If it wasn’t for Jim Shooter’s guiding hand, marvel comics probably would have went under earlier that when they filed for bankruptcy. He was and still is one of my favorite editors in comics
So Jim Shooter wanted to do Marv Wolfman's original idea for Crisis on Infinite Earths. For DC's 50th anniversary they wanted to throw out all continuity and start over, and for Marvel's 25th anniversary they wanted to throw out all continuity and start over. I think I'm glad we only got the New Universe.
Ngl, the most I know about the New Universe was when Linkara mentioned briefly during his Exiles retrospective, so this is going to be a very educational experience for me.
That’s what Marvel did with the Marvel U.K. line in the 90’s. In the comic stores each title was its own series but in the U.K. each titles where part of an anthology called Overkill. It had Death’s Head II as the lead story, written by Dan Abnett.
Maaaaaaan, listen. I cut my teeth on Star Brand (later “The Starbrand”) and while it had some major problems, that beginning was full of so much mystery, I was fully engaged with the possibilities of what The Brand really was, who The Old Man really was, etc etc. John Byrne really took something interesting and went way out into the deep end. Wasn’t a fan of the baby killing Duck at all btw. That was just shock for shock sake. I also disliked the “He’s all three guys” concept. That aged like milk. The white event and black event juxtaposition is very interesting and wish it was expanded into more detail and what it meant. Anyways, I could talk about Kenneth and his strange pals all day.
Shooter concept of the Star Brand started falling apart in issue 5 when Debbie went nuts. When the Old Man came back in issue 6 and went mad, Shooter had ran out of ideas. What was good about Star Brand was Ken Connell and his sex buddies, since that was based on his real life. Debbie was based on one of Shooter's girls. When Shooter left, the girlfriend threatened to sue and Debbie's name was changed then removed.
Very interesting to learn that the creative teams behind the New Universe books were meant to be high-profile outside hires, but instead ended up being over-worked members of Marvel's existing creative stable. I'd never heard that before, but it explains so much. Excellent, fascinating video as always, Owen!
I was heavily into the comics world in 1986 and was excited about the idea of the New Universe. You could tell within just a few months of the titles coming out that there was very little cohesiveness in them which just made it feel like something that wasn't going to last.
I remember the launch of the New Universe as if it was yesterday. My younger brother and I bought all the comics, posters and whatever else was released back in 1986.
Squadron Supreme mini series also came out about that time. Well done, by the way Owen, 85-86 was when I was really getting into comics and remember the New Universe well, not fondly, but well. Thanks
the new universe was such a interesting idea for marvel comics that I am actually sad it never got a chance to thieve similar to marvel's ultimate universe before that crashed and burned too but that's just my opinion.
Hey, I am here to talk about Valiant universe. Another superheroes/villains world having their own comics. It deserves more attention. They have many characters like Bloodshot, Ninjak and others.
Thanks for making this! I fell in love with Hickman’s versions of Starbrand and Nightmask back in 2014 and it sent me down a rabbit hole of having to find and read every new universe book I could. You’re definitely right that the quality isn’t quite there in terms of most other things that we’re coming out in 86, but there’s something about that universe that I like and I’ll always have a soft spot for
I met Jim Shooter at a con I went to this year and he gave me the most brutally honest advice about writing comics I ever heard. If you don't write you will never make it as a comic writer or really a writer at all.
You know it's kind of funny. Paul Reed Smith the guy who started PRS electric guitars said basically the same thing. It boils down too... You can't be good at something unless you're willing to be bad at it first. That got me to write and publish my first novel. Maybe it's a bad novel, maybe it's not. But if I didn't write it and I didn't publish it and I didn't let people read it then I'd never get any better. So go out there and do something. It's a risk but if it's what you want to do, you got to do it.
@@roydekock656 fair enough. I prob went at you too hard. I clearly wanted to rant against memes as a sad hivemind that stifles creativity and individuality. That doesn’t mean you deserved to be my target. My point stands, but sorry for coming at you like that.
