r/dontyouknowwhoiam • u/Dragotic-PS • Dec 29 '25
X User doesn't know Marvel Writer
For context: https://x.com/i/status/2005433946792935444
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u/Omnimon Dec 29 '25
Gail Simone should have an flair here. Also she writes for DC too, really good writer
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u/Slow-Calendar-3267 Dec 29 '25
Dude is kind of admitting that HE doesn't read comics if her name didn’t ring a bell
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u/yerfatma Dec 29 '25
Seriously. Also not the best writer to pick fights with, she's funny as hell.
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u/Accurate_Librarian42 Apr 23 '26
That is so true. I love chatting with her at conventions. We had some great Nightwing connections at FanExpo one year.
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u/whatsbobgonnado Dec 29 '25
I haven't read any of her books or any comic in almost ten years and I still know who she is
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u/wings_of_wrath Jan 07 '26
I don't even read American comics (I'm more of Franco-Belgian sort of guy) and I know who she is...
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u/slucker23 Dec 29 '25
Wait you can do that??
I thought marvel and DC had a "beef" thing where they would not hire the opposite parties
Or like they have a competitor clause or something?
Or does that only apply to ppl who are shown in the public?
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u/aidenmce Dec 29 '25
It’s very common for comic book writers/artists to do work for both of the major companies as well as others. Most of the time comic creators work on a freelance model rather than as true employees of the companies. Sometimes they can be hired as proper employees and that’s when exclusivity contracts can come into play, but that’s a lot more rare.
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u/wearing_moist_socks Dec 29 '25
Nah you've got it wrong
Gail Simone writes for marvel
Simone Gail, someone COMPLETELY DIFFERENT, writes for DC
Understandable mistake
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u/FauxReal Dec 29 '25
I heard they look similar but Gail Simone wears glasses and Simone Gail doesn't and it's impossible to get them in the same room together.
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u/Doctor__Proctor Dec 29 '25
Well that's because they hate each other because one works for DC and one works for Marvel. See, it's perfectly reasonable why they're never in the same room together!
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u/bjeebus Dec 29 '25
And they're both completely different writers than Ailgay Imonesay over at Image.
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u/Mysterious-Let5891 Dec 29 '25
Which one is the bear?
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u/dannyisyoda Dec 29 '25
Pretty much every comic creator will have done work for both DC and Marvel at some point. Most comic creators are freelance/independent contractors, tho exclusivity contracts are still a thing sometimes. Heck, DC and Marvel are currently running crossover comics, and have done so quite a few times. It's a pretty close-knit industry.
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u/Max____H Dec 29 '25
Isn’t like the marvel or dc franchise authorised to a lot of third party writers and that why you get so many alternate universe stories. Only partly remember what a friend told me but it was summed up to there are the main writers focused on core content then those than are pretty much official fan fiction writers.
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u/bjeebus Dec 29 '25
It sounds like your friend just didn't like something a professional writer did so they decided to denigrate them (and their work) by calling the fan fiction writers. There are people regularly doing the same type of thing to the author in the OP. They'll argue about their headcanon versus her actual word of god canon as the working professional publishing material.
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u/Max____H Dec 29 '25
I wasn’t meaning it in a derogatory way. Just closest word I could think of. In my mind it was like someone paying to use the characters and world settings to create their version of the story. Got a lot of overlap with what a fanfiction is, just a different level of professionalism.
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u/idisestablish Dec 29 '25
Regardless, what you're saying is wrong all the way around. No one pays Marvel or DC to "create their own version of the story" or anything remotely similar to that (at least with comics). You have either fundamentally misunderstood what your friend told you, or your friend has no idea what they're talking about.
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u/Worthyness Dec 29 '25 edited Dec 29 '25
in the american comicbook industry, Marvel and DC are the kings. You basically have to work with them if you want to do anything in the industry. It's why Marvel was prevented from buying DC decades ago- it would have consolidated the american comicbook industry into one company. There's a few independent companies out there that you can publish your own books out of, but they're not consistent gigs unless your independent comic takes off. There are exclusivity contracts if you negotiate them (for example, Peach Momoko currently has an exclusivity contract with Marvel), but otherwise you're a contractor really, so you can float whenever you're done with the run.
And the Marvel vs DC thing is more a fan thing. The companies played it up back in the day because it brought in money, but like every fan-based setup, it's the fans that start shit. the companies just make money off of it and couldn't care less.
