One of the best things about today’s blog culture is getting some behind the scenes glimpses as the thought processes behind our favorite pop culture topics. IDW editor Andy Schmidt delivers on that in a big way with his latest “Blargh” post on Comics Experience.
Going into great detail about the thought process that went into continuing the Marvel universe with G.I. Joe #155 1/2 (turning into an ongoing series with #156), and also talking about where Devils’ Due fits in (it apparently doesn’t), and also what target audience this new book is geared towards. You might be surprised. Click the “Read the Rest of this Entry” link below to check out the full text of this revealing post, or you can just hit up Andy’s blog site right here. Big thanks to The Terror Drome for the heads up!
“So, there’s been quite a bit of buzz and I anticipate a bit more after Free Comic Book Day. But Larry Hama is returning to his original continuity with G.I. Joe. The original series ran an astonishing 155 issues. For any comic, that’s huge. For a licensed book, that’s unprecedented.
So, I figured I could say this all in some interviews, and I’m sure I will, but I thought it might be fun to peal back the curtain a little bit to give you guys a glimpse at some of the business side of things on how a project like this happens.
Let’s be honest, there are many fans who have wanted Mr. Hama (yes, I call him Mr. Hama when talking about G.I. Joe) to return to his original continuity for a long time. So, before we get into why it’s happening now, its probably just as interesting to ask and then answer (and I can really only guess) why it hasn’t happened before?
After Marvel stopped the publishing G.I. Joe, the comic book license languished for a while before Devil’s Due picked it up in 2001 (someone feel free to fact check me there). DDP launched their G.I. Joe series, under license from Hasbro, same way Marvel did, with a continuation of the continuity that Marvel had established. Fans were happy about this. DDP decided to give it a five year gap between Marvel’s #155 and their own first issue.
But what DDP didn’t do was bring back Mr. Hama. Instead, they used their own creators. Which, to my mind, is totally valid. No argument from me on that. But eventually, they brought Hama back.
If I was to speculate as to why no one has done what IDW is doing with G.I. Joe before, I’d guess that Hasbro was probably not all that interested in looking backwards. While the company is very much aware of what has come before and upon whose shoulders G.I. Joe as a brand was built, they also are looking for what to do next. Strategically, from a business standpoint, to do any different means death in the market place.
DDP lost the license roughly two years ago. IDW Publishing quickly snatched it up and relaunched the franchise with a fresh start, geared more towards adults. I was hired to edit the relaunch and took a hand in shaping it from that perspective. The new relaunch (now in its second year) has been very well received and is doing great. Hasbro is happy with it, as is IDW and most fans are into it, too. There’s no doubt it’s been a success.
So, why now, would we want to “look back” at what has come before? Well, the answer to that is pretty simple, we don’t see it as a look back. We see it as diversifying the line. Mr. Hama is not under any strict marching orders, but his book was originally intended for a younger audience and the universe he originally created is good for that. Oh, there are adult themes and some adult violence, but that universe lends itself to a more colorful approach.
So we’re reaching out, not just to the old-school fans from back in the day, but also to put a comic out with G.I. Joe on the stands in a format that’s, in theory, appropriate for a younger audience. Any parent shopping for his or her child should be cautioned that G.I. Joe is military fantasy. So a parent may not feel it is age appropriate. Please read the content before handing it to your young child. I recommend that for any and all comics, but it’s worth noting here again.
When I initially took the idea of continuing G.I. Joe: A Real American Hero to Mr. Hama, I asked him at what point in the time line he’d want to pick it up. He suggested right after issue #155, where it originally ended. I then asked if ti would fill in the gap between that issue and where DDP picked up five years later and he said he didn’t think that was a good idea. He’d rather not be tied down to what DDP published. I agreed. Did I mention that I call him Mr. Hama?
And that’s how we got to the point where we could relaunch G.I. Joe: A Real American Hero.
