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John Byrne
Grumpy Old Guy
Joined: 11 May 2005
Posts: 133754
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| Posted: 27 August 2024 at 4:26pm | IP Logged | 1
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If you find yourself working at Marvel and/or DC, and you create any characters, make sure you get their origins stated/published ASAP. I say this after reading up on my Great Lakes Avengers characters and learning that somewhere along the way it was decided they were ALL MUTANTS. In fact, as I created them, NONE were mutants. Mr. Immortal was cursed, and thru that curse linked to Dinah Soar, who herself belonged to a non-human species. Flatman and Big Bertha were the result of “industrial accidents”, and Doorman was mystical. Unfortunately, I decided to keep their backstories a secret for a while. Silly me.
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Craig Earl
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 13 July 2019
Location: United Kingdom
Posts: 1430
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| Posted: 27 August 2024 at 5:54pm | IP Logged | 2
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Hmm. I'm pretty sure this would bug me, in the same way that any radical changes to a character (that I'd created) would.
I guess I'd like to think that there would be some kind of gentleman's agreement, where the creator would at least be consulted prior to any real shift (I know, unrealistic).
All part of being a gear in the machine...!
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John Byrne
Grumpy Old Guy
Joined: 11 May 2005
Posts: 133754
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| Posted: 27 August 2024 at 7:06pm | IP Logged | 3
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It’s just another example of the poverty of storytelling in comics. Mutants mutants mutants!
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Peter Hicks
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 30 April 2004
Location: Canada
Posts: 2001
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| Posted: 27 August 2024 at 9:27pm | IP Logged | 4
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Well, all’s good as long as you keep getting all those big residual cheques for Great Lakes Avengers merchandise!
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Steve Coates
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 17 November 2014
Location: Canada
Posts: 820
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| Posted: 27 August 2024 at 9:40pm | IP Logged | 5
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I have noticed, as I've gotten older and similar incidents occur, there is a strong tendency to allow entropy to foster in good systems. I have seen people actively cause systems to fail. Systems which have not actually matured, still in infancy and where a great deal of time and purpose have made them stronger, With just a little bit more effort and time...
I can't explain the motivation or thought process behind such destruction. I just know it happens. It is very hard to make something good and so very easy to make it bad.
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Steven Myers
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 10 June 2004
Location: United States
Posts: 5715
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| Posted: 28 August 2024 at 12:24am | IP Logged | 6
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Having them be mutants was really a one-off gag. I don't think anyone has tried to write them seriously since because the funny treatment was apparently successful. It would be easy to have the mutant origins corrected. It wouldn't even be a retcon, just them discovering they were wrong.
I've seen some serious appearances by Squirrel Girl and Damage Control. No reason GLA can't be done that way again.
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Craig Earl
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 13 July 2019
Location: United Kingdom
Posts: 1430
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| Posted: 28 August 2024 at 5:44am | IP Logged | 7
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I recall an interview with Stan where he pretty much admitted that the introduction of mutants saved an awful lot of time in developing origin stories. He still created a lot of non-mutant characters after the X-Men, but it seems like many writers used this as an excuse to be unoriginal.
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John Byrne
Grumpy Old Guy
Joined: 11 May 2005
Posts: 133754
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| Posted: 29 August 2024 at 12:41pm | IP Logged | 8
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…Damage Control…••• sigh As a GAG I had Ben pose a question, and the next thing I knew, someone “answered” it. Poorly.
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Peter Martin
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 17 March 2008
Location: Canada
Posts: 16041
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| Posted: 29 August 2024 at 5:39pm | IP Logged | 9
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Damage Control is a bit like the episode of Star Trek TNG where they devote a whole episode to explaining the reason behind so many aliens races being humanoid. No explanation is needed for a conceit of the genre. Bleuggrh.
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Rick Whiting
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 22 April 2004
Posts: 2231
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| Posted: 30 August 2024 at 6:53am | IP Logged | 10
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It's because of crap like this why Marvel and DC need to selectively retcon/make non cannon without an in comics explanation, ignore, and never mention again stories that either damage a character, moves the characters too far away from the core elements that made said characters work, or moves the characters too far away from the original intent of said character's creator.
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Andrew Bitner
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 01 June 2004
Location: United States
Posts: 7528
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| Posted: 30 August 2024 at 1:28pm | IP Logged | 11
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"Mutants" has become such incredibly lazy shorthand for "I don't have the energy/imagination to come up with a more elaborate origin" or "I didn't bother to find out if they HAD an origin"... it's just depressing. Small wonder they often purge whole populations of mutants.
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John Byrne
Grumpy Old Guy
Joined: 11 May 2005
Posts: 133754
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| Posted: 30 August 2024 at 1:42pm | IP Logged | 12
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Long ago the Forum’s own Paul Gibney suggested that a solution to Marvel’s mutant glut might be revealing that there was a virus that imitated natural mutation, and many, if not most “mutants” were actually normal people infected with this virus. The number of real mutants could be reduced to a manageable number without resorting to “massacres”.I mentioned this idea to a couple of senior editors at Marvel, around the time I was working on XHY. Within a very short time it was all over the internet that I wanted to turn ALL mutants into people infected with this virus. Since one of the editors was a proud Luddite who refused to have anything to do with computers or the internet, it wasn’t hard to guess where the leak had come from.
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