Brand Loyalty: How Prioritizing Characters Harms Creators
Marvel recently announced what looks to be an intriguing new series titled Vote Loki, which sees The God of Mischief running for office in the 2016 presidential election. The official announcement on Marvel.com featured two covers from Tradd Moore and Valerio Schiti and some words from editor Wil Moss, but the one thing the announcement lacked was a creative team.
It’s become common practice recently to announce a new series without a creative team, and hope the concept or the name recognition of the character is enough to get fans excited. Vote Loki could be an exciting book, and Wil Moss is editing most of Marvel’s most interesting titles at the moment, but when comics companies rely on the brand of their characters alone, it devalues the hard work of the creators who bring those characters to life.