Marvel's New Universe: what went wrong?

Cafe Society
41

Re Kickers Inc

I have the first issue. I’m proud and ashamed all at once. The quarterback becomes superhuman. The others aren’t sure if they receive any effect at all. Realizing that it would be unfair, and boring, to play football with his new powers, the quarterback forms a team of adventurers.

Psi Force

They did not all have the same power. OTTOMH Anastasia possessed healing abilities. Asian chick had telekinetic powers. Stereotypical black guy in basketball uniform could project his astral self. Red headed leader boy was a telepath. Nerdy white boy with glasses was also telekinetic, but could only destroy things with his power.

Duck

From the issues I’ve read, the whole duck thing (she also said quack as hello, goodbye, and a few other things) was just an affectation. The real sign of mental problems was that she let Starbrand use her as a spare girlfriend in between dates with other women he was really interested in.
“Hmm, that date went well. I may really have a future with Christi. Yep, she could be the one.”
“Quack.”
“Oh, hi Duck. Cook me dinner. Loan me money, and satisfy me sexually.”
“Oh, quack. Oh. Quack. Oh! Quack! Quack! Qua-hack!”

42

I think that the Kirby side of the issue is taking a bit of a narrow focus. It helps that I was reading the essential X-Men from this period last night, but in the same time frame you have Storm changing costume and losing powers, a replacement Jean Grey in Rachel Summers, the New Mutants being formed which would be fertile ground for growing new X-men, and more costume changes than you can shake a stick at. Over at DC in the same period while the big names remained pretty stable they killed Barry Allen and replaced him with Wally, completely changed the format of Green Lantern pushing Hal Jordan to the side lines, changed Robin to Jason Todd, and perhaps you’ve heard of a little thing called Crisis on Infinite Earths.

My point is looking to changes in this period as a sign of fear of Kirby doesn’t really work. Over at Marvel most of the characters had their books going for twenty years at that point and the stories had been told. It’s clear Shooter was very open to changing the status quo and probably encouraged it, but at that point the mainstream comics were playing with changing things up. There’s no need for a fear of lawsuit to come into it.

43

Re The Hulk

IIRC it was at this time that Hulk went grey again, shifted back from changing when he was angry to changing at sunset and then became Mr Fixit. He was smaller, not as strong as the green Hulk, but a lot meaner. The same accident which caused the change temporarily changed Rick Jones into Another Hulk. IIRC Jones was cured when the Leader drained the Gamma energy from Jones into himself in order to increase his powers.

44

First, my personal opinion on why the New Universe failed: The writers tried very hard to give every character personality quirks that they felt would be good story hooks in the years ahead. Unfortunately, they overdid it. They were left with such disfunctional people that their problems drove them downhill at an accelerating pace right from issue #1. It required a large suspension of disbelief to read these books and buy the concept that such messed-up individuals could succeed at anything, let alone be actual heroes. Once the characters were set up this way, the writers couldn’t prevent the rapid crash-and-burn of the universe.

Second, back when I was reading comics, I thought Shooter was generally good for the Marvel line. While I only really got to see him and DeFalco, it was clear to me that Shooter was the better editor-in-chief. While he clearly had a big ego, and he wanted to do a lot of new and experimental stuff, Shooter at least was a stickler for continuity. He seemed to like his writers and editors to read the old issues of the books, and required them to write within the established framework (or to come up with a good reason for any departures). During DeFalco’s run, a lot of things seemed to happen that directly contradicted things that had occurred previously. As a reader, I hate that sort of thing.

45

What about Professor X? Magneto? The Blob? The Juggernaut? They were all major characters in the Uncanny X-Men during Shooter’s tenure and they were all initially drawn by Kirby.

46

Beg to differ-Professor X was shipped off to Lilandra’s world, IIRC, Juggernaut appeared, once, maybe twice, Blob? I can’t think of when he appeared after X-Men 141-2 and Magneto was given a completely different (and truely sucky John Romita Jr) costume, a first and last name which he was usually referred to by/as and (IIRC) Kirby never drew him with his mask off.

47

What an interesting thread! My understanding was that the NU was created after the destruction of the Beyonder in Secret Wars II. His essence or energy was fed back into the universe he came from. This led to the creation of the NU.

