I’m curious how much input editors have on paper stock for a series. Lately, I’ve noticed more Marvel first issues with thicker covers akin to what we used to see before Marvel changed to flimsier covers a while back. I also noticed that the Doctor Strange Fall Sunrise mini is printed on different paper than most Marvel titles. Is this something that editors influence, or is it a decision made elsewhere in the process? How difficult is it to get approval to deviate from standard materials?
Also, I recently read through the Avengers/Fantastic Four Domination Factor event based on your description of it here. It was a great reminder of how much I loved that Heroes Return era where creators seemed to really be melding classic sensibilities with modern (for the time) technique. Are there any other lesser-discussed or underrated books from that era you’d recommend?
Thank you so much for answering my Young Avengers question! I'm so happy that Heinberg built on those story threads the way he did, and in doing so created some of my favorite characters in fiction. I might have some more questions in the future, but for now that will do. Your posts have become a highlight of my Sunday, and I will eagerly await the next one.
A question about event tie-ins. As I’m currently making way through the Empyre event, I’m curious, how do the tie-in, side stories come about? Does the event’s editor reach out to creators and have them pitch stories that would work alongside the main event? Or are there story ideas that the event coordinators come up with, that they then offer to certain creators? I imagine the answer is along the lines of: it depends.
I’ve been enjoying your newsletter immensely, and especially the opportunity to see these glimpses behind the scenes, as well as you taking the time to interact with your readers.
I don't think anyone expects you to hire someone who's wrong for a particular project. I think the expectation is, when the right project comes along, their name will be one of the ones you'll consider, and they'll have an opportunity to compete. Or maybe you'll manufacture a project suited to them. ("Hey, Writer A is really good at writing Character B. We haven't done anything with Character B in a while. Let's put Character B back on the map!")
At least, that's my take on it. But I understand your point.
I have been a comic reader since 1973 and I have never been able to make heads or tails of how the biogical children of two seperate couples who had to be born long before Wanda Maximoff's children came along became her children instead. Is there an issue I missed along the way?
Oh, and it's always bothered me when writers treat biological parenst as the 'real' parents. Nope. The people who raised them are the real parents. I'm grateful Marvel has done a much better job at his than other comic companies and media in general. Wiccan's real parents being treated as such in Young Avengers springs to mind.
I also wanted to say that it does suck a person in authority rightly has to insulate himself from coworkers. I work in retail and believe you can be friendly with your bosses but not friends. Any choice they make has to be towards company goals and their careers.
Steve Bryant asked an interesting question on Twitter: Which First Issues really grabbed you and won you over? And by this he meant the First Issue of a New Character— reboots or relaunches do NOT count.
This made me realize that I couldn't think of a First Issue of a New Character where, after just that one issue, I said "This is great! This is for me!" So many great books took time to find their legs and voice. FANTASTIC FOUR and SPIDER-MAN— two of the most important comics ever— had comparatively weak first issues.
Of course, it's also getting harder to find First Issues of completely New Characters, at least at Marvel and DC. You have to go to Image, Dark Horse, Kickstarter, or some of the digital platforms.
Reboots/relaunches are another matter. There are PLENTY of those that pulled me in right away. Alan Moore's SWAMP THING. Mark Waid's DAREDEVIL and FANTASTIC FOUR. Hands down my favorite is Dan Slott's SUPERIOR SPIDER-MAN. The issue that revealed Ock and Peter had switched minds was PERFECTLY put together! I fell for it hook, line and sinker. Genius work.
This also brings up the question: What makes a great First Issue? Obviously you have to establish the concept and characters, with both being as engaging and interesting as possible. I know Mark Waid feels very strongly that a first issue should be self-contained, but I don't necessarily agree with that. But if you ask me, the elusive, essential element is that there is something at the end of the issue revealing that— as much as you've loved what's come before— there is something MORE in store for you, something you didn't expect that DEEPENS your interest in the comic. THUNDERBOLTS is the best example of this, but Waid's FF (with Reed's revelation as to why he made them celebrities) also works. Even my own IMPOSSIBLE JONES ends the first issue/chapter with the moment where most main characters would dedicate themselves and their new powers to fight evil— but in IMP's case she swears revenge on the SOB's who left her for dead, signaling this isn't your typical superhero story.
