Marvel and TV Soap Guiding Light Join Forces
In an unprecedented move, Marvel Comics has teamed up with Procter & Gamble Productions – the producers of long running daytime soap opera Guiding Light – in an attempt to attract new readers to the comics and new viewers to the show.
A new superhero is introduced on the Guiding Light episode airing November 1, 2006. This new costumed vigilante, along with other characters from the soap, made their first comic appearance in Civil War: Choosing Sides and will appear as a backup story in a further twelve titles.
This isn’t the first time the show has had a Marvel connection. A few months back, the series’ costume designer Shawn Dudley created the X-Men’s Storm’s wedding dress for an issue of the monthly comic, Black Panther.
While there has always been a soap opera nature to many comics, one has to question the logic of associating some of Marvel’s most famous creations (Spider-Man, Iron Man, Captain America, and Wolverine all interact with the residents of Springfield in the comic) with probably the lowest form of American TV drama.
With Spider-Man and Wolverine already having made several highly successful movie appearances and Iron Man coming sometime next year, can this venture really reach a potential audience who would otherwise be unaware of them? Is Marvel trying to attract the housewives of America to comics? And will comic readers really be interested in the goings on of the little community of Springfield? I personally have my doubts.
Perhaps given the location of the show is Springfield, a guest appearance by the Simpsons might have been more fitting.
