ONE-SHOTS #1: CONTINUITY IS DEAD, LONG LIVE CONTINUITY

[raul grau]

<img src="http://www.comixfan.com/xfan/images/columns/oneshots1.jpg" hspace=10 align=left border=0 alt="One-Shots logo">By Joel Phillips

Continuity is Dead, Long Live Continuity

A number of years ago there was an event- an event which forever changed one of the great superhero universes. After decades of stories, continuity had been piled so high that the creators decided it was time for a change... a big change, something that would seriously turn the universe in a whole new direction. To facilitate this change, the creators came up with a powerful villain for their heroes to face, one who set out to dominate and destroy all that the heroes held dear. After a huge battle that involved all of the big names, and after some heroes made the ultimate sacrifice, the villain was defeated. But in the wake of this event, the universe was altered. Some characters had their histories restarted from scratch, while others had pieces of their history overwritten... a process which continues to this day. In the end continuity wasn’t quite the same, and a whole new way of telling stories was introduced to these characters’ world.

That event was called Onslaught, and it happened to the Marvel Universe in 1996.

Before we begin we should define our terms. Continuity, as the term is traditionally used in comics, means the continuous and self-consistent stream of history. But there is another type of continuity: continuity of concept, what Grant Morrison calls "super-consistency". The first kind of continuity refers to factual accuracy when dealing with past stories, while the second refers to conceptual fidelity, preserving the idea behind characters and concepts rather than preserving their endless catalogue of past stories.

It is the first kind of continuity that has met its end. When you restart, revamp, retool or reimagine history, continuity of the first kind no longer exists, because the history is no longer continuous, nor consistent. That’s not a value judgment, just a statement of definitional fact. One look at a DC book in the years following Crisis- or, more accurately, following the adoption of the "Hypertime" concept Crisis indirectly created- should make it clear that, in the DCU, historical continuity is dead. The reason Hypertime is great is because it provides an in-continuity explanation for continuity’s demise. The one sentence explanation of Hypertime is that with all the realities and timelines that exist, they bleed together, and weird, seemingly inconsistent stuff happens. Thus nobody argues about the cause of inconsistencies in DC history because the explanation is right there, whether you like it or not. We know that any discrepancies can be explained this way. It’s basically the writers/editors way of saying "we’re not going to worry about this, but here’s a coverall explanation if you want to". It accommodates our idiosyncrasies as fans without catering to them.

Whether or not Marvel and its fans refer to it as such, Onslaught was Marvel’s Crisis. Just as with Crisis, the post-Onslaught universe featured characters having their entire histories over-written, while other characters tales continued with massive changes being made to the past. Avengers and Fantastic Four found their way to Heroes Reborn, which completely started their histories over from scratch. When they returned, the characters had been streamlined, brought back to their conceptual roots. Teen Tony was gone and classic Iron Man was back, the Wasp no longer looked like a giant bug, and it was retro costumes all around. The event was used to wipe away a number of things the creators deemed undesirable... just as it was in Crisis. Still other characters continued on after Onslaught without a rebooted title, but underwent major changes nonetheless. Consider Spider-Man. Right after Onslaught the Green Goblin returned and was revealed to be behind all of Peter’s recent woes. What’s more, Peter returned to being the real deal after writers had proven him to be a clone a few years earlier. Both major developments which undid previous major developments that the writers no longer found desirable... again, just like Crisis.

And, as it has happened at DC with the adoption of Hypertime, characters and their histories are continually rewritten to this day, without any explanation. Many Marvel characters have had their origins completely rebooted, recent examples including Dr. Strange and the Squadron Supreme. Others have had major past events retroactively dropped into their histories, like the Norman Osborn/Gwen Stacy affair or Nightcrawler’s new origin circa The Draco.

Now retcons are nothing new, but consider how they are handled today. Writers reference continuity in one breath and then ignore it in the next. They pick and choose which pieces they wish to adhere to and which they choose to ignore. The writer that comes next may decide to go the other way, reaccepting continuity seemingly abandoned or altered by their predecessor. You have countless titles featuring the same characters that don’t seem to relate to each other at all. You have stories that are repainted versions of stories you already know and have already read; yet the characters often react as if they’ve never gone through these things before. The explanation? Continuity is dead, but continuity of concept reigns supreme. The notion of a single, continuous, self-consistent universe is gone; but past stories, themes, characters and ideas are forever fair game for writers who want to try something old and new at the same time. In short, Hypertime has come to the Marvel Universe.

Continuity buffs may well be pulling their hair out right now. This is horrible, right? Actually no, it’s incredibly freeing. Not only does it mean that creators can do what they want to tell the stories they want to tell, it also means readers can pick and choose the stories they want to read and accept. Though we’ve always had the right to ignore stories we don’t like, we haven’t always had the ability. When continuity lived, it held onto a great many stories we would rather have let go of, but were not permitted to forget. Now, in an era where every writer’s run is its own beast and there is no continuity to speak of, that right is one we can all exercise with far greater ease. Likewise, writers have greater freedom to ignore the bits they deem unpleasant or unnecessary and tell the stories they want to tell.

Unlike at DC, no Marvel story has ever taken on a Hypertime-esque concept as canon (though some of the more continuity-conscious writers have taken stabs at explaining gaffs away). That means this is all my kooky idea, and you can ignore it if you like. I imagine more than one irate fanboy will snidely remark how I’m welcome to stick my head in the sand and ignore continuity, but that doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist. Fair enough, but you all have a choice. Choice #1: continuity is dead, and all that’s left is concept continuity and each story on its own. You read what you want to read, and the rest needn’t ever have existed as far as you know or care. Choice #2: continuity does still exist, and you can spend the rest of your life trying to make sense of all the inconsistencies, dealing with all the retcons, and reconciling all the titles together into a single shared world. Either way, have fun... I know I will.

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Joel Phillips was the creative mind behind <a href="http://www.comixfan.com/xfan/forums/forumdisplay.php?f=340" target="_blank">Reeding Into Things</a>, the Comixfan column which presented strong, well-reasoned thought in each of its forty installments. He said <a href="http://www.comixfan.com/xfan/forums/showthread.php?t=31399" target="_blank">Shalom</a> this past November, but, as he explained, the word means more than just good-bye...

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One-Shots is an ongoing, revolving column, ready and willing to feature your work. Before contributing, please read over our <a href="http://www.comixfan.com/xfan/forums/showthread.php?t=32883" target="_blank">submission guidelines</a>. All submissions must be sent to Raul Grau at columns@comixfan.cjb.net.

[Drackdallion]

COntinuity should be respected, It contains what makes a character thick and important in our minds. If continuity didn`t exist Uncle Ben would just walk trough the door with a bag of bagels for lovely Aunt May without no explanation. Or The Phoenix wouldn`t be "returning from the ashes" everytime It does, it would always be a "new" event. We`re not ready (or shouldn`t be) for a Phoenix Saga with all its implications every year!. What I want to say is... Past events... important ones... shape the character, if not he/she would ALWAYS be a blank un-written sheet of paper! Bad!! :nonono:

[Ken Boehm]

Let's put it this way: can you go back in time and change your events? Nope. You live and learn. Maybe you did something stupid in life (something that would be considered a Draco kind of snafu), but you pick yourself up and move on, and maybe on in your life you do something good (like, say, a Bendis DD arc good). It all washes out in the end. Past events make you who you are, for good or for bad.

Besides, why invest so much into stories (from both the creator and reader side of the story) if you know people will just come along and piss on what you did by either ignoring it or wiping it from the slate. Blacking out everything bad that's happened is a flight response, and I just don't like that.

[Paul Shinn]

Joel, what can I say except, bravo. And I'm a Choice #1 kinda guy!

[James Groves]

I'm all for supercontinuity. The continuation of a concept--of an idea--is of paramount importance. The core of a character and what makes him/her the way they are, should always be kept in place and provide the driving force for stories that follow. Superconsistency is very important -- much more important than normal continuity.

Good read, Joel!

[Kevin Sutton]

Good column, and a nice idea. I think though that there are some cases in these modern reboots where even super continuity is ignored; possibly because people will often disagree on the unifying concept of a story or character.

[Alex Groff]

Drackdallion, you're really not arguing for anything different than Joel. Supercontinuity or superconsistency is the idea that Spiderman is Peter Parker, and Peter Parker has a certain personality based on certain events in his life-- i.e., Uncle Ben and Gwen Stacy's deaths. So while the writer may not know that Spiderman made a flip comment to Green Goblin two hundred issues ago that challenged his mother's chastity, the writer understands who Spiderman is and why he acts the way he does. Supercontinuity is allowing little details to escape while still keeping the big picture in mind.

[Dylan McKay]

Am I going crazy, or did I read this like a few months back?

[Anand Khatri]

Am I going crazy, or did I read this like a few months back?

My thoughts exactly, but if so, was even better the second time.

Superb Work Joel!

[Alex Groff]

Am I going crazy, or did I read this like a few months back?I think Raul talked about hypertime in one of his columns a bit ago, but his focus was on Crisis or Kingdom Comie or The Kingdom.... I think. Similar, but different. Like deja vu.

[Red]

I don't read much DC, so I don't know much more about Hypertime than what was said right here. But if I understand it right, I was hooked on Marvel back in the day partially because it wasn't bogged down in what eventaully became Hypertime.

Unfortunately, Joel's right. Marvel has this problem now. But it's not freeing, it's down-right obnoxious, and I hate it. Now, every time a new writer comes along, it's like starting all over, which some of you seem to love, but I hate that!! Characters used to grow, evolve, and this new dead continuity-thing has them all stagnating. Of course, no one wants to see a character change so much that the original concept is lost...no one wants to see Teen Iron Man or Red & Blue Supermen...but once upon a time it was possible for the writers to make these guys fresh and interesting without such dramatic (and stupid) changes. Human Torch was married once upon a time, Spider-Man almost had a kid, characters grew up (be it ever-so-slowly), etc. I miss that. And I doubt we'll ever see it again now that everyone in essense starts over every couple years, telling variations on the same stories that "bleed together" all Hypertime-like.

Obviously, I am dead-set against accepting choice 1 (however inevitable it may be). Ultimately, I think choice number two would make everyone happy if only there weren't so many stories out there that we want very badly to ignore. As for spending my life keeping track of everything...that used to be the editor's job, I think. ;)

[Joel Phillips]

A point to add, based off an idea Red mentioned...

Are stories stagnant because continuity is dead, or is continuity dead because the stories are stagnant? Most people see a lack of continuity as causing the comics to go nowhere, but I submit it runs the other way: the comics were already stagnant, and that's why continuity had to go.

The fact that nothing changes is what really killed continuity, because the lack of forward movement in the characters lives is what required continuity be torn down. Continuity is basically 1 happened, then 2 happened, then 3 happened, etc. But when you get to 22734, and the characters haven't aged a day, then you've hit a wall. Continuity, derived from the same root as continuous, naturally implies movement. You can't have continuity in a system that is open-ended yet shows no passage of time. That's the eternal problem with franchise comics. So while you may see the death of continuity as the cause and stagnant franchises as the result, I see the opposite.

