RKMBs Forums .::Robegories::. Comic Books Marvel, 1978-1987: Great BECAUSE of Shooter? Or in spite of Shooter?

This comment by G-man elsewhere a few days ago got me thinking:




There was an incredible pool of talent at Marvel in the late 70's and early 80's, doing some of the best work of their careers:
Michelinie/Romita Jr/Layton IRON MAN
Claremont/Byrne/Austin X-MEN, and the best selling title for 20-plus years after
Duffy/Gammill/Villamonte POWERMAN/IRON FIST
A great run on AVENGERS by Shooter/Perez, then Michelinie/Byrne, then Michelinie/Perez, then Shooter/Bob Hall (issues 141-220 roughly)
Moench/Sienkiwicz MOON KNIGHT
Bruce Jones/Brent Anderson/Armando Gil/Ron Frenz KA-ZAR
Stern/Romita Jr AMAZING SPIDER-MAN
Mantlo/Hannigan/Milgrom SPECTACULAR SPIDER-MAN
Mantlo/Golden/Broderick/G.Kane/Guice MICRONAUTS
Mantlo/Sal Buscema ROM
Byrne FF
Miller/Janson DAREDEVIL (and later Miller/Mazuchelli DD )
Marvel's Graphic Novel line
EPIC ILLUSTRATED
the Epic Comics line, in particular Starlin's DREADSTAR
Simonson's THOR run
Layton's HERCULES miniseries
Marvel's HULK magazine improved and went from b& w to color, with some really nice color and fun stories.
MARVEL PREVIEW magazine got much better in its anthology stories, and soon the title officially changed to BIZARRE ADVENTURES.
Joe Jusko began doing covers for these magazines, as well as interior work for EPIC ILLUSTRATED


I think in general the stories and creative teams improved under Shooter, and I was certainly buying more Marvel titles on a regular basis --and thoroughly enjoying them-- than I ever did before or since.
Despite strong continuity, I found it much easier to pick up ongoing storylines, and get into them. There were no crossover events that went through every series until SECRET WARS (which ironically, despite Shooter's general pressure for single-issue shorter-span storylines, was the onset of lengthy smothering crossover events that he initally discouraged)

So... in your view was it because of, or in spite of Shooter that this was such a great period for Marvel?


Feel free also to list any great series you like from this era I might not have listed.

I would argue that the moment of Shooter's departure marked the beginning of "the artist is EVERYTHING" mentality, where storytelling ceased to have as much importance, and Marvel's books under Jim Lee, Rob Liefeld, Todd McFarlane, etc., just became 22 pages a month of pin-up pages disguised as a story.

I think Shooter's tenure as editor-in-chief postponed the takeover of that mentality, which after stealing the soul of Marvel, then transplanted itself to Image Comics, and largely infected the entire industry.

Sure Shooter was hated by artists like Marv Wolfman, Roy Thomas, George Perez, Doug Moench, Gene Colan and a few others (who all left for DC, 1980-1982).
Sure Shooter was unquestionably arrogant and a jerk in some of his dealings.
But I think overall he was responsible for a general improvement on the runs of titles under his editorship, bringing consistency and editorial vision to Marvel that it really hadn't seen since Stan Lee left the helm.

I mourned the loss of Thomas' CONAN and Wolfman's TOMB OF DRACULA, Moench/Day's MASTER OF KUNG FU and Moench/Sienkiewicz's MOON KNIGHT. But only MOON KNIGHT was still at its peak when these runs ended under Shooter, and I have to agree that the others had stagnated and weren't as exciting.

Like Infantino's tenure as editor-in-chief at DC (1967-1976), Shooter was an accomplished comics creator who, while not always a nice guy, had a good business sense that arguably made him uniquely qualified to take the helm at Marvel. But not without pissing off and likewise driving away some of Marvel's best talent.

The rise in quality occurred under Shooter. The decline began almost immediately after he was fired. That's pretty conclusive, right there.

Yeah, a few guys like Byrne and Miller butted heads with him. But if you look at their work for Shooter and their work after, most of their best stuff occurred while working for Shooter (the only exceptions being Miller's stuff on Batman in the mid-80s).

