For everyone who is interested in just how much a story can change over the course of story meetings and editorial collaborations, you should check out Tom Brevoort’s Blah Blah Blog.
Drawing from a document dated at 5/24/07, Tom has gone play-by-play on the initial story outline from Brian Michael Bendis for last summer’s Marvel event, Secret Invasion.
Not only is it interesting in the fact that it was initially sketched for six issues (as by the time the project saw the light of day, it had expanded to eight), but it certainly had some darker moments, such as these highlights:
The Skrull queen is a suicide bomber. Her last hope. Sentry takes her and launches into space.
Sentry takes the explosion in the face. It?s massive. An explosion meant to wipe out the human race.
It massively depowers the sentry.
Thor catches sentry and saves him.
Not to mention:
SANCTUM- When Luke and Jessica rush to doctor strange?s house, the Wong Skrull has already killed himself and the baby.
Whew! Talk about an introduction for a Dark Reign! You can read the rest of Bendis’ pitch by clicking here.
July 8th, 2009 at 12:39 pm
Well I’m glad they didn’t kill the baby, but I’d have been all for a de-powered Sentry. In fact, having the Sentry die to save humanity would’ve been a great, heroic final act for what has otherwise been a pointless character. Too bad Brevoort and Joephisto didn’t have the courage to go that route.
July 8th, 2009 at 1:36 pm
I always thought that Secret Invasion could be told with 5 or 6 issues, and I was kinda right. The depowered Sentry would be a good idea, ah well, maybe someday it will happen.
Peace.
July 8th, 2009 at 1:47 pm
The Skrull Queen idea actually sounded kind of cool but I’m in the small minority who likes the Sentry. He’s not my favorite character or anything but I think he can be used well. It seems like Bendis is building towards something with him, but then again it seemed like that when New Avengers first began.
July 8th, 2009 at 3:43 pm
It seems like what would have been issues 4 and 5 of the original outline (the whole thing with the skrull homeship and space) got cut and the remaining 4 issues worth of story were stretched to 8.
At least they decided not to kill Hercules.
July 8th, 2009 at 9:50 pm
I still think they dropped the ball with this. There were rumors when SI was originally introduced that it would reveal that Tony Stark knew about the infiltration all along, which is why he pushed for the SHRA, so he could keep tabs on all the superhumans until he could find out who was who.
I wish would have gotten THAT story.
July 9th, 2009 at 5:57 pm
“I wish would have gotten THAT story.”
Wow… I hadn’t heard about that. I agree, THAT would’ve been a cool angle. Too bad that didn’t happen either.