I agree that watching characters grow and change is what's great about comics. It's still what's great about comics, it's just that you need to read other comics to get that. Superhero comics haven't been about that in a decade, maybe more. No longer are superheroes analogous to soap operas, with the emphasis on the continuing cycle of the characters' lives. Now that are like action shows: show up, kick ass, show up again next time and do it again. It's style over substance. Which is fine, it serves a niche. And since the emphasis is on style over substance, this approach to continuity is good because you can embrace the styles you like and forget about all the others.

That's how I see it, anyway.

[Janne Pietikainen]

I'm a continuity nut. I really am. I want to know in what order to read all the Wolverine appearances and stuff like that. I don't think they should mention irrelevant stuff from a character's past because it gets exhausting but on the other hand they should write stuff that contradicts the past. I really hated the idea of Spider-Man: Chapter One. I'm also happy that there aren't that many flashbacks anymore. Sometimes it was hard to tell if it was an actual flashback or just retelling of the previous issue that didn't count as an flashback.

So what I'm saying, I like it simple but I like it noticed.

[Swandogg]

I agree it is very difficult to keep continuity going for a number of decades, but at the same time I really don't like the recent idea of all of these stand alone stories where a creator comes in for a single story line and disregards continuity and recent events that have occured. Plus, these stand alone stories don't mean quite as much if they don't have a lasting effect. Take the upcoming All-Star Superman book for example. I will be getting it for sure, but I don't think it can be that great simply because it is out of continuity. If someone like Perry White is killed in Morrison's All Star run, it wouldn't even mean anything in the long run because the story is completely out of continuity, whereas when you have continuity that event would be about 400 times bigger.

Overall, I am all about continuity in my comics and I hope that in time this current trend will subside.

[Red]

Are stories stagnant because continuity is dead, or is continuity dead because the stories are stagnant?
In all honesty, I have no idea. A question for the ages, I guess. I do know that I noticed the continuity thing first, probably because the characters' lives moved so slowly to begin with that it took a LONG time for me to notice it had stopped.

Here's an interesting thought...
Overall, I am all about continuity in my comics and I hope that in time this current trend will subside.
Does anyone feel as if maybe it's already subsiding (at least at Marvel because, as I say, I don't read DC regularly)? I mean, sure, we still have Black Panther, and JMS rebooting Strange and Squadron, but at the same time look at JMS on Amazing Spider-Man. In his run, we've seen Peter move on from the Daily Bugle, we've seen a least some growth in his marriage, and we've seen a huge retcon (which you may hate, but you have to admit, you have to have continuity to have a retcon). Peter David's back on Hulk (YEAH!), but even before Jones' run (which seemed almost defined by its lack of continuity) ended, Betty came back from the dead with at least a minimal explanation. That's continuity. The big company crossover event seems to be making a come-back this summer...is continuity next? After all, you have to have a lot of it for those crossovers to work.

This is from Comix-Fan's Wizard World LA Day 1 post, Quesada's panel:
The Marvel Universe will begin to become more cohesive once more. The time was right after having stripped the characters down to their cores.

[Drackdallion]

Drackdallion, you're really not arguing for anything different than Joel. Supercontinuity or superconsistency is the idea that Spiderman is Peter Parker, and Peter Parker has a certain personality based on certain events in his life-- i.e., Uncle Ben and Gwen Stacy's deaths. So while the writer may not know that Spiderman made a flip comment to Green Goblin two hundred issues ago that challenged his mother's chastity, the writer understands who Spiderman is and why he acts the way he does. Supercontinuity is allowing little details to escape while still keeping the big picture in mind.

I understand what you mean, but we must agree that sometimes writers are just lazy... one word for them: Research!!! We don`t expect them to remember and take into account EVERY single word the character has said for the las 30 years, just know, like you say wich the main events in its life has been and keep them in mind while taking over the writing chores of a book

[Captain America]

Good read, excellent column - well done, Joel, you've gotten One-Shots off to a great start!

(hmm...how I am I gonna beat that? I know...lotsa X-MEN references!!! Mwahaha)

[Jon Hancock]

I agree it is very difficult to keep continuity going for a number of decades, but at the same time I really don't like the recent idea of all of these stand alone stories where a creator comes in for a single story line and disregards continuity and recent events that have occured. Plus, these stand alone stories don't mean quite as much if they don't have a lasting effect. Take the upcoming All-Star Superman book for example. I will be getting it for sure, but I don't think it can be that great simply because it is out of continuity. If someone like Perry White is killed in Morrison's All Star run, it wouldn't even mean anything in the long run because the story is completely out of continuity, whereas when you have continuity that event would be about 400 times bigger.

Overall, I am all about continuity in my comics and I hope that in time this current trend will subside.

The All-Star line isn't out of continuity like an Elseworld. It's meant to be timeless stories. Perry White won't die unless he dies in the main titles. All-Star isn't a different universe, it's just not going to be hampered by the daily goings on in the monthly titles. Eg, it won't have to acknowledge Countdown if it doesn't want to because they stories are about the characters rather than the time the story occurs.

That's why I'm excited about the All-Star line and the possible expansion of the Classified line.

[Ken Boehm]

The All-Star line isn't out of continuity like an Elseworld. It's meant to be timeless stories. Perry White won't die unless he dies in the main titles. All-Star isn't a different universe, it's just not going to be hampered by the daily goings on in the monthly titles. Eg, it won't have to acknowledge Countdown if it doesn't want to because they stories are about the characters rather than the time the story occurs.

That's why I'm excited about the All-Star line and the possible expansion of the Classified line.

But in All-Star Superman Lois and Clark aren't married, when a good portion of the country knows that they are (it got as much media attention as the death of Superman and Charlie Brown hitting his first home run in baseball). Lois also doesn't know that Clark is Superman in the all-star line, when everyone knows that she does thanks to the tv-show in the mid 90's. Add on top of that that Superman is going to be Superboy in All-Star when that never occured post-Crisis. Those event sthat are changed in All-Star is continuity that isn't hard to grasp and expands upon the characters, and to ignore that kind of stuff just seems lazy as Drackdallion put it. It's almost going out of the way in order to tell a story that would probably work just as fine with the mentions to continuity.

[roach]

Those who forget the past are destined to repeat it......

[Joel Phillips]

I don't understand the argument that stories "mean less" if they are out of continuity. They are in the continuity of the story in which they take place... which instills them with all the meaning they require.

I also don't understand the fan sentiment "when it could just as easily be told in continuity". Why should it be? If it doesn't matter either way, then it doesn't matter either way. And if existing outside of continuity gives the writer one iota of extra creative freedom in telling the story they want to tell, isn't THAT the most important thing?

[Brett White]

I also don't understand the fan sentiment "when it could just as easily be told in continuity". Why should it be? If it doesn't matter either way, then it doesn't matter either way. And if existing outside of continuity gives the writer one iota of extra creative freedom in telling the story they want to tell, isn't THAT the most important thing?

In my opinion, a talented writer is not hampered by continuity and can work around it. Continuity should act like the guidelines to keep writers in check so that they don't do anything that contradicts the fundamental nature or history of a character. Without continuity, what's to stop any writer from just doing absolutely anything they want with the characters pasts? All of a sudden Superman is German and works in construction in Hawaii! Who cares? The story is great and insert great writer here is being so creative! All of a sudden Thunderbird I is back alive chilling in Oregon with his lover, Revanche and their neighbor Uncle Ben. What? Those characters were dead? So what, the antics of Thunderbird and Revanche are crazy!

Do I think that writers have to acknowledge everything? No. That's stupid. I can look past Wolverine and Emma Frost appearing everywhere. I can't look past Warpath, Feral, and Thornn cooperating together in X-Corps Mumbai when it is established that the three of them loath each other.

Do I think that it is the writers' job to know all this stuff? Absolutely not. It is the editor's job. There are usually four editors credited to each book and I find it highly doubtful that none of them has the time to check on the status of a character that they aren't sure is dead or not.

I really don't see how continuity can be a restriction. In "Runaways," Chamber is back to his chest-hole self. This was probably done because no one really remembered that he got it fixed in Weapon X, so Vaughan just tossed in his little 10 word explanation as to what happened. No big deal. As long as the change is acknowledged or explained in brief, I'm fine with it.

And continuity can be so beneficial. With continuity the characters have real emotions towards other characters. "Astonishing X-Men" #2 is the best example of this. Kitty Pryde calling Emma Frost out as her vision of evil is such a minute continuity reference, but it completely explains why Kitty doesn't trust Emma and it makes sense. Continuity doesn't have to be addressed, but it can potentially make relationships that much deeper.

So really, I'm not for crazy-super-continuity. Characters can appear in however many books they want, whatever. I do think that continuity has the potential to give characters a personality that is three-dimensional and a history that seems realistic.

None of that probably made any sense.

[Jeanne]

As I see it, there are three kinds of continuity.

1) Key Character/Universe continuity. This is the continuity that is absolutely key to the characters and/or universe the story is told in, the continuity that every writer chooses to embrace no matter who they are because it is both easy to encorporate and fundamental. In the Xmen universe, for example, the Dark Phoenix saga is key universe continuity. Maybe some of the details will be left out, but every X-writer will be remembering that whenever they write about the X-men, especially the character of Jean Gray. Alternatively, Bishop can never stop coming from the future, for example, unless the Marvel Universe is reset in a Heroes Reborn-type event. Key continuity really gets frustrating for everyone when it is ignored or forgotten
2) Low-Impact continuity. These are events that remain in the history of the character or the universe, but they are not fundamental to the nature of the character. Authors can choose to tap this continuity if they have a story that would benefit from it, but largely ignore it in their working with the character. Low-impact continuity events generally are not transformative...they happen to the character but the character returns to normal. Rogue's relationship with Magneto/Joseph, for example, might be tapped by one writer, but another might ignore that they ever had friendly relations. Generally writers try not to create circumstances which could contradict low-impact continuity, but when conflicts occur, sometimes a reader has to do a little mental gymnastics to be ok with this, and should accept that that has to occur. IE: Rogue may not seem extra friendly with Magneto here, but it was a long time since their original relationship and Magneto has done some terrible things since then, or maybe it's just a minor mistake. Etc.
3) Better to forget continuity. These are events that generally happened out of main title (usually) and never really get into continuity in the first place. Or maybe their just sort of so off the wall that the readers and writers both try to black the memory out. The Gambit and Bishop title, for example. Some events/character histories happened in that title that were key for certain characters if you did accept it into canon, but most readers haven't read it, and it had a lot of difficult-to-accept premises, so if something were to directly contradict it in a main title, very few people would consider taking offense. I imagine that the writers feel the need to conform to every bit of continuity, so this would cover quite a bit.

