The nightmare is over. >Brian Michael Bendis has announced he is leaving the Guardians of the Galaxy comic book title, but Marvel already has a new creative team in place to succeed him. Bendis, who also writes Spider-Man, Jessica Jones, Infamous Iron Man and Invincible Iron Man, has written the series since February 2013. >"It was a couple of things," Bendis explained to ComicBook of his decision to leave the title. "Number one, I had an end story that I've been building to and it's time to unleash it. Number two, there were other projects offered to me that I was like, 'Oh, I do want to do that!' and something has to go. Even I have a bandwidth cap, even though no one in Marvel thinks that I do." >Though he's leaving, Bendis is taking the opportunity to work with the incoming creative team (whose names Bendis won't reveal, but who he says he knows "very well") and set up their run in his finale.
>The nightmare is over No, just moving to another Marvel book.
David Morgan
>The nightmare is over. It won't really be over until Bendis is dead.
Jaxson Smith
It's a team of internet personalities (that do some writing) that will do a good job of pushing Bendis' tweets outs
Jace Powell
>What will he fuck up before he leaves? Nothing that can't be undone. But depending on how much power he has over editorial decisions, whatever he fucks up may remain in place for a long while.
Bentley Ramirez
>whose names Bendis won't reveal, but who he says he knows "very well"
Hopeless
Hold on your butts.
Jaxon Walker
>It's kate leth and ryan north
Cameron Rodriguez
Likely this, this is Marvel after all.
Austin Cook
>Admitting you didn't really care and just took the title because it was "in" at the time.
Nice. It confounds me that people still buy Bendis books.
Joshua Carter
It's Jeff Lemire replacing him. Don't say I told you this.
Mason Barnes
What will he move into next? >Daredevil >Spider-Man (Ultimate) >Avengers >X-Men >Guardians of the Galaxy >Iron Man Check
What has a movie or show announced but no ongoing or announced plans? Agents of SHIELD? Ant-Man? Defenders?
Matthew Russell
>yfw he brings back Fantastic Four
Liam Mitchell
Defenders. It'll be Defenders and you know it.
William Brooks
DELETE THIS.
NOW!
Henry Wood
Will he manage to make is worse than Fearless Defenders though?
Noah Hughes
It'll be a different kind of bad.
Isaac Miller
I've been saying since secret wars he's gonna relaunch FF
Andrew Evans
I don't even care about the MCU trappings at this point, I just want someone who gives a shit about the characters.
Here's the recipe that made DnA and the movie so loved
>characters with actual personalities beyond their quirks >imaginative, high cosmic thrills and stakes >serious tone and threats contrasted with humorous, overwhelmed characters
Bendis failed because his writing sucks, especially in regards to the characters. His ideas for stories are okay but almost always underwhelming.
Humphries failed because he over-emphasized the comedy. If you think about DnA and the movie, one of the most important things is that the stakes always feel serious. The characters are funny and off-beat, but conflicts are never resolved as the butt of a joke (no, not even the "dance-off"). Humphries broke this in the very first issue of Legendary Star-Lord.
Honestly Zdarsky's first issue of Star-Lord got the tone and character writing just right, the only problem is the setting. I wouldn't be opposed to him giving the main GOTG book a shot.
Jordan Perry
I think the other big problem is outside Ewing, nobody gets Marvel cosmic right now. Cosmic Marvel is pretty much space America at the moment.
And blowing up Hala was the other dumbest move because constantly blowing up homeworlds/memorable planets at Marvel just means you have no iconic places left in Marvel space! It would be like blowing up Tatooine in Star Wars. You just lose the memorable planets.
Noah Robinson
why would Marvel do this to him after he was chased away with pitchforks and torches by the X-Mob.
guy is terrible on team book, even something not as entrenched in continuity like modern GOTG cast has distinct enough voices, you still can't get away with doing 0 research into the characters and telling the stories editorial wants you to write, like an upcoming Ego/Star-Lord retconpalooza, like he did in X-Men
Bendis has shown us GOTG isn't X-Men, the comic can't survive if the writing isn't at it's A-Game, big name talent isn't enough, they just don't have the characterfags Spidey, Deadpool and X-Men have to tolerate bad comics.
