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“Curse you, Jeff!” That’s what I’ve yelled internally as I was thrown into the nearest abyss at least five times since Marvel Rivals‘ launch on December 6. Before that, I barely even knew who the hell Jeff the Land Shark was, and this is coming from a pop culture sicko.
Look, I’m a reasonably big Marvel fan, but I’ll admit that I don’t read every single thing the publisher puts out. Hell, I probably check out a very small percentage of what they’re doing nowadays. This has been an issue for a while, and not just for Marvel: More people than ever before are aware of comic book universes, but that doesn’t mean that most of those same people are reading comics. Even during the Marvel Cinematic Universe’s peak days, there was a problem in getting viewers to jump into comic books.
A theory of mine is that, as solid as Marvel’s adaptation efforts were until a few years ago, they never quite capitalized on the weirdness and less popular side of the massive Marvel universe. Now, the MCU is very much trying to tackle such characters and elements, but is failing to consistently execute that vision well enough to make folks stick around beyond surefire hits like Deadpool & Wolverine.
When you’re presented with well-known characters like Iron Man, Captain America, or Spider-Man over and over again on the big and small screens, a common by-product is not wanting to see much more of their faces on the pages. At this point, I tend to really gravitate towards less popular characters who I know less about. That seems like a far better use of my time. And I’m willing to admit that recent TV shows and video games have a played a big role in getting me to read about characters like Agatha Harkness or Robbie Reyes’ Ghost Rider (shoutout to Midnight Suns).
After spending some time with Marvel Rivals’ full release, I’m starting to feel the same itch. Sure, having A-listers like Magneto and Venom ready to play as rocks, but I’m having even more fun with characters I wasn’t as familiar with. Even if they suck in the current meta, I’m curious to learn more about them, and I feel like Marvel Rivals has done a pretty job of mixing the popular faces with heroes and villains who are traditionally overlooked.
“No character is off limits,” executive producer Danny Koo teased back at Gamescom 2024. It’s a refreshing approach to filling out an ever-expanding roster of heroes and villains over doing something as limited as an Avengers live-service looter shooter again. Let’s put the Overwatch comparisons aside for a small moment and admit that half (if not more) of the reason why Marvel Rivals has popped off is because it simply looks and feels amazing and also promises the excitement of not knowing who’s around the corner due to the source material’s richness.
Moon Knight or Lin Lie (Marvel Rivals’ Iron Fist and currently scariest character) were relative nobodies a few years ago unless you really were into comics. Yeah, Moon Knight has been around forever, but come on, normies didn’t give a s**t until the Oscar Isaac-led show came out. New MCU entries and video games aren’t just meant to generate money on their own, they’re also meant to keep comic books and the overall brand healthy and relevant. While Marvel’s Avengers felt like a major stumble, Marvel Snap and Marvel Rivals have completely turned the ship around when it comes to video games. Stuff like Insomniac’s Spider-Man games is great and all, but having live-service titles that become this big and constantly go deeper into Marvel’s library is excellent value for the powers that be.
Yes, I still want Daredevil to enter the arena as soon as Daredevil: Born Again hits in March. Yes, I want more X-Men to show up. But at the end of the day, I’m just grateful for a very solid hero shooter that’s making the most of a genuinely colorful and rich multiverse that too often feels underused outside of comic books. Rock-solid systems aside, it’s the main reason why I found Firaxis’ Midnight Suns so damn appealing; it wasn’t afraid to get weird and explore a side of the brand that had barely made it outside of comic books before. We all knew Marvel would have something huge in their hands the moment they managed to successfully mix that with popular, highly profitable genres. Look at us now.
Now here’s the thing: We know how the video game market works and how publishers and rights holders react to massive hits by now. So, what are the chances of Warner Bros. Games rushing to make a DC alternative to Marvel Rivals that completely misses the point of why it works so well, especially now that Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League is done for good? It pains me to say that they’re quite high.
In conclusion, I guess that, in the age of milking huge IPs until they’re dry and with some of them potentially set to be around forever in one way or another, we might as well ask for transmedia works that actually make good use of them, especially if they’re pushing more people to pick up books instead of doom-scrolling for five hours a day when they’re not watching or playing anything.