The problems occur when one reader thinks this detail is extra important, while another thinks it is trivial or shouldn't happen at all. That's where we as readers need to step back and be a bit flexible, trying to judge rationally about the event we're concerned about. Does that historic event NEED to be considered key continuity, or can you justify it temporarily, or is it just something that should be ignored because it doesn't do anything for the history at all? Then you can judge how badly the continuity is being jerked around.

I don't like resetting the continuity, but sometimes it does get mired, even the key continuity. I think this is worse for a small cast book like Spiderman than it would be for a really big cast where the key continuity can be spread thin. I think that in general the writers should know their key continuity and respect their readers enough to maintain and use that, and to directly contradict the lower impact continuity if possible, and use it when they can in the interest of a great story. And keep working over the better-forgotten continuity with new stories until they get something GREAT!

Jeanne

[Alex Groff]

Digsy, you make sense... but you're still talking about supercontinuity or superconsistency. Superman being a Kansas-raised Metropolis-bound newspaper reporter married to Lois Lane is super-continuity. Its the basis or premise of the story.

The hatred between Thornn, Feral and Warpath is less important. Granted, I wasn't happy about it, but it didn't ruin or even really damage the story. And I think, as Jeanne points out, some flexibility is necessary.

[Red]

And if existing outside of continuity gives the writer one iota of extra creative freedom in telling the story they want to tell, isn't THAT the most important thing?
In a word? No.

Seriously, if creative freedom is what a writer is looking for, let him or her do something independent or creator-owned. But when I buy a comic, I don't primarily buy a Bendis comic, or a Waid comic. Maybe secondarily. But first-and-foremost I'm buying a comic about a particular character(s), and everything that comes with them. So right from the beginning, I have expectations above & beyond my concern for the creators involved and how much freedom they get.

I will take an in-continuity story over out-of-continuity any day. If only from personal experience. Think about it...if you pick a character and think of the top three stories ever told about that character, how many of them are out-of-continuity? Now throw out the ones set in the future. I doubt you have any left. The best stories are always in continuity (or set in a dark possible future).

[Chris Day]

just as an example off the top of my head.
the first few issues of Astonishing X-men showed continuity in Kitty's relationship with Colossus, and with her attitude towards Emma Frost. it was important to telling that story.

in contrast, in uncanny x-men, Rachel summers/grey is on the same team as wolverine. now wolverine tried to kill Rachel once, yet that is ignored and so that is not an issue between the two characters anymore.

it just depends on what stories a writer wants to tell, and weather they want to just have new stuff, or if they want to show that these characters act in a certain way towards each other.

and there's the question of weather writers want to remove the complex history from a character, or wants to develop the character further.
look at the Vision. Busiek managed to fix that whole Vision/Human torch problem in Avengers Forever, and that made the character more interresting.
on the other hand, Bendis saw the vision as an excuse to kill off a character and get rid of such a complex history for the character in the process.

and if what i'm hearing is right, they want to do something like that on a massive scale with House of M

[Dylan McKay]

Taking away possible futures is having your cake and eating it to. Look at Superman, What Ever Happened to the Man of Tommorow and Kingdom Come are both easily top 5 for the character, both are out of continuity.

Also, when you factor in how many out of continuity stories are published, their success rate is astounding. The big four franchises, Spiderman, Batman, Superman and X-Men have at least 3 stories published every month, all in continuity. And every year or so Batman and Superman get an out of continuity story and every five years or so the X-Men and Spiderman get one. And yet Kingdome Come, DKR and Age of Apocalypse are often cited as some of their greatest stories. (I can't even think of an out of continuity story for Spiderman.) I find the difference in hit/miss ratio of in and out of continuity stories so astounding that I'm surprised people still want continuity at all...

[Brett White]

Taking away possible futures is having your cake and eating it to. Look at Superman, What Ever Happened to the Man of Tommorow and Kingdom Come are both easily top 5 for the character, both are out of continuity.

Also, when you factor in how many out of continuity stories are published, their success rate is astounding. The big four franchises, Spiderman, Batman, Superman and X-Men have at least 3 stories published every month, all in continuity. And every year or so Batman and Superman get an out of continuity story and every five years or so the X-Men and Spiderman get one. And yet Kingdome Come, DKR and Age of Apocalypse are often cited as some of their greatest stories. (I can't even think of an out of continuity story for Spiderman.) I find the difference in hit/miss ratio of in and out of continuity stories so astounding that I'm surprised people still want continuity at all...
Except that now the out-of-continuity AoA is having a 10th anniversary and people are getting all sorts of worked up about the continuity problems of the out-of-continuity story. Out-of-continuity stories work every five years because they're every five years. They aren't good for the long run.

That's why I never really understood the point of the Ultimate line. It's just starting from scratch and in about five years time, there will be all sorts of confusion and continuity glitches. Continuity is needed to tell comic book stories and continuity glitches are 100% guaranteed to happen. Eh...

[Dylan McKay]

Well, technically speaking, continuity exists once you have two panels. I should say, I don't see why people want infinite stories when finite stories are almost always better.

[Ken Boehm]

The whole reason for Ultimate Spidey was for everyone to see Bagley draw the best Spider-Man ever, nothing more. Duh ;) :D

Anyways, they already did screw up the continuity of the Ultimate Universe. The Ultimate FF were shown to appear before Ultimate Spidey yet their own series came around while Spidey was well into his career. But Marvel decided to just ignore it out and out. And the origin of Ultimate Iron Man will no doubt be remade again after that mini series is over with.

[Brett White]

Well, technically speaking, continuity exists once you have two panels. I should say, I don't see why people want infinite stories when finite stories are almost always better.
That is 100% true but it cannot apply to any of the big namers. Really, no character in the DC and Marvel universe is safe until the company goes down. I would have much rather had Captain Marvel's story end with the end of the Peter David series, but there he is in "New Thunderbolts." Now, I trust Nicieza with the character...since he created him...but there's the risk of something happening in that series to demean the character or his run with David.

Just thinking about continuity is hard. As readers we want infinite stories even though it isn't good for the characters (who never age) and the continuity (which just keeps on piling up and, in the case of some writers, hard to handle or impossible). We should be left wanting more but instead we're just brainwashed into buying the stories over and over again because we're afraid we'll miss something. I mean, how great would Wolverine be if he had just disappeared at the height of his popularity? We'd have the best of his stories to remember and he wouldn't be on so many people's bad list because of his continuity-defying appearances in every Marvel book. But this can never happen because he still "makes money."

I'm really rambling here, but I kinda wrote a paper on this topic for my "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" class last summer. TV treats characters better because they are finite and they have a definitive end. Anya dies. Sunnydale sinks. Period. Comics aren't. Angel loses wings, gets them back, they go shiny, they go feathery, back and forth just adding to the dates that fans remember and expect creators to remember. Chamber loses his chest hole, gets it back, this will go on for the rest of Marvel's existence.

And I'll buy it all.

[Dylan McKay]

Well, there are a couple ways around it.

1. Respect, this only works on lower tier characters. Publishers respect that a characters story is done and literally or figuratively retire them. Starman is a perfect example of this.

2. Scrap the shared universe concept and allow all titles to exist in their own world. Not many superhero books do this though, it seems to me that superhero fans enjoy the shared universe aspect.

3. Have a finite universe. Probably nearly impossible.

4. the Image method. All titles exist in their own universe, but all universes have all the other superheroes published by Image existing in exactly the same way they exist in their own title.

I shouldn't say I dislike continuity, I love it, my favourite series is 100 Bullets which is very continuity heavy. But I also like that it's going to end, I know that it will never be tarnished or tainted by bad creative changes or filler stories just because it needs to be published.

[Red]

Taking away possible futures is having your cake and eating it to. Look at Superman, What Ever Happened to the Man of Tommorow and Kingdom Come are both easily top 5 for the character, both are out of continuity.

Also, when you factor in how many out of continuity stories are published, their success rate is astounding. The big four franchises, Spiderman, Batman, Superman and X-Men have at least 3 stories published every month, all in continuity. And every year or so Batman and Superman get an out of continuity story and every five years or so the X-Men and Spiderman get one. And yet Kingdome Come, DKR and Age of Apocalypse are often cited as some of their greatest stories. (I can't even think of an out of continuity story for Spiderman.) I find the difference in hit/miss ratio of in and out of continuity stories so astounding that I'm surprised people still want continuity at all...

You are forgetting the bajillion Elseworlds, Startling Stories and the like out there. I do not think their success rate is astounding at all. Alternate future stories are the exception that proves the rule. In fact, they are really a different animal altogether because, in a sense, they are still somewhat continuity-bound. How many future stories do you read that are based on an alternate timeline? (Like, how would it go over if there was an Age of Apocalypse version of Days of Future Past?) Future stories are so powerful partly because (at the time they are published) they are based on mainstream continuity, and they represent the actual character involved, not a throw-away alternate version. They are, in a sense, the opposite of flashback stories, and in my mind totally separate from actual out-of-continuity stories.

But I know most people lump them in with the others, so I was trying to challenge everyone to think of a great, memorable example of an out-of-continuity story that was not set in the future.

[Dylan McKay]

I think you're missing the point of superconsistancy/supercontinuity...

[Red]

Sorry, Dylan, are you talking to me or Digsy?

[Dylan McKay]

You, I should 'splain though.

It simply wouldn't even be a Batman or Captain America story if you don't keep the core elements. So while yes, those stories do utilize continuity, they are not actually part of the characters current continuity. There are exceptions, I didn't mention Days of Future's Past because Rachel's involvement in the current Marvel U makes her future a part of continuity. Where as there is no link direct link between Dark Knight Returns and Batman's current continuity.

I do apologize though, in my first point I made myself seem more radical than I intended. I am not opposed to continuity, just that working out of continuity yields on the average yields better results.

[Red]

Okay, I see what you're saying, Dylan: If given the choice between out-of-continuity, but still within "super-continuity" (I know that it was the premise of Joel's column, but at this point, the concept is giving me a headache); and in-continuity, you'll take the first one.

And you are using the alternate futures and AOA as examples as to why.

Fair enough.

I think I got off on a tangent there, so let me refer you back to post #21 (Joel) and #25 (me) because they are what started this in the first place. I disagree with both Joel and you in that I think it's better to be in continuity whenever possible (and yes, Joel, it does matter to me, and for me it supercedes creative freedom), for two reasons that I don't think I've stated so far, so here goes:

1. While the alternate future stories are often the best stories about a character, they are by far the exception when it comes to out-of-continuity. As far as super-continuity goes, I can't think of too many other examples (outside of future stories) that qualify as out-of-continuity yet within super-continuity. Can you give me some examples of the kind of thing you're trying to support?

Seriously, I can't believe I'm typing all this, it's driving me insane...which brings me to...

