We interrupt this regularly scheduled column for important speculation
I know I promised that I would be talking about Power Company this week, but something came up. An important piece of news rocked this column writer’s world!
As announced by John Babos last week, at San Diego Con, during the Cup Of Joe panel, a CrossGen logo appeared on screen with the year 2011 on it. No other information was given at the time. In fact, reports said that most in attendance seemed to have no idea even what that logo meant. I gotta tell you, that definitely made me sad. I’m a huge CrossGen fan, and when Disney (who has the rights for CrossGen) bought Marvel, I was really hoping this would lead to these characters and books coming back.
Since none of us know exactly what the specific deal is with this “new CrossGen,” I figured I would explain to “non-cultists” what CrossGen was, and throw in a little speculation on what I would like to see from Marvel’s CrossGen.
Crossgenesis
Way back in January 2000 (has it really been ten years?), a new player entered the comic industry. Millionaire Mark Alessi and his cousin Gina Villa tapped into some of the most creative people in comics (Mark Waid, Ron Marz, George Perez, and Barbara Kesel, for example) to build a comic universe from the ground up. The universe wouldn’t be superhero based. These stories would take place in genres as diverse as sci-fi, sword and sorcery, martial arts, pirates, horror, even Victorian whodunits. Many of the books would have some connecting threads, but each would remain separate.
Various people in this universe were marked with a sigil, which gave them unique powers, so the universe was called the “Sigilverse.” The initial books were Mystic, Meridian, Scion, and Sigil.
The books quickly gained critical acclaim and a very solid fan base. CrossGen fans were often called cultists by the rest of the industry, and if you ever saw a CrossGen gathering at a convention, you would know why. We were loud and very enthusiastic about our favorite company. It was like a geek pep rally.
CrossGen quickly grew to be a power in the industry, even going so far as to pioneer new formats, such as Comics on the Web and their “Digital Comics” which worked via DVD players, presenting comic stories with voiceovers and animations. They were also the first company to take a “collect everything into trade” policy, which Marvel and DC picked up on later. In order to get the books a wider audience, they also created “manga sized” pocket trades, and provided copies of their comics with mini-lesson plans to schools to inspire the use of comics in education. They also started to expand outside the Sigilverse, publishing some great creator-owned projects like Medieval Lady Death, and the brilliant Abadazad.
CrossGen also made some efforts to tap into different markets, even advertising in magazines geared towards teenage girls. Marvel would soon try to tap into this vein too with books like Mary Jane and Emma Frost, but the covers of Emma Frost might have sent out the wrong image. Does this book really look appropriate for young female readers??
In addition to the Sigilverse, we also found out about “The Negation,” which was a powerful alien race in an alternate universe that was looking to create their own mark of power (basically an Anti-Sigil). Both universes started moving pieces into place, and this all came to a head in a massive crossover series called Negation War. Unfortunately, after issue 2 came out, CrossGen abruptly stopped publishing.
So how did such a promising company come to such a bad end? CrossGen grew too big too quickly. They had basically been living investor to investor while they continued to grow well beyond their means. The money dried up, and they were suddenly bankrupt. Crossgen ceased publication in June 2004.
Disney ended up purchasing all the rights for a pretty small amount, mostly because they had wanted Abadazad, though they ended up not doing much with it. All that came out of this purchase was a handful of novel/comic hybrids, several of which never even got released in America.
That brings us to now.
The Future of Crossgen: Skitch Style
So, if I had my say, how would the CrossGen universe be brought back? My initial thought was “finish off Negation War and go from there,” but the more I thought about it, the more I realized that was a purely fanboy reaction.
It would actually be much better for them to pretty much start from scratch. Follow a lot of the same plans, but tighten the focus down to a handful of books, and let some of the more “tangent” books be on their own without being shoe horned into the main “Sigilverse.” For example, Route 666 was a brilliant horror book, and it was probably a mistake to reveal that the main character was a sigilbearer. It really felt like a “we’re doing this because we have to, not because it really fits the story we’ve been telling.” Get some of the best talents in comics on board, add in some new talent prospects, and you’re in business!
The New Sigilverse should consist of:
Meridian: Meridian was the book that I felt really showed what CrossGen was all about. Yes, the main character had “superpowers” and yes, the book featured a villain with superpowers of their own, but it was still a very unique story. Sephie and her uncle were both sigilbearers, and Meridian really showed how these gifts could be used in polar opposite ways. Meridian was full of fantastic adventure (including Sephie spending some time as a pirate on an airship) and hints of romance without ever bogging down the narrative. It was pretty much the perfect comic for all readers.