Now, before we got cooking on it, I spoke with Mr. Hama about the notion of competing with his own nostalgia. Or, more accurately, with fans’s nostalgia of Hama’s work. That’s a really tough thing to go up against. But Hama turned in the plot and we took it from there. He’s right on target and the comic very much feels like an older Joe comic, without actually being exactly like one.
Choosing artist Agustin Padilla to handle art chores was a big help in that regard as well. He brings a kinetic sense from the 90s but is also able to tell a compelling story. He’s got a lot of flash on top of his storytelling substance. I think he’ll turn a lot of heads in the months to come. It’s no easy feet to jump into a book that is so well loved. It’s intimidating, and I’ve seen some artists get stage fright from such a gig. But not Agustin. He just dived right in and made it his own from day one.
Whether you’re a long-time Joe fan or a someone interested in trying out the latest G.I. Joe book, give this a try on Free Comic Book Day (first Saturday of May). It’s free after all, and it just might capture a feeling you haven’t experienced since 1983.
Andy”
Pretty cool. Love reading this stuff.
Fantastic interview/post. Thank you! 1 week til FCBD and #155 1/2!!
Nice interview. Thank you. I have been a long time fan of G.I.Joe since it first cme out when I was a kid. As far as Hama coming back . . . well, I think that sucks. I mean he had a good run a long time ago and even that was iffy because of his stance against the cartoon (which did more for the line than the comic.) Here is a comparison for you, Claremont was good on te X-Men back in the early 90’s right? Well, he is on X-Men Forever and that book is one of the worst I have ever read! I figure Hama will go through and kill off any ‘toon’ aspects he dislikes then throw in all his B.S. military jargan so that way kids will not want to read the crap. Also, He will probly have Storm Shadow jump back and forth 30 times and start beating all the dead horses from his previous writings. At least DDP tried to do something new and work with the fans. DDP even gave us Serpentor for awhile! Do you think Hama is gonna do the same? Be careful what you wish for fans, you just may get it.
Not sure what to think about this interview.
For one, I was happy to see that there were no disrespectful comments/shots at DDP. For many of us, IDW has quite a ways to go until they match the best DDP offered (mainly issues 20 or so up to 43 of the original run).
What gets me is that IDW seems to think their title is more adult oriented. How so? If I had to say one thing that annoyed the crap out of me with the new comics is that they are written to “seem” adultish to a fourteen year old. They are NOT adult oriented comics. Everything is contrived, characterization is glossed over and the whole thing comes off seeming empty and hollow like most modern Hollywood movies. There is no soul in any of it. I have yet to see anything that touches on adult topics (like true right and wrong, beliefs, love, etc, etc)
Given this as the alternative I’ll take the “kid-oriented” world of Hama or the original run of DDP anyday. Sure, they never tackled adult themes or plastered every page in stylized, dark and crappy art but they had extremely entertaining stories that kept me interested.
It does follow a trend though, like I said modern movies are like this too. Dark, gritty, emotionless and without moral direction. I don’t know what rosy little worlds everyone else lives in but when I want to escape from this crappy world, reading about more of the same only from some naive fourteen year olds point of view, really doesn’t do it for me.
High adventure is a lost art these days. And apparently I’m not the only one who thinks so, otherwise Avatar wouldn’t have crushed every other movie in history. There’s nothing intelligent about the “Pocahontas in space” storyline, but it tells an intense tale that does grip your attention for a very fun ride with awesome visuals, just like the old GIJoe comics did (and some of DDPs comics did as well).
Fact is, after the first twelve issues of IDW’s main Joe title I can’t shake the feeling that the whole story could have and should of been told in one double-sized first issue. Never been more bored reading Joe comics. And news flash for the IDW team, Joes fighting robots is boring, unless they are BATS who are the front wave of a Cobra invasion.
One week.