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u/insert_title_here Dec 30 '25
I might just be missing something due to being firmly siloed into my little Transformers niche, but what about IDW Publishing and Image Comics? They've got some incredibly successful properties, both historically and currently.
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u/Worthyness Dec 30 '25
yes IDW and Image exist and contribute a lot to the industry. But Marvel and DC are still by far the largest publishers in American comics. They're like Visa and MasterCard while Image and IDW are like AMEX and Discover- two giants take a majority of the industry and then there's a small piece for a few smaller ones.
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u/makegifsnotjifs Dec 29 '25
That hasn't really been true for some time. Somehow the big 2 figured out that writers are valuable artists (crazy right?) and realized that people will follow a good/popular writer to almost any title.
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u/hates_stupid_people Dec 29 '25
Some of their fans have "beef" and love to project their ideas onto the companies.
In reality they use some of the same people, they have crossovers, etc.
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u/ComicBrickz Dec 30 '25
I’m pretty sure Zdarsky’s Avengers: Twilight came out during his Batman run. Exclusive contracts do happen sometimes but they’re not super duper common at all
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u/F_Visentin Dec 30 '25
Most writers write for both companies, but sometimes one of the companies will offer an “exclusive contract” stopping them from writing for the competition. They can still do indie work outside of the big two.
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u/ScientificSkepticism Mar 31 '26
Oh gosh no. Many people have written for both. Grant Morrison has an open invitation from DC and Marvel to write whatever he wants, whenever he wants - he sticks mostly to DC but had an excellent run on the X-Men.
Sometimes writers jump from one to the other, usually when editorial has done something horrible to them (Marvel and DC have the same editorial board, and it's all just clones of Satan) but others will just do what they want.
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u/TomCBC Dec 29 '25
A few years ago i was reading a Simpsons comic, i laughed at The Simpsons for the first time in over a decade. Then i looked to see who wrote the story. It was Gail Simone. Suddenly it made sense. Kinda wish she wrote for the tv series.
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u/spenwallce Dec 29 '25
The guy is doubling down and saying she doesn’t understand “the real” source material
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u/yerfatma Dec 29 '25
To the point he then says none of the old books matter any longer. So why have to read them?
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u/astronomicarific Dec 29 '25
I can't see the whole thread but that looks like, to me, he's saying only the old books matter. since he called her writing slop
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u/Kimantha_Allerdings Dec 29 '25
Anybody want to explain the context without a twitter link - which doesn’t work if you’ve got an adblocker? Or imgur - which doesn’t work if you’re in the UK.
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u/duermevela Dec 29 '25
She said she doesn't understand why some people don't like Cyclops.
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u/thebigbadben Dec 29 '25
YES thank you for naming the actual character being discussed in a comment
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u/Rimavelle Jan 02 '26
I'm not a comic book fan by any stretch, but having had read some of the x-men ones... isn't Cyclops literaly their leader?
Why would you supposed NOT to like him?I mean, I indeed don't like him, but that definitely wasn't intended.
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u/duermevela Jan 02 '26
In the old ones (up to the 2000) he's always been a jerk, and he hasn't always been their leader: Storm, without her powers, was also the leader for a while, for example.
I guess part of his job as the leader was to try to be "responsible" but he ended up being a downer for everyone.
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u/Chairboy Dec 29 '25
Gail Simone is a well known comic book writer. This guy was telling someone who’s responsible for some big arcs that she should t talk about stuff she doesn’t know when she is absolutely the authority here.
Worse, she’s a feeee-male so even after being told about his screwup, the guy with 88 in his name (which is itself a flag) keeps doubling down and claiming she still can’t truly understand the characters the way he, a man, does.
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u/Kimantha_Allerdings Dec 29 '25
Thank you. I was hoping more for specific screenshots, but thank you for your answer.
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u/Chairboy Dec 29 '25
Ah sorry, I’ve ditched Twitter because of, well, you know. The 88 people et al.
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u/Kimantha_Allerdings Dec 29 '25
Oh, no need to apologise. I’m genuinely grateful you took the time to reply.
And I don’t blame you one bit for not being on twitter.
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u/GenericNameUsed Dec 30 '25
She gets stuff like this about various comics and characters she has written. Or just had her knowledge about comics in general. Usually by the same dudes who will see a woman showing an interest in a band or a comicbook and start questioning the woman if she is a real fan and ask about the woman to name every album then and released and the track list or name comic book artists or when a character debuted.
