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Topic: Q for the Forum: How would YOU fix Spider-Man? (Topic Closed Topic Closed) Post ReplyPost New Topic
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John Mietus
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Posted: 26 September 2007 at 5:12am | IP Logged | 1  

Hawkman and Hawkwoman.
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Brendan Howard
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Posted: 26 September 2007 at 6:05am | IP Logged | 2  

Yes, those are the same ones I was thinking of ... now compare that list to
all the other superheroes in existence!
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Bruce Buchanan
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Posted: 26 September 2007 at 7:13am | IP Logged | 3  

 think that may have been a factor, sort of. For many years, fans--and even Lee and Romita and Conway--have said that Gwen was a bland nice girl with no real personality, especially compared to the lively Mary Jane. In recent years, a lot of people have insisted that Gwen "had no character", and that's why she was killed off.

So JMS may have been attempting to give Gwen a "more believable" personality, despite the fact that, y'know, she already had one, even if fans thought that personality was bland.

*************

Yeah, that bugs me to hear folks say "Gwen had no personality." Like you said, even some of the great Spider-Man creators have echoed those sentiments, but I don't believe them to be correct. Just because she's not as outgoing as MJ doesn't mean the character lacks depth.

 

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Bruce Buchanan
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Posted: 26 September 2007 at 7:23am | IP Logged | 4  

As for the marriage question, I think there is merit to both sides of the argument.

I agree that turning Peter from a student to a married, working guy was a mistake. It takes away from what made the character so beloved in the first place and does make it harder for young readers to relate to him.

However, Andrew is exactly right that the Peter-MJ marriage is far, far down on the list of problems with Spider-Man. The dark tone of the book has been much more of an issue than the central character not being single.

I can pinpoint the moment JMS lost me. Peter encounters a version of himself from the future. The future Spider-Man is an accused murderer (and the implication is that he may be, in fact, guilty) and ends up committing suicide by cop. I knew then that "This ain't Spider-Man."

The marriage issue, by comparison, is no big deal. I'd much rather see well-written stories with a married Peter Parker than the gloom-and-doom Spider-Man we've seen in the past decade.

 

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Brad Danson
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Posted: 26 September 2007 at 7:52am | IP Logged | 5  


 QUOTE:
What, once every 3 years?

That's what we agreed on previously, yes.
 

 QUOTE:
They mention Uncle Ben periodically as well.  Is this because "fanboy writers"are clamoring for it as well?

No, that's the entire basis of Spider-Man.  Gwen has nothing to do with the basis.
 

 QUOTE:
Gwen was mentioned because she has a big part in Peter and Spider-Man's history.  Her death is one of the book's signature stories.

Doesn't need to be for any reason other than you want it to be.  An unblemished girlfriend that died BECAUSE of Spider-Man hurts the idea that Peter needs to be Spider-Man because his Uncle Ben died since Peter WASN'T Spider-Man.  Contradictory points.  Gwen hurts the basis of the character.
 

 QUOTE:
You postulated a theory that holds no water
Instead of just conceding that you were wrong or dropping out...

If you'll read all my posts you'll see that I conceded that JMS did not do it to make readers forget her. But I'm sticking with the theory that he intentionally tried to make her less likeable. "Forget" was too strong of a word. "Move past" is what I should have used.
 

 QUOTE:
you then added the, IMO,  ridiculous assertion that Peter's reminiscing occasionally on what a wonderful girl Gwen was somehow keeps him from really  moving on in his lovelife despite all the stories that show he has.

If he's going to be single...and he continues to reminisce about a flawless girlfriend who is dead (even as little as once every 3 years)...how can the readers think that he may ever fall in love again?  You may realize that you can have many loves over your life.  A twelve year old readers doesn't...and that's who should be reading this title.  The memory of a flawless, dead Gwen hurts the reader's interest if we have a single Peter Parker and, as readers, are suppose to be interested in his love life. 

The basis of the (single) Spider-Man character does not, should not have a corollary that Peter has no chance at finding someone as great as Gwen.

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Howard Mackie
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Posted: 26 September 2007 at 9:45am | IP Logged | 6  

<<Hey Howard, since we're talking about Spider-Man and all, is it okay if I ask you a question about your Web run? 

