#155: If It Looks Good, It IS Good

The quote in the title originates with my friend Steve Cicala during our art school and fanzine days. Steve’s point was that, while there is perfect and best way to do something, even if corners are cut in one way or another, if the effect is still strong, then it doesn’t matter. So if Jack Kirby fudges the perspective in a panel as he often did, it’s something that he can get away with because the effect that he creates is so oversized. And if Rob Liefeld can’t keep the design of his characters straight from one panel to the next, that’s forgivable because the energy and excitement level of his work is so high. And so on. This isn’t to say that you shouldn’t struggle for quality, but it does reflect the fact that the one “right” way to do a thing is only valid until somebody else shows another, better way to accomplish the same thing. So don’t become paralyzed by the rules, jump in and show what you can do.

I have another similar statement to this that I’ve used over the years mainly on social media. And it is If I’m Not Talking About You, Then I’m Not Talking About You. So if, for example, I categorized certain Spider-Man fans who have been obsessively sending the same letter into the fan mail e-mail address day after day after day as “yahoos”, and you are not sending such a letter in again and again and again, then you really don’t need to take umbrage at my comment. It isn’t about you.

On another note, the fine writer Alex Segura talked in his Substack at this link about his feelings about writing every comic book as though it might be some reader’s first issue. And he relates his own personal experiences about getting on board with UNCANNY X-MEN in the middle of a multi-part story. I don’t really disagree with the crux of what Alex is saying here, but I’m not as down with some of the terminology that he uses to communicate it. I expect that different people have different metrics for “every comic book is some reader’s first”, but to me, it all comes down to basic, essential storytelling. I need to know who the characters are, I need to be able to pick up on their relationships and I need to understand their capabilities as well as the stakes of the situation that they find themselves in. In other words, I need to care about them. But this doesn’t mean that you can’t do stories where you put them in unfamiliar situations and don’t revert back to a simple status quo at the end like a weekly television series. But it does mean that you had better give me their names every single time as well as some context for what is going on around them and why it matters. Having taken a look back at the issue in question, it does all of these things, despite the fact that the main X-Men don’t show up until about halfway through it, and they aren’t really ever depicted in costume. So that book gets it right, even if Alex maybe thought that it got it wrong. (And as a reader, I don’t know that I think the 5-year later LEGION OF SUPER HEROES run necessarily got it right, especially since it was seemingly so phobic about using the characters’ super hero names in the course of its storytelling. But I haven’t looked back at that run in many years.)

Hey, it’s time to answer your many questions, so let’s see if we can get into a bit more trouble here. And remember: If I’m Not Talking About You, Then I’m Not Talking About You!

Seastar

In a scenario where there is another Avengers vs X-Men event happening, is there ever any kind of slightly competitive instinct driving each set of editors? Would it be your job to "got to bat" so to speak for your "team"?

It doesn’t really work that way, Seastar, not among professionals. I would certainly want the characters under my office to be depicted well, but I’d also be invested in making sure that all of the characters were similarly well-treated. What I care about is crafting an emotionally-affecting story, not in making sure that my guys can lift more than other peoples’ guys or can punch harder of whatever. That sort of power-jockeying is always of interest to the fans but seldom of interest to storytellers. The person I want to win is the reader, not any of the characters.

Zack J.

You mentioning Cain and Mockingbird got me thinking, what ever happened to her Vision series?

That VISION project simply didn’t work out, Zack, and was ultimately abandoned. Especially after the response to the earlier VISION series, I expect that the bar had been set relatively high.

Jeff Ryan

I read that certain SNL sketches get kicked around for years before the star align -- right host, right costume, right timeslot and zeitgeist. Are there any comic stories like that? "Oh, we've been trying to give Foggy Nelson the Phoenix Force for DECADES!"

Well, sure, Jeff, I’m certain that most people have ideas that they’d like to someday see make it into stories. I’m using one of those in an upcoming X-Project at the moment, and it’s something that I’ve had in the back of my mind for forty-plus years. On a more concrete example, the premise of ORIGINAL SIN was hit upon in a Retreat room while we were gearing up to do what became FEAR ITSELF, and it took a number of years after that before we were ready to actualize it as a project and had the right creative team who could commit to execute it.

David Brazier

Of the classic Lee/Kirby FF run which is your favourite issue and why?

I don’t know that I can point to one single issue, David. But I can tell you that the artwork was at its best and slickest around issue #61, before the size of the original artwork was reduced down.

