All-purpose, running Geek thread (formerly Battlestar Galactica thread)

The original Captain Marvel was killed off in 1982. Carol Danvers didn't take on the name until 2012, 30 years after the original's death. Kind of a long gap to think that was about changing the character.

I don't know much about the original, who was before my time reading Marvel superhero comics. (When I was little, I preferred DC and military stuff like G.I. Joe and Sgt. Rock.) I know a lot about the original and I don't think her popularity has much to do with the original. I don't know if he was fleshed out and developed nearly as well as Danvers, who is also getting a solo movie in the MCU.

Most of the others in Marvel coexist with the original in one way or another. Peter Parker and Miles Morales have worked together. The original Thor is still around. The current one is his former lover, Jane Foster. Steve Rogers became active again as Captain America before the whole Hydra thing and likely will be in the role again even if Sam Wilson keeps the shield.

Marvel is actually doing a series based on this, with one-shot stories including the originals with the newer heroes.

 

The whole "Marvel sucks because diversity and they should just create new characters" would have a point if Marvel didn't create new characters. But they do. All the friggin' time. And they celebrate existing female characters and/or characters of color (Storm had her own series recently, and Black Panther was holding down two or three, to name two). And the Jane Foster Thor storyline started out excellent. Heck, until the last few months, the last few years of Thor -- with Odinson or Jane Foster -- have been excellent.

But the storytelling isn't what matters to the folks who complain. It's that their white male hetero characters aren't white, male and hetero any more. Iceman is gay. That was a fan joke for year, and guess what -- men in their 30s and 40s come to realizations about their sexuality all the time. Iceman is one of my favorite X-Men. I was more pissed when they made him super-depressed Bobby Drake than I'll ever be that they made him wants-to-date-guys Bobby Drake. Why? Because Iceman has always been a more lighthearted character, the Johnny Storm of the X-Men. His sexuality wasn't central to his character. His attitude was.

Kamala Khan is the new Ms. Marvel, and the stories are brilliant. The name wasn't being used, and she admires Carol Danvers, so it fits her story, so what's the big deal? The writing was great, but the Internet just saw too much PC and said, "NOOOOOOO!!!!" And she wasn't going to need the Ms. Marvel name back; Captain Marvel is dead and staying that way. They've teased him being back, but it will never happen full-time.

Iron Man is replaced with a young black girl, but let's be honest -- Tony Stark has overall been one of the worst comic book characters. Read him the last few years. He's been horrible. Replacing him wasn't a bad thing. I'd bet 90 percent of the people who complained about his replacement hadn't read Iron Man since the 1990s if they ever had.

You've said you were cool with Sam Wilson and Miles Morales (who, btw, preceded the wave of character changes by Marvel by a few years; guess he could be considered the first, though). And as it's been pointed out, X-23 became "Wolverine" when he died and they had a storyline that explained the need for a new Wolverine. I didn't buy into it because his death was ridiculous, but this isn't the first new Wolverine they had. There was a guy named Daken, but since he had balls, guess no one cared. Oh, and the Ultimate Universe Wolverine got killed and replaced with his son, but since he was white and male and hetero, no one cared. In fairness, it was because Logan was still around in the 616, so no one cared about his Ultimate counterpart getting replaced.

And we've had a bunch of Thors, Captain Americas, Iron Men (and even Iron Women) and others over the years. But when Eric Masterson was Thor, no big deal. He was white and had a penis, so it's cool for him to be worthy. But don't DARE act like a woman would be worthy to lift Mjolnir.

As for creating new characters, when in the last several decades has DC or Marvel created a brand new character to lead a title without first establishing them in another book either with team-ups or as part of a team? It doesn't happen. They've introduced plenty of characters in lots of books, but characters like Gambit and Bishop and Deadpool don't come along every day. The movies are part of the problem here. New readers don't want to see superheroes with names they've never heard. Even DC leans heavy on their big five (Batman, Supes, WW, Flash and Green Lantern). Squirrel Girl has taken off, but she isn't new. She's been bouncing around since 1991. Gwenpool and Spider-Gwen were surprise hits, but they were based off other characters, so they don't count as new. They're just more PC crap. (Never mind that one started as a variant cover and became a character because of reader demand; who cares what the readers want, right?)

