found the shift too jarring and the book just wasn’t the same.
Brian, the book wasn’t the same, and that’s the point. But he’d written the stories of all those characters, so bringing in new ones kept it fresh, but kept the core cast tight, rather than bringing in new characters to write about AND keeping the old characters around… while they were appearing in 12 other team books, a solo title and a mini series… (and maybe a summer event comic) like we get today.
Speaking of time passing, i loved how in starman, a seven (#?) Issue story was from one day with 7 pov and then the next issue jumped ahead 6 months or so inone panel.
@DanLichtenberg I too am also still nursing a grudge over the cancellation of Generation X and the general misuse/killing of the characters…at least Hush is being used and “Chamber is back (sort of) although his post M-Day depowering was a massive fail in how his powers worked…
Would like to see a story where repowered Chamber bumps into Champocalypse and they find out that the Apocalypse looking Chamber was merely his corpse powered up…but since Frank Tieri and Joe Casey seem to be the only ones interested in using the character….”
@Jacob
I have fond memories of the early part of Generation X. It started to really cook from #25 onward, but a few issues later (sometime in the 30’s I believe) Lobdell was out and Hama was in. Hoo boy. People think Morrison’s stories got immediately crapped over when his tenure was up? I’m not even sure Hama had read the freaking book before he sat at his typewriter. Still, a great little series that really could have made it in the right hands.
As for the eventual fates of the characters, Jesus. One train wreck after another. Monet is just about the only one who got out unscathed (her scathing came much earlier in the actual series lol). “Angelo Torres” got crucified on the lawn. Husk got frisky with Angel. Synch… oh, right. And Banshee, who had kicked his alcoholism and was ready to make a fresh start with X-Corps, got slashed by Mystique, disappeared for a couple of years, only to get killed by freaking Vulcan. And Chamber… poor, poor Chamber. The best character of GenX by far. His first story in Uncanny (Poptopia) was pretty neat. After that, it was Austen Hell and then one depowering / repowering rollercoaster ride after another. Toss in a Chamberpocalypse transformation in the middle before another repowering. How can one man’s face blow off so many times in his life? And you thought Xavier getting re-crippled all the time was silly.
I’d say Blink was the luckiest because she died before the team actually formed and was spared all of the eventual nastiness, but it looks like she got the last laugh by outliving (in a manner of speaking) just about all of them.
“Brian, the book wasn’t the same, and that’s the point.”
Of course I realize that was the point, but I nonetheless didn’t care for it. Dropped the book somewhere between the Mutant Massacre and Fall of the Mutants.
@DanLichtenberg
Husk was also relegated to Austin Hell as well, when she got frisky with Angel 😉
Emma also seems to have made it out of the book ok. Heck, who knew back when her character was introduced, she’d end up where she is now?