{"id":797,"date":"2016-03-18T23:30:56","date_gmt":"2016-03-19T03:30:56","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/aboutcomics.blogwyrm.com\/?p=797"},"modified":"2016-03-12T11:21:16","modified_gmt":"2016-03-12T16:21:16","slug":"a-marvel-epic-part-5-wins-and-losses","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/aboutcomics.blogwyrm.com\/?p=797","title":{"rendered":"A Marvel Epic: Part 5 \u2013 Wins and Losses"},"content":{"rendered":"

In this final installment of the 5-part series looking at Jonathan Hickman\u2019s epic work on the Everything Dies<\/em> storyline, I\u2019ll be looking at what succeeded and failed.\u00a0 Since it was both a commercial and a literary undertaking in the medium of comic books, I\u2019ll be looking at three broad categories:\u00a0 commercial aspects, storytelling mechanics, and story content.<\/p>\n

Commercial Aspects<\/h2>\n

There are two major aspects to consider when judging the commercial success of the Everything Dies story:\u00a0 raw sales of books and positioning for long-term viability.<\/p>\n

In terms of raw sales of books, there is no denying that Everything Dies<\/em> was a consistent success.\u00a0 As expected, when both the Avengers<\/em> and New Avengers<\/em> titles premiered back in Dec 2012-Jan 2013, they sold at or near the top.\u00a0 As time wore on, the Avengers<\/em> title mostly hovered in the mid-teens and low-twenties in sale rank \u2013 although the near the end, perhaps due to fatigue, the sales began to sag.\u00a0 The New Avengers<\/em> title consistently lagged behind, fluctuating between the high-twenties and mid-forties.\u00a0 Secret Wars consistently scored near the top with an average sales rank of 2.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
Month <\/strong><\/th>\nTitle<\/strong><\/th>\nSale Rank<\/strong><\/th>\n<\/tr>\n
Jan 2015<\/strong><\/td>\nAvengers #40<\/td>\n19<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
New Avengers #29<\/td>\n30<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Feb 2015<\/strong><\/td>\nAvengers #41<\/td>\n26<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
New Avengers #30<\/td>\n36<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Mar 2015<\/strong><\/td>\nAvengers #42<\/td>\n24<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
New Avengers #31<\/td>\n31<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
New Avengers #32<\/td>\n42<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Apr 2015<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/td>\n

Avengers #43<\/td>\n40<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Avengers #44<\/td>\n21<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
New Avengers #33<\/td>\n29<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
May 2015<\/strong><\/td>\nSecret Wars #1<\/td>\n1<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Secret Wars #2<\/td>\n3<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Jun 2015<\/strong><\/td>\nSecret Wars #3<\/td>\n1<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Jul 2015<\/strong><\/td>\nSecret Wars #4<\/td>\n1<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Aug 2015<\/strong><\/td>\nSecret Wars #5<\/td>\n1<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Oct 2015<\/strong><\/td>\nSecret Wars #6<\/td>\n4<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Nov 2015<\/strong><\/td>\nSecret Wars #7<\/td>\n4<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Dec 2015<\/strong><\/td>\nSecret Wars #8<\/td>\n1<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Jan 2016<\/strong><\/td>\nSecret Wars #9<\/td>\n2<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n

In terms of positioning for future success, it is hard to argue that anyone else could have done better.\u00a0 Hickman was able to adapt the storylines to handle changing situations in the movie-side of the Marvel mythos.\u00a0 When both titles were launched, Marvel didn\u2019t own the movie rights to 3 important franchises: The X-Men, The Fantastic Four, and Spider-Man.\u00a0 Each of these franchises was initially downplayed in the Everything Dies<\/em> storyline.\u00a0 As the relationship between Marvel Studios and the others progressed, the X-Men and Spider-Man made more of an appearance.\u00a0 But a large component of the Everything Dies<\/em> storyline centered around Thanos and the Inhumans \u2013 properties that have a significant role to play in the MCU.\u00a0\u00a0 As discussed in an earlier post<\/a>, the Inhumans are essentially mutants without the name and the promotion of this property over the X-Men solidifies the MCU approach (e.g. Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.) over the Fox Studios X-Men.<\/p>\n

