Marvel’s Senior Vice President of Publishing Tom Brevoort just posted this on his Formspring account talking about the Spider-Marriage. What do you think? Sound off on the comment section.
Question: Characters along with the rest of humanity, and most species, for that matter evolve. Why can’t Superman be married? Or Spider Man for that matter? Is it possible that books lose readers because the content doesn’t jive with the real world?
Brevort: The characters on most ongoing television series evolve very little, even over years. The same thing goes for characters in, say, comic strips. So I think that in certain ways, characters can evolve, but in others, it’s a bad idea to develop characters away from the very things that made them popular in the first place. To use a very old example, Fonzie the motorcycle-riding rebel was cool, Fonzie the High School teacher was lame. (And Fonzie the eventual married suburbanite with a motorcycle in his garage that he never touched because he was too busy earning a living to support his wife and two children would have been horrifying.) The appeal of Superman or Spider-Man has very little to do with them being married–and in fact, I think being married diminishes both of them on a conceptual level.
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I don’t want everyone to shut up. You’re projecting your own hostility onto me. Your inability to see the difference between government and an privately owned entertainment company is telling.
Marvel as a company is not too concerned with what a few anonymous cranks think. I just like you is all…and figure some here might like actual information. As opposed to only hearing some haters’ wishful groanings.
And I’m relatively certain Comichron doesn’t claim to get actual sales numbers from Diamond. (note the very first word: Estimated) Your anger is probably just lowering your reading comprehension.
I look forward to your error making you angrier at me…don’t disappoint, Crawlspacers!
SW
Well then the only way to shut everyone up is to put your money where your mouth is and show the real sales figures before BND and through today. Until Marvel as a company is willing to offer proof, sorry you sound just like congressman in 2007 saying the economy is fine and that short term mortgages aren’t going to cause any problems and only we in Congress know what’s really going on. When people are unwilling to show transparency to act like suspicion is unwarranted is naive.
Also, so you are saying when a site like comichron lists figures that they claim they are getting from Diamond that they are lying and did not get it from Diamond?
http://www.comichron.com/monthlycomicssales/2011/2011-01.html
Yes. They are wrong. Sometimes very. Diamond does not publish sales figures. Nor does Marvel.
They also do not take into account newsstand and subscription and digital sales… not to mention piracy which has become rampant.
The rankings are usually correct… though even they have been wrong before.
Some “experts” here will try and tell you that none of that matters but keep in mind they have a fraternity to maintain and that all of the above is in fact the whole ballgame. To ignore it is laughable. There’s a reason they aren’t taken seriously.
If Marvel were as clueless as some think, we wouldn’t be in business.
SW
I see what Mr Brevoort is saying, and it’s hard because I agree with him yet disagree with him at the same time.
Who cares by this point. Seriously, if you don’t like Spidey now, dislike him for what he has become (masked sex), not for what he once was.
And in regards to the ‘fiction’ that sales are down, am I to understand that those Diamond comic sales listings that pop up every month are incorrect?
I love that Brevoort now hates teachers and “hard working people”.
Remember when we all must “hate our wives” because of OMD? That was classic.
SW
“Lost” I meant.
Ironic!
Only the weak minded and truly oslt roll out the eye rolling icon. Exhibit A above.
SW
@#38
Must be making up for not jumping all over you in your last review…
Ok, so getting married diminish the caracter, then getting a job other than photogapher will do the same, as well as dating someone that is not Gwen Stacy, not being in highschool, hey all that is not happening right know. I would not haven’t mind if he got divorsed as long as the story was great, the story was lame, and since they anounced that they would “kill” ultimate spiday, I really have lost almost all interest in comic books, I have enough reading the reviews here in the crawlspace
@spidey… i’ll add that Aunt May needs to actually die… teaching Peter the lesson that he can’t save everyone… (maybe Brand New Day is actually Aunt May’s last dying thoughts where she reflects on what life would have been like if Peter never married that harlot she helped set him up with…) no but seriously, I think Aunt May was supposed to die at the end of Civil War and that possibly could have started this whole negative chain reaction in Peter’s life.