I'd be okay with BMB taking another crack on X-Men with Emma, the Cuckoos and his OC's Uncanny #600 wasn't really a great ending. just stay away from Dazzler.
>How did you come to the decision that is was time to depart Guardians of the Galaxy?
Brian Michael Bendis: It was a couple of things. Number one, I had an end story that I've been building to and it's time to unleash it.
Number two, there were other projects offered to me that I was like, "Oh, I do want to do that!" and something has to go. Even I have a bandwidth cap, even though no one in Marvel thinks that I do.
It was like, "Well, I could leave Guardians, and I could leave Guardians the month the movie comes out or the month before, giving the new creative team the opportunity to really blow the roof off the place,” and that's cool. The new creative team is one that I like. I want to tee them up in a good way, but at the same time, I really want to land my ending in a big way.
We were talking about it a couple of retreats ago and I said, "Well, I could have them stuck here on earth and in Civil War II" and then it ends with this double, if not triple-sized, final issue, which we're putting together right now. All the pieces fell together in the way that said I can leave in a big, classy cool way, and at the same time, get the new guys ready and give them a really strong push, because I know the new writer very well, I was able to go, "What do you want? What do you need from me? What don't you need from me? Who’s staying? Who's going?"
Since I’m taking Ben Grimm with me to Infamous Iron Man. I can write an issue that, describes his transition from Guardian of the Galaxy to agent of SHIELD and that's cool, and then I can do an issue that explores Gamora's quest. I have an issue coming where it's actually all about Groot being stuck on earth, but it's told almost like a Dr. Seuss kind of fable, in a way.
I'm actually getting really brassy and ballsy at the end here with the way we're telling our stories in the last few issues. Each issue is very different, giving Valerio [Schiti] a big send-off with a lot of challenges and then we're going to end on a big jam issue coming in the spring.
>Will that be the basic structure of “Grounded”? Each issue focuses on an individual character vignette, or is there a bigger story at play?
BMB: They're coming to terms with being on Earth and with everything that's happened to them so far, and starting their new quest because of Civil War II. At the end of each issue, something pretty surprising happens to each character. All of that will connect in the big final issue.
People are very curious about Angela and how she left Earth and now she's back on Earth, so all of that will be described. There’s a lot to do with the characters and having them on Earth which is a grand, fish out of water, Star Trek IV, cool way to explore the characters at their most dire. You take away their ships, you take away their toys, you just have them and what've you got? That's a fun ass way to write big chapters of each character that I love.
Leo Mitchell
>Your time on Guardians of the Galaxy is coming to an end, but the franchise looks like it has a long and bright future in front of it. When fans think of the Bendis run on Guardians of the Galaxy in the future, what do you hope it is remembered for?
BMB: I think Guardians is a lot like the X-Men where when you're on it, people are constantly worried about what you're going to do and screaming and carrying on and harkening back to some classic run that you should do now, and that if you're not doing exactly what's in that classic run, you're being upsetting. Then slowly but surely... Even the response the last few issues have been positive, and I think people are just finally getting used to my voice on the book. It feels like we're ending on a nice wave. I think when people see the final issue and the big showdown that's coming and where we're leaving the book...I’m making a concerted effort to leave big and for the statement of the book that I've been working on for all these years to have it's final moment and at the same time, setup for a new person.
Brandon Murphy
I think, hopefully, people will respond to it the same way they're responding to my X-Men run, which is the entire time I was on X-Men, they were screaming, “You need to get off X-Men,” then the minute I stopped, people are like, "You should go back to X-Men." That's what I'm thinking will happen. I do see a lot of similarity between the Guardians of the Galaxy fans and X-Men fans, where they're right to be worried, they're right to be paranoid, I get where they're coming from, but when the dust settles, they see that a lot of love and care was being brought to the book, though I may not have been imitating DNA [Dan Abnett and Andy Lanning]. They're like, "Write it like DNA". That's insulting to them, to imitate them. That's not what I do, that's not what they do. That's not how this should go. They'll see that my love for what DNA built was expressed subtlely by not imitating that much. My love for Daredevil was not expressed through imitating Frank Miller. That would be the worst thing I could do. I'm using the same respect for DNA that I have for Frank Miller in how I approach the Guardians, which is to do my own thing and at the same time, be very aware of what they built and how special it is.
