And considering Damian Wayne, I could see how Bruce should have retired long ago and put Dick in charge. The old stories are still there for reading and titles dedicated to the in-between years.

I offer this up to those who think that comics should assume a new readership rotation every few years (seven?). In the first place this is strictly a Marvel Age continuity-obsessed premise: before Marvel continuity of any sort was rarely discussed.

Also, in the early years of the Marvel age time seemed to move at a more or less natural pace. Reed and Sue got married and had a child within the Lee & Kirby run: Peter Parker graduated HS within the Lee & Ditko run IIRC.

It's only when it was recognized that the Kirby & Ditko cornucopia of creativity wouldn't be around forever that time suddenly steeped into a swamp of molasses.

Again, I'm not selling Erik Larsen here, but he can get away with realtime mostly because he's one of those comic book creators that creates characters and concepts the way Kirby used to do. Granted he's got Kirby as inspiration but he's gone places even the King wouldn't have gone.

The Marvel characters being frozen in time is largely a consequence of comic book creators refusing to create characters without getting a big piece of the action.

Wolverine is probably the nearest to last last memorable character created at Marvel (probably the Eternals and Celestials were the last) and I wonder how many characters we will never get to see fleshed out because they'll go to the grave along with their "creators".

Using other media for example, let's look at TV.  A show like THE SIMPSONS has no change (except when necessitated by the loss of a voice actor) and shows like THE WALKING DEAD (and LOST before it) kill off a beloved character almost every single episode.  Both are extremes and both have their advantages and disadvantages.  THE SIMPSONS has survived for 30 years, but THE WALKING DEAD really gets people excited!  Episodic versus continued/advancing storytelling.

There is the middle ground, where most episodes stand on their own, but there is some ongoing subplot (that usually comes to a head in the season finale).  People enjoy CASTLE for example, where nothing changes for the most part--and then somebody dies (or some other big change happens) in the season finale.  People always cite that MOONLIGHTING jumped the shark when Dave and Maddie finally slept together--"the sexual tension was gone!"  Well, no, the show went from episodic where nothing happened (what the fans were used to) to continued storytelling where everything permanently changed.

I would say that both approaches are valid, but the real argument comes in when you have to decide which approach is appropriate for which property.

It makes perfect sense that John Byrne (raised on Mort Weisinger SUPERMAN comics and even Stan Lee early Marvel) would gravitate to the episodic "nothing ever changes" approach.  On the other hand, looking at Dan Slott for example, he was raised on Byrne and Claremont's X-MEN with epics like the Dark Phoenix Saga.  Again, it makes sense that he would gravitate to more long form storytelling.

I would only disagree with JB in that I see no reason for someone to move on from their favorite comic just because they got older.  (I've watched JAMES BOND and STAR WARS movies since I was a kid--do I have to quit those too?)  But even if you agree with that and say that super-hero comics (like "Dark Phoenix" and Miller's Elektra saga?) are only for kids, there have always been REPRINT editions!  (Stan Lee made sure of that!)  When I was a kid, I read Conway and Andru's SPIDER-MAN at the same time that I read Lee and Romita in MARVEL TALES and Ditko's issues in all sorts of reprint editions--and I loved them all!  I enjoyed the life changes Peter Parker went through and I would hated it if the different versions contradicted each other at all.

On the other hand, Marvel is drowning us right now with "change for change's sake" which is much worse than nothing happening!  I'm sad that kids who fall in love with CAPTAIN AMERICA or SPIDER-MAN in the latest movies can't go to the comics and easily find those same characters.  ("Who's this Miles Morales kid?"  Why is everyone calling the Falcon "Cap"?)

I don't want change in ARCHIE or THE SIMPSONS!  I actually do think Marvel and DC are different--I don't want change in the SUPERMAN or BATMAN books!  I want classic, iconic stories about those characters who really need no change.  But I do appreciate MINOR change in the SPIDER-MAN or X-MEN books, which had some degree of real life growth right from the beginning.

****

Oh, JB, you tease!