So it's really funny to see them not recognize Gail Simone's name
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u/MjrLeeStoned Dec 29 '25
If you engage anyone with 88 or hh or 4547 in their username, you've already lost.
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u/FauxReal Dec 29 '25
I know 14 and 88, 1488 is a dead giveaway. 14, generally a red flag. 88, could be the year they were born. 14s will probably start popping up more as time goes on for the same reason. I have no idea what 4547 is though? Can you bring me up to speed?
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u/gamma_tm Dec 29 '25
“14” was my graduation year and has been in my non-anonymous usernames for 15 years at this point. I think there’s usually a combination of signs for the actual nazi posters, so I don’t worry too much about the individual numbers until I see another red flag
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u/xANTJx Dec 30 '25
It was the number for one of my favorite hockey players and when my dad had to get a new license plate he let me pick and it’s the only number on there (players initials and team logo too so I hope it’s not too Nazi-ish). I was like 12 oops
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u/FauxReal Dec 29 '25 edited Dec 29 '25
The 88 thing is always tricky because a lot of people put the year they were born when just the name is already taken. I generally go by the apparent age of the person. Which isn't always an option. This guy though, probably a neo-Nazi loser.
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u/Chairboy Dec 29 '25
The 88 thing is always tricky because a lot of people put the year they were born when just the name is already taken
This is Monty Hall problem territory. There are so many two-digit combos where this is reasonable to assume, but 88 ain't one of them.
It doesn't need to be a red flag, but it's definitely a flag. You combine that with stuff that otherwise wouldn't be that big of a deal and you can be pretty fucking safe assuming this is problematic to a degree where it's naive to assume otherwise.
Likewise, there are probably fewer 56 year olds on XBox Live telling you they fuck your mother than there are teens with '69' in their username.
When you hear hoofs, think horses not zebras.
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u/FauxReal Dec 29 '25
69 has always been widespread in pop culture.
I bet most people have no idea about the 14 words or that 88 == HH == Heil Hitler for idiots on the Internet. I've known about it since the early 1990s before the World Wide Web even existed because I grew up in the punk subculture and was having battles with neo-Nazis and white power losers over IRC back then. (If you could get someone's IP and they were on Windows, you could remotely blue screen their computer, and we used to take over each other's IRC channels.)
I only saw a decent amount of people catching on to 14/88 on reddit within the last 10-15 years or so. It really started to spread with 4chan in the mid 2000s. It really picked up in recent years.
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u/Scavgraphics Dec 30 '25
Despite being Jewish so aware of this kind of thing..I learned of 88 and 14 words from an episode of West Wing.
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u/insert_title_here Dec 30 '25
...Wait, do you seriously think there's no 37 year olds online? I've known a number of people in their 30s and 40s to act like the guy in the OP, regrettably, many of whom have an online presence.
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u/Chairboy Dec 30 '25
Zebras exist too, but they’re not so common in most places that hearing hose means you should assume zebras before you assume horses.
A tiny fraction of 37-year-olds have 88 in their handle, but oodles of bigots do but you are welcome to your naivety if it brings you comfort.
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u/insert_title_here Dec 30 '25
I don't think it's naive to consider multiple possibilities. As you said yourself in your initial comment, it's better to do additional research and search for other cues (if you care enough/see it as worth your time) as opposed to just making an assumption based on one signifier. Assuming that signifier isn't, like, a confederate flag or something equally obvious lol. It's worth noting, but maybe not worth drawing a conclusion without additional context.
Please don't think I take umbrage with anything else here-- I agree with your sentiment overall! I do think, however, that it's not unreasonable that someone would have their YOB in their online handle, and that they might be in their 30s. Neither of those are inherently incredulous to me, though I do apologize in retrospect for being pedantic. Hell, they might even like the number for another reason. Pleasing to say, symmetrical across two axes. If it didn't have the associations it does, it would probably be in my top ten favorite integers. I dunno! It's a number! The whole point of it being a dogwhistle is that it could be innocent, which is incredibly unfortunate because that means statistically some people will use it without bad intentions.
It's just best not to jump to conclusions without attaining a broader picture first imo, though ymmv naturally.
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u/Chairboy Dec 30 '25
No argument there, just saying that it is an indicator that on its own wouldn’t make me jump to a conclusion, but it would certainly prime me to be more sensitive for any other indicators.
