Seems to me that the gripes people have and I have with DC or Marvel are usually pretty much the same. They both use basically the same tactics. If something works for one the other seems to follow shortly after.

What I was wondering was if this is just one company trying go stay on top of what could be a trend or is it just the writers have been back and forth between the companies.

Since the writers are all basically from and in the same pool I wonder if they have all just exposed themselves to the same ideas. They like something that was chatted up in the lunchroom and include it with their characters and just ignore the fact it was just done by somebody else. Maybe because it's different characters they think no one notices.

I think it probably is a little of both. Which do you think is more the cause? If you even agree with my observation.

I remember reading a commentary by one of the Great Satans who said that he believed there was a "mental ether" area that many people tapped into and that was how different people come up with similar ideas at the same time.

Also there are people who talk too much at the wrong time and thus ideas are seeded out across many people.

Soooo archetypes?

Or the Collective Unconscious?

I think, for the most part, this is the situation right here.
A lot of writers and artists work for both companies or associate with people from both companies. So whether it be at conventions, gatherings, social funtions or meetings, things are said that are overheard by others involuntarily. It ends up batting around in someones mind and then later on comes out a little different but with the same intitial idea. The person who came up with the idea may have never realized they overheard it since it was something they picked up subconsciously.
I know this is the reason why some writers do not want to critique other peoples stories at cons, they are afraid of being accused of stealing someones idea if sometime later they come up with an idea that is like something they read.