Shooter seems to have been lacking in people skills (probably because he came up under the legendarily abrasive Mort Weisinger at DC) but unlike the EIC's who followed him, he understood story structure and insisted on it.

I agree. Byrne's MAN OF STEEL and SUPERMAN were a sharp decline from his FF work just previous to it.

I never heard of Miller having clashes with Shooter. I credit much of the playful humor in Miller's DAREDEVIL run and overall quality of the stories to editor Dennis O'Neil contributing to the plotting. But Miller had originally intended to do his RONIN series for Marvel, until DC gave him (my best Marlon Brando voice) an offer he couldn't refuse. At a convention, he disclosed he was making 300 dollars a page for pencils alone! Plus writing, plus inks, plus royalties...

Maybe you know something I don't, but i never got the impression that Miller left Marvel for DC for any reason other than a great offer. And he did come back when Shooter was still in charge (1985-1986) to do DAREDEVIL: BORN AGAIN (DD 226-233), and ELECKTRA ASSASSIN 1-8, plus a few other graphic novels and other stories.

I recall Miller getting all bent out of shape with DC (circa 1987) when DC wanted to put warning labels on their "mature" material, along with Wolfman, Chaykin, and Moore. I never saw that as censorship, just letting readers know what they were buying, and thought the four of them were being ridiculous about it.

You are probably right about Miller now that I think about it. I was thinking Marvel was the company he butted heads with over the rating system but it was, in fact, DC.

None of this makes up for him giving us Joe Quesada, IMO.

Or Secret Wars II...

Shooter only used him as an artist. He didn't let the guy write. And that was post-Marvel in any event.

Doesn't matter, started career.

Claremont's X-MEN, John Byrne's FANTASTIC FOUR, DeMatties' "Kraven's Last Hunt" / "Who is the Hobgoblin?" era of SPIDER-MAN, and Walt Simonson's THOR are, for me, the very best MARVEL runs in the 1980's.

The Hulk would find its true voice with Peter David in the late-80's early 90's. Captain America's solo book was all over the place in the 1980's due to various political and public sway of Conservatism, Reagan's America, and the (ultimate) end of the Cold War. Thus, no writer really knew what to do with Steve and keep the wide demographic readers happy. Eventually having him quit to avoid working as a crony for the US Government was probably the truest expression of the character in that decade.

The Avengers are known for the "Korvac Saga" and "Kree-Skrull War" that occurred in the late 70's/early 80's of that book. But, after that, they struggled to find their direction. I think the team went through about three or four "leaders" and creative staff during that era. However, the whole "Masters of Evil/Attack on Avengers Mansion" storyline, where Hyde beat Jarvis near to death and forced Cap to watch (also ripping up Steve's only pic of his own mother, thus forcing tears from the soldier....and my young self....at the end of the story) and put Hercules into the hospital can be considered a true classic of the 80's.

Claremont's X-MEN is its own pinnacle, and I don't think I need to point out how extraordinary was Chris's early vision for this book. It went from a canceled book that published only reprints of itself, to becoming the second-greatest franchise (under Spider-Man, himself) MARVEL Comics has ever managed to create.

Spider-Man books have always, always been a crapshoot. I don't know of any single writer who you can point at just say "HE gets it, he gets Spider-Man" in the same way you can say "Claremont's X-MEN" or "Byrne's FF". But, J. M. DeMatteis gave us a really intense story with "Kraven's Last Hunt". The most serious and honest approach to any Spider-Man villain of the time. It actually revolutionized the way writers treated his rogue's gallery after that, implying and retconning sympathetic and nuanced facets into Doc Ock, Sandman, etc. That alone puts this up there as an 80's Classic. The whole "Who is the Hobgoblin?" mystery from the mid-80's era, before the "Kraven Hunt", was just really damn fun mystery storytelling for its time.

Then there's John Byrne Fantastic Four. He took a very tame, one-dimensional concept book and truly defined what we know as the FF today. This was the era we gained She-Hulk as a priceless Marvel character. This was when the Thing stretched out into his own book. This was when Susan Richards went from "Invisible Girl" to "Invisible Woman". This was the era Franklin was born, we saw what lengths Reed would go to in protecting his family. I could go on, and on, and on. But, if you've never read the sublime John Byrne-era of The Fantastic Four, then you've never actually read The Fantastic Four.

