Well, apparently, the
1973 Avengers-Defenders War is in my brain today (and why shouldn't it be?
Black Panther kicked Doctor Strange in the face--twice!!).
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I very well may wrong, but I think this was maybe the first inter-book crossovers at either company, certainly of that
length. If you counted the 4-page prologue in
Defenders #8, the 3-page prologue in
Avengers #115, and the two-page "
bye, everybody" in
Defenders #11, the whole thing took place over 8 issues of the two mags.
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It's interesting to compare with the forthcoming
Avengers Vs. X-Men book, which will be 12 issues long, plus a
zero issue, plus a six-issue mini "
expanding" fights from the main mini, plus 5-6 issues each of
New Avengers, Avengers, Secret Avengers, Uncanny X-Men and Wolverine & The X-Men.
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That's
a lot of issues. Granted, there are a lot more members (and series!) of the
Avengers and
X-Men these days. But still, it sure seems like they're giving every single member their
own individual issue.
Plus, buying each issue of the Avengers-Defenders War?
$1.60. Avengers Vs. X-Men? Following every word costs you approximately
$196. Save your shekels, kids!
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It should be noted that the entire Avengers-Defenders War was written by
one person--
Steve Englehart. Avengers Vs. X-Men? The twelve issue series has
FIVE different writers (
Bendis, Fraction, Aaron, Brubaker and Hickman).
Five writers...
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There are other similarities. At the time
Hulk and
Hawkeye were former Avengers but hanging with the Defenders, something Englehart made good use of. Present day, the multi-team statuses of
Wolverine,
The Beast,
Namor, and
Storm will certainly come into play.
Both deal with potentially universe-altering crises:
Dormammu and
Loki taking over the universe, the
Phoenix Force coming back again for...?
So 2012? Bigger, longer, more sprawling and
much more expensive. But at its core, not really that different from 1973--
two teams of heroes beating each others' brains in.
And to those complaining about multi-title crossovers? Your 40 years too late for that...
3 comments:
Is it me, or do Marvel characters just fight each other all of the time? And now...they're going to do it AGAIN with the Avengers and the X-Men. It has to be tough being a Marvel villain...and getting their attention long enough to fight YOU!
"Is it me, or do Marvel characters just fight each other all of the time?"
This from the green Lantern girl?!?
Well, once in a while, Green Lanterns (ie: Hal and Guy) WILL eventually get tired of pummelling each other and showing off their asses, and go out and pummel aliens and stuff.
But I admit, you have a point. Still, I think Marvel characters fight each other a whole lot more than DC characters do.
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