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Marvel style

Just a note for myself, really, but it is interesting. Tom Brevoort says that through the 90s, over 90% of Marvel books were still being written in "Marvel style", where a writer writes up a plot and gives it to the artist, and then gets the art back to write the script. It wasn't until the Bill Jemas era that the switchover to full script (where the writer writes a full "movie script" style story with panel by panel descriptions) happened. Marvel style gives artists a lot more leeway and creative control of the story, which can be a good or bad thing depending on the artist's storytelling abilities. But i'd bet that a lot of what i don't like about more modern art, which often feels lifeless and even unclear to me, is due to that change.

I wonder if there was a tilt back to Marvel style with the more creator driven books like Daredevil and Hawkeye.

By fnord12 | May 20, 2015, 9:02 AM | Comics


Comments

I think the problem is writers who have come from a film background and have no idea that comic books are a different medium to film so we get a lot of slow build-up and decompression. The link below shows a good example of this. Is seeing the cup on the ground after it has been thrown really necessary?

http://goodcomics.comicbookresources.com/wp-content/uploads/2007/10/07-31-2005%2004;44;49PM.jpg

It might look good on film but it has no place in a comic book. I know DC isn't a great example but haven't they been working full-script from the 60/70s? They still knew how to write good comics even if they weren't as entertaining as Marvel.

There was a very interesting episode of Kieron Gillen's infrequent podcast a couple of years ago when he discussed the resurgence of the Marvel style with Matt Fraction and Mark Waid, who both had begun working that way. It was interesting to learn that Joe Quesada actually thought that was a better way of making comics since it was under his watch that tradition disappeared.

And i got the feeling all three disliked the "fimwriter" comic style mentioned. However, I think that criticism is a bit anachronistic as the "very slow, talky comic" has fallen out of favour the last 5 years or so and I don't know any major Marvel writer at the moment who comes from film/tv originally.