harry@ucbarpa.BERKELEY.EDU (& I. Rubin) (11/11/85)
In article <1009@gitpyr.UUCP> jkr@gitpyr.UUCP (John Kenneth Riviere) writes: >... Jim Shooter may possibly be, >at least partially, responsible for what I now consider to be one of the >most active times for comics in the last thirty years. > ... >Jim Shooter turned Marvel around when he took over in 1978 > ... >It is hard to find a spot now which is more than a few >miles from a comics specialty store. Maybe I am making too much of Shooter's >contribution to the field ... but I feel that he helped to >guide Marvel (and in turn, the rest of the industry) to a level of acceptance >in American society that comics has never previously enjoyed. Thank you for speaking the other side of the issue (every issue has at least two sides). Has Shooter made Marvel, and comics in general, a commercial success at the expense of artistic integrity or quality? I don't know. I read and enjoy more comics now than ever, on the other hand, there is a lot of crap coming out, too. >However, I >don't feel that it is fair to expect that, as a company grows as Marvel has >under Shooter, that everything that the company does will appeal to everyone >who follows any part of that company's products. >... >As someone else said, if you don't like it, >then don't buy it. Vote with your dollars for what you want to see. >-- >John Kenneth Riviere >Georgia Insitute of Technology, Atlanta Georgia, 30332 >...!{akgua,allegra,amd,hplabs,ihnp4,seismo,ut-ngp}!gatech!gitpyr!jkr MAJOR PET PEAVE WARNING!!! If each of Marvel's comics series' were a separate product, then we consumers could indeed buy and read only those series which we liked and of which we approved. Even if the series were grouped into "families" (e.g. Avengers-Thor-Cap, XMen-NewMutants, etc.) where the goings on in each family did not spill over from one family to another (at least not much), then we consumers could decide to buy one family but not another. However, this is not the case. There is a lot of crossing over among comics and even among "families," and I believe there is more and more of it. This means that if we want to follow the stories of, the development of, our favorite characters we are "forced" to buy and read several other comics. A recent example: I follow Power Pack, last ish the kids fought Kurse, they stopped him long enough to think him dead and left, this ish there is a different story not involving Kurse, but there is a reference to the kids helping Thor stop Kurse in some other comic (Thor?). I don't buy Thor, but I now feel pressured to go find and buy the appropriate issue of Thor, not because I suddenly want to follow Thor, but because I want to follow what is happening to the Power Kids. Of course, I could say "I won't," but then I would feel I was missing out on something I am interested in. Secret Bores II, of course, is the example par excellance. I find it significant, and disturbing, that the beginning of X-Factor is not in X-Factor at all, but in two other comics, which are not at all related! Even more disturbing, no one has mentioned it, no one here seems to think it unusual or unacceptable. So it appears that the whole Marvel Universe is actually one product. Therefore, those of us who are interested in the product have a good reason to gripe rather than to walk away.