Recent Spider-Man comics - Spoilers

Rico · December 31, 2007, 08:30:12 AM

Does anyone read the Spider-Man comics? Not the Ultimate book (but that's good too), but I mean the regular, older Spider comics. There has been this thing going on in them called "One More Day." J. M. Straczynski (yes - of "Babylon 5" fame) has been writing Spidey for awhile now. I just read "Amazing Spider-Man" # 545 yesterday. OH MY GOD! Something has happened that has changed Peter and Spider-Man forever! And I mean this is huge! He has been building to this for awhile. I don't want to spoil it, but man I got misty and very emotional reading this book. I don't know how I feel right now. It's such a shock. I'm not going to say more because I don't want to spoil it for those that read these comics. All I will say is if they could work this plot into a movie at some point it would be amazing. :spidey

Geekyfanboy · December 31, 2007, 09:14:48 AM

Well I don't read Spiderman.. but after that post I might have to read 545 just to find out what has happened.

Rico · December 31, 2007, 09:32:12 AM

I can mark the thread spoilers and do a recap, if people want. But it's very much worth the read.

wraith1701 · December 31, 2007, 03:17:09 PM

Just finished part 4. There were rumors that things would play out this way, but to actually see it in print is pretty intense. MJS did a great job breathing life into the characters; you can't help but share their pain.

Pretty rough situation; either outcome would have been bad, but I guess that goes with the territory when making these kind of deals.

The plus is that the story opens the door to all kinds of possibilities; I foresee a lot of storylines dealing with Peter's attempt to recapture what has been lost.

I'm curious about what was whispered before the clock struck 12:00? My knowledge of the Spider-Man universe is kind of sketchy (I've always been more of an X-Men fan growing up), but there seemed to be some faces in the "aftermath" sequence that shouldn't have been there. Might this have been tied into what was whispered?

Fanboy · December 31, 2007, 03:24:51 PM

Dude that's wicked. Spidey's always got it rough.

Geekyfanboy · December 31, 2007, 03:45:04 PM

okay you guys are driving me crazy.. put a spoiler tag on this thread and tell us what happen. :)

X · January 03, 2008, 03:44:47 PM

I read it and I think that the motives behind it were poor. They did what they did because they (the Editors) didn't think Spiderman would be as accepted a rolemodel if Peter ended things in a more legal sense.

Maybe it's just me, but I think that the legal ending of what they saw as a problem would have been far more acceptable then the way it was presented in OMD.

Also there are several interviews and posts out there from JMS and the EIC at Marvel about the direction of the comic and why things were done.

If you take all of these into consideration, I think that this is worse story ever written and from what they say, it and everything in the past few years were done because they wanted what happened to be the end result and the other news worthy thing he did in Civil War was going to be removed by the end of this story.

I felt used after I read this.

And not in the good way that it can happen sometimes.

Rico · January 03, 2008, 03:56:14 PM

Ok - I marked the thread as containing spoilers so I warned you.....

SPOILERS AHOY...

Over the last year or so, Spider-man's identity was revealed to the world due to the Marvel Civil War conflict. Everyone learned that Peter Parker is Spider-Man. This of course put his wife Mary Jane and Aunt May in danger. The Kingpin ordered a hit on Peter. Aunt May got shot instead with a bullet meant for Peter. He has been trying to save her ever since. She was close to death. The only way to save her was to make basically a pack with the devil, Mephisto. The deal was this. Mephisto would save Aunt May, make it so she was never even shot. He would also make it so the world had never learned Peter's secret identity. On one condition. The condition was Peter and MJ would of never married. They would know each other, but never have gotten serious, gotten married and made a life together (which in comics has been about the last twenty years, since the late 80's). Mephisto said basically Peter and MJ have that rare true love that's not found very often and basically by doing this God would be robbed of their happiness and love. Peter felt such enormous guilt over Aunt May taking a bullet meant for him that he wanted to agree to this, but he wouldn't do it unless MJ said ok as well. She did agree saying that no matter what happened they would find each other again. The last pages of the book are them at a party and just seeing each other but there is no connection. Mephisto has reset the world in a way.