I started reading everything in the Marvel digital archive during the pandemic, I'm still not finished yet, but Jim Shooters time as editor-in-chief really stands out as one of their best eras. The comics suddenly felt fresher then they had since Stan Lee held the position, artists started to break out of the house style, and the company finally stopped interrupting storylines with random one-shots because someone missed their deadlines. I thought the New Universe started alright, but quickly went downhill. I really liked the first several issues of Star Brand in particular, so much that I even went out and bought some physical copies of the first few issues (don't worry, they were cheap). Part way through the series though, it starts to just feel weirdly mean spirited. It seems like the writer almost actively hates the material they're creating and want to punish the reader if they had been enjoying the comic up until that point. It's really just unpleasant, and that's a shame, because I think it started with a ton of potential.
Agreed. I liked Shooter's first six issues or so of Star Brand, but after Byrne took over he was clearly trying to destroy the character out of spite. It's not as enjoyable after that.
Great video, excellent breakdown! I was largely unaware of the New Universe, except that watching your video dredged up memories of some long past late night Wikipedia diving I did into the subject ages ago. My only qualm is that I'm surprised you didn't mention Marvel's *new* Ultimate Universe is operating on the same "real time" concept as the New Universe did, which is a pretty intriguing connection, now that I see it!
@@eddiejoewalt7746every editor has their flaws, doesn’t change the fact that he was good for the time he was in. I’ve seen the video, so don’t tell me to go watch it, it doesn’t change that fact
As great as Milestone Comics was, it was still a universe that leans more towards fantasy rather than science fiction. If characters don't age it's not science fiction. Valiant Comics , Broadway Comics and Big Entertainment Tekno Comix are the only comic book companies since to attempt to create a science fiction universe/multiverse.
@@afroscifizianzcomix7836 Fair, but I was referring to "the world outside your window." concept. Far from an exact match, but those and Vertigo Comics were still closer than everything else I saw at the time. The New Universe felt like the old universe if it was ashamed of itself.
@@juststatedtheobvious9633 I can agree with you about Vertigo. Both Shade The Changing Man and Hellblazer had "world outside your window " settings. I also remember John Constantine celebrating his 40th birthday.
@@afroscifizianzcomix7836 I'll just say that Milestone had a book about an inner city gang that featured characters far more relatable to where I was living for a good chunk of my life.
@juststatedtheobvious9633 I have the entire run of Blood Syndicate. My point was that in order for a "world outside your window "you need to have characters that age and as much real world physics as possible. In both Static: The Rebirth of Cool mini series and Milestone Forever two issue series the characters hadn't aged a day since the 90's. That is NOT science fiction.
The more i hear about this pitch of a more real world take and the paranoia of the unknown AND a huge world event triggering these powers, my mind goes to Heroes from NBC.
I’ve always said that the new universe type stuff should be a secondary MCU type arrangement. Not as much hype or knowledge behind the characters, so more can be experimented and the budgets can be smaller.
Time in the comic moving relative to real life? Never heard of such a concept before, but I guess it shows just how creative this universe was. Someone should try recreating that concept. I can see it working really well in an ARG or something.
The new Ultimate books are actually doing something similar! There's an 18-month ticking clock to the Maker returning, and each new issue is set a month after the previous one.
The MCU actually used the concept. Each movie thru Phases 1 thru 3 was set so that the year in the movies linked up so it was the same as the year of the films release. Captain America ended shortly before the events that started The Avengers, and Captain Marvel’s end credit scene was set just after the events of Infinity war.
It's an interesting concept that i think would only work if done by a single person and not by a large group of writers, that's where the problems start.
The most famous example is probably Hellblazer. Constantine aged a year every year and the passage of spurred a lot of plot developments. I'll always remember the birthday cake cover.
This was an interesting side path back in 1986 and a bit of 87. I found and bought a few of the early issues of things like dp7 my favorite -and Justice. I love the way Owen says Spider-Man
Spent a year collecting and 2 months reading it all last year. It's pretty impressive the way they brought all 8 titles I to the 4 issue The War at the end. Some very cool point of view stuff happening and paved the way for the modern "comic universe". You didn't mention that Byrne hated Shooter and immediately upon his promotion made Starbrand, who was created and inspired by Shooter himself, the villain. They constantly attacked Shooter in the pages of the Universe he created. Very petty, dramatic stuff. Rock on!
Man, I bet if Shooter got the budget for the type of writers he wanted it would've been a totally different story, I mean the stories during his era are some of the best, but his fully realized new universe would've been something else for sure
14:00 (Night Mask) this one sounds kind of interesting. I could sort of see this guy going up against a Freddy Kreuger style antagonist that's messing with people's dreams and lives. Sort of like a Dream Warriors sort of scenario. And each issue is a new person's mind he's going through with a new environment with new rules and art styles with stuff going on and stuff. I don't know. At least that's what this makes me think of without looking into this. That's where my mind goes with a premise like this.
