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  1. #1
    Astonishing Member your_name_here's Avatar
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    Default Missed Opportunities

    As the title suggests, I want this thread to be about what we feel were missed opportunities in stories. No matter how good/bad the stories were, this is all just personal opinion.

    I’ll start with Secret Invasion.

    This was a HUGE chance for Marvel, to explain/rectify retcons and almost give Marvel a soft reboot if they needed to. We could have real, BIG impacts as we realised characters we have been following for some time aren’t who they say the are. It could have solved a lot of issues of dead characters returning/staying dead. Instead we got...Elektra? And that was about it. And even then she was taken at an unexplained time.

  2. #2
    Mighty Member Hybrid's Avatar
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    Sandman going back to being a crook again after spending like what 20 years legit? He was a freaking AVENGER for crying out loud. While I have enjoyed stories with him as a villain, I found the reason for that to be incredibly stupid (Wizard using mind control to make him a bad guy).

    Just think about all the stories nowadays you could've had with Sandman as a hero, an example of a crook who found a better path. But no, status quo is god and all.

  3. #3
    Astonishing Member your_name_here's Avatar
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    Another would be the return of Gorr (against modern day Thor)
    Thor becoming worthy again mid-battle, thus proving Gorrs very mission wrong...would have been a far superior and epic moment to wrap up Aaron’s big run. Malekith had no interest in Thors unworthiness, he could have been a problem for Janes Thor, as far as I’m concerned.
    Gorr was Thors greatest fear made real, so therefore proving him wrong and then defeating him with it would have shown real characters growth.

  4. #4

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    Not giving the secret empire dark Avengers solo books or even mini series. just imagine a Scarlet Witch and Vision book with her being possessed by Chthon and he being horribly corrupted by one of Zola's computer viruses. a lot of potential for horror in it. to counter it, there'd be the more humorous buddy book with Taskmaster and Black Ant getting into trouble. i wanted to see more of Eric's romance with the processing agent. we also barely saw any of Thor's reasoning for playing ball. he was clearly conflicted. might have been good to see some of that.
    Last edited by Michael Watkins; 01-13-2020 at 06:35 AM.

  5. #5
    iMan 42s
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    Where to freaking start on these...,

    1.) Pymtron
    Hank Pym being able to confront his demons worn quite literally on his sleeve and actually have closure on Ultron and the heros by proxy is wasted for some of the truly dumbest plots I have read of Ultron. That's really the big problem here. Instead of it being a character piece on Hank Pym it's just Ultron with a new gimmick and nobody has been able to justify it. Just using the composite to hammer on the tired white horse that is the slap heard around the world or fixate on how the Avengers treated Hank with nothing to justify it. It's all just so tired and cliche that you could be doing far more intriguing stories and it's wasted on Ultron just being whiny and having a face he didn't need (way to ruin character design).

    2.) OMD
    This isn't anything specific about OMD but was actually the easier thing to do and help sell tie-ins. Secret Invasion of course is the Skrull in invasion and instead of say Mephisto being the thing Spider-man turns to in order to fix a bullet wound in the Marvel universe and making the entire universe look inept just so Editorial could feel like kids again, just make it a skrull. That would've solved literally every single issue with the story. A Skrull either mascaraed as Peter or Mary Jane and we don't know who. Memories could be implanted into both or either parties to blur the line further and neither now know if their marriage is even valid anymore. They separate but don't outright divorce (to appease editorial) to see if they find their way back to each other once the crisis is over setting up BND's status quo. Like if they just waited a bit longer to have their ducks in a row and while it wouldn't have been perfect saved us the single worst story to have ever come from he who shall not be named.

