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Post by berkley on Dec 2, 2014 2:00:15 GMT -5
How about "What if Frank Frazetta had drawn a Tarzan or Conan series?" What if there was still a market for diverse black and white comic magazines on the newsstands? Or a John Carter, or, better yet, general Barsoom series - that would have been my dream choice for a Frazetta series, having become a fan through the hardcover edition of The Mastermind of Mars and A Fighting Man of Mars (still my favourite of the Barsoom series and probably my favourite ERB book period) that featured painted covers and interior illustrations (not as many as I'd like) by Frazetta:   |
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Post by Paste Pot Paul on Dec 2, 2014 3:01:31 GMT -5
How about "What if Frank Frazetta had drawn a Tarzan or Conan series?" What if there was still a market for diverse black and white comic magazines on the newsstands? Or a John Carter, or, better yet, general Barsoom series - that would have been my dream choice for a Frazetta series, having become a fan through the hardcover edition of The Mastermind of Mars and A Fighting Man of Mars (still my favourite of the Barsoom series and probably my favourite ERB book period) that featured painted covers and interior illustrations (not as many as I'd like) by Frazetta: Mate, don't get me wrong cos Frazetta is my favourite artist ever, but how can we wish for something which takes so much away...Frank stays in comics and we get no paintings, no paintings and do the Conan books ever take off again in the 60s, no Conan by BWS, or sword and sorcery comics at all in the 70s... I summon the dilemma (apologies Cei-U) |
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Post by berkley on Dec 2, 2014 9:56:27 GMT -5
Or a John Carter, or, better yet, general Barsoom series - that would have been my dream choice for a Frazetta series, having become a fan through the hardcover edition of The Mastermind of Mars and A Fighting Man of Mars (still my favourite of the Barsoom series and probably my favourite ERB book period) that featured painted covers and interior illustrations (not as many as I'd like) by Frazetta: Mate, don't get me wrong cos Frazetta is my favourite artist ever, but how can we wish for something which takes so much away...Frank stays in comics and we get no paintings, no paintings and do the Conan books ever take off again in the 60s, no Conan by BWS, or sword and sorcery comics at all in the 70s... I summon the dilemma (apologies Cei-U) Oh, I was just thinking in terms of the thread - a complete fantasy, IOW - not in terms of real-world consequences or feasibility. No, I wouldn't want to give up all those paintings and book covers, and so on. Well, maybe I'd trade one or two of my least favourites for, say, one 12-issue limited series ... But realistically, he wouldn't have been interested. Look at an artist like Mark Schultz - when did he last produce a comic? They'd rather do other kinds of artwork, and who can blame them? Comics has to be one of the most labour-intensive fields an artist can go into, and if you can make better money as a painter or illustrator or book-cover artist, it would probably be very difficult to muster the motivation to go back to comics even if you really love creating them. |
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Post by adamwarlock2099 on Dec 2, 2014 11:32:08 GMT -5
Mate, don't get me wrong cos Frazetta is my favourite artist ever, but how can we wish for something which takes so much away...Frank stays in comics and we get no paintings, no paintings and do the Conan books ever take off again in the 60s, no Conan by BWS, or sword and sorcery comics at all in the 70s... I summon the dilemma (apologies Cei-U) Oh, I was just thinking in terms of the thread - a complete fantasy, IOW - not in terms of real-world consequences or feasibility. No, I wouldn't want to give up all those paintings and book covers, and so on. Well, maybe I'd trade one or two of my least favourites for, say, one 12-issue limited series ... But realistically, he wouldn't have been interested. Look at an artist like Mark Schultz - when did he last produce a comic? They'd rather do other kinds of artwork, and who can blame them? Comics has to be one of the most labour-intensive fields an artist can go into, and if you can make better money as a painter or illustrator or book-cover artist, it would probably be very difficult to muster the motivation to go back to comics even if you really love creating them. I remember finding Xenoxoic Tales in the 90's, and ... blown ... away! The last thing I've seen of his was Aliens -- Destroying Angels, which was 1999, and he wrote it but only did covers. I still bought it, though I don't remember if the story or interior art was good. But when you sell a book with a cover like this ...  /spoiler] |
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Post by Roquefort Raider on Dec 2, 2014 13:29:43 GMT -5
Hence the wording. What if she had STAYED dead? My point being that it's not a single "What if?" scenario. I could believe one EIC deciding to pass on a Jean Grey resurrection, but every single EIC after Shooter? It's quite a suspension of disbelief. There are no sacred cows at the Big Two. The 1990s proved that. True, but I think it can be argued that it is in large part Jean's return that led to that mind-set. Oh, before Jean's death, characters did die sometimes… but they mostly died "comic-book deaths". When Dr. Octopus was blown up by a nuclear explosion or when the Joker fell off a bridge, we knew they'd be back. But on top of those there were also "real" deaths, from which nobody came back: Uncle Ben stayed dead, Gwen stayed dead, Bucky stayed dead, Fafnir stayed dead, Mr. Terrific stayed dead, Captain Marvel stayed dead. After Jean first died, it became trendy to kill major characters for shock value, and naturally when you go that way you eventually have to resurrect a few people because you end up lacking warm bodies to play with. And yet, most major characters tended to stay dead after they had had a convincing death scene. After Jean's return, it was like the doors to the afterworld had been blown open. Very quickly, anybody could be killed or maimed at the drop of a hat, only to be brought back whenever was convenient. Jean's return was like the first thread that's pulled and leads to a sweater falling apart! I honestly think that had Jean stayed dead, not only wouldn't we have a revolving door instead of a three-headed dog guarding Hades's realm, but we also would have continuing stories where characters (at least in most team books) would be allowed to get older. |
