New Avengers Annual #2 -- what the #$%^&!?

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Re: New Avengers Annual #2 -- what the #$%^&!?

Post by cweed4 »

Jason Doty wrote:Is it possible to keep "all" of Spider-Man's Back In Black appearances before One More Day, beter yet even before Aunt May gets shot?
Nope. He dons the black costume after, and specifically because of, May getting shot.
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Re: New Avengers Annual #2 -- what the #$%^&!?

Post by Col_Fury »

Hey Jason, you attributed Paul's response to me To me, so I fixed it for you.
cweed4 wrote:The ONLY thing that has "unhappened" because of OMD is the wedding in ASM@ 21.
Exactly. All of PAD's FNSM issues happened, Peter beat up Jameson, May was shot, the Back in Black Sensational issues happened, it all happened.

Mephisto erased the marriage, & as a follow up concession to Mary Jane restored Peter's secret identity and healed May. That's all that happened, and it happened all at once.

Sometime after Mephisto did that, Peter & MJ break up. We don't know exactly why yet, but there are plans to eventually show us. Maybe. Mephisto did not break them up, they broke themselves up.(see the above linked Joe Q interview) The break-up happens early(I think) in the 'missing time/100 days', and in the epilogue to OMD, Flash mentions that things are still frosty between Pete & MJ. I took that to mean that they broke up a while ago, and that they still aren't talking. The 'missing time/100 days' all takes place after OMD-proper ends. I'm under the impression that there's a gap of time between OMD & the epilogue, probably close to that 100 day mark.

Spider-Man hasn't been spotted often during that 100 days, but he has been active. The Free Comic Book Day issue Swing Shift takes place during that time, and I'm sure some other adventures happens then, also.

Now, having said all of that, I really, really don't see OMD taking place in the middle of current black suit Spider-Man appearances. I just don't. The black suit appearances happen after May is shot and before he makes a deal with Mephisto. By the time he makes the deal, he's not in the black suit anymore.
Paul Bourcier wrote:if we split Mephisto's mumbo jumbo into two phases -- May saved/marriage forgotten and secret ID restored --
I also don't see this being the case. Mephisto proposes a deal, MJ adds a concession, everyone agrees, BANG! It's done. Doing it in parts? No.
Paul Bourcier wrote:Citing a creator interview concerning the gap of time after May is saved, cweed4 asserts that FNSM 24, too, occurs prior to NA@ 2
Sure, interview says that time passes after OMD ends, after May is saved, opening up time for May's house to be rebuilt and for Peter to meet new people. But I don't see how that places OMD before the Annual.

New Avengers Annual 2 has to go before OMD, it's the only order that makes sense for Spider-Man. Until a story is published saying that Spider-Man was wearing the black suit out of mourning for Captain America's death or something, after May is healed, then he's wearing it because of May's situation. However, even 'I'm wearing black for Cap' doesn't fix Peter being unmasked in front of the other Avengers when his secret identity is a secret. That alone places the Annual before OMD.

As for Strange, if his status ends up the way we think it will leading into Secret Invasion, then I guess we'll have a problem.
Paul Bourcier wrote:How would she happen to time a visit to the Sanctum long after her betrayal right at the point Hood finally decided to attack? To me, this all makes sense only if Hood acted quickly on his intel and Tigra immediately went to warn her friends.
Ah, I glossed over that. Yeah, Tigra makes her way to Strange's place as the villains do, and they arrive at roughly the same time. So forget any time passing between pgs 4 & 5 of the Annual.
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Re: New Avengers Annual #2 -- what the #$%^&!?

Post by simmo »

If the Dr Strange in OMD is revealed as a skrull, would that help anything? It strikes me that Spidey could be affected by some mind altering hallucinogen...although that's probably too much detail for background in OMD.
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Re: New Avengers Annual #2 -- what the #$%^&!?

Post by Paul Bourcier »

Jason Doty wrote:
Why not put a gap between pages 4 and 5 on NA@2, Tigra gave the bad guys the location. She could have been easily stalking the place untill they made there move, wanting revenge for the treatment she has been enduring and the Initiative side not being able or unwilling to help. Hence her now switching sides.
That doesn't make much sense to me, both from Tigra's standpoint and the Hood's standpoint. I think a gap between pages 18 and 19 of A4 37 has more plausibility. It took a while for Hood to break his comrades out of prison. BTS, he was losing credibility among the other villains for this delay and the attack on the Sanctum right after his Raft infiltration was critical to his vindication. Of course, that didn't turn out too well.


