Your Unpopular/Controversial Opinions on the X-Universe

[Dthirds3]

Comic fights suck, there over in a few pages. Copy battle shonen more, they fights are more interesting and creative. I mean we never see it referenced how different powers can check others or any real creative uses. Its just larger scale, get creative with how powers are shown

[ZephyrSurf]

Comic fights suck, there over in a few pages. Copy battle shonen more, they fights are more interesting and creative. I mean we never see it referenced how different powers can check others or any real creative uses. Its just larger scale, get creative with how powers are shown

unfortunately, Comics do not have the real estate to pull that off in most instances. You'll only get some versions of it in certain martial arts or street level comics. At least from the Big 2

[Grunty]

Comic fights suck, there over in a few pages. Copy battle shonen more, they fights are more interesting and creative. I mean we never see it referenced how different powers can check others or any real creative uses. Its just larger scale, get creative with how powers are shown

Shonen manga are usualy 20 pages PER WEEK, drawn in black and white, often by an artist working with a team (usualy once a manga takes off they hire help to splice up the workload), telling a singular story and the core artist often also doubeling as the story writer.

Even the Seinen (comics for older teens and young adults) style manga which are usualy monthly tend to have 40 pages, which still allows for more elaborate fight scenes.

So 4 times the page count per month, no worries about coloring complicating the image (allowing more details in pannels) and the people in charge have a lot more controll over how the writing and the art complement each other. Which of course means they can have more complex looking and drawn out fight scenes. Though they can end into an opposite problem where they spread them far too long and they become boring too. No to forget that there have certainly been shonen manga with very dull fight scenes aswell.

Some of the core problems with super hero comics and good fight scenes comes down to page restriction, time restriction, stories having to be over in 6 issues (to fit into trades), dialoge heavy writing styles and disconnect between artist and writer.

Doesn't help that the popularity of decompressed writing often seems to involve spending pannels on empty character scenes with reduced dialoge, rather than tacticaly using them for the story proper or giving fights more time to shine.

So the end result are big splash pages involving characters in various positions just flying at something to punch, stab or shoot it, or characters posing and fights being over in 2 pages, while we might get 5 pages of characters just sitting at a table eating pizza and talking about a movie reference. Of course i exaggarate here and i'm certainly a fan of good character moments and dialoge, but in recent years it can often feel like some writers are willing to spend a lot of page time for scenes doing barely anything for the story, even though their comics are primarily meant to be action adventures with super natural displays.

[Dthirds3]

Shonen manga are usualy 20 pages PER WEEK, drawn in black and white, often by an artist working with a team (usualy once a manga takes off they hire help to splice up the workload), telling a singular story and the core artist often also doubeling as the story writer.

Even the Seinen (comics for older teens and young adults) style manga which are usualy monthly tend to have 40 pages, which still allows for more elaborate fight scenes.

So 4 times the page count per month, no worries about coloring complicating the image (allowing more details in pannels) and the people in charge have a lot more controll over how the writing and the art complement each other. Which of course means they can have more complex looking and drawn out fight scenes. Though they can end into an opposite problem where they spread them far too long and they become boring too. No to forget that there have certainly been shonen manga with very dull fight scenes aswell.

Some of the core problems with super hero comics and good fight scenes comes down to page restriction, time restriction, stories having to be over in 6 issues (to fit into trades), dialoge heavy writing styles and disconnect between artist and writer.

Doesn't help that the popularity of decompressed writing often seems to involve spending pannels on empty character scenes with reduced dialoge, rather than tacticaly using them for the story proper or giving fights more time to shine.

So the end result are big splash pages involving characters in various positions just flying at something to punch, stab or shoot it, or characters posing and fights being over in 2 pages, while we might get 5 pages of characters just sitting at a table eating pizza and talking about a movie reference. Of course i exaggarate here and i'm certainly a fan of good character moments and dialoge, but in recent years it can often feel like some writers are willing to spend a lot of page time for scenes doing barely anything for the story, even though their comics are primarily meant to be action adventures with super natural displays.

Ok but at least be creative. For example 99% of logans fights are he screaming and charging with his claws, if he's the best at what he dose show us that; show us the martial arts he know and the other crazy **** he learned thought the years, be more creative with your fights, I dont care if they fast as long as its not the same moves over and over again.

