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Gilda · 11-25-2005, 05:25 PM

Heroes reborn:

In the mid-1990's, Marvel was floundering. They had been very, very big in the boom of the early 90's, riding on the backs of a bunch of hot young artists like Jim Lee and Rob Leifeld. Marvel promoted them superstar style, marketing the artist rather than the character or writer. This worked, but had an unexpected effect. The hot artists left Marvel to start their own company, Image, which was to focus on high quality art over everything else.

Marvel hit financial difficulties soon after, when the comics boom went bust. They were taken over by a corporate raider who knew nothing about comics, stories were driven by marketing rather than art and story concerns, and the successful X-Men crossover led to a massive, badly failed Spider-Man Crossover in which they attempted to claim Peter Parker was actually a clone, retire him, an replace him with a newer, younger Spider-Man named Ben Reilly, who was originally thought to be the clone but turned out to be the original. Fans hated it, and they reset to the status quo with a truly awful John Byrne run. Byrne was fantastic on Uncanny X-Men in the 70's, equally good at revamping Fantastic Four in the early 80's, and did a very nice job rebooting Superman in the mid 80's. As his reputation grew, so did his ego, and his version of Spider-Man was a travesty. Marvel's icon continued to flounder.

The X-franchises were still selling well, but that was it. Former core books Fantastic Four, Avengers, and Iron Man were selling poorly. Captain America was doing ok on the back of its best run in a decade with Mark Waid, one of the best in the biz, writing.

Marvel, desperate, decided to try outsourcing their lesser books. Keeping the X-books in house along with Spider-Man, they decided to reboot the others. A massive crossover was put into play. A supervillain named Onslaught, a merged being made of Prof X and Magneto, threatened to destroy the universe. In a last second effort to protect his parents, Franklin Richards created a brand new universe from nowhere, and sent the FF, Avengers, Iron Man, and Captain America into it.

Captain America and Avengers were given to Rob Leifeld, while Fantastic Four and Iron man were given to Jim Lee. Leifeld couldn't hold up producing his issues, and they were shipped over to Lee after six issues, to be finished out there.

Iron Man, Avengers, and Fantastic Four were in bad shape before, and they all recovered nicely afterwards with Heroes Return, particularly the Avengers under Kurt Busiek, one the best writers in the biz and an incredibly nice guy, who also wrote some of the best Iron Man stories in a great while.

Captain America already had two strikes against it because the Waid/Garney run that had been going before Heroes Reborn was a critical darling and a favorite among the hard core fans and comic geeks (like me). It was being drawn by Rob Leifeld, who seems to be a polarizing artist. Casual fans seem to like him, while the hard core geeks (like me) hate the hyper-muscular drawings, poor anatomy, and hard to process action. Captain America #1 in particular suffered from a big problem with the art. Among other problems, Cap's shield would change size relative to Cap from panel to panel. The book was rife with visual continuity errors. Add to this the hostility already in place as a result of Waid being dumped, and the built in dislike among the hard core fans, and it was a complete failure.

Fantastic Four was generally ok, Iron Man the same, Avengers and Captain America a dismal failure for the first 6 issues, but recovered in Leifeld's absense, and came back strong after Heroes Return.

All that said, enjoy what you like. If the super-muscular look and frenetic action style Leifeld uses work for you, that just means we have different taste.

Hope that helps a bit.

Gilda

11-25-2005, 05:25 PM	#38 (permalink)
Gilda 32 flavors and then some Location: Out on a wire.	Heroes reborn: In the mid-1990's, Marvel was floundering. They had been very, very big in the boom of the early 90's, riding on the backs of a bunch of hot young artists like Jim Lee and Rob Leifeld. Marvel promoted them superstar style, marketing the artist rather than the character or writer. This worked, but had an unexpected effect. The hot artists left Marvel to start their own company, Image, which was to focus on high quality art over everything else. Marvel hit financial difficulties soon after, when the comics boom went bust. They were taken over by a corporate raider who knew nothing about comics, stories were driven by marketing rather than art and story concerns, and the successful X-Men crossover led to a massive, badly failed Spider-Man Crossover in which they attempted to claim Peter Parker was actually a clone, retire him, an replace him with a newer, younger Spider-Man named Ben Reilly, who was originally thought to be the clone but turned out to be the original. Fans hated it, and they reset to the status quo with a truly awful John Byrne run. Byrne was fantastic on Uncanny X-Men in the 70's, equally good at revamping Fantastic Four in the early 80's, and did a very nice job rebooting Superman in the mid 80's. As his reputation grew, so did his ego, and his version of Spider-Man was a travesty. Marvel's icon continued to flounder. The X-franchises were still selling well, but that was it. Former core books Fantastic Four, Avengers, and Iron Man were selling poorly. Captain America was doing ok on the back of its best run in a decade with Mark Waid, one of the best in the biz, writing. Marvel, desperate, decided to try outsourcing their lesser books. Keeping the X-books in house along with Spider-Man, they decided to reboot the others. A massive crossover was put into play. A supervillain named Onslaught, a merged being made of Prof X and Magneto, threatened to destroy the universe. In a last second effort to protect his parents, Franklin Richards created a brand new universe from nowhere, and sent the FF, Avengers, Iron Man, and Captain America into it. Captain America and Avengers were given to Rob Leifeld, while Fantastic Four and Iron man were given to Jim Lee. Leifeld couldn't hold up producing his issues, and they were shipped over to Lee after six issues, to be finished out there. Iron Man, Avengers, and Fantastic Four were in bad shape before, and they all recovered nicely afterwards with Heroes Return, particularly the Avengers under Kurt Busiek, one the best writers in the biz and an incredibly nice guy, who also wrote some of the best Iron Man stories in a great while. Captain America already had two strikes against it because the Waid/Garney run that had been going before Heroes Reborn was a critical darling and a favorite among the hard core fans and comic geeks (like me). It was being drawn by Rob Leifeld, who seems to be a polarizing artist. Casual fans seem to like him, while the hard core geeks (like me) hate the hyper-muscular drawings, poor anatomy, and hard to process action. Captain America #1 in particular suffered from a big problem with the art. Among other problems, Cap's shield would change size relative to Cap from panel to panel. The book was rife with visual continuity errors. Add to this the hostility already in place as a result of Waid being dumped, and the built in dislike among the hard core fans, and it was a complete failure. Fantastic Four was generally ok, Iron Man the same, Avengers and Captain America a dismal failure for the first 6 issues, but recovered in Leifeld's absense, and came back strong after Heroes Return. All that said, enjoy what you like. If the super-muscular look and frenetic action style Leifeld uses work for you, that just means we have different taste. Hope that helps a bit. Gilda __________________ I'm against ending blackness. I believe that everyone has a right to be black, it's a choice, and I support that. ~Steven Colbert