Getting to the root of Marvel's New York City Problem....

Marvel constantly talks about the world outside your window but if all we ever see are the five boroughs then what is the point? How about some diversity when it comes to cities?

Folks, I get it. I get how important NYC is to the Marvel Universe. I get how important it was to Stan and Jack. The problem is the New York City they grew up in loomed three times as large in the American consciousness as the current NYC, and the other cities were just there. And that is Marvel's problem.

Sure they changed some details here and there but Marvel is still writing Stan and Jack's version of the USA. That mindset is so last millennium. Hopefully Marvel can figure out a way to move forward. If they can't there is always the imaginary city route. I would be open to that, Wakanda is awesome.

Oooooooh, how about Luke Cage in Detroit or Daredevil in Chicago?

Having them in NYC does make it easier for team-ups. Especially with the popular heroes like spider-man or doctor strange

[QUOTE=Citizen Kane;3228983]Oooooooh, how about Luke Cage in Detroit or Daredevil in Chicago?[/QUOTE]



Luke would be awesome in Detroit, but pulling him out of Harlem would be next to impossible. Then you would have to create another hero to replace him. I guess you could do a "here comes the neighborhood" scenario where Harlem starts to gentrify to the point where a white non-street level heavy hitter cape wearing primary colors costume "real" superhero shows up.

For all its efforts to appeal to a wider audience it still feels, to me, that Marvel's world is mostly new York

I realise that's not actually true, but for the big names it feels it to me

Xmen and their West chester roots aside I suppose

I am not clear on how there is an actual problem here.

[QUOTE=Carabas;3229217]I am not clear on how there is an actual problem here.[/QUOTE]

Well for me I'm not saying there is

Just that I'm reflecting on the idea marvel has said it's characters live in the world outside your widow (figuratively ) but most of their major characters seem to work in one city

Sure it's not literally true, but it's the impression a lot of books give

It's not a good or bad thing situation, more an observation I suppose

In a compony pushing the rich range of characters it has, it's modus operandi seems to be New York or there abouts for the day to day lives of many big characters I feel, there's a wide world of readers out there too is all I'm thinking,

Not all stories I appreciate nor characters, but a good chunk of the big names I think

The irony is every so often they'll move characters from NY (examples...Luke Cage, Thor, Daredevil, 70's Champions, Black Goliath, etc), but some writer or editor always brings them back.

X-Men, too. Now they're not only in New York state, in the city, but Central Park itself last I checked.

I think the Hulk was the highest profile hero of the traditional Marvel not based out of NY.

[QUOTE=Anthony W;3229009] I guess you could do a "here comes the neighborhood" scenario where Harlem starts to gentrify to the point where a white non-street level heavy hitter cape wearing primary colors costume "real" superhero shows up.[/QUOTE]

Would read.

Yeah, they definitely need to spread the heroes out more. But I can easily see fans soon wanting them back in New York because often fans are adverse to changes and new things.

[QUOTE=Citizen Kane;3228983]Oooooooh, how about Luke Cage in Detroit or Daredevil in Chicago?[/QUOTE]

The Falcon is currently in Chicago now. Didn't Luke get moved to New Orleans for Walkers run? If only briefly....

[QUOTE=Knight27;3229004]Having them in NYC does make it easier for team-ups. Especially with the popular heroes like spider-man or doctor strange[/QUOTE]

It is not like they can travel and stuff...

[QUOTE=kilderkin;3229272]Well for me I'm not saying there is

Just that I'm reflecting on the idea marvel has said it's characters live in the world outside your widow (figuratively ) but most of their major characters seem to work in one city

Sure it's not literally true, but it's the impression a lot of books give...[/QUOTE]

Wakanda, Latveria, Mutants, Galactus, most of Europe resembles a medieval village with pitch-fork-wielding lynch mobs straight from an old Hammer movie.

Marvel's characters are not ever going to live in the world outside your window, regardles of whether there's a superdiaspora from New York to the rest of the USA or not... Not even (or perhaps especially not) if you actually live in New York.

I thoroughly endorse the message in this thread. While it’s a good thing to embrace diversity in their new characters (the majority of which do come from the US, though), a bit of geographical diversity as well would be extremely welcome :) For such an extensive universe, it can feel at times to be extremely small. If anything, it seems to be shrinking further and further to the environs of New York, as other posters have remarked. Another US city would be fascinating - even more another country.

[QUOTE=Carabas;3229333]Wakanda, Latveria, Mutants, Galactus, most of Europe resembles a medieval village with pitch-fork-wielding lynch mobs straight from an old Hammer movie.

Marvel's characters are not ever going to live in the world outside your window, regardles of whether there's a superdiaspora from New York to the rest of the USA or not... Not even (or perhaps especially not) if you actually live in New York.[/QUOTE]

Well, all this is true enough, I guess. Nightcrawler’s origin is indeed notable for a hilarious band of 19th century peasants, and when I recalled that on the occasion when a superhero did venture across the Atlantic to the UK, he was to be met by a variety of stereotypes with Edwardian moustaches, wearing bowler hats, and saying things like “Jolly Good Show!” (I remember as a teenager reading The Spectacular Spider-Man 166, thinking WTF is this :)) That said, this isn’t the 80s or 90s. While Wakanda or Latveria aren’t going to change, fictional representations of other areas are going to differ from the sort of broad-based, appealing to a young(ish) audience presentation, that Chris Claremont or Gerry Conway might have given it back then.

[QUOTE=Carabas;3229333]Wakanda, Latveria, Mutants, Galactus, most of Europe resembles a medieval village with pitch-fork-wielding lynch mobs straight from an old Hammer movie.

Marvel's characters are not ever going to live in the world outside your window, regardles of whether there's a superdiaspora from New York to the rest of the USA or not... Not even (or perhaps especially not) if you actually live in New York.[/QUOTE]


Thanks, you made my point better than I could,

most of those places arnt real, space isn't where any of us live, xmen in new York now?


I never said they should live anywhere else nor that I wanted it, it was pointed out that Marvel has used the idea of there story's being set in the "real world - outside your window" when it's not the case

But

it is true that most of their big names work around there either by themselves or on a team, or as you pointed out, in a not real place at all

I'm not saying it shouldn't be this way, I'm pointing out that it is and their idea of "world outside your window" isn't so

which isn't necessarily good or bad