Did Jim Lee, Rob Liefeld, and Bob Harris ruin the X-Men?

[yogaflame]

Jim Lee was brimming with ambition in those days. He made moves. Editorial sided with him, and pushed Claremont into a corner. Except, even when Claremont was gone, it wasn't enough for him. Just half a year later Jim jumps ship to found WildStorm/Image. Ambitious.

Harras was dumb, threw the baby out with the bathwater, got played by Jim, and presided over the implosion of the once unstoppable comics line(Were it not for the success of TAS, floated largely on the strength of Claremont's characterizations and stories, the line would have imploded even faster. I mean, it didn't even take a whole decade before they had Claremont come back....).

Claremont could understand Jim's youthful ambition, and wisely understood Harras and Marvel as the true villian(can you imagine the sense of betrayal after 16 years of spinning straw into gold for those people??). Besides, at the end of the day, Claremont is always pragmatic. If Jim reached out to work with him at Image two years later, of course he's going to take the job(all the better if it helps erode Marvel's market share at the time). Only a few years later he's writing for them again. Even when the Fox films butchered his characters and stories, he towed the line. He's pragmatic more so than egotistical, despite having been used and abused by these companies. Given how a lot of writers operate in this industry, that kind of professionalism is rare(especially when no other writers have accomplished what he has).

I hope Feige rolls out the red carpet for Lord Claremont if society doesn't completely implode before he gets to the MCU X-Men.

[Castle]

Jim Lee was brimming with ambition in those days. He made moves. Editorial sided with him, and pushed Claremont into a corner. Except, even when Claremont was gone, it wasn't enough for him. Just half a year later Jim jumps ship to found WildStorm/Image. Ambitious.

Harras was dumb, threw the baby out with the bathwater, got played by Jim, and presided over the implosion of the once unstoppable comics line(Were it not for the success of TAS, floated largely on the strength of Claremont's characterizations and stories, the line would have imploded even faster. I mean, it didn't even take a whole decade before they had Claremont come back....).

Claremont could understand Jim's youthful ambition, and wisely understood Harras and Marvel as the true villian(can you imagine the sense of betrayal after 16 years of spinning straw into gold for those people??). Besides, at the end of the day, Claremont is always pragmatic. If Jim reached out to work with him at Image two years later, of course he's going to take the job(all the better if it helps erode Marvel's market share at the time). Only a few years later he's writing for them again. Even when the Fox films butchered his characters and stories, he towed the line. He's pragmatic more so than egotistical, despite having been used and abused by these companies. Given how a lot of writers operate in this industry, that kind of professionalism is rare(especially when no other writers have accomplished what he has).

I hope Feige rolls out the red carpet for Lord Claremont if society doesn't completely implode before he gets to the MCU X-Men.

A lot or people overestimate the impact of TAS, TAS added a lot sure but it was not the main thing that made X-Men, it just exposed it more. TAS did what Batman 92 did for the X-men Brand.

Nothing personal against Feige, but he is the last person that will role the red carpet for Claremont. Claremont was the main person that gave X-men all the edge, soap opera plots and darkness and themes. That goes against how Feige makes MCU movies. It's a joke to even consider Feige rolling the carpet for The Mutant Massacre, Days of future past, The Brood, Mutant Genesis or Inferno

The greatest irony of Gambit, he was purposely designed to be lame... he's basically a Mr. Sinister clone aged to his twenties (hence the eyes); and designed to be an eleven-year-old child's idea of what's cool, but lame to everybody else (Claremont has gone on record about this). As someone who was a little older when Gambit came along, he was never cool to me... hell, I thought he was lame. He was supposed to betray the X-Men.

... then he became a super star character. And his romance with Rogue. Ugh.

I still believe Gambit is a Sinister clone; and I am waiting for a writer to make it official.

Gambit's appeal was that he was a very complex X-Man. He was never truly good. He had one of the most deepest back stories of any character. He was dangerous, edgy, unpredictable. he and rogue had this electrifying chemistry that became an enduring thing even before the ship term was defined.

