Okay, let's see if I'm understanding the plot correctly.

Brian Bendis and Ed Brubaker come up with an idea for a Batman/Daredevil crossover. They're very excited about it. They take it to Marvel, who say yes. They take it to the Batman editor, who also says yes. But Paul Levitz says no, so it isn't going to happen, because he doesn't like Joe Quesada.

So Brian Bendis decides to talk about it at Wizard World Chicago, and Marvel ask him to do it on his own panel rather than on theirs. Then DC editor Bob Wayne turns up at Bendis' panel so that the companies can insult one another in public. And then Joe Quesada puts out a public statement saying that DC are being very small-minded, because he's only trying to help the kids, the retailers, the industry, the cause of art, and the starving children of Africa. That's about the size of it, right?

Christ, this is pathetic.

For one thing, I'm a sceptical about this sort of stunt. It has all the hallmarks of a hoax (despite the insistence of the usual suspects that there's a core of truth to it). But otherwise, everyone involved would have to have a mental age of twelve. I suppose it's traditionally been seen as a virtue in the world of superhero comics to be an overgrown twelve-year-old, but there are limits.

'Everyone involved would have to have a mental age of twelve.' Besides, the whole set-up stinks. Marvel pitch co-published project to DC, DC say no? Plausible. DC say no because they don't want to work with Marvel's current management? Plausible - and a good enough reason to say no. But then you get into this whole convention set piece nonsense. Bendis says he wants to talk about it. Oh no, say Marvel. Don't do that at our panel. Do it at yours, so that nobody will think we're endorsing it. Be sure to let everyone know that we've told you to do it at yours. That way nobody would ever, ever think that we were endorsing it. Not after we'd told you to do it.

Uh-huh.

Now, if Marvel didn't want to talk about it at all, they'd just tell Bendis not to mention it. And presumably he wouldn't. If they just wanted to distance themselves from the statement, they might well tell him to talk about it on his personal panel (or just announce it on his message board), but they'd hardly want him to make public that they positively told him to do so, would they? Kind of defeats the point.

Equally, it seems more than a little unlikely that DC would choose to respond to this by sending Bob Wayne along to debate the issue in public. Pop quiz! You are DC Comics! A Marvel freelancer is about to complain in public that you aren't going to publish his crossover idea! This could cause up to two and a half weeks of grumbling on message boards! People who can't spell might flame you mercilessly! Do you:

(a) Ignore it?
(b) Put out a statement afterwards saying you're not interested?
Or do you
(c) Send along Bob Wayne, DC Vice President of Sales and Marketing, to have a public confrontation on the whole subject and attract even more attention to it?

The answer, of course, is (c). But only if you're an idiot, or if it's a stunt. And heaven forfend that the Vice President of Sales and Marketing should ever get involved in marketing stunts. That would be completely outside his job description. The very thought is scandalous.

The big idea is, supposedly, that we now all lobby to see what would otherwise be a rather uneventful crossover book, and that when - sorry, if - it finally comes out, it'll be the focus of enormous attention and it'll sell tons. Because in the real world, companies always cave in to public pressure on this kind of thing. That's why JLA/AVENGERS came out so very, very quickly. If Bendis really thinks this is going to achieve anything, then "optimistic" would be putting it mildly.

'It does nothing whatsoever to build appeal for a BATMAN/DAREDEVIL book.' Anyhow: I have a healthy dose of scepticism about the whole thing. Either it's a stunt, or else everyone involved on both sides would have to be really extraordinarily stupid. (Except Brubaker, who doesn't seem to have said anything public on the subject at the time of writing.)

The question is why anyone would think this was a sensible way to do business. It attracts attention, to be sure. But it doesn't attract attention to the books, and it just makes all concerned look like squabbling brats. I realise everyone in the industry is supposed to be looking for ways to appeal to children, but does that have to mean acting like them? To be honest, the main argument against it being a publicity stunt is that it does nothing whatsoever to build appeal for a BATMAN/DAREDEVIL book. All it does is build a spurious Marvel/DC feud. Where's the money in that? Publish another MARVEL VERSUS DC series, with a photostrip of Joe Quesada and Paul Levitz mudwrestling in thongs?

(Please don't. Not even for charity.)

There's been a general background of childish potshots from Marvel in DC's direction over the last few years, but nothing that really crosses the line from playing the established inter-company rivalry for cheap laughs. This affair takes that rivalry into a new and vastly more stupid dimension. Who is this meant to be impress? What does this achieve, other than make everyone look like a fool?

You can get away with calling out your opposition if you work in professional wrestling, because that's all part of the show. You can get away with it in rap because it's just part of the routine. You can get away with it if you're a proper celebrity because hell, if you're famous enough you can get away with pretty much anything. But comic book editors squabbling in public? It's like watching two local butchers have a fight in the street about the quality of their salami.

Wallace Sayre once observed that academic politics were the most vicious and bitter form of politics, precisely because the stakes were so low. When the Internet came along, it didn't take long for somebody to point out that Usenet was the next level down. Bluntly, in-fighting in the comics industry generally exists at around the same level. There are exceptions, where money, creative freedom and the like are genuinely at stake. But when you're just looking at petulant personal and inter-company rivalries being fought out at geek cons and on message boards, by editors-in-chief and vice-presidents... well, you have to wonder whether these people couldn't be doing something a little more productive with their time.

If it's a hoax, it just makes everyone look pathetic. If it isn't, it makes everyone look even more pathetic. What on earth are they thinking?

Paul O'Brien is the author of the weekly X-AXIS comics review.

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