Marvel needs to start dealing with Marvel

[NachtcGleiskette]

Anyone else sick of immediate retcons, or completely ignoring unpopular plots? I am.

Granted, there are alot of plots out there that are just god awful, and they spurn the internet wrath of the fanboy. In some ways, editorial has held back plots and made the writer have to change where they were going, in other ways the plot was just dumb to begin with. HOWEVER, WHY is it then OK to just have the next writer make some stupid one-liner excuse and everyone moves on, especially from something large? The Draco, for instance. An arc people hate, but you never ever see Kurt ever even think of it again. It's completely ignored. This is now part of Marvel continuity, and if they hate it, they shouldn't have let it happen to begin with, rather than let this huge event happen in a characters life and then let it get ignored.

Now, after Blood of Apocalypse (which was a really, really bad arc. Just....terrible terrible arc), Gambit fans are basically calling for it to just be ignored. Bring him back completely normal and write it off. Granted, I hated what that arc did to his character, but I think it'd be more interesting to actually DEAL WITH CONTINUITY than ignore it. Fans complain about how no one deals with continuity in one breath, then call for it to be ignored in another. This is what makes Marvel so frikken irritating, is that every time writers are switched up, continuity is basically thrown out the window. How does it make for any type of cohesion as a universe?

*where I go off on a Gambit-specific rant*

One example of this that really bugs me is after Antartica, where Rogue tells Remy she absorbed his self hatred, and thats why she left him. What a nice little wrap up that basically absolves her of all guilt. How can he even be mad? It was his self hatred. What pisses me off is that this was an opportunity for the writers to actually deal with a BIG HUGE event in this god forsaken romance that has lasted years and gone nowhere. They could have gone SOMEWHERE but instead, write it off really quickly and move on. Granted, it was Nicieza and I love him, so I'm not too pissed . But it's annoying that this is acceptable now. ANYTHING can happen today and it won't matter tomorrow.

[Saint Kurt]

You're right and I don't get it either.

I can't figure why, at a time when television shows are being written like long movies (24, Lost, Battlestar Galactica, Heroes to name just a few) where continuity is everything comic books are suddenly being written like half hour sitcoms. For the first time in my life I actually like television and comics are bumming me out and this is exactly the reason. Anything can happen and nothing matters.

Originally posted by NachtcGleiskette
...WHY is it then OK to just have the next writer make some stupid one-liner excuse and everyone moves on, especially from something large? The Draco, for instance. An arc people hate, but you never ever see Kurt ever even think of it again. It's completely ignored. This is now part of Marvel continuity, and if they hate it, they shouldn't have let it happen to begin with, rather than let this huge event happen in a characters life and then let it get ignored.

Well - The Draco is briefly hinted at in the Nightcrawler solo book. For a panel. But I think we all know that that book had an exceptional creative team really interested in using Nightcrawler's whole history: the good and the stupid. It was actually cool to see the Draco addressed at last even if it was for one panel because yeah, you're right - whole arc... completely forgotten by everyone, including the key character. Personally, I think any good guy who gets kidnapped naked on a remote desert island by a weird evil meglomaniac mutant (and his weird evil buddies) who thinks he's satan is bound to experience some trauma beyond "You know Charles - It was cool to find out that I have brothers". But that's just me.

It seems to me that Marvel seems more bent on capturing a Blockbuster Sales Event right now than telling a good story that lasts. And that's too bad.

-e

[kladyelf]

It can be irksome the melted-cheeze-on-a-pizza type of continuity, ie: it bends, stretches and its suddenly gone! (mmm... pizza )

lets take the "Blood of Apocalypse" for the sake of argument, you could have had the X-men (or Rogue herself in a spin-off mini series) hunt the Cajun down and restore him to his normal frame of mind (and body, i mean really haliotosis as a super-power? give me a break!) - i mean the X-men did that with Wolverine in "The Twelve" storyline (never mind that he was supposedly resisting the conditioning)

Maybe in regards to "Draco" (bleah! spit!) a mini-series could be written entitled "Brothers" where familial relationships between heroes are explored while said heroes fight giant radioactive space monkeys* - and it wouldn't just have to be Nightcrawlers brothers, you could have a Wagner issue, a Summers issue, a Rasputin issue, etc. etc.