Col_Fury wrote:
If the Dr Strange in OMD is revealed as a skrull, would that help anything? It strikes me that Spidey could be affected by some mind altering hallucinogen...although that's probably too much detail for background in OMD.
Unfortunately, the Skrull theory doesn't help. The Sanctum is still there, intact. And why would Spidey think to go to Strange in the first place if he knows Strange is in exile?

I'd be willing to chalk up all of FSNM 24 as an illusory, dreamlike trick by Mephisto if it weren't for the time travel element that forces the story to occur in reality.

I don't relish the idea of the two-part Mephisto deal with a gap between. It's an interesting outside-the-box idea worth contemplating, given the impossible continuity situation and the unknown way Marvel will handle the OMD time gap, but I hope there's a better solution.

The fundamental problem is that Spidey's and Strange's chronologies are incompatible, thanks to NA@ 2 and FNSM 24. I suppose we'll have to wait and see if future comics resolve this chronological conundrum, but I'm not holding my breath.

The only other theory I have to offer is to reintroduce the idea of wedging a gap between panels on the second-to-last page of FNSM 24. Spidey leaves the Sanctum with Strange's words in his head. He puts on his black costume for some contrived reason, sees his teammates converging on the Sanctum for the BTS mission from which they return in NA@2. Then the Hood's gang attacks, the Sanctum is destroyed and Strange goes into exile. A depressed Spidey chages back into the classic costume (yeah, yeah), Strange's words from FNSM 24 echo in his head again, and he encounters the daughter-that-could've-been at the end of FNSM 24.

This solves the Strange situation and explains how Spidey can unmask in NA@ 2. The only problem I see here is Spidey's costume changes, which I think are fairly minor in the grand scheme of things.
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Re: New Avengers Annual #2 -- what the #$%^&!?

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cweed4 wrote:Peter still unmasked in CW but everyone (and all records of it) have been erased.
But everyone's memories and all records of it have been erased. In a strictly de jure sense it may still have "happened", but de facto it all unhappened.

BND picks up straight from OMD. All changes happened in one instant, like the HoM waves.

EDIT: Found this post by one of the Handbook Guys on a related matter :roll:... http://www.comicboards.com/smb/view.php ... 0118180000
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Re: New Avengers Annual #2 -- what the #$%^&!?

Post by cweed4 »

Somebody wrote:But everyone's memories and all records of it have been erased. In a strictly de jure sense it may still have "happened", but de facto it all unhappened.

BND picks up straight from OMD. All changes happened in one instant, like the HoM waves.
Sorry, but that's not what happened. People still remember that someone unmasked, just not who it was. Believe me, I hated having to try and understand how OMD/BND worked by reading every on-line interview and discussion from JoeQ and others from Marvel. No matter how convoluted the explanations are they have said that everyone still remembers past events, they all still happened, and there is a time gap between OMB and BND.

From JoeQ-
Very simply, Peter and MJ were together, the wedding didn’t happen. Peter proposed but something happened that cause the wedding to get derailed. What was that thing, what monkey wrench did Mephisto throw into their lives to prevent it, well that’s a story for another day. There’s also a very obvious rift between Peter and MJ at the end of OMD, what caused that is also something yet to be revealed. And then there’s the Harry piece of the puzzle, ah that pesky Mephisto! So, yes, a lot of this will eventually be dealt with in “Amazing Spider-Man” moving forward, but not right away as we want to spend the majority of our time in “Brand New Day” looking forward to establish the new world and then later on deal a bit more with the past as it comes up.

The bolded part of the quote establishes both of my points. There is at least some gap in time between the OMD ending in ASM 545 and the BND epilogue in ASM 545 because whatever causes the break-up is yet to be revealed. (Contrary to Col_Fury's opinion I believe this HAS to be attributed to Mephisto's involvement.) This also establishes that the Mephisting is not an instantaneous event because some of his plan is being put into motion over that gap in time. All of the other retcons (eg rebuilding May's house, Harry's return, Jackpot, new friends, etc...) may, OR MAY NOT, be part of the Mephisting. Those stories are also "yet to be revealed".
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Re: New Avengers Annual #2 -- what the #$%^&!?

