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Remember, I am not asking to change well loved comics. I am asking for a parallel universe, just one comic, where characters awake from Groundhog day.
Who wants real time?
Would it work?
There is nothing wrong with Marvel Time?
Other Frequently Asked Questions
- "Who cares? This is a non-issue! Nobody wants this."
There are several answers to this.
- Plenty of people wanted their characters to be firmly in the real world in the golden age of comics and the silver age of comics. Back then comics were relevant to current events and fashions and people bought them by the million. Today almost nobody buys comics (in comparison to then). Obviously the ones who stay behind, the ones who still buy, are happy with the comics as they are, and these people dominate the comics message boards.
- Some people who read this site have said they agree. These are usually people like me who had large comic collections but gave up because the comics seems stuck in a rut. Comics are losing dedicated readers who should not be lost!
- The issue is not about aging but story development. Stories need to develop and change in order to be interesting. Real time is just the easiest way to ensure this.
- "Lots of people don't want this!"
We are not arguing to replace existing comics, We are arguing for two universes running side by side. One would be classic stories, where heroes are always young and always fight the same battles, just like today. Nothing there would change. The real time universe would be separate, just like the Ultimates universe.
- "Who wants to see their favorite heroes grow old?"
Some people do. If you don’t, then read the classic books. But why stop the other people from reading what they want? And growing older sometimes means getting better. Nick Fury was firmly rooted in the 1930s yet Nick Fury Agent of Shield was more popular than Sergeant Fury the young soldier. Dr Strange is on his second career, and if he becomes like the ancient one is that a bad thing? And what if Reed Richards grows older? That can only be good. The only really interesting new character in the Fantastic Four over the past 20 years has been Reed’s father!
- "The heroes would all be septuagenarians and octogenarians!"
This is the most common objection, and it is false:
- The real time series would not replace the timeless comics. Both markets are needed. The timeless heroes would always be there.
- If the heroes began aging right now they would not be old until you were old, many decades from now.
- Some of the most popular characters are already old. Wolverine for example is around a hundred years old (his regenerative power means he does not show it). Thor is thousands of years old. Does this make them out of touch or unpopular with the kids?
- Old heroes don't need to look old if you don't want them to. With all their access to alien technology it would be perfectly normal for them to look young forever. Many heroes, such as Wolverine and Thor, already do not age as part of the story.
- If an older hero is really irreplaceable, all we need is one clone story or mind swap / time travel story every thirty years and the hero in question can be forever young if you wish.
- The Marvel Time universe cannot avoid changing either - Spiderman is now married, and with more advanced powers. The original teenage angst Spiderman is gone forever, even in Marvel time, and people seem OK with it.
- "If heroes suddenly remember they were born in the 1960s, that would turn off younger readers."
The heroes would still be young. Think "the 4400" - where people were born a long time ago, yet have not aged and have no memory of aging. Were younger readers turned off when Harry Potter discovered that he was a wizard? Discovering something about your early life makes you more interesting, not less.
- "You just don't like comics. Don't blame the comics if you grow out of them."
Why should people grow out of comics? They don't grow out of movies or TV or books or other forms of entertainment. Only comics insist on repeating the same youthful formula, and only comics lose most of their readers when the readers get older. Why throw away half your readers? It does not have to be that way!
- “I'm still not convinced”
Comics are largely a form of soap opera. TV soap operas work in real time and have far bigger audiences than comics ever reach. Real time works.
- “Some new characters change and sell well - e.g. the X-Men”
This point was answered by jasinmartin at newsarama:
"It’s not really about aging so much as character growth. By restricting characters ability to age, it restricts the ability for stories to grow. ... Another great example is the classic Byrne/Claremont run on X-Men. When they took that book in their direction, it brought in comic readership that has yet to be rivaled. For a while those books truly felt like they were moving an epic story along, forward through time. Then, well, X-Men became a franchise and license giant, and you lost all of your forward movement and got people back from the dead and endless resets. One could argue that the X-Men are still very popular today despite this, but they aren't quite the juggernaut they once were. I bet if you look at classic runs, and stories, most deal with character and story growth."
- “The New Mutants and Power Pack didn't sell as well as the old titles”
New Mutants and Power Pack were not real time stories. And even if they had been, not every new story is a success. Real time is no guarantee of good stories, it just makes good stories easier to write because characters can be more relevant to the present day.
- "We don't need real time, we just need better writing"
And how do you guarantee good writing? The first rule of popular comic book writing, to make the reader want to know "what happens next?" This rule has been broken, kicked to death and buried in a shallow grave, by the modern rule that heroes cannot really change.
- "But the characters would all eventually be killed?"
Only the mortal ones. Comics allow a thousand ways to keep older characters alive. But if there is no danger of real death then there is no danger at all and the stories become boring.
- "The world would soon become unrecognizable"
The comics world would become MORE recognizable because it would keep pace with the real world. And if you wanted the old classic stories you could just read the "classic" line of comics and forget about continuity. There is room for both universes.
- "The characters would become unrecognizable"
As we saw in the 1998 Fantastic Four annual, or the "The End" series, the characters do not become unrecognizable, even after many decades.
