Is there no room for originality anymore at Marvel? (spoilers for the Ant-Man Annual via article connection)

[Mary Jay]

It'd help if people werent ya know, sexist, racist, or hating on LGBT people a lot of the time this issue comes up. That article they linked to has to be some of the whiniest, most delusional "The darkies are out to get me!" paranoia I've read in some time. "The PC police at Disney"? Gimme a break.

I know there are a lot of people like that, and I know it's probably what people think straight away when they hear someone complain about let's say Sam being Cap now, or the new female Thor.

Now I can't speak for everyone of course. But I can assure everyone here that there is nothing racist, sexist or anti-LGBT in me. They would have given the Giant-Man suit to a Scandinavian albino that I would have had the same reaction. If they had kept Steve young and active, let's say as Captain Rogers, I wouldn't mind FalCap. If Thor was still worthy, I wouldn't mind the female Thor. If Hank Pym was still alive and doing heroics, heck I wouldn't mind if there was another Giant-Man... Okay, I'll be honest on that one: I wouldn't mind as much

My point is I like the original characters. The fact that their 'replacements' are of a different gender, ethnicity or orientation is irrelevant to me. That's not what's bugging me. What bugs me is that I don't get to read about the characters I like, except in old trades.

[Mary Jay]

And as far as I can tell, they didn't kill Hank to introduce an Indian Giant-Man either. People seem to be conflating two entirely different events to make some hill to die on about how Hank Pym was gotten rid of for the sake of political correctness, when the writer who "killed" him was someone entirely different who did it in an entirely different story months ago.

I did say Marvel, not Remender or Spencer. Remender did his thing, and then Spencer jumped on the occasion. Whether it was planned in advance, only the people at Marvel know.

[Frontier]

And as far as I can tell, they didn't kill Hank to introduce an Indian Giant-Man either. People seem to be conflating two entirely different events to make some hill to die on about how Hank Pym was gotten rid of for the sake of political correctness, when the writer who "killed" him was someone entirely different who did it in an entirely different story months ago.

Yeah, if that had been the case Raz probably would've been introduced relatively immediately after RoU was released, or at least Marvel would probably have announced earlier and promoted the fact that we'd be getting a new Giant-Man that was a minority.

As far as a I can tell, this is pretty much just Spencer taking what Remender did and using it to add a new supporting cast member for Scott, which is what looks to be happening in the Ant-Man relaunch. Maybe it was discussed at a retreat, though I'm not sure if Spencer actually goes to them, but I doubt it.

[Tiamatty]

I know there are a lot of people like that, and I know it's probably what people think straight away when they hear someone complain about let's say Sam being Cap now, or the new female Thor.

Now I can't speak for everyone of course. But I can assure everyone here that there is nothing racist, sexist or anti-LGBT in me. They would have given the Giant-Man suit to a Scandinavian albino that I would have had the same reaction. If they had kept Steve young and active, let's say as Captain Rogers, I wouldn't mind FalCap. If Thor was still worthy, I wouldn't mind the female Thor. If Hank Pym was still alive and doing heroics, heck I wouldn't mind if there was another Giant-Man... Okay, I'll be honest on that one: I wouldn't mind as much

My point is I like the original characters. The fact that their 'replacements' are of a different gender, ethnicity or orientation is irrelevant to me. That's not what's bugging me. What bugs me is that I don't get to read about the characters I like, except in old trades.

For my part, I find it more frustrating that the old characters usually get pushed so damn hard. I don't give a shit about most of the characters from the '60s and '70s. And yet, most of the time, those are basically the only characters who get any attention. In the end, it's actually not even going to matter how great a character Raz is. It won't matter if he immediately becomes one of my all-time favourites. It'll still take less than three years for him to be tossed into limbo, never to be seen again until the next time some cannon fodder is needed to show how horrible a villain is. And that's a problem whether the character takes on an existing legacy or has their own identity. Look at the Avengers Academy kids. Or the characters from the Initiative. Or the New X-Men. Generation X. The New Mutants. The Runaways. Really, look at any time a writer creates a new character. How often does that character last beyond that writer's run?

And then it's right back to the same few dozen straight white dudes from the '60s and '70s, because the only characters who are ever allowed to matter are the ones created when racism and sexism were so deeply institutionalized that "don't hit women" was basically the height of progressiveness.

[itspopularnowitsucks]

Because he's Hank Pym.