And speaking of projects that Karl Kesel worked on... I really enjoyed those "From the Marvel Vault" one-shots that came out in 2011. Are there other examples of that sort of thing still in "the vault"--work that's particularly interesting, and complete or nearly complete, but has never been published and doesn't fit with current continuity?
Here's something I've been wondering about: now that you've edited a number of Avengers runs where nearly every character has a solo book, do you have any thoughts about how that differs from the rosters that mix solo stars with exclusive characters? My assumption is that having fewer exclusive characters makes it harder to do character development, but I don't know if that's actually true (since character relationships can be exclusive even when characters aren't).
The question occurred to me when I saw the new roster, where everyone has been on the team since (I think) the 1970s, but all but one of them have a solo series at the same time, whereas in the '70s (again, I think) Carol Danvers was added to the roster only after her own series was canceled.
Do you think Stilt-Man would be such a silly c-list villain today had the character simply been named something other than "Stilt-Man" when he was first created? OR is the reason he's still around today because of his totally oddball name?
I've always dug the character/armor design. I think it makes for some wild visuals and unique action sequences. Telescoping limbs are rad (Inspector Gadget, Machine Man).
Any who-- obviously anything is possible, just curious about your thoughts. Annnd if there are any other specific c or d-list characters out there who you always thought had potential for a different path but are constantly derailed by a single creative choice made early on or vice versa.
(Forgive me if either you've touched on this before or I'm way off base and there's an amazing story out there I'm unaware of that redeems the name "Stilt-Man" and renders my question obsolete)
The Alan Moore Ant-Man pitch just made me think of a fun idea for a line of comics:
Current Marvel creators adapt unmade pitches from classic creators! It's possible that something like this has been done before, but there has to be a well of those pitches/proposals sitting around somewhere!
The idea of an Alan Moore "Ant-Man" series seems like such an obvious coup; it seemed strange that sales concerns could have mooted the idea. Then I started to think, "well, Moore's name alone didn't necessarily sell oodles of comics in the early 2000s" - the League of Extraordinary Gentlemen always sold pretty well, but the (in my opinion) equally good or better books from the ABC line like Top Ten or Tom Strong hovered around the 20,000-30,000 mark (not too shabby by today's standards, but right around Marvel books that would perpetually flirt with cancellation, like Spider-Girl or Black Panther back in the early '00s). Yet I still have to imagine that an Alan Moore-written Marvel property would be an evergreen in collected editions.
Then, of course, I started to think about whether future collected edition sales would have been considered back in 2001... or if they're considered now. Marvel does, after all, have the rights to a great Captain Britain run by Moore and now publishes reprints of Miracleman, but it doesn't seem like there's been a great deal of effort made to keep those collections in print and easily accessible. I think there have been reprints of both runs in the last year, but only in large, expensive hardcovers. Marvel hasn't ever published a paperback version of Moore's Miracleman run, and the only trade paperback collection of the Captain Britain run that I'm aware of was back in 2004 or so. If DC owned these stories, I'd have to imagine that they'd be selling a thousand or two thousand copies a year in perpetuity like they are with V for Vendetta and Swamp Thing.
Do future collected edition sales play a big role today in deciding whether to greenlight a series (and determining how intertwined with continuity a miniseries might be)? Or is the periodical side a little more distanced from the collected editions side of the business? It does seem like Marvel has fewer perennial bestselling collections than DC (or Image, Dark Horse, or especially Scholastic) despite a multitude of good stories. I think part of that is that many of Marvel's best stories are segments of a long-running soap opera (The Dark Phoenix Saga, The Galactus Trilogy, even to an extent Daredevil: Born Again) while DC's evergreens are a bit more standalone (Watchmen, the Dark Knight, Year One) but it also seems like there's a weird failure to market/reprint some of the better stories that do stand quite well on their own (a lot of old Marvel Graphic Novels like The Death of Captain Marvel, Daredevil: Love and War, and Doctor Strange/Doctor Doom: Triumph and Torment stand alone quite well, along with the aforementioned Alan Moore runs, but you never see these in Barnes & Noble or at an airport bookstore. Tom King's Vision story seems as close as Marvel has come to the endless reprint cycle of self-contained classic runs that DC has perfected. Even miniseries I don't enjoy as much, like the Loeb/Sale "color" books, seem like they should be ripe for frequent reprints, but I don't see them at bookstores that often these days).
