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They've gone out of their way to wreck the one thing that separates DC from Marvel: the legacy characters.
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So when you think about it...DC ruined their comics for nothing?
- Thread starter SageShinigami
- Start date
They've gone out of their way to wreck the one thing that separates DC from Marvel: the legacy characters.
I really wish DC would just let him write whatever version of the DC Universe he has in his head.
Because whatever it is, is amazing compared to what DC actually publishes some days.
Fair enough, but dont get me wrong I'm not saying that cape comics cant change over the years, especially between creative teams, but to continue using the X-Men as an example, theres a reason it always seems to revert back every several years to a bunch of vaguely mid-twenties characters at the x-mansion fighting for a world that fears and hates them and playing baseball in their off-time. Wolverine is the best there is at what he does, Cyclops is the uptight leader, etc. etc. I mean, I'd love to be proven wrong, but for all the wonderfully wacky stuff happening in the X-Books right now, I dont have much confidence that any of it will actually stick, especially not after witnessing Marvel slam so hard on the brakes after Morrison left the X-Men.
That's actually not true at all. The Spider Man marriage wasn't supposed to have happened.
If I recall correctly, what happened was this:
Stan Lee who was writing the newspaper Spidey (which is and always has been abysmal) at the time but was NOT writing the comic and hadn't been for a long time came up with the wedding as a publicity stunt that would be synchronized between the newspaper and comic book versions of Spidey.
Lee pitched it to the Marvel Brass at the time who approved it without any input from the writers, who weren't happy with it. Peter and MJ weren't even a couple when this idea got approved, he was seeing Felicia Hardy.
Because Lee's idea required the marriage to happen at the same time between different mediums, this resulted in several hastily written borderline nonsense issues in which Hardy betrays Peter, they break up, Peter proposes to MJ and the two are married at a breakneck pace.
The actual writers HATED this because they had already moved on from MJ. She should have been relegated to the same status as Betty Brant, Gwen Stacy, etc but she was forced back into the narrative because of Lee's newspaper stunt.
Writers had been looking for a way to reverse that decision for a VERY long time before OMD happened, and OMD wasn't the first attempt. The Clone Saga of the 90s was.
THAT plot was conceived as a way to introduce "Ben Reilly" as the real Peter Parker who would go back to the pre marriage status quo while allowing the married "Peter" and MJ to be retired from the book and enjoy a happy ending.
Editorial wildly underestimated how much fans were attached to "Peter" though, it led to insane levels of backlash and the storyline was reversed while still ongoing, turning the entire Saga of a confusing mess of nobody knowing who the clone was.
It's funny, I've found myself caring les about continuity in recent years but then I read something like this and it sounds horrible.
Also, I'm now bummed once again. DC really had a great streak going with Rebirth and it feels they've flushed it all away. I pared down what I read at that time to mostly Batman, 'tec, Superman, Action, and Wonder Woman and all off those books were awesome. And now I've not read any Superman issue in, I think, a few months, I stopped reading 'tec, and WW has been okay with the new writer but has overall been pretty spotty for a while.
I read dc comics here and there, not in order
I think the constant resetting is impenetrable for casual readers
I just decided to not care and keep going but it's dumb
I think the constant resetting is impenetrable for casual readers
I just decided to not care and keep going but it's dumb
The problem with Crisis, and every reboot after, isn't the stories themselves or what they attempt to "fix" it's that they always half ass it.
All those questions shouldn't have to be asked, it should be a hard reset. Why does superman get the slamming brand new origin and start from scratch status quo while batsmen just gets a year one story but basically all the story lines continue on like nothing happened.
It's even worse in the new 52. Somethings got totally wiped out, some things are the same but different and other things are just untouched (this is mostly batman, again except now they have to figure out how he had 5 Robin's in 5 years or some shit.)
You're telling the new 52 wouldn't have been better as a complete line wide clean slate? I certainly think it would have.
But no, instead they have to say that Tim drake was never Robin, he was always red Robin. Fuuuuck all that.
All those questions shouldn't have to be asked, it should be a hard reset. Why does superman get the slamming brand new origin and start from scratch status quo while batsmen just gets a year one story but basically all the story lines continue on like nothing happened.
