Marvel NOW! | Shifting to a "Shocking, New Status Quo" Before a Status Quo Has Even Been Set
bralinator
Posts: 5,967
My Marvel pull-list is about to get even smaller. Last week, Marvel Comics announced a new iteration of "Marvel NOW!" spinning out of Civil War II. While it is unconfirmed how extensive this relaunch will be, this new line-wide status quo shift will once again lead to large-scale relaunches of various titles.
According to Newsarama, Marvel Editor-in-Chief Axel Alonso said
Marvel Executive Editor Tom Brevoort says
You can't have a status quo shift if you don't let your books run long enough to even have a status quo. But Brevoort says that's the world we live in now? Maybe they should poll their readers. These continuous relaunches and stories with no real conclusions and series that only last 5 or 6 issues are driving customers out of the stores. Done right, story arcs and initiatives could both tell good stories and maintain sales without relaunches and "seasonal" storytelling, but if Marvel going to keep 're-freshing' every six months to a year, couldn't they at least make sure to tie up loose ends from the previous year> Looking at Original Sin, Secret Wars, et al. Readers inevitably will ask why they should invest time and money on something that has no payoff and will buy less and less. Funny how Brevoort realizes readers don't have enough money to read everything they want, but makes no mention of the price of his funny books being higher than they've ever been.
According to Newsarama, Marvel Editor-in-Chief Axel Alonso said
"Marvel NOW! is about the future of the Marvel Universe. We’re excited to provide fans with a snapshot of things to come right before San Diego Comic-Con. "Fans can look forward to hearing about brand new titles, returning favorites and even some shocking status quo shifts that are sure to keep fans guessing all the way through Civil War II. There has never been a better time to be a Marvel reader.”The announcement of another presumed relaunch for Marvel's line begs the question - can a "shocking status quo" be considered very shocking when an ever-shifting dynamic becomes the status quo? Marvel has already had two line-wide "shocking new status quos" occurring in the past year with Secret Wars and "All-New All-Different Marvel." Of course, Marvel announced this new Marvel NOW! initiative on the day DC Comics, launched it's own line-wide renewal, Rebirth.
Marvel Executive Editor Tom Brevoort says
"It's not a stunt, it’s a recognition of the fact that this is the world we live in now, because the demands on readers’ times and dollars are what they are. I’m convinced – utterly convinced – that virtually every comic book reader cannot afford to buy all the comics they’d like to be buying and reading. There are too many good books out there, across all publishers. The average fan just can’t afford everything. What that means is, readers are far more cutthroat these days than they might have been back in the day, in terms of axing any particular title from their pull list, if only because there are so many other delicious looking pieces of candy on the shelf that they might want to sample."In response to this level of "selectiveness" from fans, Brevoort says Marvel has recognized its titles need to operate at a high level at all times.
"What that means is, every book has to be working at peak performance level every single issue without fail, otherwise you’re put adrift. And even if you do everything right, to the best of your ability, if it’s not the right time, or the right story, or the right character, you can still lose readers. We’ve seen it time and time again that the stuff that sells the best, that people aggregate onto, is stuff that’s just starting. It’s an absolute rarity – not an impossibility, but a rarity – that a book starts out and its numbers grow over time."While it's inevitable that audiences grow more and more skeptical with every "stunning status quo change," Brevoort insists Marvel's model is working. And, when its returns diminish, Brevoort says they'll "return to the old way, or find yet another new way to do things."
"That’s neither condemning or supporting that trend, it’s just a recognition of fact, the audience is much more cut throat in being ready to drop a book if it’s not doing it for them. That being the case, creative teams tend to burn through their material more quickly. There’s not a lot of patience for downtime issues, or a slow build anymore. You can have your great master plan where you slowly set your dominos and then in year two, you’re gonna wow everybody, but your book is gonna be dead in six issues, well before you get to that. People just don’t have the patience to wait a year and a half to get to the good stuff. You have to get to the good stuff immediately. And you have to all be good stuff. Every issue has to be giving readers what they want, or they start to move onto other stories. One of the things a big event story is judged on, rightly or wrongly, is what kind of an impact it has on the Marvel Universe in its aftermath. That just becomes a condition of these big event stories: what is it at the end that changes the landscape?"