I’m pretty sure this was information I already knew three or so years ago. Brevoort wasn’t a fan of the marriage so of course he thinks it somehow diminishes the character. That’s bogus, obviously, but not unexpected. I’m curious as to how he thinks being married diminishes Superman though. I’d like to hear Mike Bailey’s thoughts on that.
@24 – I agree completely about your preferred eventual outcome to the deal. I’d only add that Aunt May needs to know as well.
“…Fonzie the High School teacher was lame.”
I was never a big fan of Happy Days, but there is one episode I do remember nearly thirty years after I watched it. The Fonz was teaching a class, rebuilding an engine. I thought at age eight or so that Fonzie made a cool teacher. (Apologies.) Joking aside, there was something worldly and—dare I say sexy?—about someone like the Fonz becoming a teacher. One student wasn’t getting it, for whatever reason—it’s been thirty years, as I say, but to me at age eight or so, it was the resolution that mattered. The Fonz and this student stay after class, late into the night, taking apart and rebuilding this engine, and the Fonz just doesn’t stop—he is so driven and he believes this kid will get it, and they work very late into the night, until the student gets it. And I got it. That was something that affected me when I was young: sometimes it takes a few tries to get it right. That’s a pretty good lesson. I remember next to nothing else about Happy Days but on hard days, I remember that. I’d say that story was compelling.
Lameness is in the eye of the beholder, I guess.
“(And Fonzie the eventual married suburbanite with a motorcycle in his garage that he never touched because he was too busy earning a living to support his wife and two children would have been horrifying.)”
There’s a good compelling story in that idea somewhere, if that storyteller is talented enough. Why doesn’t this potential future Fonzie touch the bike? Why does the bike remain? What does it represent? Where will he and his bike go?
I hope Mr. Breevort doesn’t have something against hard-working people. Are they not cool anymore?
I hope Mr. Breevort doesn’t have anything against teachers, either. My future mother-in-law is a teacher, and a good one.
I’m not even going to touch this one. 🙄
Don’t sue me, I AGREE with Tom Brevoort.
#34: I don’t know if you’d count it but I see Fringe as a Lost like show. I think that calling a show Lost-esque is really a good idea largely because people think a show like Lost needs to be science fiction or confusing or both, look at The Event. I think viewers just want to watch a show where the story progresses not like cop dramas which are more of a done in one affair.
Couple of problems with what Brevoort is saying. If we take his argument that “it’s a bad idea to develop characters away from the very things that made them popular in the first place,” then shouldn’t Peter Parker still be a freelance photographer for the Daily Bugle struggling when it comes to having enough money? After all, doesn’t his current, well-paying job at Horizon Labs go against one of the things that made Spider-Man popular in the first place? At least according to Tom Brevoort’s own manifesto on Spider-Man. I suppose the response to that is “well, it’s easier for Peter to lose his job than it is to get out of a marriage. Well, hard the later because having him divorce would age him and set a bad example to the kids we’re trying to reach. Hence why [Marvel] went with having Peter and MJ make a deal Marvel’s proxy for the devil, Mephisto, to have their marriage erased from existence.”
Second, if Spider-Man was a comic book series which the main source of drama was his romantic relationships, then it be one thing. After all, the romance between Lois and Clark in “Lois and Clark: The New Adventures of Superman” was the main source of drama in that show, so when they got them together and married, it, of course, killed the series. However, as Brevoort even stated, the appeal of characters like Superman and Spider-Man–and their comic book series–have little to do with their marital status. And if that’s the case, and as others have already pointed out, what difference does it make if Spidey is married or not if him being married has little to do with the character’s appeal?
Ha, I love the Wacker instigating. And he never fails to rise to the occassion. Is it a coincidence that once I mention his name he appears?? It’s like Candyman… don’t say his name three times into a mirror!
I agree with Steve though… which Lost-esque shows were successful, cause by my count, that show was good for a little bit, and then everyone tried to make a show like that and no one was able to capitalize on it again. Not even Lost itself since it just turned out miserable and the writers painted themselves into a corner… so maybe Amazing and Lost have more in common than we think.