It's even worse in the new 52. Somethings got totally wiped out, some things are the same but different and other things are just untouched (this is mostly batman, again except now they have to figure out how he had 5 Robin's in 5 years or some shit.)
You're telling the new 52 wouldn't have been better as a complete line wide clean slate? I certainly think it would have.
But no, instead they have to say that Tim drake was never Robin, he was always red Robin. Fuuuuck all that.
You would be VERY surprised to find out what was going on in the Xbooks if you picked one up. Everything you just mentioned is inapplicable and Marvel has officially committed to this direction as the New Status Quo on par with Giant Size #1.
But beyond that even before House of X look at where the relationships were:
Cyclops had grown past Xavier as a mentor a long time ago in favor of a "third way" that was more militant but not as far gone as Magneto.
Storm had married Black Panther and enjoyed an off and on stint as wakandan royalty in addition to her Xmen duties.
Emma frost went from Hellfire club antagonist to professor of the Gen X team, then moved to a serious relationship with Cyclops after the death of Jean Grey.
Magneto had long since abandoned his role as primary antagonist to embrace a role as co-commander alongside Cyclops.
Wolverine had been given all of his memories back all the way back in House of M, putting to bed forever the endless loop of mysterious pasts and false memories.
Cyclops and Jean went from two clueless teenagers in Xmen #1 to parents of a child they raised for over a decade together.
Kitty Pryde went from (at one point) youngest Xman to head of the Xavier School.
Jubilee went from teenage Mallrat to adoptive parent.
Gambit and Rogue went from "infuruating on again off again couple who can never touch because of mutant powers" to married couple in a stable relationship. Rogue had gained control of her abilities and could engage in physical contact at will.
Iceman went from perpetual bachelor who could never commit to coming out as LGBT and struggling internally with that new reality.
Cannonball had left earth permanently to live with his wife and child in Shi'ar space as part of the imperial guard.
The list of things like this is not short at all, and this was before House of X took a wrecking ball to all of it for a New Way Forward.
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Always just read specific runs. You don't have to know everything about a character, because the writer usually puts their own spin on it.
Yeah, new 52 was the moment I stopped sweating continuity and just enjoyed the ride. As a Green Lantern reader, it couldn't really make sense otherwise anyway.
It's fine and helps a lot of parties... writers don't have to be beholden to lore or history to make a story with DC. Readers can pick and choose where to start and end.
All media we've seen and read from DC is valid since it all takes place on a different Earth (unless otherwise stated).
I initially thought it was confusing but it makes sense when you step back and look at what they were going for. And then you see how the DC movies have gone and all the sudden, oh yeah a multiverse will work... we can just move on.
I like the multiverse. It's very, very comic book sci fi. And it makes sense within the world of DC... most of the time lol. Nothing is ruined...
SageShinigami I reccomend these videos from DC Fandome. They break it down and explain why it's good for readers and writers. They also tease how they'll implement it in the films.
All media we've seen and read from DC is valid since it all takes place on a different Earth (unless otherwise stated).
I initially thought it was confusing but it makes sense when you step back and look at what they were going for. And then you see how the DC movies have gone and all the sudden, oh yeah a multiverse will work... we can just move on.
I like the multiverse. It's very, very comic book sci fi. And it makes sense within the world of DC... most of the time lol. Nothing is ruined...
SageShinigami I reccomend these videos from DC Fandome. They break it down and explain why it's good for readers and writers. They also tease how they'll implement it in the films.
Ironically what is ultimately deemed good during specific teams' runs is what becomes canon. If I read a particularly bad story for a specific character it just doesn't make an impact on me and very likely any future writers will either do their own thing and hope it is received well or play off another teams' work.
But you know crossovers events must make a fuckton of money otherwise they wouldn't keep doing them.
I feel like most people who only care about good stories have them curated to them so they lean towards buying TPBs or borrow from libraries rather than throwing money into floppies only a regular basis.
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I'm not confused by the multiverse. Not even confused by the reboots. But I think they confuse other people, and I think that's unfortunate.