There were many theories of Gambit including the Sinister clone, however the best theory for me was he was the 3rd Summers brother and speaking of Claremont, one of his better series in the 2000s was X-Men: The End, Claremont did a good job exploring that theory.

[seccruz]

Jim Lee was brimming with ambition in those days. He made moves. Editorial sided with him, and pushed Claremont into a corner. Except, even when Claremont was gone, it wasn't enough for him. Just half a year later Jim jumps ship to found WildStorm/Image. Ambitious.

Harras was dumb, threw the baby out with the bathwater, got played by Jim, and presided over the implosion of the once unstoppable comics line(Were it not for the success of TAS, floated largely on the strength of Claremont's characterizations and stories, the line would have imploded even faster. I mean, it didn't even take a whole decade before they had Claremont come back....).

Claremont could understand Jim's youthful ambition, and wisely understood Harras and Marvel as the true villian(can you imagine the sense of betrayal after 16 years of spinning straw into gold for those people??). Besides, at the end of the day, Claremont is always pragmatic. If Jim reached out to work with him at Image two years later, of course he's going to take the job(all the better if it helps erode Marvel's market share at the time). Only a few years later he's writing for them again. Even when the Fox films butchered his characters and stories, he towed the line. He's pragmatic more so than egotistical, despite having been used and abused by these companies. Given how a lot of writers operate in this industry, that kind of professionalism is rare(especially when no other writers have accomplished what he has).

I hope Feige rolls out the red carpet for Lord Claremont if society doesn't completely implode before he gets to the MCU X-Men.

All of this. Plus it was dumb as hell to sell X-Men and Spidey

[Alan2099]

Anybody remember Claremont's creator owned title Sovereign Seven that he did for DC after leaving Marvel?

That was a big ball of absolutely nothing.

[dkrook]

Anybody remember Claremont's creator owned title Sovereign Seven that he did for DC after leaving Marvel?

That was a big ball of absolutely nothing.

YES, and I personally felt that he was kept on way too long.

[AdamFTF]

He’s 100% a Poochie. They had to make him actually care about Rogue as a “weakness”, otherwise there’s nothing interesting to him beyond betrayal and grifter slickness.

Your description is something I could apply to a number of beloved characters on this message board. For example, that's how I felt about X-23 when she first appeared, only with an added layer of unoriginality ("It's Wolverine but as a little girl. This one's got living weapon angst AND clone angst!") And I'm still trying to figure out what the big deal about Magik is beyond being aggressive, carrying a sword and setting off some people's gaydar. I swear, Illyana was more interesting as a dying child.

But I thought the interesting thing about Gambit was the self-esteem/self-efficacy paradigm. He's someone who's really good at what he does because he was raised to be that way. Unfortunately, what he was raised to be was a liar, disingenuous charmer and thief. He's proud of himself but also kind of hates himself for it. And then he hooks up with the X-Men where he can maybe do bad things for good reasons, but even then they don't trust him.

[Drexelhand]

There were many theories of Gambit including the Sinister clone, however the best theory for me was he was the 3rd Summers brother and speaking of Claremont, one of his better series in the 2000s was X-Men: The End, Claremont did a good job exploring that theory.

I agree. That series has a lot of soul and works very well as an epilogue to Morrison's X-Men while conveniently ignoring everything from 1991 to New X-Men.

[Castle]

All of this. Plus it was dumb as hell to sell X-Men and Spidey

Lots of new age fantasy marvel fan theories but here is the reality. Marvel was ruined financially in the 90s.They had to sell X-Men and Spidey not to go down under and declare bankruptcy. the financial rewards they got from the Spidey and X-Men movies kept the entire marvel line afloat including X-Men not to mention to this day gave Spidey his best movies. if they had not sold spidey and xmen, marvel won't be here at all. that was not dumb, it was smart. Hopefully it gets a lot smarter when Into the Spiderverse 2 is out since this is the only truly artistic marvel film to look forward to in the coming future.

