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Post by Dizzy D on Aug 7, 2014 7:14:00 GMT -5
when did the marvel method end and why? i always think that alan moore's very very detailed scripts and maybe just him as a person and how he worked with artists, often got those artists to produce some of their finest art which seems counter intuitive - being so prescriptive should stifle the artist. (he said vaguely) If I had to guess I would say it ended at Marvel when the Quesada era started (mid-to-late 90's-early 2000s) and writers like Bendis came to the fore who were writing for the six issue arc and controlling the pacing to do so. Writers who approached the story telling from a visual point of view and wanted to have more say in the visuals as well as the text of the story. It was an influx of writers almost a new generation who were influenced by things like Robert McKee's screenwriting book/seminar story, and the David Mamet book on directing (both of which Bendis brought up every time he talked about his influences). It was the post-image era, when the flash of the Image art first approach had fizzled and the idea of super-star writers was emerging. Writers were being recruited from other mediums and people were looking at the possibilities of the medium of comics, but the focus shifted to the writers and so more control of the project was ceded to them. Neil Gaiman, Warren Ellis, Garth Ennis, Kurt Busiek, Mark Waid, etc. etc. became he creative superstars and the full script re-asserted itself as the norm. Those writers form other mediums (Kevin Smith, Brad Meltzer, etc.) were used to the full script and even screenplay/teleplay formats and used them as well. What was different though, was that almost to a person, those writers talked about tailoring the scripts to the strengths of the artists, of knowing who they were working with and of having a lot of back and forths with the artists throughout the creative process. In the old days it required being in the bullpen to be able to do this, or working on site, but with advances in communication tech in the 90's, especially the growth of the net and the ability to share files and instantly communicate no matter what the distance, allowed for a more collaborative approach but still having the full script be the framework, allowing the artists to have input without necessarily going full on Marvel method. Again this is only a guess on my part based on interviews and back page matter I have read and such. -M Your timeline seems a bit messed up: Gaiman, Ellis, Busiek and Waid were around long for the late 80s/early 90s with a lot of their most reknown/unfluential work. |
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Post by fanboystranger on Aug 7, 2014 9:40:44 GMT -5
I think everything mrp says is spot on, but I also think you have a generation of artists who's hyper-detailed styles probably leaves them little time to generate plot points. Maybe most of them simply can't write or plot on their own? Not that it was ever the norm, but it is interesting how you rarely, if ever, see creators like John Byrne, Frank Miller and Walt Simonson at Marvel or DC with the capacity to write and draw a 40+ issue run anymore. I don't think that's really because of the end of the Marvel style, though. It has more to do with people not buying their books. Byrne had several failed ongoing series at DC before he finally burnt his bridges with the company. Walt had the excellent Orion, and realizing he couldn't hit a monthly deadline any more, decided to have back-ups featuring friends of his. Frank has only had one foot in the industry since the late '90s.
Over at Vertigo, you do have two artists responsible for plot and script modification in Peter Gross and Mark Buckingham. They've been working on their books for several years.
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Post by fanboystranger on Aug 7, 2014 9:44:06 GMT -5
If I had to guess I would say it ended at Marvel when the Quesada era started (mid-to-late 90's-early 2000s) and writers like Bendis came to the fore who were writing for the six issue arc and controlling the pacing to do so. Writers who approached the story telling from a visual point of view and wanted to have more say in the visuals as well as the text of the story. It was an influx of writers almost a new generation who were influenced by things like Robert McKee's screenwriting book/seminar story, and the David Mamet book on directing (both of which Bendis brought up every time he talked about his influences). It was the post-image era, when the flash of the Image art first approach had fizzled and the idea of super-star writers was emerging. Writers were being recruited from other mediums and people were looking at the possibilities of the medium of comics, but the focus shifted to the writers and so more control of the project was ceded to them. Neil Gaiman, Warren Ellis, Garth Ennis, Kurt Busiek, Mark Waid, etc. etc. became he creative superstars and the full script re-asserted itself as the norm. Those writers form other mediums (Kevin Smith, Brad Meltzer, etc.) were used to the full script and even screenplay/teleplay formats and used them as well. What was different though, was that almost to a person, those writers talked about tailoring the scripts to the strengths of the artists, of knowing who they were working with and of having a lot of back and forths with the artists throughout the creative process. In the old days it required being in the bullpen to be able to do this, or working on site, but with advances in communication tech in the 90's, especially the growth of the net and the ability to share files and instantly communicate no matter what the distance, allowed for a more collaborative approach but still having the full script be the framework, allowing the artists to have input without necessarily going full on Marvel method. Again this is only a guess on my part based on interviews and back page matter I have read and such. -M Your timeline seems a bit messed up: Gaiman, Ellis, Busiek and Waid were around long for the late 80s/early 90s with a lot of their most reknown/unfluential work. Ellis mostly works full script, but he has written about using a "hybrid Marvel style" in the past for certain books. One of them was the Ultraforce/Avengers book he did with George Perez. He said he'd see a page of George's art, and he would have a dozen new ideas where to take the story. |