Eh, it's a bit more complicated than that, as many things are. Many writers DID hate the marriage. Many writers were strongly in support of it. It was always divisive, and it was certainly rushed, but it DID work and, more importantly, it built and grew and really worked and resonated with many readers. Some of the best Spider-man stories at that time involved their marriage, and I'd definitely argue that branching off of it to give us a real Spider-man family with the MC2 Spider-Girl series was, really, the essence of Spider-man at his best.
And I grew up as a kid and adolescent reading these married Peter stories, so every time a future editor said that kids couldn't relate to a married hero or that it made him boring, it confused the hell out of me. I wasn't "too old" for these type of stories - I was the ideal age bracket they wanted to appeal to and I found a lot of warmth and love and value in those stories.
And now, as a husband and father myself, I find these stories hold even greater value. Not just Spider-man, but any hero who views love and family not as "the end" or a hindrance to adventure, but a motivation to be even better and more adventurous than before.
I had a hard time finding good examples of family at home. Comics were often my escape, and there's a good reason so many of my favorite heroes were people who embraced the hardships but rewards of having a family.
Any writer or editor who says marriage or kids is a creative dead-end is a writer with no passion or imagination at all.
Hell, one of my favorite comics in YEARS is all about the challenges, drama, and triumphs of family.
Wrapping back to how DC is handling things, this is why I'm all for writers being free to write more stories with happily married heroes, generational adventures with their kids, and the freedom to explore the infinite number of challenges that marriage and family bring to the table.
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Eh, it's a bit more complicated than that, as many things are. Many writers DID hate the marriage. Many writers were strongly in sport of it. It was always divisive, and it was certainly rushed, but it DID work and, more importantly, it built and grew and really worked and resonated with many readers. Some of the best Spider-man stories at that time involved their marriage, and I'd definitely argue that branching off of it to give us a real Spider-man family with the MC2 Spider-Girl series was, really, the essence of Spider-man at his best.
And I grew up as a kid and adolescent reading these married Peter stories, so every time a future editor said that kids couldn't relate to a married hero or that it made him boring, it confused the hell out of me. I wasn't "too old" for these type of stories - I was the ideal age bracket they wanted to appeal to and I found a lot of warmth and love and value in those stories.
And now, as a husband and father myself, I find these stories hold even greater value. Not just Spider-man, but any hero who views love and family not as "the end" or a hindrance to adventure, but a motivation to be even better and more adventurous than before.
I had a hard time finding good examples of family at home. Comics were often my escape, and there's a good reason so many of my favorite heroes were people who embraced the hardships but rewards of having a family.
Any writer or editor who says marriage or kids is a creative dead-end is a writer with no passion or imagination at all.
Hell, one of my favorite comics in YEARS is all about the challenges, drama, and triumphs of family.
Wrapping back to how DC is handling things, this is why I'm all for writers being free to write more stories with happily married heroes, generational adventures with their kids, and the freedom to explore the infinite number of challenges that marriage and family bring to the table.
It really isn't more complicated than that.
The wedding issue was 1987 and was NOT planned by writers. The attempt at reversing that decision and writing MJ out of the book entirely was 1994.
It was less than 7 years before editorial and the writing staff had seen enough to scrap the idea.
To be fear SAGA definitely isnt for kids :pEh, it's a bit more complicated than that, as many things are. Many writers DID hate the marriage. Many writers were strongly in support of it. It was always divisive, and it was certainly rushed, but it DID work and, more importantly, it built and grew and really worked and resonated with many readers. Some of the best Spider-man stories at that time involved their marriage, and I'd definitely argue that branching off of it to give us a real Spider-man family with the MC2 Spider-Girl series was, really, the essence of Spider-man at his best.
And I grew up as a kid and adolescent reading these married Peter stories, so every time a future editor said that kids couldn't relate to a married hero or that it made him boring, it confused the hell out of me. I wasn't "too old" for these type of stories - I was the ideal age bracket they wanted to appeal to and I found a lot of warmth and love and value in those stories.
And now, as a husband and father myself, I find these stories hold even greater value. Not just Spider-man, but any hero who views love and family not as "the end" or a hindrance to adventure, but a motivation to be even better and more adventurous than before.