Mongho

Who's asking for stories to be erased? All I want is additional clarification on stories. Percy's X-Force said Beast was evil from the earliest X-Men stories, thus casting ALL of the stories he's appeared in a new light. Then, confusedly, introduces a new Beast who is good, but according to what's already stated by Percy, he's still evil. People are saying it's just a matter of time until you or some other editor give the green light for current Beast to become evil again. You don't think that's harmful to the character in general? The From the Ashes Infinity Comics explored this, but almost no one read them and I was reduced to spreading word-of-mouth about them. Why wasn't this in the main book? And I've seen people ask why he was in the new cartoon because he's evil now, as well as asking the same about the current X-Men book by MacKay. Public perception is important. If someone picks up the comics because they like Beast after seeing the upcoming X-Men movies, starts exploring back issues and sees Beast's history with little explanation beyond 'lol he's just naturally evil, maybe', they're going to drop the comics.

Mongho, I have to say, I get where you’re coming from, but I think you’re making more of a mountain out of this than it is. And really, my goal here isn’t and can’t be preventing you from encountering other fans online who feel differently than you do about a given character. Everything is story material, and all stories will play out over their natural course. also, nobody can control what the audience thinks about the characters in question. So if the world thinks that hank McCoy is irredeemable, then he’s going to be seen as irredeemable—right up to the moment when somebody does a story that redeems him.

Stefan

You're pushing 60. I think it's a relatively safe bet that you will not continue at Marvel for anywhere near the length of those runs. For comparison's sake, Ralph Macchio was at Marvel for approximately 35 years before retiring/being forced out at age 61.

Well, you certainly could be right here, Stefan, and it’s always a safe bet to put your money on entropy over the long haul. That said, history is littered with the bodies of people who thought that I was going to be out of Marvel in another few weeks or months, and I seem to keep on just chugging along. So maybe settle in for a bit.

Alison Cabot

with some X-titles being canceled at issue #10, many fans are worried that Exceptional X-Men might face the same fate. Since, so far, it’s the slowest-paced book among the three main titles, some are also concerned that if it continues past issue #10, it might undergo a creative team overhaul. What can you say about this?

Well, Alison, I think that people who feel like EXCEPTIONAL X-MEN is too slow-paced are missing the point. That isn’t some failing, that’s what the book is, part of its identity. Beyond that, there’s going to be an EXCEPTIONAL X-MEN #11 and a #12. And that will continue on for as long as there’s sufficient readership support for the title from the audience. But these days especially, no title and no run continue on indefinitely, so things will inevitably change sooner or later. But worrying about tomorrow can prevent you from enjoying today, so if you’re liking the series, I’d advise you to just sit back and relax and not worry about it.

Carlos

After the Last retreat Mr Brevoort, Are there any plans for Jessica Drew /Spider-woman in works?

I don’t think that Spider-Woman came up much at all at the last Marvel Retreat, Carlos. Sorry.

How to Collect Comics

Since you mention the Rogue book selling well, I’d love to know if there was ever any question of turning it into an ongoing, or are the economics of limited series and ongoing just too different? I appreciate that this particular book fits into a continuity gap but you could easily do a second arc that leaps into the present or whatever.

I think that it’s more likely that we’d do a sequel to that ROGUE series, How, rather than trying to make it an ongoing series. It wasn’t conceived or designed to be that. But doing a follow-up? Sure.

STILES

when did Amy Chu come up with the pitch for an Emma Frost story?

Was there any talk of this story taking place in the present or did Chu strictly want to write a story about Emma's villainous past?

Amy came up with the pitch for EMMA when we asked her if she’d be interested in putting one together, Stiles, and that was after we’d decided to set the series in the past as we did with ROGUE. So no, no talk about it taking place in the present.

JV

You had once mentioned at an editorial meeting the staff had agreed that Daredevil Born Again was the quintessential/best Marvel story out there that could be handed to anyone to read (I pretty much agree).

Any other more recent tales that you think measure up as much as DD Born Again?

To me it has to stand alone, offer a definitive satisfying end (of sorts), consistent art, no major continuity 'homework's do, have a timeless effect, and be accessible (not an easy task - lots of comics I love are good fro lifelong readers like me and not casual readers or are just cool runs with no real narrative arc (Simsonson's Thor - which I love but is just a great ongoing title).

My vote goes to the Brubaker/Epting initial Winter Soldier story (Cap 1-14) - it has a satisfying end (even though the saga continues after).

I feel like this is more a question for the readership than it is one for me, JV. So what do you guys think? What stories from the past several years meet JV’s criteria? (I think that Winter Soldier storyline is a good suggestion, though I also don’t think it’s the equal of Born Again.)