But I thought the interesting thing about Gambit was the self-esteem/self-efficacy paradigm. He's someone who's really good at what he does because he was raised to be that way. Unfortunately, what he was raised to be was a liar, disingenuous charmer and thief. He's proud of himself but also kind of hates himself for it. And then he hooks up with the X-Men where he can maybe do bad things for good reasons, but even then they don't trust him.

If or not the X-men trust him is a complex question. Gambit is one of the characters that has some writers that hated him. Mike Carey comes to mind. He hated Gambit and favoured Magneto.

I have always likened Gambit to the side coin of Cersei from Game of thrones. Gambit like Cersei was indeed raised under extreme bad circumstances but he made a choice to be a hero, Cersei however chose to be a villain.

[skyvolt2000]

All of this. Plus it was dumb as hell to sell X-Men and Spidey

It was sell them or go out of business.

Mind you when all those money issues hit-they were flooding the market with both of them.

[Maniacal]

I only wish (going by the little I know of what happened), only wish that Jim Lee and Chris Claremont were able to work together better. Jim had fun and fresh ideas, and Chris was the seasoned writer who could flesh out those and his own plans better. Jim designed and redesigned some great iconic imagery. Chris wrote great stories. As for Rob... you have to admit that man had some great ideas, regardless of how you feel about his "confidence" in his own abilities. Keeping it to the X-world: Cable, Deadpool, Domino, Externals, Shatterstar, Stryfe, the list goes on. Jim and Rob left a legacy in the X-world that will be hard to forget. The powers at be at Marvel saw dollar signs in their hot artists. You can't blame the artists for that.

What lowered the X-men's popularity for a bit? I think every other Marvel book trying to ape their style and be X-treme as well. Invisible Boob Window, Dark Thor, Mutated Wasp, Adamantium-laced everything... In my opinion it just seemed like Marvel was trying to xmenize their entire superhero line.

[IN-a-Synch]

After Onslaught everything went down hill. Xavier was gone. A issue about crows was made. The X-men had no direction. The Twelve was poorly written. It didn’t pick back up until Morrison took the helm. Jim lee, Lobdell, and Fabian Niceza propelled the X-men in my opinion.

[Killerbee911]

All of this. Plus it was dumb as hell to sell X-Men and Spidey

No it wasn't Marvel wasn't a studio back then and as you can see with DC cinematic universe isn't always the best approach, even without them being in finical trouble it wasn't a bad idea. What was a bad idea was the set up of contracts they need better contracts to be able to regain their properties. They signed deals that basically force companies to keep making their movies which is why Spiderman is nearly impossible for them to get back. Think about it you are company with no intentions of making movies yourself. There is no better deal than couple years movie companies HAVE to keep making movies which you get a cut and advertising your product.

[Drexelhand]

After Onslaught everything went down hill. Xavier was gone. A issue about crows was made. The X-men had no direction. The Twelve was poorly written. It didn’t pick back up until Morrison took the helm. Jim lee, Lobdell, and Fabian Niceza propelled the X-men in my opinion.

I liked the Twelve a hell of a lot more than Onslaught. It was Magneto War that was godawful.

[sunofdarkchild]

Your description is something I could apply to a number of beloved characters on this message board. For example, that's how I felt about X-23 when she first appeared, only with an added layer of unoriginality ("It's Wolverine but as a little girl. This one's got living weapon angst AND clone angst!") And I'm still trying to figure out what the big deal about Magik is beyond being aggressive, carrying a sword and setting off some people's gaydar. I swear, Illyana was more interesting as a dying child.

But I thought the interesting thing about Gambit was the self-esteem/self-efficacy paradigm. He's someone who's really good at what he does because he was raised to be that way. Unfortunately, what he was raised to be was a liar, disingenuous charmer and thief. He's proud of himself but also kind of hates himself for it. And then he hooks up with the X-Men where he can maybe do bad things for good reasons, but even then they don't trust him.

