Marvel's Spines
I can't be the only one who finds that Marvel's spines are getting worse and worse. I'm not even talking about all the misprints and misalignments (God knows I get tons of them). No, I'm talking about what goes on in their heads when they're choosing what to put there. More and more, in team books, they tend to always be a supporting or tertiary character instead of the main protagonists or even antagonists. And I cannot understand why.
I received my Gillen Utopia X-Men Omni the other day. Misaligned spine. Whatever. And then I look at the spine. I got the DM. I expected Cyclops or Magneto or Emma or Namor or Storm. Instead it's... Psylocke. I like Betsy. But I have to ask; why? Why in this book when there are far more involved players? The other cover has Magneto in the spine, but why doesn't the DM have, you know, the main characters? You look at the Excalibur Omnis, and Brian's present in only a single Omni. 4, the DM having the cover of his and Meggan's wedding, has a tiny little Colossus. UltFF V2 DM has the Not!Forever People instead of following suit with V1 and having Psycho Man, Thanos and the such. Ult X-Men V3 has a Kurt in a grey blouse and sweatpants. Road To Onslaught has those silly floating heads. EllisBolts has one with Venom (expected) and the other has... Songbird and Radioactive Man. Why would you put Radioactive Man over Moonstone or Bullseye? How is Osborn not on a spine? None of it makes sense.
You buy a DC Omni and you get exactly what you're expecting. A Batman Omni has, wait for it, Batman, alongside a personalized design. A JL Omni has the JL. With Marvel you're liable to end up with a supporting character wearing a sweater. And I just don't understand why this keeps happening. It keeps getting worse and worse. If Marvel published Morrison's JL, there'd be 3 covers, and the spines would be Green Arrow, Electric Superman and Batman.
Some don't mind, but personally it irks me. The way these books are displayed, the spines are arguably more important that the actual covers. When I buy a book with 5 core characters, and the picture I'm forced to look at whenever I glance at my shelves, is of a supporting one instead of the protagonists, I feel slighted. Doesn't it make sense to put the main characters in there just to make sure?
Not to mention that they rarely try to add a generally cool picture. I got the Fatal Attractions Omni some time ago, and I expected at least one cover to have Magneto ripping off Logan's adamantium on the spine, but no, just generic face shots. It just doesn't make sense to me. The New Republic V2 DM has an awkward close-up of Luke's face. The Empire V4 DM, which has a cover of The Star Wars, has a spine picture of Kane Starkiller, but instead of it being a cool pic of him, it's... him in a t-shirt putting on a backpack.... How? Why? What's the thought process behind this? Why not have him and Anikin, lightsabers drawn and all?
I don't know, the more time goes on, the more I find their spines and covers to be lacking, especially compared to DC. You're basically rolling the dice every time, and sometimes there's not even a good choice altogether.