If Pete is never getting married, then someone better tell Carly. You know, so she can find someone who can actually marry her.
Exactly which Lost- esque shows are successful?
If things were as bad as you think we wouldn’t have jobs. I certainly wouldn’t. Marvels better at this than you want to admit.
Understandable though. Without bitterness and self-righteousness where would some of you be!?
SW
@ 19 Totally agree Proto. That’s what made Marvel and comics unique – in the character progression despite being an ongoing story. When that style was brought to TV in shows like LOST it took off and people wanted more TV like that and the stale non evolving shows (well that aren’t reality TV) are dying off. But apparently they can’t even read sales charts correctly so I wouldn’t expect them to pick up on the obvious trend either.
We haven’t. That’s a fiction some people here are pushing. It ignores many realities about the world you live in.
SW
And you’re okay with having lost about 40% of your ASM hard-copy sales.
Is there any sort of demerit for constantly predicting the failure of something and never being right?
I suspect Spidey’s going to be okay.
@Jack – I completely agree with what you said and basically that is my whole theory. Have we all forgotten that there was a huge character development and plot point in Grim Hunt… Madame Web dying and a new one taking her place. What was the point of that, she will need to play a role at some point in these stories or else that was just a useless character change. Madame Web would be the perfect one to look at Spidey, show him this other dimension where he didn’t make this deal with the devil and show him how much better life would be. I think that they have been leaving enough hints or easter eggs for a writer to come in and retcon the whole brand new day world as an alternate dimension that resulted from this deal. A crafty creative team should be perfectly capable of taking this story and fixing it so that Mephisto doesn’t win in the long run. There are plenty of ways they can still have it dissolve the marriage if they want, but I would not be surprised if this happens.
I don’t think its coincidence that Spider-Man has not been a major player in any of the big Marvel events since Civil War… I mean Norman Osborn, his greatest enemy, was running the country and Sieging Asgard and Spider-Man barely did anything. The less used he is in the main storylines, the easier it will be for them to come back and alter the status quo… this is just my opinion, but I plan on rereading all of Brand New Day and laying out all these theories so that when Wacker comes to me one day to fix this mess I’ll be ready. You hear that Steve, I’m ready for the challenge whenever you guys are.
It’s the same company line that Marvel has been feeding the fans for 4 years. Yawn.
” The appeal of Superman or Spider-Man has very little to do with them being married–and in fact, I think being married diminishes both of them on a conceptual level.”
But somehow, making a deal with the devil to avoid the messy break-up/divorce is A-OK…
And I personally think his bed-hopping as of late diminishes Peter on a conceptual level.
@Brian: What I can see there is a way some future editors and writers could satisfactorily resolve these problems without further retconning anything. I can see a story in which all the horrors you’ve described are assertively pointed out by some future character, re-interpreted as a curse through which Peter just keeps blindly stumbling and blundering. I don’t believe that’s how the current regime intends them to be taken — I think they wish everyone would magically pretend Mephisto never happened, and the current status quo exists for no reason at all — but a more in-tune-with-the-character set of editors could easily create a story along that line, then use it to put the whole thing to bed forever.
I’ve said several times that Peter and MJ need to remember 100% of what they did, deal with it, then (somehow or another, probably with help) face Mephisto, and (somehow or another, probably with help) defeat him and reverse the curse, even if they remain unmarried at the conclusion. Then at least their shared wrong-doing and complicity with evil would be expunged.
What is the CENTRAL DYNAMIC that is present in EVERY Spider book IN WRITING? “With great power, comes great responsibility”. Peter Parker is supposed to be the everyman, the character that has to balance his super-life with his normal life. IMO, there is no greater responsibility for a man than his wife and family, which is why MJ and the marriage was an integral part of the book.