And the thing lost in all this is that while a portion of the Internet pounds at their keyboards yelling "NO PC!!!! YOU'RE THREATENING MY WHITE HETERO MALENESS!!!!", Marvel with its PC lineup has for the most part dominated sales. DC had a moment, but Marvel quickly jumped back on top. And when it comes down to it, that's all that matters. In June, 43 percent of comics sold were Marvel. 32 were DC. Except for a few blips here and there, Marvel has maintained market dominance for a looooong time, so they must be doing something right, even if some fanboys can't take it.

And to get this on record, I've hated a bunch of recent storylines in Marvel and DC. But not because they were "too PC." Because they were crappy, predictable stories. Some of those "PC" stories have been some of the best. And some have sucked. And political correctness had nothing to do with either.

 

I'm not sure who you are responding to with some of this. I thought the death of Ultimate Peter Parker was more ridiculous and forced than the death of Wolverine, but at least that led to the creation of a strong character in Miles Morales.

By the way, Daken wasn't white, male and heterosexual. Daken was bisexual. People also didn't care because he never really replaced Logan, who was still active the entire time.

The reason there wasn't much noise regarding Wolverine being replaced by his son in the Ultimate Universe is the creators had turned most of that universe to shit by then. I'm not sure Jimmy Hudson was ever really considered the new Wolverine because like most fans, I had abandoned everything Ultimate but Spider-Man by then. Laura Kinney may currently wear the costume, but Daken and Old Man Logan are still around and Jimmy Hudson just resurfaced in the main Marvel U.

You are right that there has been a backlash, but those come any time you change a beloved character. People flipped when Doctor Octopus took over Spider-Man's body, too, and that was a heterosexual white male taking over the role.

 

I was replying mostly to Batman. Sorry about that. And early on Daken's bisexuality was portrayed mostly as a means to an end -- he was screwing with someone or using someone to get something, so a lot of people wrote it off. Wasn't until later that his bisexuality was made explicit, but you are correct. But in fairness, I was saying the Ultimate Universe Wolverine replacement was hetero, not Daken. Just said he had balls.

I didn't bring up Old Man Logan because he just confuses things (I haven't read any of the Wolverine comics in months; have been reading X-Men Blue though and know Hudson made the move to the 616, which is why I brought him up to begin with). But not as much uproar for either of them being Wolverine as there was for X-23.

And I remember people flipping about Doc Ock, but that wasn't people screaming "PC!" A large part of that was Dan Slott saying it was permanent and Parker wasn't coming back when we all knew that was crap. If they hadn't pretended Peter Parker was gone for good, no one would've freaked out like they did.

 

Not having read Wolverine (or comics at all) in a few years, why did they need to turn X-23 into "Wolverine" at all? I do remember her debuting, being popular, and having her own book at one point, so why couldn't she just continue on as X-23? Kill off Wolverine, but let X-23 walk her own path.
The Ultimate universe stuff doesn't bother me a bit, because that whole thing was sort of an experiment. If you're going to radically change things up, that was the place to do it, where there's not as much history and back story to mess with.

 

To lighten things up a little bit, this whole debate reminds of an article from "Marvel Year in Review 1993," which was a pretty good piece of self-satire. The 1992 edition was even better.
The article was about how all of the heroes of the early 90s were getting dark and edgy, and why and how they were going that way. Included were some graphics detailing the logical next evolutions of the characters. It's creepy how prescient some of these were. I think the Red Hulk one was actually inspiration for somebody:

 

She took on the role to honor his memory. He had become a mentor to her before his death. She was created to be used as a weapon and others had used her in one way or another. Logan did it too at one point with X-Force, a team of X-Men that often killed the team's enemies, but he kicked her off the team so she could choose a path for herself.

 

I'm fine with a female Doctor because she's hot. See, we can be progressive and pigs at the same time! #nouglychicks #nofatties

 

New teaser for Defenders with Stan Lee narrating. Make sure you watch to the final seconds.

 

Maybe, finally, they do Dr. Doom right?
I doubt it. But, maybe ???
Doom is without a doubt my favorite Marvel Universe villain.

Noah Hawley Developing Doctor Doom Movie for Fox