Sean Gordon Murphy might be one of the most talented artists in the business. His Batman: White Knight story at DC Comics has been one of the most successful comics over the past year. He’s also showed his talent in his creator owned work with Rick Remender on Tokyo Ghost and Mark Millar on Chrononauts.
In a recent in promptu Question and Answer with his fans on Twitter, Murphy hinted at one of the major problems Marvel Comics is suffering.
A user asked him if he’d ever work on a Moon Knight run. Murphy’s reply was telling, “I’ll say this half jokingly — Marvel can’t afford me.”
I’ll say this half jokingly–Marvel can’t afford me. https://t.co/7im7Op49hz
— Sean Gordon Murphy (@Sean_G_Murphy) June 15, 2018
To me that means, Marvel can’t afford top talented artists and creators like Sean Gordon Murphy. And we’ve seen them lose maybe their most talented writer over the past decade in Brian Michael Bendis to DC Comics. Artist Jim Cheung also appears to have jumped ship to DC Comics as he’s working with Scott Snyder on Justice League. They also lost the talents of artist John Romita Jr.
And they aren’t alone in the creative brain drain leaving Marvel Comics. Writer Jeff Lemire hasn’t written anything for Marvel since his run on Thanos ended. Even the creator of Thanos, Jim Starlin has separated his ties with Marvel Comics. And maybe the most recent artist to leave was Captain America artist Chris Samnee.
That’s on top of creatives who have gone on to pursue creator owned work like writers Rick Remender, Jonathan Hickman, Matt Fraction, and Ed Brubaker.
Marvel definitely appears to have a talent problem as many creatives are taking their work and leaving for their top competitor DC Comics or are setting of on their own into creator owned works with publishers like Image Comics or even doing things themselves with fundraising campaigns like IndieGoGo or KickStarter.
Do you think Marvel has a talent problem? How do you think they could fix it?