Kayden Baker
>Now that you're leaving Guardians of the Galaxy behind, what's up next?
BMB: Here's the good news: we're planning our next year and the next year will be very different for me from this year. Already, literally the last week and a half has been filled with opportunities and excitement and new projects, some of which will legitimately surprise the fans over the year. We had a very fun 2016 with the debut of Riri Williams and the return of Jessica Jones and Civil War II and the fun stuff we've done this year. Now we have some opportunities in front of us that are so exciting I can't even express to you. I'm so excited that Hollywood and Marvel shuts down now for a couple weeks and it's the best time, so I can just sit and get work done with no phone calls and stuff and I'm so excited. In early January I get to drop what I've written on Tom and all my editors and I know it's all stuff we're very excited about. You're hitting me at a time where I'm so personally excited about what's coming and I'm so happy that everything debuted so strongly, including that Riri William's debut was so strong because there’s opportunity to take things even further and that's what we're going to do.
>We’re looking forward to seeing what’s you’ve got cooking for 2017.
BMB: You won’t have to wait too long!
Ryder Robinson
I mean, he's not wrong. There are some crazy stupid DnAfags just like there are crazy stupid X-fags.
The problem is just that Bendis is not a very good writer. I can't think of a single time in the past four years (!) when something he's written for Guardians has really grabbed my attention. I decided long ago, before Original Sin even, that Bendis' run is not in fact terrible. It's just offensively mediocre and bland to anyone that gives the Guardians more than a passing thought.
Julian Jackson
>I’m making a concerted effort to leave big and for the statement of the book that I've been working on for all these years to have it's final moment What did he mean by this? I'm actually serious, what did he mean by this? What statement? What exactly is the statement Bendis believes he's telling in this book? Because I can't think of any real consistent theme or message throughout his run.
Easton Morales
>because I know the new writer very well Well there goes any hope that Ewing is the writer. Who does Bendis know very well? Preferably somebody decent.
Joseph Phillips
He's still wrong because he's using a Strawman argument. Fans weren't complaining about him not imitating DnA, they're complaining about his blatant disregard to continuity and prior characterizations.
Lucas Perry
ANYTHING BUT DAREDEVIL FOR FUCK'S SAKE
Liam Lopez
>You won’t have to wait too long! in b4 new event announced in three weeks.
Colton Mitchell
He's taking Thunderbolts.
Adrian Ortiz
Oh god. There was a "leak" back in September here that said hed be leaving GOTG and Slott would take over the book. Gods help us.
Ryder Allen
You know what, I wouldn't mind Slott, his Spider-Man is at worst readable, I'm sure he'd do fine with GotG. But I doubt it's him, dude can would have to drop Spider-Man, he's barely capable of doing Silver Surfer. Unlike Bendis, he has limits to how much he can write per month.
Luke Taylor
There are a lot of "not muh DnA" fags that don't give a fuck about prior continuity or characterization either though. Just look at those crazy fucks over at Cosmic Book News. I'm almost ashamed to share my love of the Giffen/DnA era with them.
Jackson Ward
God I never wanted him to write like DnA (although that would have improved his comic) I just wanted him to fucking write an interesting cosmic comic and he failed at that.
I mean people want Ewing because he tends to have a lot of passion for what he's writing, he can follow continuity in a way that satisfies older fans and is friendly for newer fans, and can write Cosmic Marvel very well.
Ewing doesn't write like DnA or Abnett by himself, he has his own distinct form of writing but he was interesting.
