Amph Continuity in Comics

I was reading through some of my old comics the other day and realising how many things happen that never really get mentioned again. So I was wondering how important really is continuity in comics, I mean once a character reaches a certain age with hundreds possibly thousands of stories behind them does it really have any purpose. As long as the characters main moments are acknowledged eg "Batmans parents shot or Superman crashes to earth as baby" do writers really have any obligation to take much notice of whats happened before.

 

Ask Joey Q at Marvel about that...

 

Continuity is a dirty word in the comic book industry. A number of writers and editors don't like to get so mixed in such details, because then it stifles their creativity. Sometimes it is good and sometimes it isn't. It varies from writer to writer. Marv Wolfman has made no secret that he hates being bound by every single bit of continuity. That's partly why he did "Crisis On Infinite Earths". On the other hand, Geoff Johns draws upon continuity for all of his writings. He might tweak a few things here and there, but for the most part it matches up to the previously established material. Even bringing back things that never were followed up on and sometimes giving extra weight to them. It just really depends on what is being ignored and how important it is to the overal story.

For instance, explainations regarding the roles of Doomsday and the Eradicator in the Superman books are unclear. They're still mentioned as existing, but details about their backstories have been brought into question ever since "Birthright" and the 2006 relaunch. The Cyborg Superman has had much of his continuity kept in tact, with only one noticeable difference from the actual origin issue. Other areas are still uncertain such as what caused Superman to go into his self-imposed exile into space. And did Lex do the whole clone body switch? Then there are other areas such as when the 2004 "Venom vs Carnage" mini-series stated that Black Cat never met either villian, which is a total contradiction.

It's one thing to not mention a story all the time, it's another to ignore it without a retcon explaination. Or in the case of Marvel, ignore a lot of stuff from the late 80's and throughout the 90's. Sure, there was some bad stuff in the 90's. But there was also some good material as well.

We, as fans, do care because we'd like to be able to see it as sort of like real life. In the real world, we don't go through reboots and retcons. Our memories might be questionable on certian things, but the undisputable facts of our lives remain the same. When I read my Superman collection from "Man Of Steel" through "Behold The Millenium Giants", I see a lot of connections to previous material. I like that a mini-series that didn't seem so important when it was first published has importance down the line in the main books. In a way, it mirrors real life. You see that it is all one continuing story, with breaks in between.

 

Yeah for the most part I'd like them to keep continuity, but I can understand how it could be limiting after a while to telling new stories. I know there a lot of stories I don't like so I don't include them in my personal version of the character.

 

Geoff Johns at DC and Mike Carey on X-Men currently are two examples of writers who know how to use continuity to the advancement of a good story. A lot of comic writers can't balance this well so you either have comics so steeped in continuity that they are impossible for someone without a degree in DC 101 to understand, or you get the other extreme which is a comic that says "Continuity? **** contnuity! I'm telling MY story here!" Neither is really preferrable, IMO.

 

I like that Zod is back in the Superman books, but I don't like that they ignore "The Greatest Hero Who Ever Lived" and "The Supergirl Saga" in the process. That kind of thing I'm not into. I've accepted ideas like Lex Luthor is the other half of Superboy's DNA, rather than Paul Westfeild and the reasoning behind it. There needs to be a fine balance. An author can make changes, just do it reasonably. "Brithright" is a good idea done wrong. Everything from "Up, Up & Away" on has done a better job of sticking to continuity while blazing it's own trail. "Sins Past", good idea in theory, but not necessary. Peter David's portion of "Back In Black", good idea done well. JMS's method of bringing back the black suit, poorly done. Peter had a black costume in the 90's which he kept in storage. He wore it twice.

 

i think it is rather important to maintain a certain modicum of continuity for the sake of itself... sometimes.
part of me says that though because over the last summer i spent a good amount of time reading up on x-men and x-factor and accumulated a collection of about 100 issues or so of the two books. not too long ago i discovered that with the advent of the ultimates and comics as they stand now, all of that history i boned up on has little to no bearing on the current marvel continuity. is that bad? well, no not exactly. i mean, people have to get older eventually. right? unless they're calvin and hobbes or the simpsons. i guess it seems sort of like that's what they're really trying to get at in the exiles. there's so many different ideas and "realities" blowing around out there, somebody has to keep them straight. but now there's the new exiles so i'm back to thinking "what the %*&!?"

then there's 2099. that was supposed to be the definative marvel future. i mean, that's what there was to look forward to as we approached the advent of the 22nd century of marvel comics. now i understand that those issues and their respective continuity has little or no bearing on present events. i mean, yeah, i get the fact that the future can't influence the past, or can it? but it was kind of nice to know for awhile that that was how things were destined to turn out. in fact, i still take comfort in the existence of miguel o'hara.

but i guess with a long-running issue, team, or charater there have to be some changes made when new writers take over. and also there are always big changes that swing into effect when all of those cross-overs happen. maybe that's the real question: are cross-overs really all that great? inferno was pretty good, extinction agenda was alright, and so far this messiah complex is doing pretty well. but i understand it's cross-overs that upsets so many writers. when they might just be jammin' along on a perfectly sweet idea and then they have to compensate for the varied new ideas that bleed off from other comics. yeah, i'd rekon that would be pretty frusterating.

oh, and aren't unfinished continuities called "danglers"?

 

Actually, Marvel in the 90's had several futures.

-2099 where all of the old school heroes and villians were gone. Where Victor Von Doom returned after so many years and new incarnations of the Marvel heroes debuted.

-The dark future first seen in "Days Of Future Past" which then lead into the eras of X.S.E. and further into the reign of Apocalypse and the war with Cable.

-The future world of the Maestro as seen in "Future Imperfect", where the Hulk has become the Maestro and has taken over the world.

Each future was a possibility, yet only the future world that Bishop and Cable are from has any bearing today. They are all possible futures. This is due to the fact that both Mutants exist in the present day, while the other two continuities were only seen in the future. Miguel is part of the Exiles, which allows him to exist, but not affect the 616 Earth. And the Maestro was laid to rest just before Peter David left the Hulk the first time.

Got me. Usually when a title is canceled, unless the characters reappear elsewhere, the story is left in limbo.