Or, how I come down on one side of the big question.
Yes, folks, I think — I’m almost certain — I’m picking Marvel over DC.
Hush! Don’t judge me!
There are elements on both sides that I like a lot. I love DC’s Vertigo imprint, for instance, and I’m still eagerly awaiting Joss’ Wonder Woman movie. (Which reminds me, I must see if my moms has a photo of me in my favorite Wonder Woman bathing suit from when I was a kid). Also, bring on Supes! And Batman!
So maybe it’s a matter of which recent comics I’ve grown more attached to lately, which ones are more familiar to me. And that’s partly, no doubt, because of their cinematic adaptations. But, well, I finished “Identity Crisis” by Brad Meltzer today (link over there under “Recent Reads”), which is a very well done murder mystery about superheroes. And I was capital L lost half the time, completely confused as to who anyone was. Two Flashes? Father and son Green Arrows? Two Green Lanterns? And what’s up with Robin being some kid named “Tim”? Of course I know the biggies, but most of the rest of the time — and especially because characters referred to each other by their real names, not superhero names — I was utterly confused.
Don’t get me wrong, it’s still a powerful story. I guess I just didn’t feel as connected to the characters because I didn’t know their whole history, just the barest sketches. I did what I could with what I had, but still…
I’m comparing it, perhaps unfairly, with Neil Gaiman’s “Marvel 1602,” which took all the main Marvel superheroes and put them in Elizabethan Europe. Sure, there were some I didn’t get, but for the most part, the story still worked for me, without all that backstory.
The Blatantly Cody said after I finished “Identity Crisis” I’d need to dive into the “Infinite Crisis” storyline, but I think I’m going to hold off for now. Maybe I’ll be wrong, but I guess my big fear with comics is that I’m never going to be able to get entirely caught up, unless it’s with something brand new, like Astro City or Planetary (and even there, I had to have some references explained to me). I respect the huge backstories, but they worry me.
It is, probably, an unfair comparison — Gaiman took the ur-protagonists from the modern Marvel Universe, stripped down to their basics, and plopped them into a non-canonical tale all by themselves.
Meltzer, on the other hand, was trying to create a world-spanning murder mystery that, by its very nature, would have even fans trying to remember trivia from a decade ago.
The best comparison I could think of would be, instead, reading (on the Marvel side) the House of M saga, or something else X-related. Great stuff, if you’re into all the details, but hell if you’re not.
I go back and forth between DC and Marvel. Currently I’m more leaning DC, just because Marvel got too roccoco in their historicity (especially on the X-side), but there’s some great Marvel writers out there (Bendis, Whedon, Straczynski), and ditto on the DC side (Johns, Rucka, Winick, Busiek); there are plenty of fine titles to read in each sphere for both the trivia-obsessed and those not so much.
I’ve read Whedon’s X-Men stories, certainly, and it’s there that I think my familiarity with the movie world has helped. Although, ok, if I’m being fair, I had to ask just who the heck this “Emma Frost” person was. Soem may not believe it, but I’d never heard of her before reading Whedon’s series, despite my own superhero being named Noelle Frost.
I think Dave Hill is right –
I dare you to pick up a regular issue of the x-men and even know which way is up by page 3. Whedon is kind of working in his own ‘newbie friendly’ universe with astonishing, but the other x-books baffle even me.
There are great books over in DC land that are good for the uninitiated like Batman: The Long Halloween, etc. And I suspect that the summer re-launches of Wonder Woman and Justice League will be good jumping on points.
Okay, let me start by saying that I’m at heart a Marvelite (RFO, KOF). When I started collecting comics in the late 70s, I bought nearly every back issue of almost every Marvel title there was. DC I’d read, but never dug enough to spend money buying back issues.
When I started collecting again in 2001, I found that Marvel had changed. Gone were the character-driven stories I was used to. Gimmicks were the thing. DC, contrariwise, had started focusing more on the folks under the masks.
You mentioned Identity Crisis. That miniseries came out the same time as Marvel’s Identity Disc (the issues even came out the same week each month, as I recall). Crisis profoundly affected the characters in the books, forcing them to look closely at their core beliefs, at who they were and who they wanted to be. Disc was floundering mess, centering on an interesting MacGuffin that was all sound and fury, signifying nothing (and with a lame ending, to boot). (Of course, YMMV, as ***Dave likes to disclaim.)
While I will always, always, feel a stronger emotional connection to the Marvel heroes, DC’s stories are holding my interest more these days. Of course, there are certainly elements in Marvel’s books that are interesting. While the “Iron Spidey” costume seemed gimmicky, having him at the press conference, about to reveal his secret identity, has me on the edge of my seat.
You pays your money, and you takes your choice. I like both, sometimes one more than the other. Maybe next year, I’ll be looking forward to Marvel titles more than Dc (depends largely on what DC’s “1 Year Later” event does to the books I like). Either way, I respect your choice. Read on, True Believer! Excelsior!
Nuff said.
Marvel? I’m such a DC guy, I don’t even see how that’s an option. But I do have to admit they’re bringin’ it right with Civil War (which, as others have said, has similar continuity/accessibility issues to Identity Crisis).