Now for those that don't read these comics regularly this might not seem that big a deal. But for me, it was gut wrenching. Spider-Man and Peter Parker have always been my favorite comic characters and the ones I most identified with (probably because I was a geeky science nerd in school). So to see his wife gone and life torn apart - well that was hard to read. So there you have it. If you are interested, pick up some of these recent books and read them yourself. You won't be disappointed.

wraith1701 · January 03, 2008, 06:22:36 PM

I found that the story was very emotionally wrenching, for several different reasons. It was painful to see the choice that Peter and MJ were faced with, and I think that Straczynski did a great job depicting the couple's struggle with the choice in a very realistic way. The raw, naked anguish of MJ was particularly well done. As a single, isolated story-arc, One More Day provided a very emotional, cathartic, and satisfying read.

The story was also emotionally wrenching on a much broader level. As X and Rico mentioned, Joe Q. (Marvel's current Editor in Chief) has basically trivialized the time and money many fans have invested in the different Spider-Man series for the past 20 years. His retconning has basically said "You know all of those stories you have followed for the past 20 years? Well, they never happened."

This has caused quite an uproar among a lot of Spidey fans; many are screaming for blood. The story has taken years and years of history and wiped it away. As much as this troubles me, I think I understand why Marvel decided to risk disenfranchising many of its long-time fans. Many new readers are afraid to start reading a book, afraid that they will be hopelessly lost because they don't know all of the backstory of the characters. In wiping the slate clean, Marvel seems to think that it will attract new readers. The new "Brand New Day", or reboot of Spider-Man, is supposed to provide a good "Jumping on" point for new readers. I'm not so sure that I agree with this.

Nevertheless, I will continue to follow the books. Retconning and reboots are inevitable in ongoing comic series. It's been done before, and it will be done again.

Rico · January 04, 2008, 04:42:09 AM

I agree wraith pretty much. I've read comics for a very long time and I know how these things go. But just like they wiped away the past they can just as easily put it back to the way it was - or close to it. You'd be very naive about comics if you thought this retcon or any other major plot development would stay that way forever.

One thing I don't really see though is why Marvel or Joe Q. thinks they needed to do this. They started the "Ultimate" line of comics for this very reason. To give new readers a good jumping on point. One other thing in their favor now is for a small monthly fee (think it's $4.99) you have access to much of Marvel's comic archive online. So people can "catch up" pretty easily.

In any case, these recent issues and the death of Cap has really stirred the pot up over at Marvel.

wraith1701 · January 04, 2008, 06:32:10 AM

Retconning and status-quo altering events happen on a regular basis in comics. One title that I've been following pretty closely is The Astonishing X-Men, written by Buffy's Jos Whedon. In just the last two issues, a major character died, and was then brought back to life. In fact, I've lost count of the number of times characters have died and come back, or have been replaced by "evil twins", or have had their history retconned by some earth-shattering event. In the long run, I guess this is part of the fun of comics. They would be pretty boring if things weren't shaken up every now and then.

Straying a little off topic-
I've seen images of the "New" Captain America in different magazines and online. I haven't been following the title very closely, but I'm wondering- does anyone know who the new Cap is? Is it the Winter Soldier/Bucky?

Rico · January 04, 2008, 06:48:11 AM

On the Cap thing - yep, it's looking like the new Cap will be Bucky/Winter Soldier. But I'm still convinced the real Cap is still alive.

X · January 04, 2008, 05:58:04 PM

Okay, I'm going to chime in on the Spidey thing in detail.

I think that they made a terrible mistake in involving Mephisto in this. Joe Q has gone on the record to state that he didn't want them to get a divorce because of the negative headlines it would generate. So he opted for MJ and Peter to make a deal with the Devil because he find that more acceptable.

I think the reason behind the deal was stupid. Peter wanted to save May so he agrees to the deal. To get him to the point of desperation, he travels to every key player in the Marvel Universe and Joe suggested we further suspend disbelief and pretent that there is no one onthe planet that can save her from a gunshot wound. I could see if he didn't have time, but the allowed him to visit everyone on the planet that could offer help.

