Marvel almost brought back Gwen Stacy as a part of Secret Invasion

[Kevinroc]

https://www.marvel.com/articles/comi...ecret-invasion

Marvel has released an article detailing the oral history of the Secret Invasion crossover event, and revealed that Gwen Stacy was at one point going to return as part of the event.

Dan Buckley: It was like, "No, no, no, that is contradicting!" and then the writer and the editor would argue back and forth. There may have been some voting on the final tally, because I often would go to a vote in those retreats, sometimes, when people just wouldn't to get off a topic. One of the more legendary ones is they almost brought Gwen Stacy back at one point and I did not want to bring Gwen Stacy back.

Tom Brevoort: Saying Spider-Woman has been a Skrull since the beginning of NEW AVENGERS, that's not a problem. Brian knew she was a Skrull when he was writing those stories. It's baked in, so that's okay.

But you can't go back and say Gwen Stacy is alive now because that was a Skrull that got thrown off that bridge, because as much as you want Gwen Stacy back, that's a problem. There are too many stories in which that's the fundamentals. The thing that's appealing about it, of course, is it's transgressive and therefore exciting and therefore dangerous and daring. Yeah, people are going to get upset, but they'll be excited. That's always the argument.

Dan Buckley: When it came to me, and I had the final vote, "bring Gwen back" was up by one. My single vote created a tie. I then said were tied, and in order to change something you need to win the vote... so I essentially gave myself two votes. Some people were not very pleased with me because I gave myself two votes at the end.

Tom Brevoort: To me, it was always a baby/bathwater thing. You can do this, and you can do some of this, and we took the opportunity to get Mockingbird back in this, for example. She had died in—I'm going to say—1993, 1994. That's still a long way back, but not that long, having been dead; there were not a lot of stories that you were invalidating by bringing her back. It was literally just a, "Here's a character that we thought was dead and now they're alive again." That's fine. But going back and saying that the Beast hasn't been the Beast since 1976? I'm sorry, that's a bridge too far.

I find this particularly surprising since I believe there was a vote on whether or not to revive Gwen as a part of One More Day/Brand New Day, and all the upcoming writers voted against the idea. That it almost happened as a part of Secret Invasion, and it was so close that Dan Buckley had to pull weight to say "no" is something I find myself surprised by.

[Frontier]

One blonde resurrection was enough I guess.

[clonegeek]

https://www.marvel.com/articles/comi...ecret-invasion

Marvel has released an article detailing the oral history of the Secret Invasion crossover event, and revealed that Gwen Stacy was at one point going to return as part of the event.



I find this particularly surprising since I believe there was a vote on whether or not to revive Gwen as a part of One More Day/Brand New Day, and all the upcoming writers voted against the idea. That it almost happened as a part of Secret Invasion, and it was so close that Dan Buckley had to pull weight to say "no" is something I find myself surprised by.

The Gwen turning out to be a Skrull would be interesting considerong Norman's role in defeating them

[Huntsman Spider]

One blonde resurrection was enough I guess.

Are you referring to Mockingbird?

[Grapeweasel]

One remembers the Skrull who seduced Hank Pym Was a dead ringer for Gwen.

[Frontier]

Are you referring to Mockingbird?

Yes, yes I am .

One remembers the Skrull who seduced Hank Pym Was a dead ringer for Gwen.

Because Bendis thought the best way to replace Hank Pym with a Skrull was to have him sleep with a college student.

[Huntsman Spider]

Yes, yes I am .

Because Bendis thought the best way to replace Hank Pym with a Skrull was to have him sleep with a college student.

Yeah, that was messed up.

[CaptainUniverse]

I am glad Dan Buckley put an end to the resurrecting Gwen nonsense if they had gone through with both that and Quesada had gone with making Skrull-Vell the actual Captain Mar-Vell, then Secret Invasion would have undermined two of the most famous "Death of..." stories of all time.