- "The real time stories would be too serious, too boring"
The opposite would be true. Comics today are en endless series of battles. Everyone looks so serious, and their idea of gritty realism means lots of darkness and (temporary) death. But as readers get older they can appreciate the gentler, more fun kind of stories.
- "We cannot generate good new characters at this rate?
Comics had no trouble generating great new characters in the 1930s, when they took place in real time. Marvel had no trouble generating great new characters in the 1960s, when comics were in real time. Just look at news and currentevents. Just look at the natural results of previous actions. There are always new ideas waiting to be used. Then give writers the freedom to make real changes, and readers will be interested. Of course, nine tenths of new characters will fail. That was always true, but the one tenth who succeed make it all worth it
- "A real time universe would still repeat stories"
All media repeat story ideas, but it is a matter of degree. Shakespeare recycled stories. Hollywood recycles stories. Soap operas recycle stories. But they don't have exactly the same characters at exactly the same ages trying to achieve exactly the same things each time.
- "Poor sales are only because of the Internet and Video games."
There is some truth in this, but other comics still sell well: Manga, for example.
- "Readers do not want relevance, they want escapism"
If people just want escapism, why do they ever stop buying comics? Do they get to a certain age and lose the desire to escape? Obviously relevance must be part of the equation.
- “It is selfish to want your heroes to age with you, denying them to future generations.”
Those who want a timeless universe can still have it: Marvel has a long track record of parallel universes (Ultimates, 616, 2099, 1606, etc.). Isn’t it selfish to deny the choice? And isn’t it selfish for the older generation to prevent the new generation from having its own heroes? We need real time in order to create fresh relevant new heroes. The heroes of the sixties and the classic X-Men evolved from real time comics. By stopping real time we preserve our own favorite heroes and stop new ones from being created.
- “Real Time Marvel in the 1960s does not count - they didn’t change much”
Marvel in the 1960s was not afraid to change, even if it risked alienating the readers. What happened to the fun loving High School kid the human torch? Gone forever, grown up into an adult. What happened to the young love triangle between Namor, Sue and Reed? Gone forever - Sue and Reed got married and had a baby. What happened to the skinny high school Peter Parker who never dated? Gone forever, replaced by the muscular adult with long term girlfriends. What happened to the gray Hulk, the intelligent Hulk, the friend of Rick Jones? Gone, gone, gone. What happened to the cozy amateurish Avengers? Or the angry Thing or the original Ant Man? Or Sergeant Fury and his howling Commandos? Grown up and changed. The characters changed, they grew older, they moved away from their direct connection with young readers, yet readers loved it!
- "Monthly titles mean that short events have to be stretched over many months."
Six months in our time is sometimes just six days in a comic. But there is nothing to stop the next story from starting six months later. If the heroes are popular enough you can then have another title, "untold stories of..." showing what happened in the missing months. But if we slow down events then we also slow down the ideas.
- "Real time can be too constricting"
If we insist that each month must be that exact month, then yes it is restrictive. But I am only arguing for real time on the large scale. That is, we know when the character was born, and they react to real world events and fashions, and remember those events just as a real person would.
- "It is too late to start real time - these characters were teenagers in the 1960s."
It is never too late to accept reality. In the case of Marvel characters, we just need the story to face up to the fact that something caused the characters to age just seven years between 1968 and 2006. They can accept that fact, build an interesting story around it, then carry on in real time.
- "These are timeless, legendary characters, so time is unimportant"
That is the argument for a two track universe: classic and real time. Some readers like timeless characters, other readers like to know what happens next.
- “Let the independents try it, why should Marvel take risks?”
Independents and other companies have already proven that real time comics work. But Marvel has a bigger opportunity because of its huge stable of characters who are going nowhere.
- Would this be a financial risk for Marvel?
No more than normal, Marvel is constantly starting new titles anyway. And this one would feature numerous mainstream characters and events that matter to readers, so the odds of success are quite high.
- “Why Marvel? What about DC, Black Horse, and all the others?“
The problem of stagnation hits any title from any publisher where a character has a life beyond the comic. The more successful the character is (financially), the more afraid people are of making changes. Obviously this is a bigger problem for older titles and more successful titles.
- “What is Marvel Time?”
In the Marvel Universe, about one year passes for every four to seven years in the real world. So Spiderman and others were not even born when their comic books began, and all the cultural references in past comics are changed or denied, piece by piece.
- “What is Groundhog Day?”
Groundhog Day was a movie starring Bill Murray, in which he lived the same day over and over again. In the case of Marvel, the same characters do the same stuff over and over again, without getting any older. And without learning from their past mistakes.
- “If every Marvel title changed to real time, how do we explain the last 40 years?”
Two words: Franklin Richards. Real time existed in the Marvel Universe (more or less) until Franklin was born in 1968. He has proved himself able to create a pocket universe and control the heroes' memories in the "Onslaught" rebranding. And he usually does it unconsciously. Obviously the chronological slippage between 1968 and the present was his unconscious refusal to grow up. Little kids don't like too much change. The Onslaught year (heroes reborn etc.) can be considered both an illustration of how fake timing does not work, and also it was a dry run for the move to real time.
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