I was curious about the New Universe when the ads for it popped up, but when it actually was released, I just didn't care enough to do more than read an issue at one of the local convenience stores it was being sold, and then pass on the rest.
Maybe the initial ad should have been "expect the expected. " As a young teen i couldn't get into these titles. I dont remember how many issues of the New Universe i had, but every Nightmask cover in this video makes me feel like I had it.
I read all the first issues of New Universe and stayed for the whole run of Starbrand and DP7 which are amazing books, true hidden gems. It is important to mention also that Jonathan Hickman brought back some of the New Universe characters for his Avengers titles in countdown to Secret Wars.
As a comics, reading kid, I adored the new universe. I was too young to have any idea about why it existed and my brother was the one choosing all of the comics and I was just reading what he bought. But I loved them all, and I felt every bit of what they were trying to do in terms of making it feel more realistic.
I think Hickman's Ultimate Universe borrows a few elements of Shooter's New Universe. It also has a focus on telling stories in real-time and a White Event-style point of deviation from real-world history with the Maker's rewriting of history from 1961 onwards.
Good balanced video. After all the years of people dumping on the New Universe, it's nice to hear someone halfway defend it. On the other hand, I think you're too hard on Shooter. I don't know if he was so bad or if it's just the people who say it. Consider this: in your video, you mention how the new team destroyed Pittsburgh. Jim Shooter is from Pittsburgh, so this tells you something about the maturity he dealt with. Have you thought about Epic Comics, Marvel's other failed imprint?
This was supposed to be the New DC titles published by Marvel. Marvel was in the process of acquiring the rights to publish DC titles, but it was dropped because pf a lawsuit by First Comics.
I was really excited for the New Universe when it launched. Read almost everything for about four months and grew tired of nothing feeling "New". I can understand Marvel canceling a few of them, they just didn't connect or seemed like more monthly slog compared to what I was reading from Eclipse comics. I had also become entranced by Dave Steven's work and also Dark Knight Returns, so the New Universe felt cobbled together without as much care as newer things. I wish it could have been a stronger approach to storyline, but it just felt hurried and budget. Great video. Jim Shooter deserves praise for getting event stories off the ground.
I read quite a lot of the New Universe titles. Some of them were good, two were really good (Psi-Force and DP7) but there was a lot of bad stuff as well. Also, the whole 'No advanced technology' thing really Seemed to stick considering Spirfire and the Troubleshooters was basically We have Iron Man at home.
I must have collected a bulk of the New Universe books a couple of years after their release when my local IGA grocery store began selling those 3-packs of comics for 99 cents. You were guaranteed to get at least one NU book amongst the three.
I will always have a fondness for the New Universe. The first time I bought comics, I was in a bookstore (we had those back then) and walked by one of those rotating wireframe comics racks (we had those back then...they resulted in damaged comics), and mostly on a whim decided to give comics a try after having rolled my eyes at them for most of my young life at that point. I picked up 4 comics to try based almost exclusively on cover art. It was an issue of Uncanny X-Men, X-Factor, Psi-Force, and DP7. And I loved all four of them. Psi-Force and DP7 were, IMHO, the class of the New U. The psi-hawk was pretty dumb, but everything else about these books reached right into my scifi loving brain and hooked me. I later added other New U books, and went back and got back issues of the entire New U run. Psi Force and DP7 really were the only ones worth collecting, and even they ran off the rails later in their runs. Justice had SOME appeal, but limited. I never really like Star Brand and didn't understand why this book, which I deemed one of the worst of the bunch, was the standard bearer.
Did I hear Comic Tropes? I'll never understand the idea of making superhero comics more "grounded" by removing the fantastic elements. Part of why I read Superman and Doctor Strange over Batman and Iron Man is that I like superpowers and magic. I wouldn't buy New Universe for the same reason I didn't enjoy the version of Deadpool who showed up in the Ultimate Universe; it's not written for my tastes.