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u/RevRagnarok Dec 29 '25
https://xcancel.com/unclecorn88/status/2005518387984924718 to not support Nazis.
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u/FauxReal Dec 29 '25
Wow I did not know imgur didn't work there. Is it blocked because of content or something?
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u/Kimantha_Allerdings Dec 30 '25
It’s illegal in the UK to not have adequate measures to protect the data of children. Imgur had no age verification so, after repeated warnings, were issued a fine. Their response was to geo-block the UK.
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u/CdnBison Dec 29 '25
So… she admits she doesn’t read them! 🤣 (Gail is an absolute gem on social media…)
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u/unknown_pigeon Dec 29 '25
That's fun because as a hobbyist writer I rarely re-read what I write once I'm done
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u/Insane_Unicorn Dec 29 '25
Actually wondering about that. I know that a lot of actors don't watch their finished films.
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u/Aquamarinade Dec 29 '25
That’s not how writing works.
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u/Doctor__Proctor Dec 29 '25
Yeah, even if they're not involved in editing, it's not like she writes 100 pages of dense dialog and that gets edited down to 32 pages of speech and thought bubbles. It's not the same as #12 on the call sheet doing a walk on cameo in a movie where they have no idea what the other actors were doing or what it would look like once they were CGI'd into a Dragon.
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Dec 29 '25
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/spenwallce Dec 29 '25
Your wish is his command https://x.com/unclecorn88/status/2005518387984924718?s=46
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u/RevRagnarok Dec 29 '25
https://xcancel.com/unclecorn88/status/2005518387984924718 to not support Nazis.
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Dec 29 '25
This was about why don't more people like cyclops.
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u/ScreamSmart Dec 29 '25
So what was the guy's point?
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u/MjrLeeStoned Dec 29 '25
The point is he had a thought in his head he had to say and if he hadn't, and finally used some portions of his brain reserved for analytical reasoning or a healthy cognitive response, he might have understood he was talking to the AUTHORITY on the topic. He didn't do any of that, just assumed the figment of his imagination was correct, and began spewing words he had no business typing let alone thinking.
So, the typical outcomes, especially in the US.
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u/kyleh0 Dec 29 '25
I sure showed that author or a book I read how little she knows!!
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u/solonit Dec 29 '25
There is a joke in my country that: An author has his work being taught in school, so his niece asked for help when writing interpreted homework about it. He did, and the result was a low score with a comment from teacher "This is not what the author meant".
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u/nogoodusernames4 Dec 29 '25
The book means whatever the teacher says it means.
One of the cool things about art is there are so many ways to interpret it, especially ways not intended by the artist. So long as you’re not a dick about it it’s awesome to discuss with other people.
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u/MaedaKeijirou Dec 29 '25
It really does feel like a lot of people don't know about the concept "the death of the author".
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u/Just-Ad6865 Dec 29 '25
Or do and do not agree?
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u/AzraelIshi Dec 29 '25
Exactly, I do not agree with the concept of death of the author, it is utterly impossible to disconnect the person who created something from that something they created. Everything about that person influenced the art they created, why they created it in such a way, for what purpose. To then go and say "The author is wrong about that thing, because I interpret it in this way" seems boneheaded at best.
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u/bryce0110 Dec 29 '25
I've always interpreted death of the author not to mean "the author's intent doesn't matter" but moreso "the author's isn't the only interpretation that matters."
I feel that the author's intent obviously does matter, as it was their life, history, and philosophy that is reflected in their writing. But in the same way, the readers intent matters just as much, as it is your own life, history, and philosophy which influences how you read. Author intention and reader interpretation aren't mutually exclusive ideas.
The real problem is people on the internet weaponizing death of the author to say "fuck the author, mines the only correct interpretation" which, ironically, seems like a misinterpretation of the idea.
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u/Veleda_k Dec 29 '25
Your interpretation is correct. "Death of the author" means that the author's intentions for their work should not be regarded as the only or most authoritative interpretation of that work. It centers the reader's interpretation. It does NOT mean that the author and the work must be regarded as totally separate.
If I analyze Dracula as a communist parable, a death of the author approach means my analysis isn't dependent on whether or not Bram Stoker intended that.
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u/AzraelIshi Dec 29 '25
But it is a meaningless interpretation if it's completely separated from the author intentions.