I eagerly await Hama’s return. While the preview art showed us that the artist they chose doesn’t know crap about the GIJoe universe hopefully time will fix that. Or better yet, they get Rod Whigham to take the reigns again and all will be right with the world again. lol.
I understand the first issue is for Free Comic Book day, so I’ll be picking it up, since it will be free, one can’t loose on such a deal. But I already know I won’t be following it any further than that, for the simple reason that I don’t need yet another continuity in GIJoe comics.
Though a part of me is curious how they are going to make a kids-oriented version of a comic where they consider the one with an underground city, robots and a teleporting MASS-device that’s straight from the cartoon, to be the adult version.
ya Im happy with the DDP run, had they had hama pick up from the end of the DDP run or fill in the gap between the marvel/ddp series then Id be all over this new series. Right now, ill watch and if the issue doesnt contradict DDPs stuff too much ( I dont mind small/slight retcons ) Ill buy it, but once they do something that totally contradicts the DDP stuff and there is no way to fit it in, im gone. like the poster said above, dont need ANOTHER continuity to follow. I like one, the Marvel/ddp one.
What a shame it is to throw away GI JOE declassified , Snake Eyes declassified, Master and Apprentice, and ect. Be a bigger shame if this series only lasted 12 issues and they canceled the DDP series for it.
Its too bad really too because I do have all the respect in the world for the IDW crew, they put out the best art, colors, paper quality, books . They have larry too and they are great guys, Im just not a comic book reader. The whole reason I read the DDP series is because it was a continuation of my childhood and I had the first half of the story and wanted to continue to read it to see what happens. Now they want me to throw away those 100 plus issues? ( in essence ) no thank you.
Nice interview. Thank you. I have been a long time fan of G.I.Joe since it first cme out when I was a kid. As far as Hama coming back . . . well, I think that sucks. I mean he had a good run a long time ago and even that was iffy because of his stance against the cartoon (which did more for the line than the comic.) Here is a comparison for you, Claremont was good on te X-Men back in the early 90’s right? Well, he is on X-Men Forever and that book is one of the worst I have ever read! I figure Hama will go through and kill off any ‘toon’ aspects he dislikes then throw in all his military jargan so that way kids will not want to read the stuff. Also, He will probly have Storm Shadow jump back and forth 30 times and start beating all the dead horses from his previous writings. At least DDP tried to do something new and work with the fans. DDP even gave us Serpentor for awhile! Do you think Hama is gonna do the same? Be careful what you wish for fans, you just may get it.
Anyone recommend a good subscription service provider for this title? Is it on the IDW site?
While I do sympathize with those that are burned out by having yet another continuity created, I am curious to see how Hama handles things. I am also curious to see if he uses anything from the aborted Anartic Press relaunch in the 90s.
I’m wondering if this does good enough if we’ll get a series detailing the Devils Due run if it had been allowed to follow Jerwa’s ideas.
Okay, first of all, I for one am tired of the “Mr. Hama” crap where these guys are constantly kissing his @$$ like he’s the be all and end all where GI Joe is concerned. I have some news for you, he isn’t. Shocking I know, but really, he isn’t. He was the LAST guy they asked to do it and he, like anybody else trying to get work, wanted a regular paycheck, so he took the gig. Could’ve been anyone, but it was Hama. Also, understand that he knew going in that he’d pretty much have to do what Hasbro said to do, because GI Joe belongs to them and always has, not Hama, not that punk Blaylock, and certainly not these gimps at IDW. I say this because I am forever and a day hearing Hama whine about how he hated this or that, about either the cartoons or what Hasbro made him incorporate into the books, as new toys came out. Guess what Larry? The comic was and is a monthly advertisement for, get this now, a TOY LINE… I know, two shockers in one day, can our hearts take it?