Kurt Busiek

Gotta say, that Lobdell/Cockrum X-MEN page has absolutely terrible balloon placement on the last two balloons. Not that there's a better way to place them -- it needs rewriting, not placement adjustment.

I'd ask what Scott was thinking, scripting it like that, but I'm sure you don't know either. Do you remember at all how you reacted, trying to make it work?

I think it was just a matter of trying to make everything work as best we could in the space we had, Kurt. As i mentioned, we only had three pages to play with, and in that space, we had to introduce an entire team of X-Men, get across their central concept and a lot of ancillary backmatter, and bring in Magneto (and introduce him) for a small bit of action. My memory is spotty, but I think that balloon was added in at a certain point to convey the fact that Rogue had super-strength, so I’m not certain that Scott had it there from the beginning. But there were more cooks on this story than there would normally be, with FOX people looking at it to make sure it accomplished their objectives as well as Marvel people.

Taylor Murphy

I’m curious about the division of editor groups that currently exist at Marvel (as well as subgroups within those offices, e.g. the “claws” subgroup under Mark Basso that lives under your larger “X-Men” executive editorial group). I’m sure something of an organizational chart exists to this effect at Marvel, and as a reader it would be really interesting to see how all of that intertwines both in being able to put a name to each group and subgroup and to understand the inner workings of how all of these groups might coordinate. I realize there are a lot of moving parts but it would be neat to see at least this moment in time. Do you have anything like that you’d be able to share? If not maybe it’s too much to ask for you to rattle all that off in a free newsletter lol.

As it happens, Taylor, I don’t have what you’re talking about here in a graphic, but I do have a list from a recent summary of some editorial shifts that went on. So here’s what that looks like.

Brevoort Group/X-MEN

• Tom Brevoort - Executive Editor

• Annalise Bissa - Associate Editor

• Lindsey Cohick - Assistant Editor

• Darren Shan - Editor

• Noah Sharma - Assistant Editor

• Mark Basso - Editor

• Cy Beltran - Assistant Editor

Lowe Group/SPIDER-MAN

• Nick Lowe - Executive Editor

• Tom Groneman - Associate Editor

• Kaitlyn Lindtvedt - Assistnat Editor

• Jordan D. White- Senior Editor

• Martin Biro - Associate Editor

• Kaeden McGahey - Assistant Editor

• Emerald Bensadoun - Assistant Editor

Moss Group/AVENGERS

• Wil Moss - Senior Editor

• Danny Khazem - Associate Editor

• Michelle Marchese - Assistant Editor

• Devin Lewis - Editor

• Drew Baumgartner - Assistant Editor

• Alanna Smith - Editor

• Sidney Stubbs - Assistant Editor

Paniccia Group/STAR WARS

• Mark Paniccia - Senior Editor

• Lauren Amaro - Associate Editor

• Mike Basso - Assistant Editor

Bisom Group/LICENSED PUBLISHING

• Lauren Bisom - Senior Editor

• Farah Javed -Assistant Editor

Chris Ferguson

Thanks, Tom; now I'll have "Ba Ba Ba Bat Man" in my head for the rest of the week…

Hey, could’ve been worse. Could’ve been this.

Sean Stoltey

I've finally been playing catch-up with FF and am really loving the ideas/concepts/execution, all of it. As a long-time reader since the late 1970s, I should have been comfortable from the start with the single-issue stories, but I have to admit it took a minute, which is why I came back to it now and am plowing through. With so many years of longer multi-issue storytelling, did you have concerns at first about the single issue, two at most, plan?

I'm absolutely loving it now. I get that many people have said over the years that they wanted a return to this type of storytelling, but frankly, fans say lots of things and then don't show up when you do what they asked for.

No, I didn’t have any concerns about structuring the series with more emphasis on single-issue stories, Sean. I’ve been experimenting with that model for some time with some strong results, on titles such as IMMORTAL HULK and MOON KNIGHT among others. Even Jed’s X-MEN operates in that mold. And that’s very much how Ryan has tended to work on a lot of his projects, so it was a comfortable fit.

Cian McDarby

Recent cancellations at #10 has made me much more cautious to pick up Marvel books I don’t think will sell. It feels like 9/10 times they’re cancelled at 10. It feels like if a book has a C List lead, it’s living a brief life. Do you not think shortlived books might corrode fan faith in books they view as “Too good to last”?

As I mentioned above, Cian, I think this is an instance where your fear of the future prevents you from enjoying the present. And if 10 issues isn’t long enough for you to feel comfortable, how many would? 11? 15? 20? The truth of the matter is that most series that are launched these days aren’t going to command enough of the audience to reach those digits. We can pretend that the situation is otherwise, but it simply isn’t so. So the only advice that I can give you is to pick up whatever series appeal to you and don’t worry so much about six months from now or whenever.

