Marvel Reboot... I know, I know

[Bob-el]

Avengers ends in April. A January announcement lines up with April solicits. Makes sense.

The timing would be right with the conclusion of the current incursion story in New Avengers and Avengers. They've dug themselves a pretty nasty hole with some well known characters doing some dubious unheroic things, most notably Sub-mariner and Dr Strange. With the kind of multiple reality story line that this involves, it could end in something dramatic that would allow them to "fix" those characters and revise other things in a way that would generate buzz and some must-read comics.

[krazijoe]

Mesphisto better be involved!!!

[David_99]

Someone probably already thought of this, so I apologize if you've heard this before, but with the whole "reboot", "incursions", "time isn't linear" stuff... Could the last "other Earth" that's on a collision course with the 616 be a past version of the 616 Earth? And by destroying it, they'd be destroying their present selves as well? So they end up sacrificing themselves and the Earth to keep the past alive (minus a few popular heroes, who make the transition to keep the past continuity relevant)? So we end up, lets say, with the 80s version of Marvel and it's characters? So everything from the 60s-80s is still canon, but they start over from there? (Not a real reboot?) That way they can keep the original origins, but make up for the convoluted 90s-to-Now Marvel? Back to College Peter Parker, pre-Marriage, etc? Other popular characters can avoid the "partial reboot" (or "reb-" as Marvel called it) like Winter Soldier, GotG, Cap Marvel, Venom, new Nova, New Thor, Miles Morales etc because, they are out in Space or in the Ultimate U, so they avoid the "time wipe". This would put continuity timeline closer to the movies. Is this a possibility?

[Goggindowner]

Someone probably already thought of this, so I apologize if you've heard this before, but with the whole "reboot", "incursions", "time isn't linear" stuff... Could the last "other Earth" that's on a collision course with the 616 be a past version of the 616 Earth? And by destroying it, they'd be destroying their present selves as well? So they end up sacrificing themselves and the Earth to keep the past alive (minus a few popular heroes, who make the transition to keep the past continuity relevant)? So we end up, lets say, with the 80s version of Marvel and it's characters? So everything from the 60s-80s is still canon, but they start over from there? (Not a real reboot?) That way they can keep the original origins, but make up for the convoluted 90s-to-Now Marvel? Back to College Peter Parker, pre-Marriage, etc? Other popular characters can avoid the "partial reboot" (or "reb-" as Marvel called it) like Winter Soldier, GotG, Cap Marvel, Venom, new Nova, New Thor, Miles Morales etc because, they are out in Space or in the Ultimate U, so they avoid the "time wipe". This would put continuity timeline closer to the movies. Is this a possibility?

Ya know what? I actually really like this idea a lot. They won't do it, but its an interesting idea none the less.

[Mark]

Comic sales have probably risen in recent years, as the economy has gradually improved in the aftermath of the Great Recession.

The economy has improved? Not in my neighborhood.

[Mark]

The timing would be right with the conclusion of the current incursion story in New Avengers and Avengers. They've dug themselves a pretty nasty hole with some well known characters doing some dubious unheroic things, most notably Sub-mariner and Dr Strange. With the kind of multiple reality story line that this involves, it could end in something dramatic that would allow them to "fix" those characters and revise other things in a way that would generate buzz and some must-read comics.

That is if they actually care about fixing the characters.

[John Ossie]

Mesphisto better be involved!!!

Not him again!

[Tiamatty]

They won't do a reboot.

But a line wide re-launch with every title starting over at #1 again . . . . . .

Yes.

You could be right, but that rabbit has been pulled out the hat before and has done little or nothing to bring comic sales to a more respectable level.

A reboot wouldn't be much more effective. It's not going to bring any significant number of new readers. And it actually risks losing a fair number of existing Marvel readers.

Someone probably already thought of this, so I apologize if you've heard this before, but with the whole "reboot", "incursions", "time isn't linear" stuff... Could the last "other Earth" that's on a collision course with the 616 be a past version of the 616 Earth? And by destroying it, they'd be destroying their present selves as well? So they end up sacrificing themselves and the Earth to keep the past alive (minus a few popular heroes, who make the transition to keep the past continuity relevant)? So we end up, lets say, with the 80s version of Marvel and it's characters? So everything from the 60s-80s is still canon, but they start over from there? (Not a real reboot?) That way they can keep the original origins, but make up for the convoluted 90s-to-Now Marvel? Back to College Peter Parker, pre-Marriage, etc? Other popular characters can avoid the "partial reboot" (or "reb-" as Marvel called it) like Winter Soldier, GotG, Cap Marvel, Venom, new Nova, New Thor, Miles Morales etc because, they are out in Space or in the Ultimate U, so they avoid the "time wipe". This would put continuity timeline closer to the movies. Is this a possibility?

Ugh. No. That would be awful. For one thing, we could say goodbye to a whole shitload of awesome characters. The New X-Men? All gone. The Young Avengers? So long, been nice knowing you. Runaways? Thanks, but your services are no longer required.

It also gets rid of a lot of amazing stories. We lose out on a shit-ton of fantastic development. Anyone who was a fan of, say, PAD's X-Factor runs would be shit out of luck - none of it will have happened, and Madrox would be back to being some shmuck living on Muir Island, while Wolfsbane is back to being a teenager angsting about how sinful she is. All of Loki's development in Journey Into Mystery, Young Avengers and the current Agent of Asgard series would be wiped out to set him back to the preening, pompous villain he used to be.

