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Underground > Comic Books >

Geeky Spider-Man Thread

  
 
tickspeak
15:19 / 11.08.06
Spun (HAW) out from the Civil War thread:

I love Spider-Man to a profound degree and have since I discovered him at age 8. Peter Parker is the only man for me and always will be in spite of the fact that he's whiney, self-destructive, withdrawn, a drama magnet, trapped in self-imposed patterns of guilt and denial, a mama's boy, and married to a perpetually hot woman.

The structure of Spider-Man's story over the past four decades is fascinating and was, at one point, unique to comics in its freedom of movement (as Chris pointed out in the CW thread). He's had a dozen significant romantic foils, each of whom had a different personality and played a different role in his personal drama, culminating in a marriage to a strong-willed, exciting, compatable partner. He graduated high school, moved out of Queens to go to college, and every so often returns to grad school. His career as a freelance crime photographer, which started in high school, progressed to the point where he had a book of his work published, then spun its wheels for years until he gave up and decided to try teaching. In short, if you table the super powers, scientific genius, constant imperilment and death of loved ones, participation in galaxy-spanning conflicts, and clones, Peter Parker has had one hell of a normal life characterized by endeavor, disappointment, and, inescapably, growth despite his personal tendency towards wheel-spinning and recapitulation of his favorite internal conflicts. Which sounds to me like real life.

In fact, it's Peter's capacity for growth that brings me back to the character again and again and that makes reading from his history an engaging experience. I choose to read the periodic resets ("If he's not poor, he's not Spider-Man!" "If he's married, he's not Spider-Man!" "If he's not in school, he's not Spider-Man!" etc.) not as ill-conceived editorial fixes that have little to do with the problem (sales) they're supposed to solve, but as attempts by a man to reconcile the inevitability of personal development over time with a conception of self that was locked in at age 16 when he had a set of experiences so traumatic and defining that he's still never really gotten over them.

So what is the future of Spider-Man? Let's, for a moment, take as a given the new revealed-identity status quo. Let's pretend that it's going to last. This is bigger than marriage, bigger than a new costume or a clone or a baby. This is more than just Tony Stark stepping into the howling Father Figure vacuum in Peter's psyche, and more than a response to the Registration Act. Spider-Man has been in and out of public favor since his inception, and it's pretty much established that while some cops tolerate or even appreciate his activities, he's a known lawbreaker. Why does a man like Peter Parker decide to reveal his identity to the public after all this time? Is he that starved for validation in spite of the CONSTANT praise and encouragement he receives from his doting aunt and hot, sassy wife? Is he finally fed up with the paranoia and lies that come with a double-life? Or is he forcing himself to grow up by taking the one step that can't be taken back (until Dr. Strange appears in a puff of smoke), making change for its own sake to overcome his psychological tendencies?
 
 
aku aku
15:47 / 11.08.06
I think part of the problem with Peter is that he's was meant to be thiss joe average/everyman that people (kids reading comics) identified with. So he can't have a happy life as people don't want to read that, in the same way the characters in Eastenders never seem to get a break.

Which perhaps isn't a bad thing, but it smacks of lazy writing to equate that with never evoling as a character. I enjoyed Spiderman when I read it (just prior to the maximum caranage era) because he had problems such as his wife thinking he was going to cheat on her with Black Cat, Venon was trying to kill him, etc. Yes he had a model wife and superpowers, but his life was messed up, which I think is what a lot of people like about the character.

But this doesn't mean he has to always have the same problems, I don't want to read 40 years of Flash thompson beating him up and JJJ trying to expose him as a menace, etc, it gets dull.

As for the identity reveal, well thats not going to last long, and if it did, who would want to read about Spiderman - agent of Shield and celebrity. Surely half the fun/drama of the book,and in fact the superhero genre, is that they have secret identities
 
 
Mario
16:01 / 11.08.06
The thing about Spider-Man is that the core of his character, at the end of the day, is remarkably straightforward, and has nothing to do with whether he is married, employed, or eating eyeballs.

It's this: "With great power comes great responsibility". Over the years, Peter has explored various facets of that:

He's married. That puts pressure on him because now he has dueling responsibilities. Which is more important? Catching the Vulture or being home with his wife on their anniversary?

He gains new powers. How does that change his responsibilities?

He joins the Avengers. Now he has allies who can share his burden. How does that change him?

He becomes a teacher. Now he's responsible for 30-40 students, as well as to the city. Another balancing act.

As he grows in power and responsibility, his character should deepen. I'll leave it to people who actually read his books to decide if that's true.
 
