Axel Alonso fights the belief that Marvel editors are as involved in the writing of the publisher’s books as its writers:
Well, let’s be clear: The writers write the books, not the editors. The most we do is confer on a general roadmap and a general destination that’s rarely, if ever, a pinpoint landing. The story always evolves… Bottom line: An editor’s job is to know when they’re needed and when they’re not. A bad editor is one who feels that they need to see his fingerprints on everything he edits or he hasn’t done his job. That’s foolish. Sometimes, an editor’s job is as simple as saying, “Wow, that’s great. Send it to the artist.”
I admit to some skepticism as to whether Marvel’s editors are quite as hands off as Alonso describes, but part of me wonders how much of the pushing of this message – Seemingly from out of nowhere, unless I’ve missed recent accusations of Marvel being particularly creator-unfriendly (besides Marko’s Fan Expo appearance last Friday, of course)? – has something to do with presenting itself as an opposing narrative to DC’s reportedly top-down approach to the New 52. Is Marvel going to become the new DC, in terms of being the creator haven that DC used to be…?
August 29th, 2011 at 1:18 pm
Talk to me when the Mephisto marriage retcon is undone.
Or when Tom Brevoort stops saying things like, “If Brian Michael Bendis didn’t want to write the death of Ultimate Spider-Man, we would have hired someone else to do it.”
August 29th, 2011 at 1:20 pm
What’s funny is that Marvel editors are micromanaging in the worst ways — by their own directly stated admission, they dictate the creative content of the books through endless line-wide crossovers, and yet, they can’t be bothered to do simple copy-editing (watch my get a typo in this post).
I’ll never forget the issue of USM where Bendis gave Mary Jane’s dad three different first names within a single page.
August 29th, 2011 at 1:21 pm
“watch my get a typo in this post”
Never fails.
August 29th, 2011 at 1:43 pm
“Is Marvel going to become the new DC, in terms of being the creator haven that DC used to be…?”
When was DC considered a creator’s Haven more than Marvel? pre- 2000 sometime?
August 29th, 2011 at 2:44 pm
Actually, I always looked at Marvel as being more editorial driven than DC in the last few years, but that’s because I think Quesada couldn’t handle not being a creator. I always saw him and Bendis as an evil brain trust who set out to ruin the Marvel; Universe I love so much.
August 29th, 2011 at 6:13 pm
Editors don’t write the books, yes. The marketers do.
Just take a look at that glut of unnecessary Marvel product put out there solely to grab market share.
August 29th, 2011 at 7:09 pm
K-Box pretty much said it all in the first post (although the second and third posts were great for hilarity alone!). My first thought was the “if he didn’t write it, we would’ve found someone who would have” comment. Nothing, to me, is as blatant a statement of Editorial over Creator. That and the “kill off a character a quarter” comment I’ve also read around the net.
I sometimes wish I could just go back to the time in my childhood where I didn’t know who ANYONE was that worked in comics. They were just these magic books full of wonder that wound up in my hands month after month that brought me new worlds, amazing characters, and joy. I didn’t know who wrote Batman… I just heard “Batman” speaking.
I know, I know… that puts the characters above the creators, and I sometimes complain about just that… I believe creators (and editors) deserve some recognition for good work. It just seems like they’re more about being pitchmen and celebrities a lot more lately than they are storytellers.
Sufficed to say, if Marvel feels like they have to put out an official statement about what their Editors’ actual jobs are, it’s a pretty bad sign of what the Editors must have been doing up til now.