The seventh episode of the Marvel 616 documentary series again was interesting, if not necessarily entirely truthful about the controversies that the "Marvel Method" have generated.
The Marvel method, is a technique for producing comic books that was pioneered in the Bullpen in the 1960's. Rather than scripting a full book, as was the norm, the writer hands an extended outline to the artist, who would then draw the book and then hand it back to the writer to add the dialogue. This helped alleviate the deadline pressure of producing so many books so quickly. In the documentary we see long time Marvel writer Dan Slott begin the process of writing his first issue of Iron Man 2020, we follow the work through the hands of an editor, artist Pete Woods, second writer Christos Gage, assistant editor Alanna Smith and letterer Joe Caramanga.
In and of itself, this episode is quite an interesting show. Slott is an engaging character and the documentary style is fun and exciting. Slott walks around New York imagining the characters swinging over his head, then sits in front of his laptop agonising over what will happen to Iron Man. Pete Woods tends to work out of a van, on various Californian beaches - working when the mood takes him. It's fun stuff to watch but I'm not sure that the example we see actually fits in to what, even this show, says the Marvel method is. Slott just seems incapable of making a deadline, something joked about with the editors - but the quality of his work makes him worth it. Even when they have to engage another writer to help and the pressure is mounting on the rest of the team the work seems to be handed around piecemeal, rather than worked through as per the methodology.
Completely glossed over is the idea that what the documentary cheerily describes as a "collaborative" team effort, of everyone pulling together has, in the past, created some chaos and bad feeling for decades when it comes to accurately attributing the credit for character creation and story. Something that only became more bitter as Marvel characters became lynchpins for billion-dollar movies.
It's a fun story to watch, as issue one of the rebooted Iron Man 2020 is created, but as an honest appraisal of the Marvel Method, it's a bit lacking.