Hypothetical questions for anyone who likes Batman

[JoeBlank]

DC: Barry Allen. Still dead (replaced by Kid Flash Wally West). Superman and Lois Lane. Married (!). Clayface II. Still Dead (I think). Dick Grayson. Stopped being Robin and became Nightwing. Speedy. Became Arsenal.

Marvel: Spiderman and Mary Jane Watson. Married (!). Not as familiar with Marvel. Has any other major change lasted at least 10 years and still is in effect today?

Marvel: The one ironclad rule of comics continuity, Bucky stays dead! (Captain America's sidekick.)

Now the next poster will come along and tell me Bucky is alive, and I will be completely done with comics.

 

[stevelabny]

Well, actually...

there's this character walking around called the Winter Soldier

and Marvel is strongly trying to convince us that its Bucky...

 

[WayneLigon]

Marvel: The one ironclad rule of comics continuity, Bucky stays dead! (Captain America's sidekick.)

Now the next poster will come along and tell me Bucky is alive, and I will be completely done with comics.

You're done, then. Perhaps.

Spoilers follow.

Spoiler

Current Captain America storyline: Bucky did indeed live, and he's been an amnesiac Russian operative who is put in stasis until they need his skills. So he's just barely into adulthood now. I don't think yet that it's total proof but it sure looks like it.

http://www.newsarama.com/marvelnew/CapAmerica/Cap06.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bucky_(comics)

There is a very relevant part in one of the links that bears repeating:

There's that legendary story where Stan Lee took all the editors into a meeting right after Marvel surpassed DC on the sales charts and said, "Up until now, Marvel comics has been about change, from now on we just want to have the illusion of change." And I think that Dan and Joe are basically saying, "Let's actually have change again." And as a writer, that's something you like to hear.

That's pretty much why you have no change in comics, really, just like so many movies are not what they could be: too many people looking out for that bottom line. You have to do that to an extent, but when it starts to kill what you set out to do? It's a fine, fine line to walk.

I guess there is a reason no-one wants change is that they cannot afford to gamble. Comics sales are abyssmal. If the hottest, best selling books today would have pulled in the number they do 15 years ago they'd have been cancelled for low sales. Now, the question on everyone's mind is: there's a chance we could just ro-do everything, tick off our customer base now but perhaps pick up a far larger customer base from the mainstream if we can get people to read comics again in the numbers they used to before comics left the grocery store and drug store, and before video games. Really, I don't think they would worry so much. Most comics collectors are really going to be like D&D folk: they may whine and cry about changes, but they'll pick up the titles anyway. If 4E came out tomorrow, most D&D players would buy it. I think that's just a fact. I think the same might be able to happen in comics.

Of course if I was wrong, they'd all be screwed and the entire industry would perhaps never recover. You never know.

 

[Filby]

DC: Barry Allen. Still dead (replaced by Kid Flash Wally West). Superman and Lois Lane. Married (!). Clayface II. Still Dead (I think). Dick Grayson. Stopped being Robin and became Nightwing. Speedy. Became Arsenal.

Marvel: Spiderman and Mary Jane Watson. Married (!). Not as familiar with Marvel. Has any other major change lasted at least 10 years and still is in effect today?

Peter Parker's old girlfriend Gwen Stacy's stayed dead all this time, clones notwithstanding.