Marvel Special Announcement 10.10.03

Posted by Jim Trabold on 10.10.2003

The Big Good Bye!

Ladies and gentlemen this news is still breaking here. The man who most fans have complained about is leaving the company as of January if not before. According to numerous sources this will be happening and very soon. Marvel’s upper management apparently finally grew tired of the Publishing President’s style, as well reports have leaked out that Marvel’s Avi Arad found Jemas’ take on Marvel characters made it more difficult for him to sell the properties in Hollywood, and retailers finally took their complaints over Marvel’s policies to Jemas’ superiors earlier this year.

One source has said Marvel was experiencing a tremendous surge in attention and popularity due to movies based on its franchises, the most recent headlines the comic side of the company had grabbed were due to “gay cowboys and dead princesses.”

To note that Jemas never commented when JQ’s contract was announced surprised many and also lead to much speculation on the matters. Also him not appearing at the press conference made more questions. If most of you will remember Mark Waid pointed to Jemas as one of the reasons he was fired from the FANTASTIC FOUR. Waid did not want to take the book in the direction that was, he felt, being dictated to him by Jemas

Sources are saying former Fleer/Skybox product director Dan Buckley will take the position of Publisher at Marvel shortly. While Buckley was not technically a Marvel employee, he did work extensively on Marvel-related products, such as OverPower and Marvel cards published by Fleer.

For more on this stay with 411 Comics and thanks to Newsarama for their help in this breaking news.

This may be a return to the good old days at Marvel. I think this may be the move that fans have been waiting for. Now the questions will come what about Joe and what about the others. Not much is known yet. We do know Joe has a contract. He will be EIC until stated otherwise. Now of course these sources of Newsrama’s may be wrong as well but I would hope they are right. With Jemas gone the fans will be happy and many of them that left because of him may run back. This news is major and I will continue to follow the situation as much as possible.