Lets be real Bendis never cared for GotG, he had to be convinced to be on board and only wanted to ramp up his writer popularity by being in the hot new property, heck the fact that he admitted he wants to finish around the same month GotG vol. 2 comes out says a lot.
Christian Rodriguez
The only thing I can think of is that he's played up the Guardians as a family. Which I honestly don't mind, they are characters without real lasting supporting casts of their own and loss of family is significant to the ones that can talk. Hell, the last thing ever written about Classic Quill was that he came back to his dad after years of adventure because he finally realized that no amount of soul searching can replace the innate human need for love and kinship.
It was something the OG Guardians grew into as well, so I'm not against it happening to Quill's team. But Bendis is still a shitty heavy-handed writer, so...
Ian Powell
3 years of nothing
THREE FUCKING YEARS OF FUCKING NOTHING!
Jaxon Jones
Four. GOTG 0.1 was January 2013.
Robert Turner
Seriously. 3 years and any memorable stories or arcs? Bendis needs to stay in his fucking lane and keep to his pet projects like Miles, Riri, and JJ.
Joseph Flores
JUST GET EWING THE BOOK ALREADY
ULTIMATES 2 WILL PROBABLY GO TO CRAP SINCE THE ARTIST DECIDED TO DO THE COLORS HIMSELF AND IT MAKES HIS ART LOOK LIKE SHIT
Jaxson Williams
The most memorable thing he did was the Cancerverse stuff with Rich and that's only because of how stupid it was and how much it ignored everything from DnA's work.
Robert Walker
So what are the best GOTG runs Sup Forums recommends?
Luke Edwards
Even worse. fuck Bendis.
Benjamin Lopez
That wasn't his fault, though. It was DnA's fault. GAWD! If they hadn't ended their run that way then he wouldn't have had to write that story! Don't you see!? It's THEIR fault!
Matthew Gonzalez
The problem is he gave Quill daddy issues out of nowherr and made J'Son a giant jerk which then spiraled out of control when Hickman made him into a bigger jerk and Humphries into an outright villain named Mistet Knife which was mega retarded.
Bendis also didn't bother building up the family angle, Quill and Gamora were BFFs and we didn't know why, Bendis never showed us why they just werr, at least the time skip in Annihilation had Rich and Peter sharing moments in war which established why they became friends.
Robert Cox
I think making Gamora suddenly have huge daddy issues over Thanos was even worse. Especially since because of it Bendis didn't focus on DRAX's murderboner for Thanos at all, most of Gamora's lines about Thanos should have come from Drax.
Jose Green
i hope that leak is true so he leaves spiderman, dead no more could be the finale to his godawful shit run anyway so he can leave with his errands done and then do whatever he wants with the guardians, he won´t ever fuck off out of comics but at least the disease can move to other property
Adrian Green
No dude it was the fans fault!
They kept asking what happened to Rich, so I was forced to write that story. If they didn't keep asking why I was ignoring him, I would have never wrote that.
It's all the fans fault!
Wyatt Rodriguez
>Bendis leaves Guardians >Slott leaves Spiderman
I fear for Peter's life.
Isaac Baker
Go home bendis, you're drunk
Adam Carter
>en I have a bandwidth cap, even though no one in Marvel thinks that I do Bendis has a cap. A cap? Like on his head? No, on bandwidth. On bandwidth? Yes, a cap on bandwidth. Bendis the writer? Bendis the writer. Has a cap on ... Bandwidth. I'm saying he has a cap on bandwidth. Bandwidth. On his writing? On his writing. Writer's have bandwidth? This is a thing? It's a thing writer's have, yes.
Jeremiah Reyes
>At least we know it won't be dog fucker. I liked Weirdworld and Green Lanterns.
Black Vortex was crap though.
Asher Brown
Ewing was never going to write GotG he is writing Cosmic in Ultimates and will be doing more Cosmic in Inhumans so he has his fill of that.
I just hope that if they ever want to put Rich on a team that he ends up with the Ultimates and Ewing of not I hope he just stays in Nova far away from the team comics then.
