1. Jean is NOT coming back...yes a younger group of X-men is coming from the past that includes a younger Jean but she is NOT the same Jean who is in the White Hot Room and I really don't see current day Cyclops dumping Emma in favor of a 16-18 year old Jean...especially since a younger Cyclops is coming with her

2. I don't understand why everyone is looking at the X-men as the villains here....it's the Phoenix who is the villain and is making them do these things...plus the rest of the Marvel Universe has had this coming....they've spent the last decade ignoring the mutants and their problems and sat and watched as the mutant race has dwindled to a few hundred survivors and now all of a sudden something comes along that could possibly help them and the Avengers decide to try and sneak onto their island to abduct an underage girl...the X-men handled the situation correctly....then on top of everything they were only doing good things with the Phoenix Force...they stopped war and ended hunger and disease...yeah those are some terrible people right there

Interesting article. It is possible to destroy a franchise - that's what happens when main characters are quietly ushered a way and a new cast and/or new direction is loudly announced. I'm not sure if "A vs X" is the event that will do it, though. The sales seem to have been good and the series seems to have an audience that doesn't really care about interesting characters, scenarios that don't get resolved with fisticuffs or a consistently well-delivered story. I think Marvel's happy with the way the sales are turning out which may have been why the Marvel execs were surprised when fans were cheering when they hinted that Cyclops might die - many of their mega events are designed to boost comic sales and promote other merchandising activities, so when a character is undermined, they often don't realize the impact until their money is affected. As far as they are concerned, Cyclops is helping to drive the sales of a pretty successful event, and many of them might not recognize how odious the X-Men have become to some readers.

@PhoenixoftheTides: @The_Diamond_Prince: @danhimself: @Chaos Burn: Funny that I was considering writing an blog based upon that article as well. It really does feel like with the constant events, the misuse of Cyclops character, and with AvX, that Cyclops is being put on the proverbial chopping block. Months ago I really wanted to believe that this series wouldn't turn out to be another superhero slobber-knocker but it would appear that Marvel is determined to make a fool of me. I have no problem with being wrong, however, I hate this event is turning out so predictable as once again Marvel proves that they can't write morally-themed stories and concepts worth nothing. They don't understand the concept that just because a book sells well doesn't mean that it's well-written. After this event I'm not even certain that I want to give Marvel my time or my money. I'm just disappointed though, given the setup I shouldn't be surprised. I mean Cyclops who seems to have a 50/50 love/hate ratio with fans up against Wolverine AND Captain America? Sheesh...I'm almost to the point of complete apathy as far as this goes.

I agree. I like Cyclops but it's just getting hard to defend him nowadays. Emma is reduced to her worst qualities in AvX and that might spell the end for their relationship.

I must be blind. I really do not see this event in a terrible light. It is engaging, fun, and good with canon (as far as how the PF currupts). I think what has happened is a shift in audiences. Instead of Marvel always pleasing the readers from 1980+, they are trying to engage new readers. Let's face it, the comic book industry, at least in Denver, where I live, is going down hill. And will soon be gone if there are no more readers. This includes, the apparently infallible, DC.

I know you guys are upset at something, not sure why? Cyclops has ALWAYS been a whiney little girl, ALWAYS. Don't believe me? Read the O5, read X-Factor, read Morrison's and Whedon's run. Magik has always been a bitch, check out original New Mutants. Colossus desperatley need a character change, and is also, if you forgot, still possessed by Cytorrak; making it easy for Colossus to want more bloodshed and power. Emma is even shown that she doesn't want the PF anymore, which is good canon, since she hated the PF to begin with. And Namor, really? He is the biggest douche ever. Even in a 'History of Marvel Comics" book I read, they label the Sub-Mariner as an uber cock.

At first everyone complains about too many xbooks, then when they finally decide to get rid of a lot of them, you still complain. What is that bad? Yes Wolverine sucks, I hate him the most, but honestly I haven't read an xbook with him in it in a long time. I even get WatX, and I do not remember the last time I saw Wolverine involved. Think long term, if the new Marvel Now movement doesn't sell, then they will always just go back to normal and forget that AvX happened. It happened with Inferno, Second Coming, and Fear Itself.