#2: If we were all to decide Joel's idea is great and we are just going to stick to some super-consistent version of things, who's going to decide what's super-consistent and what's not? Because, frankly, if I had to choose between being the guy who had to put every one of Wolverine's appearances in a consistent, logical chronological order, or being the guy who had to decide what about Wolverine was super-consistent and what's not, I'm going to choose to be the first guy.

[Swandogg]

The All-Star line isn't out of continuity like an Elseworld. It's meant to be timeless stories. Perry White won't die unless he dies in the main titles. All-Star isn't a different universe, it's just not going to be hampered by the daily goings on in the monthly titles. Eg, it won't have to acknowledge Countdown if it doesn't want to because they stories are about the characters rather than the time the story occurs.

That's why I'm excited about the All-Star line and the possible expansion of the Classified line.

Ever since the announcement of the All Star line I have been under the impression that they are completely out of continuity. If you think All Star is in continuity then I guess we have a different idea of what continuity is. I consider Action Comics, Adventures of Superman, Superman, and Superman/Batman to be in continuity.

This is referring to the All Star line...

"And, contrary to speculation, the All-Stars books will not create a new or alternate continuity like the "Ultimate" books do, but will instead contain stories told in present day but utilizing what could be described as timeless, iconic, Pre-Crisis versions of the DCU's top characters."

That last paragraph is from an All-Star book original announcement. It's taking place in present day but Lois and Clark won't be married? How is that possible if it is current continuity? I thought the whole point of the All Star and Classified line was to be able to tell amazing stand alone stories that are not affected by the barriers of continuity.

[Dylan McKay]

Okay, I see what you're saying, Dylan: If given the choice between out-of-continuity, but still within "super-continuity" (I know that it was the premise of Joel's column, but at this point, the concept is giving me a headache); and in-continuity, you'll take the first one.

And you are using the alternate futures and AOA as examples as to why.

Fair enough.

I think I got off on a tangent there, so let me refer you back to post #21 (Joel) and #25 (me) because they are what started this in the first place. I disagree with both Joel and you in that I think it's better to be in continuity whenever possible (and yes, Joel, it does matter to me, and for me it supercedes creative freedom), for two reasons that I don't think I've stated so far, so here goes:

1. While the alternate future stories are often the best stories about a character, they are by far the exception when it comes to out-of-continuity. As far as super-continuity goes, I can't think of too many other examples (outside of future stories) that qualify as out-of-continuity yet within super-continuity. Can you give me some examples of the kind of thing you're trying to support?

Seriously, I can't believe I'm typing all this, it's driving me insane...which brings me to...

#2: If we were all to decide Joel's idea is great and we are just going to stick to some super-consistent version of things, who's going to decide what's super-consistent and what's not? Because, frankly, if I had to choose between being the guy who had to put every one of Wolverine's appearances in a consistent, logical chronological order, or being the guy who had to decide what about Wolverine was super-consistent and what's not, I'm going to choose to be the first guy.


1. There aren't many, because most out of continuity stories change the character as a hook. The Ultimate line, discounting the Ultimates, is the best example. The up-comming All-Star line is one example and cross-company crossovers are another example.

2. Supercontiuity isn't that there is no continuity, the stories would still be infinate ongoings, just that the key to the continuity is always the essence of the character. That the creators need to know the current status quo and the origin/core of the character. The stories inbetween aren't necisarily relevant. The idea is that creators only build on the core of the character and that the details of past in counters aren't necissary.

[Red]

1. Okay, that's what I thought: we're dealing with an unusual situation here. So basically, you think it would be a good idea if the writers (and readers) of all the monthly titles just threw their arms up and said "Continuity is dead! Long live super-continuity!" and resigned ourselves to a world where all the books had the feel (continuity-wise) of a cross-company crossover? No thanks. And as for the DC All-Star line, we'll have to wait and see I guess, but all initial indications (at least judging by this thread) is that it's confusing the hell out of everyone.

2. I understand the concept. I can understand it and still get a headache from it. ;)
But like I said, who decides what "core" the creators should build on, and what "details" they should forget? Writers? Editors? Do you really think that could work??

[Chris Day]

the problem though is that a character is made up of all their experiences, yet many writers choose to disregard pieces they don't like to deal with which limits characters so much. there are very few stories that have characters who are the sum of their experiences in the past. and even less stories that thrive on dealing with continuity.

it's disrespectful to the characters if you limit them only to the here and now. look at Wolverine, appearing in exactly the same way in a dozen or more titles every month, his character has been turned into a stereotype of what we think of as wolverine. just about no one respects his character anymore in a way that makes him more interresting, simply because he has to remain the same character throughout so many different titles...

i don't want to rant about wolverine, i'm sick of him.

dealing with continuity isn't the only problem these days, it's also an issue of having comics not bothering to be a part of a shared universe.
back a few years ago titles would be affected by events elsewhere, sometimes even on a weekly basis. i remember enjoying the days just before and during operation zero tollerance because it was clearly a shared universe. Graydon Creed being assassinated caused things to happen in just about every x-men title that followed X-factor #130. events like that were viewed as important, and characters reacted to them accordingly.

these days, no one outside of astonishing x-men cares that Colossus is alive, no one outside of uncanny x-men cares that psylocke is alive.

the only title that has reacted to wolverine being evil when controlled by Hydra recently is New Thunderbolts. That's absurd! Sure, Academy X will react to it next month, but i doubt anyone else will... no teams that wolverine is actually on will give a damn.

[Ovid]

Are stories stagnant because continuity is dead, or is continuity dead because the stories are stagnant? Most people see a lack of continuity as causing the comics to go nowhere, but I submit it runs the other way: the comics were already stagnant, and that's why continuity had to go.

But does resorting to supercontinuity solve the stagnation problem or just institutionalise it?

I really don't see how continuity can be a restriction. In "Runaways," Chamber is back to his chest-hole self. This was probably done because no one really remembered that he got it fixed in Weapon X, so Vaughan just tossed in his little 10 word explanation as to what happened. No big deal. As long as the change is acknowledged or explained in brief, I'm fine with it.

But try working out the ages of the members of Excelsior. Vaughn has aged them much more quickly than more mainstream characters. I'd submit that all writers have to ignore continuity to a certain extent. It's not either super- or normal continuity. It's a spectrum from 'core' attributes where both American and Soviet Supermen are recognisably Superman, to totally anal, every-single-detail continuity at the other extreme.

the problem though is that a character is made up of all their experiences, yet many writers choose to disregard pieces they don't like to deal with which limits characters so much. there are very few stories that have characters who are the sum of their experiences in the past. and even less stories that thrive on dealing with continuity.

it's disrespectful to the characters if you limit them only to the here and now.

But the characters don't exist, so it's difficult to be disrespectful. What this generally means is that fans want the effort they put into reconstructing the history of the character to be respected.

Seriously, if creative freedom is what a writer is looking for, let him or her do something independent or creator-owned. But when I buy a comic, I don't primarily buy a Bendis comic, or a Waid comic. Maybe secondarily. But first-and-foremost I'm buying a comic about a particular character(s), and everything that comes with them. So right from the beginning, I have expectations above & beyond my concern for the creators involved and how much freedom they get.

I'm the opposite. I want to read first and foremost good comics. The writer is a better indicator of that than the character. If Simone left Birds of Prey or Vaughn Runaways I'd probably drop the title unless another creator I equally trusted replaced them. I'm suspicious of what will happen to Gotham Central with only Rucka on board. I grit my teeth and bore it when Bobillo left She-Hulk as penciller.

Would you read a sequel to Pride and Prejudice? I wouldn't. And if I did, I would want to to be 'out of continuity' so that I could appreciate the new writer's take on its own terms and if he screwed up it wouldn't pollute my appreciation of Austen's world.

[Ken Boehm]

Wait, so All-Star is pre-Crisis? Why go back to a Universe that doesn't even exist anymore and might confuse people when they try a staple Superman title?

[raul grau]

Not exactly, Ken. From what I understand, the All-Star books are not set pre-Crisis (or, for that matter, are they set post-Crisis), they just take what is considered to be the 'core idea' of the character, and project that version in a modern day setting. So you have the world of 2005, but Dick Grayson is Robin, and War Games (or Hush, or anything else recent) is not going to be mentioned. Personally, I'm looking forward to these books...DC has put some very talented creators on these projects, and while I greatly dislike the concept of 'super-consistency', this line is clearly meant to stand outside of continuity.

Joel, very nice piece. Granted, I disagree with just about everything you said, but you always say it well. ;)

[bravelybravesirrobin]

This is completely out of left feild but there is actually a sequel to Pride and Prejudice. Pretty much every Jane Austen novel has been sequelised by other writers who felt they could add to her stories.

It's not a rare thing in literature either although it only really sprang up when novels became so dominating and it's really, really hard to find publishers still producing them as well.



HMMM I guess getting different creative teams to continue popular works really is nothing new.




Okay My 2 cents here

1. Super-continuity is a given and is the MOST important thing about the whole concept of continuty. If Batman suddenly was a teenager from Queens who was bitten by a radioactive bat it would infuriate the reader. less ridiculousy if batman begins using guns on people and killing them it would also piss off a hell of a lot of people.

Super continuity is the core of the charactr, the basic rules every single writer approaching this character must abide by.

However this does not mean that super-continuity is set in stone, a key example is Spiderman's super-continuity. One day its spider-powers, driven by guilt for letting Ben die, wise-cracking, dates Gwen Stacy. The next it's spider-powers driven by guilt for letting Ben and Gwen die, wise-cracking and dates Mary Jane. The Super-continuity is altered by the story and you can then no longer use the super-continuity as it once was (with the exception of hidden stories and retcons which usually are horrible.


So you have to have a super-continuity. Do you have to have a continuity?

Well on the most basic of levels yes, stories have to follow on from panel to panel, issue to issue. If the events in one issue do not affect the events in the next you end up with this scenario. Every story is self contained with a beginning middle and an end and internal continuity but at the end of the story you start again with the super-continuity and no acknowledgement of what happenned before. All the benefits of finite narratives with all the benefits of being able to publish continuously.

Cartoons do this, and do it well. No Bugs Bunny cartoon will ever refer to an exisiting cartoon but the characters and conflict remain consistent throughout. It's pretty much the basic form that all children's entertainment takes and its works.

But it won't work for adults.

Bugs Bunny from an adult perspective still works because the enjoyment comes from the jokes and visual gags not the story but Super Friends (minus the nostalgia factor and the hilarious awfulness) doesn't. Adults crave character development, they assume that as they watch a series characters will change and grow. Entertainment without a fully formed character arc just doesn't fly for adults in any medium.


In order to appeal to an adult audience you need a basic continuity where characters grow from their experiences.

This raises lots of problems but it also raises one argument I want to dismiss immediately, should comics market themselves at adults anyway, do they need a character arc in order to entertain we the comic book readers or do we just enjoy fights, flashy images and inventive sci-fi ideas. Indeed All-Star Superman seems to be jsut such an experiment. Superman's super-continuity will not change and each story will be self contained and bear no relation to the one before it. Such an experiment will live or die based purely on Morrisson's entertaining and bizarre sci-fi ideas, gripping action and comedy and I have no doubt he'll pull it off.