Post by Paul Bourcier »

cweed4 wrote:
All of the other retcons (eg rebuilding May's house, Harry's return, Jackpot, new friends, etc...) may, OR MAY NOT, be part of the Mephisting.
I think this is the way most folks are interpreting events:

The Mephisto deal happens all at once. The three elements of the deal are:
1) May's life is saved
2) Peter's and MJ's marriage is forgotten
3) Spidey's identity is forgotten (MJ's addendum)

Time passes after the deal is done. In this time:
1) Pete and M.J. break up
2) May's house is rebuilt
3) Harry returns
4) Jackpot debuts
5) New friends enter Peter's life

The epilog of ASM 545 picks up from there.

Let's wait and see how future flashbacks in ASM handle the time gap. I wouldn't be surprised if Mephisto has nothing to do with anything aside from the 3-point deal described above. Yes, time passes, but it doesn't mean NA@ 2 belongs in that time span.

If the above description of events is accurate, the question remains: how do we reconcile Spidey in NA@ 2? My solution is wedging NA@ 2 between the last two panels of page 24 of FNSM 24. Not very neat, but par for the course; recent continuity gaffes don't afford neat solutions. Any other ideas?
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Re: New Avengers Annual #2 -- what the #$%^&!?

Post by Col_Fury »

cweed4 wrote:There is at least some gap in time between the OMD ending in ASM 545 and the BND epilogue in ASM 545 because whatever causes the break-up is yet to be revealed.(Contrary to Col_Fury's opinion I believe this HAS to be attributed to Mephisto's involvement.)
Well, I'm sure the break-up will be a result from the fall out, but I really don't think that Mephisto breaks them up. There would be an emotional rift between Pete & MJ, he's running around at night & suddenly she doesn't know why. Her not knowing what's he's doing at night would definitely create a rift between them.

I think Mephisto would get more satisfaction from them breaking themselves up, rather than him separating the two.
cweed4 wrote:This also establishes that the Mephisting is not an instantaneous event because some of his plan is being put into motion over that gap in time.
Well, the Mephisting is 'No more marriage', 'no more public identity', and 'May's healed'. The other changes in status quo from OUR perspective:
cweed4 wrote:(eg rebuilding May's house, Harry's return, Jackpot, new friends, etc...)
Are just things we didn't see happen between 'then' and 'now'. I don't see Mephisto rebuilding May's house, for example.

They would have eventually rebuilt the house, but they couldn't because Peter was a fugitive. When suddenly Peter's not a fugitive anymore, because no one knows who Spider-Man is, May can get her house rebuilt because S.H.I.E.L.D. isn't looking to her for Peter's whereabouts.
cweed4 wrote:Those stories are also "yet to be revealed".
Exactly.
Somebody wrote:EDIT: Found this post by one of the Handbook Guys on a related matter :roll: ... http://www.comicboards.com/smb/view.php ... 0118180000
My rationale: At the end of PAD's FNSM arc, he had a big old fight with the Other, burning out his 'other' powers, resetting him to normal. And he eventually dried up his organic web shooters. *shrug*
Paul Bourcier wrote:I think this is the way most folks are interpreting events:

The Mephisto deal happens all at once. The three elements of the deal are:
1) May's life is saved
2) Peter's and MJ's marriage is forgotten
3) Spidey's identity is forgotten (MJ's addendum)

Time passes after the deal is done. In this time:
1) Pete and M.J. break up
2) May's house is rebuilt
3) Harry returns
4) Jackpot debuts
5) New friends enter Peter's life

The epilog of ASM 545 picks up from there.
Yeah. I think I should add something that doesn't come across that well:

Mephisto wants the marriage over, and the trade-off is May gets to live. MJ wants Peter's secret identity restored, so the trade-off is Harry's not dead anymore. Harry's return was supposed to be a twist, but I don't think that came across very well in the comic. When you make a deal with the devil, what you want is supposed to be undone, like May getting healed then hit by a bus. She didn't die from the gunshot, she was killed by a bus! Haha, Satan wins! Bringing Harry back doesn't have the same bite. But there it is, I guess. So yeah, Harry was made un-dead, but didn't return to New York until later on.

