What is the Marvel Method?

So this is a compelling episode but probably not for the reasons you’re anticipating. So far I’ve loved episodes that have uplifted, offered insight and given us a look at how the industry works and how it’s being challenged by consumers and creators alike to be more representative.

I walked into this with no idea what the Marvel Method is or where it came from. Others have remarked to me the show doesn’t really get the point of this near legendary approach to comics but…well I think they’re wrong.

The story goes something like this: Stan Lee was working so hard on so many things he didn’t have time to write proper scripts or, perhaps depending on who you ask, didn’t have time to finish all the projects he had his hand in. Was he a micromanager or just taking on too much? Difficult to tell and I’m sure everyone involved has an opinion.

All I can take from it, as someone who’s worked as a professional in an industry renowned for its extremely high pressure environments, is that I recognised several problematic red flags about the process as soon as they started to describe it (in entirely anodyne loving terms devoid of any of the human stress which must have been part of the process). The Marvel Method looks like nothing more than a coping strategy enacted by people being forced to manage UP.

The episode follows Dan Slott, who appears to be one of the most prolific creators in the Marvel stable. I can only say this creativity appears to cover over a working culture of extreme self-absorption and lack of care for colleagues. I would not work here based on this representation because everyone else has to wait around for Dan and when he fails to deliver they end up hiring other people to cover his ass.

What’s even more infuriating is this was predicted at the start of the show (and we must be cautious of the editing here) with Dan’s editor being quite clear he expected Dan to fail to deliver.

There is a heartbreaking scene in which Joe Caramagna, the letterer and effectively the last person to touch the manuscript effectively tells us he sits like a mushroom – in the dark and fed bullshit – until such point everyone else is dragged across the line and then he’s expected to just jump and get it done. He mentions that on some projects he’s been fifteen minutes away from a deadline people have known was coming for literally months and he’s still getting changes to make.

Personally I’d fire just about everyone involved in facilitating this absolutely terrible working culture. What’s fascinating is to contrast this to the episode where we meet the artisans and see how they work – seriously, studiously and, frankly like professionals. Here everyone is held up by one cog in the machine. What infuriates me is that no one is irreplaceable and there must be literally hundreds of talented writers out there ready to step up but Slott keeps getting the gig.

In a month when Crunch is all over the geek news for how the media (games in particular) industry kicks the crap out of its employees as a matter of course, this episode exemplifies these kinds of horrendous practices.

And it’s a fantastic documentary because of it. The presentation is gentle but it’s pretty unflinching, even if everyone’s trying to say nice things about the problem child at the heart of their process. It offers huge insight into how entire ways of working grow up around intractable problems, and it also offers great insight into how a comic goes from blank page to story to image to completed product – many elements about which I was previously ignorant.

The other redeeming point here is that it’s pretty clear Slott and others like him are the minority in the Marvel stable and despite people rhapsodising the Marvel Method for its creative freedom (read, desperate rear guard action of filling in the gaps the writer didn’t actually write) it’s a relief to walk away knowing the general approach appears to be one where people do what they’re supposed to on time.

I come away from the episode not disliking Slott but astonished he isn’t better managed and that he doesn’t appear to have any awareness of the damage he’s doing to others with his selfishness. Hey, it may just be his creative juice but I’m also a creative and I know many of us and he’s definitely an outlier. Besides, such outcomes for others are never justified regardless of what it takes to get our own creativity flowing.

Verdict: It’s a difficult episode to watch because it tackles dysfunctionality sidelong but it also shows a huge amount about the process and in this is it one of the best episodes of the series – even if you’ll be shouting at Slott repeatedly throughout.

My rating: 7 pages of late submission out of 10.

Stewart Hotston