While I do have preferences about how I try new titles, catch up on old ones, and follow ongoing runs, I'd like to be a little more mindful about how much / little I'm supporting creators based on my consumption choices.
Q1: I presume a writer or artist gets a bigger cut of a unit sold when I buy a creator-owned series than when I buy work they do for the Big Two. Is that even true? Is there a rough rule of thumb one can follow for how different it is? For instance, "Ernest Scribbler makes 1.5x as much on his creator-owned "PassionProject — A Muse Tale" as he does when he's writing "Captain Superpower" for Superlative Comics, the wholly-owned subsidiary of Global Amalgamated Petrochemical."
Or is all over the board depending on a constantly-changing set of x-factors?
Q2: I can buy a series as monthly magazines from The Golden Orange comic shop; collected as a TPB ordered from Amazon; digital purchase via the Marvel app; or "stream" the comic on Marvel Unlimited. How much can you broadly share about how much more / less a creator will make depending on how I read their work?
Or is all over the board depending on a constantly-changing set of x-factors?
"there’s an expectation in friendship that you will use your abilities to assist your friend. To me, though, doing so would be a violation of the Editor’s primary responsibility, which is to the project he or she is shepherding. I must make creative choices honestly, and not be swayed by personal relationships."
I think we ought to try to respect other people's viewpoints even if ours differ. So I definitely feel your professional associates should respect your choice not to use the power you have for any purpose other than making and selling comics. As you point out, that's what you were hired to do. But unintentional though it may be, it does come across as though those with a different view are a bunch of self-interested, envious people lacking in integrity and looking for cronyism, and you are the lone "man with a code". You've said many times in the past this isn't really an issue of an aversion to cronyism or abusing your position to bestow riches on buddies; if there was a creator you had no personal relationship with, but recognized their enormous contributions to the field, I believe you've said you would base your hiring considerations solely on what they were doing right now. And I think anyone (particularly those who like comics) should be able to respect someone whose top priority is making the best possible comic. This isn't a "What have you done for me lately" Mort Weisinger kind of thing where you're looking for how you'll benefit professionally and tossing aside those who aren't going to bring in the bucks anymore. Even if you actively chose to make bad comics from now on, you're at a point in your career where you're pretty much set. You take this approach because it's what you believe is right.
But I would submit that the folks with a different view are just as likely people of integrity with a strong moral code; it's just that they would disagree with you that "nobody is owed work", that people only merit earning a living based on what they're contributing in the moment... they would argue those folks have in fact morally earned a lifetime of work based on their lifetime of contributions, and that taking care of other human beings is always the number one priority, even if it means the occasional stinky comic. Maybe they're right, maybe they're wrong. But either way, it seems like both sides base their views on what they believe to be the biggest moral issue, and when it comes to moral issues, I don't think anyone can claim with certainty that their perspective is the only one that's right and everyone else's is wrong.
There’s a lot of comments on here already so I’d just like to chime in and say thanks for your response on the internship program on the previous newsletter! I’ll just keep my eyes peeled and be sure to stay updated on it. It’s also beneficial to hear about the current office practices -- I’m curious to see how much the work landscape will change by the time I’m out there.
There already seems to be a lot here, but I’ll throw in a small auxiliary question if needed:
Do you have any thoughts you want to share on the announced DC movie slate? For my part, I’m happy with how much emphasis James Gunn placed on existing comic books in his announcement, especially that of “Supergirl: Woman of Tomorrow.” Words can’t express how much I loved that book, but a movie adaption would be a tall task for me. It’ll be difficult to put forward something as visually striking as the comic!
