I suspect Breevort’s simply doing the best he can with the hand he was dealt. This seems more like a result of Marvel letting creators like Bendis and Millar have too much control.

Still if you cut out important things like the capture of Cloak and Dagger which were loyal members of the anti-side, it’s a shame they cut such a scene out.

It’s really kind of funny how the guy in charge of the project doesn’t seem to know what’s going on with it.

The only way CW can be better is that if Millar is either fired or his scripts are ghosted.

>>No books are post-CIVIL WAR at this point.

Okay, I think you’re maybe making a bunch of mountains out of molehills here, at least as far as your interpretation of the story content is concerned. But what the hell, let’s take a few of these point-by-point:

>That’s latest draft, not final draft, and not even dialogue revisions if it affects which characters are in a book or not…>

Well, yes and no. There are dozens if not hundreds of characters in CIVIL WAR #7, most of whom are not going to be major players in the action. The Green Goblin is one of those characters. So until every last bit of intimate choreography is worked out, I cannot say with absolute certainty that the Goblin will or will not be in CIVIL WAR #7–and knowing that folks would jump me if I said one thing or the other and things changed by the time the final book printed, I chose to try to be honest. Clearly not the right tactic here. But fear not–the script to CIVIL WAR #7 that existed on November 18th was largely ready to be drawn, and the elements that were still up-in-the-air only would have affected a handful of panels. So it’s not like Steve McNiven is ever sitting around for days or weeks at a time not doing anything.

>Although, really, it seems that those script revisions are something that may be creating the problems that certain readers have had with the most recent issue.>

Here’s the reality: we only have 22 pages an issue in which to tell this story, and that means that we need to pick and choose what’s important and what isn’t. The Cloak & Dagger capture was a panel in an earlier draft, and the Daredevil capture/unmask was a few pages that wound up hitting the cutting room floor when it became apparent that there were other elements we needed to focus on more importantly. These are the decisions that Mark and I make as we work over every issue. And it it’s cut, it’s because we didn’t feel as though the bits in question were as important to the whole as the material we left in. Of course, we could have always expanded every issue to 38 pages, but then you’d all be even angrier with the delays and such.

>Me, I’m waiting to hear from the retailers who apparently said to Marvel, “You know, why not just delay the book an extra week?” as to why they suggested pushing it back yet further.>

I didn’t speak to the retailers in question, but what came back to us was pretty simple and straightforward: traffic in most stores between Christmas and New Year’s isn’t great, as many of a given shop’s regular customers are occupied with the holidays. So this is a weak place to ship a key book like CIVIL WAR #6–and when whichever retailers our guys spoke to were queried, the majority of them said they’d rather have the book the first week of January, as they felt it would sell through better for them in that week than during the holiday slow-down. Couldn’t tell you how many retailers may have made up that consensus, and certainly not every retailer asked said the same thing, but that’s what came back to us, and part of what guided our decision.

Tom B

When was the moment you realized you never wanted to be a Marvel editor, Tim?

The minute I realized part of the job duties would have you answering critics’ and consumers’ questions at 2:47 AM on a Friday night/Saturday morning.

Tom, in all seriousness, I respect your effort to answer everyone’s concerns/grievances.

And, crazy question that I throw out to everyone, what penultimate crossover event of this scale has ever been completely successful? For my money, there’s just too many variables involved and logistics to manage to make it work for everyone. (I think Contest of Champions was the first and last one I ever enjoyed [I mean the original] and I only made it through the first issue.)

>When CIVIL WAR was first pushed back, we were told it was to give Steve McNiven more time, because he takes six weeks to draw an issue. Well, if he takes six weeks to draw an issue, and the revised schedule required him to produce issues #6 and #7 in four weeks, how did anyone ever expect it to be achieved?

And if, as Joe Quesada now claims, Steve McNiven can draw one page a day, why WAS the series delayed in the first place?>

Not every page is created equal. For the last two weeks, Steve’s been drawing a page a day, but part of our strategy for getting the issue done on time was for Steve to do the most difficult pages first, such as a spread containing something like forty or fifty characters that took a hell of a lot longer than one day to complete.

