The fans at Millarworld are over the Ultimate line finally:
“I loved the Ultimate Universe at it’s conception. It was fresh and exciting. Six years later Ultimate Spider-Man is the only title that keeps my interest (I don’t count Ultimates as it’s over basically). Ultimate X-Men has suffered from the looming spectre of Singer for the last 3 years and now it’s just as muddled as any other X-title. With Millar and Hitch gone Ultimates seems to be losing that ‘real world’ feel that I loved about it. I never got into UFF. I think I would prefer Marvel to go the ‘All-Star’ route. A line of titles for huge names to tell their stories free of continuity and worry.”
“Long story short, I don’t care. I’ll buy Ultimate Power when it’s collected because I like Supreme Power and Greg Land draws hot chicks. That’s about it.”
“The Ultimate Universe is at a crossroads. They need to spice it up a little. The UU is developing its own continuity, which is starting to become as confusing as the current MU. Look at the Ultimate Cable stuff. The line is necessary though. The first few trades are GREAT jumping on points for new readers interested in the characters. Do readers need it? ummmm…I guess that’s up to them. Some people like it, some don’t.”
“Marvel definitely no longer needs this line, as it served its initial purpose of jumpstarting a comic book company that had become stale. Once the Ultimate stuff took off, Marvel started doing bolder things with their regular books and incorporating some of the ideas that initially made the Ultimate line seem so cool and fresh. Now the Ultimate Universe is just redundant IMO, and thus the readers defintely don’t need it either (though some have become attached to it, as is prone to happen with any alternate universe).”
“With regret Ultimate Marvel should go (but I bet it won’t). The inital idea was good with top level talent creating a new spin on tired concepts but, sadly, some of the books are now just as much of a mess as their 616 counterparts. Look how sales of UXM and UFF have fallen since Kirkman and Carey took control. Yes these are good writers - but not the ones to set these titles apart from others on the market.”
Somewhere, Bill Jemas is crying.
April 3rd, 2007 at 9:51 am
I think the sales on the Ultimate books back up this being a general attitude. I don’t think the imprint has the aura of being anything particularly special any more, and the sales on UFF, USM and UX have been drifting downwards quite noticeably for a while. None of them are selling BADLY by any stretch of the imagination, but it’s hard to avoid the conclusion that the line has lost its lustre.
April 3rd, 2007 at 10:20 am
I remember when you were excited to see the “Ultimate” version of a character and a concept, and what kind of spin they were going to put on it. Less and less have those “twists” been interesting (Thanos, Deadpool, Cable), and the rest have been just total rehashes. The upcoming Morlock story for instance, which thus far seems to just be “they’re ugly mutants who live in the sewer.”
I will say that one of the things I’d always hoped for the Ultimate line was that it could be a way for Marvel to keep certain characters and concepts in use so that they can take more chances in the regular Marvel U (like killing Aunt May/Professor X/Magneto, etc) and not worry about bringing them back to keep the copyright valid. Maybe this is happening to a certain extent, but it seems like it’s been a flip, with 616 mirroring the more “real worldy-ness” of the Ultimate U.
It almost reminds me of the Patton Oswalt bit, where he talks about how all the reality will be filmed by reality TV and they’ll have to hire Hollywood screenwriters to make reality, and it will have car chases and ninjas and action everywhere. Then the movies will be just a guy doing his taxes and other stuff like that, because they have to be an escape from reality. Of course, the independent film makers will say “That’s not reality! Where are all the vampires and ninja attacks!”
I think the Ultimate books deserve to exist, but one of the two universes needs to be the “we’re just like the real world and we solve real world problems…in tights” and the other more, for lack of a better term, all-star “this is the heart of what these characters are about and here’s a really good story with them that has a definite beginning, middle and end.”
April 3rd, 2007 at 10:28 am
“Long story short, I don’t care. I’ll buy Ultimate Power when it’s collected because I like Supreme Power and Greg Land draws hot chicks. That’s about it.”