But it's not rally an experiment is it, because for years and years that's how Superman was published. Bound by a super-continuity but otherwise completely continuity free and the continuity heavy Marvel wiped the floor with D.C. increasingly in sales and always in critical acclaim.

Think about any truly great celebrated comic story and you'll see it contains a character arc. Dark Phoenix Saga, The terra storyline from Teen Titans, Watchmen, V, Sandman, Starman all of them involve characters moving emotionally from point a to point b and you can only do that with continuity.


So for a story to make sense you need continutiy within an issue (or arc) for characters to make sense you need super-continuity and to tell a truly good story you need a running continuity in which the character continually grows and changes from each prior experience.

Even alternate universe stories must confide by these rules. AoA for example
contained character arcs for Magneto, Bishop, Gambit, etc, etc. But AoA also proves another thing, readers really like extensive continuities.

What, you lie, this is heresy, convulted continuity is the devil and puts off readers I hear you all shout. Well not in AoA. AoA implied a continuity that did not exist, it refers to stories the reader could not possibly have read and that's why we loved it so much. Seeing Sabretooth rip into holocaust made us want to know more about the history between these two men. AoA had to fake it's continuity to create interest in these brand new characters. Not jsut a super-continuity of this is a new Magneto who leads the x-men but specific off-panel events that modern theory suggests turns readers off because they can't understand the story unless everything they need to know about a chaarcter is presented at face value. This modern theory is of course utter bollocks. One of the first words you learn in a media course is "enigma", capture attention by posing a question the audience has to read the text in order to find the answer to. Continuity by it's referral to the past is an engima and readers (if they're readily available hint hint) go track down back issues to get the answers.



So continuity is essential to good stories - but of course we all know it has major problems as well, the bigegst one being continually published characters do not abide by the rules of continuity. Narrative theory says you have a conflict and a resolution with something changed (usually the character) to tell a satisfying story but continually published characters are restricted in what they can change so you tend to get stories without a point. The other problem of course being embarassing changes the current writer would rather ignore or misguided changes to the super-continuity which ultimately make the chaarcter less appealing to the readers (i.e. Spiderman getting married and becoming famous). Finite stories of course don't have this problem, Sandman and Starman grew and changed and ended and in the case of Starman utilised the strengths of the external shared continuity of the universe (a whole other kettle of fish but imho the shared universe is also a strong concept) and it's previous continuity within the book to do so.


So if continutiy is such a positive essential to the storytelling process and also such a huge problem what's the solution. You can't drop it completely or characters will never change and if you become a slave to it, well, welcome to the clone saga.


As much as I hate to say it my gut feeling says that X-men: Reloaded is the answer.

With Morrisson's run he acknoweldges both true and super-continuity from previous works. Has his own internal continuity through the three year run and has several charater arcs which all resolve satisfyingly.
Then the next set of writers come along and go write back to the super-contnuity. They cannot change this but they can pick and choose what elements of Morrisson's stories will form they're new continuity and which they'll discard. Hence Ernst living at the mansion dissapears and the costumes come back on but we keep Beast's mutation, and Emma and Scoot together and Jean's death.

This re-set function seems to be the best way to deal with continuity. If you ignore certain stories happened it doesn't invalidate those stories at all but it prevents them from messing up new stories. Yet you keep all the benefits of having a consistent continuity.


I typed continuity waaaaaay too many times whilst writing that.

[Ovid]

Well argued, Sir Robin. You should have done that as a One Shot column. Except then it would have been an ongoing series of course. With resulting continuity problems. And all about continuity. :?

I get my 'reload' from how I approach each creator. I just read one writer's take on a character as a reloaded version of another's. There doesn't have to be an 'official' editorially-sanctioned reload for me to do it.

This is completely out of left feild but there is actually a sequel to Pride and Prejudice. Pretty much every Jane Austen novel has been sequelised by other writers who felt they could add to her stories.

I know. And are any of them any good? Don't think so.


Bugs Bunny from an adult perspective still works because the enjoyment comes from the jokes and visual gags not the story but Super Friends (minus the nostalgia factor and the hilarious awfulness) doesn't. Adults crave character development, they assume that as they watch a series characters will change and grow. Entertainment without a fully formed character arc just doesn't fly for adults in any medium.

What about soaps? Part of the problem is the fallacy that a character with lots of events in his past is therefore well characterised. Characters are more than the sum of their experiences. They need to be well written. Otherwise they just go round and round the same plots/subjects and we get the stagnation. There's a kind of pedantic joy to be gained from tracing the plots of a long continuity, whether in comics or Eastenders (sorry, don't know any American soaps after Dallas), but that doesn't mean the comics/programmes are any good.

[Joel Phillips]

But does resorting to supercontinuity solve the stagnation problem or just institutionalise it?

A valid point, and it depends how you look at it. Let's use Batman as an example. If you take every Batman story as part of the same continuum, then supercontinuity probably would result in a more stagnant line. That said, the whole idea behind supercontinuity is that every Batman story needn't exist in a continuum at all, rather that every writer's run is its own continuum, tangentially related to the continuums of other writers runs through their use of common characters. If you look at it that way, with each run as its own beast, supercontinuity destroys stagnation by allowing each continuum to go anywhere and do anything it wants, without subsequent writers having to be bound by it.

I'm the opposite. I want to read first and foremost good comics.

Well said. This just takes me back to the time Ryan Day said "I was a lot happier as a reader of comics when I stopped reading titles and started reading stories". Basically he's saying the same thing... read what's good, not what's familiar.

I think this is the fundamental problem with continuity. A reader who can honestly place continuity as having more value than story quality has just plain lost perspective. What point is there to continuity if the stories suck? It's the marketing of comics towards this mindset that results in that institutional stagnation we discussed.

Joel, very nice piece. Granted, I disagree with just about everything you said, but you always say it well. ;)

Yeah, I get that a lot... which is better than people agreeing with me and it being written poorly.

With Morrisson's run he acknoweldges both true and super-continuity from previous works. Has his own internal continuity through the three year run and has several charater arcs which all resolve satisfyingly.
Then the next set of writers come along and go write back to the super-contnuity. They cannot change this but they can pick and choose what elements of Morrisson's stories will form they're new continuity and which they'll discard. Hence Ernst living at the mansion dissapears and the costumes come back on but we keep Beast's mutation, and Emma and Scoot together and Jean's death.

This re-set function seems to be the best way to deal with continuity. If you ignore certain stories happened it doesn't invalidate those stories at all but it prevents them from messing up new stories. Yet you keep all the benefits of having a consistent continuity.

This is supercontinuity... internal continuity within individual runs with fidelity to the larger themes that define characters. The next writers then do whatever they want, keeping or ditching what they want. That's supercontinuity, or at least that's how it works between runs. But as Ovid said, you don't need an editorially mandated "event" for it to be this way. Ideally, the simple act of one writer leaving and another coming on should signal this "re-set" every time.

[russbrett77]

1) True continuity is impossible for an ongoing series. It can never happen. The best we can hope for is that the writer and editors do their best to respect what came before.

2) There is a very simple solution to the continuity problem. View comics as historical recordings of events written by whichever quasi-omniscient being was witness to them. This allows for "errors" to be made on that part of the writer (not even the bible, with its many writers, was able to maintain true continuity).

The best example of this I have seen are the Dragonlance novels. Any inconsistencies from novel to novel are chalked up to the fact that the characters have become legends. Any retelling of a story involving a legend is bound to be met with some exageration or hyperbole. We, as readers, simply have to accept that although it is written, it is not necessarily accurate.

We can view our comics the same way. Ex: A recent issue of Spider-Man shows him lifting a city bus with little effort. This conflicts with an incident from several years ago which shows him able to only life the bus a few feet. We rationalize this disparity by accepting that the person who wrote the original story was playing up the dramatic tension of the event by showing Spidey weaker than he is (or the opposite: that the current writer was so blinded by Spidey's heroics that he over-emphasized just how strong Spidey was).

If we can accept that the comics are not being told from the point of a truly omniscient narrator, then continuity errors become easier to accept (and ignore).

[Red]

First off, I thought bravely's post was great. Well done. :clap:

Bugs Bunny from an adult perspective still works because the enjoyment comes from the jokes and visual gags not the story but Super Friends (minus the nostalgia factor and the hilarious awfulness) doesn't. Adults crave character development, they assume that as they watch a series characters will change and grow. Entertainment without a fully formed character arc just doesn't fly for adults in any medium.

In order to appeal to an adult audience you need a basic continuity where characters grow from their experiences.
This hits things dead on. I'm afraid Super Friends is where we'd end up with super-consistency.

As much as I hate to say it my gut feeling says that X-men: Reloaded is the answer.

With Morrisson's run he acknoweldges both true and super-continuity from previous works. Has his own internal continuity through the three year run and has several charater arcs which all resolve satisfyingly.
Then the next set of writers come along and go write back to the super-contnuity. They cannot change this but they can pick and choose what elements of Morrisson's stories will form they're new continuity and which they'll discard. Hence Ernst living at the mansion dissapears and the costumes come back on but we keep Beast's mutation, and Emma and Scoot together and Jean's death.

This re-set function seems to be the best way to deal with continuity. If you ignore certain stories happened it doesn't invalidate those stories at all but it prevents them from messing up new stories. Yet you keep all the benefits of having a consistent continuity.
Luckily, X-Men Reloaded was well thought-out from the standpoint of what was kept and what wasn't. I'm not sure we'd always be so lucky.

This is supercontinuity... internal continuity within individual runs with fidelity to the larger themes that define characters. The next writers then do whatever they want, keeping or ditching what they want. That's supercontinuity, or at least that's how it works between runs. But as Ovid said, you don't need an editorially mandated "event" for it to be this way. Ideally, the simple act of one writer leaving and another coming on should signal this "re-set" every time.
Well, I'll have to take you at your word, since you wrote the column, but the way I understood you before is that nothing would be held over in a new run except the "core" of the character (whatever that may be). But X-Men Reloaded held over a lot more than that. (Jean's death, etc.) So I'm really at a loss as to how you are equating X-Men Reloaded with super-consistency.

Another problem with looking at X-Men Reloaded and saying "writers should get to do that every time they start a new run" is that it may not always work out as well. Even as good a job as X-Men Reloaded did with this, we still ended up with a resurrected Magneto, and the readers still don't know how or why. Most books get new writers almost annually now (Morrison's run was amazingly long by today's standards), do you really want to put up with those kinds of changes that often?

I'm the opposite. I want to read first and foremost good comics.

Well said. This just takes me back to the time Ryan Day said "I was a lot happier as a reader of comics when I stopped reading titles and started reading stories". Basically he's saying the same thing... read what's good, not what's familiar.