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Crimebuster
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Post by Crimebuster on Dec 2, 2014 13:55:21 GMT -5
After Jean's return, it was like the doors to the afterworld had been blown open. Very quickly, anybody could be killed or maimed at the drop of a hat, only to be brought back whenever was convenient. Jean's return was like the first thread that's pulled and leads to a sweater falling apart! If you want to destroy my X-Men, pull this string as I walk away. Watch me unravel, I'll soon be X-Force! |
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Post by Jesse on Dec 3, 2014 5:10:32 GMT -5
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Post by Paste Pot Paul on Dec 3, 2014 11:12:11 GMT -5
Mate, don't get me wrong cos Frazetta is my favourite artist ever, but how can we wish for something which takes so much away...Frank stays in comics and we get no paintings, no paintings and do the Conan books ever take off again in the 60s, no Conan by BWS, or sword and sorcery comics at all in the 70s... I summon the dilemma (apologies Cei-U) Oh, I was just thinking in terms of the thread - a complete fantasy, IOW - not in terms of real-world consequences or feasibility. No, I wouldn't want to give up all those paintings and book covers, and so on. Well, maybe I'd trade one or two of my least favourites for, say, one 12-issue limited series ... Mate you did nothing wrong, and I hope I didnt sound snarky. I too wish he had done a lot more comics work, AS WELL as the paintings  |
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Post by justicefreak on Dec 3, 2014 18:21:40 GMT -5
What If a good-hearted army runt Steve Rogers had been given the power of Shazam! And he became the American Marvel.
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Post by berkley on Dec 3, 2014 23:44:56 GMT -5
Oh, I was just thinking in terms of the thread - a complete fantasy, IOW - not in terms of real-world consequences or feasibility. No, I wouldn't want to give up all those paintings and book covers, and so on. Well, maybe I'd trade one or two of my least favourites for, say, one 12-issue limited series ... Mate you did nothing wrong, and I hope I didnt sound snarky. I too wish he had done a lot more comics work, AS WELL as the paintings No, your reply didn't come across that way at all. No worries. |
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Post by chadwilliam on Dec 4, 2014 19:18:52 GMT -5
What if the superhero genre hadn't shed its pulp influences as quickly as it had? Villains granted entrance into this world simply by way of their own depravity rather than through some unusual gimmick; heroes with a kill or be killed attitude; an air of mystery keeping us unclear as to what rules actually govern these stories. Too quickly I think, did writers work out a forumula for these characters that didn't involve these elements. |
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Post by hondobrode on Dec 6, 2014 23:51:57 GMT -5
Stan himself has said that Maneely would have been a big star in the Bullpen. I'm sure he's right.
What if Marvel had taken DC up on their offer to buy all of their non-mutant characters and titles from them ? When Marvel was on the ropes and near bankruptcy, this nearly happened. I remember seeing an in-house ad for Marvel subscriptions and noting that Marvel had groups of titles and had moved Elektra to the X-Men family. Ha !
What killed the deal was that Marvel said we keep the X-Men and Spidey and you can get the rest. DC insisted Spidey was part of the deal. Spidey broke the deal, and it very nearly happened.
At that time, it would have easily made DC number one, of course, but without adding the non-mutant Marvel characters to DC's, Marvel still would have been number three behind Image.
Think of the DC universe meshed with the Marvel universe minus the X-Men.
Would Marvel have then bought out Valiant or bought Malibu and paid the royalties to keep those characters rolling ?
Would Marvel have bought Milestone ? I could see it.
Disney probably wouldn't have bought Marvel at that point either.
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Post by justicefreak on Jan 1, 2015 20:50:21 GMT -5
What if instead of having the Reign of Superman Storyline....We had the Reign of Shazam story line....what type of new takes would we have gotten on the character?
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Post by Deleted on Jan 1, 2015 21:20:08 GMT -5
What if instead of having the Reign of Superman Storyline....We had the Reign of Shazam story line....what type of new takes would we have gotten on the character? Well, since Captain Marvel is magic-based, rather than science-fictional, we probably wouldn't see a Cyborg version or a Steel-style super suit. (Say that 3 times fast.) So maybe something like Captain Thunder - the black Earth-1 version that Roy Thomas wanted to introduce Marvel Boy (or Girl) - a new version of Junior or Mary, less powerful, rebellious Captain Shazam - maybe less physically powerful, more of a magician, channeling the wizard Shazam more than the gods Lord Marvel - without a Billy persona to ground him, this one is more god-like, aloof, less human |
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Post by Rob Allen on Jan 8, 2015 20:09:58 GMT -5
What if Kirby, instead of going back to DC in the 1970s, had instead pitched his Fourth World books to one of the underground comix publishers of the era? New Gods, Mr. Miracle, et. al. being distributed in head shops alongside other idiosyncratic visionaries like Crumb and Shelton? Makes sense to me... That would have been cool to see. My variant of this idea is based on the fact that Kirby and Sol Brodsky left Marvel within a few months of each other. What if Kirby had gone in with Sol and Israel Waldman on their new company, Skywald? |
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