So, no. No no no no no no no. A million times no. I happen to like the fact that these characters have continued to develop. I like the fact that Kitty now isn't the same person she was 25 years ago. I like a lot of characters who've been created since then. Losing out on all that shit would get me to simply stop bothering with Marvel altogether. I've read the '80s versions of these characters, so why would I want to read those versions again? Of my 10 favourite characters, 6 were created in the past 15 years - why would I want to keep reading when those characters get completely erased from existence?

[dragonmp93]

Yes.


A reboot wouldn't be much more effective. It's not going to bring any significant number of new readers. And it actually risks losing a fair number of existing Marvel readers.


Ugh. No. That would be awful. For one thing, we could say goodbye to a whole shitload of awesome characters. The New X-Men? All gone. The Young Avengers? So long, been nice knowing you. Runaways? Thanks, but your services are no longer required.

It also gets rid of a lot of amazing stories. We lose out on a shit-ton of fantastic development. Anyone who was a fan of, say, PAD's X-Factor runs would be shit out of luck - none of it will have happened, and Madrox would be back to being some shmuck living on Muir Island, while Wolfsbane is back to being a teenager angsting about how sinful she is. All of Loki's development in Journey Into Mystery, Young Avengers and the current Agent of Asgard series would be wiped out to set him back to the preening, pompous villain he used to be.

So, no. No no no no no no no. A million times no. I happen to like the fact that these characters have continued to develop. I like the fact that Kitty now isn't the same person she was 25 years ago. I like a lot of characters who've been created since then. Losing out on all that shit would get me to simply stop bothering with Marvel altogether. I've read the '80s versions of these characters, so why would I want to read those versions again? Of my 10 favourite characters, 6 were created in the past 15 years - why would I want to keep reading when those characters get completely erased from existence?

Yeah, that is pretty much how i feel about this whole thing of rebooting the marvel universe; it would be so horrible.

[Magnito]

Not that I ever really read too much DC (because I always preferred Marvel) but the few books of theirs I did read were destroyed by the reboot and I've dropped them altogether now. A reboot is a horrible idea and I really hope Marvel knows better than to do it.

[hunter_peterson]

Yes.


A reboot wouldn't be much more effective. It's not going to bring any significant number of new readers. And it actually risks losing a fair number of existing Marvel readers.


Ugh. No. That would be awful. For one thing, we could say goodbye to a whole shitload of awesome characters. The New X-Men? All gone. The Young Avengers? So long, been nice knowing you. Runaways? Thanks, but your services are no longer required.

It also gets rid of a lot of amazing stories. We lose out on a shit-ton of fantastic development. Anyone who was a fan of, say, PAD's X-Factor runs would be shit out of luck - none of it will have happened, and Madrox would be back to being some shmuck living on Muir Island, while Wolfsbane is back to being a teenager angsting about how sinful she is. All of Loki's development in Journey Into Mystery, Young Avengers and the current Agent of Asgard series would be wiped out to set him back to the preening, pompous villain he used to be.

So, no. No no no no no no no. A million times no. I happen to like the fact that these characters have continued to develop. I like the fact that Kitty now isn't the same person she was 25 years ago. I like a lot of characters who've been created since then. Losing out on all that shit would get me to simply stop bothering with Marvel altogether. I've read the '80s versions of these characters, so why would I want to read those versions again? Of my 10 favourite characters, 6 were created in the past 15 years - why would I want to keep reading when those characters get completely erased from existence?

To be fair, they could include all those kinds of developments in a rebooted Marvel U. DC tried and failed to integrate their favored pieces of history, but there's nothing to say that actually carefully mapping out a reboot beforehand wouldn't mean that the only stories that didn't happen in some form were the poor ones. Like, you could reboot Spider-Man to college while retaining big events like Spider-Island and Superior by setting them a year or so before the new present. A lot of details would be lost, but those could eventually be built back in.

But I agree that it would be unlikely not to mess everything up; Marvel's in a really good place right now. It would take insane levels of planning to have a successful reboot...

EDIT: Again, though, Marvel has the great advantage of the excellent movie universe to possibly base the reboot's status quo off of. So it would be a really useful tool for, say, integrating a Japanese version of the Disney Big Hero a Six, making a Spider-Man young again, having the X-franchise be set in the earlier days of the X-Men, making Hank Pym old and the Wasp his daughter, making Carol Danvers and Kamala Khan the only Captain Marvels and Miss Marvels respectively, having Coulson lead a wanted and smaller SHIELD... so there's a lot of easy fodder there. And it could even use recent events like Inhumanity to be, say, the source for the Falcon's bird powers and the like.

So... we'll have to wait until it doesn't happen before we bother to think about it too much. :P

[Dog]

The economy has improved? Not in my neighborhood.

https://yourlogicalfallacyis.com/anecdotal

[The Shadow]

I can't wait until it's not a reboot so people can shut up about a reboot.

Marvel has seen how DC's reboot has worked and the negative reaction to it.

I don't think they NEED to do it either.

[Darth Phoenix]

I can't wait until it's not a reboot so people can shut up about a reboot.

i agree, perhaps Wolverine will return soon than we thought in a mass crossover event that month

[KingsLeadHat]

A reboot really depends on the audience. If Marvel is picking up more casual fans, then I think it would be worth it to do something similar to Heroes Return. (Which was the last time I enjoyed most of the line.)

Marvel already had a major reboot that nobody seemed to notice around 2001 when Quesada and Jemas threw out most continuity and established characterizations: Bendis' Avengers, Morrison's X-Men, JMS's Spider-Man, etc.

Once Heroes Return ended (I'd say Busiek's last issue of Avengers) the classic Marvel universe -- circa 1961-2001 (sans Heroes Reborn) -- was no more.