Marvel Comics blabbery

He is writing all of Marvel, that must take some time.

I enjoyed reading negative reviews of Howe's book by people who love Marvel at their worst, including one guy who was saying "what? Maximum Carnage was the greatest!"

Al's story in the Christmas 2000ad special is astonishing. Dredd gets called out to a guy whose life is a choose-your-own-adventure.

I'd been wondering if Al Ewing was maybe the writer of the Starlord strip in the current issue of 2000ad? (it's credited to 'Ken Niemand' which is presumably a pseudonym?) The style seemed similar, anyway

Which issue is that in, Aldo? I just bought the Christmas ish (prog 2061!) but couldn't find it

Ah wait, it was in Festive Thrillpower 2017 so might be old.

So I hear that (***SPOILER ALERT***) it turns out the Ultimate Universe is still around, after all?

This is getting ridiculous!

in which title are they delving into that topic?

afaik there’s still a Marvel multiverse, the new not-FF title might delve into that. post Secret Wars, the Richards family has been out there creating new universes and throwing them into the void so who knows what could exist

Here's the reveal: https://www.cbr.com/spider-men-ii-ultimate-universe/

I feel like that’s the weird canon trap that pedantic readers fall into, and try to lawyer around every time they see something that doesn’t fall into their conception. I caught myself arguing about the Runaways tv show, of all things, on io9 comments.

An editor, writer, whoever, saying a story falls into a comics universe, cinematic universe, whatever... it doesn’t matter to the work you’re reading until it actually ties into a story and matters in a way that affects the work. If I see something that seems like magic, and someone pipes in “oh they said this is the same universe as blah, so magic is like blah” it adds nothing to the work I’m watching unless magic being the same, or even connected, is part of the plot!

They kind of create artist ions in the fictional geology of the work, universe numbers, events explaining a link, but it’s all a workaround to make something more meaningful to readers. If Marvel has an ultimate universe maybe this one’s now the equivalent of 1611 or 1607 instead of 1610. The shitty ultimatum thing never happened, or the whole place is rewound a few years so what was contemporaneous never was.

The more I read different fictional works with their self-contained continuity the more clear it becomes that events fucking with that continuity, or tying disparate pieces together, are only good if they’re good stories. The fan service pedantic bits are just horrible. No-prizes all the way down for me.

the end of Secret Wars II had the Franklin kids rebuilding the multiverse so... but yeah, every time DC rebooted that would bring back the Earth-Xs pretty fast, so no surprise

I don't know if you're interested in British comics, but Pat Mills recently wrote a history of 2000AD that looks fun, and Chris Donald's book from a while back about setting up Viz Magazine is full of fun anecdotes and charmingly pedantic score-settling. There's also Grant Morrison's book, which I've never read as it was published around the time he stopped being interesting (which I'm still sad about) and sounded like it had some less-than-lightened views on creator rights.

― Chuck_Tatum, Thursday, December 21, 2017 12:53 AM (one week ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

I have not read it yet but Steve McManus's recent autiobiog about his time in the UK comics biz had some decent reviews.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Mighty-One-Inside-Nerve-Centre/dp/1781084750/

I discover these things late because I mail-order my monthly haul but apparently at least part of the reason Marvel engaged in their Legacy renumbering is so they could celebrate (warning: fake examples) issue 900 of Sleepwalker and issue 750 of NFL SuperPro with (drumroll please) lenticular covers! Do I smell a Clone Saga II around the corner? Perhaps the unnecessary purchase of a trading card company?

I'm cautiously optimistic about this Chip Zdarsky/Jim Cheung "Marvel Two-in-One" ploy, when it comes to the stealth number catching-up

In theory, I'm totally on board with restoring the original numbering. In practice, though, a) they seem to have fudged an awful lot of these numbers, and b) come on, is anyone under any illusions that we'll see every title revert to a Totally All-New All-Different For Real This Time #1 within the next couple of years?

As someone who only reads library trades periodically, all these events, series retitling and renumbering have effectively killed that Marvel interest, too. Not sure what that says, other than I'm easily confused, and the catalogs don't easily compile and sort different titles / authors / characters in date published order. If I was more OCD, I'd print off Wikipedia lists for guides. It is nice, though, not to be complaining about character deaths or revamps.

No, I totally get it. Those tendencies are a major barrier of entry for anyone with a casual interest. Renumbering seems to be only for the sake of short-term gains at the expense of any audience beyond the one that's already on the train. I'd love to see them stick with the Legacy numbering but I have approximately zero faith that they'll do so.

I think the terrible packaging and pricing of collected editions hurts more than random floppy renumbering - you know, even something minor like Aaron's run on Scalped has been collected in two different ways, with covers that aren't substantially different - and collecting the whole run is somewhere between 100 to 150 quid. Meanwhile, Miller's Daredevil run is collected under the name "Visionaries" and comes packaged with all the terrible Roger Mackenzie stories. And Claremont's 80s Xmen/New Mutants run isn't collected *anywhere* except in cheap UK-only pocket sized editions.

xp I'm telling you, the publishers should ditch numbering on the cover altogether -- just use "January 2018," "February 2018," etc. (or "Early Jan. / Late Jan.", for bimonthly titles). There's no good reason for using issue numbers as the primary means of identification, and the first thing I usually want to know when I see an issue # is, "When exactly did that come out...?"

there's a lot of bi-weekly / non-monthly comics that would get messed up by that

Fuck 'em!

Srsly, tho -- don't most consumer publications use cover date as the main thing, and then also print "Vol. #, Issue #" in the publication data (so if you're afraid you missed an issue, or in cases of irregular publication schedule, you can keep track)?