@Dman1366 said:

I must be blind. I really do not see this event in a terrible light. It is engaging, fun, and good with canon (as far as how the PF currupts). I think what has happened is a shift in audiences. Instead of Marvel always pleasing the readers from 1980+, they are trying to engage new readers. Let's face it, the comic book industry, at least in Denver, where I live, is going down hill. And will soon be gone if there are no more readers. This includes, the apparently infallible, DC.

I know you guys are upset at something, not sure why? Cyclops has ALWAYS been a whiney little girl, ALWAYS. Don't believe me? Read the O5, read X-Factor, read Morrison's and Whedon's run. Magik has always been a bitch, check out original New Mutants. Colossus desperatley need a character change, and is also, if you forgot, still possessed by Cytorrak; making it easy for Colossus to want more bloodshed and power. Emma is even shown that she doesn't want the PF anymore, which is good canon, since she hated the PF to begin with. And Namor, really? He is the biggest douche ever. Even in a 'History of Marvel Comics" book I read, they label the Sub-Mariner as an uber cock.

At first everyone complains about too many xbooks, then when they finally decide to get rid of a lot of them, you still complain. What is that bad? Yes Wolverine sucks, I hate him the most, but honestly I haven't read an xbook with him in it in a long time. I even get WatX, and I do not remember the last time I saw Wolverine involved. Think long term, if the new Marvel Now movement doesn't sell, then they will always just go back to normal and forget that AvX happened. It happened with Inferno, Second Coming, and Fear Itself.

Can't really speak for anyone else, but I'm not really upset. I think the event has found an audience, and I'm not a part of it. It may be that I'm no longer in the right demographic for what they are trying to do. That being said, I still buy X-Force, X-Factor, occasionally the New Mutants (I hear this is going away), FF, Fantastic Four and a bunch of other independent titles.

I think the writing on a lot of the current X books is below par, which is why I'm dropping so many titles. In fact, if the writing was consistently good or excellent, I doubt there would be so many calls to prune any books from the range of titles. There was a point in time where I was buying every X-related book because the editorial consistency was high, stories didn't get interrupted by events/crossovers and the artwork was different but good across the board. I was going broke, but loved that period of time.

But, as I said above, I don't think this event will destroy the franchise, either.

@PhoenixoftheTides: I completely agree with you on that. I just don't have the money for these events, especially when they write very lazily. That is one thing I cannot defend; even though I like AvX, most of the time it is just lazy writing, and that would not have been okay 20 years ago. But as of now, I just get Avenging Spider-Man, Scarlet Spider, WatX, Avengers Academy, and UXM. All have great writers, I think Jason is one of the best on Marvel's pay role, and Gage is only good with AA.

Great article! Although, there were some points I slightly disagree with.  For instance, when the article stated that comic fans don't want a change in the stories and the characters, I think that comic fans do want a slight change in their characters and the situations.  It's just that Marvel has been forcing these events on the fans and they are not allowing any of the characters to really develop before the event comes by, so a lot of the current changes happening with the characters seemed too forced rather than being developed gradually.  
 
I do agree though that having too many events in the X-Men comics is going to eventually cause Marvel to go through a decline in the quality of the X-Men comics, unless they start making stories that actually develop the characters and gradually move the plots forward.

Someones complaining Marvel is dying and that they suck now and they sold out and that they'll never buy from Marvel again. They aren't, they don't, they didn't and they will.

What else is new?

@TheAnnihilator said:

Someones complaining Marvel is dying and that they suck now and they sold out and that they'll never buy from Marvel again. They aren't, they don't, they didn't and they will.

What else is new?

'nuff said.

"Quesada and the faceless Disney executives aren't the only ones to blame, though. We, the fans, deserve some too. Comic book fans notoriously resist change. In general, most of us want the same old stories with the same old heroes fighting the same old villains, over and over again. We're not reading for new material. We're reading to relive the feelings we experienced when we discovered these characters as children."

I believe the title of that article should be "The slow and painful death of the comic book industry" based on that one, sad, true line.

"Quesada and the faceless Disney executives aren't the only ones to blame, though. We, the fans, deserve some too. Comic book fans notoriously resist change. In general, most of us want the same old stories with the same old heroes fighting the same old villains, over and over again. We're not reading for new material. We're reading to relive the feelings we experienced when we discovered these characters as children."

I believe the title of that article should be "The slow and painful death of the comic book industry" based on that one, sad, true line.