I had a hard time finding good examples of family at home. Comics were often my escape, and there's a good reason so many of my favorite heroes were people who embraced the hardships but rewards of having a family.
Any writer or editor who says marriage or kids is a creative dead-end is a writer with no passion or imagination at all.
Hell, one of my favorite comics in YEARS is all about the challenges, drama, and triumphs of family.
Wrapping back to how DC is handling things, this is why I'm all for writers being free to write more stories with happily married heroes, generational adventures with their kids, and the freedom to explore the infinite number of challenges that marriage and family bring to the table.
But yea i overall agree with you ,as a child i never had an issue with having married characters and even as a single young adult ,i find it heartwarming to see the rare time a stable marraige is a thing in stories because its so rare
It was always kind of dumb when you really examine it, because it was never confusing. It was like, here is the main line and everything not in that canon is labeled clearly as being another Earth, usually where the heroes were older. Like literal children read this shit and never had any issues. Even if you wanted to not do the multiverse, just stop publishing multiverse stories lol.
Concept and execution are separate things. You made it sound like all the writers hated it, when that was absolutely not the case. Many are on record saying they loved the idea and thought it was a fresh spin on what was tired material. Yeah, some thought it was the worst decision ever, and others were very hyped for it and eager to write for those characters. Jim Shooter wrote the marriage comic and is on record saying he was fully on-board with it. Stan Lee co-created the whole character and pushed for it. Many other writers have written about how it was a good thing long-term.
Editorial screws things up all the time. How many writers and readers hated Clone Saga because of constant editorial changes, divorced from the marriage itself?
Ironically, I still find it crazy how Clone Saga birthed the longest-running female-led Marvel comic of all time.
And, well, reception to the marriage from fans is part of the reason fans pushed back against Clone Saga, because writing Peter and MJ out wasn't the answer, and it never was. Many great stories proved that their relationship wasn't a hindrance to good stories and having them go through the highs and lows of their complicated life and unique marriage was often a joy.
Let's not pretend that editorial dictations often won't misunderstand and mess with POSITIVE writing on marriage and relationships. Remember when DC had a mandate that all their characters had to be single? Remember when the writers of Batwoman quit in response because editorial said they couldn't do it? DC tried to break up ALL the marriages at this time, and it was WIDELY panned.
You'll always have dumb writers and editors who view marriage as a creative dead-end, and as I've mentioned before, those are writers with dull, limited imaginations.
Cherry picking those who were against the concept of marriage and fidelity in comics is ultimately a disappointing argument to me, largely because those editors and writers so against it have never once given me a truly valid defense for their stance.
Ask any kid in the 90s if they disliked Goku for being a married father.
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I know about the clone saga and the stuff with Lee and the marriage. I'm talking more about OMD and the reasons Joey Q gave at the time for getting rid of the marriage
Concept and execution are separate things. You made it sound like all the writers hated it, when that was absolutely not the case. Many are on record saying they loved the idea and thought it was a fresh spin on what was tired material. Yeah, some thought it was the worst decision ever, and others were very hyped for it and eager to write for those characters. Jim Shooter wrote the marriage comic and is on record saying he was fully on-board with it. Stan Lee co-created the whole character and pushed for it. Many other writers have written about how it was a good thing long-term.
Editorial screws things up all the time. How many writers and readers hated Clone Saga because of constant editorial changes, divorced from the marriage itself?
Ironically, I still find it crazy how Clone Saga birthed the longest-running female-led Marvel comic of all time.
And, well, reception to the marriage from fans is part of the reason fans pushed back against Clone Saga, because writing Peter and MJ out wasn't the answer, and it never was. Many great stories proved that their relationship wasn't a hindrance to good stories and having them go through the highs and lows of their complicated life and unique marriage was often a joy.
Let's not pretend that editorial dictations often won't misunderstand and mess with POSITIVE writing on marriage and relationships. Remember when DC had a mandate that all their characters had to be single? Remember when the writers of Batwoman quit in response because editorial said they couldn't do it? DC tried to break up ALL the marriages at this time, and it was WIDELY panned.
You'll always have dumb writers and editors who view marriage as a creative dead-end, and as I've mentioned before, those are writers with dull, limited imaginations.