@Jack – I agree that the moral character turning amoral is a bad bad move, but I have a theory that I will eventually break down on my personal blogsite about what is happening in the world of Spider-Man. You say “nothing but positive consquences resulting”… i disagree with that. While it may seem like its all positive for Spider-Man, the people around him are the ones who are really suffering. The deaths, the good guys turning bad, the inevitable storyline involving all of Peter’s tech getting out of Horizon labs (I would bet a good sum that this will be the plot of Infestation in some way)… all these bad things are happening around him, and Peter is just going on like nothing is wrong. They will fix that character flaw when Peter realizes that just because things may seem perfect for him, that doesn’t mean its perfect for everyone else and the way it should be. He’s not a selfish person and it should be/hopefully will be fixed.
1. Donovan FTW!
2. It seems to me that his reasoning is “We didn’t like the marriage and our opinion is what counts, so we got rid of it. Now shut the #%*@ up and give me your money.”
There’s a difference between changes that inch along but at least still inching, and utter fossilization. You don’t want to blow the wad too fast, then the fans get too much too quickly. And I understand that producers don’t want to accidentally wreck whatever it was that mde the successful character appealing. E.g., you would’t want to switch Michael Westen & Sam Axe’s personalities (Burn Notice), just because it sounds like something fun to try. It’s like New Coke, you’ve ruined the brand.
But how about driving a moral character to make severely amoral choices (like contracting with a demon to abandon your marriage?), with nothing but positive consequences resulting? How was that not a hammer blow to the character? Talk about jumping a shark.
@16
I completely agree with you, and heres the real kicker, spidey and marvel comics in general were that ever progressing serialized format not only back then but going all the way back to their creations in the 60’s. In away marvel was a pioneer in that type of pregressive evlolving continuity style that most TV shows have today. Marvel was ahead of its time and now is trying to run away from the very thing that made their characters popular int eh first place and at the absolute wrong possible time as the other entertainment mediums(including the most popular one television) embrace it.
Remoteman, Brevoort is quoted saying “The characters on most ongoing television series evolve very little, even over years…So I think that in certain ways, characters can evolve, but in others, it’s a bad idea to develop characters away from the very things that made them popular in the first place.” I read that as him being against character development and progression based on this and other views he has expressed as they seem to be focused on keeping Spidey about being young and without change character wise. Peter matured and grew a great deal between Amazing Fantasy 15 and OMD. A maturation that seems to have been wiped out to keep him in this perpetual Peter Pan/Bart Simpson state.
Breevort’s certainly entitled to his opinion, but we agree with it because it’s a misinformed opinion. He says it himself, marital status of both Supes and Spidey actually matters very little.
THE PROBLEM IS, as others have said, if they matter so little, why eff with them in the first place? Amazing Fantasy #15, Amazing Spider-Man #1 and Action Comics #1 were not focused on the characters’ relationship status. That does not make them what they are. You see Spider-Man, you’re not supposed to care if he’s married or not. At the same time, you cannot deny that the characters HAVE evolved a great deal in the past half century, and that evolution makes them richer and deeper characters by default. It makes them multi-layered, engaging for readers old and new alike, and deepens their worth. Comic strips that change very little or not at all are not better loved by it. When they “married” Archie, that made headlines because it was a big change. But In other cases such as Peanuts, Dick Tracy (moustache aside) and others, if they stay static they stay at that complacent level of interest. Not to say that makes them worthless, but there’s no risk involved in reading the characters, no inherent sense engagement with their universe because that type of world where everything stays the same does not exist. Spider-Man celebrated Barack Obama’s inauguration, that’s a change to progress the character right there because it progressed the world we live in, a world Marvel desperately wants to share.
Heck, new costumes, new girlfriends, new enemies, this is all change to progress the character and give him new challenges on a minute and bare level. Breevort wants to bring up Happy Days, I would think the better example of changing the show into what it wasn’t intended to be was to have Richie move away from the series. Granted Ron Howard left and they couldn’t do much about it, but it’s a more fundamental and significant change than “Oh noes! Fonzie’s a teacher!”
