August 24, 2004

Remember billjemas.com?

Ages ago, around the time of U-Decide, Glenn pointed out to me that Bill Jemas had, shockingly, not locked up www.billjemas.com. "Ohhh, Glenn, get it for me, would'ja?" I asked. And Glenn did. And after having some giggles at Bill's expense, I publicly stated that if he wanted to take it off our hands, we wouldn't cybersquat on it. Never heard from him.

Until recently.

So just to let you guys know, with any luck www.billjemas.com will be undergoing new management and will be the launchpoint for...well, for whatever Bill Jemas is going to do next.

PAD

Posted by Peter David at August 24, 2004 01:24 AM | TrackBack | Other blogs commenting
Comments
Posted by: James Tichy at August 24, 2004 01:44 AM

Oh, I can hardly wait.

Posted by: hdefined at August 24, 2004 02:53 AM

Oh god. If there's one thing Bill Jemas needs to refrain from, it's thinking up new ideas. Tsunami, Nuff Said month, Marvel Mangaverse, Epic take two, U-Decide, and let's not forget his pride and joy, Marville and Namor. Is there a safe dimension he can be sent to in which there's no sentient life he can bother?

Posted by: Michael Rawdon at August 24, 2004 03:01 AM

Then again, I'd rather have four more years (heh) of Bill Jemas than return to the heady days of the 1990s, Marvel-style. Urgh. I think for a while there the only Marvel comic I was buying was Peter's Hulk.

And y'know, I'm not buying many Marvels today either. (Though I am eternally grateful that we're getting new Marvel Masterworks volumes, and with the old-style dustjackets, yet! Yaybo!)

Posted by: Fred Chamberlain at August 24, 2004 07:35 AM

hdefined:

>Oh god. If there's one thing Bill Jemas needs to refrain from, it's thinking up new ideas. Tsunami, Nuff Said month, Marvel Mangaverse, Epic take two, U-Decide, and let's not forget his pride and joy, Marville and Namor. Is there a safe dimension he can be sent to in which there's no sentient life he can bother?

Although Jemas made several incredibly bad business decisions when it came to dealing with the public and his employees.... um as well as forcing ideas and story directions down creator's' throats, the idea of Nuff Said Month was pretty cool, IMO. It was original, had much potential, worked well in books that had solid, creative writers and reminded me of the freshness that Marvel has back Marvel's earlier days. I'd support any ideas like this that comes along, as long as they don't come along too frequently.

Fred

Posted by: John DiBello at August 24, 2004 08:39 AM

From PAD's billjemas.com: "People keep asking me if I'm mad over the slam at me in "Marville #2."

As someone who wouldn't have picked up a copy of MARVILLE if it has been shrinkwrapped with a CD-ROM for Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow (...uh, bad example, but you get the idea), what did Bill say or how did he swipe PAD in that issue? Just curious.

Posted by: Fred Chamberlain at August 24, 2004 09:10 AM

John D.
From PAD's billjemas.com: "People keep asking me if I'm mad over the slam at me in "Marville #2."

>As someone who wouldn't have picked up a copy of MARVILLE if it has been shrinkwrapped with a CD-ROM for Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow (...uh, bad example, but you get the idea), what did Bill say or how did he swipe PAD in that issue? Just curious.

I didn't buy it (Thought I'd make that very clear as my rep would be irrevokably damaged should that misinformation get out.), but I did skim it in the shop. As I recall, there was an unidentified character who was very anal, fanboyish, had no life and resembled PAD enough for anyone with knowledge of the Jeams/PAD situation to pick up that it was supposed to be a parady of him. Not only unflattering, but downright insulting and worst of all......... not funny in the least. It was painful even to skim that book.

Fred

Ned

Posted by: Rob at August 24, 2004 09:44 AM

Rich Johnston should have some fun with this info.

Posted by: Augie De Blieck Jr. at August 24, 2004 09:52 AM

Hdefined: How quickly you forget Ultimate Marvel and Marvel Age. Both were Bill Jemas' creations/co-creations/ideas/what-have-you. The former is the most popular thing at Marvel since the Image founders left. The latter is the foundation for Marvel's future in getting to younger readers.

Posted by: Duke Harrington at August 24, 2004 11:26 AM

Or, you could say the former is an drawn-out, unneccesary rehash, taking six to ten issues to retell, for most ultimate series, essentially the same tales orginally told, and told better, in one. While the latter is merely an even greater insult to the original creators, swiping their plots and saddeling them with inferior artwork. But your milage may vary.

