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Post by defiant1 on Jan 2, 2011 17:25:22 GMT -5
@defiant 1; 8 years, 100 issues. Hell yeah that is managable. Its much more managable than trying to sift thrugh 40-70 years of history to decide what direction to take a character. Especially if a couple of those 8 years were created by the same writer. In reality, we lose ties to events from 5-10 years ago, but in comics, bot hthe creators, and many fans seem to think that every moment of a characters existance needs to be catalogued and put in a position of being able to come back. Its not like that in reality and it shouldn't be like that in comics. now granted they do try to cycle a characters life every ten years, but then they allow people to go all the way back for some things and its just not realistic. I would prefer to see only a single solo book per character and maybe have them as a team member in a second. but, Marvel and DC are trying to maintain a bottom line so they flood the hell out of the market to sell to the same people. This is why I feel they need to come up with new characters and Ideas. In 20 years, there is no telling what animation will be like. I am rather excited at the possibilities myself. But Toy Story, especially the 3rd one will still be considered one of the best films ever made. I do not throw plattitudes for films around lightly. I have a huge understanding for film and story structure. I have always been good about breaking down films based on strength or weakness. This film which starts off with the basic theme that most of them have which revolves around their -kid-, but ends up becoming one of the deepest looks at abandonment, loss and the true meaning of friendship. among so many other things. Its a remarkable work from a film studio that has yet to make a bad film. When you write with deep continuity into a title, the stories start writing themselves as each new element creates "what if" scenarios. Chasing every "what if" scenario can keep a writer busy and there is no way to tell all the stories. df1
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Post by cyberstrike on Jan 2, 2011 18:38:02 GMT -5
Peter David could make it work for a couple of reasons. First, he created the version that is most current., and he is in complete control with how it functions. the original series had less than 100 issues at the time he worked on it, and again in a shorter run of that type it is much easier to handle the soap opera aspects. When you have a title that is up to issue 500+ and it is only one series out of say 7 in the case of spidey that add up to over 1000 stories, It begins to get a bit convoluted. Peter David has made it work ever event that Marvel has done since they restarted the series and it connects it to both the Marvel Universe and the rest of the X-titles, by being told ahead of time that a crossover is coming. That was one of the reasons he said he left the series back in the 90s was that Marvel was throwing crossovers between the X-titles and the Marvel Universe left and right and only telling the creators at the last minute. If given enough time any decent comic book creator can make the crossover work for their book, if you do at the last minute then it'll be a hack job. (DC did/does that too and was it so painfully obivious that 99% of the creators involved in the The Joker's Last Laugh storyline were told at the 11th hour that the best they a quick reference to it and put Joker faces on some of the villains and a lot of them were upset because of being told at the last minute that another crossover was coming two months after doing the three month Our Worlds at War crossover). Even when X-Factor isnot involved in the Marvel crossover of the week he makes the series works by a basically making it a soap opera the characters are second and third stringers (and most of them they know it) so they tend to screw up more in both their adventures and in their private lives. I like how Maddrox stated it in a recent issue which is basically: that the X-Men are a swiss watch and X-Factor is a cuckoo-clock. The original X-Factor series lasted 149 issues plus at least 9 annuals (maybe more). The second series lasted 50 issues and and at least 4 specials. The current series started at #200 and is still going.
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Post by G on Jan 2, 2011 21:00:56 GMT -5
Regarding the soap opera aspect, As I said before, its nearly impossible to do that now. There have been so many stories told of these characters in their own titles and in crossovers that its virtually impossible to keep it straight. The other factor is that the teams change to quick and each team has their own idea that they are determined to do no matter what may have taken place in a title to render their idea moot. That itself is the biggest problem right there. I agree 100%. I respectfully disagree 100%. Having continuity doesn't mean we have to take into account all 1000 issues of the character's history, we just have to understand what took place and where are we now. I don't think when I was reading a comic in 1985, it needed to connect to what took place in 1963. It only needed to respect what came before it. The comic itself was dealing in the now. In fact, 95% of the time, there was never any connection or reference to the far away past. We just dealt with now, or what happened recently and what was coming up. And I don't think a creative team should have ideas that replace or disrespect what already took place. If I created a character, owned the company, had set the character in motion and made it who it is, it doesn't mean when it's time for me to let someone else do the book I'm going to hire somebody who comes in and totally changes everything I created and do things their own way. No, you can put your own spin on it, but you're still going to respect what came before it and you're going to work within the rules of the game. It's still my character and I'm still in charge. Or the higher ups need to be in charge and run it as it has been created and meant to be. And if it is going to drastically alter things, we better have board meetings and discuss the affects of things and get everyone on the same page. Again, you can put your spin on it. But if you're just going to reinvent everything that came before it, than I think as owner of the property, I think I have the right to say "no thanks, your services are not wanted on this product". I think the problem has been that creative teams have came in and ran all over a property and no one in charge of them has reigned them in and said "you're letting this get out of control" and have let histories be destroyed all to hell. I think it's letting the creators be more important than the properties themselves. As soon as we think Todd McFarlane is more important than Spider-Man, than to hell with Spider-Man (or any other character/creator combo). That creator can do whatever he wants because he's more important to the character than the character itself. It's basically no longer following a set of ideals. Sorta like what happened once Shooter got shown the door. (strictly ONE example only). I mean once no one is in charge, you can do whatever the hell you want to with a product. If the people at the top no longer care what you do with it, than you are free to make a mockery out of what came before it. If no one has to be accountable, it's every man for themselves when it comes to ideas and I think I can do it better than you did before me. Pretty soon there is no connection to the past. There is only a connection to the creative team of that era. At what point did we jump the shark and say it was no longer possible to do things we had done for a couple of decades before???
