Relax, it's not really as deep as it's sounds, I just felt like doing one of those thesis-esque titles.
So in reading through the first 25 issues of Byrne's Namor series, West Coast Avengers and New Warriors, I've detected a sense of closure after that 25th issue. Like there was an overarching plot from the first, and now it's done, and they're moving on to the next arc.
With Namor, the first 25 seem to focus on Namor getting involved in the surface world, and dealing with parts of his past (his history of aggression, his dead wife, his time in WWII, etc.). Well, that and things Byrne had some sort of vested interest in (I'm still not sure why he was so intent on bringing Iron Fist back, but I won't complain). The 25th issue wraps up a lot of those things, and sets Namor off in a somewhat different direction.
The point of the first 25 issues of West Coast Avengers seems to have been to get a roster constructed, as well as deal with various psycholgical problems of the members (Wonder Man, Tigra, Hank Pym). Sounds a lot like New Avengers, except WCA actually involved time travel, Hellcat, and about a dozen different super-villains getting beat down (including Ultron and the Grim Reaper). And nothing as incomprehensible as the Xorn/Magneto thing. After 25 issues, the roster is set, one of the major villains of the first 25 issues is dealt with, but there's still some other threads left open to hit later.
New Warriors plot point seemed to be Night Thrasher, and what the hell was up with him. Throw in some bonding between the team, some confrontations tied into character history (Firestar/Hellfire Club and Marvel Boy and his dad), and by issue 25 Nicieza was pretty much ready to go from there.
I think Darkhawk had roughly the same scenario, with Chris Powell having found the truth about his dad's death, fended off numerous people trying to kill him, learned some of the ups and downs of herodom, and helped keep his family together, but by then he'd run into another person with similar armor to his, which raised new questions as you moved into the later issues.
This doesn't always happen. The adjectiveless Spider-Man series of the '90s didn't have an arc I could discern, but the book went through about 4 writers in 25 issues (3 after MacFarlane left at #16), and it was one of 4 monthly Spidey titles, so it was at least a little beholden to what was happening in those. It's hard to have a defining arc in those circumstances.
But why would writers go with 25 issues as sort of a wrap-up/jumping forward point? Did writers have to come to the Editorial with a plan laid out for the first two years of any project they wanted to kick start? Was it simply because it was a quarter of the way to 100 issues?
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5 comments:
I'm just spitballin', but a regular TV season has around 22 episodes. A lot of what you described usually occurs during a season as well - with the next season having a new overarching plot.
Or it could just be that it's a milestone/anniversary issue being that it's one quarter.
spitballin: I hadn't thought of the TV comparison, but that's a good point.
IIRC did Darkhawk's 25th issue really resolve anything? I remember being so disappointed with the payoff that I dropped the book.
dan: It may not have. I'm going from a general impression from the few issues out of the first 25 I've actually read, plus from skimming through issue 26, where Chris starts reflecting on what's happened so far.
So yeah, it's entirely possible nothing was resolved in that issue, but I think I was thinking that the book was moving past the "finding his way/finding his father's killer" stuff, to something else at that point. I could easily be wrong.
Well, the subplots with Chris' dad were resolved when "Heart of the Hawk" finished around issue #15; the chief issue of "Return to Forever" being DH's origins, and I remember feeling nothing was satisfactorily answered and Fingeroth had spent five issues building to nothing. My copies of the issues are long gone, though.
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