Golden Age Young Allies

Discuss chronologies for characters in the main "Marvel Universe"

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HalP
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Golden Age Young Allies

Post by HalP »

I noticed that some Golden Age characters have the Young Allies series in their chronologies. Wasn't this written out of canon by the 70th Anniversary Special? The Golden Age series was published within the Marvel Universe and based on the adventures of the "real" Young Allies, who differed in many ways (including some of their names).

Characters like Bucky and Toro presumably had roughly those same adventures-- but the Young Allies issues themselves are seemingly non-canon.
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loki
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Re: Golden Age Young Allies

Post by loki »

HalP wrote:I noticed that some Golden Age characters have the Young Allies series in their chronologies. Wasn't this written out of canon by the 70th Anniversary Special? The Golden Age series was published within the Marvel Universe and based on the adventures of the "real" Young Allies, who differed in many ways (including some of their names).

Characters like Bucky and Toro presumably had roughly those same adventures-- but the Young Allies issues themselves are seemingly non-canon.
You've answered your own question
HalP wrote:The Golden Age series was ... based on the adventures of the "real" Young Allies
The assumption is that, except where we know for sure otherwise, Golden Age adventures took place, though perhaps not exactly as depicted. Which, given that we know the adventures recounted in both Marvel Team-Up #28 and The Thing #7's first story took place but not quite as the comics depicted them, actually is equally true of every comic.
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Re: Golden Age Young Allies

Post by HalP »

But we do know for sure otherwise! The Young Allies 70th Anniversary Special says that those stories didn't take place and that most of those characters didn't exist.

According to the Special, the "real" Young Allies (other than Bucky and Toro) were Pat O'Toole, Geoff Vandergill, Henry Tinklebaum, and Washington Carver Jones. The Golden Age Young Allies were Knuckles O'Toole, Jeff Sandervilt, Tubby Tinkle, and Whitewash Jones; those characters are not "real" in the Marvel Universe, just comic book characters based on the "real" Young Allies (sometimes very loosely, i.e. Whitewash).
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loki
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Re: Golden Age Young Allies

Post by loki »

HalP wrote:But we do know for sure otherwise! The Young Allies 70th Anniversary Special says that those stories didn't take place and that most of those characters didn't exist.
No, we don't and it doesn't. It gives an updated / "real" version of how they met and their first adventure, and it notes they had a comic, which "exaggerated the story, inventing some wild fantasies about us." That doesn't preclude subsequent adventures taking place, and, indeed, it is hard to believe the team became as close friends as the rest of the special shows if that was their only time working together. "inventing some wild fantasies" is vague - it allows for stories to be blown out of proportion and for some, probably, to have been made up whole cloth, but it doesn't mean they all, or maybe even most, were. And yes, later on the group discusses how poorly they were depicted and how silly some of the depicted escapades were, but again no specific stories are ruled out as not actually happening. Knuckles notes them being shown stealing Goering's car, suggesting that didn't happen - but even if that can be matched to a specific Golden Age story, it might not rule the story out as having happened, just that the vehicle they stole was something less "exciting" and that the comic hyped it up to something they thought would be funnier. Look at the examples I cited - the Thing did encounter and fight Goody Two-Shoes, but neither Goody nor the fight were as the story had depicted them; Spider-Man and Hercules did fight the City-Stealers and protect Manhattan, but the City-Stealers did not dislodge Manhattan from it's base and Herc did not pull the entire island back into place.
HalP wrote:According to the Special, the "real" Young Allies (other than Bucky and Toro) were Pat O'Toole, Geoff Vandergill, Henry Tinklebaum, and Washington Carver Jones. The Golden Age Young Allies were Knuckles O'Toole, Jeff Sandervilt, Tubby Tinkle, and Whitewash Jones; those characters are not "real" in the Marvel Universe, just comic book characters based on the "real" Young Allies (sometimes very loosely, i.e. Whitewash).
Again, this doesn't disprove that the stories happened, just that some details were inaccurate.
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Re: Golden Age Young Allies

Post by JephYork »

...does the 70th anniversary one-shot even have to be Earth-616 canon?

If I see an obscure one-shot comic trying to toss a whole bunch of other books out of continuity, I generally suspect the obscure one-shot to be the one that's non-canon.

-Jeph!
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Re: Golden Age Young Allies

Post by HalP »

JephYork wrote:...does the 70th anniversary one-shot even have to be Earth-616 canon?

If I see an obscure one-shot comic trying to toss a whole bunch of other books out of continuity, I generally suspect the obscure one-shot to be the one that's non-canon.

-Jeph!
That is true-- as far as I know, neither version of the Young Allies has been referenced anywhere else. You've got one version in the Golden Age comics, another version in the 70th Anniversary Special, and that's it. You could eliminate either (or both!) without affecting anything else.

I would think it goes by what's more recent, right? The 70th Anniversary Special is Marvel telling us that the Golden Age stories are not canon, and establishing what really happened. That seems "official" until contradicted.
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