Image: Marvel Comics. Legacy #1 art by Esad Ribic.

Look, I get it. Marvel Studios popularized the “post-credits” tease that leaves us all sitting in our theater seats a lot longer than we should. Marvel Comics would love that sort of hypemongering and attention focused on their comics, so it makes sense to include some shocking last page reveals. But for the love of god, don’t actually call them “post-credits scenes.”


Marvel’s been teasing the return of Wolverine—not to be confused with the version of Logan currently running around in the comics from a parallel universe, Old Man Logan, because comic booooooooks—following his death in 2014 ever since it kicked off its “Legacy” reboot a few months ago. But now that the character’s return is imminent, the company plans on going into overdrive with a newly announced initiative that will see teasers that are being dubbed “post-credit scenes” inserted into the pages of Captain America #697, The Mighty Thor #703, and Amazing Spider-Man #794 next January.


It’s fine to play up the return of an iconic character, even if admittedly in Wolverine’s case the distinction is more weird than usual because we’ve had not just the aforementioned Old Man version running around in his place for a while at this point, but also a very excellent replacement in the form of Laura Kinney’s All-New Wolverine, anyway. But just call it what it is, instead of desperately trying to lean on the terminology of movies that the modern comics will never have the reach of.



This is an epilogue. A postscript. Hell, an addendum. There’s so many words you could use! Just don’t use “post-credits scene,” because some genius in marketing thinks that a Marvel movie fan might read that and go “ooh I should check out this comic book because it’s doing a thing just like my favorite movies do!” The more explicit ties the company has made between its films and its comics have already done that, this? Plus, the vast majority of comics have their creator credits at the start of an issue... so aren’t they all just one big long “post-credits” scene anyway?

This is dumb. You can start reading epilogues about Wolverine’s return in select Marvel comics this January.

[Newsarama]