JB wrote: "Or it's incredibly lazy writing by people who would really rather be doing something else."

I'll buy that. As TV and film writers get the opportunity to fill time writing comics in between their more L.A.-centric gigs, I get the sense they want to "write about comics" instead, having the books be about previous books rather than earning their own space on the racks.

There are a number of books out there that seem like "fish in a barrel" concepts. Someone wrote a limited series retelling Secret Wars just from Spider-Man's point of view. Then came a series redoing Shooter's Korvac Saga just from Captain America's vantage point. This trend could easily continue without interruption indefinitely... The Marvel Adventure line for kids regularly revisits established continuity from odd angles, giving us, for example, a nightclub lothario Ego, the Living Planet, who comes by the Solar System to hit on lovely blue-green Earth, while noticing she's "got a shorty" (the moon) but letting her know he's cool with that...

These aren't stories in and of themselves. They're commentaries and retakes on previous stories. The Ultimates Universe was very much a case of rewriting what longtime readers already knew, but edgier. Harder. Kewler. More like Warren Ellis and Grant Morrison, not because those guys sold so well, but because they wrote so cool.

I guess coming up with stuff on your own does take a bit more sweat and strain. And hey, for what comics pay, why kill yourself, right?

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One of the things I was looking forward to on HIDDEN YEARS was retelling tales that had appeared in other titles while the X-Men's own book was in reprint limbo. The key, of course, was that these stories would be separated by new material, not the entire raison d'etre for the series!

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Percentage, I don't know, but I have added actual blacks to Spider-Man, Power Man, Black Bolt, and perhaps a few others. Plus I added "shading" to the "cracks" in the Thing's rocky hide, to give greater definition.

The biggest changes, of course, were turning a Silver Surfer (minus board) into Guardian, and an Iceman (minus ice dagger) into Havok. I also played around with turning Kitty Pryde into Heather Hudson, but was not ultimately satisfied with how it turned out.

Guardian looks fantastic from where I'm sitting!

I still haven't given Heather glasses.  I'm such a slacker.

May Previews:

J. Jonah Jameson, Sabastian Shaw, Terrex (special)