@Rabbitearsblog said:

Great article! Although, there were some points I slightly disagree with. For instance, when the article stated that comic fans don't want a change in the stories and the characters, I think that comic fans do want a slight change in their characters and the situations. It's just that Marvel has been forcing these events on the fans and they are not allowing any of the characters to really develop before the event comes by, so a lot of the current changes happening with the characters seemed too forced rather than being developed gradually. I do agree though that having too many events in the X-Men comics is going to eventually cause Marvel to go through a decline in the quality of the X-Men comics, unless they start making stories that actually develop the characters and gradually move the plots forward.

Agreed I even found this statement a little untrue "Marvel creates them, but it's more books starring Wolverine that fans will pay for. So Marvel makes them."

@Rabbitearsblog said:

Great article! Although, there were some points I slightly disagree with. For instance, when the article stated that comic fans don't want a change in the stories and the characters, I think that comic fans do want a slight change in their characters and the situations. It's just that Marvel has been forcing these events on the fans and they are not allowing any of the characters to really develop before the event comes by, so a lot of the current changes happening with the characters seemed too forced rather than being developed gradually. I do agree though that having too many events in the X-Men comics is going to eventually cause Marvel to go through a decline in the quality of the X-Men comics, unless they start making stories that actually develop the characters and gradually move the plots forward.

Agreed I even found this statement a little untrue "Marvel creates them, but it's more books starring Wolverine that fans will pay for. So Marvel makes them."

The event mentality of Marvel has grown tiresome and I can see something bad on the horizon if this continues, again I don't think it will happen with A.V.X however I've been actively following current comics since 2009 and just watching what has passed since and how it bleeds into perfectly good books temporarily ruining them in many cases cannot continue for much longer. If, where or when this will happen is anyone's guess I think.

@danhimself said:

1. Jean is NOT coming back...yes a younger group of X-men is coming from the past that includes a younger Jean but she is NOT the same Jean who is in the White Hot Room and I really don't see current day Cyclops dumping Emma in favor of a 16-18 year old Jean...especially since a younger Cyclops is coming with her

2. I don't understand why everyone is looking at the X-men as the villains here....it's the Phoenix who is the villain and is making them do these things...plus the rest of the Marvel Universe has had this coming....they've spent the last decade ignoring the mutants and their problems and sat and watched as the mutant race has dwindled to a few hundred survivors and now all of a sudden something comes along that could possibly help them and the Avengers decide to try and sneak onto their island to abduct an underage girl...the X-men handled the situation correctly....then on top of everything they were only doing good things with the Phoenix Force...they stopped war and ended hunger and disease...yeah those are some terrible people right there

I agree with you

Plus maybe Marvel is wanting to fan out and fade some of the X-Men and X-titles because of how huge it is and has gotten over the years... I mean the X-Men (and X-related) have a total of 11 titles (that's excluding some of the new ones that are approaching and the ones that have just ended this year) while the Avengers have a total of 5 titles... Marvel has just released The Avengers this year, grossing well enough to know where their money needs to go, so what better way to up the Avengers side of the Marvel Universe than have a huge event like Avengers vs X-Men to "put the X-Men in their place" so to say, and have the Avengers be the heroes and victims of this event. They do this to gain new readers and more followers so that when sequels to the blockbuster hits Captain America, Thor, and The Avengers (as well as Ironman 3 and whatever else is coming out) premieres, Marvel will gain even more praise for their wonderful work, characters, etc... While the X-Men get subjected to another X-Men First Class movie (which wasn't that bad, but wasn't to me what the X-Men are all about... it didn't catch the grip of what the X-Men are) and loyal readers and followers get even more pissed off and lose interest in the characters and stories and go to DC because of inconsistency. Look at this "Marvel NOW!" change that is happening, out of all of that, what do the X-Men get?... A crappy "back to the future, past, and present" series and yet another book on how the original 5 X-Men weren't the original 5! Just because Disney or Marvel or whomever don't own the rights to the X-Men feature film-wise, doesn't mean they have to shrug them off to the side and deliver horrible writing to such great characters in favor for Avengers series that will gain them money because of their box office hits!

