Are comic movies ruining comics? Part 3 Conspiracies and combined universes

If you are an avid reader of comics you're no stranger to big events. By this I mean a new book, usually a mini-series, will feature several heros banding together and facing some new threat. It's like the biggest team up stories. We get to see all of our favorite characters conversing with one another outside of their individual books. Historically it's been going on for quite some time, but recently it tends to happen a few times a year.
In fact some of the big ones have had movies named after them. Civil War, Age of Ultron, Days of Future Past, and Age of Apocolypse. These four were the big ines in recent years. These four titled events in comics were huge and took the characters we liked and took them to places we really hadn't seen them go before. One thing the movies did though was take these titles in name only, and didnt completely reflect the stories as they were presented in comics.
Now to be fair the closest was probably civil war. The comic essentailly had Iron Man and Captain America facing off with one another. The movie captures that pretty well and gave us enough back story through previous movies that it made sense. Days of future past was also close. They at least jumped from the past to the present but the characters involved weren't quite same. The other two I mentioned took the name only and did what they wanted.
That's fine I'm not here to argue about that. I'm not the biggest fan of it but whatever.
The thing is the four movies I mentioned were two different teams. Two were Avengers movies and two were X-men movies. Now some of you who aren't avud readers or don't really pay attention to movie studios or movie/comic news may be wondering why haven't the X-men and Avengers teamed up in a movies yet.
Well I'm here to tell you why.
Even though in the comcis the two teams have worked together on several occassions the likely hood of thwm doi g so in film is slim. X-men film rights are owned by Fox while we all know now that the Avengers Marvel filming properties are owned by Disney. Two completely different film studios. Who it seems do not want to share. Now that may not be true if Disney because they got Sony, who owns filming rights of Spider-man to share him, so maybe Disney is willing to share and Fox wants to keep the mutants to themselves.
Some of you may be thinking that can't be true. Fox wouldn't do that.
Fox has been releasing X-men movies pretty consistently since first class and with each one, in my opinion, I feel like they've missed the mark. They're big exciting special effects fight 'em ups but not much story. At least not the kind that made us all fall in love with the X-men years ago. The thing is as long as Fox keeps making X-men movies they get to keep the filming rights, and it appears to me they don't want to give them up.
Marvel it seems has recognized this in not only the films but the comics as well. Since the X-men are mutants I believe the rights to the term mutants are tied together so in Marvel movies they can't use mutants. Except it seems the Scarlet Witch and Quicksilver are no longer mutants. At least according to the Avengers Marvel movie universe. Fox also has the Fantastic Four filming rights and despite the less than mediocre movies they've produced they're still going to make more.
Insert joke about beating a dead horse here.
Anyway now that I've told that story lets get into conspiracy. What I'm about to say is pure speculation but I believe on some level it's the truth.
Avid readers of comics will have noticed this change but those who aren't I want to fill you in. The X-men don't really exist in the comics anymore. Now thats not to say the they've been wiped from existance within the confines of the Marvel universe but they don't matter. X-titles used to make up a huge portion of Marvel titles and in the 90's helped to carry the company. When the Marvel films really got kickstarted with Iron Man, heroes like him began to come into the spotlight, and because the X-men movies had come out earlier, they were all sharing in the same succes. The characters in the Avengers began to grow and th X-men were growing with them. The events I mentioned earlier always involved both teams in big ways. Then the success of the movies began to grow and fans were flocking to Iron Man movies and Captain America movies because dammit Marvel was doing it right, and the future X-men movies not so much.
Earlier I mentioned that comics have started to reflect the movies in some respects. Characters would look like their film counterparts and some stories would change just enough so that film and comic were parrallel in a lot ways. It appears that recently this has escalated beyond costume and power modifications. Such as the combination of universerses and the loss of focus on other characters.
Now here we are in the present and if you walked into a comic star you would notice a surprising lack of X-men and Fantastic Four comics. The charcters still exist in the pages but they've been moved to the back burner. Fox owns both film titles and doesn't seem to want to give them up. Mo matter how bad the movies they put out are. While in the books Marvel is queitly sideling the characters or moving them from other teams. That's not to say they're no X-men books left but the quality of them has dropped. The original Fantastic Four seems to be nowhere in sight. According to the more recent Secret Wars mini-series. They are buildinf universes.
This I think makes a great segway to the combining of universes and Secret Wars was the book where it happened.
By all appearances the Ultimate universe was on its way. There were several series that led to the demise of that universe, but it all wrapped up nicely in Secret Wars.
I won't go into that book really. I feel that series really needs its own blog, but imagine a series where DrDoom is god and he rules a planet compiled of the multiverse. Whatever you picture in your head is probably pretty accurate.
Anyway now the original Marvel universe exists with some Ultimate flair mixed in it.
(something by the way a certain editor amd cheif said would never happen, and if it did then they had run out of ideas... Just sayin) I havent see Nick Fury yet but part of me thinks he will be Sam Jackson Nick Fury. The Agents of Sheild from the Tv show now exist within the pages of the Marvel U. The Inhumans who have been utilized in the Marvel cinematic universe are now big characters and apart of big ongoing plots.
What I'm getting at is old movies deals and who owns certain cinematic rights are affecting our comics. Whether this is a bad thing or a good thing I leave that up to you. Personally I would like more X-men in my comics and I don't want to see Marvel movies to stop coming out, so in a lot of ways I'm okay with it. I also have to give thecreators at Marvel tremendous credit at putting out such great stories, while working with out characters that used to be top sellers. What they're doing are making you appreciate classic characters that had small followings of people who would snatch up the most obscure of appearances when they could, but now those characters are headlining books.
I think it's a great time for comica and movies and if I know anything about either is it will change. It always does. If you aren't happy with the current events happening take a break for a few months and come back it will be very different.
Thanks to everyone who made to part 3. I hope you enjoyed it.
Till next time readers.