    3.)Reboot 2099
    So Spider-man 2099 has to go to Spider-man of 2019 to help him save the future. Events in ASM during the 2099 event have almost **** all to do with the 2099 books despite being apart of and the catalyst for the event. So basically what they did was try to reboot 2099 and it seems nobody took to it for what is partially a political message that doesn't know what its talking about, and being non-engaging to the reader because it has no payoff (they never confront Doom, who is also not Doom in either the future or past so it's entirely a new guy we haven't met using the name, and never restore prior continuity in favor of this inept version). It's not a matter of time, ASM double ships and so had more than enough time to help the event it itself set into motion. It also took from the Doom book running before and then at the same time in plot points that Doom actually did better than this and is supposed to take place before it. So it's the comicbook equivalent of the copied homework meme even if somehow it was completely accidental.
    -----------------------------------
    For anyone that needs to know why OMD is awful please search the internet for Linkara' s video's specifically his One more day review or his One more day Analysis.

  6. #6
    Tyrant Sun User leokearon's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by your_name_here View Post
    Another would be the return of Gorr (against modern day Thor)
    Thor becoming worthy again mid-battle, thus proving Gorrs very mission wrong...would have been a far superior and epic moment to wrap up Aaron’s big run. Malekith had no interest in Thors unworthiness, he could have been a problem for Janes Thor, as far as I’m concerned.
    Gorr was Thors greatest fear made real, so therefore proving him wrong and then defeating him with it would have shown real characters growth.
    Not to mention Thor was already worthy again at the end of Hickman's run, but that was undone.

    Using the remaking of the multiverse at the end of Secret Wars and not using it to fix things (like M-Day and Sins Past) was a really big missed opportunity

  7. #7
    Extraordinary Member Gaastra's Avatar
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    Sandman going back to being a crook again after spending like what 20 years legit? He was a freaking AVENGER for crying out loud. While I have enjoyed stories with him as a villain, I found the reason for that to be incredibly stupid (Wizard using mind control to make him a bad guy).
    And marvel could cure him anytime. Reed has cured that machine twice! Other then Polaris and spider-man has there been any of hero that has been mind controlled and the hero just says "i'm to busy. Just leave him mind controlled!" "not worth my time!"

  8. #8
    Uncanny Member Digifiend's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by your_name_here View Post
    As the title suggests, I want this thread to be about what we feel were missed opportunities in stories. No matter how good/bad the stories were, this is all just personal opinion.

    I’ll start with Secret Invasion.

    This was a HUGE chance for Marvel, to explain/rectify retcons and almost give Marvel a soft reboot if they needed to. We could have real, BIG impacts as we realised characters we have been following for some time aren’t who they say the are. It could have solved a lot of issues of dead characters returning/staying dead. Instead we got...Elektra? And that was about it. And even then she was taken at an unexplained time.
    Mockingbird and Spider-Woman also turned out to be Skrulls, which nullified Bobbi's death from way back in the 1980s!

    I think Lifebringer Galactus and Infamous Iron Man should've lasted longer. Both were undone before the Richards family came home, so Reed and Sue never got to react to them seemingly pulling heel face turns.
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  9. #9
    iMan 42s
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    Quote Originally Posted by Digifiend View Post
    Mockingbird and Spider-Woman also turned out to be Skrulls, which nullified Bobbi's death from way back in the 1980s!

    I think Lifebringer Galactus and Infamous Iron Man should've lasted longer. Both were undone before the Richards family came home, so Reed and Sue never got to react to them seemingly pulling heel face turns.
    I'm still baffled that we got that plot about batteries than Reed confronting a "heroic" version of Doctor Doom. There is so much wrong with that battery plot I'm surprised it got published.
    -----------------------------------
    For anyone that needs to know why OMD is awful please search the internet for Linkara' s video's specifically his One more day review or his One more day Analysis.

  10. #10
    Formerly Assassin Spider Huntsman Spider's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by SuperiorIronman View Post
    Where to freaking start on these...,

    1.) Pymtron
    Hank Pym being able to confront his demons worn quite literally on his sleeve and actually have closure on Ultron and the heros by proxy is wasted for some of the truly dumbest plots I have read of Ultron. That's really the big problem here. Instead of it being a character piece on Hank Pym it's just Ultron with a new gimmick and nobody has been able to justify it. Just using the composite to hammer on the tired white horse that is the slap heard around the world or fixate on how the Avengers treated Hank with nothing to justify it. It's all just so tired and cliche that you could be doing far more intriguing stories and it's wasted on Ultron just being whiny and having a face he didn't need (way to ruin character design).