Connor Collins
>THREE FUCKING YEARS OF FUCKING NOTHING! As an ex-Xfag (I've literally given up at this point); I feel your pain.
Lincoln Hill
I'm aslo a spiderfag. I'm desperate.
Mason Hall
It's somebody that Bendis knows "very well" Anyone got any ideas?
Christopher Adams
For Classic Guardians
>Various 60s/70s issues by Drake, Gerber, and others >GOTG v1 by Jim Valentino, book takes a nosedive after Gallagher takes over and never really recovers >Guardians 3000 by Abnett >Secret Wars: Korvac Saga by Abnett >Guardians of Infinity by Abnett
I believe there was also a Marvel Adventures retelling of Korvac Saga some years back that I heard was pretty good, but I never read it.
For the modern Guardians:
>Various 70s, 80s, and 90s stories featuring solo adventures of Star-Lord, Gamora, Drax, and Rocket, pretty much all worth reading either independently (Star-Lord, Rocket) or as part of Warlock/Thanos stories (Gamora, Drax), penned by Cosmic greats like Englehart, Claremont, Starlin, Mantlo, and others, illustrated by folks like Byrne, Infantino, Starlin, and a young Mike Mignola >Annihilation thru Thanos Imperative by Giffen and later Abnett and Lanning, this includes GOTG v2 which is what really sparked interest in them
After that things have been pretty dire for them on the comic side. Skottie Young's Rocket Raccoon was pretty good I guess. Bendis' GOTG is a boring slog. Legendary Star-Lord was a total comedy book. Never got around to CM Punk's Drax, but I heard it was relatively inoffensive.
A few new books just launched this month. I thought they were pretty good despite some retcons, but only time will tell if they hold up.
If you have any other questions don't hesitate to ask. Cosmic Marvel ate my brain.
Don't mistake me, I'm not saying he did a good job conveying it. Just that, when I strain my brain thinking of some kind of theme, that's the only one I can come up with. And while I don't mind it conceptually, Bendis certainly never delivered in a satisfying way.
Jose Russell
>I'm aslo a spiderfag. Ouch.
I dropped Slotterman after the relaunch ( Peter "Stark" Parker wasn't doing it for me ); dropped Silk when they made Tana Ford the main artist ( blech ); dropped Spider-Woman when they made her a single mother; dropped Spider-Gwen when she crossed over with Silk and SW ( it'd been floundering for a while and it was a good 'jumping off point' ); never started with Miles ( because: Bendis ).
So it's just Spider-Man Deadpool that's left.
I've never, in 30 years, felt so little interest in the Marvel universe.
Kayden Baker
CM Punk's Drax (actually written by Cullen Bunn) was fun. It has Drax and Cammi's reunion. It also had Terrax and Fin Fang Foom trying to retire and become farmers, I guess that's just what cosmic villains do.
Ethan Gomez
eh, its the same. not 30 years maybe, but it's still long enought (it's been 16 years since I'm reading Marvel).
Anyway Silk is still pretty good, main artist aside. you shuold at least read some scans. I had to start with miles since it's togheter with Peter and silk and,spider woman in rotation) in my country, and it suck so, fucking, hard. Like Bendis doesn't know what to do with the character (as always). It's mind blowingthat he still has a job in Marvel, I still thinik that Miles have a good potential especially if they allows himn to remember about Earth 616.
Hunter Robinson
What I really fear is that Sott and Bendis changes books. If that happens, I stop reading Marvel.
Ethan Morales
Fin Fang Foom has had a weird life.
Blake Cruz
Fuck off back to CBN. DnA is great, Bendis is shit, but there's more to Cosmic than those two eras of GOTG.
Ian Johnson
>It's mind blowingthat he still has a job in Marvel It literally comes down to $$$. As long as he keeps shifting units he'll keep getting work.
That said: they're clearly paying more attention to the 'long tail' of TPB sales; hence things like Squirrel Girl that have crappy floppy sales but do really well with parents/little kids are treated as a win; and something like Vision that's got shit sales but great reviews and word of mouth gets a full 12 issues (damn shame that they couldn't have done the same with Weirdworld).
