Talk:Marvel Comics continuity
Can we get a timeline to go along with this? I can do up a template to (I think) make it really clear how US and UK stuff intercuts. (Which I guess means I'm asking should there be a timeline, then volunteering to work on a sane layout for it.)
I actually went and took notes on all the explanations of the Timeward US/UK split from the UK Letters pages- and I think I've got a pretty clear idea exactly how the two are separated. (or at last the official explanation thereof.) -Derik 17:50, 11 May 2007 (UTC)
- I think a timeline would be prudent. Though I would imagine it might be hard to do outside a flowchart, what with the 30 million different continuity branchoffs. --ItsWalky 17:53, 11 May 2007 (UTC)
- Depends on the approach. I'll mock something up.
- Unrelated, have we considered a 'year' page? Similar to our overall Transformers timeline but like 'in 1988, these comic issues were published, these episodes aired, this other major event took place...' I ask mostly because, technically speaking, you should always include a year on the copyright notice on pics, and sometimes I'm ballparking. -Derik 18:04, 11 May 2007 (UTC)
Timeline Mockup
Okay, I'm picturing something like this.
Post-timewars It'd probably be easier to jsut switch to three-collumn than the interleaved Earthforce/UK layout I have there (and the interleaving is pretty bad here since I hacked this together with photoshop.) But this is essentially what I'm proposing.
Relevant ideas conveyed:
- Time Wars created a new timeline for the US stories (stated in the letters pages)
- Target 2006 and everythign that directly resulted from it (which is about 2/3 of the UK stories) didn't happen in that new timeline. Thus- the Nemesis is suddenly around again.
- Earthforce is a less drastic branch- it continues the UK timeline, but the 'UK Future' of the TFTM Comic Adaption is no longer valid. Nonetheless, Earthforce continues on it's merry path, and Unicron will arrive in 2006 while in the US he shows up early in 1991.
- Peace is the endpoint of the Earthforce timeline (Dreadwind made a poitn of Peace's healthy Rodimus not being in conflict w/ sick Rodimus from Aspects in the letters page.)
The result is- the US timeline stands more-or-less alone. A few UK stories took place in the new UK timeline (Deathbringer demonstrably, but probably also some other stuff like Decepticon Dam Busters that didn't matter that much.) Some holes had to be filled in the US timeline- and Marvel UK suddenly publishign the long-delayed Gi Joe teamup that explains why Bumblebee became goldbug instead of being rebuilt by Wreck-Gar (since Wreck-gar's visit had just been erased) really makes a lot of sense.
The UK timeline isn't the mess everyone claims it is- time travel ON TOP of the branching timelines and mini-Crisis makes it hard to sort out.... but there actually is a method to the madness.
(Of course, now you'all will probably tell me I'm crazy and am making things up.) -Derik 21:02, 11 May 2007 (UTC)
- You are indeed making a lot of stuff up. Less speculation, more facty, please!--ItsWalky 18:04, 12 May 2007 (UTC)
- Hrm, i thought of a better visualization that hangs on less of that anyway. I'll get around to it. -Derik 19:48, 12 May 2007 (UTC)
It's been quite a while but just where does the idea that Time Wars altered the past come from? I remember someone suggested this in the UK letters page around about the 230s when they tried to guess at how Goldbug had become Bumblebee again in the Pretender Classics (before the relevant stories were printed), but the response was that this was wrong and the time changes hadn't gone backwards.
The reason for the UK comic suddenly running the G.I. Joe vs Transformers series was entirely due to problems of schedules - because the UK comic was weekly and some of the US stories were short enough to reprint in three issues the comic kept catching up so the next US story wasn't yet ready. This led to reprints in issues #221-231 & #255-258 that a lot of letter writers complained about, whilst the problem kept recurring so they instead ran the limited series as it could create a much larger gap in the publication schedule and solve the problem once and for all. It was always billed from the outset as including "the US origin of Goldbug" and never presented as being in continuity. (Similarly no effort was made to rename "G.I. Joe" to "Action Force", even though that would have been the "correct" name at that point in their UK timeline.) Timrollpickering 20:32, 6 June 2008 (UTC)
Timeline Mockup 2
Okay, this si what happened. Around timewars, the Original Target 2006 future got invalidated, so when Rodimus et al, traveled froward, ti was suddenly to a new and different future. thus, Earthforce is after Timewaars in a really straightforward 'this possible future that caused us no end of grief is no longer possible' sort of way'
Simultaneously, the timerify in timeaars created a 'post crisis' continuity that the US stories from, say, US #72 forward take place in. Everythign replating to the time-travelign Galvatron got yanked out (and suddenly the nemesis is no longer destroyed, etc.) This is explicitly explaind in the US letters page.
UK continuity continues relatively unimpeded, just with the original future invalidated, US continuity takes place on a post-crisis (post-Timewars) earth. -Derik 22:31, 12 May 2007 (UTC)
Continuity
Neither of these theories is right. Its actually all very simple. In the UK continuity there are 3 timelines. The main timeline splits from the original by Galvatron arriving in Target: 2006. The space time rift repairs itself by replacing the original time line with the 'Rhythms of darkness' timeline in which Galvatron never time-jumped. Earthforce takes place between 'Price of life' and 'Surrender' in a massive plot loop. (This was due to publishing problems at the time). A complete list can be found on the Marvel wikia and on a talk page of the Transformers wikia. Have a look and you will see it all makes sense.
On plot summaries
I made a suggestion in regards to "in-universe" story summaries, but I made it in response to a year-old discussion on a character's talk page, so I think it probably was overlooked. I don't know if the suggestion is still relevant, but this seems to be a good place to put it forth again.
For context, the discussion was about writing summaries as in-universe, as actual events that really happened, and the counter-argument was that people may want to go back and view a story, but writing in-universe would not allow issue or episode number/title references.
What if we write the articles referring to plot points as events, as opposed to story titles, but we still put superscript links where appropriate, with the matching footnotes used to denote episode or issue numbers and titles? That way the article itself is still written "in-universe", but we also provide a reference for anyone who wishes to watch or read the plot in question.
Like I said, it was a year ago discussion I replied to. Maybe a solution's already been found? --Sntint 18:11, 11 May 2007 (UTC)
- Footnotes, italicised notes, contextual linking like "Blaster was surprised to see Straxus single again, as he had previously been seen getting gay-married in Hawaii." Doesn't that about cover it? -Derik 18:44, 11 May 2007 (UTC)
- Also, Template:Storylink --KilMichaelMcC 18:53, 11 May 2007 (UTC)
Balls
Do we really need to be making such jokes in front of kids? And it's not even a very good "balls" joke. --Rotty 19:02, 11 May 2007 (UTC)
- I can change it to "testicles," if you want. --ItsWalky 19:46, 11 May 2007 (UTC)
I, uh, I kind of agree with Rotty's first statement that this isn't even a good joke. It's a real stretch, honestly. The classics bubble itself is the only remotely phallic part of the diagram so I don't see how it could be considered the balls. Also, the diagram kind of sucks anyway. Sorry, Walky. :( --Steve-o 19:41, 12 May 2007 (UTC)
