Money was just a reallly nice bonus.

Uh, come on, really. "A nice bonus", rofl. They clearly would have done it all for nothing and lived as hobos. Cold war is over, capitalism has won, it's the other way around, having fun playing the characters and being friends was the nice bonus. Which is okay, that's how society is structured. Please stop all being ridicolous and defend billionairs. It's okay for them being greedy and making tons of money, but pretending that isn't the core of it is pretty dumb in my eyes. What Marvel cares for is making money and they'll do whatever it takes to make money, including giving their employees a good time.