Kent L

Wait! When did Scarlet Witch and Quicksilver stop being mutants?!?

They haven’t been mutants for about a decade now, Kent, not since the revelations of AXIS and their follow-up in UNCANNY AVENGERS.

Justin

I’m sorry you’re having a difficult time with Spider-Man fans, Mr. Brevoort. I realize that things can be frustrating for you, but I’m sure you understand after so many years that no fandom is a monolith or a hive-mind. Even among people who dislike the current status quo, there are a variety of opinions and actions taken or not taken. I wish you well, and hope that these frustrations don’t bleed over into your excellent work on the X-Men, or stop you from keeping an open mind on what would benefit Marvel and it’s readership the most.

I think there’s a real fear that pushback against unpopular calls will only cause the staff to dig in their heels and make decisions mainly as a response to the perceived hostility rather than genuine self-interest or consumer benefit. The community is in a regrettable state, partially because of a changing culture and partially because of social media and its tendency to form echo chambers. I find myself enjoying engaging in it less and less as time goes on.

But I also often feel unheard, and worse, often belittled despite my only thought being ‘I like this comic better than that comic.’ Ultimate Spider-Man is the book that rekindled my interest in Marvel again, and I really do wonder whether, if it wasn’t quite as successful as it had been, or only did ‘well enough’ the book would’ve been prematurely shuttered despite its quality and the number of lapsed readers like me who rediscovered their love for the character. Or that unpopular characters are artificially propped up as a marketing tactic or for the sake of online feuds with specific portions of a hopefully growing and increasingly diverse readership.

All i can tell you, Justin, is that we really don’t operate that way. And it’s kind of silly if you stop and think about it dispassionately for a few minutes. After all, we were the ones who started ULTIMATE SPIDER-MAN, so of course we want it to be successful and to do well. And we’re mercenaries, so we’re not likely to cut a title that’s bringing in good money and getting a good response. We aren’t in business to win arguments online, we’re in it to tell stories and sell comics. So any characters that we do stories about get done because somebody, a creator or an editor or someone, sees some potential in telling stories about those characters. I don’t know who you think we might be artificially propping up in order to spur online feuds, but whoever you mean, it really isn’t so. To be honest, that’s maybe the thing that we think about the least when it comes to our decision-making. Now, if ULTIMATE SPIDER-MAN had performed poorly, then we almost certainly would have shut it down at some point—but in that instance, all of those lapsed readers and whatnot that you ‘re pointing to wouldn’t have been there, since they’re part of those sales, so it’s not as though we’d be ending a book despite universal acclaim or anything.

Shaun

Not long ago, we saw Callisto warn Kitty that if she hurts Colossus, she will kick her ass. Since we all know how that ended up going, are we going to see that storyline pick up at some point? Or even see Callisto and Colossus interact soon?

Well, Shaun, as neither Colossus nor Callisto have been appearing in the current X-Titles, I don’t know that we’ll be getting back to it any time soon, sorry.

Dan Gvozden

I forgot to ask if you had any more details on the artwork's initial disappearance.

You mention that it disappeared from the Marvel warehouses in the '70s and/or '80s. But, I'm curious, do you know how it was being stored before then (given its perfect condition)? When did someone notice it was gone? Etc. I haven't found much information about its disappearance, just its sudden reappearance at the Library of Congress from an anonymous donor.

Which, I guess leads to another question. How has Marvel's artwork, especially those with a historic significance, been stored over the years?

This is a complicated question, Dan. But to give you a brief answer, the artwork for years was stored poorly in a dilapidated warehouse. And it wasn’t a infrequent thing for whole books to be stolen (in some cases by creators working for the company.) But the value of the artwork in those days was considered minimal, so it was never all that big a deal. In the case of that AMAZING FANTASY artwork, I don’t know much more for certain that you do, but as I understand things, the owner received it in the past as a gift, which isn’t impossible—artwork would sometimes be given out to people involved in business dealings with Marvel— and first offered to return it to Steve Ditko. But Ditko’s response was that the person had been given those pages fairly, and so he didn’t see himself as having any claim on them. But that’s all hearsay, and Ditko himself is gone now, so it’s impossible to corroborate that story. Let’s all just be happy that the boards wound up at the Library of Congress where they can be well-looked-after and enjoyed by many.

Caleido

Tom, will we have an annual PHOENIX?