TRACES hot chicks.
Greg Land TRACES hot chicks.
April 3rd, 2007 at 10:54 am
Stop stalking the Ultimate line, Graeme. (Yes, I am joking).
April 3rd, 2007 at 12:25 pm
Haven’t really cared about the Ultimate line ever, frankly. Initially the idea was to draw in new readers and avoid continuity problems inherent in the “616″ universe (God, I hate that label). Now it’s funny to see that there is just as much confusing stuff going on there, and there’s very little anymore that distinguishes it from the regular continuity. How long was it before Bendis introduced Venom, Carnage, and the Clone Saga? I predict they’ll start over in another 5 years with new number one issues, or spin-off titles like Ultimate Spectacular Spider-Man #1, just to keep it “fresh”.
April 3rd, 2007 at 1:27 pm
We gotta get to the REAL issue here:
“With Millar and Hitch gone Ultimates seems to be losing that ‘real world’ feel that I loved about it.”
Who is this person and how has he been reading future issues of Ultimates?
April 3rd, 2007 at 2:09 pm
To be clear, they would not need to use a character in any particular comic story to keep the copyright valid.
The copyright is valid until its time-limit expires.
They may need to use a character to keep a trademark valid. Laws about trademarks have to do with being used in some commercial sense, while copyright is protection from the first time some character is published.
That said, I have no idea if Marvel holds a trademark on Aunt May.
April 3rd, 2007 at 3:15 pm
Marvel’s inept handling of its 616 and Ultimate lines of titles makes me wonder if they’ve ever heard of economic theory, much less read any of it, even at a high school level.
Regardless of my own feelings about Mark Millar and Brian Michael Bendis’ work on their Ultimate titles, honesty compels me to admit that one of the biggest draws of the Ultimate line as a whole could be summed up as, “Bendis and Millar remake the Marvel Universe however they want.”
But at this point, how is that mission statement any different from the 616 line of titles, and if there is no difference anymore, why in the name of free-market capitalism would anyone be surprised that the Ultimate titles aren’t selling as well as they once did?
And I would suggest that anyone who thinks that the solution is to restart the Ultimate line needs to grab a dictionary and look up what the word “ultimate” actually means.
April 3rd, 2007 at 3:50 pm
I think the line could have held up just fine with the right creators and the right level of editorial stewardship, but without Jemas around to sort of whip things into shape and keep the mission statement in focus, there’s been a definite lack of direction.
I think Ultimate Spider-Man has held up pretty well for the most part, occasional dips in quality notwithstanding. It remains the place to go if you want to read self-contained (and by that I mean confined to one title) stories about a teenaged Spider-Man. And The Ultimates, which hasn’t published all that many issues and has so far retained its original creative team, is still a very strong property. That it’s told in “seasons” probably helps keep it fresh, too.
Dunno if Loeb will be able to preserve that, but we shall see.
But there’s no doubt in my mind that Ultimate X-Men and Ultimate Fantastic Four have drifted way, way off course. UFF was always a little iffy, and the rotating creative teams and fundamental disconnect the book — with its aliens and multiple dimensions and time travelling — has with the rest of the Ultimate Universe haven’t helped.
UXM, meanwhile, whatever character shortcomings it might have, was at least under Millar always a reliable Big Dumb Action Movie book. It fired on all cylinders. But every writer since Millar has seemed to have less momentum than the one who proceeded them, and Kirkman’s Claremont-esque approach (which hasn’t been helped by the incorporation of stupid concepts into his storylines) feels very detached from the title’s original appeal. With that Singer arc continuously getting pushed back, the book feels like it’s been in a holding pattern.
I’m not sure if the line can really be redeemed at this point or not. The A-game creators don’t really work on it anymore, and the brand has been diluted with poorly-conceived events. It’s obvious to me that if Marvel wants to save it they’ve got to get back to basics and really make an effort again. As a fan of the line, I want to see that happen, but I’m not convinced it will.