Where Wolverine Prances by in a Frilly Pink Dress

So my post scheduling isn’t working lately, and until I figure out what’s messing it up I probably won’t be on my usual schedule. Plus, this morning I received some really disturbing news from The Best Boss Ever, which has me really nervy and worried, but I’m not going to blog about it because, while I may not be the smartest geek in the world, I know better than to blog publicly about work.  I won’t blog about work since I have The Best Boss Ever and don’t want to endanger that.

Good bosses are hard to come by.  Let’s just say that if there’s someone you haven’t hugged lately and you need to, do so. They might be taken from you at a moment’s notice.

And in the middle of all of this nerve-wracking news I get a tweet that says that Disney has bought out Marvel comics.

What?!?!

I had to stop a moment and sit down.  My beloved Marvel comics. Purchased. By Disney. The producers of elephants in tutus.  It naturally wasn’t long before the idea of Wolverine dressed as a Disney princess drifted across the Twitter airwaves. (Gee, thanks for that image, @furiey and @knightless...Damn you, tweeple. Damn you. That is so wrong.)

My first initial reaction to this news was utmost horror, but looking at it logically I have to admit that this doesn’t necessarily have to be a bad thing.  Disney did the Pirates of the Caribbean movies, after all, and while none of the sequels had all of the charm of the first, they were in no way horrible. Although, I do still wonder how Johnny Depp still manages to be sexy when he’s filthy and his teeth look to be rotting out.

This purchase means money.  Money that Marvel needs in a time where all print media, comics included, is losing readership left and right. A few blockbuster films might help that and encourage people to at least check out the comics, but Disney has an unparalleled ability to market licensed characters in the form of just about any purchasable item you can think of, and that could just be the thing to help Marvel along.

Provided, of course, that it’s done the right way.

I am more than a bit worried for Marvel’s more mature and independent-minded properties.  Will they have to deal with the bowdlerizing influence of Disney? Will Disney try to make Marvel’s comic books into comics just for kids? – The potential is definitely there with some lines for censorship to remove all meaning from the stories.  Take the increasingly apparent parallels between the struggles for mutant rights in X-men and the struggles for gay rights and civil rights in politics today.  Will those political ideas that give the X-men comics so much meaning to so many people be expunged from the books?

I hope that Disney’s controlling influence in that manner will be light to non-existent.  As much as Marvel may need this new partnership, I would hate to see it destroy the quality of content that I have come to expect from them.  I’ve always been a devoted Marvel fan, and I hope that I can continue to be so.

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Comics, Geekery Comics, Disney, Marvel Comics, Wolverine, X-Men