Same goes for Walt Simonson's phenomenal opus in THOR. This man was the writer/artist for an era of Thor that stepped him back and away from the Stan Lee superhero stuff, and steeped the character into a fresh approach to Norse lore. Like reading The Odyssey for the first time, I would compare Thor's journey through Simonson's run as a truly definitive tempering of what makes Thor Odinson tick. Who and what is he, beyond his godly position and royal seat. Not to mention, Walt really fleshed out his adversaries, such as the Enchantress and, mainly, The Executioner. Let's just sum it up like this: Walter Simonson is the only...and I mean only....writer that can get away with making The God of Thunder into a fucking frog for multiple issues, and you come away thinking 'Badass.'. Damn, DAMN good stuff! Highly recommended. I just bought the Omnibus from Amazon. Check it out.

P.S. Fuck Jim Shooter. He was a pompous, bullheaded opportunist who rode his wave of fame on the backs of industry greats.

I think Malice was my first foray into the world of BDSM.

MINE TOO!! I was JUST thinking about Susan Richards possessed by Malice when I was writing about Byrne. Talk about shared childhood memories...

Franklin was born in a Kirby/Lee annual. SHAME ON YOU PRO.

All true, ALL TRUE!!!!!

I meant Susan's second child that miscarried or something....I think? I don't know. I remember Doc Ock and Doom involved. DAMN YOU SWISS CHEESE MEMORY!! NO MORE QUANTUM LEAPING AL(lan1)!! NO MORE!!!!

I know Shooter isn't popular in many circles but Marvel did produce good comics while he was in charge and he gets some credit for that. Without good strong editorial stuff just falls apart. Sure good stories still happen and talented people have more freedom with a weaker editorial hand but as time goes by it just gets to be a messy hodge podge IMHO.

Pretty much. Using Byrne as an example compare his work as edited by Shooter and his work everywhere else.

Shooter was, probably, a good editor-in-chief. Mainly because the more "horror stories" I hear from creators about his tight continuity requirements just means that he was forcing them to do their jobs. I have no beef with that. And, compared to the modern market, appreciate such a (now)quaint idea. But, as a writer, it was absurd he got paid money for anything...

I think it's required that we can't agree on stuff G-man , so I will point out that Byrne did have some good stuff after that. Particullary some limited series like Generations for DC and the one for Marvel that documented the superheroes that appeared before the Fantastic Four. However I concede that for the most part there was a big drop in quality.

As for Shooter, can't help but to admire the guy's talent and hard work. I think he came dang close to making a bunch of obscure Gold Key characters as big as some of the Marvel and DC properties. It was also a treat seeing him back writing the Legion again too. If one of the big two was smart enough they should offer the guy a line of books and let him run with it.

Really? His runs on the Legion and Avengers are really standouts for me personally. Are you thinking more of the Secret Wars stuff?

I am. But, then again, I missed the Shooter-Legion era, and never thought his Avengers stuff was that great. So, maybe I'm in the minority on his writing.

80's Marvel had some of the best stuff but most for me was reading retrospectively because I didn't start collecting until the late 80's with the beginning of the Cap quits/John Walker Cap story,Kraven's Last Hunt and the Evolutionary War Annuals(which really hooked me into the Marvel Universe). I was die-hard Spidey and FF fan first and then branched out as I got more familiar with characters.The first issue of Iron Man's Armor Wars (#225) an issue of Thor in which it was him vs. the Celestials(which made me a fan of Ron Frenz for life). Alex Saviuk was who I preferred as Spidey artist and Romita Jr.s Daredevil was the standard. Byrne was winding down his Superman run before I even knew who he was,but my Dad had given me a huge stack of FF before I started collecting and it was mostly Byrne's take that made me a fan of FF,but I started with the Crystal & Ms. Marvel FF team and still enjoy that run. John Buscema was on Avengers but I loved the West Coast Avengers more.Inferno is the greatest X-Men crossover ever and Spider-Ham is the best back-up feature of all time.