 
John Octave
18:11 / 11.08.06
About growth and change vs. not, when you strip everything away, Peter/Spider-Man's just "power and responsibility" like Mario said. His status quo since high school, give or take, is about exactly the right equilibrium he's found between personal life and superhero life. The more time he spends advancing his life as Peter Parker is the less time spent helping people as Spider-Man, simple as that. It's why whenever he quits being Spider-Man for a spell he gets a swanky science job, but gives it up whenever he gets back in the suit. Responsibility to other people is prioritized over responsibility to himself, as is the moral of the story. Doesn't quite jibe with Ditko's personal philosophy, but there you go.

Also, I disagree with the conceit that Peter can't have a "happy" life. His life isn't too terrible, surely. I think what Peter has is a disappointing life. Sure, he's getting by, but he always has that sense that he was meant for more. He makes enough money to get by well enough, but he was supposed to be one of those 23-year-old millionaire prodigies. He's a superhero, but most people don't like him. He's got powers, but he's not as powerful as a lot of his contemporaries. He's married to Mary Jane, but he could've been married to Gwen Stacy. And so on. If he was a little less fixated on "what might have been," he could take a step back and see what he's got's not too shabby at all. But he's Peter Parker, so he won't.

That's what Spider-Man's all about, taking into account 40+ years of history, I think.
 
 
tickspeak
19:22 / 11.08.06
So where does Spidey stand in the pantheon of the Marvel U? Originally (and it seems there are those in the PTB and the fandom who would like this to return) he was a maverick, pitied by the FF, mistrusted by everyone else.

Nowadays he's something of an elder statesman--I could see any number of Marvel's younger heroes claiming Spidey as their inspiration. He's been in the game as long as anyone except the FF and Captain America, he has proven that he can kick ANYBODY'S ass (from the Shocker to Dr. Doom to Thanos) given a couple rounds to think through a strategy, and he still occasionally grabs babies from burning buildings and strings up jewel thieves (old school!).

So if Joey da Q really does intend to revert to a "heroes are mistrusted and generally sort of covert" 60s status quo after CW wraps...well, what's gained here? Specifically in terms of Spidey, since this is his thread--why is it wrong for him to be more mature than the New Warriors (or whatever Teen Group refuses to sell at the moment)? Is being looked up to by less seasoned heroes antithetical to the "power and responsibility" theme that posters here claim is his core? Can he be both experienced and reviled, or is that asking too much suspension of disbelief (if he's as good at heroing as we all know he is, then how can he still be an object of public fear)?
 
 
Mario
20:49 / 11.08.06
I wouldn't call him an elder statesman... he's too much the loner. But I could see him as somewhat of a celebrity among the younger ranks of heroes, sort of like a Tony Hawk-level.

It amuses me to think that the next step could be for Peter to find himself saddled with a neophyte hero who wants to learn the ropes (metaphorically). Not a sidekick, but more of an apprentice.

Peter has never been the leader type. He feels that HE has to take responsibility (because when he didn't, his uncle died). So having someone trying to take his place would drive him nuts, not only because he'll have to resist the urge to jump in and do it himself, but also because he'll feel responsible for his student.
 
 
tickspeak
20:54 / 11.08.06
I wish you wouldn't steal the most self-evident plots out of my For When I Write Spider-Man brainfile and post them on the internet.
 
 
Billuccho!
23:05 / 11.08.06
I think Spider-Man, as a concept, has hit a wall. His story is a coming-of-age story, but he came of age a while ago. Storywise, he's just spinning his wheels now, being dragged through "event" after "event" and "shock" after "shock." Peter is a character that needs to grow and evolve and change over time... but he's also a character that will never turn thirty. Hence, he's trapped in his own web, so to speak.
 
 
Solitaire Rose as Tom Servo
11:06 / 13.08.06
One of the things I am liking about the "Spidey as an Avenger" is that he is finding out that people admire him, and he's kind of blown away by that. It's a great character bit and is one of the few things about Spidey's new direction I like.
 
 
rabideyemovement
17:51 / 16.08.06
I'm gonna miss this new Spidey suit when it's gone. I didn't like the look of it that much, but the functionality made a lot of sense. The extra arms, the ability to glide... It seems to make perfect sense to me that a kid who invented web-shooters at age fifteen would wear a technologically enhanced suit. Maybe when he quits Starkin around, he can implement some of the designs into his new suit.
As for the other recent changes... organic web-shooting/venomous spike = dumb. And I still don't see the reason behind the entire Other storyline. I hope there's more to come with that, otherwise it was pretty pointless, eh?
 
