Is Spencer leading the way out of decompression?

[JKtheMac]

Slightly academic question I know. But everyone in comics is so obsessed with decompression it occurred to me Spenecr isn't really using it. You may think, "Hang on a minute he took months to tell his story about Captain America" but bear with me.

Decompression is usually seen as opening up the story and spinning it out over many issues, such that the actual events are few and far between. This is usually contrasted with older comics that seem to have lots of incident happening in a single issue. I am not saying Spencer is doing the latter, but I have always had an issue with this idea because it depends how you define incident. Take for example an often quoted addage by Henry James in literary circles: “What is character but the determination of incident? What is incident but the illustration of character?” (You can tell he was a writer and not a critic, he has a lovely turn of phrase.) In this simple truism James is pointing out the interconnected nature of plot and character. What many consider decompression is actually an emphasis on character, and when you strip that idea down to its basics then much of the incident in a modem story is not action but character focused.

I always think that the way to tell if a story is truely decompressed you need to try and summarise it. If you can do that very quickly and convey everything significant that has happened then we may indeed be looking at decompression. If you just relay the action and ignore the character beats you are cheating. A truely decompressed story has very few combined action incidents and character incidents.

Related to this is how tightly plotted a story is. In a tightly plotted story everything that happens is important to the story. Very few events happen that are incidental or insignificant to the story. It is fair to say a story is decompressed if a large portion of the incidents are not actually particularly relevant. Indeed when many people criticise decompression this is a big factor. Some readers may consider references to two characters' old and almost forgotten relationship to be vital to the story, because they have always valued that relationship. A book that shouts out that Storm and Forge have a complex past together will contain an incident that divides the audience. Some will count it as a vital one, some will pass over it looking for something they care about because it really isn't impacting the plot.

So look at Spencer's Captain America stories. Although they plodded along at the normal slow pace of modern comic books, by the time we got to Secret Empire #0 we can see that barely a panel was wasted on unimportant points. The whole run was very tightly plotted and full of incident that proved relevant to the story.

While not significantly changing the overall pace of the books, and therefore not going back to an earlier age of comics, Spencer is significantly increasing the relevance of his incidents, leading to a tightly plotted and retrospectively heavily laden with significance. All the character and action incidents are relevant, even if they felt incidental at the time. The trick, tightly plot your story, lay lots of pipe, pick up dangling threads and try and tie things together at the end.

To be honest this isn't a new trick. Dickens was doing this in the very early days of serial fiction. We could all name some comic writers that have done this too. Just see a list of classic comic runs. It could be argued Hickman was also doing this, but he seemed to get a little too busy to really tie up everything. Let's hope Spencer can keep his schedule under control.

[Prof. Warren]

Well, all of Spencer's Marvel work has been tightly plotted and packed with incident. Books like Superior Foes of Spider-Man and Ant-Man were very dense reads, which definitely set them apart from many modern books. I was stoked to hear he'd be doing an event because I knew he'd bring that approach to it. I don't know if it will lead to others following suit but certainly having an event showcase the appeal of that style of storytelling doesn't hurt.

[Mike_Murdock]

I doubt it. It's a style of an individual writer. Mark Waid tends to be fairly compressed (e.g., his Daredevil run would have done in one and two part stories quite often), but it didn't influence the industry as a whole. I think the Trade Paperback industry tends to push towards decompression because it gives your trade a unified story.

Plus, honestly, I didn't find Spencer's Steve Rogers book to be all that compact either (probably because it had to fill time until Secret Empire).

[JKtheMac]

Well, all of Spencer's Marvel work has been tightly plotted and packed with incident. Books like Superior Foes of Spider-Man and Ant-Man were very dense reads, which definitely set them apart from many modern books. I was stoked to hear he'd be doing an event because I knew he'd bring that approach to it. I don't know if it will lead to others following suit but certainly having an event showcase the appeal of that style of storytelling doesn't hurt.

I agree. I especially appreciated Superior Foes.

[Shirayuki]

Quite a few of the current Marvel writers seem to focus on shorter arcs.

[JKtheMac]

I doubt it. It's a style of an individual writer. Mark Waid tends to be fairly compressed (e.g., his Daredevil run would have done in one and two part stories quite often), but it didn't influence the industry as a whole. I think the Trade Paperback industry tends to push towards decompression because it gives your trade a unified story.

Plus, honestly, I didn't find Spencer's Steve Rogers book to be all that compact either (probably because it had to fill time until Secret Empire).

I did say he hasn't significantly changed the pace of the books. His trick is to make the incident count in the long run. He has been doing this consistently for quite a while now.

[JKtheMac]

Has anyone here read Morning Glories? I have put off reading it for quite some time, but if Spencer uses this technique of tight plotting via laying pipe and interweaving threads I should maybe take a look.

[JKtheMac]

Quite a few of the current Marvel writers seem to focus on shorter arcs.

I think that's an economic necessity, Marvel are constantly testing the market with shorter stuff. But that isn't really the point. Writers like Spencer, Hickman and probably to some extent Dan Slott, are really packing in lots of stuff into otherwise trade paced stories. None of these guys write short arcs, they write long involved plots that have lots of call backs and very few incidental elements. They have plans that involve working towards an ending, and they put lots of stuff in their story that can hopefully become incorporated into that ending.

[InformationGeek]

Well, all of Spencer's Marvel work has been tightly plotted and packed with incident. Books like Superior Foes of Spider-Man and Ant-Man were very dense reads, which definitely set them apart from many modern books. I was stoked to hear he'd be doing an event because I knew he'd bring that approach to it. I don't know if it will lead to others following suit but certainly having an event showcase the appeal of that style of storytelling doesn't hurt.

