10 New Year 2018 Resolutions Marvel Comics Should Make

9. Acknowledge Event Fatigue

Marvel Comics

Further to Marvel's fascination with Variants, it's equally true that fans aren't so keen on event comics, certainly not, when a new one comes around every year.

The 'event' this year was Secret Empire, Nick Spencer's story of a Nazified Steve Rogers creating and enforcing a totalitarian will on the world. That reveal (of Cap having been an Agent of Hydra), could be considered 2016's biggest hangover, and it certainly didn't help Marvel sell readers on the concept of another year of events, crossovers, tie-ins and the rest.

Since Civil War, Marvel have had an event in every year, going so far as to option and then produce a sequel to said event in 2016. DC have largely been the same, but a shift to self-contained narratives and smaller crossovers has typified their efforts in recent years, and it's worked - largely - to their benefit.

2018 should be the year Marvel wind back on their commitment to annualised event books. If they're looking to trap the same lightning DC did with Rebirth, it'd be wise to do so.

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WhatCulture's very own resident movie guy, Ewan has been working in the content creation biz for over 10 years now, having started as a freelance contributor to WhatCulture Gaming all the way back in 2015. After graduating with a First-Class Honours in History from Northumbria University in 2017 (where he won a prize for a totally killer dissertation on the Watergate years), Ewan took on the role of Comics Editor at WhatCulture and quickly developed WhatCulture Comics into one of the biggest superhero-focused channels on YouTube. He followed this with a brief hiatus at Screen Rant in 2021, where he worked across the Gaming and Film sections as a writer and editor, before returning to WhatCulture as a Senior Content Producer / Presenter in 2023. He started his own podcast, We Love Dad Movies, in 2022, and has contributed several written pieces to the Eisner-nominated comics website Shelfdust as well. In his current role, Ewan incorporates his love of cinema, comic books, and history into written pieces and video essays for WhatCulture's Film & TV channel, as well as WhatCulture Gaming and WhatCulture Horror, with a particular focus on nineties-era Dad Movies, old school Westerns, and Golden Age Hollywood Noir. John Carpenter is his fave, and he thinks Batman Beyond should never have been cancelled. If that's your vibe, you'll probably like his stuff.