Two things I wanted to say:
1) I wish this video was more than a summary of what happened and the reaction, because I think "One More Day" cuts into a lot of what's wrong with the comics industry. Marvel's collective reaction to the marriage since it's inception has been strange at best, and downright toxic at worst. It's resulted in no less than 3(!!) of the most critically reviled storylines in the character's history (Clone Saga, the Mackie-Byrne run from '99-'00, and One More Day itself), hampered at least two great runs on the character (Paul Jenkins, who had the unfortunate task of cleaning up after Mackie-Byrne, only to get side-swiped a few years later by the runup to One More Day, which ruined J. Michael Strackyzinski's run more directly), and did more long-term damage to the character than just letting the marriage be would have. It's also showed how lazy, possibly emotionally challenged, the editors and most of the writers really are in that they're unable/unwilling to come up with interesting stories based around a married couple (which isn't that hard if you actually get relationships), or at least write a decent story about splitting them up that wasn't convoluted or reeked of editorial gimmickery. Which brings me to...
...2) It's even more telling that when Joe Quesada was asked on Newsarama why, considering his rather public hatred of the marriage, he didn't just simply have a story that ended with Peter and MJ's divorce, he replied, and I quote:
[D]ivorcing them to me sends out completely the wrong message. Imagine you?re a mom and you?re buying little Bobby or little Betty Spidey Adventures or maybe Spidey Loves MJ and you?re watching the news one day and the broadcaster looks right at you and says, ?Spider-Man is getting divorced, more on that after these messages.? Let?s just say that as a parent, I?d be upset by the sound bite, I could only imagine how the rest of the world would feel?.
And also said to CBR:
Sure, divorce is a reality of life, but Peter Parker and Spider-Man are not the types of characters that would do that. Spider-Man is a worldwide icon and is considered one of the good guys, like Superman.
So, let me get this straight, Mr. Quesada: having two adults who may have loved each other at one point, but don't anymore for whatever reason do the responsible thing and end a relationship 'sends the wrong message,' and imply that only 'bad guys' get divorces, but having them make a deal with the Devil is perfectly fine!? Speaking as the son of a woman who has twice divorced, I find this mindset way more offensive than two fictional characters getting a divorce (and I'm agnostic, what do you think fundamentalist Christians would think of this?). In fact, since the Spider-Man comics, to say nothing of Marvel in general, have a history of tackling drugs, politics, racism, the plight of the poor and so many other tough subjects, a divorce would have fit in pretty well with the kind of stories that Marvel used to do well. Marvel editorial's decision to not go there shows them for the toothless hacks they really are.
PedroSteckecilo said:
Personally I blame Civil War, but then again it and House of M pretty much undid all the comics I'd been reading since I started reading comics again (around 2000, 2001) so all these retcons were a big "Fuck You" to the stories I'd been reading for 5 years, you know THE STORIES I WAS READING WHEN I EFFECTIVELY STARTED READING COMICS, hence I cried "well fuck this" and stopped reading comics.
Good on you Marvel
I'm sorry you gave up on comics. I got back into comics because of Marvel's output from 2000-2005, and felt the same frustration in the years since. I just instead switched to more indie books (like
Chew, easily the best comic I've read in a long time), so there are options if you ever want to get back into the medium.