Posted by: Fred Chamberlain at August 24, 2004 11:43 AM

The Duke:

>Or, you could say the former is an drawn-out, unneccesary rehash, taking six to ten issues to retell, for most ultimate series, essentially the same tales orginally told, and told better, in one.

You certainly could..... as long as you were not actually reading the Ultimate books and knew better.

Posted by: Robert Jung at August 24, 2004 11:53 AM

Marvel Age? Oh, good; does that mean Fred Hembeck has a regular assignment once more? ;-)

--R.J.

Posted by: Luigi Novi at August 24, 2004 12:35 PM

hdefined: Oh god. If there's one thing Bill Jemas needs to refrain from, it's thinking up new ideas. Tsunami, Nuff Said month, Marvel Mangaverse, Epic take two, U-Decide, and let's not forget his pride and joy, Marville and Namor.
Luigi Novi: What was wrong with Nuff Said? Creators have done silent issues before; this was nothing new. Even Peter defended it. And what was wrong with Epic? I think it would’ve been a good idea to have a creator-owned line by Marvel if it had been allowed to get off the ground. And didn’t he come up with the Ultimate line? Ultimate Spidey and The Ultimates look pretty good.

Posted by: Michael Pullmann at August 24, 2004 12:41 PM

And anyone who talks smack about Tsunami is gonna have to answer to me and all the other Runaways fans out there. And we bite.

Posted by: Scavenger at August 24, 2004 02:02 PM

And anyone who talks smack about Tsunami is gonna have to answer to me and all the other Runaways fans out there. And we bite

And Crew fans...muvstepper!

Posted by: Augie De Blieck Jr. at August 24, 2004 02:14 PM

Duke: The Ultimate line is outselling plenty of comics (most, actually), generating plenty of revenue for Marvel, and providing an instant library of trade paperbacks with constant sell through. That includes good placement in book stores, places where people who can't find or don't want to shop at a local direct market store can find them.

It's an unqualified success for Marvel.

Posted by: Thomas E. Reed at August 24, 2004 02:41 PM

Why am I reminded of the character Nucleus, from Bendis's "Powers," who in his retirement spent all his time on a web site, bitching about all the wrong things other heroes were doing? With only four fanboys responding to him, just to yank his chain?

I'm not going to monitor www.billjemas.com, but if anything like this materializes, let us all know.

Posted by: Joe Frietze at August 24, 2004 03:41 PM

And anyone who talks smack about Tsunami is gonna have to answer to me and all the other Runaways fans out there. And we bite

And Crew fans...muvstepper!

And Sentinel fans!

Posted by: J. Alexander at August 24, 2004 04:11 PM

Jemas may have been a jerk, but you have to credit him that he did not insist on the status quo. There was something about the U-Decide fiasco that rubbed me the wrong way, but at least Marvel used it as a way to publicize CAPTAIN MARVEL. This is more than DC is willing to do with FA.

Posted by: Brian G at August 24, 2004 04:35 PM

You know, I can never understand the bile and venom towards the Quemas regime. As far as I'm concerned they did more good (Daredevil, rejuvinating Spider-Man, X-Force/X-Statix,the Morrison X-Men, the Ultimate titles which kick some serious @$$) than they did bad (Namor and Marville for example).

If some people would stop whining about how "it was all better when I was a kid" and start living in the now, the world would be a better place. As Claremont has shown us time and time again, you can't go home again (although I'm hoping Wolfman/Perez will prove me wrong with Titans: Games).

Posted by: Roger Tang at August 24, 2004 04:53 PM

You know, I can never understand the bile and venom towards the Quemas regime. As far as I'm concerned they did more good (Daredevil, rejuvinating Spider-Man, X-Force/X-Statix,the Morrison X-Men, the Ultimate titles which kick some serious @$$) than they did bad (Namor and Marville for example).

If some people would stop whining about how "it was all better when I was a kid" and start living in the now, the world would be a better place

One guy was ragging on how Quesada/Jemas never treated DC as professionally as Stan Lee did.

Hmmm. Is "AOL Comics" that much worse than "Brand Eccch!"

Posted by: Joe V. at August 24, 2004 08:22 PM

The only good decision Bill made was hiring Quesada as EIC, in turn, Quesada hired Axel Alonso & Grant Morrison. The Axel hiring really is what put Marvel back on top (although i'm still a hopeless DC guy).

Joe V.