You have a monthly PHOENIX at the moment, Caleido. At the moment, though, there aren’t any plans for an Annual.

Stephen Boggs-Puckett

Just wanted to comment that I was pretty disappointed in the "fanfare" (for lack of a more appropriate term) for X-Factor #300 this week. Slightly larger numbering on the cover, and a cover gallery on the inside in a size only readable by the Micronauts. Reaching a 300th issue, regardless of volumes, is a notable accomplishment in today's comics world, and I had hoped for a little more effort than that.

Sorry that you were disappointed, Stephen. That issue had to serve a few different masters as it was a part of the X-MANHUNT crossover. And given that, I didn’t want to increase the price and the page count too much and make it harder for readers who were following the crossover but not regular X-FACTOR readers to have to buy it.

Deborah

In answer to a question in your latest blog, you stated that your usual practice when it comes to character status quo is to 'leave the ball where it lays' when you take up an editing role for that character, but you specifically mention not doing this with Magneto.

I'd be very interested to know why you broke your usual rule in this instance. Magneto now couldn't be more different than he was before you took over as editor. In fact, he looks so old and worn out in the latest issue that if this Resurrection Sickness isn't sorted out soon, he surely can't survive much longer. I'm sad about it, have to admit, and I'd just like to understand the reasons for that decision, if you can say without it being spoilery.

“Play the ball where it lays”, Deborah. Play, not leave. It isn’t about things remaining static. And even with that, we’re going to be telling stories, and that means that characters are going to be put through changes and experiences. So that’s the way it is with Magneto at the moment, simple as that.

Betsy

Would you be interested in relaunching X-Force in a more modern way with a killer team like Fantomex, deadpool, wolverine, cable, etc?

We’re doing that book already, Betsy. it’s called WEAPON X-MEN, on sale now at your local retailer.

Patrick Stump

How involved were you with the X-Men’s guest appearance in the latest issues of Amazing Spider-Man? Specifically with Juggernaut, as issue #68.DEATHS focused on Cain and his character/motivations? It was a great issue, by the way.

I was consulted on it and signed off on the appearance, Patrick, but I didn’t have anything specific to do with the story. That was all in the hands of Spidey editor Nick Lowe and his creators and junior editors. But glad you enjoyed it.

Michael Baumann

I'm curious about the state of the Phoenix book, considering that your words last year were (paraphrasing) "the Phoenix book will be used as a launchpad for our future cosmic line", but today Imperial gets revealed with the tagine "Imperial lays the foundation for an entire new landscape of interconnected space-set stories". So what you said about Phoenix being that foundational book was false? Considering the titular character is not even included in the reveal for Imperial, what happened to all the talk about Phoenix being THE cosmic book, according to your own words?

Things change and plans evolve over time, Michael, when new opportunities present themselves. No plan survives contact with the enemy, after all. But you’ll know more as we begin to show you more about what IMPERIAL is all about.

Jordan L

Who is your favorite Marvel inker from the Bronze Age?

It’s hard to top Joe Sinnott, Jordan, even today.

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Off The Wall

I got this piece at a New York city comic book convention shortly after I began working for Marvel—it’s so old that I don’t yet have my fabled beard in it. It was drawn by the great fan cartoonist Fred Hembeck, whom I’d been a fan of for several years. During my time in fandom, I’d started drawing a caricature of myself as a character that was inspired by Hembeck’s style—no squiggles on the elbows and knees, but very much his sort of construction. so i was interested in seeing what a genuine Hembeck version would look like. As I recall, Fred wasn’t all that comfortable or wild about doing a caricature of somebody, but I paid the commission fee and he did this for me regardless of any misgivings. To make it more palatable, i suggested that he do me in the guise of Brother Voodoo, a character that he had made a recurring butt of gags in his different strips. Hembeck’s version of me is a lot more buff and built than my own home-grown version.

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On The Spinner Rack

So what books are now facing me on my Spinner Rack, you ask? ell, let’s find out. Right at the top, we see a copy of UNCANNY X-MEN #137, the death of Phoenix issue. Below that is a random issue of SUPERBOY featuring a young Bruce Wayne, followed by a coverless copy of AMAZING SPIDER-MAN #45. Below that is an issue of KAMANDI from the tail end of Jack Kirby’s tenure, when he was illustrating stories written by Gerry Conway. Next is the first collectors’ item issue of SLEEPWALKER, then a random issue of DETECTIVE COMICS, then an issue of the !MPACT COMICS BLACK HOOD series, and a random issue of BARBIE. And at the bottom, there’s ADVENTURES OF CAPTAIN AMERICA #3 by Fabian Nicieza but not Kevin Maguire, and MIGHTY MOUSE #5 for which I wrote a fun Bat-Bat back-up story.

