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Post by Deleted on May 6, 2022 12:42:02 GMT -5
A little late to the conversation, but agree with a lot of points already raised. My personal summary:
1.) Do you think there are any villains who should remain restricted solely to one superhero?
Not restricted per se, but I like a general "rogues gallery" concept that sometimes gets shaken up a little either on occasion or even ongoing. Like Electro debuting as a Spider-Man villain, but also early on facing off with Daredevil. Or where the match-up makes sense, like taking another Spidey villain with the Rhino and having him battle the Hulk. Or just the fun old school "what? Lex is fighting Batman and the Joker is taking on Superman??" one-off type events. But overall, I do like long-running adversarial relationships between specific heroes and villains.
2.) Would you like to see more “cross-pollination”?
I feel like things are kind of "just right", at least with classic comics, per my comments above.
3.) Do you think the current way of doing things (decompression, writing for the trade) prevents “cross-pollination” occurring?
Interesting question, and I think my answer is yes based again on some of my "exceptions examples" in my first answer.
So in summary...I like established "nemeses", but I also like some of the various types of shake-ups to keep things interesting. At the end of the day though, I can kind roll with anything as long as there is a good story involved.
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Post by Deleted on May 6, 2022 12:50:27 GMT -5
I appreciate everyone’s contributions.
I’m not singling any contribution out for criticism (loved them all), but on the subject of emotional stakes, I get that. A Juggernaut/Thing battle might benefit from an emotional stake, but it won’t be the same as Juggernaut battling Wolverine as Professor Xavier watches. But just like every wrestling match need not be for high stakes (e.g. a world championship), there are some match-ups where a simple punch-up would suffice, at least for me; so even if it’s just Thing happening to be having a hot dog while Juggernaut goes on a rampage, which brings them together for a punch-up, that can work for me on a fun visual level.
Stakes are important, one can almost feel in their hearts the antagonism when Green Goblin and Spidey have fought. Wouldn’t be the same if it was a simple case of the Hulk leaping around and coming across Goblin. But I don’t think everything has to have depth.
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Post by Deleted on May 6, 2022 14:22:42 GMT -5
I appreciate everyone’s contributions. I’m not singling any contribution out for criticism (loved them all), but on the subject of emotional stakes, I get that. A Juggernaut/Thing battle might benefit from an emotional stake, but it won’t be the same as Juggernaut battling Wolverine as Professor Xavier watches. But just like every wrestling match need not be for high stakes (e.g. a world championship), there are some match-ups where a simple punch-up would suffice, at least for me; so even if it’s just Thing happening to be having a hot dog while Juggernaut goes on a rampage, which brings them together for a punch-up, that can work for me on a fun visual level. Stakes are important, one can almost feel in their hearts the antagonism when Green Goblin and Spidey have fought. Wouldn’t be the same if it was a simple case of the Hulk leaping around and coming across Goblin. But I don’t think everything has to have depth. And I am pretty much the opposite. If there are no stakes, if it's just a run of the mill filler fight to fill an issue and make deadlines, why should I be interested and why sold I shell out money for it? If the fight reveals nothing about the characters because there is no depth to it and it doesn't further the narrative of the characters involved, why should I bother with it. If it means no more than the character crossing the street to get to the other side (i.e. they're fighting just to show a hero fighting a different villain but at the end of the day it accomplished nothing for the hero or the villain it was just to fill some pages with a different fight scene), it's not a story worth telling and certainly not worth my time or money. I find filler stories like this to be much more annoying and much more of a waste of my time and money than even decompressed stories. I won't go as far to say as it is creators mailing it in and hacking it out, but often times that's what it feels like to me. Let's fill an issue or two until we find a story to tell that will further the character's actual story. Toy know they're not going to do anything major to develop the villain unless sits against their primary antagonist, and they're not likely to do anything major with the hero against a "guest-villain of the month" type, so unless you are up for some mindless fight scenes, I don't really find anything worth my time and money in such issues. -M
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Post by Deleted on May 6, 2022 16:57:08 GMT -5
Yes, I mean I don’t think I’d particularly want anything mindless. And, after reading your post, I believe it should always, always be advisable for writers to at least *try* to come up with some emotional stakes.
