What's The Tallest Toadstool at Marvel Right Now?

Something I realized earlier this week was that there are really only two Avengers book coming out from Marvel this fall, Avengers and West Coast Avengers. Which is quite a turnaround from those years during the Bendis and Hickman runs where they slapped "Avengers" on everything. Avengers Arena, Avengers A.I., like four different Secret Avengers titles, New Avengers, etc.

But these things tend to be cyclical. Before the Avengers were the big deal, it was the X-Men with 47 different related books for over a decade. Then they were cut back - slightly - during the Avengers' rise. Other groups pop up from time to time. The success of the first Guardians of the Galaxy movie prompted Marvel to slap Guardians on something like 4 different books at once, which ultimately didn't work. They tried making the Inhumans a big thing, relatively speaking, gave them 3 or 4 monthly books, which really did not work.

And now we're at the current point. Inhumans is down to a mini-series, Death of the Inhumans. The only Guardians book this fall is Asgardians of the Galaxy. And Avengers is down to two titles, as mentioned. But X-Men Gold and X-Men Blue both seem to be ending, which leaves just X-Men Red. I guess X-Men Black could turn out to be some Evil X-Men book, but so far it looks like a bunch of one-shots starring X-Men villains. There's also Champions, and Runaways, but as far as team books go, that's about it.

Maybe that's because we're in the middle of Infinity Whatever. Once it's over, I'm sure Marvel will rearrange the deck chairs to throw a bunch of new titles out, reflecting the sorta new status quo for the next 4 months. That'll maybe clarify where Marvel thinks they're going at the moment.

Although maybe the answer is "solo titles". Spider-Man's got a ton of related books out there right now. Deadpool still has a couple, ditto Black Panther. The X-Men do have several of those, or at least some mini-series. The Inhumans have a couple, although it isn't as though Ms. Marvel or Moon Girl pay more than occasional lip service to either of them being Terrigen-affected. I'm hesitant to describe Thor or Iron Man books as "Avengers titles", since those guys (and Cap) tend to have their own book whether they're Avengers at the moment or not.

Maybe people just want to see the specific characters they like, and not have to deal with them in a team setting where they might only get a little panel time and be shoehorned with characters the readers hate. Solo books barely seem able to spare room for subplots with supporting characters at the pace stories go, what do you with a team book where theoretically there are six or seven leads? Somebody, more likely a couple of somebodies, are going to get the short end of the stick.

It isn't as though books at Marvel pay more than passing attention to each other. If you're writing, say Deathlok, and you want Thor to show up, it doesn't matter if he's supposed to be off-world at the moment in Avengers.