And across the room on the egoboo rack, we have AVENGERS #10 by Kurt Busiek and George Perez, followed by an AVENGERS ANNUAL from that same run co-starring the Squadron Supreme. Then is a holofoil-covered copy of DEATHLOK #25 and the rare cover for FANTASTIC FOUR #16 that I’m featured on. Underneath that is CIVIL WAR #5 and then MARVEL MYSTERY COMICS #1 a collection of golden age reprints I put together. Then an issue of the Matt Fraction/Mike Allred FF series and SHE-HULK #11 by Dan Slott and Paul Pelletier. And right at the bottom we see SECRET AVENGERS #16 by Warren Ellis and Jamie McKelvie and FANTASTIC FOUR #68 by Mark Waid and Mike Wieringo, with a cover that caused me no end of grief.

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Behind the Curtain

Speaking of Fred Hembeck, this is a house ad that he drew for the editorial office of Al Milgrom and Mary Jo Duffy back around 1980 or so, which promoted all of their disparate and assorted titles. It ran exclusively in their books, and I don’t know if it did anything to increase awareness or sales, but I certainly remembered it. So that’s something. Gotta love that Tarzan’s chimp gets to be a part of the chorus line.

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Pimp My Wednesday

It’s time again to showcase the works my office has been working on recently that you’ll get to experience for yourselves this Wednesday. Here’s the shape of things:

ONE WORLD UNDER DOOM #2 continues with the Master of Latveria’s takeover of the world and the ramifications therein. This issue includes a fateful and life-changing encounter with the Fantastic Four, plus all of the usual cleverness that you’d expect from Ryan North and RB Silva.

EXCEPTIONAL X-MEN #7 isn’t a real part of the ongoing X-MANHUNT storyline—it’s more like what we used to call a “Red Skies” tie-in. But it’s got its own big deal story going on featuring the return of a seminal X-villain and the first truly dangerous adventure these young newbie X-Men have ever been a part of. It’s by Eve L. Ewing and Carmen Carnero.

But what is the next genuine installment of X-MANHUNT also comes out this wee, in the pages of X-FORCE #9 as brought to you by editor Mark Basso, writer Geoffrey Thorne and artist Marcus To. This one’s pretty key in that it answers the mystery question that’s been lingering after this week’s X-FACTOR installment, and it sets matters up to head into the wrap-up next week.

Closer to home, we have the third issue of CABLE: LOVE AND CHROME by David Pepose and Mike Henderson. I really hope that people are enjoying this somewhat different flavor for a Cable story, because I certainly am. Assuming that the sales would support it, I could see doing a project like this once a year.

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A Comic I Worked On That Came Out On This Date

Alas, poor FEAR ITSELF. It’s a storyline that wasn’t entirely loved when it was coming out, and that’s mostly been overlooked ever since. But it really did have a lot to offer. Part of the difficulty, I expect, is that we taffy-pulled it too much from the inside. Initially, it was intended to be an Avengers family crossover rather than something that would impact on the entire line. Ed Brubaker and Matt Fraction were going to co-write the entire thing, much as they’d been doing on IMMORTAL IRON FIST. But then, early on, the decision was made to elevate it into becoming a full line-wide thing, and yet people were concerned about different elements of the storyline. As matters became more tense, Ed decided that he wasn’t having any fun and recused himself from the bulk of the assignment—he did write the lead-in book, FEAR ITSELF: BOOK OF THE SKULL, which went on sale on March 16, 2011. But he left the main series entirely in Matt’s hands at that point, which made people even more nervous and had different folks pushing and pulling on it even more as a result. I remember that once we got into writing the actual scripts, we wound up off-pace from our outline by about half an issue, which meant that story beats were coming later than anticipated. On top of that, a promotional decision was made to give away certain story aspects ahead of time, in an attempt to get readers and retailers invested in the series. What this meant is that we promoted all of the new Hammer-Wielders before the first issue came out, even showing the cool Stuart Immonen designs. But issue #1 ends with those hammers falling to Earth, and so from that point forward, much of the readership was ahead of the story, and was frustrated that we weren’t getting on with it quickly enough. This pattern continued all the way through to the end—it seemed like we couldn’t get out of our own way in promoting the work. By the same token, i expect that any Event story that was following the cycle that had been CIVIL WAR - WORLD WAR HULK - SECRET INVASION - SIEGE was going to come up short. It’s similar to being a film released after AVENGERS: ENDGAME: once you’ve gone that big, the expectation level is so high for these things that there isn’t any easy way to achieve it. That all said, I’m still pleased with the story we crafted and the individual issues, and I feel like, separated from the expectations of the time, they make for a good read to go back to today.

