Still think Joe Quesada saved Marvel?

[sherlockbones]

Pretty much.

Its news to me that anybody thinks Quesada "saved" Marvel at all.

germany´s biggest weekly magazin published it that way barely a month ago

http://www.spiegel.de/kultur/literat...-a-866134.html
(babelfish)
Alonso is in 15 years, only the third editor in chief, who took over the post of legend Stan Lee. The son of a British mother and a Mexican took the controversial job last year by Joe Quesada, who watches now as Chief Creative Officer over Alonso's editorial decisions. Quesada was the one that, with a bold strategy change, saved Marvel from ruin, because when Axel Alonso twelve years ago by Erzkonkurrenten DC Comics, home of Superman, Batman and Wonder Woman, moved to Marvel, was the traditional hero forged shortly before bankruptcy . Quesada put on quality of content, scooped together with the competition story talents like Ed Brubaker, Mark Millar, Brian Michael Bendis or Joss Whedon and the writers paired with new, outstanding artist talents.

[motherofpearl1]

The guy Responsible for most of the trade paperback and coming out with a crap load of #1 was Marvel EX-Editor In chief Bob Harras, who is now the Editor In chief of DC Comics. It was his involvement into trying to get Marvel back on it's feet. Before he was Editor In chief all of marvel, Bob Harras was Editor In chief of the X-Men Franchise. back when the X-men where at there prime. And was the guy that help Joe Quesada cook up Marvel Kights, that Harras gave a green light to, as well as giving a green light to Ultimate Marvel Franchise. And shortly after that he was fired and all his Credit was given to Joe Quesada.

And for Bob Harras, he was forced into Early Retirement, to where he Occasionally Edit Stories for Wild Storm that later got him on as the new Editor In chief of DC comics. The man has been Editor In chief 3 times.

Which shows just how cutthroat big business is.
But it doesn't really matter does it? Because Quesada is here to stay and those who don't like what he's done, like myself, have taken his advice and stopped buying. And those who do are Marvel's new legion of fans!
Nuff said!

[T.M. Anthony]

I don't know if joe Q saved marvel, but he sure didn't get in its way in terms of being successful again. Its currently the best comic company financially, edging their rival DC.

I don't know how long thats been the case, but apparently it was enough to make DC have to reboot just to keep up.

I'm not gonna baptize myself in the church of Quesada anytime soon, but he did a good enough job managing the ship to keep it from sinking, so... credit where credit is due I guess.

Oh and having a united status quo was a great move, things like the dark reign have been brilliant catalysts for stories. that probably helped out.

[Ilostmyplace]

True.

The 90s were pretty shameful when it came to gimmicks.

Heck, most issue 1s even had "COLLECTORS ITEM" blazoned on the covers.

Just about every crappy gimmick that happened in the 90's was Because of this guy.

[Nomads1]

Meh. I think in the context of comics the 90s boom seems like some sort of singular phenomenon, but really in the 90s there were all manner of fads - Pogs, Beanie Babies, Pokemon cards, etc. Everyone remembers that issue because of that sales figure, but how many people actually remember what happened in it? Cashing in on a fad is all well and good while it lasts, but you have to be realistic about the shelf life and anticipate the eventual backlash once people realize they aren't putting their kids through college by amassing collectibles and the hobby becomes an almost shameful thing to be involved in.

While I agree with your point of view on the excesses of the gimmicky 90's, i may be an exception, for I recall almost exactly every page of that book (I wasn't buying it just to bag and collect it, though, so I did read it dozens of times). IMHO, exciting story marvelously rendered.

Peace

[Sighphi]

The only people that think that Ques saved Marvel are just people that read the comics not the people that know about comics.
And,yes, this is something that is brought up regularly, there is a very big thread here about who is the best EIC of Marvel and pretty much everyone that said Ques mentions how he saved Marvel.

[XPac]

I doubt anyone literally thinks Joe single handedly did anything.

This sort of thing is obviously a group effort involving a lot of people. But in the same way the president gets the lion's share of the credit or the blame for the state of the US, an editor in chief will usually get the lions share of the credit or the blame for the good or bad fortune of a comic company.

Saying Joe Q is just short hand for Joe and countless editors and creators behind him.

[Kaos]

Just.....no

Then watch this video and then read this book. And then come back and tell me Joe Quesada saved Marvel. It's about time everyone learned the truth.

[RDMacQ]

I doubt anyone literally thinks Joe single handedly did anything.

This sort of thing is obviously a group effort involving a lot of people. But in the same way the president gets the lion's share of the credit or the blame for the state of the US, an editor in chief will usually get the lions share of the credit or the blame for the good or bad fortune of a comic company.

Saying Joe Q is just short hand for Joe and countless editors and creators behind him.

Yeah. While I don't think that Joe Q had NO hand in helping Marvel along, to say he's the guy that "Saved" Marvel is probably stretching it.

With things like this, it would be hard if not downright impossible to establish who did what, who thought of what, which action was the result of luck and which was the result of hard work, ect. I think people like to simplify things to help a certain narrative. Like saying "Todd MacFarlane created Venom" or "Steve Ditko left ASM because he wanted the Green Goblin to be someone Spidey didn't know" or "The reason HERBIE was on the 70's FF cartoon was because the network was afraid kids would set themselves on fire if they say the Human Torch." None of these reasons are true. But they make for a more interesting or complete narrative than the truth.

[Blade X]

so you're saying that under Quesada Marvel was able to successfully maintain greater reader interest than DC to support the additional books they were publishing when they couldn't prior?

No, I'm saying that the only way Marvel was able to beat DC in the dollar share market was to put out more books then DC. Under Quesada, Marvel went from outselling DC by a lot to out selling them by a little.

[Blade X]

Uncanny X-men had been the top selling comic in the U.S since the 80s though.

Harras just bloated the heck out of the line.

This is very true. That being said, under Quesada the line got even more bloated after he cancelled a few X-titles only to replace them with several brand new X-titles. Also, under Quesada, the 2 core X-Men books went from being consistent top 2 or top 5 selling books to being top 12 or top 15 selling books. Hell, even the WOLVERINE series (which has been relaunched several times over the last decade) has been unable to consistently sell in the top 5 since Quesada became EIC.

[dern]

I remember the Quemas era very well, and at no point did I hear anyone rejoicing that one or both of them saved the industry. Personally, I hated the both of them. They acted like a couple of frat boys who just happened to make a few good decisions.

[Karl Cook]

Personally speaking, I don't really care as to who, or what, saved Marvel.
I'm just glad that they're still around.

[Sighphi]

I doubt anyone literally thinks Joe single handedly did anything.

This sort of thing is obviously a group effort involving a lot of people. But in the same way the president gets the lion's share of the credit or the blame for the state of the US, an editor in chief will usually get the lions share of the credit or the blame for the good or bad fortune of a comic company.

Saying Joe Q is just short hand for Joe and countless editors and creators behind him.

That's not the point, the point is that his watch was not involve in this at all.

[RDMacQ]

Personally speaking, I don't really care as to who, or what, saved Marvel.
I'm just glad that they're still around.

Same here (although I do wish that they'd show some more humility and respect for the fans after coming very close to losing everything and seeing many readers up and leave the industry due to indifference).