Favorite Avengers Writer

[manymade1]

1. Busiek
2. Thomas
3. Stern
4.Shooter
5. Englehart
6. Slott
7. Byrne

[MonteMike72]

My List:
Jim Shooter
Kurt Busiek
Roger Stern
Roy Thomas
Stan Lee
John Byrne
Bob Harras

[Monty_Cristo]

Geoff Johns did the most for me
David Michelinie would be my close second

[RDMacQ]

Roger Stern, easily. With one reservation, I really disliked some of the teams he put together. Namor and Hercules on the team at the same time? Two half naked guys with very similar powers and attitudes, seemed very redundant.
Starfox? She-Hulk? Captain Marvel? Doctor Druid? I feel very blah about all of these characters except for Namor.

It says a lot for his writing that he is still my favorite even through some of those teams where I disliked half of more of them at any one time.

Followed by Shooter and Stan.

Englehart and Thomas did some great stuff, but I always felt their quality was all over the place.

Busiek gets an honorable mention, but he never shook up the book or took the kind of creative risks that some of the others did. He played it safe, but did write some really fun stuff.

In fact, I'm noticing most of my favorite writers really shook up the team and did some unconventional things. Even Bendis, my least favorite writer on the book ever stands out for shaking things up.

Not to pick on Kurt, because I am a big fan (especially of Astro City) but he really didn't take enough risks on this book, that is why I won't rank him any higher.

I kind of feel the same way about Busiek. Again, I really like his work. But, as you said, he never really took any big creative risks with the title. Which I kind of think was a systemic problem with the Avengers franchise for a while. Writers would rarely try to shake things up for the Avengers and do something really daring. It'd kind of be the same thing- a mix of older and established characters, and one or two new members.

[SJNeal]

Which I kind of think was a systemic problem with the Avengers franchise for a while. Writers would rarely try to shake things up for the Avengers and do something really daring.

And yet "The Crossing" still gets bashed relentlessly...

[strathcona]

I kind of feel the same way about Busiek. Again, I really like his work. But, as you said, he never really took any big creative risks with the title. Which I kind of think was a systemic problem with the Avengers franchise for a while. Writers would rarely try to shake things up for the Avengers and do something really daring. It'd kind of be the same thing- a mix of older and established characters, and one or two new members.

Harras's run was quite different from what had come before, and had quite a few new members. As SJNeal mentioned, the Crossing tried really hard to shake things up and then that was followed by a huge shake up in Heroes Reborn. Then Busiek came on and brought things back to what you are saying was status quo, something that hadn't been there for around 7 years at that point (I might even say longer as the Byrne/Hama/Nicezia era wasn't all that traditional either). While his take was more traditional... it was in no way the same as what we had been getting for quite a few years before.

[XPac]

I gotta go with Stern (Bendis and Busiek get honorable mention).

There's some degree of childhood bias as that's the Avengers run I sort of grew up on. That was my first comic book subscription.

The book took a lot of risks while still capturing a sort of classic feel. Best of both worlds in a lot of ways.

[XPac]

And yet "The Crossing" still gets bashed relentlessly...

Part of the problem with the Crossing is that it was a huge shake up that was basically erased right after it occured.

If Bendis run was basically wiped out of existance as soon as it occured, it'd have the same problem. But Bendis had the time to make his changes stick. So who knows... maybe if the changes brought on by the crossing had been given time to grow on readers it would have won over the readers. Maybe, maybe not.

[SJNeal]

^ ^ ^

I appreciate "The Crossing" now more than I did at the time of publication, when it seemed like radical change just for the sake of change. In retrospect, it reads like a great "What If...?", *because* none of the changes stuck.

We did get a handful of issues post-Crossing that gave us a taste of what might have been. The final issues of Avengers and Thor (v. 1) were actually pretty good; however Iron Man was horrible, what with Terry Kavanaugh's Teen Tony Adventures. Bleh.

That fact caused me to lay the blame for "The Crossing"'s shortcomings at the feet of Kavanaugh. Once Busiek and Heroes Return set everything right again, I stopped hatin' on the guy.

[Aaric Rivad]

Englehart
Thomas
Busiek
Shooter
Bendis

I'll give Harras a shoutout for writing the only readable Avengers for a long period of time, even though he basically turned them into the X-Men.

[Aaric Rivad]

^ ^ ^

I appreciate "The Crossing" now more than I did at the time of publication, when it seemed like radical change just for the sake of change. In retrospect, it reads like a great "What If...?", *because* none of the changes stuck.

We did get a handful of issues post-Crossing that gave us a taste of what might have been. The final issues of Avengers and Thor (v. 1) were actually pretty good; however Iron Man was horrible, what with Terry Kavanaugh's Teen Tony Adventures. Bleh.

That fact caused me to lay the blame for "The Crossing"'s shortcomings at the feet of Kavanaugh. Once Busiek and Heroes Return set everything right again, I stopped hatin' on the guy.

I still hate on Kavanaugh for what he did to Iron Man after Len Kaminski had done such great work on the title. He took one of the best-written (and overlooked) titles of the 90s and turned it into a pile of shit almost immediately.

[This-is-the-Zodiac-speaking]

hmmm...probably 1. Stern
2. Shooter
3. Slott
4. Thomas
5. Jeff Parker(wishful thinking...fingers crossed!)

[Nomads1]

^ ^ ^

I appreciate "The Crossing" now more than I did at the time of publication, when it seemed like radical change just for the sake of change. In retrospect, it reads like a great "What If...?", *because* none of the changes stuck.

We did get a handful of issues post-Crossing that gave us a taste of what might have been. The final issues of Avengers and Thor (v. 1) were actually pretty good; however Iron Man was horrible, what with Terry Kavanaugh's Teen Tony Adventures. Bleh.

That fact caused me to lay the blame for "The Crossing"'s shortcomings at the feet of Kavanaugh. Once Busiek and Heroes Return set everything right again, I stopped hatin' on the guy.

My hardcover is on the mail as we speak (with a 48% dicount, as it would be the only way I could afford it), and as soon as I read it (re-read in most cases) I plan on ressurecting the Crossing thread to give a fresh opinion on the subject, but, for me, the greatest problem of the Crossing was that they didn't have an endgame planned. "Let's make Iron Man a murder and a traitor." Great, but how will we get out of that? We still have to publish his monthly book. Teen Tony couldn't have been the original choice. It's too moronic a concept. "Let's make the Wasp a bug lady." Okay, but won't that limit the character? And so on... Let's see what I think of it in a few weeks.

Peace

[nosocialize100]

You can't beat Busiek. I'm currently reading all of his work on the Avengers for an article at my site. Love his work.

[XPac]

My hardcover is on the mail as we speak (with a 48% dicount, as it would be the only way I could afford it), and as soon as I read it (re-read in most cases) I plan on ressurecting the Crossing thread to give a fresh opinion on the subject, but, for me, the greatest problem of the Crossing was that they didn't have an endgame planned. "Let's make Iron Man a murder and a traitor." Great, but how will we get out of that? We still have to publish his monthly book. Teen Tony couldn't have been the original choice. It's too moronic a concept. "Let's make the Wasp a bug lady." Okay, but won't that limit the character? And so on... Let's see what I think of it in a few weeks.

Peace

Though I'm not sure they were aware of this at the time it was written, they honestly didn't need much of an end game since Heroes Reborn would essentially wipe all of that away anyways.