Magik's story at it's most basic level is that of an abuse victim attempting not to become the same as her abuser. Moving beyond that it is a story about whether good can come from evil, whether it is possible to use power that is inherently evil to do good. Beyond that it is the story of a person facing the same dilemma Jean did in the Dark Phoenix Saga and making the exact opposite choice - having to maintain total control at all times or risk destroying the world. Where Jean chose to end her life then and there Illyana chose to say 'someday I'll fall, but not today' and to keep living and fighting. One of the main appeals of her character in the 80s was that she was designed with an endpoint in mind which was unusual for for a superhero character and gave her a sense of inevitability and danger that was and still remains rare. It ultimately did not matter what she did, her ending was pre-ordained like a character from a Greek tragedy. That particular aspect no longer applies in quite the same way. She's still a character who is not going to get a happy ending, but her story is no longer building towards a single inevitable tragic conclusion in part because of how much she's grown since those days. But the other aspects still apply. She slips occasionally and becomes more like Belasco, having to then struggle even harder to stop being like him. The dark stain on her soul still taints every good thing she does. When she asks a child she finds stranded on an island 'How many sleeps' that child was there, that line comes from an understanding of the child's situation based on her being stranded in a frozen wilderness for a year. When she puts Doug through tough love training to get him ready for the tournament, that carries the background of her having not only seen many friends and loved ones die, but having had to mercy kill several of them and never wanting to have to go through that again. It also has a background of her going very easy on Doug compared to how tough her own sword training was. Her sword isn't just a flashy weapon, it's a piece of her soul and a reminder of what she had to sacrifice to end the years of abuse she suffered as a child.

You talk about Gambit and self-hate and trust issues. Magik was doing all of that years earlier. When she came back from Limbo the X-Men did not trust her because they couldn't be sure she wasn't brainwashed over the years and sent back as a trojan horse. The New Mutants didn't trust her because having spent half her life in Limbo she didn't understand normal human behavior and therefore acted strangely. Then when she revealed her sorceress powers they feared her even more and some of them outright hated her. As much as that hurt her, she felt they were right to fear and hate her and hated herself just as much. That self-hatred is what motivates her worst actions. When Belasco recreates her as a soulless beast, she steals a part of Pixie's soul to get revenge on him for giving her such a wretched existence. But knowing what she's done, she later asks Pixie to kill her as atonement for that act. Her abuse of Colossus under Gillen was a giant plea of 'look at me! can't you see I'm nothing but a monster?' Sometimes she earns the mistrust of others through her own actions and then has to work harder to earn it back even as she feels she doesn't deserve it. That's also the background for her conversation with Glob when he talks about his abuse and how angry he is at himself for being angry. Her advice about a little anger being ok and needing to look at the good as well as the bad is based on having gone through all of that herself.

All the aggressive attitude, one liners, and cool visuals are just the surface built on top of that deep edifice.

[lowfyr]

Primary notice. Cartoons and movies don't affect the comics much. I don't want to speak of the other marvels but I can speak that way for X-men and Spiderman.

And for a very long time, movies were not affecting comics. this was changed when disney got marvel studios. I don't know much about Hickman shading the MCU as some fans have pointed out since I am not reading his run but I can only guess Hickman may be old fashion. old fashion meaning everything is separate to him.

And what happened after the Raimi Spider-Man movies for one example? Peter gained organic webshooters. I would say that can be called "much".
Another are the X-Men adapting the movie uniforms or Wolverine suddenly getting taller and looking more like Jackman.
So it happened even before Disney buying Marvel.
So please do not use this for your vendetta against Disney.

And seeing that Spider-Man for example did not adapt to the last two movies version I would guess that the comics are a lot more safe from adapting to the movie version than before. But I am sure you will manage to "adapt" that to an Anti-Disney Rant.