Scion: Scion tells the story of two nations at perpetual war. Just as peace is starting to appear in sight, the Raven king is murdered, and the blame is placed on the Heron prince, Ethan. Ethan’s life is further complicated when he’s given a sigil of power. He ends up working with the Raven Princess, Ashleigh, to try and bring peace to the land.
One thing CrossGen did brilliantly was creating strong female protagonists. Ethan was a good character, but I found Ashleigh to be much more compelling. In the relaunched Scion, I really hope she becomes the central character.
Mystic: I actually wasn’t sure if I was going to include Mystic on the list, but it really is a necessity to provide a little more range of settings. Due to the interference of a sigil, one of the powerful guilds of mages that dominate the world of Ciress has been thrown into chaos. Instead of her more responsible sister, a spoiled party girl named Giselle is given immense mystical power. The book follows her journey about learning to use these powers responsibly and learning more about how the various guilds work (which I thought were some of the most compelling issues of the series). Mystic also had a great sense of humor with numerous other mystical characters making cameos like Harry Potter and Doctor Strange.
Negation: Negation was probably CrossGen’s most critically praised book (rightfully so). It helped put the Sigilverse in a much larger context, and provided the “big bad.” At the heart of it, Negation was a massive sci-fi prison break movie. By the time Negation War came out, many of the heroes and villains of the Sigilverse had decided to work together against this bigger threat.
Just an editorial note: CrossGen had some other solid sci-fi books, including launch title Sigil, but I want to keep the number of titles as condensed as possible. In this list, I am also leaving off Crux, which was not only a great play on the Atlantis legends, but also a fun sci-fi book, and tied closely into the origins of the Negation.
Sojourn Sojourn was CrossGen’s bestselling book. People give Greg Land a lot of flak, but his gorgeous art on Sojourn was probably a big part of the reason this book sold so well. Sojourn was a sword and sorcery tale of a warrior woman on a quest to find pieces of a weapon to kill the evil dictator responsible for killing her family. In the typical CrossGen model, Arwyn was a strong, self-reliant female. In fact, I still have Arwyn and Ashleigh statues on top of my entertainment center.
Sojourn was the first CrossGen book where the villain was the sigilbearer (not counting the shared sigils in Meridian). In fact, the whole purpose of the book was a quest to kill the sigilbearer.
The Way of the Rat: To be honest, I would LOVE for this to be a shared book with The Path. Both stories took place on the same world, and both had a terrific Asian flare to them. Way of the Rat was much more light hearted, and is just about the best martial arts story I’ve ever seen in any medium. The Path was much more serious, and was kind of redundant with Brath (which actually launched much later), so that is why Way of the Rat got the edge here.
Brath: Brath is pretty much the combination of Conan, Gladiator, and Braveheart. It had a very unique feel to it, and while Brath probably is the least necessary of the books I am suggesting to keep, it was also the one I couldn’t bring myself to get rid of.
CrossGen Chronicles: In order to keep the flow of the main books going, Crossgen would publish quarterly “flashback” stories. It ended only after a few issues, but I would have loved to see it continue, especially as an anthology, giving us a bigger perspective of the Sigilverse outside of the core titles. This could be the place for books like Sigil, the First and Crux to be represented.
What about everything else? I definitely feel Route 666, Ruse, El Cazador, and Kiss Kiss Bang Bang should still be ongoing series, just set outside the main Sigilverse. Just keep them as standalone horror, mystery, pirate, and spy stories respectively. Then again, that might have been their intention all along with El Cazador and Kiss Kiss Bang Bang, which got cancelled before any connection was ever revealed.
There are some books I would say shouldn’t come back on their own. The First and Solus come to mind. Both these books were very inaccessible, and would have been better served as backups in Crossgen Chronicles that as their own monthly series. I admire what they were trying to do with those books (getting much deeper into the lore of the Sigilverse), but all in all, I don’t think they succeeded.
Other Thoughts
Hey, Disney/Marvel!! Now that you have brought back CrossGen, you know what should be next on the agenda? PUBLISH W.I.T.C.H. IN AMERICA!! W.I.T.C.H. is the best selling comic in the world, and the most we can get here are some digest sized trades that are a hassle to find? Bad enough the cartoon only lasted two seasons.
Before I shut er down for the week, here are my Ashleigh and Arwyn statues, hanging out in front of Young Justice.
As always, I love hearing from the readers. Please drop me a line with any comments, criticisms, or suggestions for other books you’d like to see me take on.