Some interesting points Fenris but I see some flaws in your argument. Let’s assume that Kirby spoke with his attorneys but never filed suit (that would public record, a least the filing of the suit would be). This was enough, however, to scare Marvel into taking fairly drastic action with their characters. Wouldn’t these profound changes have tipped Kirby off that he’d better act soon before Marvel changed everything? Wouldn’t the fact that Marvel changed everything so drastically been used as evidence in a civil trial? A tacit admission so to speak? Further, it seems to be an astonishing overreaction on Marvel’s part to the threat, not the filing, of a lawsuit. Comic book readers are a loyal lot and there isn’t a chance in hell that they would have stayed with Marvel had they replaced all of their major characters. Had Kirby won it was lights out for Marvel regardless of whether or not they made the Hulk Gray or created X-Factor. Indeed, I doubt those changes in and of themselves would have been enough to defend against, or survive, a successful claim by Kirby. Their efforts would have been better served trying to settle with Kirby not change their entire line in a fairly haphazzard way.

Just to nit-pick, when Captain American was replaced by the US Agent (I believe he was called the Patriot first) it was quite clear that he was unbalanced (US Agent that is). Even as a 12 year old I knew that Cap was coming back and that the US Agent would go rogue very quickly. Also, there is no way that Beta-Ray Billwas ever going to replace Thor. They could have gone back to Red Norvell (unless he was a Kirby creation) or used someother Asgardian figure still in the public domain. A comic based on a Thor that looked like a horse and had a fleet full of refugees with him? I don’t think so.

48

Does it ever work when a company introduces an entire universe all at once? I mean, yeah, there were periods where several new characters came out in very close succession (the beginnings of the golden and silver ages, for instance), but it wasn’t like the New Universe or 2099 or M2 were, where they actively create an entire stable of heroes right from the getgo.

I’m expressing this really badly, but it’s not like at the beginning of the silver age Marvel was like “Now - the Marvel universe!” and introduced the FF, the Avengers, and Spider-Man all in the same month. Stuff like Valiant lasted for a while, and I guess Image sort of counts, although most of the original books aren’t being published (in their original form, anyway) anymore, and they didn’t have a ton to do with each other in the first place. The closest thing I can think of is the Ultimate universe, and there they seem to have made the wise decision by introducing one or two books at a time.

I guess my point is that it seems like any comic universe that doesn’t develop somewhat organically tends to fail eventually.

49

Professor X was hardly written out of the book, his adventures with the Shiar were a major subplot. And he did show up in the Secret Wars.

Magneto’s costume was different, but he became even more important during these years as he ran the school in Professor X’s absence. If you’re thinking of his renaming to Erik Lennsherr (sp?), that was post-Shooter (and a really lame change).

I can think of three or four major tussles the X-Men had with the Juggernaut during this time.

The Blob joined Freedom Force with the rest of the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants. Freedom Force fought the X-Men about every ten minutes, as well as showing up in major appearances in the Avengers and other books.

50

SW2 #1, New Mutants #29 and Uncanny #196 were his last appearances before the “Trial Of Magneto”. He didn’t communicate with Earth again 'til New Mutants 50. (Illyanna teleports to deep space).

Tom DeFalco became EIC with the November 87 coverdate, (New Mutants 57, with Bret Blevins and Bird Brain, ouch)

UX 101-102. Juggy and Black Tom hire Arcade in 122. UX 183, Marvel Team-Up 150, UX194. Fought Dazzler in 217-218.

51

Hmmm. I’m wondering about the original development of the Wildstorm Universe - they’re still around and kicking, with gems like Planetary and The Authority. Did it develop organically?

Of course, I have to point out that all comic book universes tend to fail eventually, due to economic entropy. :wink:

52

I have fond memories of the New U.

I very much enjoyed Psi-Force at first. I was 11 or 12 when the New U debuted, so sophistication wasn’t a requirement. Unfortnately, it went through a rut in the middle of the 36 issue run. But, I thought that by the time the series ended, it was an exceptional book. I was REALLY interested in seeing the adventures of that team. As an espionage team in the “realish” world, there were MANY story opportunities.

Starbrand was ok, but it really interested me when Byrne took over the title. When it ended, it was a book I was very much enjoying.

Justice was the biggest hit or miss book around. When he was in his delusional phase, where he decides to go BIG 80’s and start his own drug war, the book was AWESOME. One of my favorites. When he learned the “truth”, it was mediocre at best. But when the series settled down and became basically a government agent trying to cope with his daughter story, then it became very solid.

DP7 was excellent from start to finish. I am glad it seems to be recognized as the best by most people. The Clinic stories were excellent. The stories on the run were great. The post-Pitt stories were the driving force behind the larger story of the New Universe (Starbrand may have been the “cause”, but the story of the New U was always about how the world would react. DP7 was the series that reflected that sentiment.)