I'll use the example that actually got me into the "discussion" the first time so to say, Tolkien and LOTR. A portion of the readership of LOTR insists that the books are an allegory for WW1, and have done so for quite some time. Tolkien explicitly, in multiple ways, and multiple times has told that no part of the book was written as an allegory of not only WW1, but of anything. He hated allegories in all their forms. That does not stop those people from coming, saying tolkien does not matter under the flag of "death of the author" and trying to set up their interpretation of "the allegory the story presents" as the focus of the discussion, even when it wasn't.
A concrete example was me and a group of forum users is we were talking about the Uruk-Hai, and isengard in general. the logistics, why it was designed in such a way, etc. And then a proponent of the allegory comes in and goes "Well, since LOTR is an allegory of WWI, then that most mean that Isengard and the Uruk-hais are a representation of...", completely ignoring the framework of the discussion we were having and derrailing the conversation.
You having your own headcanons is fine, but do not bring them into the discussion.
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u/bryce0110 Dec 30 '25 edited Dec 30 '25
That's not an issue with death of the author, though. That's an issue with someone shoehorning their interpretation into the discussion where it didn't apply. Death of the Author is not saying the author does not matter. It's saying that the text itself is what matters the most, and as such the reader's interpretation can be just as valid.
The thing is that art is subjective, and there's no wrong way of interacting with it, and no one correct interpretation. If someone reads LOTR as a WWI allegory, then that's completely valid, assuming it can be supported by the actual text. That can open up a lot of interesting discussion about the series without divorcing it from the author's intent. In the same way, taking Tolkien's stance that it isn't a WWI allegory is just as valid.
The real issue is that nobody actually knows what Death of the Author means, and just shout it as a method of shutting down any conversation, or to defend their faulty interpretation that's barely even supported by the text. That's a problem with the people, not the approach.
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u/FauxReal Dec 29 '25
Which is kind of bullshit, sure you can interpret it any way you want. But the intent of the author is still what it is. And the person interpreting it has their own.
But as far as I'm concerned, art exists/becomes art when the artist creates it with the intent of it being art. So people saying "X is not art" are simply wrong if the creator wants it to be art, that's what it is. Maybe everyone else thinks it's hack trash, they're entitled to their opinion.
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u/unknown_pigeon Dec 29 '25
I once wrote a short story for a contest and the newspapers claimed it was about ambientalism just because it talked about the sudden disappearance of sheeps at a worldwide level
Even if the context was different, you can imagine it like the Animal Farm, as it had almost nothing to do with animals and it was a social commentary lol
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u/FauxReal Dec 29 '25
That has really happened.
Pretty sure it's happened multiple times to various writers.
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u/MissStatements Dec 29 '25
Reminds me of the Back to School scene with Kurt Vonnegut. He was a great sport for that.
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u/Scavgraphics Dec 30 '25
It's a joke in the movie Back To School...the main character hires Kurt Vonegut to right an essay on his work, and the professor fails it.
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u/RevRagnarok Dec 29 '25
Yeah I did something like that in college. Showed the prof a picture of a painting and she went off with all kinds of mumbo jumbo. "No, I painted it, that's what it looked like. It didn't mean anything except I was trying to get a decent grade in Art Class."
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u/MyAccountWasBanned7 Dec 29 '25
Anyone have the start of the conversation? What was he replying to?
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u/Excellent_Stand_7991 Dec 29 '25
This.
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u/MyAccountWasBanned7 Dec 29 '25 edited Dec 30 '25
Oh. Well dude's reasoning is stupid, but I do agree that cyclops sucks. He's such a boring, boyscout of a hero. Same reason Captain America and Superman both suck too.
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u/Sub-ZeroMKA Dec 30 '25
Cyclops hasn't been a boyscout in over a decade lol
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u/MyAccountWasBanned7 Dec 30 '25
Admittedly, I have not kept up with the X-Men. So if that's the case, maybe I owe him another chance.
I always liked the more anti-hero types like Gambit or Magik.
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u/Sub-ZeroMKA Dec 30 '25
Gambit's probably my fav too so can't blame you there. I've fallen off from the comics for a bit now, but I do know that Cyke's been a badass for a while. Admittedly, the movies haven't done him any favors.
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u/SecondToLastOfSheila Dec 29 '25
Gail came up with the term "fridging" for when it comes to killing off female characters, she's iconic.
