scans_daily | Original Sins #5

From:

I know it's increasingly awkward to have people like the Howling Commandos, who were active in WW2, running around playing soldier, which is undoubtedly why they've been dying off over the past few years, (in fact, I think of the core group, only Izzy Cohen remains?) but...

THE FUCK.

The real problem I have with these ULTRA SUPER DUPER SPECIAL LMDs is trying to reconcile their existence with some of the ways SHIELD and LMDs have been approached in the past. The Deltite Affair, where almost everyone was replaced by LMDs. Livewires, where sometimes they didn't even know they weren't human, and a bunch of Nick Fury LMDs became an evil collective. And all the other lifelike robotics in the Marvel Universe.

It's like, LMDs have become the perfect answer for everything. Along with Doombots, Mad Thinker androids, and Thanos clones.

Still... I trust Al Ewing as a writer, and this does clean up the issue of otherwise normal Dugan being a century old and still in prime shape, Infinity Formula or no Infinity Formula.

From:

coldfury

Let's be honest, here. This isn't about the fact that you can only have so many WWII folks running around before it gets silly. I mean, I'm sure that helps make this more plausible, but this is about one thing, the Marvel Cinematic Universe.

They will deny it to their dying breath. They will lie, they will sidestep, they will give justification after justification. But the higher ups at Marvel and/or Disney want there to be an alignment between the MCU and the comics. The close those two things are, the higher probability of cross promotion.

Wolverine is a popular property that another company makes movies off of? Kill him off.

Fantastic Four is floundering and another company is making movies? Let's break them up.

Avengers just released a movie that made a billion dollars? Yeah, let's make that the new core team in the comics.

Time and time again, from costumes, to team memberships, to who is running Shield, it all gets aligned with the MCU.

So we have a white Fury who is a mainstay in the Marvel comic verse, but a black Fury in the MCU? Let's give him a black son of the same name, and write Fury and his supporting cast out in an epic story that he can never *ever* come back from.

Don't get me wrong, I understand why they do it and I don't mean to say it's wrong. Sometimes it just feels... commercialized, to me. I don't know. Some of the changes, Hawkeye & Cap's costumes, the non-chalant re-insertion of Hulk into the Avengers mythos, this... they don't sit well with me, even if I understand why they're doing it.

I just wish they wouldn't lie about it, that makes me angry more than anything else. That's another reason why all their recent Avengers changes ring hollow. If Superior Stark, New Thor, and Falcon!Cap aren't ejected by the time Avengers 2 rolls around, I'll be very surprised.

Edited Date: 2014-08-20 06:32 pm (UTC)

From:

flint_marko

I don't think the stuff with Fantastic Four or Wolverine has anything to do with the MCU. The FF title is still going on, and the latest solicts say "The rebuilding of the FF starts here."

Wolverine dying is Marvel's latest "Kill off an important character" storyline. First they did Captain America, then they did the Human Torch, then they did Peter Parker, and now they're doing Wolverine. He'll be back in a year or two. In the meantime there'll be plenty of stories dealing with his death, like Cap got.

But yeah, them getting rid of the old Fury and replacing him with the new one is definitely to make it more like the MCU, Marvel has pretty much admitted that (along with adding Coulson to the comics, even though he's younger and his relationship with Fury Jr is different from the relationship Coulson and Fury have in the MCU). I wonder if their intention is for the new readers who've only seen the movies to come in and see Fury Jr and assume he's the real one.

From:

shingi70

As much as Marvel is saying to the contrary, I won't be surprised if Time Runs out ends with a quasi reboot similar to that of the new 52 where on the whole everything is still similar but gaps in time will be gone, allowing for a more MCU version of the 616.

Some changes would be in the avengers going back to only two or three titles with one mirroring the film team as they are now.

The Mighty Avengers become the Defender.

The Fantastic Four get a more diminished role in favor of The Guardians being the cosmic hot shots.

Inhumans replace the xmen as being the dominant non human species on earth.

Miles is brought over to 616 and Nick Fury is retconned into being a James Bond esque title hence the new Man on the Wall stuff in Original Sin.

From:

ablackraptor

But why would they? Marvel Now has so far been a much more consistent success than DC's New 52 reboot, why would they decide to copy it now?

From:

drtechnobabel

To give them an excuse to make the comics more like the movies. The New 52 reboot happened a year before 'Avengers' came out and proved that this sort of long-term serial movie strategy could work today. If Marvel is planning on doing a reboot that extensive (and that's a pretty big if), they probably only started laying the groundwork for it in late 2012.

From:

ablackraptor

But if they were going to do that, why bother with so many extensive relaunches beforehand? Especially when these relaunches have proven to be enough to make things similar to the MCU. They wouldn't need an extensive reboot of their continuity like that to get their universe to match the films, nor would it be a practical idea. So far, the relaunches have done a much better job than a reboot could ever do at getting things to a reasonably film-like mindset.