The Fantastic Four is an interesting situation.\u00a0 The movie franchise is not owned by Marvel nor is it developed in conjunction with Marvel Studios.\u00a0 The poor showing of the Fantastic Four (2015) movie no doubt reinforced Marvel\u2019s desire to distance itself from its once flagship group.\u00a0 This approach is poignantly summed up in an exchange between Franklin and Reed Richards at the end of Secret Wars<\/em> #9.<\/p>\n

\"No<\/a><\/p>\n

Storytelling Mechanics<\/h2>\n

This is the one area where I would say that Hickman consistently falls short of the mark. \u00a0For every really nice thing he does there are others that detract from the success.\u00a0 In the interest of ending on the positive, I\u2019ll talk about the negative aspects first.<\/p>\n

One of Hickman\u2019s most used devices is the \u2018Then & Now\u2019 approach.\u00a0 A few pages are presented with the what happened in the past, either as new material for the reader to digest or in flashback form.\u00a0 The action then flips immediately and abruptly to the present where events happening \u2018now\u2019 are shaped by reactions and recollections from \u2018then\u2019.\u00a0 Used every so often, this isn\u2019t a bad mechanic, but Hickman over-relies on it.\u00a0 Often times, there isn\u2019t enough structure for the casual reader to note the transition.<\/p>\n

In a storyline as complex as Everything Dies, a less haphazard mechanism should have been used.\u00a0 Something as simple as changing the border style (the old rounded borders for flashbacks with appropriate captions always worked nicely) and color scheme would have worked.\u00a0 When read and re-read sequentially, at one sitting, this mechanism works marginally.\u00a0 But it is too daunting of a task to try to parse and piece the plot together when reading the book monthly with other titles (e.g. Infinity<\/em>, Original Sin<\/em>, etc.) interspersed and with no clear picture of where the whole is going.<\/p>\n

Hickman\u2019s other short-coming is the lack of exposition even with events progressing sequentially.\u00a0 Although captions have fallen out of favor, a few well-placed ones would have been welcome.\u00a0 The best example of this comes from Secret Wars<\/em> #9.\u00a0 As mentioned in earlier posts, the Black Panther confronts Doctor Doom with some version of the Infinity Gauntlet.\u00a0 Although defeated, T\u2019Challa provides the necessary distraction so that Reed Richards can find the Molecule Man and shut down the Doom\u2019s \u2018godhood\u2019.\u00a0\u00a0 Just before Battleworld comes to an end, the Black Panther grabs one of the gems, clutches it tightly, and is whisked away.<\/p>\n

\"Time<\/a><\/p>\n

The reader has no way of knowing which gem it was.\u00a0 The official list of gems from Marvel\u2019s database is<\/p>\n

\"Infinity_Gems\"<\/a><\/p>\n

but as demonstrated in an earlier post<\/a>, the color-coding of the gems is not consistent and so the reader is left to guess.\u00a0 There are, of course, times to let the reader guess, but Hickman does it too often and with pivotal elements of the plot.<\/p>\n

One the positive side, he does a nice job, given his page limit constraints, of touching upon elements that the reader may actually wonder about.\u00a0 In over 50 years of written fantasy storeis, the Marvel Publication Universe has a vast amount of cosmic elements.\u00a0 Each of these should figure into something as large as the complete and whole-sale structural rearrangement that is done in Everything Dies<\/em>. Of course, there is no way for Hickman to explore each and every idea thoroughly but he does a reasonable job of at least mentioning what was tried and what failed when dealing with the incursions.\u00a0 The following composite image shows how he deals with the Cosmic Cube, the universal Avatars, and the multiversal Captain Britain squad.<\/p>\n

\"Various<\/a><\/p>\n

He also provides a nice set of symmetrical bookends to the tale.\u00a0 The incursion threat begins in Wakanda in New Avengers<\/em> #1 with a group of Wakandan youths on a coming of age trial.\u00a0 Once he grabbed the undisclosed gem from the Infinity Gauntlet in Secret Wars<\/em> #9, the Black Panther again finds himself in the Wakandan jungle where the same events play out but to a different end.\u00a0 In New Avengers<\/em> #1, his speech is interrupted with a rumble of rhinoceros fleeing the first incursion and the final outcome is the death of the young Wakandans at the hands of Black Swan\u2019s group.\u00a0 In Secret Wars #9, his speech is punctuated with the rumble of Wakandan rocket lifting of to space and hope.<\/p>\n