Hi Tom,
I’m curious how much input editors have on paper stock for a series. Lately, I’ve noticed more Marvel first issues with thicker covers akin to what we used to see before Marvel changed to flimsier covers a while back. I also noticed that the Doctor Strange Fall Sunrise mini is printed on different paper than most Marvel titles. Is this something that editors influence, or is it a decision made elsewhere in the process? How difficult is it to get approval to deviate from standard materials?
Also, I recently read through the Avengers/Fantastic Four Domination Factor event based on your description of it here. It was a great reminder of how much I loved that Heroes Return era where creators seemed to really be melding classic sensibilities with modern (for the time) technique. Are there any other lesser-discussed or underrated books from that era you’d recommend?
Thank you so much for answering my Young Avengers question! I'm so happy that Heinberg built on those story threads the way he did, and in doing so created some of my favorite characters in fiction. I might have some more questions in the future, but for now that will do. Your posts have become a highlight of my Sunday, and I will eagerly await the next one.
Such a blast to work on that story with Jim! Thanks, Tom!
Mr. Brevoort,
A question about event tie-ins. As I’m currently making way through the Empyre event, I’m curious, how do the tie-in, side stories come about? Does the event’s editor reach out to creators and have them pitch stories that would work alongside the main event? Or are there story ideas that the event coordinators come up with, that they then offer to certain creators? I imagine the answer is along the lines of: it depends.
I’ve been enjoying your newsletter immensely, and especially the opportunity to see these glimpses behind the scenes, as well as you taking the time to interact with your readers.
Thank you!
I don't think anyone expects you to hire someone who's wrong for a particular project. I think the expectation is, when the right project comes along, their name will be one of the ones you'll consider, and they'll have an opportunity to compete. Or maybe you'll manufacture a project suited to them. ("Hey, Writer A is really good at writing Character B. We haven't done anything with Character B in a while. Let's put Character B back on the map!")
At least, that's my take on it. But I understand your point.
I have been a comic reader since 1973 and I have never been able to make heads or tails of how the biogical children of two seperate couples who had to be born long before Wanda Maximoff's children came along became her children instead. Is there an issue I missed along the way?
Oh, and it's always bothered me when writers treat biological parenst as the 'real' parents. Nope. The people who raised them are the real parents. I'm grateful Marvel has done a much better job at his than other comic companies and media in general. Wiccan's real parents being treated as such in Young Avengers springs to mind.
I also wanted to say that it does suck a person in authority rightly has to insulate himself from coworkers. I work in retail and believe you can be friendly with your bosses but not friends. Any choice they make has to be towards company goals and their careers.
Tom:
Steve Bryant asked an interesting question on Twitter: Which First Issues really grabbed you and won you over? And by this he meant the First Issue of a New Character— reboots or relaunches do NOT count.
This made me realize that I couldn't think of a First Issue of a New Character where, after just that one issue, I said "This is great! This is for me!" So many great books took time to find their legs and voice. FANTASTIC FOUR and SPIDER-MAN— two of the most important comics ever— had comparatively weak first issues.
Of course, it's also getting harder to find First Issues of completely New Characters, at least at Marvel and DC. You have to go to Image, Dark Horse, Kickstarter, or some of the digital platforms.
Reboots/relaunches are another matter. There are PLENTY of those that pulled me in right away. Alan Moore's SWAMP THING. Mark Waid's DAREDEVIL and FANTASTIC FOUR. Hands down my favorite is Dan Slott's SUPERIOR SPIDER-MAN. The issue that revealed Ock and Peter had switched minds was PERFECTLY put together! I fell for it hook, line and sinker. Genius work.
This also brings up the question: What makes a great First Issue? Obviously you have to establish the concept and characters, with both being as engaging and interesting as possible. I know Mark Waid feels very strongly that a first issue should be self-contained, but I don't necessarily agree with that. But if you ask me, the elusive, essential element is that there is something at the end of the issue revealing that— as much as you've loved what's come before— there is something MORE in store for you, something you didn't expect that DEEPENS your interest in the comic. THUNDERBOLTS is the best example of this, but Waid's FF (with Reed's revelation as to why he made them celebrities) also works. Even my own IMPOSSIBLE JONES ends the first issue/chapter with the moment where most main characters would dedicate themselves and their new powers to fight evil— but in IMP's case she swears revenge on the SOB's who left her for dead, signaling this isn't your typical superhero story.
