Animal House.

After reading the first issue of Big Time, I might have to become a regular Spidey reader again. I haven't been a collect-every-issue guy in regards to Spidey since the late 80s, but I've got a good feeling about this one.

It seemed pretty apparent that Dan Slott has always wanted to write Spider-Man. When I think back on the various series he has done for Marvel that made me a fan, there have always been significant Spider-Man appearances.

In She-Hulk, She-Hulk helped Spider-Man sue J. Jonah Jameson. The love for the character and his history were apparent and it was obvious from that one story that Slott was born to write Spider-Man.

In The Thing, there was a great team-up between the two in which Spidey and the Thing took on the Trapster and Sandman at a construction site for a Yancy Street community center.

In the Initiative, Slott created a deft obfuscation of the Peter Parker identity reveal that could easily have returned Parker's secret identity status quo without resorting to the use of Mephisto's powers.

He's been building up to this for years and his work during the BND phase of Spider-Man's career made his aptitude even more obvious. He's earned my interest.

Also: Humberto Ramos and Marcos Martin are stellar artists, so we got that going for us as well.

So I picked up the new Spider-Man book and let me tell you, It's a lot of FUN. I am going to be picking it up regularly now. The art work seems to fit the story well. I highly recommend this book to any spidey fan.

Sweet! Now I don't have to give you your money back!

Fine. I'll read Slott's work when they return the last 10 years of Spidey. A true excellent writer can take anything and do well with it. Wiping everything clean just to tell a 'the stories we used to read' all over is weak sauce. I only expect that thing in Universal Reboots. Ya, DC. I'm looking at you.

For what it's worth, I think Slott's Spidey stories are not only the best of the last 10 years, but I think they are better than most Spidey stories from the 10-15 years before that.

I think going back to the Mary Jane 90s would be a serious step backwards in quality.

And there is the point. Going back in continuity is a serious step backwards. The character must continue to develop, and move forward to be interesting. While all BND and OMD did was to take spidey and plunge him backwards in his history. They are retelling stories from the 60's, with a modern feel(kinda like the Ultimate Universe), but they want us to think its new and fresh. I don't want the 90's MJ. But, in a few story arcs, you might get her, and its ok, cause they reset it.

I am sure Slott is a great writer, but I would have been happier to see him write his own stories on Spidet-Man, not retell the ones I read when JoeyQ was a kid.

This, though, gets to the ultimate problem for this type of character. People want character growth, but they want the same character to appear over and over again for decades. In reality, these characters would grow out of the kinds of adventures that make us read about them. The marriage to Mary Jane represented exactly that - Spidey getting to a point where he was dangerously close to growing out of being a superhero.

It doesn't take much to argue that the years of him being married to her represented the time when his personal life, outside of his crime-fighting career, was the most boring. I believe arguing in favor of a return to the Mary Jane years is an argument for a more boring Spider-Man comic.

While you can characterize the move away from the marriage as a throwback, a "plunge backwards," I don't. I characterize it as a move towards making Spider-Man a more interesting character and a more interesting comic book. Domestic bliss is a wonderful thing to have in real life, but it's a boring status quo for a superhero comic.

Slott is easily my favourite writer.

I've never seriously collected Spider-man, even though I've always enjoyed the character. Dan Slott on Amazing Spider-man is making me seriously reconsider.

I guess we just enjoy different stories, and thats ok. But, I never saw Pete and MJ have married bliss. There were lots of struggles, lots of problems, lots of oppotunities for good stories. The problems were just of an older nature. I guess the problem is how old do you think Spidey needs to be to be interesting. If you really want to have all the problems back, then he needs to go back to high school, or at least college. My personal favorite time in Spidey's history was when he was with Black Cat, so much so that I actually bought the black cat TPB of AMS. And you know what, the writeres took a big dump on her as well. SO, thanks for returning to a time when they could be together and making her like a moron. I am glad you are enjoying the new book, but you cannot convince me that redoing decades of continuity is a step forward for the character. What are you going to say when MJ is finally thrust back into the story and they get back together(cause you know they will eventually do that).

I think this also proves that the oversaturation of a character also isnt a good thing. 4-5 titles for so many years accelerated the running out of stories that our hero now suffers from.

You are so showing your age, youngin'. Hobgoblin? One of the all-time great Spidey villains?? Not even close.

There were a couple cool stories from the 1980's but nothing that climbs him into the ranks of the Green Goblin, Kraven, Mysterio, Scorpion, Rhino, Ox, Dandy Dan and the third guy who I'm blanking on, etc.



I hear that!!!!



Even longer for me. I bailed right after the whole Iron Spider-thing and him unmasking. Don't even get me started on the whole Civil War debacle.

Nova described it best in his title to Stark when he came to Earth for a visit after defeating Annihilus: [paraphrase] "The whole universe is in peril and you guys are fighting each other?!" [/paraphrase]


Being a non-completionist and a minimalist is great, isn't it?

That 3rd guy would "Montana" or Moe Howard.
Then there was Karl Stragg, who was the 2nd Ox, tho in the same body.

You know, every time I read posts with people complaining about Spidey's reboot, I feel like I can definitely relate because the same thing was done to my favourite character. Unfortunately there doesn't even seem to be any reason why Black Panther's continuity was completely messed up, except for he got a writer who couldn't be bothered with his past continuity, so I can't help but feel that is much worse.

Imagine if Spidey's origin was changed so that:

- Aunt May died instead of Uncle Ben
- He has a little sister instead of being an only child. That sister later takes on the Spider-Girl mantle.
- 'The Mugger' is given super-powers.
- He marries Ms. Marvel instead of Mary Jane.

Because that's what they've done to my beloved Black Panther. I don't think it's even possible for it to be fixed. At least Mephisto's magic can theoretically be undone one day.

The original Hobby is considered a classic, albeit in a rip-off sort of way. And I'm not young. Mind you, I'm not old either, so shut-up.



BTW - Ox, Dan and Montana are all pretty lame for Spidey. They're more into Daredevil.