So hopefully the abysmal word of mouth/shit reviews will cut into the future sales of things like Age of Ultron, Civil War II, and Bendy's runs on things like X-Men and GotG and make them more likely to stop the bleeding; wereas right now the beancounters are looking at his sales on things like Avengers, Daredevil, and (the original) Jessica Jones that are consistent revenue streams year in and year out and thinking that he's a solid investment in future sales.
Parker Wright
>Since I’m taking Ben Grimm with me to Infamous Iron Man. >writing ben grimm >writing doom He really going to write a fantastic four book, isn't him?
Owen Ross
The March solicitation even teases the return of two characters that haven't been seen in awhile.
Mason Hill
Good god...
Levi Mitchell
Repeat it as a question, huh?
Matthew Carter
You mean Morgana and The Maker? The ones on the cover?
Jayden Richardson
The nightmare continue as he willgo on to ruin Thunderbolts
Isaac Miller
Why would Bendis do Thunderbolts? More importantly, if he were going to do Thunderbolts, he would have had them show up in another book he's writing first. He ALWAYS does this, every time he's going to write a new book, he'll have the character(s) show up in whatever he's currently writing.
Jacob Cooper
grimm doom and the maker also there's supposed to be a fantastic four page in tomorrows civil war issue
Anthony Sanchez
>also there's supposed to be a fantastic four page in tomorrows civil war issue Source?
Sebastian Carter
it's from rich the leech on bleeding cool but all those guest artist are supposed to have a page dedicated to a possible future
Henry Brown
Yes, indeed.
Blake Morgan
...
Austin Jones
PLS BE LOVENESS AND PEREZ ON GUARDIANS
I WANT IT MORE THAN ANYTHING ELSE
Jason King
>I had an end story that I've been building to and it's time to unleash it. Hope you're ready for Annihilation II
Tyler Scott
Millar?
Grayson Russell
Wouldn't that just be Infinity?
Liam Bennett
>He really going to write a fantastic four book, isn't him? At the rate he's going at, there won't be any Fantastic Four villains left alive by the time he gets the book.
Ryan Perry
It wasn't called Annihilation II though. Bendis is exactly the right type of audacious to literally call it Annihilation II.
Also, Annihilus was one of the good guys in Infinity. Annihilation II (or whatever it ends up being called if it isn't actually A2) is Annihilus and the Brood Queen attacking Earth and the Guardians having to fight them off.
Ayden Martin
>Annihilus was one of the good guys in Infinity I always hated that. I would have been able to tolerate it if they had shown instances of the Kree and the Skrulls showing their utter loathing for Annihilus and the Wave for what they did to their people. Ronan and Kl'rt just hang out with him and fight alongside him like they had no history together.
Isaiah Miller
>Nothing that can't be undone >He made Iceman gay which it would be career suicide to undo
Never underestimate how much Bendis can break before he leaves a series
Caleb Garcia
Why? He might actually be good at a single street based hero
Brayden Sanders
Yeah but you don't even have to undo it. You can outright ignore it so long as you keep him out of romantic relationships
Dylan Parker
I'd read it
Adrian Garcia
Jury is still out on Loveness but his Nova is so far so good.
If he writes GotG you bet he's going to add Rich to the team.
Henry Miller
His Groot mini was also pretty cute.
Ethan Martin
Is this from Foolkiller?
Landon Scott
The disregard for past continuity annoyed me a bit, though.
Oliver Phillips
Gentlemen, how do we fire Bendis and Slott?
Jackson Campbell
Get tumblr really mad at them
Jordan Anderson
See if Titan will hire Slott to write a Doctor Who comic, and see if he'll leave Marvel to work on that instead.
Henry Perry
I practically expect it from Marvel these days. Like Rocket, Groot might as well be a completely different character at this point. I would mind less if they tried to explain and connect it in SOME fashion but instead we just get MCU-inspired versions dropped in to replace everybody with vague, often incorrect references to the old stuff.