 
Phex: Dorset Doom
18:32 / 16.08.06
They've already written a get-out clause for the Spider-armor. The version 2.0 version can alter the color so it can look like the Stark version, Original Spidey or wicked-cool eighties black spider symbiote spandex. Peter just has to delete the Spyware Iron Man hinted at in the recent Civil War issue, set the preferences>skins to original settings in the options menu and we're back to the safe, comfortable status-quo.
Also: Did anybody read 'Spider Man Family: Spider-man and his Amazing Friends'? It was fun. No angst, no Civil War, no Aunt May, no 'With Great Power...'. Just Spidey, Iceman and Firestar hitting villains (but not in a nasty way) and quipping. It was fun, PG-13 goodness.
 
 
doyoufeelloved
18:40 / 16.08.06
And I still don't see the reason behind the entire Other storyline. I hope there's more to come with that, otherwise it was pretty pointless, eh?

From the sound of things, it probably WOULD'VE been a bigger deal (if a fairly lame deal, since it was a pretty wretched story) if they hadn't decided so suddenly to do CIVIL WAR. I'm surprised more people aren't more astonished by the fact that CIVIL WAR as an idea sounds like it came about a maximum of five or six months before the first issue hit the stands. They reeeeaaaally wanted something to compete with INFINITE CRISIS, I guess.

This is a net positive, IMO. THE OTHER was pretty moronic, while Spidey's CIVIL WAR character arc has been kind of refreshing.
 
 
slagar
20:19 / 16.08.06
And I still don't see the reason behind the entire Other storyline. I hope there's more to come with that, otherwise it was pretty pointless, eh?

i believe it was to get rid of the web shooters. you'll notice in a recent Spider-Man book Peter, without costume, webbed a gunman's hand. you can plainly see there were no web shooters on his wrist.

this is the first time in my memory, since the movies, that there was an overt statement that he doesn't use mechanical mean to shoot webs.

there was a mention in an early New Avengers where Peter comments that his webbing wasn't working when they went to that primitive land in Antarctic, but i couldn't figure out if they he meant his inorganic or organic web shooters.

as has been mentioned the Other storyline was rushed because of Civil War so i'm sure there would have been more an exploration of this.

it's unfortunate they wrote them out, the technology was an early indication of Peter's genius. not only did he create the web solution and shooters, but numerous times he had to use his brain to think on how to improve the webbing to defeat villains, Electro and Sandman come to mind. the drama when he runs out of fluid and has to improvise, of which he is a great at doing, is now lost, also. i'm sad to see them go. it's ironic that Tony Stark wants Peter to focus on the intellect yet the writers just buried the one thing that really showed his smarts.
 
 
Bubblegum Death
00:03 / 17.08.06
Actually, Peter got his organic webshooters in the Spectacular Spider-Man Disassembled issues. He gets kissed by a woman who can control people with the "insect gene". He turns in to a giant spider, and eventually dies. He later hatches from the spider's body with the ability to shoot webs from his arms and also to communicate with bugs.
 
 
bio k9
02:23 / 17.08.06
Um, what?
 
 
Mario
11:02 / 17.08.06
That's basically what everybody says.
 
 
doctorbeck
11:26 / 17.08.06
>communicate with bugs.

because the avengers are always going to need someone who can do that when thanos or galactus shows up again and hank pym has lost his helmet?

otherwise think it is about time he got organic web shooters, one of the smart things the films have done.
 
 
matthew.
12:33 / 17.08.06
I was just about to mention that Disassembled nonsense. The editorial reason behind The Other was two-fold: to get Pete et al into the Avengers' mantion, and to reiterate that Pete has become confused over his human status. Most people ignored the whole "becoming a spider" thing, so the writing team wrote it again. Is Peter an avatar for the race of spiders? Possibly....
 
 
doyoufeelloved
14:21 / 17.08.06
Because, you know, being MARRIED to a WOMAN makes Peter hard to relate to, but being an avatar for a race of spiders doesn't. I'll bet that Joe Quesada is a wiz at logic puzzles.
 
 
John Octave
14:37 / 17.08.06
I thought the organic webshooters were a great idea for the movie, I guess for the symbolic "OMG what's that white stuff coming out of my body?" thing, but mainly because it simplifies things for the film, which has to be a tad more..."realistic."