Creating a comic book isn’t math, and not every comic or even every page is equivalent. Part of the difficulty you’re running into is that you’re trying to look at this stuff a hair too mathematically. If all this was that simple, there’d never be a late book.

>It just doesn’t add up.>

It’s always more fun to contemplate a massive conspiracy.

Tom B

Okay, I feel the light of illumination starting to dawn here. But I’m still confused here.

Arch points out, quite rightly, that the delay amounts to two months spread over four issues, so it’s an extra two weeks per issue. That’s true, if you’re looking at the average delay. The problem is, Marvel didn’t spread the delay out evenly. Instead, they opted for a two-month delay between issues #3-4, another one between issues #4-5, and then a return to monthly shipping after that.

So if I’m following this right, each issue takes more than a month to produce, yet issues #5, #6 and #7 are coming out only a month apart. Unless there’s something I’m missing, the only way that can work is if you’re deliberately frontloading the delay and holding back issue #5 for several weeks even after it’s ready. But I’m struggling to see why that’s an attractive option.

Tom Breevort’s patience and professionalism in the face of massive and inexplicable ill will is amazing.

Yeah, and just to clarify (since reading this stuff back, it DOES look a bit aggressive), I certainly have no ill will towards Tom Brevoort personally. He’s always struck me as a nice guy. As far as I’m concerned, I’m just asking follow-up questions given that he’s chosen to offer an explanation here - which, of course, he’s under no obligation to do.

Marvel as a whole, I think, *has* done rather more to deserve ill-will - the timing of the original delay announcement was a very bad presentational move, which has probably skewed perception of the whole issue. Although I can think of understandable reasons why they might have thought it was a good idea. (Not distracting from other announcements, for example.)

Mr. Brevoort,

Why do you assume accusations of massive conspiracy when “shoddy business practices” would be the more fitting accusation?

Late comics have become extremely prevalent in the industry…as have false promises of new ship dates that were more hopeful than realistic at the time of their announcement.

Joe insinuates that you guys could likely have shipped Civil War #6 on time, but wanted to give it at least 1 week more cushion…then had retailers say that, if that’s the case, ship it in January. All reports indicate that this is a highly unlikely request by the retailers (seeing as how they could just shelve the book with the new releases an extra week if they were so concerned).

When a child says “the dog ate my homework”, it isn’t a conspiracy…it is an unlikely excuse meant to avoid some of the consequences for their lateness. I believe THAT is what people, right or wrong, are suggesting here…not some conspiracy. To try to build up the discussion as being something much more grandiose (and, therefore, unlikely) is to build up a straw man to easily be knocked down.

And it is an insult to the intelligence of those you are arguing against.

I’m with Paul O’Brien…the ill-will is more suited for Marvel. The timing of their announcements…or, in this case, really a non-announcement…was bad business. Retailers basically found out this issue was going to be late by it not being on the adjustable list. Word from Marvel didn’t come until days later. And then retailers were blamed for the extra week. Regardless of whether or not you really think that Marvel delayed it based on retailers expressing a desire for it to wait (and I haven’t seen ONE that has owned up to having that opinion), it was kinda adding insult to injury when Marvel delays it because of their own poor scheduling and then publicly lets the fanbase know that the retailers are to blame for the second week.

Tolly, no one is saying they rather have a shoddy piece of work. They prefer great artwork, easily. They would prefer scheduling and communication that wasn’t shoddy, as well, though. Both have been indisputably shoddy here. They scheduled poorly from the start and were too hopeful instead of realistic on rescheduling. When the first communication retailers got on the biggest event coming into their store was its NON-PRESENCE on the order cutoff list…that’s NOT even mediocre communication…it is piss poor. I’d like to see either of those addressed with a legitimate argument, rather than trying to spin the whole discussion into Marvel being accused of a dastardly conspiracy (which no one has done).