Take this as a thought experiment as I write for multiple reasons, not the least of which is hopefully getting my cobwebs worked out on a frequent basis for my fiction writing, but this is something that I’ve felt pretty strongly about for several years now and spurred by the recent development in Spider-Man (which I’ll go into more detail later) I wanted to put my thoughts out there and share.
There’s so much ground to cover but I’ll try to be as expansive but as brief as I can. It all began with the death of Superman in the 90’s. If you haven’t watched this short film by Max Landis yet please do so before going any further. No with that out of the way, let me say that this was a real eye-opener for me. Now I am what many would call a sheltered, naive midwestern farm boy who only just started to really observe the rest of the world around me in the last two years. It completely blew my mind to think that other people thought the same things I do in other parts of the country/planet. I say this because I may end up being a little irritating in my naivete from here out so I ask that you please bear with me.
Apart from the precedent set by Superman’s resurrection, planned or un-planned as it may have been, the film highlights a larger issue as well: the treatment of the comic book medium by the powers that be. In my lifetime, that I can recall at least, Marvel Comics has “rebooted” the characters’ origins at least 4 times, not including alternate reality “retellings” like Marvel’s miniseries 1602 and Spider-Man Noir or DC’s Elseworlds label. For an interesting read, I suggest you check out Cracked.com’s article on how fanfiction is currently influencing all mainstream fiction. What it basically says it that the people who are writing for comics, television, movies and basically all fiction in existence are fans themselves who grew up on the stories they now write professionally and applying their own unique spin. This, combined with some force for which I have yet to find an explanation has resulted in characters in fiction, but especially in comics, being “reimagined” every so often. This unknown force I speak of is the mind-boggling insistence that the only way to bring in new readers to comics is to reset the status quo every so often, resulting in characters older than my grandparents running around and acting like people in their 20’s and 30’s in a present day that reflects the present day of the readers. Oddly enough, in my lifetime alone their have been major events where massively popular characters are actually killed off, sometimes multiple times per character, Spider-Man and Batman are two major offenders in this category. Yet somehow, Peter Parker and Bruce Wayne still live, heirs to their respective mantles are written out of existence or sidelined once again.
I don’t think I need to remind my fellow comic book fans of the brief careers of Ben Reilly and Jean-Paul Valley, nor the Reign of the Supermen. As many people actually lamented it, the absence of Thor was felt in the Marvel 616 universe for some time. Then of course there’s the massive Ultimatum event from the Marvel Ultimate line and the death of Peter Parker and even what initially appeared to be a true death for Bruce Wayne. In every case we have what on the surface appeared to be true progress only for both companies to leave themselves back doors by which to reverse it all whenever they choose, or at the very least in the case of Ultimate Marvel an excuse to say, “Look, it’s not the real characters, it’s the new versions.” In the DC universe Robin finally grew up and took on the mantle the Bat, with his very own Robin and a his very own rouges gallery to boot, only for DC to pull the Silver Age Flash out of retirement and take a business move, the cancellation of two separate comic lines, and use it as an excuse to reboot the entire thing again. What’s worse, by some reports they can’t even maintain consistency in this move as characters like Green Lantern were all but unaffected and while Batman has gotten younger, minus the presence of Stephanie/Spoiler, nothing else, to include his international Batman league, has changed. Please understand that I do understand the changes are bigger and more complex than that, I’m merely using hyperbole to make a point. I do not want to argue continuity here.
My point is this, Barbara Gordon was Oracle for so long that for her to become Batgirl again was disrespectful of the readers in many ways, not the least of which is we have kids in their tweens now who never knew her any other way. Comics as a medium have an impossible to replicate ability to transcend time and therefore have a perfect opportunity to tell out of continuity or out of sequence stories whenever they want. It has a built-in benefit that can allow multiple versions of the same character to exist side-by-side meaning the need to continually update Superman for the new generation is unnecessary, as Max pointed out above and while I’m not saying he should have stayed dead, I am saying that there are more than enough characters out there that could have, and quite possibly have already, successfully replaced him.
I think the most offensive example to date, for myself anyway, was probably about a year before the Spider-Man Brand New Day reboot when the two artists preparing to take over duties on Amazing Spider-Man said in an interview with Wizard magazine that the worst thing to ever happen to Peter Parker was his marriage to Mary Jane. Both men expressed distaste and their own personal opinion that Spider-Man was better when he was single and that was the character they wanted to write. I remember thinking, “Well that’s a pretty narrow-minded view. It’s a good thing they can’t just erase all that. Characters in all other forms of fiction grow and move on and their lives change.” Not to mention that aspect of the character was so well-established that a previous attempt to kill off Mary Jane had already been reversed not 5 years before! Then they announced that in the wake of a massive Marvel crossover event that Peter would successfully regain his secret identity, his marriage to Mary Jane would be written out of existence and the death of his best friend would be retconned. Fanboy rage aside, I realized I was wrong when I thought they would never be so disrespectful to fans and the character. Of course within just a few years the situation would become moot as he would once again reveal his identity to his fellow Avengers and Marvel’s EIC would assist in retconning the retcon in such a way as they could reverse it all again one day if need be. Some major superheroes have been unmasked for years and dealt with it just fine! Was it too much to consider using truly talented writers to tell truly unique tales to maybe expand on Peter’s colorful history or if these guys want to tell old-school Parker stories so bad they can do so out of sequence with no issue whatsoever because that’s how comics work!? Now Dan Slott has done something truly different, and by some accounts appalling, to the character of Peter Parker and while I don’t exactly like the change and I think on multiple levels it’s just a cheap stunt, it has generated serious interest in the comic books once again. But good ol’ Cody hit it on the head recently when he said, “They’ll fix it all in time for Amazing Spider-Man 2, everyone just relax.” You know what that is? That’s sad! I can’t even begin to describe how many ways that’s sad. It’s sad the character had gotten so stagnant they had to resort to a body-swapping tale and deus ex machina just to “shake things up”; it’s sad that the biggest fans of us all are do disenfranchised that we’re not even affected by it; it’s sad that comic books is a medium like no other with more potential than anyone knows but it’s too bogged down in bureaucratic nonsense that true artistic can’t be allowed to thrive.
Is it that they don’t have the balls to really try something new or is it just plain arrogant, superior, I write for [insert comic publisher here] now and I can do whatever I want fanboy bullshit to say, “The character was better when,” and then make it that once more? (Sorry about the wall of text ya’ll.)