I think this is the fundamental problem with continuity. A reader who can honestly place continuity as having more value than story quality has just plain lost perspective. What point is there to continuity if the stories suck? It's the marketing of comics towards this mindset that results in that institutional stagnation we discussed.
Look, everybody wants to read a good comic. But Joel's comment seems to assume that continuity and good stories are somehow mutually exclusive, which they aren't. Obviously, I believe in-continuity stories are almost always better stories, or I wouldn't be arguing this.

I may be guilty of sometimes reading a title even when it's not good. People do it all the time. They follow sports teams, their favorite celebrities, or TV shows, even when they suck. So what?

But I don't put continuity before story quality. As a reader, I want both. It's entirely feasible to write good stories that are consistent with continuity, it's been done many times before, and you should want both too. We shouldn't have to play little games to decide how much of one we are willing to trade in for more of the other.
Joel, very nice piece. Granted, I disagree with just about everything you said, but you always say it well. ;)
Well said. Despite all my groaning, I do feel the column was a good one. Just FYI.

[Joel Phillips]

In order to appeal to an adult audience you need a basic continuity where characters grow from their experiences.

But you only need that character growth within the confines of the story, you don't need it to stretch across more than one person's stories. The X-Men is not one story, it's many smaller stories which happen to use variations on the same characters. An individual run is capable of offering all the growth and development an adult audience needs to sustain interest... you just shouldn't expect that development to be used by the next writer. New writer, new story.

Well, I'll have to take you at your word, since you wrote the column, but the way I understood you before is that nothing would be held over in a new run except the "core" of the character (whatever that may be). But X-Men Reloaded held over a lot more than that. (Jean's death, etc.) So I'm really at a loss as to how you are equating X-Men Reloaded with super-consistency.

The point is that it doesn't matter what is or isn't carried over. The new writers are free to keep or ignore any continuity they deem useful in telling the story they want to tell. The only things which must be respected, the supercontinuity, are those things which are so fundamental that changing them would mean you simply aren't writing the same characters anymore. Batman has to stay millionaire playboy Bruce Wayne, whose parents were murdered in his youth. You can change that, but then it wouldn't be Batman anymore. So the only thing writers need to keep is that one or two sentence explanation of what the character is and what they are all about. Everything else is pick and choose. Keep what you want, ditch what you don't. And if the next writer wants it back the other way, they get that same freedom. The point is that each writer's story is its own thing, so there's no reason why they can't play around with these things as much as they want.

Another problem with looking at X-Men Reloaded and saying "writers should get to do that every time they start a new run" is that it may not always work out as well. Even as good a job as X-Men Reloaded did with this, we still ended up with a resurrected Magneto, and the readers still don't know how or why. Most books get new writers almost annually now (Morrison's run was amazingly long by today's standards), do you really want to put up with those kinds of changes that often?

They're not changes, they're different stories. Morrison's X-Men is one story. Whedon's X-Men is one story. Milligan's X-Men is one story. Claremont's X-Men is one story. And on, and on. So the fact that Morrison's X-Men ended with Magneto dead, and Claremont's Excalibur has Magneto alive, makes no difference because they are separate stories. Now that particular example is problematic, because Magneto's "death" in Morrison's story was continuity Claremont chose to keep, and then didn't explain. Note then that the problem arose because continuity was used, and used carelessly. Had Claremont simply ignored the Morrison story entirely and included a living Magneto in his story, there'd be no inconsistency... just two separate tales. It's only by bringing the aspects of one tale into the other that consistency becomes a problem.

Look, everybody wants to read a good comic. But Joel's comment seems to assume that continuity and good stories are somehow mutually exclusive, which they aren't. Obviously, I believe in-continuity stories are almost always better stories, or I wouldn't be arguing this.

I don't think they are mutually exclusive by any means. I do, however, think that attempting to force 100% compliance with ALL continuity is detrimental to creative freedom, and thus detrimental to story quality. And more than that, I just think it can't be done... show me one writer in the last fifteen years that hasn't made a continuity "error" at some point. There's just too much of it to expect every story to be totally faithful to every story that came before. And even if it were possible, it's not really advisable... plenty of those stories are bad for the purposes of what the current writer is trying to do. So why can't a writer, within the confines of their story, decide event A didn't happen? Even if the next writer wants to use event A, what does it matter? Two separate stories.

I may be guilty of sometimes reading a title even when it's not good. People do it all the time. They follow sports teams, their favorite celebrities, or TV shows, even when they suck. So what?

Well this is a completely different argument, and one I don't really want to get into, but those are different things you are discussing. TV shows, celebrity watching, and following the exploits of a sports team are all free. Comics aren't. Every single bad comic you buy costs more money, and every single bad comic you support is an implicit endorsement for the company to keep doing what they are doing, even if it's bad. In that way it doesn't just affect you, it affects everyone who wants better stories and can't get them because the bad stories are too profitable for the company to make a change.

But I don't put continuity before story quality. As a reader, I want both. It's entirely feasible to write good stories that are consistent with continuity, it's been done many times before, and you should want both too. We shouldn't have to play little games to decide how much of one we are willing to trade in for more of the other.

You're allowed to want both, and some writers will give it to you. But not all of them will, and that doesn't make their stories any worse. Maybe it makes them not for you, which is fine... don't buy them. As I pointed out in the column, that's the great freedom this approach to continuity allows: buy what you want, screw everything else. But again, the fact that good stories can and have been written in continuity doesn't mean stories have to be written in continuity to be good, nor does it mean that stories written in continuity are automatically good by virtue of being in continuity. Really I think one has little to do with the other, so I choose to endorse the method that allows the greatest creative freedom, as creative freedom tends to translate to better stories.

Well said. Despite all my groaning, I do feel the column was a good one. Just FYI.

Thank you. It's actually been enjoyable for me to discuss this, I haven't had a good comic book discussion in quite some time.

[Alex Groff]

I am dumbfounded by the amount of conversation that this has generated. Impressed by its eloquence, but dumbfounded nevertheless. I didn't realize people cared that much about continuity.

[Brett White]

They're not changes, they're different stories. Morrison's X-Men is one story. Whedon's X-Men is one story. Milligan's X-Men is one story. Claremont's X-Men is one story. And on, and on.

Yeah, I 100% disagree with this. If they were all different stories, then why are the stories numbered? If they're all different stories with nothing in common except for the "basic fundamental core of the characters" then why not just start over with a new #1 every time a new writer comes on. The number on an issue flat out says that it's all one story. There's a continuity in numbers. 1 leads to 2 leads to 3, so on and so on. There's a reason that, for the most part, long-running series aren't relaunched with new #1s. The ones that have been, like "Amazing Spider-Man" and "Fantastic Four" have gone back to their original numbering, which flat out acknowledges that it's all one huge story. By doing this Marvel is telling us that it wants the big issue numbers, especially when they hit 500.

I look at a comic book as a television series with a writing staff instead of seperate stories.

[Joel Phillips]

One thing that must be clearly understood: I am not proposing anything in this column or discussion that is not already being implemented. The fact of the matter is this approach to continuity IS being used. If you compare any two writer runs in recent years you can see everything I mention in the column at work in the very comics you are reading and enjoying right now.

As for the continuing of issue #s (which is a good point, BTW), I think it's a holdover from a bygone era when the stories could be considered singular and continuous. You'll notice many creators do get brand new #1s when they start: Bendis on Avengers, Brubaker on Captain America, Ellis on Iron Man, Whedon on his own new X-title, Millar on his own new Spider-title... and that's just in the last year. This is the way the wind is blowing, and I expect we'll see a lot more of it in the years to come. Because you're right... having the stories exist as independently as they do while continuing to share a common numbering system doesn't make a lot of sense. (Although Marvel returning to big issue numbers is a sales ploy, nothing more. Look at Avengers... they went back to #500 and then rebooted the title four months later, which they'd planned to do all along. That pretty much confirms it's just about selling an anniversary issue, not some endorsement of their titles existing as a single continuum.)

I appreciate all the lively discussion and the passion with which everyone defends their point of view. While I'm happy to debate the merits of this approach to continuity with those of you who oppose it, there is no debating that this approach is a reality, and one which is becoming more and more prevalent with each passing year. And just so you know that I do understand where you're all coming from, read my first column on continuity (http://www.comixfan.com/xfan/forums/showthread.php?t=23010). The opinion I had then is significantly different than the one I have now, so if nothing else you can see that I do understand the opinions you are all expressing (since some of them used to be mine).

[Chris Day]

I read an interresting passage earlier by Jim Krueger in the Afterword to Paradise X, vol.1 trade paperback

QUOTE:
All those stories that were written, all those characters and battles that were drawn, mean something. Something important. It doesn't matter when you entered the Marvel Universe, when you read your first Marvel comic. All of the stories, all of the continuity, play an integral part in who and what these characters are today. They were formative events in the lives of these heroes. And just like me, the more you give to it, the more you consider the amazing stories that have been written for so many years, the more you'll get out of it, the more you'll appreciate what's come before and think about what's to come.
END QUOTE

i totally agree with this, and perhaps that's why i regard the Earth X trilogy as such a brilliant piece of work. it respects the continuity and the characters, and builds a huge epic on top of all that. and it shows the Marvel universe as an interconnected world where characters can and do interact with each other.
A powerful Epic story
Characters are respected and are developed further
Continuity, even very obscure continuity, is respected and used to tell a new story.
Characters from different comics interact realistically

to me, that's a good measure of quality in a comic book story,
it's why i like Earth X, why i like Thunderbolts, why i liked Sandman, why i like Astonishing X-men.

I don't like hype because Wolverine, Spider-man and Captain America are in the same title, with very little dialogue or text based storytelling, simply to fit more art onto the paper. I don't see that as quality story-telling.

[bravelybravesirrobin]

I read an interresting passage earlier by Jim Krueger in the Afterword to Paradise X, vol.1 trade paperback

QUOTE:
All those stories that were written, all those characters and battles that were drawn, mean something. Something important. It doesn't matter when you entered the Marvel Universe, when you read your first Marvel comic. All of the stories, all of the continuity, play an integral part in who and what these characters are today. They were formative events in the lives of these heroes. And just like me, the more you give to it, the more you consider the amazing stories that have been written for so many years, the more you'll get out of it, the more you'll appreciate what's come before and think about what's to come.
END QUOTE







While I see where he's coming from, I disagree here.

Less than half the stories matter. Less than half the stories a character is published in fundamentally affect and change the character because

a) a lot of stories have no point other than to fill space. Nothing happens over than equilibrium, conflict, resolution. No character changes or development occur be it in the lead a villain or a supporting character jsut everyone goes through the motions of the story and it ends.

Such stories can be fun but they only affect the "bad" continuity. The minutae of their adventures "happens" and writers should respect that but if the story is so unimportant in the larger scale it becomes dismissable continuity.

b) some stories ar so embarassingly bad and contain such awful ideas that they have to be either ret-conned away or ignored i.e. how many people remember when Viper had magic powers. no one right, because it was a horrible idea.