Then in futher interviews he tells us that history wasn't changed, that Peter and MJ just didn't pull the trigger on the wedding, something stopped it and they never married. They just lived together in sin, the same reason he suggested that the kids of Gwen Stacy be Norman's kids because he didn't want Peter having premarital sex.

Now even as he say that history wasn't changed, at the end of the book we find his secret identity restored, Peter never married, his webshooters and enhanced powers are gone, and Aunt May healthy with no evidence of a gunshot wound, her house back (it got exploded a few years ago), and Harry Osborn back from the dead, but they really didn't change history.

Now here comes the insulting part of all of this JMS wanted to take his name off the book because his solution would have made more sense than the rewrites that they wanted. When JMS questioned him on how to make sense of the changes that Joe Q wanted, he said that "It's magic, we don't have to explain it."

Going into Marvel to become the Editor in Charge, Joe Q told them that he doesn't like Peter married, so they spent the two years revealing his secret identity and pushing the story to remove the marriage that Joe Q didn't like. They wrote the story of his unmasking because they knew that they were going to remove it and that seems less like writing about a character you claim to love and more about making a buck at something you knew that you would remove.

Lastly, Peter and Mary Jane Parker made a deal with the Devil to save an Aunt that requested Peter to just let her go. In the final moments it was revealed that peter and MJ were also going to lose the child that they were going to have together. MJ puking in the beginning of the final issue suggest that she was already pregnant. With all of these things, they STILL go through with the deal and then removes the knowledge of the deal from Peter so that he doesn't ever have to deal with the consequence.

At that moment, Peter Parker turned his back on everything that he was suposed to stand for. He was offered a deal of Great Power and totally ignored the responsibility of what that would mean. This entire story, building for the last few years killed spiderman to me.

My favorite part is that Mephisto did the deal because he wanted the spite god and take away their marriage and what he called a legendary love, but in the House of M storyline, we found that when Peter got his greatest wish, he was married not to MJ, but to Gwen and they had a family. They even let him retain all of these memoires about his perfect life with Gwen. KNowing this, I can't see how this "deal" is supposed to end this perfect marriage when the same people are telling us that in Peter's heart of hearts, he wants the family life with Gwen Stacy.

OKay, I've ranted enough and probably read too much of the drama between JMS and JQ. I do know that I can in good conscience continue to pick up a book that I share with the kids when the man in charge thinks that parents would be happier explaining spiderman making a deal with the devil to their kids as opposed to parents explaining that they got a divorce.

His reason for that gem was because divorce really exists and the devil doesn't so it is acceptable. Spider-man doesn't exist either, so I would assume that a fictional divorce would be better than a fictional deal with the devil, but that's just me.

Rico · January 04, 2008, 06:33:51 PM

I can understand what your points are but I think you have to keep in mind that most people reading this comic don't dig up the back story and reasons for it. Even knowing that I have to judge the book on what was printed - not the drama behind it. And again, while I wished it hadn't quite gone this way, I still think it's a powerful story.

Jobydrone · January 13, 2008, 04:29:27 PM

My favorite issue of Spiderman in recent memory was the one near the end of the "Back in Black" story arc. Spidey goes to the prison where the Kingpin is being held and beats the snot out of him, just a brutal, vicious beating, then tells him that he has as long to live as Aunt May, and as soon as she dies he is coming back to fill his lungs with webbing. This was maybe the first time reading a comic ever made me want to stand up and cheer. I'm pretty dubious about the new direction Spidey is taking after this reboot, although I will certainly continue to read it as Spiderman has always been one of my favorite Marvel characters ever since I was a kid. I have a feeling that the editors at Marvel may have been having some qualms as well considering the recent delays in the books...I think the end of "One more day" was delayed by over a month and it wouldn't surprise me if they had some last minute changes they were considering. But as Rico said, nothing in comics is ever written in stone, changes can and do happen as often as the wind blows.

That being said, does anyone else think this new MaryJane superhero thing looks incredibly dumb?