Thoughts?
KK
And speaking of projects that Karl Kesel worked on... I really enjoyed those "From the Marvel Vault" one-shots that came out in 2011. Are there other examples of that sort of thing still in "the vault"--work that's particularly interesting, and complete or nearly complete, but has never been published and doesn't fit with current continuity?
Has there even been any sort of vendor confusion with "biweekly" means both "twice a week" and "every other week"?
Here's something I've been wondering about: now that you've edited a number of Avengers runs where nearly every character has a solo book, do you have any thoughts about how that differs from the rosters that mix solo stars with exclusive characters? My assumption is that having fewer exclusive characters makes it harder to do character development, but I don't know if that's actually true (since character relationships can be exclusive even when characters aren't).
The question occurred to me when I saw the new roster, where everyone has been on the team since (I think) the 1970s, but all but one of them have a solo series at the same time, whereas in the '70s (again, I think) Carol Danvers was added to the roster only after her own series was canceled.
Hi Tom,
Do you think Stilt-Man would be such a silly c-list villain today had the character simply been named something other than "Stilt-Man" when he was first created? OR is the reason he's still around today because of his totally oddball name?
I've always dug the character/armor design. I think it makes for some wild visuals and unique action sequences. Telescoping limbs are rad (Inspector Gadget, Machine Man).
Any who-- obviously anything is possible, just curious about your thoughts. Annnd if there are any other specific c or d-list characters out there who you always thought had potential for a different path but are constantly derailed by a single creative choice made early on or vice versa.
(Forgive me if either you've touched on this before or I'm way off base and there's an amazing story out there I'm unaware of that redeems the name "Stilt-Man" and renders my question obsolete)
The Alan Moore Ant-Man pitch just made me think of a fun idea for a line of comics:
Current Marvel creators adapt unmade pitches from classic creators! It's possible that something like this has been done before, but there has to be a well of those pitches/proposals sitting around somewhere!
The idea of an Alan Moore "Ant-Man" series seems like such an obvious coup; it seemed strange that sales concerns could have mooted the idea. Then I started to think, "well, Moore's name alone didn't necessarily sell oodles of comics in the early 2000s" - the League of Extraordinary Gentlemen always sold pretty well, but the (in my opinion) equally good or better books from the ABC line like Top Ten or Tom Strong hovered around the 20,000-30,000 mark (not too shabby by today's standards, but right around Marvel books that would perpetually flirt with cancellation, like Spider-Girl or Black Panther back in the early '00s). Yet I still have to imagine that an Alan Moore-written Marvel property would be an evergreen in collected editions.
Then, of course, I started to think about whether future collected edition sales would have been considered back in 2001... or if they're considered now. Marvel does, after all, have the rights to a great Captain Britain run by Moore and now publishes reprints of Miracleman, but it doesn't seem like there's been a great deal of effort made to keep those collections in print and easily accessible. I think there have been reprints of both runs in the last year, but only in large, expensive hardcovers. Marvel hasn't ever published a paperback version of Moore's Miracleman run, and the only trade paperback collection of the Captain Britain run that I'm aware of was back in 2004 or so. If DC owned these stories, I'd have to imagine that they'd be selling a thousand or two thousand copies a year in perpetuity like they are with V for Vendetta and Swamp Thing.
Do future collected edition sales play a big role today in deciding whether to greenlight a series (and determining how intertwined with continuity a miniseries might be)? Or is the periodical side a little more distanced from the collected editions side of the business? It does seem like Marvel has fewer perennial bestselling collections than DC (or Image, Dark Horse, or especially Scholastic) despite a multitude of good stories. I think part of that is that many of Marvel's best stories are segments of a long-running soap opera (The Dark Phoenix Saga, The Galactus Trilogy, even to an extent Daredevil: Born Again) while DC's evergreens are a bit more standalone (Watchmen, the Dark Knight, Year One) but it also seems like there's a weird failure to market/reprint some of the better stories that do stand quite well on their own (a lot of old Marvel Graphic Novels like The Death of Captain Marvel, Daredevil: Love and War, and Doctor Strange/Doctor Doom: Triumph and Torment stand alone quite well, along with the aforementioned Alan Moore runs, but you never see these in Barnes & Noble or at an airport bookstore. Tom King's Vision story seems as close as Marvel has come to the endless reprint cycle of self-contained classic runs that DC has perfected. Even miniseries I don't enjoy as much, like the Loeb/Sale "color" books, seem like they should be ripe for frequent reprints, but I don't see them at bookstores that often these days).