"As long as we have a shift, we can do it infinitely. We can’t always do it with the same level of success; some decisions and some storytelling choices are gonna be better received than others. But them’s the rules of the game. That’s the outcome whether you relaunch or not. Every story we tell, some people will like and some people won’t like. Depending on the numbers that come up in either column, it’s either a success or a failure."
You can't have a status quo shift if you don't let your books run long enough to even have a status quo. But Brevoort says that's the world we live in now? Maybe they should poll their readers. These continuous relaunches and stories with no real conclusions and series that only last 5 or 6 issues are driving customers out of the stores. Done right, story arcs and initiatives could both tell good stories and maintain sales without relaunches and "seasonal" storytelling, but if Marvel going to keep 're-freshing' every six months to a year, couldn't they at least make sure to tie up loose ends from the previous year> Looking at Original Sin, Secret Wars, et al. Readers inevitably will ask why they should invest time and money on something that has no payoff and will buy less and less. Funny how Brevoort realizes readers don't have enough money to read everything they want, but makes no mention of the price of his funny books being higher than they've ever been.
Comments
As puzzled as I am by the need to have constant renumbering and resets of long-established properties, as long as the stories are good, I'm all for doing whatever they want to do.
Just make the books worth reading.
And get off my lawn!
But, in general, whatever this next thing is, if it doesn't interrupt what I am reading and enjoying already, then no problem. I don't need to keep the big picture continuity organized, I think that tends to be more of a DCU thing, I can enjoy the books in their silos. Though I respect that, for a reader that wants more of a macro understanding of the MU, it has been a frustrating couple of years.
What did Nick Fury whisper to Thor in Original Sin that made him unworthy? I still believe that they pulled a 'LOST' and just decided to make Thor unworthy, and didn't actually have a reason for him being unworthy, like a big Deus ex machina. I'm pretty certain that they had no real idea why he might be unworthy and just did it to put the hammer in Jane's hands.
I realize I'm over-geeking this issue but sometimes what makes us geeks is our passion for the stories/characters and yes, continuity.
M
And let's not pretend Marvel wasn't full to the brim with stories free of conclusions in the past. I'm old enough to remember the lengthy lists of abandoned X-Men plotlines posted to usenet. Or how about the rotating door on various titles in the 70s meant you often had to leap title to title following a Steve Gerber or Jim Starlin to find out how a story ended?
That aside, re-doing Marvel Now branding this soon after only doing it 3 years ago is silly.
Branding aside, whatever they call it, they do need to do something to consolidate their lines. The fact is, there are not enough good superhero artists out there to produce the number of superhero comics Marvel have been attempting, let alone enough to do DC's as well. Did you see that Black Knight comic? How it made it to issue 2, let alone 5 surprised me.
And books need to launch stronger and punchier. The All-New launch has started to push in that direction, with a surprising amount of opening arcs that have been 1 or 2 issues long, but for every New Avengers, there's also been a Daredevil.
Just tell good stories and people will buy them--and maybe not have them cost an arm and a leg. I've been happy with Doctor Strange, Silver Surfer, Daredevil, and Extraordinary X-Men recently. I'm past caring about new number 1s. Just tell a good story.
Easy formula to what will get me to buy a certain book:
[(Writer + Artist) x Character] / Cost
Anything else is superfluous.
Marvel and DC pay a certain few artists big money, and then find as many competent artists as they can who are willing to work for bottom-end rates to fill out the rest.
I also agree with @nweathington and @SolitaireRose that there is an embarrassment of riches in the amount of artists out there that should be getting some work from he big 2, and on more than just Black Knight or some other C-list characters - doomed to fail. I wonder if they just don't want to work for the big two?
I've only read issue 1 of MK. I'm very lukewarm about it. I'll ride out the first arc, but it feels like soggy cereal.
M