Maybe it’s just me, but the day after Christmas – Boxing Day for me, because I come from Britain which still remembers to call it that – is always a weird mix of comedown, letdown and relaxation. No wonder, then, that I’ve found myself thinking about all the various Aftermath comics of yore. You know the ones: They come out after a big event comic, and deal with all the fallout, either putting the toys back in the box carefully (The three Fear Itself epilogues from Marvel), trying to come up with new toys to play with (The Final Crisis Aftermath minis from DC) or exploring the landscape left by what had come before (Marvel’s Civil War: The Conversation or Secret Invasion:Dark Reign).
I’m always kind of amused by these types of books, because they feel like after-the-fact efforts to emphasize the importance of the event book they’re epiloguing, instead of anything in their own right (“What just happened was so important that we needed more comics to tell you how important is was!”). They also, for me at least, feel somewhat weightless by themselves, and therefore throwaway. Am I being too harsh? I’m not arguing that big stories shouldn’t have impact, or leave some kind of aftermath, but I feel as if that aftermath should be dealt with in the regular series of the characters that starred in the events, I guess (Secret Wars, for example, with its “Spider-Man has a new costume! She-Hulk has joined the Fantastic Four” endings… and startings, really, considering the publishing timeline), instead of being shunted off into the Aftermath book ghetto.
Am I being too harsh? Are there fans out there of the special issues that underscore the dramatic importance of what went before? Should I stop thinking about all of this, and get back to eggnog and mince pies…? Probably that last one, really…
December 26th, 2011 at 10:56 am
It’s not just you, those comics serve mostly to point up the failings of their parent series to work either as serial fiction or as selfcontained works. The Fear Itself one shots were spectacularly ridiculous even as those things go, though–what follow up straight up tells the audience they were wasting their time and money reading the main event?
December 26th, 2011 at 11:41 am
Event comics (all you listed above) are not ‘complete’ ‘all in one stories’ to begin with. They are serialized stories to draw in consumers to more product and to tell an over arching story. In the same way soap operas never end (well how they used to never end)these event comics continue the narrative to the next story. Civil War: Confession (not Conversation i believe) was superb in that it admitted Iron Man manipulated the situation more than he led us to believe and led into his own Invicible Iron Man series.
Secret Invasion: Dark Reign led to a year of the Dark Reign theme throughout Marvel and the quite excellent Dark Avengers story.
I do admit that the Fear Itself .1 issues were one of the first times Marvel immediately ‘reset’ some of the major happenings of the main series – usually it takes a year or so before you realize the event comic doesn’t matter anymore. But this happens all the time in comics.
Don’t think of it as an ‘aftermath’; think of it as ‘as our story continues’. These are the days of our superheroes lives…they don’t end (even in death).
December 26th, 2011 at 12:49 pm
I think the question you’re really trying to ask is, “Am I being too harsh?”
Anyway, all these issues should be called “Civil War: Boxing Day” or “Atlantis Attacks: Boxing Day” or “Brightest Day: Boxing Day.” And so on.
December 27th, 2011 at 1:12 am
Yeah, they’re pretty much just there to transition from one event into the other or the new status quo.
Most of them aren’t even necessary half the time, though some do help the story but those are usually few.
December 27th, 2011 at 10:28 am
i have to say Fearless – with the Valkyre spotlight – is a great ‘aftermath’ book. Ya the Hammers are kinda silly in a 1980′s nostalgia way but at least Marvel didn’t just vanish them into thin air as we all expected. I would never EVER have thought I’d buy a Valkyre series but I am and i enjoy it.
The Battlescar one I haven’t tried – whats the significance of the new character? Anyone care to spoil that for me? I don’t mind..