Not sure if it counts as emotional stakes as such, but I loved those Thor/Juggernaut battles (two of them) because Juggernaut was making a big deal of how even a god and Mjolnir couldn’t hurt him. Maybe that added a bit of depth even if there wasn’t the same history/antagonism that Juggernaut had had with Xavier and the X-Men.
I’ve long advocated for a Superman/Riddler encounter, and I certainly would want some sort of depth/emotional stakes there, e.g. Riddler kidnapping Lois Lane or Martha Kent, and Superman having to step out of his comfort zone and put his “riddle-solving head” on. Adding those elements would work better for me on a personal level than it simply being Superman flying by in Gotham and deciding he would solve one of the Riddler’s crimes while there.
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Post by commond on May 6, 2022 17:23:57 GMT -5
I think you can swing too far the other way and give things too much meaning. I was quite happy with Juggernaut the way he was, but the last story I read of his suddenly had him involved with some group called the Exemplars and tried to give extra meaning to his origins. It felt convoluted and unnecessary. One of the backbones of Marvel Comics were those epic Kirby fight scenes between Hulk and the Thing, etc. Sometimes you just wanna read a good old fashioned throw down.
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Post by Deleted on May 6, 2022 17:31:58 GMT -5
I think you can swing too far the other way and give things too much meaning. I was quite happy with Juggernaut the way he was, but the last story I read of his suddenly had him involved with some group called the Exemplars and tried to give extra meaning to his origins. It felt convoluted and unnecessary. One of the backbones of Marvel Comics were those epic Kirby fight scenes between Hulk and the Thing, etc. Sometimes you just wanna read a good old fashioned throw down. There’s certainly that element, too. I mean, I don’t desire anything big, convoluted or meaningful in a Thing/Juggernaut battle. I just want to see those two fight!
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Post by badwolf on May 6, 2022 17:37:15 GMT -5
I think you can swing too far the other way and give things too much meaning. I was quite happy with Juggernaut the way he was, but the last story I read of his suddenly had him involved with some group called the Exemplars and tried to give extra meaning to his origins. It felt convoluted and unnecessary. One of the backbones of Marvel Comics were those epic Kirby fight scenes between Hulk and the Thing, etc. Sometimes you just wanna read a good old fashioned throw down. I disliked that Exemplars thing too.
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Post by jason on May 6, 2022 21:02:07 GMT -5
Also, unless you can do something interesting with it, when you have a character take on a previously unrelated villain, at least have them have similar powers so it can be a fair fight at least. Something like Storm vs Electro would make sense for example (Storm can summon lighting to take on Electro's electricity powers), but not something like Doctor Octopus vs The Thing (Thing could just rip off Otto's mechanical arms).
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Post by codystarbuck on May 6, 2022 22:59:34 GMT -5
Also, unless you can do something interesting with it, when you have a character take on a previously unrelated villain, at least have them have similar powers so it can be a fair fight at least. Something like Storm vs Electro would make sense for example (Storm can summon lighting to take on Electro's electricity powers), but not something like Doctor Octopus vs The Thing (Thing could just rip off Otto's mechanical arms). Except, in your latter example, Doc Ock's scientific skills could compensate for Thing's strength. That would make for an interesting fight, similar to the Marvel Fanfare meeting of Doc Ock and Iron Man. In fact, you could actually use such a confrontation to show that Ben's own technical skills are more than most would expect, both from his time around Reed and from his test pilot background. Test pilots usually had a strong engineering background. Chuck Yeager was more the outlier, as he didn't have a college education; but, was a natural pilot. However, being a natural pilot, he picked up on things like avionics pretty quickly. I could see Ben as either a more technologically educated test pilot, ala the Mercury guys; or, a natural, like Yeager, who picked up the new technology quickly. At the heart, you still need to have an underlying reason for the story, even if it is a slugfest. The Hulk and The Thing have always been about who is stronger, though there have been a few added wrinkles, in some of their battles.
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