From:

flint_marko

Pretty sure Bucky is going to be the new man on the wall, judging from the Winter Soldier solicts and the way they've described the title.

From:

steverodgers5

I feel the same way. But I don't think you've went quite far enough with your theory. I would say that as far as Falcon Cap & Lady Thor are concerned, they are using the comics to set up future changes in their franchise films.

It's like what they did with Cap's costume, but taken to another level. As soon as I saw that God ugly bulky chin strap costume on Cap in the comics, I knew that Avengers 2 would have him a costume of that design. And lo and behold that's exactly what happened.

They're obviously thinking in terms of 'well what happens when Chris Evans and Hemsworth leave?' No problem. We introduce these replacements in the comics, by the time the movies reach that point we can say, oh but look we're being true to when this happened in the Thor comic or the Cap comic. Hey..Synergy!

Plus they get bonus points for saying they're being more diverse, effectively trying to have their cake and eat it, by creating new versions of the cash cow characters that are tearing up the multiplexes just now..

I wish I wasn't so cynical about this. But I'm absolutely convinced this is the business plan. And it's really turning me off their books. I don't want the books to be testing grounds for whatever executives think will be their movies down the line, but what can you do?

I'm also thinking that DC too has been desperately trying to make their characters more sellable to movie studios with a lot of the changes in the new 52. The changes to Supes costume certainly seem to ring of that..

Edited Date: 2014-08-20 07:24 pm (UTC)

From:

flint_marko

When Hemsorth and Evans do leave, I think it's more likely they'll be recast. Replacing them with new characters like that is too risky.

From:

ablackraptor

I doubt the Thor and Cap stuff has anything to do with the films. As Flint-Marko said, they've made it clear they'd just go the route of recasting if the actors leave. They said the same thing when it looked like RDJ might step down from the role; they've said from the beginning that recasting is their preferred option. If they do go the legacy route with anyone, its fairly likely it'd be Bucky!Cap, given that everyone's been talking about the option of Bucky taking the shield. Falcon!Cap and Woman!Thor are very obviously a temporary move, just like killing off Wolverine.

Hell, even the suit is a pretty far-fetched idea. Given that there's only a few similarities (mostly the chest and shoulder padding), but a lot of other differences (film suit has fingerless gloves instead of techy armoured ones and exposed ears on the helmet). It looks more like the suit was inspired by what he wore in the first film, rather than it being what they had planned for A2 (especially since, if they were really going to do that, it'd be far more accurate, and would have made an appearance in Cap 2 rather than Avengers 2). Note that even now, Tony's not set to wear his black and gold outfit, while Hawkeye's comic outfit is completely different, save for asthetics, from his film outfit (though, I would really like if they did give him that outfit in the film, if just to get some actual purple on him).

It needs to be stressed, but the film executives DO NOT control the comics; the comics are controlled by their respective creative teams and editors, who while they're liable to take inspiration from the films, they're not directly tied to their production and aren't going to do things to 'test the waters' for the films to try out, since not only are the audiences completely different, but its not even a good pool to base your perspective audience on. If comic audiences were anything to go by, Iron Man 3 would have been a flop because of the Mandarin twist, but its the second most successful superhero film of all time.

From:

halloweenjack

Ease up on the throttle just a skosh there, Slim. Yes, Nick Fury Jr. is mainstreaming SamJackFury, and getting rid of Old Nick (or sidelining him permanently, however this works out) is aligning things closer to the MCU, but... Wolverine being "killed"? FF breaking up? I don't think that those things have one whit to do with Marvel Studios not having the movie rights, and I'm not sure that they even care, as long as they're getting a decent cut of the profits (if that's how their deals with Fox et al. works out). TPTB at Marvel are just trying to mix things up a little. And even if they are changing the comics to fit other media, well, I hate to break it to you, but if that's "commercialized", that train left the station so long ago that the tracks are rusty. I'm thinking of Herbie showing up in FF after getting put in the cartoon because of fears that kids would set themselves on fire playing Human Torch.

From:

silverhammerman

That Herbie/Human Torch thing is a myth, they dropped Torch from the team because Marvel was pursuing a solo movie deal for him. Why anyone thought the Torch would work as a solo character is beyond me, but they had enough confidence in it that they didn't want to confuse matters by having a different version with a different origin in the cartoon.

From:

citygod

There seems to be truth to the rumour that Marvel are now "anti-FF and XMen": memos telling contract artists not to draw the FF; and (anecdotal) story that Marvel actually pay Fox some form of royalty for the XMen movies. Seems crazy, but Marvel have a history of crazy deals (i.e. the Sony Spiderman deal; the Fox FF and XMen deal)

From:

ablackraptor

But they've very clearly not, at least not Anti-X-Men. X-Men are still one of their biggest entities, and have around 12 comics currently out either focusing on the various teams, spin-offs, or solo adventures of the group, and are being heavily involved in the next big event. Going from what I've been able to gather, Marvel's current EiC adores the X-Men and is still pushing them as duelling with the Avengers as their flagship team.

