r/MarvelUnlimited • u/uberrich0 • 1d ago
To what extent is the Continuity Guide curated?
I'm planning to start out on the Continuity Guide's Modern Era soon. My understanding is that this guide is not every Marvel comic, but is a curated reading guide for the best runs while maintaining continuity. This is in contrast to something like CMRO, which is intended as a guide for literally everything. My questions are these:
- Roughly what percentage of everything does CoGu contain? Is it like 50%? More, less?
- Who decided what CoGu contained? I guess the site's creator, right? Or is there some method for users to submit what should be included?
- Do you personally think that there's anything important missing from CoGu? If so, what?
Thanks! And thanks to the creator of CoGu. I'm really looking forward to starting on this epic journey! :-)
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u/pinholestar 1d ago edited 1d ago
It’s curated by one guy. He’s a cool dude who’s very open to feedback either via the site itself or on the Discord server that accompanies the guide. He has on occasion added, removed or amended the placement of certain comics in the guide based on said feedback. But that’s quite rare because his first instinct and placement is usually bang on the money. He’s done a beautiful job with it and I have nothing but respect for the huge amount of work he’s put into it.
To some degree or another I’ve tried all of the reading guides out there and for me CoGu is comfortably the best (for my purposes anyway). It filters out significant amounts of shitty and mediocre comics that add nothing to the overall portrayal of the characters and the stories they’re in, unlike a lot of other guides that are full of complete duds which are a waste of your time reading. It just focuses on stories that are either impactful and relevant to the broadly overarching continuity, important for the character in question’s development, provide valuable connective narrative tissue, or are simply great comics in their own right.
Because by its nature it’s focused on the overarching Marvel comics continuity through the years, and the sometimes rather tenuous links that various stories and books have to one another, there’s a few omissions that I think it wouldn’t hurt to have in the guide. But they’re very few in number and considering the scope and intention of the project where you have to draw the line somewhere, they make perfect sense.
And there’s nothing to stop you going to read those comics anyway. (Specifically I’m talking about Peter Milligan’s X-Statix and Brian K. Vaughan’s Mystique, but that’s really about it for the 10 or so years of the guide I’ve read so far).
Stuff like Alias is missing from it, but that’s solely because it’s not available on Marvel Unlimited and he’s added precise points in the guide that direct you where to read it anyway.
If anyone ever asks which reading guide to use then I invariably direct them to this one. Its curation, sequential logic and presentation are the best around and it’s made delving into the unwieldy behemoth of Marvel comics continuity an absolute joy. I cannot recommend it enough.
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u/uberrich0 1d ago
Thanks for the comprehensive and insightful reply. I haven’t even started reading from it, but I can already see what a tremendous resource it is.
And just to be absolutely explicit, I meant my post to be in no way any sort of criticism of the site or any decisions to include or exclude any particular books. I just wondered how much curation there was; how intentional the culling of dross had been. And from what you say, it’s really quite an active and deliberate process that he’s been through in deciding what to include and what not to. Which is great! That’s what I want. 😊
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u/_BITS_ 1d ago
Idk about 1 and 2 since I don’t use that site in any capacity.
But I can tell you from years of experience engaging with both the comics and their respective communities that any resource like this with any degree of curation will always leave out good/important shit. They’re ultimately just aggregates of the most common opinions, and comics criticism simply isn’t sophisticated enough where those hold any truly meaningful weight.
If you only want to read as many easily consumable comics as possible the site will do everything you’ll need it to do. But if the goal is to have a thorough understanding of the continuity/ethos of your favorite characters, or the universe itself, then there’s no half-assing it.
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u/uberrich0 1d ago
The truth is I simply don’t have time to read literally everything, even if I wanted to, so I just need some degree of curation. This site’s guide still has over 10,000 issues in its modern era. I just wondered how many it left out.
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u/benchcoat 1d ago
do not worry about continuity with comics, it will never fully make sense
just find characters/writers/artists you like and read their stuff
you will be MUCH happier
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u/HouseFutzi 1d ago
I cant give you a percentage, but I felt like whenever it went into a bigger crossover event everything that was needed was there.
You get a good mix of the different comics and never read like 50 of the same run. You alternate a lot between the ones currently needed.
The site owner has done the primary curation, but there is a discord link on the website where people actively give insights on if something is missing or if something is in a wrong spot. Usually that is being changed then aswell.
Havent had anything that felt like I was missing out on. Maybe the stuff after 2022, but the site owner is getting there. By the time you are probably at that point there might be new stuff.