"Whoa! That was almost cancelled??"

[Michael P]

'91 was a bit too early for bankruptcy to be looming.

[FanboyStranger]

'91 was a bit too early for bankruptcy to be looming.

I was speaking about the period in general, not specifically the moment when Lobdell was hired. Marvel was considered very unfriendly to creators from '90-'96. The bankruptcy becomes a bigger factor later in that period, but there was a sense that Marvel was in flux and uncertain as far as its ownership. Part of this was the distribution fiasco, part of it was that they were more interested in producing toys than quality comics, and part of it was a general reluctance to give creators credit.

[Michael P]

That much is certainly true.

[sonofspam1972]

This probably doesn't count as almost cancelled but Punisher didn't really become popular into the mid-80's. It's been a long time, but I remember some late 70's Spidey comics where they tried to soften him. He was shooting folks with rubber "mercy bullets" and swinging behind Spiderman on a his web line.

I dont think they where trying to soften him as much as having to deal with the comic code at the time.

[FanboyStranger]

I dont think they where trying to soften him as much as having to deal with the comic code at the time.

I think it had more to do with the character gaining some popularity, and Marvel testing the waters to see if he could be a viable character. We also had some intense b&w stories in Marvel Premiere (or Marvel Spotlight... I always get the two confused). I think the real turning point for the character was Frank Miller using him in DD, and creators really seeing the potential in the character. Steven Grant's mini would be a few years later.

[FabianNicieza]

The truth is that Marvel was in its nadir as far as creator relations at the time. The brass had decreed that it was solely the characters that mattered, and talent was essentially interchangable and replacable. As a result, they were bleeding talent. Furthermore, the spectre of bankruptcy was looming, so established talent also questioned Marvel's stability-- not just in the sense of getting paid, but who might buy the company and make changes. This was the era when assistant editors were writing every other Marvel book. Lobdell had proven he could hit deadlines and write well enough to take on a major franchise book. (And people in the office liked him.) Fabian Nicieza, himself an assistant editor before going freelance, was given the other core X-book. This would have been standard operating procedure at Marvel in the '70s when the expectation was that an editorial position would lead to writing assignments to put more cash in your pocket, but it was becoming more frowned upon by creators in the late '80s-early '90s. DC even went so far as to officially prevent editors from writing books in the early '90s (with the exception of Denny O'Neil and the occasional special project), which lead to editors like Priest, Mark Waid, Tom Peyer, and Brian Augustyn going freelance.

Your post is filled with a lot of inaccurate information and flawed interpretations of reality, but I'll just address where MY name was mentioned... if the "era" you are talking about was circa 1991, "this" was NOT a time when "assistant editors were writing every other Marvel book".

To the best of my recollection, no assistant editors had a monthly writing assignment, though several had sold inventory stories or short stories to Marvel Comics Presents. And yes, many editors (too many probably) did have monthly writing assignments.

And... I was never an assistant editor.

I started working at Marvel in 1985. I was named their Advertising Manager in 1986. I sold my first story in 1987 (Psi-Force #9) and was named the monthly writer soon thereafter. I wrote 16 issues of Psi-Force (#16-32) before it was cancelled. I continued to write inventory stories for various books (Daredevil, Web of Spider-Man, Dr. Strange, Marvel Annuals and more) and was developing the Adventures of Captain America: Sentinel of Liberty in 1988 (which wouldn't see print for a few years after that). I was named the monthly writer of both new Warriors and then Alpha Flight. I then accepted an offer to move from the Promotions Department to become an EDITOR, which is what I was doing (along with writing New Warriors and other titles) when I was also offered New Mutants/X-Force to script and then X-Men.

So basically, I had already been working on staff at Marvel, while also writing hundreds of pages of comic material for the company on a freelance basis, for 5-6 years before I was working on any X-books. Yes, I left my editorial position because I was doing so much writing, but I didn't go completely freelance, I remained on staff as a "company ombudsman" connecting various departments to each other through 1993-1994. I didn't officially leave staff and become a full-time freelance writer until early 1995, just a few months before I decided to QUIT writing the monthly X-Men title with #45.

- Fabian