"Everyone's on the raft?"
"Yup"
"What about Hank Pym? The guy that crossed dimensions and faced ridiculous odds for months, staring into events that would otherwise drive one to madness, to reveal the true threat behind the incursions?"
"He's too unstable."
"So unstable that we hired him to raise the next generation of super-heroes?"
"Yup."
"...Makes sense to me!"

That really says everything about how the other heroes in the 616 and the writers and editors at marvel view Hank. Oh, he's a good hero with a great legacy, and he's entirely expendable.

Even then he did a better job than any other teacher characters...

[jphamlore]

Because he's Hank Pym.

"Everyone's on the raft?"
"Yup"
"What about Hank Pym? The guy that crossed dimensions and faced ridiculous odds for months, staring into events that would otherwise drive one to madness, to reveal the true threat behind the incursions?"
"He's too unstable."
"So unstable that we hired him to raise the next generation of super-heroes?"
"Yup."
"...Makes sense to me!"

That really says everything about how the other heroes in the 616 and the writers and editors at marvel view Hank. Oh, he's a good hero with a great legacy, and he's entirely expendable.

The rest of the heroes just couldn't overcome their guilt at realizing too late they could have bought time during the incursions simply by using Pym particles to temporarily shrink the Earth down to subatomic size ...

[Silvermoth]

I never get the terror of people warning about politic correctness. What exactly is there to be afraid of every single time this happens? A diminishing of power for straight white guys? Probably not as we've seen it happen a lot in comics and no straight white guy has been taken to the camps yet.

Are people really saying this new guy deserves the job less than old wife beater hank pym? He literally couldn't be worse than him.

[Anubhavkumarc]

I'll just ask this, can you guys give me another character suffering and recovering from depression, identity crisis and guilt? It really makes me cry how marvel treats Hank, when he acts like a beacon of hope to people suffering from depression, and you shut that beacon off for sad storytelling? And then you introduce a different character using his identity!?

[Prof. Warren]

I mean can anyone create their own original hero and character and NOT HAVE THEM REPLACE an already alive hero to create some type of legacy hero for PC reasons ?

http://www.cosmicbooknews.com/conten...cter-giant-man

I'm all for diversity in all types, but is there no more room for creativity anymore ?

What do you think of this ?

I think this article is idiotic, and appears on a site noted for its idiotic opinions. As many others on this thread have noted, Pym's many identities have been passed on before and they're especially fair game now that he's, you know, dead.

[The Fury]

He literally couldn't be worse than him.

He could murder a person.

[The Sword is Drawn]

I mean can anyone create their own original hero and character and NOT HAVE THEM REPLACE an already alive hero to create some type of legacy hero for PC reasons ?

http://www.cosmicbooknews.com/conten...cter-giant-man

I'm all for diversity in all types, but is there no more room for creativity anymore ?

What do you think of this ?

To be honest, the article kind of lost any sympathies I could have had for it with the aggressively right wing rantyness of the whole piece.

Yes, to a small degree I do think that Marvel is starting to look like it's trying a little too hard to be inclusive. But is it unwelcome? Not really.

And sure, a lot of heroes are vacating their identities to give over to new people in the costume. I do feel that this is a little bit regressive when they could be simply creating new characters with their own new identity. I'd prefer that. I'd buy into that easier. But sadly it seems that new characters just struggle to gain traction these days without being directly attached to an established brand.

[Mike]

I've given up on marvel quite awhile ago.
There just isn't anything new or interesting coming out of the house of no-ideas.
I haven't bought anything "new" from marvel for a few months and I haven't missed them.

[SuperiorIronman]

It's a bit too soon for me. 3 months later and continuity hasn't even caught up and we haven't seen Pymtron following all of this. It of course doesn't sit well with Pym fans.

And seriously, if Pym can track Ultron then why can't the Avengers do it? Find Hank, track him down and get Vision to separate him from Ultron. But I guess he is too unstable when Steve Rogers led a hit squad against the only people able to do something against incursions, or The Hulk who has not bothered to kill people on a rampage today, or spiderman who punched his pregnant wife oh but he sold his marriage to a Satan stand in to forcibly save someone who wanted to die and see her loved ones again. Hank is clearly the worst Avenger.

[Expletive Deleted]

Yet what's going to occur when, and you know this might happen, Hank returns ?

He'll use one of his fifteen other identities?

I always liked his red jumpsuit "Dr. Pym" era, personally.

[Cmbmool]

i dunno man. mc2 is full of legacy characters

At least some of those characters had a biological reason to be legacy characters.