One of the dismaying truths about comics is that nothing is forever, particularly creative teams. Sometimes this works out great, as when Steve Englehart replaced Roy Thomas writing Avengers or Neal Adams took over as artist on X-Men (the cover below is not the changing point, I just like it).
Other times it’s simply a different take, not necessarily better or worse. And sometimes the new writer doesn’t get the characters or the storytelling right. My Silver Age reread is now in early 1966, with Robert Kanigher doing a lot of Batman stories, and it definitely feels off-brand for the Caped Crusader. Robin, for example, is constantly cracking wise, though it’s too early to be the TV show’s influence.
Adventure Comics #338 is one of the cases where changing up the writer, though only temporarily, worked out poorly. This was the climax of a running subplot Legion of Super-Heroes writer Edmond Hamilton had been developing since Dream Girl debuted 21 months earlier. While the focus of Adventure Comics #317 is the sexy platinum blonde Naltorian and her scheme to get several Legionnaires expelled (she has a good reason, don’t worry), there’s a B-plot involving a criminal scientist who flees the Legion into the future, then blocks them from pursuing him.
The story says the barrier blocks time travel further than thirty days into the future, though I think other stories implied it was much further ahead. Either way, cracking the “Iron Curtain of Time” (a metaphorical reference even kids picked up on) became a running subplot. The Legion makes repeated attempts to penetrate the curtain, but without success. The Time Trapper sometimes strikes back, for example hunting the secret of the Concentrator, an ultimate weapon, in #321.
I don’t know if Hamilton knew where he was going with this; plenty of comics writers don’t. If he did have an end game in mind, he didn’t get to realize it because Jerry Siegel was the writer on #338. Siegel wrote the two-part origin of Computo as well, otherwise it was Hamilton in the writer’s chair until Jim Shooter came on board. Whether editor Mort Weisinger wanted to give Siegel some extra opportunities to earn a paycheck or Hamilton just got too busy, I do not know.
Whatever the reason, the results were not good. The plot involves the Time Trapper sending Glorith of Baaldur (who 
would later play a large role in the post-crisis LSH era) to devolve the Legion into protoplasmic slime. By a convenient freak reaction she turns them into toddlers instead. Weisinger was happy to reuse shticks that boosted sales and this would be one of three stories involved the Legion turning into babies (one of them was #317).
The Time Trapper then manipulates the super-powered kiddies to knock off a bank for him. It works, but in the usual way of such things the infants turn the tables on him just by being infants. It’s a story Siegel could have done with a one-shot villain and I wish he had. The Time Trapper is wasted, coming off as a conventional bank-robbing supervillain and not a very competent one. The purpose of the Iron Curtain of Time? We never learn.
My question for today: is there a time a change of writers ruined an ongoing plotline for you?
#SFWApro. Legion covers by Curt Swan, interior panel by John Foote.
“is there a time a change of writers ruined an ongoing plotline for you?”
I’m an Alpha Flight reader. They were once (in a What The –?! parody) threatened with a ‘fate worse than having John Byrne quit the book!
It wasn’t a plotline per se, but the change of the guard ruined a one-off character called Nemesis (who I love for that one appearance, in v1 #8). I don’t know what Byrne had planned for her, but I’m pretty sure it wasn’t what Mantlo did.
An ironic original-creator version: in the original ClanDestine series, we see a flashforward. Part of it involves people being sucked into a vortex with a giant green hand attacking in the background. Then Alan Davis left, there were a few issues by somebody else (that weren’t that bad, actually, but had problems), then about ten years later he followed up. We saw the same panel with the characters being sucked into the vortex – but no giant green hand. Clearly, it wasn’t his original plan.
Most of the time for me, though, the big problem with change of creator isn’t the lack of / poor resolution of storylines (but that is a problem) so much as the massive tonal shift that usually comes with it.
For example, when John Byrne (again!) left Namor, The Submariner, we went from bright, open, detailed stories and art to cramped, dark artwork (that even the artist wasn’t satisfied with – Jae Lee said it wasn’t printed well), and every story for several issues until I stopped reading was the same: Namor wakes up in some small rural area, people don’t know who he is, then he faces off against some sort of super-menace.
Not a single negative letter got printed. I don’t expect everybody to feel the way I did, but you can’t go completely the opposite to what you were and tell me everybody was happy with the change.
Yes, tonal shift is another common problem. Didn’t fit as well with the Time Trapper story though.
Yeah, you can’t cover everything in one article, and that wasn’t the point of this article.
I just thought I’d bring it up anyway.
I really liked the second Brood storyline in Uncanny X-Men 232-234. It was short and to the point, had great art and was full of action (thus it was the complete opposite of the first Brood storyline). And the typical Claremont-end of leaving lots of possibilities to revisit this decades later. So what happened? After Claremont left the X-Titles the story is revisited in the second (adjective-less) X-Men book by Jim Lee and it is turned into a totally generic X-Over with Ghost Rider. Major letdown.
I second Le Messor`s disappointment with Namor.
The Five-Years-Later Legion Of Super-Heroes by Keith Giffen. The first year was great. Yes, it was waaayyyy darker than what came before but also completely unpredictable which is kinda rare with Super-Heroes. Giffens second year lost a bit of steam. It became noticeable that he started to lose track. When the Bierbaums took over though…generic, predictable Super-Hero title. I had a really hard time finishing that. On that note: DC released the entire 5-Year-Later era in two Omnis. The first one is mostly great. They probably only released the second one because there is no real cut-off point until the Zero-Hour reboot. Oh god, the memories return. It got so bad towards the end. And the spin-offs: Timber Wolf – the quintessential cliche-crap nineties book. Also Valor was horrible. And I still read it all!?!
I think Giffen balanced out the darkness of 5YL by showing the Legion, despite everything, remained convinced they could make a difference. It definitely lost steam as it went along.
My biggest problem with the Bierbaums was their various fan-canon ideas such as Lightning Lad being secretly Proty I, Cos being part of a triangle over Saturn Girl, etc.
And yes, Valor, Timber Wolf etc. were piss-poor spinoffs.