While I do have preferences about how I try new titles, catch up on old ones, and follow ongoing runs, I'd like to be a little more mindful about how much / little I'm supporting creators based on my consumption choices.
Q1: I presume a writer or artist gets a bigger cut of a unit sold when I buy a creator-owned series than when I buy work they do for the Big Two. Is that even true? Is there a rough rule of thumb one can follow for how different it is? For instance, "Ernest Scribbler makes 1.5x as much on his creator-owned "PassionProject — A Muse Tale" as he does when he's writing "Captain Superpower" for Superlative Comics, the wholly-owned subsidiary of Global Amalgamated Petrochemical."
Or is all over the board depending on a constantly-changing set of x-factors?
Q2: I can buy a series as monthly magazines from The Golden Orange comic shop; collected as a TPB ordered from Amazon; digital purchase via the Marvel app; or "stream" the comic on Marvel Unlimited. How much can you broadly share about how much more / less a creator will make depending on how I read their work?
Or is all over the board depending on a constantly-changing set of x-factors?
"there’s an expectation in friendship that you will use your abilities to assist your friend. To me, though, doing so would be a violation of the Editor’s primary responsibility, which is to the project he or she is shepherding. I must make creative choices honestly, and not be swayed by personal relationships."
I think we ought to try to respect other people's viewpoints even if ours differ. So I definitely feel your professional associates should respect your choice not to use the power you have for any purpose other than making and selling comics. As you point out, that's what you were hired to do. But unintentional though it may be, it does come across as though those with a different view are a bunch of self-interested, envious people lacking in integrity and looking for cronyism, and you are the lone "man with a code". You've said many times in the past this isn't really an issue of an aversion to cronyism or abusing your position to bestow riches on buddies; if there was a creator you had no personal relationship with, but recognized their enormous contributions to the field, I believe you've said you would base your hiring considerations solely on what they were doing right now. And I think anyone (particularly those who like comics) should be able to respect someone whose top priority is making the best possible comic. This isn't a "What have you done for me lately" Mort Weisinger kind of thing where you're looking for how you'll benefit professionally and tossing aside those who aren't going to bring in the bucks anymore. Even if you actively chose to make bad comics from now on, you're at a point in your career where you're pretty much set. You take this approach because it's what you believe is right.
But I would submit that the folks with a different view are just as likely people of integrity with a strong moral code; it's just that they would disagree with you that "nobody is owed work", that people only merit earning a living based on what they're contributing in the moment... they would argue those folks have in fact morally earned a lifetime of work based on their lifetime of contributions, and that taking care of other human beings is always the number one priority, even if it means the occasional stinky comic. Maybe they're right, maybe they're wrong. But either way, it seems like both sides base their views on what they believe to be the biggest moral issue, and when it comes to moral issues, I don't think anyone can claim with certainty that their perspective is the only one that's right and everyone else's is wrong.
There’s a lot of comments on here already so I’d just like to chime in and say thanks for your response on the internship program on the previous newsletter! I’ll just keep my eyes peeled and be sure to stay updated on it. It’s also beneficial to hear about the current office practices -- I’m curious to see how much the work landscape will change by the time I’m out there.
There already seems to be a lot here, but I’ll throw in a small auxiliary question if needed:
Do you have any thoughts you want to share on the announced DC movie slate? For my part, I’m happy with how much emphasis James Gunn placed on existing comic books in his announcement, especially that of “Supergirl: Woman of Tomorrow.” Words can’t express how much I loved that book, but a movie adaption would be a tall task for me. It’ll be difficult to put forward something as visually striking as the comic!