In order to sell the toys, kids needed to see the stuff in cartoons and comics so they’d rush out and buy them. Then of course, the comics sold themselves simply because there was an interesting storyline with fun characters based on the toys they’d bought, so they could see them in action, so to speak, even if they couldn’t see them on TV 24/7, as the toons went 5 days a week for only 30 minutes a day, at best. We didn’t need to see guys getting killed or hear tons of trumped of military jargon to enjoy either the comics, toys OR cartoons, we just wanted to see our favorite characters and read/watch the stories that let us see them in action.
I mean seriously, did ANY of us really believe that the real military would allow garishly clad individuals to run around on a battlefield wearing bright yellow, red, blue or purple suits, wearing missile launchers on their backs or swinging a football on a stick?! Nope. Did we REALLY believe, even as kids, that everyone who ever got shot down in a jet or helicopter or whatever was going to survive this? Uh-uh. Did we really believe that a girl tossing an explosive javelin tip could take a million dollar jet out of the sky without killing herself or the pilot? Kind of doubt it. Did anyone really buy that SE and Shipwreck could casually walk into a Cobra hang out with a wolf and a parrot and no one would recognize them? Or that they could sing or breakdance their way out of it in ridiculous 80’s clothes as disguises? No way.
Well, if you haven’t already guessed where I’m going with this, then I’ll tell you. It’s called a “suspension of disbelief”, which is to say that we KNOW it can’t happen or shouldn’t, but for the sake of the subject in question and entertainment value, we (in our minds) “pretend” that it can so that a story can be told to ENTERTAIN us, as entertainment is meant as an ESCAPE from reality, not to further entrench us in the everyday real world crap of people getting killed in wars and so forth.
Sure, we do need a certain amount of “realism” to set the background for believeability on even a rudimentary scale, but it does not need to get to the point of killing off characters left and right or ultra-violence or excessively contrived drama (like the new IDW thing with Duke/SE/Scarlett) or whatever. The difference between killing of main characters (read as those who have figures) and supporting characters or generic troop types (like Candy/Professor Appel or the various viper troop types and Greenshirts) is that supporting cast reach an end point to their overall usefulness, or were created to eventually be killed off once their role was played out, or in the case of common troops, there are always more to fill the ranks, not so with guys like Bazooka. Sure you can bring in a new guy and call him Bazooka, but it isn’t Bazooka, it’s just some other guy filling a spot, so we can’t just suspend those types of deaths, which really served no purpose other than to sate the death-mongers out there. Vehicles, like common troopers are a dime a dozen in comics and cartoons, so it’s fine to blow the crap out of them all day long.
See, the thing is, with Hama, and apparently other writers, if they don’t particularly like a character, they want to go and kill them off so they never have to deal with them again, rather than just simply not using them and leaving them as options for writers in the future to have access to, as well as the fans who actually DO like a character, such as Bazooka, Quick Kick or Doc or whoever else. That type of “kill them because I don’t like them” mentality, only hurts the fans who do like them and never really has anything to do with moving the story along, because no matter what Hama or anyone else says, the same story can be told with equivalent impact if they are more creative than to solve their dislikes at the other end of a comic or cartoon bullet. Now guys like CC, SS, SE, Zartan, when they get “killed” you know they’ll be back. How many times did CC get killed in the Marvel run? At least once or twice, but he came back, as did SS and some other guys too. Those things had a way in and a way back out and kept the fans happy while perpetuating the stories being told.