I swear that issue numbering is one of those super geeky comics things that I would think serves as an accessibility barrier, no matter if the numbers are high or low... Isn't it cooler to ask the guy/gal at the counter if they have the March issue of "Captain Marvel," rather than "Issue #15" (*push glasses up on bridge of nose*)?

I kind of hate calling into comic shops and and having to say something like "hey, er, do you have Captain America 673" but that is *literally* what the clerk is there for so I guess it's ok

I find comic shop employees/owners often treat customers as if they're "in the way"; so AFAIC, they can and should answer whatever you ask when you call.

I was once browsing in a shop on a Tuesday afternoon, and a guy came over and scolded / warned me that I couldn't touch the new issues he was putting out, as they're embargoed until the next morning. (I was like, "Gotcha... I'm not looking at those.")

they're not all Comic Book Guys anymore, these days. most owners i've met have been quite chill

xpost I'm sorry that that's been your experience, but it's fairly reductive as a general statement. There are plenty of cool and helpful comic shop staffers. None of the shops I visit semi-regularly are run by chuds.

Also, the place you mention shouldn't be putting embargoed issues out on a Tuesday. That shit's kinda on them.

Didn't mean to be reductive, tho it has been my experience at several places (one of which went out of business soon afterward, so there's that). There is a shop in my hood whose owner is cool, and has a female-centric focus in the product she stocks, which I think is interesting. Somewhat less fortunately (IMO), she calls her shop "The Perky Nerd" (she also serves coffee).

As a former book (and comic book) store clerk, I didn't work with a lot of chuds, but any public-facing retail job will turn you into an asshole eventually.

there's a lot of bi-weekly / non-monthly comics that would get messed up by that

Bi-weekly comics are a bad thing for the DM overall so discouraging them is only a positive

is there anything good for the direct market that doesn’t involve enforcing the weird direct market rules more stringently to make sure people only can buy comics according to existing rules?

I wonder if upturning the ideas of what’s bad and coming up with things that fit how people who want to casually buy comics instead of enforcing the rules would work better

Marvel kind of flirted with the idea with their “timely comics” revival but limited it to a specific collection idea

how are bi-weekly comics hurting the direct market? i've only seen 'em for very successful titles like Batman or Superman

Biweekly titles require Marvel's customers to spend double upfront every month on titles they "have" to stock, reducing the capital available to invest on material that grows their business with their customers

is there anything good for the direct market that doesn’t involve enforcing the weird direct market rules more stringently to make sure people only can buy comics according to existing rules?

I wonder if upturning the ideas of what’s bad and coming up with things that fit how people who want to casually buy comics instead of enforcing the rules would work better

Casual customers are not the ones who come in so frequently that biweekly titles suit them. If the shops have spent 79% of their budget on stuff of which they haven't been given time to assess the sales potential, likely with bullshit variant percentages leaving them choking on even more unsold stock, there is even less possibility for them to shelf-stock with material that appeals to the casual buyer.

Heroes World was TWENTY-THREE years ago. To imagine that Marvel will do something revolutionary to repair the damage of that one act, let alone what they have continued to do since then, is more creative than anything they've published in that time.

seems like the answer to most shops (as I've seen, anyway) is to diversify and get away from relying on floppies as main income. floppies are far less than half the product in most shops i've been in this past decade, filled with toys, collectibles, trades, etc

those rules for prebuys from Diamond are obviously awful ofc

Sadly they seem to diversify by having walls of fucking funko pops.

started to draft a post of my past comics buying habits but it's really tl;dr

I guess the bottom line is that Marvel and company need to make some significant change or single monthly issues are pretty much fucked, more so than they are now.

If they were a freestanding company and not owned by Disney I'd joke that they'd be merging with Funko

Are digital floppies from the Big Two still the same price as physical floppies? The physical floppies that often include a free digital download? Because if I were looking to make changes, that's a place I'd start.

Yes, although I believe they're discounting more rapidly. Digital pricing is a complete shitshow, though

marvel's (6 month late) subscription service Unlimited seems the right model but i have no idea how much money it's making.

unlimited is fantastic value, even if the app could use a good overhaul

It's really weird in that Marvel Unlimited still has some horrible app design decisions, freezes on start because it updates all the "new/featured issue" feeds before it lets you do anything, has weird metadata problems (clicking on a writer's name sometimes sends you to some series from 1995 instead of books by that writer), and their curation is iffy

Comixology Unlimited also has some Marvel stuff, although typically only to tease current series, and has none of the technical problems. The depressing thing to me is that each has an exclusive Black Panther series (read neither so far) in the run up to the movie. Comixology gets an original series that's free with Unlimited or purchasable per issue. Marvel Unlimited gets... "BLACK PANTHER: SOUL OF A MACHINE" which is a multi-issue Lexus advertisement

Somehow MU has the car advertisement in their "most read" section, over the Priest run they have highlighted in their featured content. o_O

Marvel had a job posting for someone to work on the app and I almost wanted to apply, not because I'd want the job, but because I'm embarrassed by how bad some of the issues with the app are

it's def better than it was a couple of years ago but they certainly don't seem to be in a hurry to fix any of the longstanding issues

Said this before, but there's gotta be a ton of nerds who would literally pay to work on cataloguing and fixing Unlimited. It's lame that that's still not fixed.

A small problem that's always bugged me with iPads and Comixology - why is the page always resized to fit screen? Seems much better to fix it to page width and scroll a little.

It is very very weird that a major event book is being written by an ex-ILXor and Mark Waid.

The book itself isn’t, sadly, very weird at all, just packing 3 or 4 dozen characters in and ending with another person who’s been injected into continuity as an Avengers founder.

What’s the deal with Ms. Sentry? And why should anyone care? So far this thing’s a steaming pile.