    2.) OMD
    This isn't anything specific about OMD but was actually the easier thing to do and help sell tie-ins. Secret Invasion of course is the Skrull in invasion and instead of say Mephisto being the thing Spider-man turns to in order to fix a bullet wound in the Marvel universe and making the entire universe look inept just so Editorial could feel like kids again, just make it a skrull. That would've solved literally every single issue with the story. A Skrull either mascaraed as Peter or Mary Jane and we don't know who. Memories could be implanted into both or either parties to blur the line further and neither now know if their marriage is even valid anymore. They separate but don't outright divorce (to appease editorial) to see if they find their way back to each other once the crisis is over setting up BND's status quo. Like if they just waited a bit longer to have their ducks in a row and while it wouldn't have been perfect saved us the single worst story to have ever come from he who shall not be named.

    3.)Reboot 2099
    So Spider-man 2099 has to go to Spider-man of 2019 to help him save the future. Events in ASM during the 2099 event have almost **** all to do with the 2099 books despite being apart of and the catalyst for the event. So basically what they did was try to reboot 2099 and it seems nobody took to it for what is partially a political message that doesn't know what its talking about, and being non-engaging to the reader because it has no payoff (they never confront Doom, who is also not Doom in either the future or past so it's entirely a new guy we haven't met using the name, and never restore prior continuity in favor of this inept version). It's not a matter of time, ASM double ships and so had more than enough time to help the event it itself set into motion. It also took from the Doom book running before and then at the same time in plot points that Doom actually did better than this and is supposed to take place before it. So it's the comicbook equivalent of the copied homework meme even if somehow it was completely accidental.
    Generally agreed with all of those, although I'd have retconned OMD as Mysterio using amped-up illusions (since he really did come back from hell and all that) to trick Peter into believing none of those other heroes (or even Doctor Doom) could help him and make him desperate enough to accept Mephisto's offer. As for the 2099 relaunch/reboot, it definitely deserved to be handled/plotted better than it actually was. I get that maybe it was meant to lead into an ongoing series where much of our complaints would have been answered and resolved, but even so, with no actual cohesion in regards to how it was launched in the first place, where would the encouragement for readers to invest long-term come from?

    Quote Originally Posted by Digifiend View Post
    Mockingbird and Spider-Woman also turned out to be Skrulls, which nullified Bobbi's death from way back in the 1980s!

    I think Lifebringer Galactus and Infamous Iron Man should've lasted longer. Both were undone before the Richards family came home, so Reed and Sue never got to react to them seemingly pulling heel face turns.
    The most disappointing part of that, to me, is that Valeria Richards never got to see her faith that her "Uncle Doom" really did have a capacity for good rewarded.
    The spider is always on the hunt.

  11. #11
    Astonishing Member mugiwara's Avatar
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    1) X-Women
    They had Claremont and Manara of all people on a comics about the X-Women and they made it SFW. By far the biggest wasted opportunity.

    2) Dan Slott writing ASM for 10 years and not using Komodo one single time, not even in Lizard related stories.
    There are writers who bring their own creations in every comics they write, to the point it's annoying. And unfortunately there is also the extreme opposite: writers who drop their own creations as soon as they get to play with the big toys. Another instance would be Fraction not using The Order in X-Men, not even for a single issue.

    3) Not having on-panel reunions between long-time dead characters and their friends. Like Cypher andMagik with Wolfsbane and Magneto. That can also apply to the current resurrections on Krakoa, although maybe there are still opportunities to tell those stories in flashbacks.
    Bringing back the old, killing the young: that's the Marvel way

  12. #12
    iMan 42s
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    Another Spider-man related missed opportunity but just what in the Hell was the Bride supposed to be anyways?