I started with MARVEL back in the AMAZING SPIDER-MAN days when they first introduced characters like 'Hydro-Man' and 'Madame Web'...



But, I didn't branch out into comic books, in general, until I discovered two DC issues at a Kroger grocery store:





Beyond Saturday morning cartoons and "Super Friends", THAT was my introduction to DC Comics and my collecting comic books.



Hell yeah, man! While that's a bit into my collecting era, I totally remember The Captain's run. Walker losing his parents to the White Supremacists (suitably fracturing his already type-a psychological issues and giving Marvel their 'Guy Gardner') was subtly brutal for a Captain America comic. Not to mention, I was constantly waiting for Rogers to just come back and kick his ass. I don't think they fought until...



...right? That was also when they made the Skull Rogers' physical equal, if I remember correctly. Cloned his body, I think? Anyway, it was the kind of progress with the Red Skull that I liked. I mean, I know it's a comic trope to have the hero with the brawn's arch-nemesis be the villain with the brain. But, Batman/Joker is good enough. If Cap is known for being the very best hand-to-hand fighter on Earth, then he should have an arch-nemesis who puts that to the test, every single time. That's why I liked what they did with him in the movie.



Wow. And see, I've always viewed those Evolutionary War issues as some of Marvel's worst annual crossover events. Up there with Atlantis Attacks and World War Hulk. But, each their own. Did you ever read "What If? Vol. 2 #1" from that era? "What If...The High-Evolutionary Won the War"? Where humanity jumped a ladder rung? It was pretty good. Terrible art, though. Probably Al Milgrom.



The Armor Wars was awesome!! Isn't that the run where Tony has the Red-Silver (Centurion) armor and Rhodey has the Red-Gold? Right before that, one of my favorite covers of all times...





Whoa! Memory flashback! That was near when they made Ben Grimm all spiky, right? And didn't that Ms. Marvel chick (this was the one who WASN'T Carol Danvers) also become, like, "She-Thing" or something? I remember Grimm being excited about being able to fucklove another person because she was as ugly as he was. I think.



Amen! Simon Williams FTW!



Insanity! You must have missed The Mutant Massacre...



If Groo the Wanderer never "backed-up" a title, then I agree 100%.

I didn't get into DC until I read an issue of Superman that Byrne wrote and Mike Mignola drew and then the Invasion crossover is what hooked me into the rest of the DCU.

As for Steve Rogers vs. John Walker,the first time they fought was when Walker was Super-Patriot a bit before #332(I think #327 but not positive) but as Captain vs. Captain America,yes #350 was the showdown between the two.Red Skull became major bad-ass and the issue also had a John Byrne drawn back-up explaining how the Skull ended with a cloned body of Steve Rogers.

In hindsight & having re-read the Omnibus,yes the Evolutionary War doesn't hold up that great but for me,all the characters were new and exciting and I had no clue who people were so I still hold it fondly as a story.Yep the What if? issue was better than the whole original story and I dug it immensely.

Red/Silver armor Iron Man is my fave armor hands-down.

I did miss the Mutant Massacre

I don't believe Groo was a back-up and his run in Marvel's Epic line was awesomeness. MULCH!!

My favorite Iron Man armor is the Hulk Buster one, in the sense that its only purpose is to give Hulk something to smash.

Was that the annual? Where the Kryptonite radiation wave was finally reaching Earth, and Supes had to go underground to hope the lead of a mine or something would protect him. He got all fever-induced and beat the shit out of poor Man-Bat. I remember that being a Mignola. I'm sure Grimm could tell you. He has Mignola cataloged in his head like the fucking alphabet. Otherwise, I don't think I remember Mignola & Byrne on Superman. Or at least, I don't remember Byrne writing Superman without drawing him, too.



Just got that in collected trade, as well. Honestly, it doesn't hold up very well. And McFarlane's early art looks dated as hell now. But, it's a near dip back into a DCU that had a more-or-less cohesive universe, with C, D, and E-Listers making A-List status in book plots. The years of Captain Atom being the go-to guy for leadership in the DCU (since Superman was still something of a "newbie").

However, the whole Superman-encounters-The-Daxamites-punch is still pretty awesome.



