IDW Publishing Names John Barber New Editor in Chief

Discussion in 'Transformers News and Rumors' started by AzT, Apr 30, 2018.

  1. misfire19d

    misfire19d Not a writer. Not an illustrator. Just a fan.

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    o_O 
     
  2. GoLion

    GoLion Banned

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    I'm cautiously optimistic by the news of Barber's return/promotion to this position. Let's face it, the quality of stories started to slip when Barber stepped away from said position. Anyone can look at the comichron numbers and see the drop after he left. Granted, it wasn't a significant drop but there was a drop.

    I'd be happy with a leap back to the realm of 10,000 books being sold a month (Something I think will happen with Barber back in the driver's seat). Oh, and the floppy sales are still the best metric for judging how a book performs (Anyone who says they don't are dead wrong, and I question the intelligence of anyone who says the comichron numbers don't count). A book isn't selling 20,000 copies and getting cancelled. Once a book drops to around 5000 or less on the comichron chart a book is typically cancelled.
     
    Last edited: May 1, 2018
  3. AzT

    AzT Moderator News Staff TFW2005 Supporter

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    Andrew Griffith on Twitter
     
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  4. G.B. Blackrock

    G.B. Blackrock Autobot Ally

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    FWIW, I think a lot of the folks who are thrilled by this news agree that he was a better editor than a writer.
     
  5. Sockie

    Sockie Veteran

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    Which "early IDW days" do you mean? He was editor at the start of the MTMTE/RiD era, not the Furman -Ations at the very beginning.
     
  6. Probe

    Probe Well-Known Member

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    I mean, I think he's written some of the best Transformers comics and that his writing saw a huge jump in quality when he left editing, but I ALSO think he's a good editor. Not sure if I feel he's better at one or the other since they are not easily comparable.
     
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  7. shamanking282

    shamanking282 Well-Known Member

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    And I admit, I think a lot of our assumptions of Barber’s editing come from the differences in James Roberts’ writing while Barber was editing him.
     
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  8. Dark Starscream

    Dark Starscream With Headmaster Cobra Commander

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    Just my personal opinion, Barber was a very sub-par writer with juvenile, uminteresting dialogue and poor creative choices. Being a Transformers fan, I read the comics, but I never got giddy about them as I have with Roberts' MTMTE/LL comics.

    With Barber's writing, I often found myself rolling my eyes, or having to push myself through the rest of a terrible comic. I actually dreaded reading his books. As it stands, I only read Barber's comics just to keep up with the same continuity as Lost Light.
     
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  9. misfire19d

    misfire19d Not a writer. Not an illustrator. Just a fan.

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    The more I read these posts the more I'm realizing Barber didn't earn the EIC job. He was the only one left who would do it. :) :) ;) ;) :lolol :p 
     
  10. Infosaur

    Infosaur Ancient Cybertronian

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    I've found Barber to be a passable writer (who gets blown out of the water by Scott & Roberts) who mangles dialogue and misuses characters. (After 12 years of barely mentioning Sunstreaker & Sideswipe are brothers, we get Tracks & Needlenose?!?)

    That said, when he plays the long game, he's actually rather impressive. (Tarantulas is Springer's father, Prowl is a master manipulator, Optimus steps down from leadership, etc.)

    So I'd love to see him come up with long term story arcs, then promote the right writers to tell the story, pick the characters, write the dialogue.

    Now, the only issue is, we're starting this new world order during a brand relaunch. So I'm wondering just what I'm in for?
     
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  11. Ivar

    Ivar New Member

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    It would be nice to bring out a special regarding the \"Battle of Hell\'s Point\"
    This was one of the most legendary battles between decepticons and autobots.
    Would be nice to have a special or one shot about tjis great battle.
     
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  12. Deadend

    Deadend Spark of Creation

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    That had nothing to do with Ryall's leaving. And there was no going behind Hasbro's back on that. Both are still in good standing with Hasbro.
    It was a mess period that's more complicated than anyone wants to really talk about honestly. But a large chunk of it was on "fans" overreacting to begin with to a new character that was actually really cool(and shouldn't have been an issue since they got their classic version updated figure), and other areas sticking their nose in where it didn't belong. So these "fan" theories about it aren't true and are all pretty off base conjecture. And it got blown of proportion from there.

    The person who came up with the actual character change still works with Hasbro. The only thing on the creative side that was slightly bothersome, was that the problem areas were directly antagonized by the writer and tbh, he wasn't exactly completely wrong and honestly those areas should have been antagonized a bit for such a silly complaint they blew out of proportion for a different universe character, but maybe with some better explanations of the thought process on the "MANDATED character change".

    So please stop spreading that fake gossip/lies. It's tiring.

    Barber was set to get this promotion because Ryall was leaving and had been prepping for this even before that.
     
  13. justiceg

    justiceg Well-Known Member

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    Sorry, I'm totally confused because this whole conversation happened ten years ago ...what are you talking about? What "actual character change" are you talking about?

    Appreciate your passion there broski, but perhaps another way to help "stop spreading fake whatever" is to not drag up a dead thread to reply to stuff said four months back if not more? =)
     
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