The Fix-tastic Five

Marvel Comics is in some hot water. At their most recent Retailer Summit one of their Chiefs made it seem like their dip in sales is due to all their new characters. One of their artists hid anti-Semitic messages into an issue of X-Men. And the constant attempts to "reshape the Marvel Universe" through back-to-back event comics is making Marvel pricey to keep up with. Marvel Comics needs to handle their management and get back to what's important. With "Marvel Legacy" seemingly promises that, here are The Panel Biter's Top 5 Changes To Marvel Comics.

5. Acknowledge The First Family

 Marvel Comics can't outright ignore The X-Men because they still sell. They can renumber and reestablish them just like any other comic book series, but they can't make them important to any events. Case-in-point was during "Civil War II", instead of any mutants involving themselves in that event, Marvel did another event called "Inhumans vs X-Men" which kept them busy and away from the "real" event. However, one family of characters Marvel has no problem ignoring are The Fantastic Four. Currently Mr. Fantastic, The Invisible Woman, and their children are missing. The Thing was a member of The Guardians of The Galaxy and is now part of SHIELD, and The Human Torch is an Avenger and part of the Inhumans. There is no current Fantastic Four title and no indication of their return, despite most of the pieces being there. Doctor Doom is still relevant as he's taken the Iron Man mantle and is trying to be a superhero now. So instead of The First Family of Marvel having their spotlight, they are either missing or subjected to titles/mantles that can be used by Marvel Studios (i.e. Iron Man, The Avengers, The Inhumans, The Guardians of The Galaxy). "Marvel Legacy" promises the return of a classic Marvel character, but I don't think anyone would be opposed to them cheating and just bringing the Richards Family back so that the FF can return. It is because of The Fantastic Four we have The X-Men, Spider-Man, The Hulk, The Avengers. They are the cornerstone of what Marvel represents. Marvel should just be the bigger man, say "screw you, 20th Century Fox", and allow The Fantastic Four to brighten The Marvel Universe once again.

4. Don't End Diversity, Just Slow It Down

 Diversity is a touchy subject, one that readers have been on both sides about. The whole trend of replacing older, Caucasian superheroes with new races, genders, ages, and religions really got it's beginning with Miles Morales/Spider-Man, but actually meant something when the new Ms. Marvel was a Muslim girl. But then we got an Asian Hulk, a Black Captain America, a Black female Iron Man, a Hispanic Captain America (who's name is America), a Hispanic Ghost Rider, a female Thor, and everything is changing what do we do!? It all happened too fast, and while the general public may believe it has something to do with appeasing the modern audience or "giving everyone a hero of their own" it all ties back to the movies. Like everything else. You see, for as much as we love the actors who play Marvel's heroes, guys like Robert Downey Jr. are getting old. But hey, we have this teenaged African-American Iron Man character in our comics, we could just use her to replace RDJ in the movies. People can't get mad because hey, that's what happened in the books! And if they do complain we can just bank off our LGTB/racially enthused fan-base to call them sexists and racists. That is why this topic is so touchy, because Marvel-as a company-wants more Kamala Khans and Riri Williams so they can keep their movies going. They think it's too risky to have every Marvel movie star a new comic book character, but if it's a character with a pre-established title like "Iron Man" or "Captain America" people will watch it despite it not being the same actor or character. As far comics go? Diversity isn't the problem, it just needs to stop. Take a break from inventing new colored superheroes, we're good. Instead of making new characters we should just develop the ones we have. What good is Riri Williams as Iron Man/Ironheart if we sideline her for another Iron-Person just to keep things fresh? You have characters who could redefine the direction of your comics and your films, don't forget them just to get another front-page on a news site with some-I don't know-Yugoslavian, bi-sexual, teenaged, male Black Widow. Shit, that's gonna happen now.

3. No More Events/Tie-Ins/Reboots

 Just stop with the events. For Rao's sake, just stop. When events like "Avengers: Standoff", "Civil War II", and "Secret Empire" aren't banking off one another, you have events like "Inhumans vs X-Men", "Monsters Unleashed" and "The Clone Conspiracy" falling in between them. It's getting to a point where as soon as one event ends another begins. If-by the grace of Mephisto-there is no event going on, there's a Lead-Up, Preview, or Tie-In to an upcoming event already out. It's ridiculous, it's unnecessary, and it costs your readers money. And then there's the matter of "shaking up the Marvel Universe". Christ, between all these events the Marvel Universe is about as shaken up as a glass full of unstable molecules tossed in a blender, then the blender is tossed into a drying machine, then the drying machine was tossed into an open field during a hurricane. Marvel, your universe doesn't need to be changed or redefined or shaken up, just develop it. Let it grow, let it evolve. Stop establishing new relationships and partnerships and new teams and then saying "Fuck it that didn't work, redo it! Redo it all". Stop it. Stop renumbering The Avengers and making a "new team". The Avengers aren't new, they're lazy. They're predictably loose and people keep leaving and joining between the span of months. Stop renumbering Captain Marvel because people aren't buying it. When you renumber so often people are going to get pissed because they know what they're reading ultimately won't matter, it will just be replaced in a month. Creators won't want to work for you if they know their work could just end because you say so. They could be working on a year-long story and Marvel could just say "it's not selling, must be you" and take you off the book, renumber it, and then forget whatever it is you did. You take the freedom away from the people making your fucking books. And tie-ins? Making your creators stop what they're doing, do a story that relates to your dumb events, and then saying that "tie-in" is integral to the event for an extra buck? Shame on you. Up to your room, Marvel. No supper, no renumbering, and no events for at least one year!