I can't speak for Superior Foes, but Ant-Man, while not decompressed, wasn't exactly tightly plotted either. It really kept spinning its wheels on the whole Scott being in prison things and sometimes having several pages devoted to recap and saying the same thing over and over again.


As for leading the way out of decompression, no. Not at all. Having read Bendis' Spider-Man & Jessica Jones and the current Hulk book, absolutely not. These books are still EXTREMELY decompressed and spinning their wheels to drag out a plot. I read the first trade of Bendis' recent Spider-Man book and I was shocked to see how little was actually accomplished or happened.

I think that's an economic necessity, Marvel are constantly testing the market with shorter stuff. But that isn't really the point. Writers like Spencer, Hickman and probably to some extent Dan Slott, are really packing in lots of stuff into otherwise trade paced stories. None of these guys write short arcs, they write long involved plots that have lots of call backs and very few incidental elements. They have plans that involve working towards an ending, and they put lots of stuff in their story that can hopefully become incorporated into that ending.

I dunno about Hickman. Reading his Avengers work, he REALLY drags things out. Remember the story arc involving the Avengers from another dimension? I don't think he really packs a lot of stuff into his story, just a lot of dialogue that takes a long time to get to the point.

[penthotal]

I can't speak for Superior Foes, but Ant-Man, while not decompressed, wasn't exactly tightly plotted either. It really kept spinning its wheels on the whole Scott being in prison things and sometimes having several pages devoted to recap and saying the same thing over and over again.

As for leading the way out of decompression, no. Not at all. Having read Bendis' Spider-Man & Jessica Jones and the current Hulk book, absolutely not. These books are still EXTREMELY decompressed and spinning their wheels to drag out a plot. I read the first trade of Bendis' recent Spider-Man book and I was shocked to see how little was actually accomplished or happened.

I dunno about Hickman. Reading his Avengers work, he REALLY drags things out. Remember the story arc involving the Avengers from another dimension? I don't think he really packs a lot of stuff into his story, just a lot of dialogue that takes a long time to get to the point.

I don't think you got his point. Case in point, HULK is decompressed only if you don't take into account all the character work. Otherwise is definitely packed of stuff. The other dimension Avengers in Hickman run it's another good example, if superficially it could seem a detour from the main story, actually introduced many important elements for the story in the long run: the Clor hammer for Unworthy Thor to use, the first hints of the Mapmakers (the super Adaptoids that in the end leave to explore the White Space, they are what will evolve in Mapmakers), Banner becoming part of the Illuminati.

[Inversed]

I think it all has to do with the who the writer is and the approach for the story. So something like Hulk is purposefully feeling a lot slower due to it being more character-centric than story-focused, but it works in that situation.

Meanwhile you'll have someone like Bendis who's pacing has always been very slow and dragging out his stories to however many long issues. This is especially true of his Spider-Man stuff, even going all the way back to the original Ultimate Spider-Man, although (for the most part) it works there, but then you get to something like his Guardians Of The Galaxy and those problems because so much clearer.

Spencer is one of those guys who can fill so much information in one book and that's one of things I love about his writing style.

[JKtheMac]

I don't think you got his point. Case in point, HULK is decompressed only if you don't take into account all the character work. Otherwise is definitely packed of stuff. The other dimension Avengers in Hickman run it's another good example, if superficially it could seem a detour from the main story, actually introduced many important elements for the story in the long run: the Clor hammer for Unworthy Thor to use, the first hints of the Mapmakers (the super Adaptoids that in the end leave to explore the White Space, they are what will evolve in Mapmakers), Banner becoming part of the Illuminati.

Yes. Although Hickman put so much stuff in that he ran out of time to tie-it all back in due to the pressures of putting out so many books all at once. He is on record as saying about half way through that he would really like to get a chance to write a second draft of something.

Because of that I cant point to him as doing a great job of this, even if there were extenuating circumstances. But boy did he chuck a lot of stuff in that he did use, and Spencer is playing in the Hickman Sandbox even now, along with Ewing in Ultimates. That's the great thing about the kind of world building Hickman did. You can always use it later.

[JKtheMac]

I think it all has to do with the who the writer is and the approach for the story. So something like Hulk is purposefully feeling a lot slower due to it being more character-centric than story-focused, but it works in that situation.

Meanwhile you'll have someone like Bendis who's pacing has always been very slow and dragging out his stories to however many long issues. This is especially true of his Spider-Man stuff, even going all the way back to the original Ultimate Spider-Man, although (for the most part) it works there, but then you get to something like his Guardians Of The Galaxy and those problems because so much clearer.

Spencer is one of those guys who can fill so much information in one book and that's one of things I love about his writing style.

Bendis does a lot of fan service stuff akin to the Storm/Forge thing I mentioned, and quite a bit of highlighting the parts of cannon he is choosing. he does both by using witty dialogue. The problem there is threefold, some just don't consider it important (even if they like it), some would rather he touched on different parts of fan focus and as such accuse him of poor characterisation, some don't share his sense of humour. But he has an awful lot of character beats, and as such is nowhere near as decompressed as many accuse him of. He is also very popular of course, because what he does, he does well.

Not read the current Hulk.

[itspopularnowitsucks]

I gave up his later Ant-Man because entire issue passed and absolutely nothing happened and the jokes started wearing thin. Come to think of it, how much progress was made in Superior Foes? If anyone is to lead us out of decompression, look up Al Ewing.

[bigstupidjellyfish]

Has anyone here read Morning Glories? I have put off reading it for quite some time, but if Spencer uses this technique of tight plotting via laying pipe and interweaving threads I should maybe take a look.

I've only read the first arc, but Morning Glories is a lot like Lost. You learn new information but you never get the whole picture. You get answers but also new questions to ask.

I found the first arc to be paced quite well and one of the characters is just an absolute bastard and I love him.