I also thought Nightmask was a decent series. The problem with it is that it would have been better served to have been a Vertigo book written by Neil Gaiman! :wink:

But overall, I’d say that at any given time, there were 2 to 3 good series going (between the ones listed above and the mini series/specials like the Draft, Pitt, and War).

The rest was absolute garbage. But if you think about it, 75% of all new series in any universe are absolute garbage. 25% (give or take) quality is about par for the course. I never understood the special ire reserved for New U.

Because of the quality that WAS present, I give the New U thumbs up. Judge the wheat, not the chaff!

53

I’ll be the first to admit that I know absolutely nothing about the Wildstorm universe and have never read either Planetary or The Authority, so it may very well be the flaw in my argument.

54

OK, so I changed jobs about when the SDMB went to subscription and didn’t sign up right away 'cuz things were pretty chaotic. Since then, I’ve been lurking on and off for several months, waiting for some thread to come along and catalyze me into subscribing. To my everlasting shame, it’s the New Universe thread. :o

I think the NewU was about 15 years before its time (or 25 years after it). It focused on stories about people instead of slugfests. That was in contrast to a lot (by no means all) of what was going on at the time from the Big Two, and of course comics were about to get staggeringly worse for a while. But in the NewU, things actually happened like they would have in the real world. When the DP’s escaped you saw them wrestling with whether they should steal food – and then they got over it. You saw Nightmask deal with real tragedies. You saw Jack Magniconte struggle with giving up the thing he loved most (football) because of his powers. You saw life on the run turn Kathy Ling from a normal kid into a stone cold bitch. And you saw kids who thought their powers made them invulnerable get the crap beat out of them and crippled or killed. There were actual consequences in the NewU, and the consequences made sense.

Starbrand is the ultimate exemplar of this. Ken Connell was IMO a well-drawn portrait of a regular guy who tries to be good but fails miserably because he lets his, uh, passions make all the decisions. The issue Fenris cites is not an example of how bad the NewU is, but actually how good it is – Connell isn’t a hero. He keeps Debbie Duck around because she’s a doormat. I know people who do the same thing. He spent the issue trying to figure out how to stop the radioactive guy without killing him, but can’t do it so throws him into space in a fit of rage, then is immediately remoseful. When stuff ticks me off I act exactly that way. Fortunately for the people who annoy me, I’m not omnipotent. And Connell wasn’t the only one who behaved this way; the protagonists (rarely heroes) throughout the NewU lose their cool just like actual people: Scuzz becomes Scorcher, Magniconte cripples a player who taunted him, Dave Landers tosses Stephie’s husband around like a rag doll, etc. But I’d much rather read a story about a regular guy trying to measure up to the powers granted him where his success is in real doubt than read yet another comic featuring a good guy doing good. The characters of the New U were flawed, and because of their power, their flaws got themselves or others hurt. Ask Sophocles – that makes for good drama.

Of course, I really am ignoring one other facet of the NewU that has been touched on in this thread. The books weren’t well executed. Creators got shuffled around issue by issue, and no one knew what to do with several characters/series. The writer shuffle made many characters hard to pin down: is Magniconte willing to cheat at football or not? Is C.C. Chase a nice girl in over her head or a manipulative skank? Is Mark Hazzard a mercenary who takes only the jobs he can stomach, or is he the most amoral mercenary ever? Is Tensen a serial killer or just misunderstood? Etc., etc. Ultimately, I have to disagree with Krokodil when he says the NewU was a bad idea unevenly executed. I think it was a good idea executed unevenly and, in many instances, badly.

–Cliffy

55

Glad to be of service.

Mods, I’ll take that commission check now please.

56

Creating a new universe works better when it comes about one title at a time, and each title is given time to grow into it’s own. The most successful new universe in history is Marvel’s Ultimate, which rolled out one new book at a time rather than trying to dump a dozen on us all at once. Obviously, there are other factors involved there, such as the familiarity of the characters, better writing than you generally got with the New U, and the ability to adapt proven storylines from the originals.

The only title I really connected with in the NewU was DP7.

On the other hand, I liked most of the DC !mpact comics, mostly because they were a lot of fun.

57

What? You’re telling me that no one has anything to say about the exegesis above, despite it directly contradicting many previous posters in the thread?

:frowning:

–Cliffy

58

Hey, I appreciated it. I’m always impressed with your comic-related posts. You should write a column or something.

59

Yay! Validation! :cool:

I would write a column, but I have nothing to say.

–Cliffy

60

[Margo Channing]

That’s nevah stopped you before!

[/MC]