    Kaine and MC2 Peter's son I kind of get even if it's completely arbitrary for Benjy to be the youngest. Otherwise there is an actual Other entity attached to Kaine..., but what is the Bride? Maybe this was explained somewhere but it's never brought up in the event and the web as well as ritual is treated as genuine. So the Bride has some role and it's just never elaborated on. Cindy was the big breakout character (one would assume anyways) and it's not brought up in the event, it's not in her own book, and Web Warriors don't bring it up either. She's just important for reasons unknown to the reader.

    Speaking of Web Warriors,
    Why is it that the whole of reality to explore, all of the crazy and mind bending ways of spinning Spider-man, and all of them function identically to Spiders/Spider-man of our universe? They also fought an multidimensional sinister six which also happens to be made of alternate six members. So within the whole of the multiverse the biggest differences between each other might as well be branding. None of the character's even get much a chance to shine with much of the focus being on Gwen and not enough to stand-out even among themselves given the only difference was costume.
    -----------------------------------
    For anyone that needs to know why OMD is awful please search the internet for Linkara' s video's specifically his One more day review or his One more day Analysis.

  13. #13
    Formerly Assassin Spider Huntsman Spider's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by mugiwara View Post
    1) X-Women
    They had Claremont and Manara of all people on a comics about the X-Women and they made it SFW. By far the biggest wasted opportunity.

    2) Dan Slott writing ASM for 10 years and not using Komodo one single time, not even in Lizard related stories.
    There are writers who bring their own creations in every comics they write, to the point it's annoying. And unfortunately there is also the extreme opposite: writers who drop their own creations as soon as they get to play with the big toys. Another instance would be Fraction not using The Order in X-Men, not even for a single issue.

    3) Not having on-panel reunions between long-time dead characters and their friends. Like Cypher andMagik with Wolfsbane and Magneto. That can also apply to the current resurrections on Krakoa, although maybe there are still opportunities to tell those stories in flashbacks.
    Number 2, I definitely agree with. I could have seen maximum awkwardness between Spider-Man and Komodo in light of their encounter in Avengers: The Initiative, or him mentoring the last surviving Initiative Scarlet Spider. Hell, bring in the entire original The Initiative cast for Spider-Man to have mentored during that run. I'd love to see them as the special class Spidey teaches.

    Speaking of Spider-Man and missed opportunities, I'd have loved to see the last Scarlet Spider series resolve the plot threads left dangling in the 90s Clone Saga regarding Ben Reilly's and Kaine's stories, as well as have Ben atone for his actions in The Clone Conspiracy by tracking down and stopping the more criminally minded "reanimates" that survived. For example, the resurgence of the Great Game that Kaine participated in and Ben had to shut down would have been perfect for Las Vegas in light of its status as the gambling hub of America. Then there was picking up on what happened to Ben's supporting cast, especially Elizabeth Tyne/Janine Godbe; did she ever get out of prison for killing her abusive stepfather, for one, and/or did she have a son with Ben like in the MC2 comics? Oh, and what about Kaine's guardianship of Aracely/Hummingbird in light of her being (possibly) the reincarnation of the Aztec god Huitzilopochtli and the prophesized rise of Mictlan (the Aztec underworld/realm of the dead)? Come to think of it, Ben could end up tied to that as well, being punished for tampering in the domain of life and death by being forced to become Mictlan's champion in the same way Kaine was Aracely's champion, bringing the Scarlet Spiders into conflict with each other once more.
    The spider is always on the hunt.

  14. #14
    Uncanny Member Digifiend's Avatar
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    War of the Realms: Journey into Mystery, starring Miles Morales and Kate Bishop. Miles dated Ultimate Kate (who turned out to be a Hydra agent!) but because he doesn't remember much of Earth-1610, it never got mentioned.
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  15. #15

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    Spider-Men II: The Ultimate universe is back, but just as an epilogue: Miles does not return to it (not even just for that specific story and then back). All the questions caused by Miles being transferred from one universe to the other were still there and did not get any reasonable answer. It's not even a story set in it. It introduced the 616 and adult Miles Morales, but both Miles never really interact with each other and he's away at the end of the story.

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