Something I thought of at work today: Spider-Man's appearance in Avengers: the Initiative. It's post-WWH, he's in the black suit, and May's still in the hospital. If we were to put OMD before the Annual to cut down on the time that May's in the hospital, we would still have to place it after WWH & the Initiative appearance, which wouldn't have the benefit of cutting down May's hospital time. My rationale: May settled into a coma for a while, allowing for all of Spider-Man's various appearances. If she ends up in the hospital for a number of months, Oh Well.
Paul Bourcier wrote:how do we reconcile Spidey in NA@ 2?
Hrm. Let's see if Strange makes any more appearances and how he's portrayed before we split up OMD. We may have to end up doing that, but let's wait and see for now.
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Re: New Avengers Annual #2 -- what the #$%^&!?

Post by cweed4 »

I really hate having to think about OMD again so I will happily concede this debate. I'm quite sure that my interpretations won't jive with whatever Marvel's official history turns out to be anyway. :outtahere:






:stop: Spidey rant:*
My problem is in trying to create gaps w/in ASM 538 and ASM 544 to fit ALL of the black costume appearances. This story was supposed to be happening over a short period of time (a couple days to maybe a week or two). Now we have to stretch out May's coma to months? Worse than that is the inconsistent characterization of Peter that results from all of this. We are supposed to buy the idea that he is exhausting himself trying to save May in a frantic race against the clock. Meanwhile, he finds time for countless adventures in FNSM, SENSM2, WWH, A:I, etc... It all seems like such a preposterous mess. *doh* And I'm still confused as to why they restored his secret ID a second time in A:I 7. :?


* :oops: I would have hidden this in a spoiler tag because its just a pointless tangent but they don't seem to be avaialble w/ the site update.
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Re: New Avengers Annual #2 -- what the #$%^&!?

Post by Col_Fury »

cweed4 wrote:My problem is in trying to create gaps w/in ASM 538 and ASM 544 to fit ALL of the black costume appearances.
I hear you, buddy. Check outASM 543 for why that's the only viable spot for the black suit appearances.(a major reason being May's hospital room, since that's where she is in the other Spider-Books and in a couple of guest appearances) It's not a comfortable solution by any means.

You're doing a good job here, cweed4. You're picking up on things that others may not have noticed, and you're bringing them up for discussion. That's the only way we can hammer out chronologies correctly, by looking at every angle for clues and figuring out how they fit together with all of the other books. Sometimes it's fairly simple, and other times, like with this Annual, not so much. So keep it up!
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Re: New Avengers Annual #2 -- what the #$%^&!?

Post by Somebody »

Col_Fury wrote:I hear you, buddy. Check outASM 543 for why that's the only viable spot for the black suit appearances.(a major reason being May's hospital room, since that's where she is in the other Spider-Books and in a couple of guest appearances)
Actually, on that... what about WWH? Logically, May was evacuated with the rest of the city then moved back (not necessarily to the same room) after Damage Control went to work. Does that have any impact on any hospital scenes?
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Re: New Avengers Annual #2 -- what the #$%^&!?

Post by Col_Fury »

Well, Iniative 7 has May in her private hospital room post-WWH. I don't know if it matters that it's the same room, as long as it's still private. Was she moved? Did that hospital not do anything? Did Damage Control rebuild the hospitals first? Who knows?

But yeah, Initiative 7 establishes that she's still hospitalized after WWH ends. And since we know that she was shot in the last days of Civil War, then she's been hospitalized from Civil War's end through to after WWH.
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Re: New Avengers Annual #2 -- what the #$%^&!?

Post by Somebody »

What I meant was, could there have been further moves after ASM543?
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Re: New Avengers Annual #2 -- what the #$%^&!?

Post by Col_Fury »

Probably not. She's in the private room for all of her other appearances, she's only in a public area for the end of ASM 543 & the beginning of ASM 544.
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Re: New Avengers Annual #2 -- what the #$%^&!?

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One more thing - Ant-Man suffers some severe injures by being caught between Iron Man & the Hulk (from WWH1/IM19) in ANT 10. He wakes up "a month" later, far from fully healed. He then gets tortured, compounding those injures and getting his insides ripped apart to boot.

Once he's mostly, finally, healed from all of that "much time" later, he gets sent back to his old job. At this point, Veronica King - who he got pregnant in #4, is heavily "showing" (she wasn't in #9, just pre-WWH). And at the end, he passes by a fight between the Absorbing Man... and black-suit Spidey.

That would seem to be evidence for "months" May was in that coma.
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