What’s next for Marvel?
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It seems that the publisher has been rebooting almost yearly, with a new (or all-new, or all-new all-different) approach to their storytelling shaping the world their characters share with each subsequent move.
Often, they’ve been following some muse: a hugely successful storyline, a popular character driving changes down the line to make other titles fall into line…whatever.
And, yeah, like everyone else in the industry, Marvel is hoping that their next book will be another Spider-Gwen or Batgirl.
Which of their new titles do we think have the potential to break out and be huge, unexpected hits?
Well, that’s the thing about being unexpected hits: it’s really, really hard to predict beforehand.
That said, we’ll give it a go. Based on my own scan of the upcoming titles — which, admittedly, isn’t the target audience they’re hoping for, since I’m a 35-year-old white guy.
So without further ado, delve into this list of the books that I think will hit it big…for what it’s worth.
ANGELA: QUEEN OF HEL
Marvel has a ton of new books featuring women and characters of color, but few are quite as alluring as Angela.
Tossing her into a role that’s a bit more similar to her Image Comics mythology than the whole pantheon-of-Norse-gods schtick she did before, this series will team DC Bombshells writer Marguerite Benette with artists Kim Jacinto and Stephanie Hans.
The result, given Jacinto’s stylized look and strong sense of storytelling, is a comic that promises to play up some of the most interesting elements of Angela’s mythology, with a look that’s different from what we’ve seen in most of her previous stories and has the potential to really play up the cool, strange, supernatural elements of her surrounding and powers.
CAPTAIN MARVEL
For the most part, I looked down this list and steered clear of anything that stank of “volume 2+.” I was looking for what new, untapped concepts might connect with an audience in an unexpected way, as Spider-Gwen and Ms Marvel have done in the recent past.
Here, though? This one seems like a gimme.
Yeah, the Carol Corps is losing Kelly Sue DeConnick, who reinvented the wheel with Carol’s character and established one of the strongest cult followings in comics. But they’re gaining Tara Butters and Michele Fazekas, showrunners on ABC’s Marvel’s Agent Carter, which garnered strong reviews and, again, a fanatical following, amny of whom are likely to follow Butters and Fazekas to the comics.
Oh, and Kris Anka is sensational. Don’t forget that.
Any time you sit and speculate about whether non-comics readers might be finding their way in as a result of an editorial choice you’ve made on a book, that’s probably a win.
DRAX
How can you go wrong with CM Punk co-writing a book about a shirtless, musclebound maniac? Really.
As excited as I am personally about Ben Grimm joining the Guardians of the Galaxy, probably the most likely book to get a bump out of the general feeling of goodwill audiences still have from James Gunn’s film is Drax, the final core member of the Guardians not to have had his own book since the movie came out and one of the more quotable characters in the film itself.
Add Scott Hepburn to the mix: an artist with a great sense of storytelling, which should help with what I expect to be a great many well-conceived fight scenes, considering Punk’s experience and co-writer Cullen Bunn’s knock-down, drag-out comics credentials.
Them there’s good comics.
SCARLET WITCH
The number of creators more capable of taking a frequently-troubled property and turning into gold than James Robinson is…well, virtually non-existent.
If you need me to sell you on why this book will probably be amazing, then you clearly weren’t reading his Fantastic Four.
Of course, if people were reading his Fantastic Four, it might still be around, so let’s rap.
Robinson’s Scarlet Witch is set to redefine the character (yet again), establishing for one the difference between her witchcraft and the magic that’s practiced by Doctor Strange. It’s an important distinction, since having a Sorcerer Supreme on your side can sometimes feel like it renders other magic users a little impotent — even ones that have previously wiped out whole species with three little words.
The early art we’ve seen captures the kind of high-energy, experimental look that Marvel likes to go with when they’re really pumped about one of these reinventions, too.
TOTALLY AWESOME HULK
Greg Pak on Hulk should be an automatic buy, but remember that we live in an age when James Robinson’s return to the world of Starman wasn’t a huge best-seller.
So what makes this one different?
Well, The Hulk seems to have been struggling a little bit to find his niche in the Marvel Universe since he came back from the whole World War Hulk thing. If there’s anybody who could use a breath, a break and a temporary replacement, it’s Bruce Banner.
So now we get a younger, more diverse hero (and by extension supporting cast) who has a built-in history with the franchise, so he feels a bit less like an interloper. Similarly, Pak is a fan-favorite when it comes to The Hulk, so the feeling that he’s just some new guy coming in and making changes isn’t there, either.
Oh, and did we mention that this book more or less can’t help but be amazing?
VENOM: SPACEKNIGHT
Yes, Marvel has forged an unholy union between probably the greatest comic ever based on a licensed property and one of the most wildly popular characters of the ’90s.
And I’m sorry, but that’s awesome.
Robbie Thompson is a hugely entertaining writer, who has been doing a lot with much less on Silk. Now, let’s see what happens when you add Ariel Olivetti’s striking artwork and one of the more bats–t crazy concepts in recent comics memory to that mix.
THE VISION
The runaway winner of this years’ Age of Ultron fan response, The Vision is a character who has always been great in a group setting, but never really caught on as an individual.
Solution? They’ve set him up with a family.
Albeit a kind of strange, twisted, artificial family that he invented to keep himself company. But a family nonetheless, and now he has other characters to bounce off who will (presumably) not steal all the focus from him along the way.
Gabriel Hernandez Walta’s art has been absolutely gorgeous so far, and Tom King is a guy who has a proven ability to crack the strane and twisted in DC Comics’s recently un-cancelled Omega Men.