I think the comics lose a little something without them, though. One of my favorite things about Spider-Man as a lad is that at times he seemed like a mixture of a regular superhero plus a touch of Batman. Yeah he's got powers, but he also builds himself gadgets, like web-shooters, spider-tracers (a particularly clever idea using science to augment an existing power), and even that badass Spider-Signal (because it gets dark sometimes, dammit!) Peter backs up his powers, which are not the best and brightest of his contemporaries, with his own devices, and the effort is what I always found particularly endearing about him. The spider got him halfway with the jumping and the strength and everything, but Peter had to invent webs and stuff to go the other half.
 
 
doctorbeck
14:58 / 17.08.06
you know john you got me convinved there and reminded me about why spidey was an entry level superhero for me too

did anyone actually get that 'Rock reflections of a superhero' concept lp they used to advertise in the comics? the one with a cover showing PP looking at his reflection in the mirror and it was spidey? always wanted it but never figured out how to get stuff from the states
 
 
tickspeak
15:00 / 17.08.06
For that matter, when's the last time you saw spider-tracers or the spider-signal? As someone (I forget who, apologies) pointed out in another thread a few months ago, all this Iron Spider tech-heavy new costume has actually accomplished has been to allow writers to get lazy (he, uh, can be invisible! yeah! and, umm...oh okay Tony talks right into his mask. And his eyepieces can see through things! that's the ticket!) instead of giving Peter more opportunities to display his mastery of all things Science.
 
 
tickspeak
15:04 / 17.08.06
Hey, remember when Spidey first fought Kraven, and Kraven trapped him in a chain-link net, and Spidey used Science to figure out that a chain is only as strong as its weakest link, so he systematically put pressure on each link in the net until he broke one and got free? In the space of like 2 panels?

Stan Lee is the fucking MASTER.
 
 
Axolotl
17:08 / 17.08.06
I reckon one of the best Spidey stories of the past few years was Dan Slott's min-series about the relationship between Spidey and the Human Torch. It was six parts long and each one was taken from a different era; so you had one in high school, the Romita era, the Black costume etc. The great thing was that it was both a lving homage to the old spidey books (including the spider-mobile) but it also moved things on. I believe it was the first time Peter revealed his secret identity to Johnny, but the way their relationship was portrayed and what this showed about their position in the MU was really well done.
 
 
Spyder Todd 2008
17:12 / 17.08.06
I’ve always appreciated that Spider-Man is pretty much the Marvel icon (much as Superman is DC’s), but he’s hardly their heaviest hitter in terms of powers. Sure, he’s strong, but if a regular street thug manages to get lucky and hit him on the head with a baseball bat, he’s going to go down. Spider-Man isn’t that far from a regular person, which makes him more interesting and human than the big shots, people like Thor and Iron Man who are powerful beyond belief. And he knows practically everyone in the superhuman community, but he’s not really friends with many of them, except maybe Daredevil and Prowler. He’s an outsider to these people, even if they do admire his talents and feel bad about all the negative press he gets. He’s unsure of himself. He’s a science whiz kid, but he’s not willing to go the distance with it and really use his talents appropriately. His superheroic antics strain his marriage. He’s got a crazy ex-girlfriend who he fears has more in common with him than his wife (and I would argue that she does). He’s self-depreciating, and all he really wants to do is make the world a better place.

Honestly, I understand all that. I relate to Peter Parker, and I feel for him. I care about the character, his backstory, and his supporting cast. And what is so complicated about all that that Marvel feels a need to turn him into a creepy spider monster that eats the heads of badguys and has poisonous stingers on his arms, I just do not know.
 
 
John Octave
18:10 / 17.08.06
Stan Lee is the fucking MASTER.

Yeah! And that sort of thing happened all the time in the early Spider-Man stories. He fuses Doctor Octopus' arms together, wears insulated gloves to fight Electro, and figures out in a couple of panels how the Vulture's wings work and then builds a device to demagnetize them! Not good science, but great comic book science.

He also caught Sandman in an industrial vacuum cleaner the first time they fought, which is a bit of a head-scratcher, but when I read the reprint at the age of eight I thought it was the coolest fucking thing I had ever read, so it gets a free pass.

Anyway, that's what I miss most in the current stories, is the clever ways of beating villains, rather than just hitting them a bunch of times and covering them in webbing. The aforementioned and deliciously awesome Spider-Man and his Amazing Friends comic that just came out saw Spidey beating Videoman with Science! on par with Stan Lee, and I found it extremely satisfying. Plus, it contains a great Peter and Mary Jane bit that should be cut out and mailed to Spider-Man writers with a little note that says "Do it like this, see?"
 
 
tickspeak
19:38 / 17.08.06
PETITION:

Dear Axel Alonso,

More Stan The Man Style Science, less face-eating-and-bug-talking. Thanks ever so. Face Front!


Love,
{ADD YOUR NAME HERE}

Print this out and mail it.
 
 
Jackie Susann
22:30 / 17.08.06
Is anyone else reading Spiderman Loves Mary Jane? I really have no attachment to the characters, but its just a beautifully written and illustrated, sweet superpowered high school soap opera romance story. I picked up the digest yesterday, and today I'm going to collect the more recent singles.
 
 
bio k9
21:04 / 18.08.06
Yeah, I bought that at the behest of my daughter and it's great.
 
  
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