Posted by: Joe V. at August 24, 2004 08:26 PM

Oh, and Quesada hires Bendis to write every title out there. In fact it was Quesada, more then Jemeas who is responsible for Marvel's current status.

Joe V.

Posted by: Howie Hoff at August 24, 2004 08:31 PM

What did the button on your original Bill Jemis site do , anyway?

Posted by: Elie at August 24, 2004 09:07 PM

Peter,

I think it is very gentlemanly of you to give over Bill Jemas's domain to him. After reading the history the two of you have (and I'm sure there's a lot more going on than you'll ever tell us), giving him his domain name was very big of you.

I hope it was a fair transaction for both of you.

Posted by: Fred Chamberlain at August 24, 2004 09:14 PM

Elie:

>Peter,
>I think it is very gentlemanly of you to give over Bill Jemas's domain to him. After reading the history the two of you have (and I'm sure there's a lot more going on than you'll ever tell us), giving him his domain name was very big of you.

Not to mention that it makes for a helluva story. ;)

Posted by: hdefined at August 25, 2004 02:39 AM

"Hdefined: How quickly you forget Ultimate Marvel and Marvel Age. Both were Bill Jemas' creations/co-creations/ideas/what-have-you. The former is the most popular thing at Marvel since the Image founders left. The latter is the foundation for Marvel's future in getting to younger readers."

I didn't bash Ultimate Marvel because, financially, it seems to be a success, but I find it creatively boring as anything and, at least initially, was just an excuse for "Bendis and Millar redo the Marvel Universe", with less than stellar results. Heck, just ask PAD how he feels about Ultimate Hulk.

Posted by: Cory!!Strode at August 25, 2004 12:10 PM

I don't think that the "Bill Jemas killed Marvel" is valid, seeing as how everyone who has ever been in charge of Marvel since Stan has been accused of the same thing.

Jemas tried to reach new readers (you may not have like the Mangaverse, but it sold well in mainstream bookstores), tried new approaches, and beefed up Marvel's trade paperback program to where they are about the best in the industry. He also made the X-Men and Spider-Man books readable (which was one of his stated goals) for the first time in almost a decade.

He had a lot of bluster and rubbed people the wrong way, but I think his tenure will go down as one of the better eras for Marvel. Or would you rather go back to Marvel having old pros draw like Rob Liefeld, endless 20+ part crossovers and all of the Masterworks and Essentials going out of print the month they come out?

Posted by: Andrew at August 25, 2004 12:13 PM

Laugh at Bill Jemas all you want but he's the reason I'm reading comics today.

Posted by: hdefined at August 25, 2004 01:51 PM

"Or would you rather go back to Marvel having old pros draw like Rob Liefeld"

Actually I'd rather Marvel figure out how to get artists drawing 12 issues a year again. Or in Joe Quesada's case, more than 3 issues a year.

Posted by: Rich Johnston at August 27, 2004 06:22 PM

Marville 4 and 5 were pretty decent comics.

No, really.

Posted by: Jerome Maida at August 27, 2004 06:48 PM

You know, the sniping over Jemas is absolutely insane! I could see if Marvel's sales and creativity were both at their peak when he took over. While they were both somewhat low, neither was as poor as "history" (including fanatical fans and Wizard) would make it seem. Believe it or not, there were alot of good, entertaining, enjoyable stories in the '90s.
Anyway, there were some fundamental changes Jemas was responsible for. He wanted the X-Men and spider lines to be readable agin, which he accomplished. He wanted to take chances. And he dared "restart' Marvel with the Ultimate line. I truly feel most people who bash this line do not read it. He helped make this line accessible to new readers because they were seeking a Spider-man or X-man story with which they could truly relate as teens or young people.
DC has had three main Flashes. Why should kids be forced to read about an "adult" Peter Parker's marriage problems?
That's what I love about JMS's run. It appeals to both demographics. But I digress.
I simply fail to understand how a board consisting of peter for his courage or innovativemess or whatever in trying something "different", can at the dsame time excorciate Marvel for trying something different while respecting the past. Please explain this to me. Someone.

Posted by: Fred Chamberlain at September 14, 2004 09:15 AM

Hmmm, just checked out www.billjemas.com to see if there had been any changes. Bill Jemas has posted an open letter with a very general idea of what to expect there. Obviously, he is attempting to build anticipation, but I have to admit that I'm mildly curious to see what actually becomes of this and who he has involved with it.

Posted by: John DiBello at March 18, 2005 12:31 PM

Not that anyone's going to look at this thread...but seven months after PAD's post, www.billjemas.com has been apparently abandoned.