Cherry picking those who were against the concept of marriage and fidelity in comics is ultimately a disappointing argument to me, largely because those editors and writers so against it have never once given me a truly valid defense for their stance.
Ask any kid in the 90s if they disliked Goku for being a married father.
It isn't cherry picking. There have been many, many interviews over the years where it has been made clear that the people actually writing the book at the time were solidly against the idea in the first place and constantly pushed for it to be gone.
That wasn't Lee, and it wasn't shooter either. Neither was writing the book.
When you get to a point where the marriage is enough of a problem that "replacing Peter Parker' is the lengths editorial goes to get rid of it, it's not a minority opinion.
The backlash to CS had everything to do with Peter being a clone, and nothing to do with fans wanting the marriage saved.
Wizard did a feature story on the spider marriage (among other things) and interviewed past creators about it. Every single writer interviewed conceded the marriage was a mistake. No one defended it.
Any idea that there were "a lot" of writers actually in favor who were actually on the book when it happened is fiction.
But this is off topic. The original point was that OMD didn't happen because of anything to do with continuity or multiverse complexity, it was done because writers and editorial had been looking for ways to get rid of that marriage since the early 90s.
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Joey Q has straight up said the marriage was gone because it created problems for writers and editors.
Writers Hated Spider-Man’s Marriage
An important problem with the spider-marriage was that it prevented the writers from doing what they want to do. If it wasn’t for the marriage, writers would have had a much easier time chang…
whatwouldspideydo.wordpress.com
He's quoted in the article saying as much, and in fact goes so far as to stress that OMD wasn't an editorial mandate. The implication that it was the writers pushing for it as they had with Clone Saga in 94.
Yeah, that's how I am too. I just stick with what interests me and don't really care or worry about where it fits into things. Just give me good stories and I'm happy.
I don't know if I buy that, as Spencer is writing them together beautifully and might even be addressing OMD. And JMS did a great job with the marriage before then. I feel like if the writers want to write them together they can. I really believe Joey Q just thought kids would think Spidey was too old if he was married, and I absolutely think it was mandated. JMS didn't even want to put his name on the OMD story. The idea to break up their marriage, at least in that way, came from on up highJoey Q has straight up said the marriage was gone because it created problems for writers and editors.
Writers Hated Spider-Man’s Marriage
An important problem with the spider-marriage was that it prevented the writers from doing what they want to do. If it wasn’t for the marriage, writers would have had a much easier time chang…
He's quoted in the article saying as much, and in fact goes so far as to stress that OMD wasn't an editorial mandate. The implication that it was the writers pushing for it as they had with Clone Saga in 94.
I wish it was written as good as Vegeta's marriage, where it actually presented interesting character development and didn't reduce Bulma to a boring housewife. It's cool that Goku is growing up with us but there's no real substance to it other than getting Gohan.Ask any kid in the 90s if they disliked Goku for being a married father.
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that comes in time. I remember my first post crisis comic of Superman, man of steel 11. It had a giant worm on the cover , I liked Superman from the movies and cartoons. I bought it. I didn't know who Bibbo was, cat grant, Morgan Edge. but it got me curiou so I ought back issues. It isnt complicated and it isn't necessary to know the whole story, just solid written stories.
I was a fan of DC long ago, but largely gave up because it was too much effort to keep up with all of this. The last straw was when the ScansDaily LiveJournal account, which would scan key pages of recent issues, was forcibly taken down, because that was the only way to keep up with what was going on with all the inter-connected bullshit.
I don't mind as long as the story is good. Unfortunately dc and marvel blew it every single time. Kind of made me stop collecting their stuff for a while.
The issue with Donna is that they initially changed Wonder Woman's origin to make her only debut in modern day (unlike Superman and Batman where their new origins took place in the past). So, they were left with Wonder Girl having debuted before Wonder Woman which led to her needing a new origin, which got tweaked several times. So Donna's history became a mess again (her actual creation was already a mess since she was added to Teen Titans due to a mistake - "Wonder Girl" was just Diana's early adventures, not a separate character, before she was added to Teen Titans) and they've never been able to solve that even after restoring Wonder Woman's early debut due to how confusing her continuity already was.
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