MARVEL SPOTLIGHT: JMS (rare interviews?)

[Revolutionary_Jack]

As for New Avengers, the creative team mattered. The book would not have sold as well if Chuck Austen had gotten Spider-Man and Wolverine for the team.

Creative teams do matter but they are not always sufficient. There are plenty of comics, good runs that didn't do as well as it should, which got cancelled and so on.

In the case of New Avengers, you had Bendis but he also got to do one of those "Absolute Firsts", i.e. an Avengers ongoing with Spider-Man, Wolverine, Cap, Tony, side-by-side...aka the actually most prominent and famous Marvel heroes in a team together.

So yeah the team counts for some but what truly gave New Avengers value is that it had Spider-Man and Wolverine as regular ongoing team members of an Avengers team for the first time. That's what gave it value.

Without that, I don't think it's reasonable to expect and assume that New Avengers would have been as successful as it became.

[Huntsman Spider]

I think a big chunk of the anti-Tony sentiment came from the character's depiction in the Civil War spinoffs, rather than the actual mini-series which was more even-handed. Part of it is that there was no book that showed the pro-registration side to the extent Frontline and JMS/ Garney' Spider-Man showed the anti-registration side.

As for New Avengers, the creative team mattered. The book would not have sold as well if Chuck Austen had gotten Spider-Man and Wolverine for the team.

Even so, Civil War proper had a cyborg Thor clone deployed as a weapon against the anti-registration forces, only to go out of control and kill Bill Foster, with the (attempted) justification afterward being that he was an enemy combatant and therefore, by inference, couldn't or shouldn't have expected mercy from those tasked with halting the anti-registration side's illegal activities. That was the moment things went off the rails in terms of depicting the pro-registration side as still having any claim to the moral high ground over the anti-registration side.

[Kaitou D. Kid]

I think a big chunk of the anti-Tony sentiment came from the character's depiction in the Civil War spinoffs, rather than the actual mini-series which was more even-handed. Part of it is that there was no book that showed the pro-registration side to the extent Frontline and JMS/ Garney' Spider-Man showed the anti-registration side.

In a way, the anti-Tony sentiment goes back to Marvel's inception. Spider-Man initially sold well with a lot of young students that were politically involved and that were being accused by the media of a lot of the same stuff the Bugle accuses Spidey of.

Those students hated a lot of real-life industrialists that were similar to Tony. That was part of why Iron Man got created in the first place. Stan wanted to experiment and see if they could sell a character that shared traits with people their readers hated.

I have nothing against Tony as a character, but he technically does have more in common with Norman Osborn than with Uncle Ben. He works for what Stan & Jack were going for but he is such a wrong fit for mentor in the context of Spider-Man.

[Revolutionary_Jack]

In a way, the anti-Tony sentiment in the context of Spider-Man goes back to Marvel's inception. Spider-Man initially sold well with a lot of young students that were politically involved and that were being accused by the media of a lot of the same stuff the Bugle accuses Spidey of.

Those students hated a lot of real-life industrialists similar to Tony. That was partly why Iron Man got created in the first place. Stan wanted to see if they could sell a character with traits that their readers hated.

That's what Lee later said. In truth Lee was himself someone with centrist political ideas at the time (and also fond of Ayn Rand, it was him who introduced Ditko to her works) and I think Iron Man came about because he wanted more heroes, and also to some extent, a character who was closer to him in age and personality than the other characters he made (Tony being in his 40s, or pushing 40 when he became a hero, similar to Lee when he started on Fantastic Four).

Still the fact is Iron Man didn't take off or become popular in that time or later. His titles have never really been #1.

[Kaitou D. Kid]

That's what Lee later said. In truth Lee was himself someone with centrist political ideas at the time (and also fond of Ayn Rand, it was him who introduced Ditko to her works) and I think Iron Man came about because he wanted more heroes, and also to some extent, a character who was closer to him in age and personality than the other characters he made (Tony being in his 40s, or pushing 40 when he became a hero, similar to Lee when he started on Fantastic Four).