I have a theory that the New Universe even extended into Marvel's movie endeavors. "Spitfire and the Troubleshooters" appears to have been just as much an inspiration for the movie BIG HERO 6 as the Marvel title that bears it's name. In fact the plot of the film and it's aesthetic has more in common with "Spirtfire" than the comic version of "Big Hero 6". Both the movie and "Spitfire" are about college student geniuses becoming superheroes by inventing suits that give them superpowers. The MAX suit that was the signature character of the comic bears a remarkable resemblance to the Android Baymax, they even share a similar name. In the run up to the release of BIG HERO 6 there was no mention of "Spitfire" and no mention of it since then, so this is just my theory but I would say it has a remarkable set of coincidences that give it merit. What do you think?
Also I feel like I’ve said this before but thank you so much for what you, you are genuinely a big part of how managed to stay sane during C19 and I am forever greatful!
I remember getting first issue of Star Brand, the first title of The New Universe and going, "Hey, this is just a copy of Green Lantern!" Some of the other titles were a bit engaging, but that first disappointment killed much of my enthusiasm.
Great video as usual! Any thoughts on the “death” of the Beyonder in Secret Wars II coinciding with the White Event that birthed the New Universe? Was that ever a possible link or just timing?
That's a really good point! I looked into it and a fan did submit a letter published in a DP 7 issue asking if the two were connected. Gruenwald said no in his reply, but I don't think it's a pure coincidence that Shooter would write two very similar White Events so close to one another.
I worked on the first 12 issues of these New Universe titles-StarBrand, Jvstice, Night Mask, and Kickers Inc. I was hired as an assistant editor shortly after the original editorial team was fired from the project. Everything was late and all titles were well behind schedule. Archie was late, Shooter was late, Englehart had his work rewritten by Shooter and DeFalco was late as well. Jvstice # 1 was reworked in a weekend by Art Nichols, Janet Jackson, Rick Parker and the production staff in the bullpen. Add in the fact that Shooter was overbearing and drove talent away, there wasn't much real talent to pick up the slack. Titles were sent late to the printer resulting in less time on the newsstand as well. The editor i worked for was never in the office, had horrific personal issues, and put in minimal effort. Shooter was indeed canned on April 15th 1987 following a near mutiny of the editorial staff who were sick of his overbearing ways. DP7 was the only consistent title which is why it lasted as long as it did. Byrne got on Starbrand to essentially trash Shooter any chance he got. He blew up Pittsburgh-Jim's hometown. Petty as all hell. Embarrassing to be around too. What a disastrous run...
Your contribution despite how horrible the experience was was definitely worth it. You are part of Marvel comics history and based on your comments here I've got multiple follow up questions. Especially about Jim 😂 ...its always been my dream to work in the comic book industry, you have at least done that, be proud of it and wear that experience as a badge of honour. You have worked with legends. I salute you.
Excellent video jim shooter is one of the most polarizing people in comics. This is an example of a good idea but poorly executed but the concepts and ideas of new universe still resonate today
I'd be down for a smaller scoped Starbrand line with far less characters as a part of the new Ultimate Universe. A Starbrand led title with the other 3 main White Event characters and over time a small handful of others.
I think this shows how important a single creative vision is to comics when a canon is getting its start. Stan Lee was directly writing 5 or 6 comics, with some heavy help from his Marvel method sure, but his creative vision and single direction can still be felt on every title. Be had time to hash out what the X-Men, district from Avengers and F4, were at there core and what their corner of the universes adventures felt like before passing the torch to other new writers who had been following along. And your definitely right the steep competition was another key part in defining this universes failure. You can't just create a complete fresh but average standard comic canon and hook anyone's interest when more interesting radical concepts were being explored in other fresh canons like Watchman. The Watchman gave us a reason to take a break from reading the heroes we were already invested in to read about this team set in another world were overpowered heroes got sent to Vietnam changing history, heroes who were very human in all the worst ways possible.
9:18 oh yeah, I remember seeing that logo for years in a bunch of comics I had from the 80s. was curious what that was. Due to the lack of internet I never found out or had an idea of what this was until maybe like 3 or 4 years ago when i came across another video essay on this topic. I'm not entirely sure if this would've been a series I would've wanted to read. But i did love the red lightning logo and promo they used. It was red cool and mysterious. Also I think red lightning just looks really cool as just a basic like and stuff, no real deeper thing. 😆
I want that MICHEAL GOLDEN marvel universe poster !!! Gimme Gimme Gimme!!!! I enjoyed Starbrand and D.P.7 I liked Hickmans use of Starbrand and Nightmask in his Avengers run.
