[soapbox]
If we weren’t so screwed up in our relationship to both alcohol and to celebrity, this would be a non-issue. People need to get a grip and parent better, if they’re truly that worried about this.
[/soapbox]
strictly speaking - Wolverine is not selling anything to anyone - he may be ‘promoting’ its usage (not that there is not enought of that already to be found) - but he is not actively ‘selling it to children’
Thats the job of the liquor store.
Well I, for one, am outraged and I will definitely, definitely never ever ever drink a Coors again. Never!
[SIZE=“1”]Unless I absolutely have to.[/SIZE]
I’m pretty sure Wolverine doesn’t actually know the Quesadas, so that couldn’t possibly have been his reasoning.
Except, of course, for the hard-edged Garth Ennis “Nick Fury: My War Gone By” series, where damn near everybody smokes heavily.
Yeah, if he wants to feel the effect of one beer, he pretty much has to pound a six or 12 pack like a raging alcoholic which kinda makes him look like a raging alcoholic.
Isn’t that what they already had Steve Rogers notice in the CAPTAIN AMERICA movie, when trying to drown his sorrows at the bar after a mission?
(Which is a neat double whammy for the kids: “Boy, these steroids work great – apart from making it hard to get drunk!”)
Editorial edict.
Since you missed my point, I’ll state it outright, this time:
I wasn’t talking about Joe Quesada. Or the writers. Or even the artists.
I was talking about Wolverine. Wolverine’s reasoning has nothing at all to do with anything going on in the real world. He’s not Deadpool, the fourth wall is perfectly intact for him. Quesada’s personal tragedies, Quesada’s choices for the line’s direction…they mean nothing to him, because he knows nothing of them. His reasoning can only be based on what’s going on in-universe.
The article makes a big deal out of pointing out the PG-13 rating. And yet even an NC-17 movie connected with beer marketing would be (by the same “reasoning”) promoting underage drinking, since the age limit is 17, not 21.
Best I could find for in universe reasons is that Wolverine developed smokers cough in 1993.
An excellent point, Dr. Strangelove.
One might make the counterargument that it’s not just promotion of underaged drinking, which marketing to an NC-17 crowd still does, but rather promotion of alcohol and drinking to significantly underaged children. Like the Joe Camel argument, where the claim is the cartoon camel advertises to preteens rather than adults, the idea is that there are many preteens interested in Wolverine, buying comics and action figures. This movie being PG-13 just means parents are encouraged to screen for their children, not that 10 year olds won’t be seeing this movie.
The underlying premise seems to be that younger children are more susceptible to the product placement and hero-promotion aspects of marketing than the older teens and young adults. I’m not sure this is true, or if it is true, that doesn’t mean those marketing aspects are trivial for the older audience. But there’s that “protecting the children” aspect that most adults can take less seriously for 17 to 20 year olds. They are essentially adults or almost practically adults (18 year olds are treated as adults except for silly things like alcohol purchase), whereas 13 year olds are still regarded as mostly little children.
A good point. I’ll make the counter-counter-argument that 17+ year olds, despite being more adult, are more susceptible to alcohol-related advertising. In my limited experience, 13 year olds mostly don’t like beer or wine, don’t have much peer pressure for drinking, and don’t have much access to alcohol. 17 year olds, however, likely have 21 year old acquaintances able to supply beer, have friends who drink regularly, have unsupervised parties, etc.
In other words, while a 13 year old might be more easily influenced, it takes much more of a push to actually get them to start drinking beer. The 17 year old doesn’t need much of a push at all (if any), and so even if the advertising is less effective, it has stronger results.
That’s just a hypothesis, of course. I don’t have any data for it.
I laughed.
I agree. Comics in general shouldn’t be looked at as merely for kids. However, Marvel Comics superheroes are regularly advertised as kids entertainment. When Joe Quesada himself was in charge of Marvel as Editor in Chief he stopped the character of Wolverine from being depicted smoking cigarettes or cigars because he didn’t want to promote smoking to kids.
If Joe Camel had an effect on kids picking up cigarettes I don’t see why superhero characters that sell toy lines, pajamas, costumes, binders, etc, wouldn’t play a part in that. Although why focus on the beer and not the violence?
This. It would be one thing if the characters were considered Adult content, say Sin City or so. But X-men and Wolverine are regularly packaged as children’s entertainment, and do heavy marketing to children for branding of toys, etc. So sticking Wolverine in a movie is bound to get children’s attention even if the movie is rated NC-17. Because it’s difficult to isolate this element of the franchise and say “No, this is only for adults” while simultaneously running toys of the character. Kids just don’t get that kind of nuance.
That’s why my comic store guy doesn’t keep “adult” comics in stock. If a particular customer wants a particular title, he’ll order it for him, but it goes directly into that customer’s box, not onto the shelves.
Smoking: Anybody else remember when Mark Trail stopped smoking?
Marvel’s has a new Editor in Chief since 2011. Do any of the old cast of characters chomp cigars again these days?
Well since they do not use guns, thats ok.