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In the latest Comic Book Legends Revealed, see how Captain Marvel’s iconic costume redesign came about due to, of all things, a bet!
Welcome to Comic Book Legends Revealed! This is the eight hundred and thirteenth installment where we examine three comic book legends and determine whether they are true or false. As usual, there will be three posts, one for each of the three legends.
NOTE: If my Twitter page hits 5,000 followers, I’ll do a bonus edition of Comic Book Legends Revealed that week. Great deal, right? So go follow my Twitter page, Brian_Cronin!
COMIC LEGEND:
Captain Marvel’s iconic redesign by Jamie McKelvie came about because of a bet with Kelly Sue DeConnick where she put her own money on the line to get a great new costume.
STATUS:
True
When Ms. Marvel debuted in 1976, she basically just had a “feminized” version of the then-classic Captain Marvel costume that had been redesigned by Gil Kane five or so years earlier…
As you can see, however, the costume had some major issues, specifically the fact that the odd cut of her top would never work as any sort of practical outfit, as it would clearly always open up whenever she moved (Dave Cockrum complained about the costume to Marvel editorial by drawing what he thought would happen in real life with that costume – it was very much an X-rated drawing).
Marvel went with Cockrum’s idea and he introduced a new design of the costume that essentially only changed one aspect of the costume – giving her a full top. Cockrum, though, eventually came up with his own, more dramatic redesign of the costume that he introduced later in the series when Chris Claremont was writing the book…
It’s obviously a striking costume (Cockrum freakin’ LOVED his sashes, right?), but at the same time, it’s basically a bathing suit, and it is debatable whether the brilliance of the design matched the fit for the character. I’m not saying it absolutely DIDN’T, but I can easily see a strong argument for it not being the most appropriate costume for Carol Danvers, even as she changed her name from Ms. Marvel to Warbird (and then briefly wore an absurdly drab costume when she became a superhero liaison for the U.S. government).
So Marvel was planning to “promote” Carol from Ms. Marvel to Captain Marvel, and a result, she was going to get a new costume. However, as the writer of the then-not-yet-debuted new series, Kelly Sue DeConnick, explained to Polygon, the options she was given for the new costume were not anything she was a fan of. She elaborated, “So [editor Steve Wacker] sent some designs that were done in-house and I did not love them. And I was like, ‘Can we get Jamie McKelvie to do this?’ And he was like, ‘No, we don’t have the budget for it.’”
She continued, “I like to say I’m good at taking no for an answer, but I’m really not. And so I kinda kept pushing for it. And Steve was like, ‘No. But you know … if Jamie were to do a redesign … just on his own, and you were to happen to come upon it and send it to me … I might be able to get Marvel to pay for it.’”
Then a bold idea struck DeConnick…
“And so I called Jamie and was like, ‘All right, I want you to make a bet with me. I bet if you do a Carol Danvers redesign for Captain Marvel that Marvel will buy the design from you. And if I win this bet, then I get a redesign and you get paid. And if I lose this bet, I will pay for the redesign.’”
DeConnick later pointed out how the idea made no sense for her to go out of pocket to help out Marvel, noting, “My husband would have murdered me, because you don’t front money for billion-dollar companies. I mean, I would have murdered me, that’s nonsense.”
Well, as you likely imagined, McKelvie’s designs were amazing, spectacular, sensational and somehow, even web of…
DeConnick recalled, “It was extraordinary, because he’s probably the best designer working — as far as the look of contemporary hero costumes goes … He knocked it out of the park.”
It was so good that when they were posted online, it had SUCH a great reaction that there was already a ton of fan art available to run in just the FIRST ISSUE of the new series!
The outstanding Ed McGuinness did the cover of that first issue, by the way…
Obviously, the costume paid off in a big way, and very soon was adapted by Marvel Studios for Carol Danvers’ introduction as Captain Marvel into the Marvel Cinematic Universe…
What’s funny is that McKelvie, who ALSO designed the brilliant costume for Kamala Khan, the new Ms. Marvel (I assume they just paid him outright for that one), had never actually drawn Captain Marvel as a normal comic book, but he luckily got a chance to write AND draw a back-up in a recent issue of Captain Marvel’s series (which is written by another Kelly, the excellent Kelly Thompson, who is killing it on the series. Go buy and read it, people!).
Thanks to Susana Polo and Kelly Sue DeConnick for the great information!
SOME OTHER ENTERTAINMENT LEGENDS!
Check out some other entertainment and sports legends from Legends Revealed:
1. How Did the Writing Staff of the Simpsons Get “Revenge” on Justin Timberlake?
2. Was E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial Originally Going to be a Horror Film?
3. Was the Animated Series Wacky Races Originally Intended for a Live Action Game Show?
4. How Did the Graduate Inadvertently Lead to Animal House Being Filmed at the University of Oregon?
PART TWO SOON!
Check back later for part 2 of this installment’s legends!
Feel free to send suggestions for future comic legends to me at either cronb01@aol.com or brianc@cbr.com
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