In the event thread I made, I proposed a soft reboot and relaunch akin to DC Rebirth to revitalize the Marvel Comics brand in what is likely their last chance to stay alive. Well, I've put more thought into it, and here's what I propose for such a thing if it were to become real. I think DC Rebirth was their best move in the '10s, and it's a shame that they failed and ended up in a worse place than the New 52. But even still, Rebirth was great while it lasted, so let's capture that and hope to keep the magic.

The proposal:

Marvel Returns

Marvel Returns is a line-wide relaunch and a soft reboot of the Marvel Comics brand. The goal is not to hard reset the continuity from zero, but to bring back everything that's loved about Marvel Comics. The basic premise is that some kind of time fluctuation (explored in a later story) altered recent history. The last eight real world years of Marvel Comics have been rewritten to be a continuation of what came before it, and the original 2012-2020 era is jettisoned off into an alternate timeline. This allows Marvel to pick what works, change what can improve, and scrap what needs to be scrapped. It's all connected to the pre-2012 continuity, still 616, but the effects and ramifications are explored in later comics and there's some meta commentary on the state of what Marvel Comics became (like Ms. Marvel Carol looking in disgust and sheer horror at the sight of Captain Marvel Carol).

The name has a double meaning. The first is that it's based on the iconic storyline Heroes Return, which was about the undoing of Heroes Reborn, making it an apt comparison. It also means that Marvel, the real Marvel, is back with a vengeance and ready to right all the wrongs of the last eight years, and make the brand better than ever. No more fooling around.

Like with DC Rebirth, there's a unifying Marvel Returns banner on the comics, from floppies to trades, to spread the message of what they're doing. Content is rolled out in Waves after certain periods of time, building off of past success.

General Changes
  • Completely revamped creative talent. Many experienced creators from the past rejoin, and bring their skills to the task. Many promising newcomers are hired from sources that aren't Twitter fan art. The driving factor for hiring is not "woman writes woman", "black writes black", "gay writes gay" etc. but rather "how good they are as a creator", the way it should be.
  • Emphasis on on good, well-written, agenda-free stories with good art and a hard ban on any Tumblr-esque style. Politics should be handled like '80s Marvel, not like '10s, ie more nuance and mixed in with quality storytelling and other influences besides being disgruntled with the real world and projecting it on the reader.
  • Characters are restored to their classic characterizations and personalities. Examples below.
  • No events for at least a year, preferably at least 18 months and longer, so as to actually allow a status quo to be set.
  • Experiment with new characters, and by that I mean actually new characters, the kind you would see Marvel experiment in the '80s at their creative height, NOT lazy token diversity swaps. I had ideas for characters before, which I will share below to show you later, proving that you can come up with cool new heroes if you put your mind to it. Not even that hard, I've spent 20 minutes thinking of the ones below, and will spend maybe an hour or two typing it. It may sound like me flexing creative muscles, but there's a reason for it: Marvel is known as the House of Ideas. They need to rebuild that house by coming up with cool new ideas. I'll demonstrate how that can be done.
  • Related to the above, bring back the classic title Marvel Premiere, which is an anthology that's about telling 2-3 issue stories with these characters as an introduction. If received well enough, they get the greenlight for an ongoing, which further integrates them into the world by having them interact with established characters while taking part in different stories. Sounds reasonable to me, and would be a great way to engage with your customers while adding something new and exciting for a change.
  • Overall, it's darker and edgier. I don't mean that in the '90s "dark age" sense, but more like the '80s sort of way mixing idealism with cynicism in proper measure. No pulling punches, basically. Oh, speaking of which...
  • In general, the '80s is a big influence. That was the golden era of creativity and storytelling, and that's what should be looked at as a blueprint. A balance is struck between fun superheroes and mature writing, there's a very tight continuity maintained so that everything that happens has an effect and there's synergy across the titles (make sure you get good editors!), new heroes that people would likely want to read about are introduced, you have actual creative teams on a run, and not swapped-out artists, events are contained, more diverse and experimental genre content, actual story progression... you get the idea. Really, just go through this list and try to do as much of that as you can.