\"Wakandan<\/a><\/p>\n

Even the Everything Dies<\/em> mantra is closed out from despair to hope.\u00a0 One of the minor tweaks that Reed Richards performs in setting everything right again is to restore the ravaged face of Victor von Doom, ending the whole storyline with a note of optimism<\/p>\n

\"Everything<\/a><\/p>\n

Story Content<\/h2>\n

Overall, Hickman does well on the story content itself \u2013 particularly the logical structure and verisimilitude of his universe.\u00a0 He clearly shows a love and respect for much of the source material that has come before.<\/p>\n

While the Everything Dies<\/em> epic has the three elements most able to destroy a comic story<\/a>, Hickman does a good job working with two of them: alternate universes and magic.\u00a0 His treatment of parallel\/alternate universes is nicely done without badly undercutting the emotional content of the material.\u00a0 It is easy, with an infinite number of Thors upon which to draw, to make it hard to feel for a particular instantiation of Thor.\u00a0 Hickman mostly avoids the most common pitfalls by making the alternate versions different enough in both character and fate that the reader\u2019s emotional investment isn\u2019t undermined.\u00a0 He also credibly navigates away from much of the mechanics of the end-times and focuses instead on the reactions of his characters.\u00a0 In this way, he avoids the deus ex machina<\/em> aspects of magic.<\/p>\n

However, on the time travel front, the causality of his cosmology is quite a bit out of whack.\u00a0 One of the crucial storylines in the Avengers is the time travel into the future of Captain America shortly after he remembers his betrayal at the hands of the Illuminati.\u00a0 How the universe\u2019s timeline\/worldline can end with an incursion and yet still continue on into the future is totally unknown.\u00a0 I suppose he wanted\/needed to deal with the time-travel aspects of Marvel\u2019s many stories but still it comes off as illogical and forced.\u00a0 Much cleaner is his explanation for how Doom could stop the Beyonders.\u00a0 The latter were constrained to move sequentially forward in time (linearly forward as is incorrectly said in the film industry).\u00a0 Without going into details, Hickman simply offers this explanation for how the created can destroy the creators.\u00a0 Far more satisfying than a badly-constructed time-travel plot.<\/p>\n

The little details were a really big positive.\u00a0 As mentioned above, he tries to cover all the bases for why a thing works in his universe\/multiverse.\u00a0 One of the most clever things he introduces is how to construct a vehicle capable of surviving when everything is destroyed \u2013 how to make the life rafts actually work.\u00a0 It starts with the Beyonders assault on the Living Tribunal<\/p>\n

\"Beyonders<\/a><\/p>\n

which results in the Tribunal\u2019s demise and a fragment of him ending up in each of the remaining universes.\u00a0 His body forms the raw materials from which the life rafts are constructed<\/p>\n

\"How<\/a><\/p>\n

Finally, little bits of humor and homages are worked into the story in various places.\u00a0 Two of my favorites are the clear homage to the \u2018All your base are belong to us\u2019<\/a> engrish uttered by Cyclops powered by the Phoenix force<\/p>\n

\"Classic<\/a><\/p>\n

and Amadeus Cho\u2019s hilarious indictment of \u2018the certainty in ignorance\u2019 so common in everyday thought.<\/p>\n

\"Amadeus<\/a><\/p>\n

Parting Words<\/h2>\n

The Everything Dies<\/em> storyline is a remarkable set of comics and fine addition to the world of literature.\u00a0 It is the first real example of the epic being brought to fruition in the comic book medium and despite numerous flaws it is well worth reading.\u00a0 I only hope that Marvel will make an Omnibus publication in which the story is told in is proper publication order (Avengers<\/em>, New Avengers<\/em>, Infinity<\/em> correctly interleaved).\u00a0 My congratulations to Jonathan Hickman for pulling it off.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In this final installment of the 5-part series looking at Jonathan Hickman\u2019s epic work on the Everything Dies storyline, I\u2019ll be looking at what succeeded and failed.\u00a0 Since it was… Read more ><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-797","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/aboutcomics.blogwyrm.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/797","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/aboutcomics.blogwyrm.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/aboutcomics.blogwyrm.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/aboutcomics.blogwyrm.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/aboutcomics.blogwyrm.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=797"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/aboutcomics.blogwyrm.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/797\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":805,"href":"https:\/\/aboutcomics.blogwyrm.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/797\/revisions\/805"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/aboutcomics.blogwyrm.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=797"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/aboutcomics.blogwyrm.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=797"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/aboutcomics.blogwyrm.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=797"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}