Assuming you remember that far back...  in Name of the Rose, you had Richard Fisk become a "young Kingpin."  When Terry Kavanaugh did the follow-up story, he revealed that the Richard Fisk who had become the Kingpin was actually Richard's friend Alfredo.  Was that your original plan or did Terry come up with that on his own?>>

Checked with Terry, and the bottom line is...neither of us remembers! He thinks I set it up, and I think he took the story in his own direction. So... the conclusion is--we are OLD!

Glenn...Terry says "Hi!" Right back at you.

 

Howard



Edited by Howard Mackie on 26 September 2007 at 9:45am
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Glenn Greenberg
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Posted: 26 September 2007 at 10:30am | IP Logged | 7  

<<<Glenn...Terry says "Hi!" Right back at you.>>>


Thanks, Howard!

:-)
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Matt Reed
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Posted: 26 September 2007 at 11:30am | IP Logged | 8  

 Bruce Buchanan wrote:
The marriage issue, by comparison, is no big deal. I'd much rather see well-written stories with a married Peter Parker than the gloom-and-doom Spider-Man we've seen in the past decade.

But both of those scenarios took place during the same time, Bruce.  In that light, it's incredibly hard for me to separate the two.  Peter's been married to MJ nearly two decades, our time.  Spider-Man has been dark and depressing instead of being light-hearted and fun for nearly as long.  I'm not saying there's a correlation between the two, but it's all part of the same wrong-headed editorial thinking where I'm concerned.

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Andrew W. Farago
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Posted: 26 September 2007 at 12:25pm | IP Logged | 9  

The first wave of *real* gloom (as opposed to the standard neuroses that Pete had in the Ditko issues and the early Romita issues) set in when Gwen Stacy was killed, about 15 years before the marriage. Peter moped around for a while after Gwen's death, seemed to get over it, then Gwen's clone showed up and put him through the wringer all over again. *That* set the stage for gloomy, depressing stories if anything did.
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Matt Reed
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Posted: 26 September 2007 at 12:43pm | IP Logged | 10  

But that certainly wasn't the overall tone for all the Spider-books at the time, Andrew.  A few stories of doom and gloom here and there are fine.  Lee/Ditko had those in their run, as did Lee/Romita, but they weren't the standard.  I wouldn't say Gwen's death "set the stage" for doom and gloom any more than Uncle Ben's death did.  Flashforward to the late 80s when the norm went from the wise cracking Peter Parker to a self-loathing, depressed, gritty Spider-Man who felt like he wanted to be anything but a superhero and that's where the "stage was set" for the eye gouging, death/rebirth/death/rebirth, secret identity revealing, Gwen-as-slut ASM we have today.
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Bruce Buchanan
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Posted: 26 September 2007 at 1:08pm | IP Logged | 11  

I agree with Matt on that one. "The Death of Gwen Stacy"  had such an impact because it was so different from the norm. The overall tone of Spider-Man post-Gwen was still the same as it had been before her death.

Doing a tragic story once in a blue moon is fine. But when a character suffers one tragedy after another, it becomes numbing and depressing. That certainly wasn't the case of Spider-Man in the 1970s and '80s.

However, I see the "Gloom & Doom" trend and the Peter/MJ marriage as two completely separate things. Yeah, they happened roughly around the same time period (although I thought the tone didn't become gritty and somber until the 1990s. Maybe that's just me, though.).

I can understand how you might relate the two, but in my mind, I see them as separate - and the marriage doesn't bother me nearly as much as the other stuff does.



Edited by Bruce Buchanan on 26 September 2007 at 1:09pm
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Stephen Robinson
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Posted: 26 September 2007 at 1:10pm | IP Logged | 12  

But that certainly wasn't the overall tone for all the Spider-books at the time, Andrew.  A few stories of doom and gloom here and there are fine.  Lee/Ditko had those in their run, as did Lee/Romita, but they weren't the standard.

**********

SER: Agreed. Peter -- like Buffy -- had melodramatic teenage problems, amplified of course by the fact that they were both fighting supervillains. Peter -- again like Buffy at her best -- was hard-luck in almost comical ways -- he had to fight the Goblin with a cheap-ass costume he was holding together with webbing.

That said, Peter's life was never pathetic. And I never read a Spider-Man comic by Lee/Ditko/Romita and felt dispirited (THE OTHER, for example).

Buffy lost her way in a similar manner -- the last 2 seasons were unrelentingly dark.

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