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Underground > Comic Books >

Too many chiefs

19:49 / 10.01.06

A while ago, as I flicked through a copy of Wizard, I saw some report about how excited they were that Mr Geoff Johns is taking over writing chores on Superman. Flicking further through there were a few articles about B M Bendis' next ideas for the next big next event, further on, more about the shape of the DCU to come, molded and formed by five or so of the biggest names in comics - then some stuff about exclusive contracts for artists.

It got me thinking, and I wanted to open that to discussion with the board.

Is having the control of a company of comic characters in as few hands as possible good or bad for story-telling, the industry and us fans?

The pros seem to be that there are some fantastic writers out there, and if those writers are given more scope to play with a bigger canvas then the worlds that this opens up can lead to more interesting story telling. There is also the neat way that a lot of writers are now-a-days tying up loose threads, picking up old ideas and molding seemingly lame characters/mcguffins/concepts and really going to town on them.

The cons are that if a writer isn't liked by a reader, then there is a little bit of a feeling of where can you turn? What if your favourite character isn't liked by the main writer for a company? Does this limit the scope of storytelling?

From a personal point of view, I'm not totally in love with GJ's writting style, and find that he has sucked the life out of quite a few characters that I like - but I'm really enjoying 8C, so seeing where the DCU is going at present. As for Marvel, well, BMB isn't a favourite either, so I'm kind of ignoring big parts of that universe too. I'm not suggesting that they're the only ones doing anything for those companies, and using the big two as examples as they seem to be the main exclusive contractors, but it does mean that I feel like I'm not losing myself in the MU or the DCU as I really used to - in the past I would be happy to pick up a book if an idea or character interested me, now I feel as though big parts of each universe is shut off from me.

Over to the board...

20:06 / 10.01.06

Is Bendis going to be the next editor-in-chief? If so, I'm officially squatting in DC's dingy hole. I'm not a fan of Bendis, and the fact that now he writes fucking everything is making me go to tEH DC. Bendis seems to have his little fingers in everything. Whether or not he's a good writer, this question still arises with his promiscuity: other writers lower on the totem pole now have to change their continuity to keep in line with Bendis' Spider-Woman wankfest called The New Avengers. Their stories are compromised to fit into the larger framework of the Big Event. This is not a Bendis-exclusive problem. I think both companies suffer from it. I offer no solution because I can't think of one that's feasible and has less cons.

21:27 / 10.01.06

I would hope that, if Bendis is to be the next EiC, he would at some point actually *edit some books* before then. It seems like that would be vital experience, especially considering the fact that most of his comics read like he has never even *heard* the word "edd-it-tor."

Not that I find it likely that he would be the next EiC, though it is certainly possible. I'd be inclined to think that an ubercreator like Joe Q being named editor was kind of a one-off "we're so fucked, so what more harm can it do" event, rather than something that will be repeated (as successful as it seems to have been).

I'm not sure if I have a strong opinion on this, since while I can certainly find lots of things to object to in the styles of the current top-down universes, I find the *approach* to be fascinating intellectually and can therefore put up with it. The idea of the super-consistent universe is appealling to me, even if the execution isn't always.

22:06 / 10.01.06

Possibly threadrotting here, but who would be Marvel's next EiC? (IhopeIhopeIhope Dan Slott)

Yotsuba & Benjamin!

22:38 / 10.01.06

Just to yank this thread back to its intended, I think in DC's case it's not really Johns' vision. It's DiDio. Johns, Morrison, and Waid have just been tasked with making sense of its implementation.

You can see how the opposite shakes out in Marvel where the heads aren't concerned with a cohesive universe and instead just make room for creators' ideas (all of the recent Marvel foofoorah came from Bendis' choices in Dissassembled). I think that approach is a little less fair to creators. Marvel isn't touted as a Universe that is dictated upon and thus I can see creators being a little more miffed when their comics are sucked into crossover-ville. 8C, however, has been in the works for years but has a framework that appears flexible enough to accomodate individual creators' tangents. Firestorm is a perfect example. It's a book with a unique voice that instead of being glommed onto a crossover, the crossover was able to accomodate that vision, both the individual book and the crossover itself gaining something unique from the combination.

I think it's probably obvious at this point that I have a bias towards the DCU these days, and this Decimation --> Civil War nonsense isn't really helping. At this point its almost facetious to describe what DC is doing as a Crossover in the traditional sense. The new ish of Teen Titans had no crossover branding yet contained a good deal of information about what's behind some of the more germane aspects of Infinite Crisis (dead rising and all that). It's more of an instance of an entire universe finally working together to build one ginormous story. I don't think Johns, Morrison, or Waid combined have had as much of a say over its content or direction than DiDio himself.

Or maybe not. I mean obviously the writers come up with all the important things like details, emotion, motivation. I mean, crap, look at the new (last?) arc of Gotham Central. If it does indeed end up spinning into whoever it is that ends up being the Spectre, than Rucka has taken one slight editorial mandate ("We Need A New Spectre") and turned it into one of the most emotionally affecting storylines of the past few years.