Right!! Ah memories. I wonder if I still have that issue...hmmm...



Fair enough. That's how I felt about books like CRISIS. I mean, back then, just getting a book with that many "new" characters in it, in a jumping-on point destined to go down in history, how could you not like it?



I just remember humans all get big-brain-heads, and there are panels of ethnic and cultural stereotypes all walking around shaking hands like it's the fucking 'It's a Small World' ride at Disneyland. Neat story, though. Especially for the bullets-over-brains era.



Word. And the movie came so close with the racetrack armor. But, I like the literal "shell-head" design of the Centurion armor.



As a fellow human, I suggest you reading this. It's now considered to be the literal "ending" of the Byrne/Claremont "All New X-Men" era. After that, everything about X-Men changed. And it never quite went back to be the same again.



This is why you are AllanONE and the rest are AllanNONE.

The Byrne/Mignola issue was Superman 20 or something, continuing a short Mignola sequence from Action 600. Mignola also did the World of Krypton mini written by Byrne, which is awesome. This issue is sort of a sequel to that.

Boy I sure hope a famous list comedy website doesn't mock that Captain America/The Captain thing soon.

Yep,it dealt with Superman hitching a ride with Hawkman and Hawkgirl to what looks like a reformed Krypton but turns out to be a buttload of Kryptonite that was pulled back into a planet shape.Supes dons some specialized space suit to check it out and ends up having a kryptonite-fever dream about what would happen if Kryptonians had fled Krypton before the planet exploded.It was a pretty decent "What if?" type story and I rememeber at one panel,Mignola had drawn Jor-El to look so much like a GA/George Reeves looking Superman it was awesome. Anywho,it's what more or less plugged me into the Byrne-era Superman.



(GA=Golden Age)

Pro-I did end up reading Mutant Massacre a long time ago when I was a back-issue huntin' fiend,but I missed it when it first came out so Inferno ended up being my "Gateway"(no pun intended)into the X-Men and therefor my all-time fave X-over.The best thing I did,was to get all the Essential X-Men volumes that collects the whole "All-New X-Men" from Giant-Size #1 up through Inferno(vol. 8 I think).

Right on Invasion.Much like The Evolutionary War,the actual story is dated and doesn't hold very well but at the time it was soooooooo much fun to read and to get every book that Invasion was in(the whole DC Super-Hero line if I remember). It led me to liking Wally West more than Barry Allen as the Flash,the JLI under Giffen/DeMatteis is better than anything currently JL and all the other coolness that went along with the DCU and turned me from being a complete Marvel Zombie.

yeah, the Man-Bat/Mignola sequence is from Action 600. under Byrne, Action was Superman Team-up and 600 was an oversized issue. the main storyline is Superman and WW and iirc they fought Darkseid? I think Perez inked Byrne on that. interesting but weird mix of styles.

Mignola also did the immediate issue of Superman following Byrne's departure with Roger Stern on the script. they followed up a Byrne plot on the Silver Banshee character. good stuff.

Cap 350! Byrne did the backup feature with Red Skull, revealing how he'd gotten a Steve Rogers clone body. yes. this is mainly significant because Keiron Dwyer, who'd taken over art on Cap not too long before was Byrne's stepson at the time, and was living in the same NY apartment that Byrne had lived in when he drew Cap in the late 70's? that's from a Comics Scene interview with Byrne from this time period.

In addition to Editorially managing Marvel, I liked the way Shooter personally jumped in to do the grunt work to improve a series when he felt it was slipping below standards.

Shooter actually pencilled a few issues of SPECTACULAR SPIDERMAN back in 1980-1981, before it picked up an exceptional writer/artist team in Mantlo/Hannigan/Milgrom in issues 59-72.

Before Shooter became editor in chief of Marvel, Shooter had an exceptional (I would argue definitive) run in AVENGERS issues 150-180, mostly with artists Byrne and Perez, with an occasional fill-in issue by others.

Then Michelinie had another exceptional run with Byrne in 181-191, then Michelinie/Perez had a good run too from 192-202, but declining in quality.