In the F4's case, as I've said before, it wouldn't make any sense to break them up, business wise, since it won't effect the Fox films. Any issue with them seems to be less about the films, and more to do with the fact the sales are dropping and they have no idea how to use them in a manner that would avoid it.

From:

arilou_skiff

AFAIK it's less about the comics side (which keeps chugging along) but more about the merchandising side (as well as potential cartoons, etc.)

From:

ablackraptor

Yeah, others have said it, but while some of that is definitely to tie in to the MCU, a lot of that is really overdoing it. Modernized and film-friendly costumes, black!Fury, and film six becoming the 'Core' line up, all that is to tie into the films, but Fantastic Four and X-Men? How?

Ignoring that the X-Men is currently getting tons of love in terms of new books (including spin-offs and solo books, the X-Men line has about 12 books dedicated to it), but what exactly would they get out of it? It won't effect the films since only a small minority of the films audiences are comic readers, and an X-Men fan or F4 fan isn't just going to stop being a fan just because the comics stop. All they would be doing is essentially harming themselves by refusing to make money off of a property of theirs.

There is some active attempts to emulate the films, but not only do they not deny it like you claim (Bendis outright admits they made Fury Jr to tie in with the films), but its not nearly as extensive as you're trying to spin it.

From:

coldfury

I probably oversold the Wolverine and FF bits. The first is just conspiracy theory, the second is rumor. (A rumor that makes me angry if true, so that might've fed into this).

I'd really have to do some digging, but I'm pretty sure in the past the top editors of Marvel have told some pretty tall tales about how they're doing what's best for the comics, and the cinematic universe has no bearing on what they're doing.

I can't recall what exactly was the issue that annoyed me at the time, but it seems like they'll hit the reset button on most series when the movie comes out.

Here's an example: Captain America came out July 22, 2011.

The issue Steve Rogers reclaims the Captain America costume from Bucky Barnes came out July 6th, 2011.

http://www.comicbookresources.com/?page=preview&id=9050

It's things like that, and maybe they're owning up to it more these days as it gets more transparent (Fury), but they've been pretty bad about waving fans off when they predict resets like that.

And for the most part it doesn't bug me, I even get why they're doing this with Nick. I hate seeing Dugan's past retconned, though, and I hate some of the costumes they're doing to emulate the movies. Hawkeye especially.

From:

ablackraptor

I have heard the rumour before concerning the F4, but that doesn't seem to have any basis since, like I said, they'd be undermining themselves, not the movies.

Well, for the most part, it doesn't. I mean, while they have molded some elements to tie with the films and incorporated many film-entities into the comics (such as Coulson, the Chitauri, and soon Coulson's team), they generally seem to be doing their own thing with the stories themselves. I mean, AvX, Hickman's Avengers run, the upcoming Axis event, and many of these Original Sin revelations don't seem to be anything that's liable to be brought into the films, nor are they very film-friendly ideas. Hell, they regularly talk about the original Invaders and such despite the films not having them, and don't bother trying to mix them with the Howling Commandos like they easily could have.

I will concede that they do reset stuff in time for the films, but they never actively deny that these resets and changes are done in accordance to the films; they don't necessarily admit it, but they never lie or hide it.

With Dugan here though, I don't see how its been done to tie in with the films; he's such a minor part of the films as it is that him being alive or dead wouldn't effect the ease of translation from one to the other.
And as for the costumes, well, that's not completely tied with the MCU; all across the board costumes are being modernized. X-Men, F4, non-film Avengers, and the bulk of DC's current universe have had costume revamps that make them look more like functional outfits. Its less to do with the films and more to do with the current generation's idea for how it should look; its like the 90s Liefeldian craze, only not nearly as bad.

And, we're obviously going to have to agree to disagree on Hawkeye's current outfit in the comics; I like it, its very cosplay-friendly compared to his classic ensemble.

From:

arilou_skiff

The Chitauri aren't technically "film entitites", they originated in the Ultimates.

From:

ablackraptor

True, but the 616 version are clearly drawing from the MCU version rather than the Ultimates version.

From:

bruinsfan

I don't see how intentional undermining of the FF title would garner any real benefit for Marvel, even in terms of spiting Fox. I mean, even if everyone who currently buys the book refuses to see the movie (rather than just being mad at Marvel and possibly not buying other comics they publish, which seems the likelier response to me), that does what? Changes opening weekend grosses from $57.5 million to $57.2 million?

From:

ablackraptor

Probably not even that; last I checked, Fantastic Four's current sales were around 20-30K a month, so even if they all refused to watch the movie, it'd be less than half a million dollars loss, which is really not a lot of money as far as movie studios go.