Such a massive change to the super-continuity of that character needs to be adressed though and readers hate both ret-cons (which are the only instances of continuity changes which do devalue the original story. Not all tales which add to the past are ret-cons but any story which specifically sets out to change a past embarassment if flat out saying this story sucked.) or editors ignoring it because they feel confused that the world isn't consistent when continuity is ignored.



So we come back to the issue of who gets to decide what matters to the super-conintuity, the "character". Being a slave to continuity is clearly not an option so whose job is it to pick and choose what worked and what didn't.

1. The writer - as many people have pointed out we view each writer's run as a seperate entity now which creates a new status quo (or base-continuity to continue making up new terms) for the characters at the beginning based on what he liked and didn't like from previous stories and then proceeds to change this again.

Which of course evokes the fan response of "what gives him the right" and the may Morrisson mistakes such as giving Shaw telepathic powers. A writer invariably isn't aware of what the changes to the status quo were after he stopped reading the book, often as a child. Hence you get mistakes like not knowing what a characters powers are but also the annoying habit comics have to reboot to the most popular era every time a new writer comes on.

To use an example i'm familiar with when Morrisson came on X-men he immediately ignored most developments in character between the end of Claremont's run and his own hence Moira being alive (editorial caught this thankfully) and building most of his stories on classic x-men tales (probably the biggest criticism of Morrisson's runwas that he jsut rehashed old stories. While I disagree and think he added a lot of originality to them he certainly built his narratives primarily on what happenned in Claremont's run)

2. The Editor - Editorially mandated reboots be they stylistic (x-men: Reloaded) or actual in continuity stories to change the past (Dissassembled, Crisis) tend to be the happy medium in continuity straightening. While it's pretty much a given now that we do re-set with every writer havign the editorial team heavily involved in the re-set ensures a continuity of at least some ideas from the previous run e.g. Re-loaded took a lot more from morrisson then morrisson and casey took from..... you know I honestly can't remember who was writing x-men after Ellis and Claremont's 2nd run being dumped... and this means in the eyes of the fans you haven't devalued the stories (although re-loaded was maybe too much of a reboot and did in fact get rid of a lot elements that should have been continued cough no costumes cough)

The editorial team deciding what's good and bad continuity also has the advantage of being a synergy in that ultimately it is the writer who tells the stories. The editorial team can say, no Jean isn't coming back yet you are not getting Scoot back together with her, but it is the writer who then has free reign over what happens in Scott's and Emma's relationship.

and collaborative story-telling while a disadvantage in many ways should prevent the writer from making awful, awful mistakes.


3. The reader - ultimately what defines a character, what you feel was a truly great story that changed who he is and what sucked monkey-ass is all up the reader. Your own personal response to a character is your own personal response to the character and it will always be more "right" than any editor or writers interpretation.

But simply because this is true certain fans feel that only their interpretation is right and fail to recognise that it's a personal response, leading to two scenarios.


"man the characterisation is all wrong here" a valid comment from some writers (cough austen cough) but probably the most commonly wined complaint on any message board ever because these fans fail to realise that everybody interprets characters differently.


The 'fan who remembers and embraces all stories as a whole continuity' also known as the guy who's setting himself up for a fall. Most readers can accept that vipers magic powers were stupid and jsut forget the whole hing ever happenned but to a sub-set of readers not adressing this is devaluing the original story and they can never read it again.

What those readers need to realise (coming back to my starting point) is that not every story is important. In Spiderman's publishing history the only stories that really affect the super-continuity, the core of the character are

origin story
every story in which a new villain of character (that recurs) is introduced
any death of story
the recent power change story
moving to college
getting married
black costume
any change in love interest
and amazing spiderman 500 (or he finally, finally gets over Uncle Ben dying)

+ a handful of others like Stracsynki's conversation with aunt may or the master planner trilogy

most everything else even if it's a drmatic/funny/emotional/tightly wraught tale ultimately doesn't have to be acknowledged because the status quo at the beginning of said story will be the same at the end.

and a few stories did change the status quo but for the worst and the writers and editors then have to try and figure a way out. Had we just ignored the clone saga as a silly, silly idea then Norman Osborn need not have come back for instance. If we break free of a fixed continutyi and say the editors and writers are free to change past continuity to suit themselves then we open up a lot of story options and a helpful tool to forget about and never mention again the clone saga.

some stories obviously affect the super-continuity so much they cannot be forgotten (you can't for example re-introduce Doctor Octopus as a new villain, no John Bryne you can't, yes, we know you did it and please stop trying to do it thanks) but the vast majority are inconsequential to the character as a whole.

[Joel Phillips]

This is my favorite conversation on these boards in some time, so go us!

I read an interresting passage earlier by Jim Krueger in the Afterword to Paradise X, vol.1 trade paperback

QUOTE:
All those stories that were written, all those characters and battles that were drawn, mean something. Something important. It doesn't matter when you entered the Marvel Universe, when you read your first Marvel comic. All of the stories, all of the continuity, play an integral part in who and what these characters are today. They were formative events in the lives of these heroes. And just like me, the more you give to it, the more you consider the amazing stories that have been written for so many years, the more you'll get out of it, the more you'll appreciate what's come before and think about what's to come.
END QUOTE

Every story has meaning as an individual story, that I agree with. Some stories are good, some are average, some are bad... their value as a story is a qualitative judgment we each make upon reading. But most stories are totally meaningless as part of the larger mythos of the characters. Tell me how UXM #53, where the team fights Blastaar, is at all relevent to any story that's being written today? How is it relevent to any story, ever, besides itself? Stories have individual value, but only a tiny few stories remain integral to the larger mythos of the characters. The idea that every story ever told is relevent to the stories being told now is, frankly, absurd.

That said, a writer could come along and spin that Blastaar story into something really cool. Which is why this approach to continuity allows stories to be kept or dismissed at the writer's pleasure.

And as an aside, I hated the Earth X trilogy. (More accurately, I hated the first two parts... I never bothered to subject myself to the third.)

I don't like hype because Wolverine, Spider-man and Captain America are in the same title, with very little dialogue or text based storytelling, simply to fit more art onto the paper. I don't see that as quality story-telling.

I don't see it as quality story-telling either, but that's got nothing to do with the issue at hand. The whoring of popular characters, the unstoppable hype machine, the reduction of text to the point of comics being little more than picture books... none of those has anything to do with continuity. It has to do with a different style of creating comics, which I dislike as much as you do, and an editorial policy that exploits its readers inability to stop buying crap. But none of those things is the product of any approach to continuity being used or unused.

So we come back to the issue of who gets to decide what matters to the super-conintuity

While you wrote a really good, well thought out post, you're over-thinking this concept. Supercontinuity is not a list of stories that somebody decides "matter". Supercontinuity is the idea that all continuity is fluid, to be used or unused at the writer's discretion. The only things which MUST be kept is the two sentence explanation of a character. If I say "Who/what is Spider-Man?", and you need to explain the character in 50 words or less... that is all you NEED to keep for us to still be talking about Spider-Man at all. It'd probably be something like this:

"Spider-Man is Peter Parker, a superhero who gained spider-like powers from a radioactive spider bite, and who decided to become a superhero after failing to stop a burglar who subsequently murdered his Uncle Ben."

Anything less than that, and we're simply not talking about Spider-Man anymore. That is the core of the character, the uber-basics of who and what he is.

Everything else is extra. The writer uses or doesn't use continuity as it suits them. Now there are certainly stories that most people would consider fairly integral to the continuing saga of the character... Gwen Stacy's death, for example. But since we're not concerned with the continuing saga of the character, just individual sagas, even that story can be ignored if it suits the writer. And then the next writer can choose to respect it again... each story is totally independent. The story that uses a living Gwen needn't resurrect her, it just doesn't reference her having ever died. Likewise, if the next writer wants her to be dead, they simply don't reference the stories where she was alive again. Each story exists on its own. Supercontinuity/superconsistency, if I was pressed to give a dictionary definition, is the idea that all continuity but the most basic core concept can be used or ignored at the discretion of the writer. In other words, supercontinuity/superconsistency isn't what needs to be kept, it's the idea that that is all that needs to be kept. It's a semantic difference, but an important one.

Think of the conventional "everything counts" approach to continuity as a long stone tablet. Once something is etched into it, it's there for good. Not only is it there for good, it's in its specific place for good. This event happened at this point in history, it happened this way, and that's it.

With supercontinuity, continuity is more like a giant sheet of paper, with all the stories written on it. Now there are many ways to handle continuity under this model. We can approach it as we approach the tablet, with everything counting, and counting exactly as is. Or we can fold the paper, we can fold it in hundreds of thousands of different ways. We can fold some stories under so they aren't seen anymore, and are ignored. We can fold so that stories that happened years before and now moved up right next to stories happening now, leaving the event intact but changing its relative point in history. We can fold right down the middle of previous events, keeping them but changing them as well. Now at any time a writer who is so inclined can unfold the entire paper and treat it as a stone tablet again, respecting every single story, as is, in its place. But other writers, writers who want the more fluid kind of continuity, can fold it up any way they want before they start writing their piece of the paper.

This is the new approach to continuity, the so-called "supercontinuity". It allows writers to use as much or as little continuity as they deem necessary for their story to be told and told well. This straddles the line, allowing both for character building and for a clean slate for new writers coming onto a book. I get that it's different and strange and even confusing. But it's only that way because you're all used to the stone tablet. You're used to standing WAY back and looking at all of it at once. Instead, zoom in and just focus on the piece right in front of you in any given run. If you do that, then you can see how this approach to continuity can be so creatively freeing for writers, and how so many great stories can be told under this model that could never be told on the stone tablet.

[bravelybravesirrobin]

Ah, thank you. That definition certainly has helped me understand your argument a little better and frankly i'm just going to completely agree with it. That is the approach to comics continuty which I find to be the most workable.

[Red]

Okay, there's no way I'm going to go back in and insert a bunch of quotes, so hopefully you can just follow me as I make some general comments to everything that's been said.

1. Maybe I'm just totally not understanding this concept, Joel, but are you saying you'd really be okay if someone new Spider-Man writer came along, wrote a story in which Gwen had never died (no resurrection, etc, she just never died), but Peter was still married to Mary Jane? Because it sounds to me as if that's the kind of craziness you are advocating.

You may not care if that were to happen. That's fine. But one aspect of this that has so far gone completely unmentioned is how obtuse this concept would be for new readers. After all, big continuity is often cited for keeping new readers from trying comics. But here's the thing: There's an unspoken assumption among just about everybody that a new story produced about the same characters usually follows logically and chronologically after the last one, whether in comics, movies, TV, novels, whatever. (There are exceptions, such as prequels, remakes, etc, but they are generally understood going in, and I don't think your super-consistency idea is intuitive enough to be understood so easily.) So do you really think that the idea that writers can come along and do whatever they want as long as they stick to two sentences about the character would make continuity less of a problem for people who aren't as familiar with things as you?