@danhimself said:

1. Jean is NOT coming back...yes a younger group of X-men is coming from the past that includes a younger Jean but she is NOT the same Jean who is in the White Hot Room and I really don't see current day Cyclops dumping Emma in favor of a 16-18 year old Jean...especially since a younger Cyclops is coming with her

2. I don't understand why everyone is looking at the X-men as the villains here....it's the Phoenix who is the villain and is making them do these things...plus the rest of the Marvel Universe has had this coming....they've spent the last decade ignoring the mutants and their problems and sat and watched as the mutant race has dwindled to a few hundred survivors and now all of a sudden something comes along that could possibly help them and the Avengers decide to try and sneak onto their island to abduct an underage girl...the X-men handled the situation correctly....then on top of everything they were only doing good things with the Phoenix Force...they stopped war and ended hunger and disease...yeah those are some terrible people right there

I agree with you

Plus maybe Marvel is wanting to fan out and fade some of the X-Men and X-titles because of how huge it is and has gotten over the years... I mean the X-Men (and X-related) have a total of 11 titles (that's excluding some of the new ones that are approaching and the ones that have just ended this year) while the Avengers have a total of 5 titles... Marvel has just released The Avengers this year, grossing well enough to know where their money needs to go, so what better way to up the Avengers side of the Marvel Universe than have a huge event like Avengers vs X-Men to "put the X-Men in their place" so to say, and have the Avengers be the heroes and victims of this event. They do this to gain new readers and more followers so that when sequels to the blockbuster hits Captain America, Thor, and The Avengers (as well as Ironman 3 and whatever else is coming out) premieres, Marvel will gain even more praise for their wonderful work, characters, etc... While the X-Men get subjected to another X-Men First Class movie (which wasn't that bad, but wasn't to me what the X-Men are all about... it didn't catch the grip of what the X-Men are) and loyal readers and followers get even more pissed off and lose interest in the characters and stories and go to DC because of inconsistency. Look at this "Marvel NOW!" change that is happening, out of all of that, what do the X-Men get?... A crappy "back to the future, past, and present" series and yet another book on how the original 5 X-Men weren't the original 5! Just because Disney or Marvel or whomever don't own the rights to the X-Men feature film-wise, doesn't mean they have to shrug them off to the side and deliver horrible writing to such great characters in favor for Avengers series that will gain them money because of their box office hits!

@Rabbitearsblog said:

@CrimsonCake said:

@Rabbitearsblog said:

Great article! Although, there were some points I slightly disagree with. For instance, when the article stated that comic fans don't want a change in the stories and the characters, I think that comic fans do want a slight change in their characters and the situations. It's just that Marvel has been forcing these events on the fans and they are not allowing any of the characters to really develop before the event comes by, so a lot of the current changes happening with the characters seemed too forced rather than being developed gradually. I do agree though that having too many events in the X-Men comics is going to eventually cause Marvel to go through a decline in the quality of the X-Men comics, unless they start making stories that actually develop the characters and gradually move the plots forward.

Agreed I even found this statement a little untrue "Marvel creates them, but it's more books starring Wolverine that fans will pay for. So Marvel makes them."

I also disagree with this statement. I think any fan will buy books that don't have Wolverine in them, as long as the story is well written and keeps their interest.

What demographic are you referring to when you use the term 'fan'? There are different groups of fans, and the sales figures can tell a mixed story. There are fans of specific characters, those that follow any good story, others that like buying anything for a complete collection, etc. There are really good stories that certain readers don't purchase because they aren't interested in the specific character.

@Rabbitearsblog said:

@CrimsonCake said:

@Rabbitearsblog said:

Great article! Although, there were some points I slightly disagree with. For instance, when the article stated that comic fans don't want a change in the stories and the characters, I think that comic fans do want a slight change in their characters and the situations. It's just that Marvel has been forcing these events on the fans and they are not allowing any of the characters to really develop before the event comes by, so a lot of the current changes happening with the characters seemed too forced rather than being developed gradually. I do agree though that having too many events in the X-Men comics is going to eventually cause Marvel to go through a decline in the quality of the X-Men comics, unless they start making stories that actually develop the characters and gradually move the plots forward.

Agreed I even found this statement a little untrue "Marvel creates them, but it's more books starring Wolverine that fans will pay for. So Marvel makes them."

I also disagree with this statement. I think any fan will buy books that don't have Wolverine in them, as long as the story is well written and keeps their interest.

What demographic are you referring to when you use the term 'fan'? There are different groups of fans, and the sales figures can tell a mixed story. There are fans of specific characters, those that follow any good story, others that like buying anything for a complete collection, etc. There are really good stories that certain readers don't purchase because they aren't interested in the specific character.