Specific Changes
  • Carol Danvers is now Ms. Marvel again with the iconic sexy look, with her genuinely flawed but much more likable personality.
  • Same with Spider-Woman, She-Hulk, Psylocke and so on.
  • Falcon never becomes Cap, X-23 doesn't become Wolverine, Amadeus Cho remains a brainy nerd but doesn't become Hulk. Their characters instead develop naturally.
  • Miles Morales exists but has an all new identity and is written more like ITSV and PS4
  • Same with Kamala Khan who is also given more depth as a character and less emphasis on her religion/race.
  • Wolverine is now an R-rated action hero as a comic book character, like he should be.
  • Spider-Man is portrayed like his better stories and not like in Dan Slott's run.
  • Iceman is no longer forcibly made gay after decades of being straight.
  • The Fantastic Four are the greatest team of the setting and treated as such.
  • Quicksilver and Scarlet Witch are now mutants and Magneto's children again.
  • Jane Foster remains a civilian and never becomes Thor.
  • X-Men are now back in Westchester.
  • Other characters like Riri Williams, America Chavez, and a lot of the Champions are put on the backburner and HEAVILY reinvented if reintroduced. Characters like the New New Warriors and Children of the Atom no longer exist.


Wave One

Wave One features most of the flagship titles, with some lesser-known but well-liked additions.

Spider-Man:
  1. The Amazing Spider-Man
  2. Marvel Team-Up
  3. Venom

Fantastic Four:
  1. Main Title
  2. Marvel Two-in-One

X-Men:
  1. Uncanny X-Men
  2. X-Force
  3. New Mutants
  4. Wolverine

The Avengers:
  1. Main Title
  2. Iron Man
  3. Captain America
  4. The Mighty Thor
  5. Ms. Marvel (starring Carol Danvers)
  6. She-Hulk
  7. Hawkeye

Teams:
  1. Guardians of the Galaxy
  2. Thunderbolts

Solos:
  1. Daredevil
  2. Deadpool
  3. Doctor Strange
  4. The Incredible Hulk
  5. Marvel Premiere
  6. Nova (starring Richard Rider)
  7. The Punisher


Wave Two

A second wave of new content, a lot of the more more lesser-known properties with the idea of reintroducing them to new readers. Also, a subsection called "The New Heroes", which is six new ongoings about the heroes introduced in Marvel Premiere in Wave One.

X-Men:
  1. Alpha Flight
  2. Cable
  3. Excalibur
  4. Shadowcat (Kitty Pryde's first ongoing)
  5. X-Factor

The Avengers:
  1. Black Panther
  2. Black Widow
  3. Spider-Woman
  4. War Machine
  5. West Coast Avengers (an actual, proper relaunch of the classic this time)
  6. Young Avengers

Teams:
  1. Defenders (a return to being Marvel's non-team)
  2. Invaders
  3. New Warriors (a PROPER version of this, as an edgy but fun series, taking after Fabian Nicieza's run!)
  4. Power Pack
  5. Runaways

Solos:
  1. Alias: Jessica Jones
  2. Cloak & Dagger
  3. Moon Knight
  4. Power Man & Iron Fist

The New Heroes:
  1. Action Five
  2. Gremlin
  3. The Pretender
  4. Quantum & Jynx
  5. Suppressor
  6. Warbird

After thinking about this and typing it out, I realize it may not be perfect. A lot of people might be happy, but some will be mad and complain. You can't please everyone, but you can make the best decision for your business that pleases the most people. It's fine to like the new stuff Marvel was putting out, but it's also fact that many hated it, and this had caused sales to nosedive each year. There is simply no way you can argue that the new direction was good from a business standpoint, and all that reached a breaking point with New New Warriors right when COVID struck. That said, if you have any criticism, genuine criticism, please share. I'd love to discuss comics with other passionate minds who want to see Marvel recover.

Thanks.