[Grunty]

Ok but at least be creative. For example 99% of logans fights are he screaming and charging with his claws, if he's the best at what he dose show us that; show us the martial arts he know and the other crazy **** he learned thought the years, be more creative with your fights, I dont care if they fast as long as its not the same moves over and over again.

If page count isn't enough a writer and artist could get creative with using the pannels better for more dynamic appearing fights, that's true.
But it could be speculated that after 50 years of publications it might be difficult for writers to still come up with creative ways to show the same characters doing the same thing again with the same powers/skills. So that by now their main concern could be less about the fight scenes themself (which might require more time to think up) and more with creating the big splash page, image or moment at the end of it as quickly as possible that they hope people will remember. (The new tool for that in the X-men comics seems to become showing combination of mutant powers for the big shots.)

As for Wolverine. Many of his fights really have basicly regressed into this by the numbers approach, for one reason or another. Maybe there is some mandate that his powers need to be shown in order to inform new readers, hence him always getting horrible injured (once upon a time it was impressive for his power to make him recover rapidly from something like a bullet, now he needs to be torn appart, pumped full of .50 cal rounds or burned to a skeleton as "basic" display of his power), for which the "just throw him at an enemy blindly" approach seems to be the easiest. Which does however really comes at the expense of making his martial arts skills an informed ability. Or maybe writer feel this is what his fans actualy want to see of him in action. Either way there is a certain degree of lack of care at work it seems.

Poor Marrow seems to be one of the few "New Addition Characters" who in her first obligatory training match with Wolverine actualy got used to display how good he was instead of trying to convince the reader of her being worthy. Since most of the time the newcommer somehow gets an uppper hand or good showing in before he makes his comeback. Instead he beats her easily in the first half (he doesn't even uses his claws on her), gets sucker punched in the throat by her when he tries to be nice and then almost kills her when she made him mad. Which is also a fight that actualy goes over several pages with some degree of choreography at play.

But the rule is still usualy that the newcommer makes a good showing against the old "enhancement talent" that is Wolverine.

[Wolverine12]

Ok but at least be creative. For example 99% of logans fights are he screaming and charging with his claws, if he's the best at what he dose show us that; show us the martial arts he know and the other crazy **** he learned thought the years, be more creative with your fights, I dont care if they fast as long as its not the same moves over and over again.

Did you pick up Wolverine: Black, White and Blood issue 2? There is a scene where Logan clowns a guy, dude can’t even lay a hand on him. I wish we’d see more of that. Don’t get me wrong I like tank Logan, but it’s nice to see why he has the motto he does.

[Zelena]

Shonen manga are usualy 20 pages PER WEEK, drawn in black and white, often by an artist working with a team (usualy once a manga takes off they hire help to splice up the workload), telling a singular story and the core artist often also doubeling as the story writer.

Even the Seinen (comics for older teens and young adults) style manga which are usualy monthly tend to have 40 pages, which still allows for more elaborate fight scenes.

So 4 times the page count per month, no worries about coloring complicating the image (allowing more details in pannels) and the people in charge have a lot more controll over how the writing and the art complement each other. Which of course means they can have more complex looking and drawn out fight scenes. Though they can end into an opposite problem where they spread them far too long and they become boring too. No to forget that there have certainly been shonen manga with very dull fight scenes aswell.

Some of the core problems with super hero comics and good fight scenes comes down to page restriction, time restriction, stories having to be over in 6 issues (to fit into trades), dialoge heavy writing styles and disconnect between artist and writer.

Doesn't help that the popularity of decompressed writing often seems to involve spending pannels on empty character scenes with reduced dialoge, rather than tacticaly using them for the story proper or giving fights more time to shine.

So the end result are big splash pages involving characters in various positions just flying at something to punch, stab or shoot it, or characters posing and fights being over in 2 pages, while we might get 5 pages of characters just sitting at a table eating pizza and talking about a movie reference. Of course i exaggarate here and i'm certainly a fan of good character moments and dialoge, but in recent years it can often feel like some writers are willing to spend a lot of page time for scenes doing barely anything for the story, even though their comics are primarily meant to be action adventures with super natural displays.

Let’s be simple and say that the writers and artists don’t have the same talent and quality as before: so many things happened in few panels back then…

Artists didn’t spend so much time on unnecessary details and used it to find original ways to tell the story that now seems to be made just to showcase glamourous characters.