Now. This Schmidt character wants to kiss Hama’s @$$ like he’s some kind of god because he wrote the Marvel Joe series, with his “Mr. Hama” this and that. Who cares? In the last decade or so, he has been responsible for just as much crap as what good he did back on the Marvel series. Sure, he helped to set the Joe universe and establish the characters via the comics and filecards, but then he whined about it all and basically abandoned GI Joe, and then stabbed a significant portion of the fans in the back by his actions with the movie and the crap relaunch from IDW. Hate to be another one to say so, but the IDW series is NOT an adult version of the marvel days (slightly redone). No, if anything, it is another poor attempt at recreating what Blaylock tried and failed to do with GI Joe twice at DDP, first with Reloaded and then again with America’s Elite. The IDW series may have better art when Atkins is pencilling, and better colors, but that’s it. Aside from those points, it is uber slow with telling the story, a story that could have been told in a 4 issue arc at most and moved on to the next thing, and the dialogue is overcontrived crap pseudo-militaryesque tripe, all for the benefit of sounding authentic, while at the same time abbreviating every character’s codename in the field. I mean come on, what is the point of having a codename if some dousche is going to nick it down to a single syllable name because they are too damn lazy to say an extra syllable or two? That isn’t adult themed. That is simpleton themed with fake military terminology and general movie dialogue. The MASS Device cartoons were more interesting than their main title. Origins was terrible and apparently still is, while the Cobra title just plain sucks from the art right up to the story, but ESPECIALLY the art.
So, now you want to know the REAL reason why IDW decided to “diversify” their GI Joe line by going back to the Marvel contiuity? Yeah, it had nothing to do with diversification of the line, per se. No, it had everything to do with their so-called successful titles not doing as well as they want everyone to think, but they didnt want to admit outright the sales might cause them to have to rethink their strategy. So, they decided that they maybe should listen to ALL of the fans out here who think the relaunch sucks and aren’t AT ALL happy with it, and so they asked Hama to “suck it up, take one for the team, and go back to the old continuity”, since he’d already done what he wanted to do, which he admitted was to completely change GI Joe into what the main IDW title and Origins is. (Don’t believe me, go read some of his interviews.)
Also, consider Larry’s ego, is it any wonder he’s going to ignore all the cool and fun stuff that DDP did before Blaylock mucked it up with AE? No, again I’ll echo what was said earlier about there having been a great deal of the DDP stuff being far better than anything IDW has thus far produced in terms of story elements, much of the art too. Larry didn’t write the initial DDP stuff, so of course he wants to ignore it and not be bound by it, even though I seriously doubt that he’ll be writing this title, if it even exists for another 7 years anyway. Even if he does, thereis PLENTY of story stuff to tell that wouldn’t even infringe upon what DDP did, and he could even allude to some of it (coming to pass, kind of like the Star Wars Prequels) here and there where it was pertinent.
Oh, and to correct Schmidt, it was a SEVEN year gap between the Marvel and DDP runs, story-wise and in realtime too, not the five years he keeps repeating, which tells me he knows less about GI Joe than the 14-somethings IDW and the movie have been trying to draw into the Joeverse in one form or another. That being said, seven years in comics is forever, and again TONS of things could happen that wouldn’t even need to conflict with the DDP stuff, unless Hama is just dead set on being a complete dousche about things, as he seems to be more and more. The only thing I think we can expect from Hama and IDW right now, is that they will use every opportunity to kill off more older characters like Bazooka, and progressivley “update” the series to eventually be almost identical to the current main IDW series in overall content. The fans have apparently complained to the point that IDW felt forced (to some degree) to go back to what most of us feel is actual GI Joe, or we’d never even be seeing this new ongoing continuation from the Marvel run. So, I fully expect a begrudgingly concocted story to sate us long enough to have reason either to cancel the book again or morph it into the current series tone, as I just mentioned.
I reiterate, there is no good reason for IDW and Hama to NOT bridge the gap between the Marvel and DDP series’ of events, and then, if Hama does make it all the way up to DDP’s Joe #1 then by all means skip on up to the end of the first DDP series and continue on from there with the Red Shadows or what have you. There are so many things they could do without dismissing the DDP run, including mini-series to fill gaps elsewhere between the DDP issues and so forth.