@Rabbitearsblog said:

@papad1992 said:

@danhimself said:

1. Jean is NOT coming back...yes a younger group of X-men is coming from the past that includes a younger Jean but she is NOT the same Jean who is in the White Hot Room and I really don't see current day Cyclops dumping Emma in favor of a 16-18 year old Jean...especially since a younger Cyclops is coming with her

2. I don't understand why everyone is looking at the X-men as the villains here....it's the Phoenix who is the villain and is making them do these things...plus the rest of the Marvel Universe has had this coming....they've spent the last decade ignoring the mutants and their problems and sat and watched as the mutant race has dwindled to a few hundred survivors and now all of a sudden something comes along that could possibly help them and the Avengers decide to try and sneak onto their island to abduct an underage girl...the X-men handled the situation correctly....then on top of everything they were only doing good things with the Phoenix Force...they stopped war and ended hunger and disease...yeah those are some terrible people right there

I agree with you

Plus maybe Marvel is wanting to fan out and fade some of the X-Men and X-titles because of how huge it is and has gotten over the years... I mean the X-Men (and X-related) have a total of 11 titles (that's excluding some of the new ones that are approaching and the ones that have just ended this year) while the Avengers have a total of 5 titles... Marvel has just released The Avengers this year, grossing well enough to know where their money needs to go, so what better way to up the Avengers side of the Marvel Universe than have a huge event like Avengers vs X-Men to "put the X-Men in their place" so to say, and have the Avengers be the heroes and victims of this event. They do this to gain new readers and more followers so that when sequels to the blockbuster hits Captain America, Thor, and The Avengers (as well as Ironman 3 and whatever else is coming out) premieres, Marvel will gain even more praise for their wonderful work, characters, etc... While the X-Men get subjected to another X-Men First Class movie (which wasn't that bad, but wasn't to me what the X-Men are all about... it didn't catch the grip of what the X-Men are) and loyal readers and followers get even more pissed off and lose interest in the characters and stories and go to DC because of inconsistency. Look at this "Marvel NOW!" change that is happening, out of all of that, what do the X-Men get?... A crappy "back to the future, past, and present" series and yet another book on how the original 5 X-Men weren't the original 5! Just because Disney or Marvel or whomever don't own the rights to the X-Men feature film-wise, doesn't mean they have to shrug them off to the side and deliver horrible writing to such great characters in favor for Avengers series that will gain them money because of their box office hits!

I agree. It seems like Marvel is shoveling the X-Men to the side because they still don't own the rights to the movie franchise, but hopefully, all of this will be changed later on.

My thoughts exactly! I'm glad u agree...

@Rabbitearsblog said:

@PhoenixoftheTides said:

@Rabbitearsblog said:

@CrimsonCake said:

@Rabbitearsblog said:

Great article! Although, there were some points I slightly disagree with. For instance, when the article stated that comic fans don't want a change in the stories and the characters, I think that comic fans do want a slight change in their characters and the situations. It's just that Marvel has been forcing these events on the fans and they are not allowing any of the characters to really develop before the event comes by, so a lot of the current changes happening with the characters seemed too forced rather than being developed gradually. I do agree though that having too many events in the X-Men comics is going to eventually cause Marvel to go through a decline in the quality of the X-Men comics, unless they start making stories that actually develop the characters and gradually move the plots forward.

Agreed I even found this statement a little untrue "Marvel creates them, but it's more books starring Wolverine that fans will pay for. So Marvel makes them."

I also disagree with this statement. I think any fan will buy books that don't have Wolverine in them, as long as the story is well written and keeps their interest.

What demographic are you referring to when you use the term 'fan'? There are different groups of fans, and the sales figures can tell a mixed story. There are fans of specific characters, those that follow any good story, others that like buying anything for a complete collection, etc. There are really good stories that certain readers don't purchase because they aren't interested in the specific character.

Oh, I was talking about the fans that are invested in good stories.

Ah ok. I guess the only problem would be if the fans that like good stories are outnumbered by fans who are willing to buy shlock. I wonder about that sometimes.

marvels trying to make the comics like the movies. which will kinda turn away long term fans

This event is so bittersweet. Mostly bitter for the X-Men.

The Avengers suck.