2. Regarding 100% compliance: Just because I want to keep comic book continuity in its classic sense does not mean I'm totally rigid all the time. For instance, I am perfectly happy if a new writer comes along, doesn't like the last guy's run, and just generally takes the character in a different direction (although sometimes that leaves a lot of hanging plot threads, but I grit my teeth and move on). I'm not saying he or she has to reference every event that's ever happened to a character.

I'm also happy if he or she comes along and writes a good story that somehow addresses (fixes, ret-cons, whatever) what he didn't like. But I am not happy if said new writer comes along and, deciding he didn't like it, ignores it by generally contradicting what just happened. Viper with magic falls under this category. Yes, it was a stupid idea, and no, the writer shouldn't be stuck with it. But how hard is it to imply a solution, for instance, that magic Viper was an impostor? It doesn't even have to be a focus of the story; I can think of a few ways it could be done in a single panel.

3. I know continuity errors happen. It's okay, I certainly don't know everything that's happened to every character, and I don't expect a writer to. But I think writers (and editors!) should try to avoid them. It shouldn't be so hard to do a little research into the characters you are writing (especially if you are getting paid to write them!). In fact, if you did, you might actually come up with even better story ideas than you had to begin with! I know, when I read a Handbook or something like it, sometimes among all the details it occurs to me that there might be a good story just waiting to be told. (One reason I don't buy the less-continuity-in-the-name-of-creative-freedom-which-MUST-equal-better-stories concept.)

An occasional continuity error is GOING to happen. But when they stack up, or they are just really bad ones (Shaw with telepathic powers, to use bravely's example...even though I don't specifically recall that, it's convenient) it makes things feel...sloppy. And no one wants to feel that what they are reading is being written sloppily.

Having said that, errors are no reason to go about re-inventing the entire concept.

4. I think it's funny, Joel, that you cited the return to the old numbering as a sales gimmick, but say nothing about relaunches. Because that's all they are: a sales gimmick. A new number one never had any implications for continuity until, arguably, recently. And frankly, they annoyed me even before that.

5. There is already a format(s?) in which this system is already basically in place, and most people are fine with it. Most of today's original graphic novels (and prestige format, if you even think they are all that different other than in page count) are actually already relatively continuity-free. (And none of them rank very high in the list of best stories ever.)

[Joel Phillips]

Before I get going Red, I just wanted to say: you should seriously consider writing a rebuttal column and submitting it for a future edition of One-Shots. I think you’d do a good job with the topic.

1. Maybe I'm just totally not understanding this concept, Joel, but are you saying you'd really be okay if someone new Spider-Man writer came along, wrote a story in which Gwen had never died (no resurrection, etc, she just never died), but Peter was still married to Mary Jane? Because it sounds to me as if that's the kind of craziness you are advocating.

Would I have a problem with it? Not if the story were good, no. Am I advocating it? No, I don’t advocate specific creative decisions… unless I were that new writer that’s not my place. I can’t personally think of any stories to be told that would require Gwen around having never died, but the fact that I can’t think of any doesn’t mean that none exist, or that I wouldn’t be interested in seeing them.

So do you really think that the idea that writers can come along and do whatever they want as long as they stick to two sentences about the character would make continuity less of a problem for people who aren't as familiar with things as you?

If every run is its own beast, absolutely. Let’s say you are a new reader, interested in Spider-Man. You grab two Spider titles, which happen to be Amazing and Ultimate. As a new reader, you have absolutely no way of knowing that Ultimate is a separate universe. But if you read both titles, you quickly realize they are not consistent. The Spider-Man stories of Ultimate Spider-Man don’t jive with the Spider-Man stories of Amazing Spider-Man. What are you to think? The novice comic book reader will come to the simple and logical conclusion that the two separate titles are telling two separate stories with the same characters. And they’re right, that’s exactly what they have.

Now assume that you picked up Amazing and Spectacular instead, and we’re operating under the new model of continuity I’ve been talking about. Isn’t that exactly the same scenario? Two separate titles that don’t jive, which the reader will naturally (and correctly) assume to be separate entities with the same characters. Why is that more confusing for a new reader than what we already have with Amazing and Ultimate?

I should point out that I’m not one of those people who cite big continuity as a reason why readers can’t get into titles. Unless the average issue is riddled with editorial notes and consciously self-referential content, the average new reader couldn’t care less about continuity, pro or con. I think continuity only makes a difference to new readers when it gets in the way, and by and large most titles these days don’t let that happen. And with each run acting as its own entity it certainly wouldn’t be a problem.

2. Regarding 100% compliance: Just because I want to keep comic book continuity in its classic sense does not mean I'm totally rigid all the time. For instance, I am perfectly happy if a new writer comes along, doesn't like the last guy's run, and just generally takes the character in a different direction (although sometimes that leaves a lot of hanging plot threads, but I grit my teeth and move on). I'm not saying he or she has to reference every event that's ever happened to a character.

I'm also happy if he or she comes along and writes a good story that somehow addresses (fixes, ret-cons, whatever) what he didn't like. But I am not happy if said new writer comes along and, deciding he didn't like it, ignores it by generally contradicting what just happened. Viper with magic falls under this category. Yes, it was a stupid idea, and no, the writer shouldn't be stuck with it. But how hard is it to imply a solution, for instance, that magic Viper was an impostor? It doesn't even have to be a focus of the story; I can think of a few ways it could be done in a single panel.

I understand, but I fail to see how it’s BETTER to rewrite/retcon history than to simply ignore it and move on. Has there ever been a good retcon? Even things we want retconned are retconned poorly, because rewriting history is always a bad idea. The momentary gritting of your teeth that something was simply ignored is almost always better than the lasting sour taste of a sloppy retcon… and most retcons are sloppy retcons.

But beyond whether or not a retcon can be done, should it? I think this is where our core disagreement lies. You see every writer’s run as a continuation of a single, endless continuum. For that reason you want consistency, and explanation for when consistency breaks down. I see writer runs as independent entities with, at best, tangential connections between them. I don’t expect a writer’s run to be consistent with the runs of other writers, so I don’t expect them to explain themselves when they aren’t.

3. I know continuity errors happen. It's okay, I certainly don't know everything that's happened to every character, and I don't expect a writer to. But I think writers (and editors!) should try to avoid them. It shouldn't be so hard to do a little research into the characters you are writing (especially if you are getting paid to write them!). In fact, if you did, you might actually come up with even better story ideas than you had to begin with! I know, when I read a Handbook or something like it, sometimes among all the details it occurs to me that there might be a good story just waiting to be told. (One reason I don't buy the less-continuity-in-the-name-of-creative-freedom-which-MUST-equal-better-stories concept.)

First of all, I never said less continuity MUST equal better stories. I said less continuity means more creative freedom, which it does… there are a limited number of things which can be done in continuity, which by definition limits creative freedom. I also said that creative freedom means better stories, which it does… I don’t think anyone can argue that creative freedom is BAD for stories. Is it possible to write stories that follow continuity strictly and are great? Of course, I’ve read many of them. Is it possible to write a story with maximum creative freedom and stink up the joint? Of course, I’ve read many of them too. But more creative freedom is always a better place to start than less, and one of the biggest areas where creative freedom is hampered is with regards to the maintenance of continuity.

Beyond that, you are again raising something any writer or editor CAN do, but providing no real reason why they SHOULD. I don’t dispute that any good writer CAN work within continuity, but why SHOULD they? Except for pleasing those readers who do care about continuity, what is the virtue in its use? Research requires effort, and effort requires something to be gained in order to justify it. So what does the writer gain from researching and tailoring their stories to continuity?

Having said that, errors are no reason to go about re-inventing the entire concept.

I agree. I think that a better reason to re-invent the concept is because there’s more fertile creative ground by doing so. If you read my last post, with the stone tablet/paper analogy, you’ll see that supercontinuity not only allows for as little continuity as the writer wants, but also for as much as they want. You can still have runs that are faithful to pre-existing continuity, if that’s what the writer wants. But they also have the option of ignoring continuity when it suits them. The new model does not destroy the old model, it simply makes it one of many options instead of the only option. I think that’s a good reason.

4. I think it's funny, Joel, that you cited the return to the old numbering as a sales gimmick, but say nothing about relaunches. Because that's all they are: a sales gimmick. A new number one never had any implications for continuity until, arguably, recently. And frankly, they annoyed me even before that.

I wrote a column about relaunches being a cheap gimmick ( http://www.comixfan.com/xfan/forums/showthread.php?t=25733). As with many of my columns I’ve grown into a different mindset since I wrote that, but the core idea behind it I stand by: #1 reboots are frivolous sales gimmicks unless there is a creative reason to do so. And as I discussed a few posts up, if we’re going to have each writer run exist as its own entity, that’s an acceptable creative reason to start a new volume.

5. There is already a format(s?) in which this system is already basically in place, and most people are fine with it. Most of today's original graphic novels (and prestige format, if you even think they are all that different other than in page count) are actually already relatively continuity-free. (And none of them rank very high in the list of best stories ever.)

I’m fine with it in any format. And I deny the assertion of your final sentence. “Whatever Happened to the Man of Tomorrow?” is a top ten Superman story, and it was written right in advance of Crisis with a full awareness of the fact that it would be dumped from canon immediately. “Last Avengers Story” made our top 40 Avengers stories list, and “Dark Knight Returns” is often considered THE best Batman story ever written and is at least in everyone’s top five. Those are all firmly out of continuity, and all pretty high on their respective lists.

[raul grau]

Before I get going Red, I just wanted to say: you should seriously consider writing a rebuttal column and submitting it for a future edition of One-Shots. I think you’d do a good job with the topic.Red, I second Joel's comment. I haven't participated much in this discussion (frankly, I think you're all wrong, but that's just my opinion ;)), but I have noticed a lot of well-written and eloquent debate from you (and bravelybravesirrobin, among others). So if anyone here is interested in voicing their opinion(s) in column-form, they should feel free to submit to me.

- Raul

[Ovid]

I don't buy the less-continuity-in-the-name-of-creative-freedom-which-MUST-equal-better-stories concept.

They don't always, but neither a comic book industry based around continuity nor one based around individual stories can guarantee good quality stories. It is in fact a question of how we, as consumers, prioritise our comic buying. I do so by quality, not character or continuity. This doesn't mean I can't enjoy continuity references where they occur (in Runaways, for example), but they're just an added bonus for me. I'm not against continuity (that would be silly); it's a question of priorities.

As Joel pointed out, if you prioritise on the basis of a character's history, then it's hardly any wonder that the comic companies turn out dross, since they know you're going to pick it up anyway. These companies need to make money, and by going for quality over continuity we would likely get more good comics. They'd never all be good, but I suspect more would. That wouldn't stop creators putting together good comics in continuity. On the contrary: continuity would be used more carefully and imaginitively if the com