There’s also the problem that having talent is not enough: you need have personality to gain acceptance of your choices or a appropriate environment to express them.

[Steel Inquisitor]

Let’s be simple and say that the writers and artists don’t have the same talent and quality as before: so many things happened in few panels back then…

Artists didn’t spend so much time on unnecessary details and used it to find original ways to tell the story that now seems to be made just to showcase glamourous characters.

There’s also the problem that having talent is not enough: you need have personality to gain acceptance of your choices or a appropriate environment to express them.

It's not that the writers and artists aren't as talented as they were back then it's that even back then the industry wasn't doing what the manga industry was doing, it wasn't until later that they were monthly. Today artists prioritise their art being more realistic and writers stretch storylines out because that's what the readers want.

The western comics were never like manga, where creators get burnt out in the west by publishing monthly in Japan they do this weekly. Jack Kirby used to do multiple books, but he was allowed the freedom to have an impact on the story more which isn't as universal as it was back then but he never, ever did that for the same series every week. There are advantages and disadvantages and readers don't want the same things in their countries, it's why in Europe they don't have the same format for their comics. Not every artists or writer are amazing with fight scenes, like Hickman, but he's still able to bring the readers in with his stories that's why he's a juggernaut in the industry right now.

[Zelena]

It's not that the writers and artists aren't as talented as they were back then it's that even back then the industry wasn't doing what the manga industry was doing, it wasn't until later that they were monthly. Today artists prioritise their art being more realistic and writers stretch storylines out because that's what the readers want.

The western comics were never like manga, where creators get burnt out in the west by publishing monthly in Japan they do this weekly. Jack Kirby used to do multiple books, but he was allowed the freedom to have an impact on the story more which isn't as universal as it was back then but he never, ever did that for the same series every week. There are advantages and disadvantages and readers don't want the same things in their countries, it's why in Europe they don't have the same format for their comics. Not every artists or writer are amazing with fight scenes, like Hickman, but he's still able to bring the readers in with his stories that's why he's a juggernaut in the industry right now.

That’s what the readers want? That’s what the readers expect.
And if there’s never something different that is shown, the reader cannot want something different. It’s like delicious tomatoes.

The western comics were never like manga, but I remember comics that were much better than that. The color was simple, maybe the drawing, less realistic but the stories were much more riveting. It was worth waiting for the issue.

[Alpha]

If people want the X-men and mutants to represent a minority or disadvantaged group then the only solution that makes sense anymore is to make them a representation of various disabilities.

For one thing it actually fixes how the x-gene works. It's a gene that creates unpredictable abnormalities which always come with a price for the body, but grant unique duper powers. This is why people are afraid or repulsed by mutants, because they represent a "deficiency" that could exist in any child and it makes their own life harder than a normal person, although it allows them to be unique in so many ways.

The X-mansion should be like a retirement home/ treatment center/ physical therapy/ community center, where all kinds of mutants from all generations come to live when they need company from other people "like them". Training with the X-men and learning how to control their powers means learning how to live their lives with these disabilities. Mutants come there when they are young and they either stay there or leave and are welcome back any time to teach other people or just reconnect with others.

[Criticalfan]

unfortunately, Comics do not have the real estate to pull that off in most instances. You'll only get some versions of it in certain martial arts or street level comics. At least from the Big 2

The idea of limited real estate is weird to me. if an Western comic art team could draw 40 compelling pages a month and stay on schedule, you're saying Marvel wouldn't sell it for some premium price?

[Glio]

It's all because the manga has a much higher pace due to not being colored. You can make fights that last fifteen issues and it does not matter because you haven't wasted that much time. You cannot expect for various reasons that superhero comics have 20 pages a week.

[BESTXMAN]

I think Rick Remender, Jason Aaron and Brian Michael Bendis are the worst trio of X-Men writers in history. Truly dark days.

[Omega Alpha]

I think Rick Remender, Jason Aaron and Brian Michael Bendis are the worst trio of X-Men writers in history. Truly dark days.

The M-pox era was worse.

[Alpha]

I think Rick Remender, Jason Aaron and Brian Michael Bendis are the worst trio of X-Men writers in history. Truly dark days.

I loved Jason Aaron's run. It's one of the few runs to focus on the everyday happenings of the students.