2. Less Titles With Cheaper Prices

Contradicting what I just said, Marvel needs to reboot. If "Marvel Legacy" is as obvious a rip-off of "DC Rebirth" as we can all assume, there are two important factors Marvel needs to take away from DC Rebirth that could get them back on focus. Less books. Cheap prices. Currently, DC Comics has 32 titles. Marvel has roughly 62 ongoing titles. That's almost twice what DC Comics has, and while DC may give certain characters like Batman, Superman, and Green Lantern multiple books, Marvel allows Black Panther, Deadpool, and Doctor Strange to have three books each, they allow younger characters like America, Wasp, and Young Jean Grey to have titles. And Marvel's 62 books either cost 3.99 to 5.99. Most of DC Comics titles-after Rebirth-costed 2.99. In fact, the "DC Universe Rebirth Special" which was a plus-sized single-issue that set-up the event and the events to come only costed 2.99! And when prices went up, they only went up to 3.99. DC Comics is selling better than Marvel right now because people can afford their DC stories. Marvel, on the other hand, releases so many books at such steeping prices and then have the balls to see their event books undersell and say it's diversity's fault. DC Comics Rebirth also featured fresh talent and returning talent, they brought back people who left the company five years ago and promised them they could do the stories they want to do. Marvel? "You can't have the X-Men help The Avengers. You can't let Spider-Man leave New York because this event happens in New York. You can't use The Thing or The Human Torch, just use a Guardian or an Inhuman". Can't, can't, can't. All because Marvel is playing favorites. Marvel, you want better sales? Make better books. Stop thinning out your fan's wallets and keep it simple. Start with, I dunno, 25 books, and work your way from there. Pair characters together, do more teams or anthology books, stop giving every John Doe under the sun their own comic book. And stop making characters based off images. Between Gwenpool and Spider-Gwen, I'm about ready to go back in time and throw Gwen Stacy off that bridge myself.

1. Care

"The house of ideas". Sure. Ideas. If you call using your own movies as inspiration ideas. Do you know why Marvel fans exist? Because when characters like Spider-Man, and Daredevil, and The X-Men were all created they were different because they didn't act like the typical superheroes. They weren't The Green Hornet, or The Phantom, or The Shadow, or even classic DC Comics characters. You could identify a Marvel Comics character by one factor: reliability. I can't relate to Spider-Man because I fight men in bird suits, but I can relate because I have responsibilities that stress me out. I can't relate to Iron Man because I'm not an unbelievably vain dick-head, but I can relate to him hiding his self-doubt with comedy. Captain America, The Hulk, Thor, these are characters who we aspire to be modern day Gods. But for all their strength, they are still human, fallible, we can still relate to them and aspire to be them because without the powers and the costumes we are like these characters. That's why people care. Why do you care? Because every superhero is just a brand to you. Because they're all just films waiting to happen, merchandise ready to sell. Because you'd rather hear how amazing "Guardians of The Galaxy Vol. 2" was instead of hearing how crappy your comic books are. Because selling properties and banking off the creativity of movie makers is easy, but actually sitting down and talking about stories is hard. Listening to your writers and artists is hard. Listening to the people who have been buying your shit for decades is hard. Just try to make The X-Men important. Just try to give The Fantastic Four respect. More over, try to let creators create! You've done it before. Felipe Smith got no trouble when he created The All-New Ghost Rider, he just got to do his own thing with no interruption and no over-promotion. Let people tell stories. You can't just say "we don't care. Just make the comics so we have movie material, make comics so we can hype it up with movie we have coming out" and then turn around and say "hey, did you ask to use that character? You can't kill this one off we need him for a film. You can't use The X-Men here, use an Inhuman or something and keep The X-Men over there". You can't. You shouldn't. It's just sad, shameful, that during an era where Marvel has risen the ranks and now everyone on the planet knows their characters and loves them, that they refuse to let their comics be as good as their movies. That they refuse to embrace their history and opt to pick-and-choose what really matters. Well, The Fantastic Four matter. The X-Men matter. You cannot just pretend those characters haven't helped your Spider-Men and your Avengers do important things. You can't pretend the original Secret Wars didn't feature the X-Men, and you can't say The Inhumans and The Guardians of The Galaxy have always been important to your universe because they weren't. We know that, and we know you know that. So, Marvel Comics Editorial, if you want to give a shit? Give a shit. But give the right shit instead of trying to hide that you don't even know your own shit.
And make sure you wipe.
Thanks for reading.