Shooter took over writing the series again and made it a very engaging book again from 203-220, despite some very mediocre art (Gene Colan, Bob Hall) on a number of those issues. Where Yellowjacket was wracked with professional jealously, abusing his wife, and otherwise cracking up. I also enjoyed a two-part story (AVENGERS 217-218) Shooter wrote focusing on Tigra, where she doubted her ability and worthiness as an Avenger.

Shooter, along with like-minded writers of his tenure like Roger Stern, Dave Michelinie, Bill Mantlo, and Claremont at his best, fully capture the Stan Lee-brand of quaintness and normalcy that Stan Lee introduced with Silver Age Marvel, where the heroes had flaws and self-doubt and everyday problems, that bred great ability to identify with Marvel's characters, as well as really fun and humorous quirks.

I liked the way Shooter looked for what he percieved as the weak links in Marvel's line, and personally intervened to improve them.
In several cases just listed and others, Shooter's personal contribution drew warranted attention to greatly improved series (AVENGERS and SPECTACULAR SPIDER-MAN).

Does anyone else remember this issue? I love this one panel of Hulk literally standing on Simon's head, driving it into the ground with the line : "Oof! I wonder what poor people are doing for fun this year?!"

Even as a kid, I found the line odd. But, the scene itself is awesome...

SPOILERS: Hercules ain't Thor. Simon's simply not tough enough. Iron Man is a guy in a tin can. And that's fucking Namor...King of Atlantis...taking the fight into the Nevada Desert. Where there is no water. At all.

Hulk bitch-slaps every single one of them.

because he's the fucking HULK!!!!!!!!!!!

..as drawn by John Byrne!!! Seriously,back in the 80's and early 90's,it seemed Byrne was all over the place,and his all-too brief run on the Incredible Hulk was pretty entertaining stuff.

I recall Byrne had a brief 6-issue run in INCREDIBLE HULK right before he left Marvel to do MAN OF STEEL, SUPERMAN, and ACTION COMICS for DC.

There was a great HULK ANNUAL Byrne did (inked by Bob Layton, 1978, if I recall)

And around the same time as Byrne's INCREDIBLE HULK run, Byrne did an all-splash-page issue Hulk story in MARVEL FANFARE. Fanfare was another project to emerge under Shooter's reign. And a big part of Shooter's great era was the great crop of editors working under him at Marvel at the time: Dennis O'Neil, Jo Duffy, Mark Gruenwald, Archie Goodwin, Louise Jones, and Al Milgrom.

Some of the credit I give to Shooter surely deserves to be shared with them.

Milgrom and his "Editori-Als" were a very fun part of that era, as a part of the books he edited.

Shooter was also influential in MARVEL FANFARE, and in the line of Special Edition reprints, that were among the first published in a high-quality offset printed format:

STARLORD SPECIAL EDITION (Claremont/Byrne/Austin's first collaboration reprinted)
S.H.I.E.L.D. SPECIAL EDITION (Steranko)
CAPTAIN AMERICA SPECIAL EDITION (Steranko)
WARLOCK SPECIAL EDITION (Starlin)
CAPTAIN MARVEL SPECIAL EDITION (Starlin)
DOCTOR STRANGE SILVER DAGGER series (Englehart/Brunner)
MICRONAUTS SPECIAL EDITION (Mantlo/Golden)

This was a first step that led to other offset-printed series, and Epic Comics.

When Shooter took over Marvel in 1978, HULK magazine was black & white and had stories re-exploring early-Marvel-era, circa 1963.

Under Shooter, HULK magazine (issues 10-up) went to single-issue stories that were more interesting and in line with the HULK tv series, with really nice art by Wilson/Alcala, Mcleod, Zeck, and especially the Moench/Sienkiewicz Moon Knight backups, all unprecedentedly colored by Steve Oliff.
Which led to a separate MOON KNIGHT comic book series, that gave us 30 increasingly beautiful issues by the Moench/Sienkiewicz team.

MOON KNIGHT went direct-only in fall 1981.
As did KA-ZAR (Bruce Jones/Brent Anderson).
And MICRONAUTS (Mantlo/Broderick).
All great additions to the emerging direct market, another breakthrough during Shooter's reign.