Localized storm in the region of his abdomen?

BIF! BAM! POW!

Well, he gets called by his first name, James, every so often. Maybe they could do that more and more.

Like how the stage name of Johnny Cougar was changed to John Cougar Mellencamp, then finally just John Mellencamp.

Yeah, it was his nickname…. when he was a teenager…

It’s tood bad none of this will really give the industry a boost it needs. I still don’t see new kids picking up something like Civil War and that grabbing them. It wasn’t as big as X-Men #1 (1991) and sells millions of copies. I’ve seen the new Cap in a couple different mainstream press/media and realized they change things all the time at Marvel, but it usually doesn’t add up to anything. I don’t see 15 olds picking up something based on CW or the Initiative and going ‘wow, that’s a neat story’ It wasn’t. Quality, Quesada. Quality.

Hey there, Alex.

What do you consider quality?

How would you gain young adults, teenagers as frequent readers/$penders?

***One more thing: Man, using X-Men #1, a comic entirely bled from the speculation bubble about to burst off the tip of a vampire’s fang (which lead to Marvel’s bankruptcy), is the last direction I’d hope the Big Red/Marvel to turn toward. That was quantity for sure; no quality was followed -not until around the year 2000. As I stated at http://blog.newsarama.com/2008/01/28/daily-news-starts-another-round-of-cap-coverage/, Quesada has shown great story telling leadership while still building upon Marvel’s historical characters and events. For example his editors stake in stepping up the innovative and mature development of comics writing and art in the current volume of “Captain America”, “Alias”, “Daredevil”, “The Ultimates” and the “Gunslinger”. Also you have comics adaptation books (like authors Poe and Feist and the character Anita Blake). Even “Civil War”’s ballsy unmasking of Spider-man and the focus on many a character’s extreme personalities can be strengths which lead them to extreme flaws. These characterizations out of Civil War are just waiting for future writers, artists and editors to run with, thank you Millar and staff: Reed’s analytical and self absorbed mind can widen man kind’s view of reality and physics of the universe while neglecting the reality of his nuclear family responsibilities and. And Tony Stark’s intelligent mind that focuses on his futurist ambitions behave just like an addict who can susceptibly replace an extreme use of a chemical substance (Stark’s alcoholism) with extreme tendencies to say, blanketing himself in a new suit of armor that has its own intelligence and taking over an extreme world wide espionage organization (S.H.I.E.L.D)….

I remember writing an email a few years ago to JQ, just after Jemas was pres I think, and in newsarama about a couple of years ago, how cool it would be if Marvel worked on the quality of it’s stories to the extent that the mainstream TV viewer would look forward to interviews on talk shows, like Letterman (Avengers 239, baby!!!). Viewers would anticipate discussions with the new artist/writer team of say Spider-man or some great character.

Alex, I agree with your concern for quality. A friend of mine recently finished an executive weekend training ‘camp’ for a fortune 100 company. Long story short, the first day she won two of the mock three year product development workshop, because, as the executives visiting had pointed out to the teams, that the key was in QUALITY product development, not so much in advertising. People will just know/find what to flock to. In my opinion, comic’s still has an obscurity and comics still have a mainstream inferior taboo image carried by the important generation -the young’ns; the LONG TERM INVESTORS (even high schoolers to early 20’s). They are still untapped as far as their $$$’s go. Yes JQ’s appearance on Colbert and the morning show is awesome for this awareness, but their ill ‘word of mouth’ will down comics if ONE trip to the shop yields lack of quality –So there is a challenge that I think JQ/Marvel has stepped up to in implementing some cool things, my examples above, and some failings that can still lead to successes (Tsunami line, Next Wave, and the simmering to fading Gen Y stuff). ***And hey, if these appeal to adults, then I would like to note that much of who I am has been influenced by what my parents enjoyed watching, reading and listening to while I was growing up.

One of the most important things that this current run Captain America proves, along with Civil War, and World War Hulk, UNFORTUNATLY NOT Spider-Man, is a reinvestment in the money/$tories we $$$pend our time on. While JQ/Marvel has created new characters (Young Avengers for example) and events (Secret Invasion and Illuminati and World War Hulk) that reinvest and build upon past character based assets; i.e. I stre$$ once again, the comics we have been spending our money on. This new cap is not just some out of nowhere schmuck, like the Captain from the 1980’s. The new Captain America arrives out of reinvesting in recent Cap story arcs (Brubaker’s current story arcs) >>> which themselves originate from old school Cap stories (Out of the 60’s and 70’s!!!) >>while still bringing QUALITY art and Stories. Pretty flipp’n awesome, don’t cha think!

Whether or not people stick around to read Cap or Spidey, or ANY comics after all of the recent press coverage, it’s still going in the right direction. Comics (mostly Marvel’s) getting national coverage has been becoming almost a weekly thing. Marvel’s done a heck of a job in that regard.