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Another Comic I Worked On That Came Out On This Date

We put a big push behind Iron Man in the middle of the twenty-teens. Brian Michael Bendis had come on board to relaunch the title, and he was joined by David Marquez. I really liked their opening storyline, and felt like we were on to something. But CIVIL WAR II short-circuited what we were doing by shifting Tony into an adversarial role (we also lost Marquez to that project, which was good for it but bad for Iron Man) and we never quite were able to regain our stride. In the middle of all of this, we went ahead and launched a second Iron Man series, INTERNATIONAL IRON MAN. And the reason, more than anything else, I think, was that Alex Maleev was free and was interested in drawing it. This first issue dropped on March 16, 2016, and the storyline by design focused squarely on the lingering questions left by the earlier Kieron Gillen tenure on the character. It had been revealed that Tony Stark had been adopted, so the question of who his actual birth parents were was an ongoing mystery, one that INTERNATIONAL would delve into. Bendis and Maleev were a well-honed machine by this point, having collaborated on DAREDEVIL and other things over their long association. This was more of a global spy book than INVINCIBLE IRON MAN was framed as, and it played to their strengths pretty well. Of course, coming out of CIVIL WAR II, Tony Stark was effectively dead, and that led us to need to come up with a way to keep both titles going. In INVINCIBLE, Brian had introduced Riri Williams, so we made her the new lead as she transitioned into becoming the young super hero Ironheart. Over in this book, we relaunched the series as INFAMOUS IRON MAN and put a post-SECRET WARS Victor Von Doom in the title role for some unexpected storytelling. None of it quite hit the sales heights that we had been hoping for, but it was all a solid a dependable performer.

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The New Warriors Chronicles

We were having to get ahead on covers early, which I’m guessing is why I asked Mike Manley to do this cover for NEW WARRIORS #57, featuring special guest-star Namor. Coloring-wise, this one’s a bit of a mess. It’s too dark and saturated, insuring that the assorted elements don’t pop well. And with the logo needing to be so small to fit in, breaking up the letterforms with different color fades was an amateurish mistake. So this one embodies a bunch of the sins of the era when it comes to coloring. Having gained the ability to use a much wider palate of colors than the limited 64 that we’d been used to, we seemed determine to use them all on every piece. On this cover, less would have been more.

So this was the issue where new writer Evan Skolnick began to move his pieces on the board to set up the team of characters that he wanted to move forward with. In the opening pages, pissed off that Namorita was lost during their most recent mission, captured by Protocol and his Soldiers of Misfortune, angry Rich Rider acts out, blaming Night Thrasher (and to a lesser extent, Rage) for not having been around. It’s a pretty spurious argument, in that the Warriors chose to get involved in the fight several issues before, and there wasn’t any real way that Thrash would even be aware of it. And Nova isn’t acting completely sensibly, he’s emotional due to the loss of Nita. But somehow, when Rich throws down an ultimatum, the rest of the characters all side with him over Night Thrasher, who is defacto expelled from the team.

I can remember having conversations with Evan in the lead-up to this sequence, as I had an understandable concern that ejecting Night Thrasher from the home book was going to make it doubly-difficult to try to keep his solo series alive. Evan’s rebuttal, which got me to go along with it, amounted to the fact that without a strong mother book none of the spin-offs were going to be long for this world. As it turned out, NIGHT THRASHER had already been cancelled by the time we got here, so no real harm was done. And in any case, I was about to do the same thing right back to him.

As I mentioned last time, in evaluating the shape of the NOVA series, I’d come to the conclusion that the best change the title had for survival was to do something radical to its lead character. So I was in the process of working out just exactly what that would be. Evan, though, argued against it mightily, and for good reason. He was hoping to make Nova the central character of his run, as can be witnessed in this issue, so he wasn’t happy with the idea that he might have to lose him. And there, I told him that I needed to do what I needed to do for the other books in the line as well, not just NEW WARRIORS. But we’d be dealing with this situation for another few months at least.

Guest-starring Namor in this issue wasn’t done with an eye towards boosting out sales—Namor’s own series was also looking like it was in a bit of trouble at this point. Rather, it was an attempt to help convey the idea that our book was a part of the larger Marvel Universe, and wasn’t siloed all by itself. And it was a way to maybe attract one or two people to pick up the issue who otherwise wouldn’t have given it a second glance. Not exactly a Wolverine appearance, but we were trying to do things that made sense.