For all of you out there who are so excited about Hama coming back and IDW taking this on, you really should listen to Storm Shadow, Hawkwinter and Jamar’s points on this. Hama is not the “GI Joe god” that many of you make him out to be. Now, he may do very well and surprise the hell out of me/us with this new series, but it has been my experience not to get too excited about something so great because it usually ends up getting flushed down the toilet along with my expectations. Based upon the art and initial story so far, I can see the artist is clueless about which characters are which, considering the dialogue says that Zartan disguised himself as a Crimson Guard, yet the artist draws us a HISS Driver, neither of which would ever have access to CC’s private chambers, because he is far too paranoid for that. Tomax, Xamot, Baroness or Destro, sure, but never a common soldier, especially one concealing his face, they could be anybody, geez! If this is what we can expect every issue, then we may be better off if they just forget the whole thing and we continue on with the existing continuity, which I may even prefer anyway.
I will say up front, anyone who knows me, knows that there is no love lost between me and DDP. I’ll be the first to say that I liked the initial series and a lot of the subsequent stuff with minis that came along as well. I even was okay with the Frontline stuff for the most part, if not completely. BUT, with that being said, I loathed, hated and detested from the core of my very being, America’s Elite, Reloaded and a few other things they did, not the least of which was the death of Lady Jaye for nothing more than a cheap sales ploy (which Blaylock first denied then later admitted). The art, the writing and especially the coloring was absolute $#!% once AE began right up until it ended, with only about 15% of the series being worth a crap. I will say that the pencil art wouldn’t have been as bad if DDP hadn’t been too cheap to use inkers to smooth up the artwork, or at least bother to run it through a filter to offer at least SOME distinction, but then on top of not using an inker to enhance the lineart, they used possibly THE worst computer colorist ever, in some lame attempt at making GI Joe a critically acclaimed artsy book with a “gritty edge”. So instead of actual COLORS on the pages, we got crap@$$ washes and dark, putrid tones mixed in to give us dirty, dark, murky art that could barely allow the pencils to stand for themselves. It was horrid, and I thought I’d celebrate the day that DDP lost the license over the WW III story/logo issue. Well, I did celebrate, for several months, thinking that no matter what, the odds were against the next company doing any worse than DDP had just done us, or Blackthorne’s 3-D crap before them or Dark Horse before that with GI Joe Extreme. Boy, was I wrong. Even still, I thought, “Okay, cool, IDW has the license and they’ve done great with Transformers, so GI Joe should be in good hands.” Again, boy, was I wrong.
Then we started getting tidbits and previews and my hope waned, more and more with each new detail. The main title art was decent, even good by AE standards, but the characters were not the same as we’d known and I knew I wasn’t going to enjoy the results, but still, I gave it a whirl in hopes I was wrong about that…But, no. The story sucked, it was uber slow, and the dialogue/characterization was for crap at best, and it hasn’t changed, so at least they are consistent with their suckiness, and that’s about the best compliment I can offer them at this point. Basically, as much as I hated DDP after AE began, I now hate IDW even more, and that’s saying something.
Schmidt is a bit of a lying schmuck if he thinks everyone is naive enough to fall for the “company line” BS. What he’s trying to sell all of you is very much like what Wal-Mart tries to sell with their “all about family, community and all that crap”, because it just isn’t true. Oh, and another bombshell for you, WM does NOT have the lowest prices anywhere. Maybe they used to, but not anymore, and not for sometime now, years in fact. I know, I worked there for over 5 years and learned a lot during that time about how they really operate. (Go check out a few expose’s on them and see for yourself how they treat the Chinese workers in their overseas factories, making all of their “made in America” merchandise. Yeah, all true. Just like the majority of Schmidt’s interview, blog or whatever is all about making you think that IDW is doing this for you because they felt it was the right time and the right thing to do. Ha!
This series will be the ONLY series I buy from IDW, where GI Joe is concerned, but like Jamar and several others, if it deviates too far from the marvel/DDP continuity, I’ll drop it like I dropped AE and IDW’s main Joe series and Origins. I refuse to support their crap with what little money I have to entertain myself, so what they give us had better be damn good from the get-go.
As was siad for all of you Hamanites, be careful what you wish for…