Again, there’s a distinct cognitive dissonance in Marvel’s thinking how Spidey being married changes the character too much because him being a young single guy was never, ever the reason for his being. It was makeup; dressing on a salad that consisted of his inner struggle with his dual identity. To suggest that the marriage changed everything about Spider-Man 1) is completely disengenuous to fans of the character during those 20 years and the creators, and 2) is just objectively incorrect because fans of the character who like Spider-Man for the same reasons old fans like him would not have become fans in the first place if the marriage WAS so damning to the character’s essence.
I personally think that attitude is a dying one in the TV business. Look soap operas are dead and the TV shows that last nowadays last mostly because they aren’t afraid to change up the status quo and move characters forward. Otherwise they are considered to stale and don’t last long. I personally think Brevoort’s feelings on this are outdated – he is thinking like 80s TV shows that never evolve – that does not fly anymore.
they should allow characters to grow and change! change is goooood! ah well at least i’ve got ultimate spidey 😀
Brevoort never answered the question. Actually, his reasoning here nullifies his own past-stated reasons why the character was “broken” (which itself was an absurd falsehood).
But they can’t say, “We de-married him because the five of us here at Marvel like him better that way, and because we think teen boy readers want to imagine themselves having sex with the different female characters we plan to put Peter in bed with.” That would be the truth (imo), but the first reason is too self-indulgent, and the second too crass.
Brevoort never says he is against character development or progression.
So, by that rationale, we should cancel Amazing Spider-Man and stick with Ultimate Spider-Man, a Spidey who hasn’t changed too much and is still in high school, because 616 Spidey has evolved too much. He was a loner, a high school nerd with no friends. Then he went to college, got friends, started dating more, eventually graduated, got married, has worked in labs, was almost a dad, etc. I know being married made him less popular to me when I was 12. Oh, wait, no it didn’t because I was reading since the age of 5 and saw the character progression and it was what I loved about the book. And no, that does not mean I wanted to see the character grow old and die.
That image on the left is one of my favorite covers.
Th problem is that while it may be true that the marriage is not what makes spidey cool, the fact that no one is ready to let go and move on is really the biggest issue. Marvel keeps trying to tell us and force us to believe that the marriage ending is for the best, and the fans want to fight for the marriage. Until both sides can move on and let go, this will always be a mark on spidey’s image.
I don’t have an issue with anything he says. Remember guys, it’s his opinion! He is just lucky enough to be in a position where his opinion affects the characters status quo. I have personally never had a problem with the marriage but I can definitely see what he is saying.
There burst my bubble of hope that we might see some changes with the new EIC…oh well.
Oops, sorry for the redundant posting. Didn’t think the first one went through!
For as long as spiderman continues to exist, we’ll probably see him be married, unmarried and married etc throughout the ages…
And they can’t be appealing and married because…?
*sigh. Yeah, whatever. OMD and BND forced me away from being a subscriber. I’ll come back when the marriage is back. Oh, and I’m 27, so shouldn’t I be right in the middle of the targeted audience? Or am I too old?
It’s interesting that he makes a point of saying that the marriage has little to do with the appeal of the character. If that’s the case then the same is true of his “swingin’ single” status.
He’s right about one thing. The appeal of characters like Superman or Spider-Man has little (if anything) to do with their marital status, one way or another. The thing is, and this is a point that has been beaten to death over the past few years, once the character has been married, reversing that becomes a very risky proposition. You only have to look at Spidey to see that. Whatever the merits of the book itself, so much importance was placed on his marriage (or lack thereof) that Marvel was perfectly willing to compromise the character and fracture the fanbase in the name of a status quo that “has very little to do” with his appeal.
Brevoort’s faulty logic fails in that it makes no allowance for the strength or weakness of the writing for that character, married or otherwise, which is the key to story success. Editors should absolutely know this. The character certainly wasn’t “diminished” while married with writers like DeMatteis, Straczynski, Fraction, Aguirre-Sacasa, David and Jenkins, for example. The Mephisto Deal, the magical marriage eraser… this had nothing to do with “diminished characters” and everything to do with editors making short-sighted decisions for the wrong reasons.