Dani Moonstar, Misty Knight And Valkyrie Join An All-New All-Female Superhero Team From Marvel - The Fearless Defenders

[Scavenger]

Who's the cover artist?

I hope Dani FINALLY gets one of her power sets back...or both.

Hope it's good.

[Jay Diddilo]

Here's the sales chart for every comic book in history.

Issue 1 sells. Issue 2 sells less. Issue 3 sells less. Eventually it levels out to a steady number or declines to cancellation.

Releasing new series that may or may not fail at #12 is bad for Marvel? No, it's great for them. They have staff on hand already, they don't need to pay more.

The first few issues are where they make their money. If sales are strong, great. If not, start over with a new #1 and mix & match the creative. Why do you think it happens so often?

[Peter J Poole]

Well, I kinda thought they did that with the last Defenders series: Doc Strange, Silver Surfer, Namor, Red She-Hulk (instead of Hulk)... pretty cool. And Iron Fist - okay, that one makes no sense, especially considering he's also currently an Avenger. But I nearly bought the series because I thought it was a really strong - and sellable - team.

But it still didn't sell (cancelled at #12).

And now they want to try an even less marketable version that's all-female and full of c-list characters?

Iron Fist made sense as a Nighthawk analogue of sorts...

The team was OK, the infinity engines storyline was kaka... so it goes.

I think the single most important word in your post is 'try'. Because that's what publishers do, with every book they put out. When they stop doing that we'll have a problem...

Cheers

[Peter J Poole]

Can you list any examples along these lines, of such gambles that turned out to be good by Marvel? Just curious.

I'd suggest the point is that they keep on taking the gambles by trying new/weird stuff. (Northanger Abbey? WTF?!?!?)

Sadly the good ones get canned too. Deadpool Max was great (don't know if it qualifies as an example since it was a Max book), but it didn't have the readership

Each to their own. I tried Deadpool Max #1 and had to spend an hour trying to put detergent on the infected brain cells...

Cheers

[paulski]

Iron Fist made sense as a Nighthawk analogue of sorts...

Good point. I can actually see that now that you mention it.

The team was OK, the infinity engines storyline was kaka... so it goes.

It did sound a bit... odd from the Previews solicits.

I think the single most important word in your post is 'try'. Because that's what publishers do, with every book they put out. When they stop doing that we'll have a problem...

Yeah, but it's like me trying to challenge the top tennis player at my club - I can 'try' all I like, but he's going to kick my ass every time. Eventually I'll get that through my thick skin and accept it's futile. Much like a successful Defenders book.

[Peter J Poole]

Yeah, but it's like me trying to challenge the top tennis player at my club - I can 'try' all I like, but he's going to kick my ass every time. Eventually I'll get that through my thick skin and accept it's futile. Much like a successful Defenders book.

If failure was inevitable, I'd agree... but they do get the occasional win, however rare they may be. And even six issues and a trade will make some slight profit, so it's not a total loss whatever happens...

A Guardians of the Galaxy movie? Five years ago that would have been unthinkable.

Avengers Academy? The spin-off from a spin-off, cancelled at #39, but - arguably - one of the best quality books Marvel have done in years.

Plus it's the playing and the practice that let someone become the top player

Cheers

[SAMURAI36]

If failure was inevitable, I'd agree... but they do get the occasional win, however rare they may be. And even six issues and a trade will make some slight profit, so it's not a total loss whatever happens...

A Guardians of the Galaxy movie? Five years ago that would have been unthinkable.

Avengers Academy? The spin-off from a spin-off, cancelled at #39, but - arguably - one of the best quality books Marvel have done in years.

Plus it's the playing and the practice that let someone become the top player

Cheers

The problem is, you don't go out on the court like you're gonna play ping-pong against a Wimbledon champion.

This book doesn't sound very thought-thru. Like most of Marvel NOW, it sounds ad-hoc. Something to throw at the market, in hopes that it will stick.

As people have said, why wouldn't you stick a single A-lister female character on the team? Red She-Hulk was just on the Defenders roster, so why isn't she there? Why not Ms/Captain Marvel? Spider Woman? Why stick Elektra on the Thunderbolts, a team full of villains, when she would have gone nicely here??

I'm not saying don't put any C-Listers there, but a team full of C-Listers? If the goal is to give Marvel characters more exposure to one day feed their movie engine, this isn't the way to do it.

[Peter J Poole]

The problem is, you don't go out on the court like you're gonna play ping-pong against a Wimbledon champion.

This book doesn't sound very thought-thru. Like most of Marvel NOW, it sounds ad-hoc. Something to throw at the market, in hopes that it will stick.

As people have said, why wouldn't you stick a single A-lister female character on the team? Red She-Hulk was just on the Defenders roster, so why isn't she there? Why not Ms/Captain Marvel? Spider Woman? Why stick Elektra on the Thunderbolts, a team full of villains, when she would have gone nicely here??

I'm not saying don't put any C-Listers there, but a team full of C-Listers? If the goal is to give Marvel characters more exposure to one day feed their movie engine, this isn't the way to do it.

Ms Marvel I'll grant you - still not sure why she never made the cut for Secret Avengers, but maybe they have other plans for her in the other Avengers books. The rest have had their shots fairly recently and not set the world alight yet, so why not start with other characters, in a team book where they can bring in new members if as and when they want to?

Plus Avengers Academy had no real big name stars, and GotG got Starlord and Rocket Raccoon... There's just no guarantee for what will fly and what will crash and burn.

I think it's been thought through, they just came up with different answers to what you, I, or any other armchair editor came up with...

Cheers

[Joe Kalicki]

When DC announced Vibe and Katana, someone there (I think it was Johns) said any character could be A-list, and I believe it, even for Marvel. It may not happen often, and it might take a couple tries, but look at Deadpool. It took him almost 20 years to get up there, but he did.

[G. Boney]

Someone in this thread stated that she looks no different than she did in the 70's. Meanwhile, Dani Moonstar and Valkyrie have had updated looks since their creations. This just goes to show that Marvel doesn't know what to do with some of these characters, nor do they care.

This is what was said in regards to Misty's look:

The 70's visual of misty knight with her uncovered belly doesn't seem very auspicious 'though.

I'm assuming his main point was the uncovered belly and I agree. She has no healing power or invulnerabilty. It makes about as much sense as when Falcon used to have his sides exposed or Robin running around in bikini briefs back in the day. Hopefully in the actual book she won't be exposed like that. Other than that, your assumption about her look not changing since the 70's is inaccurate. The outfit she is wearing on that Fearless Defenders cover is a slightly altered version of the outfit she's been wearing since the Daughters of the Dragon mini from 4 or 5 years ago.

Because she is a street level character who works best when she is dealing with street level threats.

Fair enough. I don't necessarily agree, since this is a team book and not a solo. If she had her own title and she was up in a shuttle fighting Space Phantoms I'd agree with you. But team books usually have "street level" characters on them along with the more powerful characters. Batman in the JLA, Cap or Hawkeye on Avengers...