Ann Nocenti

Ann "Annie" Nocenti (; born January 17, 1957) is an American journalist, filmmaker, teacher, comic book writer and editor. She is best known for her work at Marvel in the late 1980s, particularly a four-year stint as the editor of ''Uncanny X-Men'' and ''The New Mutants'' (written by Chris Claremont) as well as her run as a writer of '' Daredevil'', illustrated primarily by John Romita Jr. Nocenti has created such Marvel characters as Longshot, Mojo, Spiral, Blackheart, and Typhoid Mary.

Nocenti is noted for her outspoken political views, including but not limited to animal rights and alcoholism, which characterized her run on ''Daredevil''.

Early life

When Ann Nocenti was a child, her parents frowned upon comics, though there were some in her house, including Archie Comics, a '' Pogo'' anthology that Nocenti loved, and a ''Dick Tracy'' anthology whose grotesquely-rendered characters piqued Nocenti's curiosity, more so than the heroes. Nocenti attended college at SUNY New Paltz, during which she discovered the work of Robert Crumb.

Career

Comics

After graduating from SUNY New Paltz, she discovered the superhero genre when she answered an ad in the ''Village Voice'', which led to her being given her first published comics job at Marvel Comics by editor Dennis O'Neil. Nocenti made her comics writing debut with a six-page mythological story, drawn by Greg LaRocque, in the Marvel anthology ''Bizarre Adventures'' #32 (August 1982). She got her first regular comics assignment with Marvel's superhero series ''Spider-Woman'', starting with issue #47 (December 1982). It was not a promising assignment; Marvel had already decided to end the series with issue #50 (June 1983) due to flagging sales. With guidance from editor Mark Gruenwald (who had himself written the series for a time), Nocenti ended the series with the death of the titular character, a decision she came to regret. She recalled, "It was before I understood the intense, personal attachment the readers have to the characters. In retrospect, I realized it wasn't a nice thing to kill a character off. As I worked in the field for a while, I developed a strong personal attachment to a lot of characters and I realized how alive they were." Shortly after, Nocenti lent a hand to Spider-Woman's resurrection in '' Avengers'' #240–241 as "story consultant".

Nocenti wrote an issue each of ''Doctor Strange'' and ''Star Wars'' before writing the four-issue miniseries ''Beauty and the Beast'' (December 1984 – June 1985), featuring the superheroes Dazzler and Beast. During this period Nocenti was on staff at Marvel, working as an assistant editor for Carl Potts on such titles as '' The Incredible Hulk'', ''The Defenders'', ''Doctor Strange'', and ''The Thing''.

Nocenti and artist Arthur Adams created the character Longshot in a titular, six-issue miniseries (September 1985 – February 1986). Explaining the concept of the character, which Nocenti borrowed from existentialist writers, she states, "Longshot is the idea of stripping someone of everything that they are. I never read comics, so the idea of a hero to me was different. I couldn't think of it in terms of a 'super hero' hero. I thought of it more as a conceptual hero. Not having a comic book background, I tend to come up with the metaphysics before I come up with the characters. I knew that I wanted to deal with the metaphysics of luck. It was a concept that interested me ... what luck is, what probability is, how you could shift probabilities towards yourself. What are the repercussions of that? So, I did a character centered around that idea. At the time, Nocenti was pursuing her master's degree at the School of International and Public Affairs, Columbia University, working at the magazine ''Lies of Our Times'', and reading the work of writers such as Marshall McLuhan, Noam Chomsky, Edward S. Herman and Walter Lippmann. Longshot's archvillain, Mojo, a slaver and dictator who rules his dimension through the television programs he produces, was created as a direct result of these influences. A character named Manufactured Consent after the Chomsky book of the same name, who appeared in the Nocenti's 1990 book ''The New Mutants Summer Special'' in 1990, was also born of these works.

After collaborating with Adams on the Spider-Man feature in ''Web of Spider-Man Annual'' #2 (September 1986), and with penciler Mike Mignola on a short backup story there, Nocenti teamed with artist Barry Windsor-Smith on '' Daredevil'' #236 (November 1986). Two issues later, she became the regular writer for a four-and-a-quarter year run from #238–291 (January 1987 – April 1991), minus issues #246 and #258. John Romita Jr. joined as penciler from #250–282 (January 1988 – July 1990), and was generally inked by Al Williamson. Nocenti specifically addressed societal issues, with Murdock, now running a non-profit urban legal center, confronting sexism, racism, and nuclear proliferation while fighting supervillains. Nocenti introduced the popular antagonist

HOME


Content is Copyleft
Website design, code, and AI is Copyrighted (c) 2014-2017 by Stephen Payne


Consider donating to Wikimedia



As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases