Posted in: Comics, Marvel Comics, Spider-Man | Tagged: amazing spider-man, dan slott, HRL, jane foster, jason aaron, jonathan hickman, marvel, Marvel Comics, marvel legacy, peter parker, thor, tom brevoort
Dan Slott Sticking With Amazing Spider-Man For "Long Haul"
With all the shake-ups and revamps Marvel is applying to itself through Legacy in the hopes of garnering goodwill, one thing that is not apparently happening soon is the departure of writer Dan Slott from Amazing Spider-Man.
In an interview with comicbook.com, Marvel honcho Tom Brevoort discussed Marvel Legacy and the upcoming changes. One question asked by the interviewer was the possibility of some of the new creative teams sticking to the books for the "long haul." Here is what Mr. Brevoort said in response:
"I think that depends on what you mean by the long haul — some of them, such as Dan Slott on Amazing Spider-Man or Jason Aaron on Thor have already been on for a very long haul, and will continue to be."
As you can see, this also means that writer Jason Aaron will continue with Thor for some time. I suspect many will be fairly happy with Aaron staying on Thor, and I suspect many will be unhappy about Slott staying on Amazing Spider-Man.
I've not read either title often myself, so my personal reading won't be affected much unless I decide to read either title for Bleeding Cool. I have enjoyed what I've read of Aaron's Thor. Slott's Spider-Man is alright, though I did quite enjoy "New Ways to Die" (I read that one for Thunderbolts and Anti-Venom).
I'm sure the fact that these are two of Marvel's best-selling books has a lot to do with this. Feel free to gripe about Slott sticking around, though I'm wholly against harassing him on social media.
One thing to remember is, despite the fact that it's easier to think of Marvel strictly as a product seller (and that is exactly how they behave most of the time), they are allowed to pursue their own vision of Spider-Man, Captain America, the Avengers, X-Men, etc. Criticize them for these moves, please do. I do it all the time on here.
However, they are not beholden to their audience. No comic book company, movie maker, videogame developer, writer, etc. should be entirely beholden to their audience. You get nutters like Diversity & Comics who muddle the opinion pool and would steer the ship onto boys-only-island, given the opportunity.
That's not to say that they should ignore their audience or not take audience opinion into account to some degree. That road leads to Mother! You don't want to go down that road.
It's a tough balancing act for those who deal in arts and literature, but Marvel is going to go where the money is. I mean, they are still product sellers.