By this point, I had crystalized what my platonic ideal lighthouse for the series was, and so I tried to convey that information to Evan. In essence, without Fabian, I felt like it would be futile to try to do the book the way he had done it. We weren’t going to be able to be quite so progressive or social-issues oriented in any case, because that wasn’t really where Evan’s or my interest lay. Instead, my north star for the book was Marv Wolfman and George Perez’s NEW TEEN TITANS, a series that I had loved as a reader and which featured disparate young characters from across the DC Universe coming together as a found family of no-apologies super heroes. The trick here was that Evan had never read NEW TEEN TITANS, and so didn’t have any familiarity with what I was talking about. So at a visit to a comic shop, I wound up buying a handful of cheap back issues and forcing him to read them. I don’t know that he ever got the appeal of that series, but he learned to at least smile and nod whenever I might evoke it.

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Monofocus

I’d been picking away at it for a while, but this week I finally finished reading HOW TO BE PERFECT by the creator of The Good Place, Mike Schur. Reading it was kind of like watching episodes of the show, except without the characters or plot. It’s a layman’s summation concerning all of the aspects of ethical philosophy that Schur had taught himself while working on that show, so it’s full of history and philosophy but it’s all presented with a light touch. More than anything, it reminded me of Derren Brown’s books of a similar nature, which tended to lean towards Stoicism. Anyway, I found it interesting and easy to get through, though I don’t know that it had any particular effect on my behavior or choices.

I’ve since cracked the new biography, LORNE, on Saturday Night Live creator and impresario Lorne Michaels. I’m in the earliest chapters now, but my fascination with the creative pressure cooker that is SNL is definitely going to carry me through the book in short order. Of special fascination to me in these early chapters was hearing about young Lorne’s interactions with his eventual father-in-law Frank Shuster, who had not only been half of a famous comedy team, Wayne and Shuster, but who was also a cousin to Superman creator Joe Shuster. Small world.

In comics, after seeing a recommendation for it somewhere in my travels, I ordered a copy of the one-volume manga DOWNFALL by Inio Asano. It tells the story of a clinically depressed middle aged manga artist whose once-popular series has now wrapped up and who can’t seem to come up with an idea for a follow-up, and whose personal relationships are all falling apart because he’s lost his drive and his love for the medium. It’s wonderfully drawn, but seriously bleak and depressing. But it makes an impact, and I’m fascinated by the glimpses of the world of publishing Japanese comics. It’s like looking at some sort of strange Earth-2 existence.

On video, I watched the first episode of CHESS MASTERS, a British reality series that does its level best to make chess matches between a variety of contestants exciting. I grew up playing chess, my father taught me the game when I was young, and past a certain point I could reliably beat him at it. But I haven’t played seriously since grade school, and so, like so many other things, my meager skills have long since atrophied. But this at least meant that I could form a connection with the players and understand and even decipher some of the challenges. (It also helped that it was a half-hour show, which meant I was in and out in no time.) It’s really only of merit if you have a liking for chess, but I’ll still likely try another episode.

And finally, I know that I wrote about it previously, but as I’ve gotten deeper into it, I’m absolutely hooked by FRIEREN: AFTER JOURNEY’S END. It’s sort of a series that defies description in terms of communicating its appeal, because it isn’t really plot-driven so much as it is theme-driven. The lead character, Frieren, is an Elven Mage with a lifespan of more than 1000 years. So the ten years she spent questing with her closest friends and saving the world was like a long weekend to her. And now, eighty years later, with them dying or dead, she embarks on a journey to retrace their steps in an attempt to know them and herself better. It has a very Miyazaki sensibility to it in terms of the way shots and moments are framed—the show isn’t afraid to be still. And the soundtrack is lovely and understated. The show is also pretty fearless in its use of the passage of time, since it’s an aspect that doesn’t impact on Frieren the same way it does the other characters. In the earliest episodes, it’s no uncommon thing for months and even years to pass while Frieren and her apprentice Fern carry out some task. And of course, it’s got a wonderful title sequence built around the theme song “Yuusha” by YOASOBI, whom I’m familiar with from their MOBILE SUIT GUNDAM: THE WITCH FROM MERCURY opening theme.

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Posted at TomBrevoort.com

Yesterday, I wrote about the troubled making of the origin of Galactus in THOR #169.

And five years ago, I wrote about The Greatest DAREDEVIL Story Ever Told

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And so we come to the end of another road. But while we must now walk different pathways, if we’re lucky, our journeys will bring us back together again—perhaps, say, in another week’s time!

Hat’s All, Folks!

Tom B