Whenever an executive leaves a company, it’s always somewhat dramatic. It is, no matter how amicable, a fall from a high perch, after all. But some changes of the guard are more surprising than others. And none, perhaps, more in comics than the departure of Marvel‘s editor in chief, Axel Alonso.
Alonso is leaving the company after a 17-year career working for Marvel and six years as the editor-in-chief. He’s being replaced by longtime Marvel editor, writer, and contract negotiator C.B. Cebulski, who in recent years has worked on building Marvel as a comics presence in Asia, and has extensive experience in both manga and finding and nurturing new talent. So, on paper, really, it’s all pretty straightforward: Marvel wants to expand publishing in China and Asia, so they’ve instituted an editor in chief with both business and creative experience in the region.
On the other hand, it’s difficult not to view this change through the lens of recent events, especially since Cebulski has to relocate from Shanghai to New York and Alonso is leaving the company altogether. Marvel, after selling comic books by the crate with its Secret Wars crossover, has struggled to make a wider cultural mark with its comics. The tickets sell, the series stream, but not enough readers buy the books.
And, just as important, Marvel’s publishing arm had a rough year in public relations. The recent crossover Secret Empire, which turned Captain America into a Nazi, enraged fans and didn’t sell the numbers that would have justified such a mess. That was compounded by a scandal where a Marvel executive blamed the company’s problems on “diversity,” which was quickly debunked by Marvel’s own sales data, and Alonso’s remarks that he’s “not a social justice warrior” just made matters worse.
There is, of course, no sign of turmoil on the surface. Marvel thanked Alonso for his time with the company, heralded Cebulski in his new role, and left it at that. And either way, Cebulski is stepping into a role of running one of the biggest, if not the biggest, publisher of comics in the world at a time when comics are changing radically. There simply may not be much time to look at the past, if Marvel’s going to go forward.