While reading some old comics today, I noticed a Marvel house ad for their plans in 1998 (and wow, does it feel weird to refer to 1998 comics as old). Many of these stories are familiar, a few are even favorites: the Captain America/Iron Man crossover six months into Heroes Return, the Avengers/Thunderbolts battle around the same time, the new Thor #1 with John Romita Jr. on art. But what surprised me was how many of these stories never came to be. They mention a major story that will be wrapped up in X-Factor #150, except that X-Factor was canceled with issue #149. They promise a brand new title starting with an X, except that the titles that come closest to fitting that bill won't show up until 2001 and '02 (Exiles and X-Statix). They promise a brand new imprint called Excelsior, except the imprint never happens. It looks like the crash of the late '90s caused a mini-Marvel-implosion as promised titles die on the vine and solicited stories never make it to print.
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Being only a casual Marvel follower at best, I'm not sure about the timing, but could that be a result of the editorial change from Bob Harras (I think) to Jemas and Quesada?
You're telling me?
Isn't 1998 around the time that Marvel went bankrupt (or was it almost bankrupt?)
1998 comics old? You whippersnappers! I still remember buying New Teen Titans #1 back in 19-by-gum-80! :)
I remember reading about the Excelsior imprint back then, though I don't remember what books were going to be in the line, or if they even mentioned them.
I think Bill Jemas and Quesada came into power closer to 2000. Quesada was running Marvel Knights then, but they weren't running the whole shebang yet.
It had to be the bankruptcy, power struggles and takeover bids.
Figserello said:
Ahem.
x<]:o){
Don Collett said:
You kids with yer paper and ink. I remember when our comics were drawn on raw lumber, with berry juice. You'd get splinters every time you turned the page.
And we liked it! We LOVED it!
Berry Juice!! You were spoiled rotten! We had to grind rocks into dust and spit on them!
Dust and spit? Whippersnapper! We used our own blood to finger paint on molten lava and were grateful for the opportunity!
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