Did comic movies ruin comics? Part 1 X-men in leather.

I have had a hard time trying to figure out exactly what this blog should be. It started as a way to promote writing, and in many ways it still is. I still plan to talk about upcoming books and the current books I've written. Lately though you've seen my various rants and opinions about comics and then monsters.
This blog you're reading will be the latter by the way.
I'm only stating this because I'm sort of hoping it will give whoever is reading this a look into the mind of a writer. Now I'm no Stephen King, H.P. Lovecraft, or Mark Twain, but maybe you'll get some insight into why I like to write books about a red headed cowgirl battling monsters in a post civil war united states. Maybe though I can make you smile at musings and possibly look at things in a way you haven't thought of.
Or I can help you burn 5 minutes by reading this. Either way I'm glad I could help.
The topic I wanted to talk about or talk at you about is comics and their adapted movies and whether or not they may be ruining the comics. First off I want to tell you that I love comics, like a lot.  They were what first helped me to like reading and they taught me quite a lot. Not only just providing lots of entertainment but through the X-men I learned about segration and the possibilty of what the next step of evolution could be. Spider-man let me know it was okay to be a nerd and that I could still get the girl despite not having awesome powers, but by being a good guy... The powers would have been nice though.
It's been about 20 years since I've been delving into the graphic art form and more than half of that time I spent working for a comic book store. It was by far the best job I ever had. This I feel like gives me some knowledge to both sides of comics. The seller and the reader, and by the way I am a reader, I do collect but I enjoy reading my comics over and over again far more than I do reading once and sealing them away forever. Now that being said I believe I have some valid opinions on the matter.
Like any comic fan any movie adaptation that ever comes out is a big deal. Even today when we can't get through a year without seeing at least 4 superhero movies and possibly 2 or 3 others that aren't superheros but are based off of comics, but growing up it was an even bigger deal. Movie studios just didn't do that. The best we really got was Christopher Reeves Superman and Michael Keaton Batman, which I believe still hold up today. As for Marvel the best we got were some campy Captain Americas, a never released Fantastic Four, and Dolph Lungren as the Punisher. Not really a lot to work with, but as comic fans we ate that shit up and as those movies came out they didn't affect the books we were reading month to month. Sure Batman's costume was completely black for awhile like in the movie but not a big change. Our books continued on unhampered by Hollywood success and leaving us dreaming of possible what if scenarios for the comic book movies of our dreams.
Now fast forward to Robert Downy Jr in the first Iron Man. Holy shit! What a good movie. A million comic fans the world over exploded with joy at this movie. It had most of what we ever dreamed a comic movie should have. Don't get me wrong the first X-men was great and gave us quite a lot as did Spider-man, but Iron man hinted at the start of a new universe. It didn't end there it delivered, so now we're several movies in have two Avengers movies out and Captain America and Iron Man are punching each others faces in on screen, and they're the same actors that starred in everyone of the films. Could it not get any better?
(Just a side not this post is very Marvel centric. Yes DC is doing big movies too but really Marvel is and has been doing it right for awhile. Just sayin.)
If we're talking movies I have to think that absolutely it's going to keep getting better. When it comes to our comics though I'm not so sure. Ever since X-men was first released on the big screen and we saw our favorite mutants in black leather the comics began to reflect that. Don't get me wrong Grant Morrison's run of the leather clad X-men was awesome. I still re-read it to this day but I have to wonder. Did that have to happen?
Now I understand that in order to market your movie that's based off of a property it makes sense to have that property be similar enough that people will want to buy both. Thus the movie makes money and the property makes money. It makes sense I get it. People see the movie want more so they go to comic store and buy the comic. The comic now, because of the movie, looks like the film. New readers come into get more of what they experienced in the movie and because the characters are dressed in the same biker look, the consumer feels good about their purchase and doesn't feel too lost in the storyline that took hundreds of back issues to develop, and old readers get a fresh new story and look at some of their favorite characters.
Some would consider this a win win. This after all was a costume change. The X-men did't go through any event that changed their history or how charcters interacted with each other or themselves. At least not at first...

I have discovered that this particular line of thought is going to need much more than one blog post. I don't want to give you a novel to read on the internet, so this ends part one of "Did comicbook movies ruin comics?" Stay tuned for part two it's going to get deep.
Also if you enjoy this blog give it a follow or follow me on twitter @thebeardedjon. Check my two novels too. If you're in the mood for a supernatural western check out The Wendigo and the Werewolf, or if you want some epic fantasy with DnD undertones check out Child of the Moons. Both can be found on amazon in paperback and kindle. Thanks every one part two coming soon.