From the earliest days of Major Spoilers, I have tried to instill in others a greater appreciation for the forsaken characters, titles and forgotten moments of comic-book history, many of which have never gotten much positive attention. Cheerleading for the likes of Matter-Eater Lad, Herbie The Fat Fury and the writing of Bill Mantlo can be depressing, though, even for someone like myself, and occasionally it’s fun to play ‘What If?.’ What if, instead of ‘New Teen Titans’ becoming popular, Black Lightning had been the book to save DC from utter doom? What if, instead of Rob Liefeld, John Byrne had been a founding member of the Image Seven? What if, instead of ‘Ultimate Spider-Man,’ Bendis and Jemas had reinvigorated 2000s Marvel with ‘Ultimate Power Man and Iron Fist?’ There’s even the more frivolous question of whether would people be less condescending if ‘Fifty Shades of Grey’, instead of being a Twilight fan-fic, featured the cast of ‘The Warriors?’
(The answer is, no. They would not.)
Still, if we’ve learned nothing else from Basco Ta’Jalokia, it’s that you can’t get something good without giving something else up, which leads us down a peculiar path of inquiry…
The MS-QOTD (pronounced, as always, “misquoted”) finds that there’s seldom a best of both worlds situation, especially in comics and such, but is nonetheless asking: If you had the power to make one obscure thing that you love become super-popular, but in return one other thing that you love would have to become obscure, what two items would you choose? (For the purposes of our question, this would be an irreversible process.)
5 Comments
Avatar, The Last Airbender. I want THAT to blow up again. I would totally sacrifice…
Okay, question. If you’re willing to sacrifice it do you really love it that much in the first place? I mean, does saying “I’d unpopularize this for THIS” automatically mean I don’t really love it as much?
But I’d give up the Avengers movie’s popularity from the world.
In the world of Marvel, send Deadpool to obscurity and bring Alpha Flight into the limelight.
DC wise, that’s a bit harder. Maybe send Batman (heresy, I know) to the minor league and raise up Firestorm up.
For some reason when I was wee lad, I was totally into Power Pack. I’d happily trade any mutie group for this young foursome of alien-infused badassery.
I’d like to see the His Dark Materials series get a bit more love. Sure the first book got a semi-faithful adaptation, and there is a decent audio drama out there, but it deserves a full movie or animated series.
Sorry Mad Men, but you’d have to go back to obscurity. I love ya to death, but you’ve rode the zeitgeist for long enough.
The more obscure the better; less chance that somebody will reboot it badly