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Post by Deleted on Aug 7, 2014 12:01:52 GMT -5
] Your timeline seems a bit messed up: Gaiman, Ellis, Busiek and Waid were around long for the late 80s/early 90s with a lot of their most reknown/unfluential work. These writers' early work is what started the trend towards the superstar writer idea. Busiek did a lot of stuff before Marvels, but it wasn't until Marvels that he got that superstar status that then translated into KBAC getting so much hype and then his Avengers run with Perez in the late 90s with Heroes Return. Same with Waid and Kingdom Come, the early draws on those was the art-Ross part of the superstar artist cult at the time, but the takeaways was the writers becoming names even though both had produced quality body of works previously. I think the nadir of the superstar artist was the Heroes Reborn experiment, which while sold well initially reveled a certain creative bankruptcy in the work and started people on the road to paying attention to the writer more. Certainly there were superstar writers previously-Alan Moore being prominent of those who emerged in the 80s followed by that second wave of British invasion guys following Gaiman. People took notice of the writing and the shift in focus which began with the creative failure of Heroes Reborn reached full bloom where the writjng became the dominant focus in comics-and shift of the formatting of the script was part of that shift in focus resulting in the abandonment of the Marvel method by most creative folks in that late 90s early 2000s. The shift and abandonment certainly didn't happen overnight, and there surely were antecedents of the movement reaching back into the 80s/early 90s, but the idea became dominant and the comic press started talking about the era of the superstar writer (and if the comic press of the time was finally talking about it, it must already be in the rearview mirror) during that later period I mentioned. -M |
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Post by MDG on Aug 7, 2014 12:12:30 GMT -5
One thing I'm learning as I read more articles, books, listen to podcasts, etc., in regards to classic creators, is that many older artists who started in the Golden Age didn't necessarily care about the characters or stories all that much; they were mainly passionate about the artwork and the storytelling as it related to the artwork.(Sort of a method over concept kind of thing.) I think this is still hard for some fans to wrap their heads around. It was for me when I was younger. When I was reading a lot of interviews, or seeing older artists at cons, it was almost a cliche how often they said something about not being a big fan of superheros, but that being the only or best paying work. when did the marvel method end and why? I think this is linked to the above. By the late silver/early bronze, there were more new writers coming into the biz, but still a lot of artists who started in the 40s and 50s--or even earlier. Unlike these artists who were "just" drawing the assignments, the new fans-turned-writers were fulfilling their dream of working on these characters. |
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Post by Nowhere Man on Aug 7, 2014 12:52:44 GMT -5
I think everything mrp says is spot on, but I also think you have a generation of artists who's hyper-detailed styles probably leaves them little time to generate plot points. Maybe most of them simply can't write or plot on their own? Not that it was ever the norm, but it is interesting how you rarely, if ever, see creators like John Byrne, Frank Miller and Walt Simonson at Marvel or DC with the capacity to write and draw a 40+ issue run anymore. I don't think that's really because of the end of the Marvel style, though. It has more to do with people not buying their books. Byrne had several failed ongoing series at DC before he finally burnt his bridges with the company. Walt had the excellent Orion, and realizing he couldn't hit a monthly deadline any more, decided to have back-ups featuring friends of his. Frank has only had one foot in the industry since the late '90s.
Over at Vertigo, you do have two artists responsible for plot and script modification in Peter Gross and Mark Buckingham. They've been working on their books for several years.
I understand that, but when is the last time a writer/artist took off at Marvel or DC? I'm sure editor's are far more likely to give control to creators who only write, seeing as how they can produce far more than any artist ever could. In terms of independent comics, the writer/artist seems to be the norm. |
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Post by Deleted on Aug 7, 2014 13:00:02 GMT -5
I don't think that's really because of the end of the Marvel style, though. It has more to do with people not buying their books. Byrne had several failed ongoing series at DC before he finally burnt his bridges with the company. Walt had the excellent Orion, and realizing he couldn't hit a monthly deadline any more, decided to have back-ups featuring friends of his. Frank has only had one foot in the industry since the late '90s.
Over at Vertigo, you do have two artists responsible for plot and script modification in Peter Gross and Mark Buckingham. They've been working on their books for several years.
I understand that, but when is the last time a writer/artist took off at Marvel or DC? I'm sure editor's are far more likely to give control to creators who only write, seeing as how they can produce far more than any artist ever could. In terms of independent comics, the writer/artist seems to be the norm. I think part of that is publishing schedule too. In creator-owned books, you can skip a month to keep a schedule and it comes out of your pocket. If you skip a month on a corporate comic, it's the corporation and shareholders who suffer the financial loss. So mainstream publishers have rotating art teams to keep schedules (Marvel and to a lesser extent DC) or jam issues with lots of artists pencilling and/or inking (more common at DC). Add into it the desire to double ship and tie in many books with company wide story initiatives and it makes more sense for the big two to go with assembly line production on the comics rather than a single craftsman creating their product. -M |
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