I Still Love Marvel. I Just Don't Believe in It Anymore
For most of my life, I was a Marvel Comics reader.
Not a casual reader. Not someone who checked in now and then. Marvel was one of the fictional worlds that helped shape my imagination. Spider-Man, the X-Men, the Fantastic Four, the Avengers, Daredevil. I loved those characters, but more than that, I loved the sense that they all inhabited the same living, breathing universe. It felt like a world. Events mattered. Actions had consequences. Characters grew older, changed, and carried the weight of their histories with them.
The funny thing is that I can pinpoint the first crack in that illusion long before I understood what I was seeing.
For me, it starts in 1991. Now, if you look at the numbers, that sounds ridiculous. X-Men #1 by Jim Lee is one of the highest-selling comic books of all time. The X-Men were on top of the world. Marvel was making money hand over fist. Most fans at the time were celebrating. But even as a kid, something felt off. I didn't have the vocabulary for it then. I couldn't have told you what editorial influence was. I couldn't have explained the significance of Chris Claremont being forced off the book. All I knew was that the X-Men suddenly felt different. Looking back, I think that was the first time I became aware, even subconsciously, that forces outside the story were shaping the story.
The second major crack came with Onslaught. Again, I enjoyed parts of it. There were good moments. There were exciting moments. But I could feel the hand of editorial all over the event. The story wasn't simply unfolding because these characters had arrived at a particular place. The story felt designed to move pieces around the board. Then came Heroes Reborn and later Heroes Return, and the illusion weakened even further because it became harder to ignore the feeling that publishing initiatives were driving the narrative rather than the narrative driving the publishing initiatives.
Ironically, the Clone Saga didn't bother me nearly as much as it bothered many fans. The Clone Saga was a mess. It went on too long. It clearly suffered from behind-the-scenes interference. But for most of it, Peter Parker still felt like Peter Parker. The characters largely reacted to events in ways that made sense for who they were. When Norman Osborn finally returned, I remember thinking that the ending actually worked. The pieces fit together. Whatever flaws the story had, I still believed that the characters themselves were driving the action.
Then came the Mackie and Byrne Spider-Man reboot. That was the first time I actually walked away from a Marvel title. I eventually returned because of J. Michael Straczynski's run, which reminded me why I loved Spider-Man in the first place. Peter Parker felt like a human being again. The stories felt grounded in character. The book wasn't perfect, but it felt like Spider-Man.
By then, however, we were firmly in the Quesada era. This was also the period when I began noticing something else that increasingly bothered me. Continuity and canon felt optional. Now, I know some people roll their eyes when fans talk about continuity. They think we're arguing over trivia or obsessing over details that don't matter. But continuity matters because it creates the illusion that actions have consequences. It creates the sense that the world exists beyond the current story arc. It allows readers to believe that today's stories are built on yesterday's stories and that tomorrow's stories will have to live with what happened today.
Marvel increasingly felt less interested in preserving that illusion.
The poster child for this, at least for me, was Avengers Disassembled. I hated that story. Not because bad things happened. Bad things should happen. Tragedy is part of storytelling. What bothered me was that the characters increasingly felt like they were being bent to serve a predetermined outcome. The story needed the Avengers to break apart, so the characters were pushed into positions that would accomplish that goal. The event came first and the characters came second, and once I noticed that, it became increasingly difficult not to see it elsewhere.
I followed New Avengers for a while because I genuinely liked parts of it. But it never really felt like the Avengers to me. It felt like Marvel looked over at the Justice League and decided that every major character should be on the team at the same time. The book had energy, and there were certainly stories I enjoyed, but it represented another step away from the Marvel Universe I had grown up with.
Then came One More Day, and for me, that was the breaking point. I've heard every argument in its defense over the years. I've heard people argue that Peter Parker works better when he's single. I've heard people argue that the marriage aged the character. I've heard people argue that the book became more accessible afterward. None of those arguments address my actual problem with the story.
The problem isn't that Peter and Mary Jane broke up. The problem is why they broke up. Their marriage wasn't ended because the characters reached a natural crossroads. It wasn't ended because years of storytelling led to an inevitable conclusion. It wasn't ended because Peter and Mary Jane made choices that logically destroyed their relationship. It was ended because editorial wanted an unmarried Spider-Man. The desired status quo came first, and the story was built afterward to justify it.
Once that happened, something fundamental broke for me. I didn't quit Marvel overnight. There were still books I enjoyed. There were still writers whose work I followed. There were still characters I loved. But I stopped believing in the world, and that more than anything else is what ultimately drove me away.
Over time the events became larger, the shock value became more aggressive, and characters increasingly felt bent to fit story concepts rather than stories emerging from who those characters were. Then the movies became successful, and the comics often felt pressured to create synergy with whatever was happening on the screen. Costumes changed. Status quos shifted. Entire corners of the universe sometimes felt like they were being reshaped to resemble adaptations rather than standing on their own.
Everything felt managed. Everything felt artificial. The Marvel Universe that I fell in love with felt like a place, while the Marvel Universe I eventually left felt like a product. That's not to say Marvel hasn't published great comics since then. It absolutely has. There are talented writers and artists working there right now. There are stories that I still hear wonderful things about, and every now and then I'll pick something up and be reminded of why I loved these characters in the first place.
But my relationship with Marvel changed. I still love Spider-Man. I still love the X-Men. I still love the Fantastic Four. I still love that world and those characters. The problem is that I no longer believe in the world itself, and once that illusion is gone, it's very hard to get it back.
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