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Originally posted by I'm Not Mister Mxypltk:
How is that ego?
You've mentioned this example several times. When did it happen? How do you know about it?
Grant Morrison told Psycomic shortly after he left DC and moved to Marvel that in his opinion it's obvious that Sue (Richards) wants to fuck Johnny but she doesn't so she fucks Namor.

Both parts of that statement, of course, are false.

At no time in the existance of the concept of the F4 has Sue ever shown any sexual desire for her brother OR for Namor.

This was a writer who, out of ego and because he had just lost his job at one of the big two publishers, again, because of his ego, wanted to get noticed by as many people as possible so he came up with the most shocking thing he could think of to get his little comic noticed.

Now, the different between a Grant Morrison and say a Larry Hamma is that Grant Morrison is capable to get away with whatever he wants to.

If Marvel had said "fine, let him do his comic the way he wants to do it" then Sue would have indeed had sex with either her brother or Namor.

This, you have to keep in mind, would have been an out of character action for all characters involved. It would have been completely driven by the writers own understanding of the concept.

As interesting as a "Spider-Man runs into a bank and kills people with an Uzi" story might be, such a story would NEVER, EVER happen for the simple reason that such an action would go against the basics of the character of Spider-Man.

Same holds true for the F4.

The problem here is that, more times than none, characterization and character (at least in comics) tend to take back seat to popularity.

Look at Birthright.

That's one story that's build more on the writer's popularity than on actual characterization.

Here you have a writer that's decided to re-write two (if not more) character's personalities so they better suit his own understanding and desires of what he wants them to be.

Continuity is just one word that encompases many others.

Continuity includes consistancy.

This consistancy goes from "the Batcave's under Wayne Manor, not Central Park in New York" to "Spider-Man would never use a gun to kill a group of innocent people" and "Jor-El was the one that pushed the button that sent Kal-El to Earth, not Lara".

The kind of continuity you talk about is the made up continuity that hack writers who don't like to be consistant in their work have come up with to convince people that all continuity is bad.

And you've fallen for it...

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These are not real people. If someone's being written by a writer then, like it or not, the writer knows how the character is thinking better than anyone else. He has to, otherwise he wouldn't be a writer and the comic wouldn't really be a worthy story.
Not necessarily.

I wouldn't let Stephen King write a Bugs Bunny cartoon just like I wouldn't let Mark Waid write an episode of Young and the Restless.

You have to understand that there's no such thing as uber-writers who can write anything and everything.

Writers are no different from pencilers, they have to work to their strengths.

If a penciler draws a better Yosemite Sam than he does Optimus Prime than this penciler shouldn't work on the Transformers comics.

If a writer does better incest stories than he does super hero stories then this is a writer that should only work at Vertigo or Max, no matter how much he'd like to do a Superman story because no matter how good his incest or other adult-themed stories may be, his Superman will always be off.

If a writer has to change a characters personality and characterization to work on that comic then this is NOT a good writer.

A writer has to respect the character, be consistant in how he uses that character.

A story where Captain Kirk has a few beers with a group of Klingons and gets so drunk that he wakes up with in bed with a three Klingon women might be interesting but it wouldn't be consistant with the character's personality.

He can't go from hating Klingons because they killed his son to singing Kumballa(sp?) with them just because the writer thinks he should.

Any writer who thinks that his view point, no matter how inconsistant with what came before may be, is the only one that matters, is a writer with an ego.

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I agree that you need some public in your side if you're getting published, but that doesn't mean it's all one big popularity contest where the only purpose is getting people to buy the comics. If that was the case, then every cover would be filled with tight spandex and big breasts. This isn't entirely about the reader like you say, just like it isn't entirely about the writer. It's about telling a good story that pleases both the writer and the reader (though not EVERY reader, that's impossible) without being stopped by unnecessary anal retentive imaginary decades old rules.
But between pleasing the writer and having a story that's consistant with both the character's personality and his background, what would you rather have?

For the writer all that matters is what makes him happy. Some writers, like Morrison and Waid, have no problem altering the characters they are working on to make sure that's accomplished... and they are popular enough to get away with it.

If Mark Waid wants to take the decision to send Kal-El to Earth out of Jor-El's hand's and put them on Lara he can do it... NOT because it's a good idea, but because he's popular enough to have it happen.

If a writer like Grant Morrison wants to have Sue have sex with her brother then he can get away with it for the same reason, his popularity.

It didn't happen for any number of reasons, maybe some editors got in his way and no matter how popular he is he couldn't do it, who knows. I am sure that if given the chance he would do it in a snap of the fingers.

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What you just said is that that specific sector of an audience doesn't want good stories. In fact, they don't even appreciate a good story. All they want is a monthly or weekly addition to an ongoing series, nothing else. In that case, you can have 32 pages of The Bat-Man sitting in a couch and that's gonna keep that sector of the audience happy, as long as it doesn't contradict the way The Bat-Man sits (established in Detective Comics #357,6 page three panel four caption box one line seven).

If a writer makes an awesome story like you said, but he gets fired becuase an audience doesn't like that he didn't respect some unnecessary anal retentive imaginary decades old rules, then that audience doesn't deserve the writer, what they deserve is exactly what they get: to be robbed by a company that "makes" them buy comics they don't even enjoy, but that they "have" to buy because of a logo.
Well, since "good" is subjective and not a standard that everyone must follow, like say the sky being blue and water being wet, the above is just as subjective :)

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I don't know anything about those cases, but if the majority of the audience thinks they can't write because they don't follow unnecessary anal retentive imaginary decades old rules, then that audience is wrong. If a writer makes sucky stories then he sucks. If a writer can't follow unnecessary anal retentive imaginary decades old rules then he's a writer who can't follow unnecessary anal retentive imaginary decades old rules, which isn't a bad thing, but (apparently) isn't gonna get him much money in the mainstream superhero business.
See, the above is just part of the popularity contest/lie about continuity being bad idea that many writers have come up with.

Writers who say continuity is bad don't do it because continuity is bad, they do it because continuity stops them from doing what they want to do.

Example:

1985, writer A does a story where Character 1 goes into a Dennis.

For the next 20 years this character starts goes to Dennis on a weekly basis, becomes friends with the help, has his own table, etc.

2005, writer B comes in and says how continuity prevents him from doing the stories he wants to do with Character 1.

He makes a big deal about how character 1's visits to Dennis have become redundant and predictable so he offers to redo character 1's first visit to Dennis WITHOUT rebooting the other character's history, just that one detail.

So writer B does a story where Character 1 goes into Dennis... and he has the story read like this is the FIRST time this has ever happened.

No one recognizes character 1, he has to wait in line to get a table, the service is all wrong and by the end of the story he decides he doesn't like Dennis anymore, he's going to Rascal's instead.

The above is, of course, a metaphor.

Writers who say continuity is bad are only looking to tell the SAME old stories that others have already done but make it look like it's the first time it's ever happened... but they don't want people to know this, so they have to not only badmouth continuity but belittle anyone that dares follow it.

Take Waid and his work on the F4.

He's going to introduce the idea of the Fantastic Three... well, a decade ago Tom DeFalco already did this idea, but clearly Waid doesn't want anyone to know that so he has to make a big deal about how continuity is wrong when in reality all he wants to do is do a Fantastic Three story without having it be compared to the one DeFalco did a decade ago, and to accomplish that he has to make people forget what DeFalco did and mock those that dare remember.