[clonegeek]

I am glad Dan Buckley put an end to the resurrecting Gwen nonsense if they had gone through with both that and Quesada had gone with making Skrull-Vell the actual Captain Mar-Vell, then Secret Invasion would have undermined two of the most famous "Death of..." stories of all time.

It would have been interesting to see Gwen's reaction to Sins Past

[Garlador]

I swear, there really is this sizable portion of Marvel that 1) was hellbent on erasing Spider-Man's marriage to Mary Jane and 2) bringing Gwen Stacy back. Wasn't even the first time they tried that over the years.

It really does seem to solidify they wanted the status quote of the 60s back something fierce.

I like Gwen well enough, but... look, there was a REASON even Stan admitted no matter how hard he tried, Mary Jane was the people's favorite by a mile.

So I'll just say I agree that letting Gwen stay dead was - and remains - the correct choice.

And at this point, I think Spider-Gwen has largely taken over the legacy of "Gwen Stacy" for the better.

[Majesty]

Just bring her back full time at this rate if they're going to keep teasing her.

[Spider-Tiger]

https://www.marvel.com/articles/comi...ecret-invasion

Marvel has released an article detailing the oral history of the Secret Invasion crossover event, and revealed that Gwen Stacy was at one point going to return as part of the event.



I find this particularly surprising since I believe there was a vote on whether or not to revive Gwen as a part of One More Day/Brand New Day, and all the upcoming writers voted against the idea. That it almost happened as a part of Secret Invasion, and it was so close that Dan Buckley had to pull weight to say "no" is something I find myself surprised by.

The Secret Invasion, I imagine, would have been planned around the same time as Brand New Day so who knows which vote came first. With One More Day, it's also possible that they voted against the principle of retconing continuity all the way back to 1973 more than a revival of Gwen itself and this was just another idea they toyed with.

It's a dumb idea though because they could have just as easily said that the Gwen that died in 1973 was a clone. That option had been there for years.

[Daibhidh]

I almost wish they'd done it. The Death of Gwen Stacy hovers over the way the Spider-man writers think about Peter like a bad smell. After Gerry Conway's run, I don't think any attempt to revisit it has had better than mixed results.

(Jonathan Hickman Avengers' Portentous Voice: There were Two Love Interests. One Was Life and the other Was Death.)

[bob.schoonover]

https://www.marvel.com/articles/comi...ecret-invasion

Marvel has released an article detailing the oral history of the Secret Invasion crossover event, and revealed that Gwen Stacy was at one point going to return as part of the event.



I find this particularly surprising since I believe there was a vote on whether or not to revive Gwen as a part of One More Day/Brand New Day, and all the upcoming writers voted against the idea. That it almost happened as a part of Secret Invasion, and it was so close that Dan Buckley had to pull weight to say "no" is something I find myself surprised by.

Given who is being quoted here, I imagine the difference in the closeness of the vote is who was voting in the two cases. The "bring her back for BND" thing was (I think?) a JMS idea that other people in the Spider-office didn't like, and that idea was bandied about for books due out towards the middle and end of 2007. The "Who should be revealed as a Skrull" was a broader Marvel discussion to increase the impact of the event across the universe held for books coming out in mid 2008 (I have no idea how far in advance these meetings are held, but they were probably separated by at least 6 months). So the first vote was the Spider-office plus BND team, the second was Marvel editorial across the board + whichever creators got invited to that writers' summit a few months later.

It could also be true that, since BND had been in the works for awhile and a number of issues were in the can (even if they weren't released yet), that some people changed their minds about bringing back Gwen because (a) they didn't like any of the love interests introduced in the first few months of BND or (b) they didn't want to bring back Gwen as a straight MJ replacement, but if they're two separate events, that's a different story. It also worth noting that many of the people voting in the latter case wouldn't be responsible for the stories that had to spill out of this reveal, so there's also a chance their "yes" votes were more "sure, sounds cool, whatever" and the "no" votes were more "oh, god, how are we going to explain all of this, gah!"

[Frontier]

Honestly I'm not sure what bringing back Gwen accomplishes in a world where a Spider-Powered version of her exists other than to instigate more shipping wars.