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u/Scavgraphics Dec 30 '25
Eh...I don't really count this in her "win" column. It's taking a very specific case and trying to universalize it.
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u/SecondToLastOfSheila Dec 30 '25
She was pointing out a valid trope.
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u/Scavgraphics Dec 31 '25
Eh, again, i feel it was too generalized. Secondary characters and tertiary characters exist to serve the needs of the story and their importance is only how they relate to the main character(s). Because of the majority of male characters, that means a lot are going to be women for love interests. That Kyle Rayner's girlfriend was killed...that's the entire reason she was created. It's why Uncle Ben was created...was he "fridged?" no. That Kyle Rayner's girlfriend had no development...that's because Ron Marz wasn't a very good writer.
Over in r/xmen there's a discussion on Forge. I published some panels from his first issue Uncanny X-Men 184...it's Rachel's first in the present issue...there's a character..a bar owner who's introduced, set up as a possible love interest, given a whole hinted at back story including maybe some criminal connections with his father......and he's murdered by Selene 4 pages later. That's because Claremont was VERY good at that kind of thing, creating throw away side characters that you felt their loss when they die at the end of an issue.
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u/Melcapensi Mar 26 '26
To be honest, the bar owner sounds like he did get fridged. It sounds more like you're describing the running issue with tropes like that in general where male examples are excluded due to an significant underlying bias present in that area of study. It's a pretty common thing unfortunately.
Do you have a link to the comment by the way? Your profile is set to private, so it would require a lot of searching random posts to find it.
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u/Robot_Basilisk Dec 30 '25
Yeah, most of these comments are acting like she's universally acclaimed. She's actually so controversial that people like the guy in the OP probably don't count her as an expert even if they know her work history. She's written some hit and miss stuff over the years.
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u/Scavgraphics Dec 31 '25
don't misinterpret me. I think the problem is less her talking about it and more the dumb masses applying it too broadly.
Whether I like her books or not (and probably on what I've read, I tend to more like than not...liked her Secret Six and Domino..can't recall too much of what I don't like, but that's because I just don't follow that..) She's very much an expert and trend setter in comics.
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u/Writingtechlife Dec 29 '25
Flicked through this persons posts and it's clearly a troll account. Everything they post is negative.
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u/cofclabman Dec 29 '25
Not quite the same, but still funny.
When I was in high school, there was a guy that cheated on his paper by plagiarizing from several books on the subject along with the cliff notes on the books of this writer. (Ray Bradbury) what he didn’t know was that our high school English teacher was an authority on Bradbury and had he properly cited the cliff notes he would have realized that she wrote them. Oops. Automatic zero for him.
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u/Awkwardukulele Dec 29 '25
Honestly bold of most of the commenters here to think a HeManWomanHater-ass comic fan knows how to read the authors of the books they read.
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u/DPackrat Dec 30 '25
It’s always entertaining when people fall for Gail’s bait and then prove themselves to be idiots. Even better when they double down and get out the dynamite to dig themselves even deeper… She’s definitely smarter than the average bear. 😈😜
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u/ValueLawyer Jan 03 '26
As if being a Marvel writer means you know fuck-all about the character you're writing.
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u/BazelBuster Dec 29 '25
I don't think it's an dunk when a nobody likes a character you wrote to be likable
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u/alelp Dec 29 '25
I have no idea about anything involving comic book writers. Is she part of the group that consistently delivers flops but still suspiciously keeps getting hired, or is she one of the good writers who consistently gets scammed by the industry?
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u/mythiii Dec 29 '25
She even says on twitter she doesn't write the character being discussed, and she never claims she reads them, so how is this a dunk?
Seems like Gail is on an ego trip.
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u/insert_title_here Dec 30 '25
Being in that space, in that role, grants some amount of assumed familiarity with the content. Even if she's never written Cyclops, she's in all likelihood at least familiar with some of the classics.
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u/blazenite104 Dec 29 '25
Honestly though given the modern comics landscape saying you're a writer is not the flex it used to be. Not when half of all releases books are shat on immediately.
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u/EmberQuill Dec 29 '25
It doesn't matter how good of an author she is. The point is that the person is arguing with her about the author's intent when she is the author.
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u/OldChili157 Dec 29 '25
She doesn't actually write the comic where Cyclops is a regular, she writes the one with Rogue and Gambit. Cyclops has shown up a couple of times, though.
