Marvel Time

[dlw66]

This is for all the continuity buffs out there who have been around for a long time, or who have made the now-getting-easier effort to bone up on the Silver Age.

What do you suppose was the time-elapsed feel for Stan, Jack, Steve Ditko, etc. when they started out? We've commented many times on how cool it was to have then-current events references, pop-culture references, etc. in the early Marvels. However, I came across something whilst reading the FF DVD-ROM last night that bears mentioning. I was reading the issue that introduces Agatha Harkness (#96 if I recall). While flying in the Fantasticar, Ben remarks that Reed is making him queezy. Reed replies that he is surprised, since Ben was one of the greatest fighter pilots of WWII. Going on real-time, and assuming that Ben was around 25 when the war ended, that would have put him at 50 years old in that issue, which was cover dated in early 1970!

Now, I know comic characters certainly don't age as we real folks do -- Charlie Brown's been in 3rd grade since 1953!! But what do you think of that reference?

[Ultron]

dlw66 said:

Now, I know comic characters certainly don't age as we real folks do -- Charlie Brown's been in 3rd grade since 1953!! But what do you think of that reference?

I think you replied you're own question: comic characters certainly don't age as we real folks do.

[dlw66]

True. However, I was also delving into some of your encyclopedic minds to see if there has been other mention of this elsewhere throughout the Marvel mythos. For example, Marvel takes great pains to reiterate Cap's use of the Super Soldier formula is what keeps him young (Fury, too, on a variation of the serum). But, if this reference is part of the canon (is it???), then how do we explain it away?

[Engage]

Trust me, you're in for another hundred issues of that problem. The biggest loss to Fantastic Four characterization has always been when they had to ignore their war hero past.

At that point in continuity Marvel hadn't developed sliding time. The references to the Big One in the sixties and seventies can only be ignored. They don't fit anymore.

The Thing's last issue revealed that the modern Marvel Universe is thirteen years old. That means that right now the FF got their powers in 1993. That means the Avengers started shortly after that, probably in 1993-1994.

Comic time is fun.

[Ultron]

Guys, it's comics!

Stop analysing it!

It's escapism!

The FF did not got their powers in 93 - Stop counting and being anal, start enjoying the stories!

(admitedly, these days, kinda hard, since everyone is making comics real, time included)

[dlw66]

Ah, it's no problem, Ultron... I was just struck by the thought that I mentioned above: what is considered part of the canon now? Even if they are now saying the Marvel Universe is 13 years old, Cap is still referred to as a WWII vet.

Obviously Peter Parker has aged very slowly over the past 44 years. He was around 15 when he got bit, he's maybe 25 now. No one would argue that. But there was that X-Men story way back when Wolverine, Cap, and Black Widow were in an adventure in the 1940's. Is that canon?

[asgardian]

Well, Captain America is fine. He could have fought in WWII and only been revived 5 years ago. Nick Fury has the serum and of course Thor is immortal. As for everyone else, it just requires some tinkering. Tony Stark could quite easily have taken that shrapnel in the last Gulf War and so on.

I think you'll also find that the established rule is 7 years. It's more than 5 but not as much as 10. The FF have been around for 7 years. What makes this interesting is that many of the old cultural references no longer fit. The Teen Brigade, for example, would need a new name and be a group of internet geeks.

[Engage]

Yeah, its not worth analyzing or even really thinking about, but for some reason the whole idea is just funny to me. They go out of their way to tell us dates and then have to ignore them only a handful of issues later.

[asgardian]

I wasn't there for the 60's but it is funny to see how much contemporary culture was inserted into the comics. JFK appearing in Journey Into Mystery; Jimi Hendrix getting a few mentions in Captain America and so on. Tacky I suppose, but it was part and parcel of what made the era.

[dlw66]

Stan and Jack's FF is rife with cultural references, as was a lot of the Spidey books of the late 60's. I like it as nostalgia now.

Anyway, I really didn't mean to make a big deal of this -- I just came across an important line in a comic and wondered if it had been mentioned elsewhere. I think, as has been said, canon is continually changing (DC has obviously done this in a big way twice now), and stuff that mattered before will fall away with editorial changes, passage of time, etc.

[bobc]

Dl--I'm the exact opposite. I was just reading a Fantastic Four comic from the early 70's and it had Richard Nixon in it and it kinda bothered me. I like it when comics exist in their own little world without too many real world refrences. I think it's fine to have Captain America and Namor connected to WW2, but everybody else should kin of be "timeless."

[von Bek]

Well, one of the reasons Marvel became more popular than DC was because of the cultural and political references. DC had some too, but not as many and as interesting as Marvel´s.