*(i just love giant space monkeys )

[NachtcGleiskette]

It is SUPER irritating, because it's like...blatant disrespect for themselves. Does that make sense? Basically, what's great this week sucks next week and suddenly we never talk about it again. I don't know how to solve it, but I think what SHOULD happen is editorial should step up a bit. Like...remind writers of what has happened, and ask that it be dealt with before moving on. Or at least refered back to once in a while. Like, deal with it, resolve it, and move on. Or let it fester, but make it clear it's not just "forgotten".

I'm getting sick of these huge crossover events that kind of result in nothing. The effects of HoM started going back on themselves only a month or two after the final book. And the books started to deal with these results (New Excalibur for example) have NOTHING to do with it.

Why even make something a huge, universe altering event if you're not even going to deal with it again? Or even a huge event for a character? I feel like alot of this is fanboy pandering, and that's even more irritating. Fan Fic is there for the fanboys to see what they want. Canon is there to tell real, cohesive stories. You turn Gambit black and give him crappy powers, yeah the Gambit fanboys are pissed. But come on, DO something with it and MAKE it interesting. Aren't they all supposed to be professional writers?

[The Drastic Spastic]

Why waste more paper trying to explain the retarded? Wipe it from the record.

Here's an example. It's an easy one, everyone knows this one. The priest plot. It was dumb. It was thoughtless. It was made into a major plot point to get rid of it. This sucked. It REALLY sucked. It was possibly the most derided story arc ever written. WHO HERE PROFOUNDLY REGRETS SPENDING MONEY ON THOSE ISSUES? I do. I want my fucking quarter back, you horrible pricks.

Think of how much better the canon would be if they'd just started ignoring it one day. Aaaaah.

[NachtcGleiskette]

In some cases, ignoring it could have been better than explaining it. But like....it's becoming precident now at Marvel that if something sucks, it's just swept under the rug. That's basically the same as having absolutely no standards in storytelling. Because, if it sucks, it never happened anyway.

[Saint Kurt]

Another one that's weird is when Marvel seems really bent on showcasing certain characters in their crossovers with no clear reason why.

I was really enjoying the Civil War series, but it started to get really alarming when Tony Stark started showing up in every single other Marvel comic reminding everyone who showed an inkling of a superpower to go and get themselves registered.

I started to get worried he was going to jump out of my closet one morning or something.

I started thinking ... does Ironman really have that big a fanbase? What are they doing? I don't even care about Ironman.

And I think the only story arc more hated than the priest plot was the Draco. And both were by Austin, which is really odd when you think about how much Austin loved Nightcrawler as a character. I'm really glad I got to have that hour long conversation with Austin about the Marvel editorial process and the destruction of plotlines - and that I have witnesses (and fellow participants) right here on this board!

While I can't speak for the de-ordination of Nightcrawler plot - I'm convinced that had it not been for editorial meddling, the Draco would have been good.

-e

[NachtcGleiskette]

Originally posted by Saint Kurt

While I can't speak for the de-ordination of Nightcrawler plot - I'm convinced that had it not been for editorial meddling, the Draco would have been good.

-e

I think it would have been better....not sure about good however . But he did seem to indicate a bunch of editorial issues he had over that lunch we did. He's a super nice guy

[The Drastic Spastic]

Originally posted by NachtcGleiskette
That's basically the same as having absolutely no standards in storytelling. Because, if it sucks, it never happened anyway.

They don't have nearly enough talent on the payroll to have standards. It sucks, but what can you do? No really, what can you do? I'm sure they'd like to know. It's one thing to churn out a huge load of your very own original shit, but for someone else to come along and fix it? Are you kidding me? It takes a ridiculous amount of skill and frankly the whole project sounds like a waste of talent to me. If I had a talented writer, there's no way I'd put him (or her) to work on polishing a turd. Because he wouldn't like it and he'd quit and then I'd only have "nice people" writing my books. No one wants that.