From:

jmacq1

While Lady Thor and FalconCap probably won't be replaced until the next solo outings for those heroes on film. Captain America: The First Avenger came and went with Bucky still being Captain America, as I recall (though they DID bring back Steve Rogers from death).

Superior Stark? I think he's here to stay, because it will allow them to turn comic-Stark into his MCU personality. The costume will become something more "traditional" but the personality changes will stick.

Generally I agree with your statement. I just wish they could give Old Nick a dignified exit as opposed to the kind of character assassination that normally gets retconned or ignored out of existence a few years later.

From:

wizardru

There's a fundemental flaw with your theory, though: it has been clear for some time that the Marvel comics and Marvel's other endeavors DO NOT feed into each other. A successful TV show or movie doesn't magically bring readers in, nor do readers of the comic suddenly complain that the two don't match. There is very little crossover, in terms of each's success. Remember how they rebooted Iron Man after the first movie and how the newer incarnation was MUCH more influenced by the MCU style (and yet was still firmly entrenched in 616 continuity)? The second and third movies have zero impact on sales. Thor sales didn't spike when the movies came, nor Cap nor Spidey nor Wolverine.

Part of the problem is that many adult fans of the movies simply aren't going to seek out a comic book store (never mind that it can be a chore....I was in DC the other week and according to google, the closest comic shop was in Virginia). The other problem is comics are EXPENSIVE. If a 13 year-old has a limited allowance, he can spend $12 to see Guardians of the Galaxy or he can...but three comics. In most cases, he's going to the movies.

Killing Wolverine is no different than killing Cap, wiping Iron Man's brain after making him a hunted man, having Thor turn into a frog, killing Professor X or any of a bunch of other stunts that won't really stick.

From:

starwolf_oakley

Superhero comic book morality is strange.

"Doing immoral things so moral people won't have to makes me moral."

"Doing bad things isn't so bad as long as you feel bad."

"It's all right when *I* do those things. I'm Batman."

From:

icon_uk

I dunno, the "Contemptible bastard who is actually on your side" is an interesting character that exists in other genres, and I don't actually see anything wrong with that in it's place.

We ponder thought experiments along the lines of "Would you kill a baby if it would save ten adults you had never met?" or the like because to us there is no "right" answer, but there are people who would say "Yes" because it's a simple equation to them (Well, not simple, but one they can see as the only rational decision).

Classic example would be Amanda Waller, who has admitted that she has knowing sent people to their deaths repeatedly, but has never tried to sugar coat it, even to herself. She knows she may well have damned herself to hell by some of the things she has done, but she did them for what she viewed as being the correct reasons.

Other classic examples are "Control" and "Madeline" from the original "La Femme Nikita" TV series (Especially Control). They manipulated politics on an international scale apparently to suit their own whim, but when challenged Control was able to prove that the things he's done are pretty horrible, but the world WITHOUT his interference would have been much WORSE, with political instability more widespread and all-out war more than likely in some places that were now merely strained because of his actions.

From:

spidermanwashere

So Dum Dum was a LMD? Man, you think that would have come up when the Skrulls copied him during the Secret Invasion. Or not, I guess. Whatever.

"Whatever" actually seems to be the best description for the Original Sin arc, since it's all fairly uninteresting and they keep retconning their universe so that it reads like someone's fan fiction (what if someone ELSE got bit by a radioactive spider, but she was like, locked up for 15 years and that's why we never saw her? And then she and Spider-Man can totally kiss after 5 sec of meeting each other! Forget character development, how hot would that be?)

From:

icon_uk

Forgotten about the Skrull bit... that IS a bit of a deal killer.

From:

halloweenjack

Robodumdum is giving Old Nick some hard truth there. Between this and Mighty Avengers, and potentially Loki if I ever get around to getting the TPBs of that, I'm impressed with Ewing generally.

From:

burkeonthesly

I think Robodumdum is the one person in all of this that I can like.

From:

junipepper

Try saying "Robodumdum" 10 times fast...

From:

sir_razorback

So, in an upcoming origins movie, are we going to have MCU Nick Fury's father showing up, played by Harrison Ford?

From:

ablackraptor

That...would actually be perfect. Either him or Liam Neeson.

From:

majingojira

That would be perfect as far as I'm concerned.

It's like a call-back to Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade: "Who Else could be Indiana Jone's Father but James Bond?"

From:

shingi70

Wouldn't it have been easier to make Nick Fury a code name attached to this man on the wall position. Sort of like 007/

From:

starwolf_oakley

"Nick Fury" as a code name is an interesting idea.

OF course, in real life, most spies use their real names (easier to remember). They just lie about who they work for. That's why Valarie Plame getting revealed as CIA was a big deal, as she used her real name.