Can't argue with that.  I haven't enjoyed any of his super-hero stuff.  His other stuff, like Transmetropolitan (or as I call it, Hunter S. Thompson in the 25th Century), is excellent, though.

To Matt Reed...

I don't got how you get off calling ME selfish when I say that I like to see more than ONE particular era of life portrayed in relation to a charachter where you are the one saying that "Spider-Man should ONLY be written in this particular way that I like and anyone who wants anything else is trying to deny my of exactly what I want."

I am not saying "it must be done this particular way" like you are. I am saying "I want to see a scope and range that is limited by ONLY doing things Matt's way."

Who is being selfish?

I think a lot of people on this board are purists.  They love Spider-Man and have a pretty good idea of what he was created to be.  They see these major changes - changes done by people other than Spider-Mans creators - as insults to the integrity of the character. 

I can see their point.  It's not selfishness.  They want the character to be around forever, to be shared by generations. 

Right now, I think a reboot of Marvel is inevitable.  It may be years away, but it will come.

Gregg Halecki wrote: I don't got how you get off calling ME selfish when I say that I like to see more than ONE particular era of life portrayed in relation to a charachter where you are the one saying that "Spider-Man should ONLY be written in this particular way that I like and anyone who wants anything else is trying to deny my of exactly what I want."

Now who needs good reading comprehension skills?  Never have I said "I" but always contend the widest possible audience.  You like Peter as a 30-something married teacher. Sorry, but I don't think that's appealing to kids at all.  "30 years old?  Married?  A TEACHER?!?  COOL!!!!  I'm there!!!!" isn't something I hear from my teen-aged nieces and nephew. 

When I got tired and bored with reading Dean Koonz novels, I moved on.  I didn't expect him to change his characters or the way he tells his stories so that I can enjoy them.  When I outgrew Archie comics, I stopped reading them.  I didn't keep reading them with the desire that Archie and the gang move on to college, get married, have kids, and go through all the crap of a 20 or 30 year old.  When I watch THE SIMPSONS over the last 18 years, it was never with the expectation that the characters would "age" and "grow" so that Bart and Lisa enter high school and Homer and Marge get a divorce just so the show doesn't grow "stagnant".  These are all equitable, Gregg.  They all have the same conceit: that any real change is just an illusion, making the audience feel like something happened without changing the characters so much that they a) lose their core audience, and b) they become something they were never meant to be.  It's the selfish person, like yourself, who requires of these characters to be something they are not because that's the only way you'll enjoy them.  Me, I say make them accessible to the widest possible audience (that's why they're called "mainstream superheroes" after all) and if I don't like it, I'll leave them to the audience that does just as I did with Koonz novels and Archie comics.

This is an interesting topic.  So is there an opinion that when a mini series/crossover comes out with a tag line of "nothing will be the same ever again" (or some sort of variation) it is a disservice to the characters -or- as long as the status quo is maintained afterwards, it can just be taken as a fun story. 

I am not saying that I have grown tired of Spider-Man. I in fact, I have NOT gotten tired of him specificaly because they did NOT keep him perpetually stuck in the high school years. He has been allowed to age and progress, and that is what has kept him interesting. The fact that I currently am unhappy with the charachter has nothing at all to do with him aging, it is the rediculous arm spike/totem/cocoon wierdness that they did with him. I am not even saying that all that stuff is WRONG, just that I don't like it.

I am not even saying that it is invalid to want to read more stories about him during that phase of his life. Personally, I think that the smart thing to do would be to turn one of the regular MU Spider-Man titles into something like Legends of the Dark Knight was, with flashback stories to his early days. I just don't think it is as enjoyable a concept to limit the charachter to those stories only. It would be like wiping Captain America out of current continuity and only publishing stories about him fighting the Nazi menace in WWII. I could make a big arguement that that particular defining charachteristic for the charachter and setting are for more at the original "core" of the charachter than being a teenager is to Peter. But Cap has evolved as a charachter far beyond that limited take on him, just as I feel that Spider-Man has evolved into something beyond the teenage angle.

To use the above Batman format as an example, there were some fantastic stories put out in the last 15 years or so focusing on Batman and his early days. But part of the popular aspect of the charachter is that he is an experienced, savy, veteran with a lot of experience and ability under his belt. Batman's original concept was the dark mysterious frightning vigilante of the night loner that rampaged against the scum of Gotham City. It would be wrong (or at least very shortsighted) to never allow him to fight demonic hordes or alien invasions as part of the JLA, even though that aspect of storytelling is certainly outside of the original concept of the charachter.

Other examples I can think of is Daredevil. Part of the original charachter concept was the young hot headed freewheeling aspect of Matt Murdock. Over the years, he has taken on additional charachteristics of a sometimes somber, battle weary man that has learned to temper himself.

Many people consider the changes that Simonson made to Thor some of the greatest work in the charachter's history. Walt certainly eliminates many of the key aspects of the original Thor stories. He got rid of Don Blake, possibly the single most defining charachteristic of the original Lee/Kirby stories, and he also got rid of Odin, the second biggest cornerstone of the original stories. Both of those things led to great stories. Wouldn't it be a shame if editorial mandate decided that he couldn't deviate from those two "laws of Thor"?

Well said, Matt.