She was alright, but seemed anti super villian to me.
She was alright, but seemed anti super villian to me.
In fairness, her second or third arc—with all the Spider-themed women—would have been a good place to use Pete. But! It came out in the middle of the Superior Spider-Man run—I think around the time of the Superior Venom arc—so she's have had to use SpOck, and he was already on probation if not fired outright. Basically, after that first Avenging Spider-Man story, there's never been a good time for a Carol/Spidey team-up during Kelly Sue's run, even if she really wanted to tell a story with them.
Claremont's run was odd, in that the first half was cleaning up the serious mess Conway had made with the character—eliminating the split personality, making her powers internal to her rather than in the suit, giving her a supporting cast of her own, etc. It got much better in the second half, but by then was probably already fatally wounded by the weak start (and, I think, by a contraction in the broader market that caused the DC Implosion).
I have a gut feeling that this may have been a factor in KSD leaving. I feel that Marvel has been too editorially heavy-handed for a while (starting with them insisting on the Enemy Within crossover with Avengers Assemble, interrupting the fallout of that with Infinity destroying the emotional impact of the story, and then mandating that Carol go to space for the last run) and that they were only going to get more so to set up the 2018 movie.
Favorites: Natasha Romanova, Dinah Lance, Janet Van Dyne, Selina Kyle, Emma Frost, Kitty Pryde, Kate Bishop, Sharon Carter, Sue Storm Richards, Carol Danvers
Yeah, I can totally see that she might have been tired of the editorial stuff for quite a while, but didn't really feel the freedom to leave until Bitch Planet launched successfully. I've been saying for a while you can see a clear shift in her twitter feed, with Captain Marvel falling to a distant second place behind all the Bitch Planet love. Which makes a certain sense, but it's the thing that had me absolutely convinced she was leaving post-Secret Wars (though I predicted incorrectly who would take over).
Oh, and meant to mention that the first time I read CM 17, I was like, wait, did I miss something in Infinity (which I wasn't really reading, since I hadn't kept up on Hickman's Avengers)? It didn't click until much, much later that they were celebrating her actions in Enemy Within.
Is it just me or did KSD feel more like a "movie" writer than a comic book writer.
It's like she watched a few Marvel movies and got her understanding of the characters from there.
Not a fan of her Captain Marvel stuff at all, it's mindboggling how so many people loved it since there are better books with this kind of "theme" (Ms.Marvel, Batgirl etc...).
Still better than Brian Reed though.
I actually always thought she stayed for the second volume for the Carol Corps fan base. I think if she'd left after the first volume they would have been very vocally upset and perhaps even boycotted the second run.
But yeah, with Bitch Planet's success and the DeFraction's television development deal she no longer needs to be writing Captain Marvel. But she most definitely built Carol up and developed a devoted fan base that wouldn't have existed without her unique stamp on the character. Let's hope that the future writers don't lose the qualities that KSD re-invigorated in Carol.
And let's hope that Marvel doesn't blow it with their editorial mandates which I fear they may.
Favorites: Natasha Romanova, Dinah Lance, Janet Van Dyne, Selina Kyle, Emma Frost, Kitty Pryde, Kate Bishop, Sharon Carter, Sue Storm Richards, Carol Danvers