It easier to understand a character when he/she listen to the same music and watch the same movies (and so on) we in the real world do.

It´s also interesting to see how Marvel became way more 'liberal' in the 70´s - it showed in the stories and lettercolumns, when a large part of the readers was in college (I mean for you guys in the US).

[dlw66]

bobc, I think we may be hitting on something here.

When you say you like your comics "timeless" and I say that I like the older references as "place and time" anchors, I think we may be getting to something larger. Consider...

vonbek states that it's easier to relate to our heroes if we feel they are "in tune" with what we are in tune with. That being said, if readers relate to characters "when they are" (for example, I've said "my Avengers" are from the #130's-140's, shiryu says he pictures the Milgrom years, Van the first Perez run, etc.), then it is almost the obligation of the writers/artists/editors to keep the characters constantly in line with politics/pop culture so as to make the readers feel at home. In a sense, it's no problem if Superman interacted with President Kennedy or the FF with President Nixon or the recent JSA arc "Black Reign" smacks of the US invasion of Iraq -- comics readers in their 20's-60's should be able to meet on common ground because today's heroes are doing what comics heroes have always done.

Comments? Or, do I make no sense at all?

[dlw66]

Another thought occurs to me in regard to bobc's comment on comics existing "in their own little world". I always thought Marvels were better because they existed in my world. I could never relate to Metropolis, Gotham City, Star City, etc. in the DC's because even though they looked like my world, they weren't. Especially when they had all of those cities and then mentioned New York...

[bobc]

Wait wait wait--I don't think I put my point across correctly--I DO want the characters in the real world! I just think that when you link a character directly to an event, like, say, the Vietnam War, within a few years that character will inevitably seem really dated. Iron Man, for example, never really dwelled on his Vietnam beginnings and rightly so--he'd be at least in his 60's now! Writers for him were right, IMO, to quietly distance IM from Vietnam. Reed and Ben, same thing with WW2.

This really is just a matter of opinion. I think Ultron Unlimited will stand the test of time because the war depicted in that storyline was made up, only existing in the Marvel world. Hence, it'll never seem dated.

[dlw66]

OK, bob -- thanks for the clearing-up.

BTW, I believe I was reading the same issue you spoke of. Was it around FF 102-104 where Namor and Magneto team-up? Nixon was featured in a couple of those issues. Those books were significant because it was the first appearance of Magneto after X-Men was "cancelled", as well as the departure of Kirby/debut of Romita in FF 103. Pretty good little 3-parter, too!

[The Night Phantom]

I was still a fairly recent convert to Marvel comics when I started reading the various Official Marvel Index series of the ’80s. The Index explained the inclusion of current events as “topical references” that make the stories seem current at publication. I was fascinated by this concept: in essence, the stories existed in an independent timeline, with these topical references simply making them more relatable for the reader. Since then, I’ve never had a problem with the concept of the characters aging more slowly or the subtle erasure of past references such as Reed and Ben’s WW II service.

However, I do get irritated when new stories flash back to those older stories and insert topical references that are blatantly anachronistic vis-à-vis the original stories. For example, in Avengers: Earth’s Mightiest Heroes—which flashes back to the era of stories originally published in the early ’60s—some characters are using cell phones from the ’90s. Such “re-dated” references take me out of the story. I would have preferred that the characters use landline phones and that the phones be drawn as generically as possible, to be interpretable as either a ’60s or a ’90s phone.

[dlw66]

Phantom (it's good to have you back!) --

As fate would have it, I was about to post the exact same idea with the exact reference as you just mentioned! I, too, was a bit out of sorts with that EMH "updating". I had a similar sense when reading the first few issues of Ultimate FF, but that was not as bad since I knew it was an alternate reality.

[The Night Phantom]

dlw66 said:

Phantom (it's good to have you back!)

It’s good to be back. (I was in my own independent timelime… ;D )

[The Night Phantom]

By happy coincidence, I just happened to run into this delightful quote in Beau Smith’s Busted Knuckles column over at Silver Bullet Comics:

When I was growing up I always looked at the super heroes for the most part older than me. I knew I was getting older when I became older than Spider-Man. When I get older than Aunt May then I’m gonna really feel bad.

[Ultron]

Continuity Error: Aunt May is not a super hero.

(And if she is, please, shoot me. now.)

[Doctor Bong]

Ultron: are you forgetting Golden Oldie...?

[dlw66]

Maybe Aunt May crosses over to the DCU and she's secretly Granny Goodness....

[The Night Phantom]

ultron said:

Aunt May is not a super hero.

Well, she did wear Iron Man armor recently (Marvel Knights Spider-Man #20, part 5 of the “Other: Evolve or Die” 12-parter).