It was the biggest story last week—and some are calling it the biggest story of the decade. The Walt Disney Company's purchase of Marvel Entertainment had both the comics world and the mainstream media buzzing, so it was only natural that we dedicate the weekly poll to getting readers' thoughts on the news.
While response to this week's poll was slightly down from last week's "Best Batman" query, there was still a healthy amount of responses—and the majority of those responding weren't very happy about the Disney/Marvel merger. Lest you think everyone was down on the deal, though, only a few votes separated the negative from, well... the undecided.
In the end, 36 percent of voters indicated that the Disney/Marvel deal was a sign of bad things to come, while 34 percent took a "wait and see" approach to the news. Additionally, 19 percent said they don't expect anything to change as a result of the merger, and 11 percent offered high praise for the deal.
Here's what readers had to say about their votes:
crackfiji42: worst, deal, ever.
purewitz: I even made a lot of jokes about the deal yesterday, but really its too soon to tell what will become of all this.
@autumnrae89: I'm scared that they're going to put Peter Parker in a dress, ala Princess-stylee.
dasmb: Disney has a proven track record of content management, but a pretty poor record of content production. Marvel is the exact opposite -- quite capable of producing and developing engaging stories, but fairly poor at promoting and monetizing them. America is hot for comic stories, and yet comics as an industry really don't sell. I don't think Marvel knows the solution to this conundrum -- but I bet you a stack of David Mack Daredevils that Disney can help them get there. Disney's last high profile purchase was Pixar. This resulted in Pixar visionary John Lasseter taking command of Disney's animation studios. Since then, the studio has produced Ratatouille, Wall-E and Up, and cancelled work on the mediocre original script of Toy Story 3. Pixar people made the stories and nixed the bad ideas; Disney people promoted and distributed the ones that made the cut. I can see something similar happening with Marvel...with Disney focused on promotion and management, but largely keeping their hands off the creative talent.
@JustinHamill: First sign of the apocalypse.
Toast-Jammer: It's way too early to tell. Lets wait for some announcements of hirings and firings, and then we'll have an idea as to where things are going. I really hope some improvements can be made to stabilize the company and make it more approachable, but I think they'll be making it even harder for young new talents to break-in. Maybe you'll have to be a former Mousekateer to get a gig with them now!
Nonagon: It means weeks of rolling around on the ground being worried and nauseous.
Keep it locked to Splash Page for the next weekly poll!
Let us know what you think in the comment section or on Twitter!