Still the fact is Iron Man didn't take off or become popular in that time or later. His titles have never really been #1.

I don't think Lee was ever heavily into Rand. From what I read, he was the type to read something and move along. It was Ditko who took Lee's casual compliments of Rand's work as more serious than they were and decided to look into her.

Plus Rand was popular with a lot of non-Randians at the time. A lot of that is because half the stuff she said were truisms (i.e. "Freedom is good.").

[Lukmendes]

He appeared again to yell to Matt about going back to DD and Matt pretty much bluffed his way out of the situation when Peter was ready to figth. He is gonna appear in futures issues, with some luck they would know eacth other identities again.

Starting with issue 23, judging by the cover, and I really hope Spidey and DD at least work things out before DD ends up in jail, as their friendship before they ended up forgetting each other's secret identities was one of my favorite things in the Marvel Universe setting.

Nice, thanks.

Yeah, that was a hilarious moment of comeuppance, though my favorite was Aunt May stepping up and laying down the law.

Parkers making Wolverine their bitch, wonder if MJ did anything .

Even so, Civil War proper had a cyborg Thor clone deployed as a weapon against the anti-registration forces, only to go out of control and kill Bill Foster, with the (attempted) justification afterward being that he was an enemy combatant and therefore, by inference, couldn't or shouldn't have expected mercy from those tasked with halting the anti-registration side's illegal activities. That was the moment things went off the rails in terms of depicting the pro-registration side as still having any claim to the moral high ground over the anti-registration side.

Yeah, pro-registration just looked shittier overall, and considering anti-registration was dumb enough to think calling someone like fucking Punisher was a good idea, that shows how bad pro-registration had it.

Why would Marvel even think that pro-registration was a good idea when anything similar to it used before, specifically with the X-Men, were always seen as a bad idea? So dumb to change that point of view, and not make the government look right, since just the way pro-registration started was bad enough since it was victim blaming the Super-heroes... 'Cause they're totally at fault that one super-hero team is to blame for failing to capture a super villain whose super power is exploding himself, don't blame the villains or anything...

[Huntsman Spider]

Nice, thanks.



Parkers making Wolverine their bitch, wonder if MJ did anything .



Yeah, pro-registration just looked shittier overall, and considering anti-registration was dumb enough to think calling someone like fucking Punisher was a good idea, that shows how bad pro-registration had it.

Why would Marvel even think that pro-registration was a good idea when anything similar to it used before, specifically with the X-Men, were always seen as a bad idea? So dumb to change that point of view, and not make the government look right, since just the way pro-registration started was bad enough since it was victim blaming the Super-heroes... 'Cause they're totally at fault that one super-hero team is to blame for failing to capture a super villain whose super power is exploding himself, don't blame the villains or anything...

You're welcome, and if it helps, she slapped him in the face for trying to hit on her after Peter had just died (before his rebirth) midway through The Other, though Logan later admitted he was trying to help her cope with Peter's death by giving her someone to take her anger out on that could take it and not be bothered. Somewhat good intentions, but rather dubious logic, come to think of it.

As for Civil War, while a point could be made that superheroes, particularly the younger set, needed some form of improved supervision and oversight to keep from reckless moves like what led to the Stamford Disaster, that point got lost when the pro-registration side started locking anti-registration heroes up in an extradimensional prison to avoid (having to abide by) due process laws on Earth. Not to mention that like you said, nobody --- with the exception of Wolverine and Namor, since Namorita of the New Warriors was an Atlantean --- went after Nitro, the actual culprit, for Stamford because they were too busy fighting each other and/or S.H.I.E.L.D. over registration, which only went through due to the public and the politicians (somewhat opportunistically on the politicians' part, perhaps) aiming their ire and grief at superheroes in general.