C2E2 2014: Marvel House of Ideas Panel

On Friday, April 25, 2014, Marvel Comics conducted the House of Ideas panel at the Chicago Comics [...]

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On Friday, April 25, 2014, Marvel Comics conducted the House of Ideas panel at the Chicago Comics and Entertainment Expo, featuring speakers Joshua Hale Fialkov, Mark Waid and Ryan Penagos with special guest Nick Lowe. Below you can see the panel description, followed by the blow-by-blow. Love having the best comics in the industry on your mobile devices? Want to know how Marvel stays on the cutting edge of technology? Then this panel is for you, True Believer! Get exciting news about Marvel's Infinite Comics as well as what's happening on the Marvel Comics App, Marvel Unlimited and MORE in this can't-miss panel hosted by Executive Editorial Director of Digital Ryan Penagos, writer Joshua Hale Fialkov (Amazing Spider-Man: Who Am I? Infinite Comic, Ultimate FF), Mark Waid (Daredevil, Hulk) and other Mighty Marvel guests! Much of the talk centered around the newest version of Marvel's AR app, which went live on the App Store for iOS today as well as on Google Play. You can download it here: iTunes and in Google Play. Today's panel began with a screening of their Marvel Super Heroes: What The--?! comedy webseries featuring Deadpool and The Punisher...

Christopher Daniels, who plays Deadpool in the video above, is appearing at C2E2 this weekend and got a special shout-out from the stage. Ryan "Agent M" Penagos also alluded to the Batman 75th Anniversary party going on elsewhere at the convention at the same time. Lowe described Marvel's Infinite Comics format as "our toe in the water of digital comics," saying that he loved bricks-and-mortar stores but digital "was too tempting of an apple" and "I love apples!" Fialkov's The Amazing Spider-Man: Who Am I?  is being written with input from Amazing Spider-Man writer Dan Slott, and four more installments are coming soon.

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"On May 4, we're going to drop four issues at once," with another four issues coming about a month later, Lowe explained, with Marvel apparently taking a Netflix-style model for the miniseres. He described the experiment as "like the Oregon Trail, but we don't want people getting tuberculosis or anything." Switching gears to Marvel's recently-upgraded AR app, Penagos said, "We're trying new things to give you more content in your comics for free." After asking the room who had never read a digital comic before, only two people volunteered their hands. They're both invited up on stage to try it. Later, when finished, they admitted that they enjoyed the experience. Penagos, one of the most visible parts of Marvel's social media and PR machine, said he has to "try hard not to sound shilly" about Marvel's "unlimited" digital comics option, adding that it's where he does his homework for various projects he has to understand and promote. "Over the course of seven months we've given out posters and mailed out tickets to exclusive events for Marvel Unlimited members," Penagos said, in addition to a promised exclusive Ultron action figure. "I was skeptical when we first started working on it, but it's really cool," said Lowe of adding effects like sound and motion to comics as part of the Unlimited package, adding, "It's so well done, it's interestingly done." Marvel has done around 1,400 videos since the inception of their AR program, and those are beginning to be phased into the Unlimited program as well. "Dan Slott kind of explored the idea of Spider-Man and now we're seeing what we can strip away," Fialkov said of his Who Am I? miniseries, which begins with Peter not knowing who he is or why hes' robbing a bank. "Otto was in the body and had that history. Now we have a body with powers without any responsibility or without any of the history." "He might be a terrible villain," chimed in Lowe. "Peter is put in a situation where he's doing something he swore he'd never do, but he has to do it," Fialkov said, adding that the story will be about exploring a version of the character who doesn't know his own limitations. They reminded the audience that there in an Ultimate Spider-Man Infinite Comic coming. There's also a Daredevil story currently ongoing by Waid, which they addressed next. More details on all of these projects will be released through the Marvel website soon. "I helped out on the original run of Infinite Comics with Joe Quesada and I helped lay a bit of foundation in it and it was amazing," said Waid, whose Eisner-winning run on Daredevil ended, then got picked up in Infinite Comics, then got an All-New Marvel NOW! relaunch all in the span of a few months. Waid, a digital comics evangelist, recently made headlines when he bought into a pair of comic book stores with fellow comics writers Art Baltazar, Franco, Christina Blanch and others. "One of our chief goals is don't worry about the print. We want these to be digital comics first," Lowe said of the Infinite Comics, which Waid said are made specifically for the medium. At first, Marvel had implied that Infinite Comics would never be released in print at all, but some of them have been in the time since. Going back to the upgraded AR app, they showed a teaser for Amazing Spider-Man's bonus features. They then moved on to Tales to Astonish. The Tales to Astonish webseries will tell behind-the-scenes stories about Marvel as a company and a community, starting with a mini-documentary on Marvel's Civil War event. The series has been compared (here and previously) to ESPN's 30 For 30 mini-documentaries. Coming off a short clip from Tales To Astonish, they screened another episode of What The--?!

That was followed by a brief discussion of The Captain America Experience, an augmented reality app available on iTunes and Google Play. The Marvel Gaming Universe "ties in a whole load of games with some really cool things," said Penagos. The Games Team attends Marvel's editorial retreats to discuss what can be worked into games like Avengers Alliance from current and upcoming storylines. "The games reflect the comics and that kind of synergy is pretty neat," Penagos said, adding that there are two exciting, upcoming games that he can't talk about yet. They also presented the Marvel at 75 featurette located here, telling fans to keep checking the website for updates, interviews and cool stuff celebrating the publisher's seventy-fifth year. The website is being updated all the time, including with Silver Age material just recently. Penagos also hosts a Marvel podcast, for which the most recent guest was Waid, talking about Original Sin #0. "Nobody wants to hear me talk that much," Waid joked. The next guest, up next week, will be Al Ewing. "Our Original Sin story is going to hugely affect our book. You'll meet a new villain that you'll see around for at least the next year," said Lowe.

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