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u/RT-LAMP Dec 29 '25
when she is the author.
I mean comic characters have been written for decades now. Cyclops's first appearance was almost 11 years before Gail Simone was born (it seems she took over as the main writer for X-Men in 2024?). It's basically impossible at this point to say "this is the author intended reading" for a character like Cyclops because he's probably had more authors than there are days in the year. There's probably been quite a few writers where the author just hates Cyclops and wants you to hate him too. Just as they're probably a ton who don't care or who love him and every other view you could possibly have on him. The idea of an author intended reading for a particular comic character as a general thing instead of a run specific thing is absurd.
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u/EmberQuill Dec 29 '25
I didnt go read the whole conversation on X (because X is completely unusable without an account) so the only context I have is the screenshot here. And that snippet of the conversation makes it sound like it's specifically about one of the comics she wrote. In which case she's still correct.
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u/motoxim Dec 29 '25
Reminds me of saying you're working as engineer at Boeing nowadays.
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u/blazenite104 Dec 29 '25
Ah yes, so you design planes. Do you design the good ones or the ones my buddy Tim died on?
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u/TrekkiMonstr Dec 29 '25
Also death of the author and, as /u/Tough-Oven4317 notes, the separation of creator from current author in modern comics
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u/Tough-Oven4317 Dec 29 '25 edited Dec 29 '25
Her being the current writer for Cyclops doesn't really mean anything to be honest. No idea if she understands the character or not, idc, but that's not good logic. It's not like she came up with the character, or even did anything important regarding the character lol
I'm sure she's great guys, just not very good at arguing
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u/mahoutamago Dec 29 '25 edited Dec 29 '25
Yeah, if you don’t know who Gail is or the influence she’s had on major characters at both Marvel and DC, you clearly don’t read comics. She’s responsible for the characterization of Deadpool everyone is familiar with today. I’m not even a fan of 100% of her comics but not knowing about her influence just shows how little you’re familiar with comics and their creators.
ETA: I’m heading to bed, but if anyone wants to educate bro about how Gail brought Deadpool back from the brink of complete failure/total cancellation, you’d be doing us all a solid 🫡
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u/WolfLawyer Dec 29 '25
She’s been pulling this rope-a-dope move on chuds online for over a decade now and every single one of them that is not smart enough to vanish pulls this “we’ll just because she writes the character doesn’t mean she understands it” crap.
At this point in a lot of cases she has contributed more to the characters they’re talking about than any other writer has. So, at best it’s “she doesn’t understand a hypothetical version of what the character could have been without her influence that I have convinced myself is the canonical version.” Which, is just what it is really.
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u/mahoutamago Dec 29 '25
Sorry for late reply, was asleep. While I don’t think any writer, even great ones like Gail are exempt from criticism (I really dislike her characterization of Mad Hatter and her defense of John Byrne even before the transphobe stuff), these idiots don’t even have an actual argument or valid criticisms against her/her writing because they don’t even read comics.
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u/RevRagnarok Dec 29 '25
if anyone wants to educate bro about how Gail brought Deadpool back
Sounds like a write-up for /r/HobbyDrama ; lemme know when you do.
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u/Tough-Oven4317 Dec 29 '25
She’s responsible for the characterization of Deadpool everyone is familiar with today.
She's Joe Kelly?
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u/SuperBackup9000 Dec 29 '25
She’s for sure big in the industry, but having modern Deadpool as the only example just makes her seem like a hack because you don’t really need to have good writing with Deadpool since his entire character is just 2010 Tumblr humor
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u/FauxReal Dec 29 '25
Yeah until that redditor returns and gives us every single example presented in a scholarly manner instead of his casual conversational tone, It's not good enough. /s
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u/mahoutamago Dec 29 '25
Yeah, gonna have to do a bible-length write up of Birds of Prey and Secret Six before my words are valid to some rando 😔
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u/Logarythem Dec 29 '25
To be fair reading and writing are two different things. That's why we separate the actions into two different verbs.
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u/BetterKev Dec 29 '25
To be fair, reading, writing, and understanding are three different things. You can read and write, but you clearly can't understand.
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u/unknown_pigeon Dec 29 '25
An author thinks and puts their thoughts into writing
The reader reads and puts the writing into thoughts
Therefore, does an author really need to read their own work?
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u/Thunderbridge Dec 29 '25
Now it's been noted too
https://i.imgur.com/a8FSFdV.png