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Post by bigw1966 on Jan 3, 2011 9:16:31 GMT -5
JMS famousely requested that MArvel leave Thor alone for one year after he took over the title. No crossover involvement at all. The reason that he did this is because he had that long run on spider-Man culminating in the OTHER storyline. then Marvel went and deleted everything he did in Spider-Man over that 4 year period. And this is one of the biggest writers in the Industry. Not to mention that as soon as he left Thor, they did the Seige storyline.
I have this killer Daredevil story that I came up with many years ago. "G" you actually saw the first issue of it. I always promised myself that if given a chance I would do that story in a run of Daredevil. Of course, the story works best as a followup to Born Again, but I could do some tweaks to it. That right there is the same outlook that many creators have when they get on a title. They have some 10-20 year old Idea that they want to tell. This screws up continuity. also, back in the 80's we didn't care beyond the -right now- because to go further than that required you to pull out hundreds of issues and research them physically. now all you have to do is google what you want. This is what all of the message board know-it-alls do. they primarily are the ones who bitch and moan the most.
But editorial is also to blame, because they will pull some obscure past event out of their asses and try and shoehorn it into current continuity.
What this has lead to are nearly annual reboots of charcters and a new 1st issue. This is part of the reason that I am over Superheroes. they are like a cow eating their own cud. Over and over again.
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Post by defiant1 on Jan 3, 2011 18:14:54 GMT -5
JMS famousely requested that MArvel leave Thor alone for one year after he took over the title. No crossover involvement at all. The reason that he did this is because he had that long run on spider-Man culminating in the OTHER storyline. then Marvel went and deleted everything he did in Spider-Man over that 4 year period. And this is one of the biggest writers in the Industry. Not to mention that as soon as he left Thor, they did the Seige storyline. I have this killer Daredevil story that I came up with many years ago. "G" you actually saw the first issue of it. I always promised myself that if given a chance I would do that story in a run of Daredevil. Of course, the story works best as a followup to Born Again, but I could do some tweaks to it. That right there is the same outlook that many creators have when they get on a title. They have some 10-20 year old Idea that they want to tell. This screws up continuity. also, back in the 80's we didn't care beyond the -right now- because to go further than that required you to pull out hundreds of issues and research them physically. now all you have to do is google what you want. This is what all of the message board know-it-alls do. they primarily are the ones who bitch and moan the most. But editorial is also to blame, because they will pull some obscure past event out of their asses and try and shoehorn it into current continuity. What this has lead to are nearly annual reboots of charcters and a new 1st issue. This is part of the reason that I am over Superheroes. they are like a cow eating their own cud. Over and over again. When the continuity is tight, and the story is moving forward there is no reason why you can't pluck established things from the past and expand upon them. It's when you go back and try to constantly rewrite past stories that the continuity gets convoluted. Grabbing obscure things from the past and using them wisely is actually a good marketing tool and healthy for the hobby. Back issues NEED to be more significant so all that dead inventory in the back issue bins at a comic book store become sale able again. If stores could convert dead inventory into a valuable commodity, they'd have better cash flow for ordering new comics. df1
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Post by bigw1966 on Jan 4, 2011 8:27:47 GMT -5
Its still no excuse to completely delete 4 years of continuity along with new vilains and such. As for back issues, that is all on the store and the desire of customers. Publishers have no care if that stuff can be sold later on after they have alreadt sold it.
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Post by defiant1 on Jan 4, 2011 15:59:58 GMT -5
Its still no excuse to completely delete 4 years of continuity along with new vilains and such. As for back issues, that is all on the store and the desire of customers. Publishers have no care if that stuff can be sold later on after they have alreadt sold it. I know they don't care and it's flat out ignorant. Publishers expect retailers to order aggressively, then they release a TPB 6 months later and make all the overordered books worthless. The publisher should be helping the retailer make money, not taking it and shoving them out on the street. That is literally happening. 3 stores have closed in the past year in Atlanta. How can a retailer keep a customer happy when they release 1:200 variants? The customers want them. They get stuck ordering 200 books at 50% cover price just to keep one customer happy. That isn't ordering incentives. It's blackmail. And no, they don't have to do it. They don't have to have happy customers. They can have disgruntled ones that give up and stick them with the books they've subscribed to get. Some say get the credit card numbers from the subscribers first, but that wouldn't fly in Atlanta. No one would do it. df1
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Post by bigw1966 on Jan 4, 2011 18:34:19 GMT -5
Those 1:200 covers are very rare. A buddy of mine will literally charge $60 or more for that book if someone has to have it, just to recoup some of the loss. Comic shops are not the only ones suffering this type of negligent practices either. Book stores that sell comics are going through the same shit. But, the publishers don't care. They make the books, the stores foot the risk by buying it.
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