The Big Picture: The Devil & Mr. Parker

Scyla

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Jul 26, 2010
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Sooooooooooooooo the marvel devil is kinda stupid? ^_^

Awesome work Bob. Just stumbled over your new show and I like it.
 

likalaruku

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I have my own theory on why comics struggle to sell: They require actual reading.

Sounds like Linkara's rant on the Mary Jane marriage kabosh; the comic writers thought readers wouldn't be able to relate to a married hero. He had to be single & mingle because commitment is boring & unsexy.

Dunno about Marvel, but with DC, I expect massive retcons every 10 years. It doesn't all have to happen at once or even in the same series. Jason Todd is back, the Joker is sane, etc.
 

Technicka

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Ultratwinkie said:
CynicalMarcus said:
You're going to sit there and tell me that it's a smart idea to take a character that has had constant development throughout his entire stint as a comic character out of a situation that will continue to develop him is a SMART IDEA? Because you're a fat virgin who has never been in a relationship, and thus has a skewed idea of it?

Bob Chipman is an imbecile.
right because spiderman fighting criminals is much more boring than spiderman talking with his wife. i forgot this was TMZ, and not the spiderman comic. /sarcasm.

"its SPIDERMAN! FIGHTING CRIME!"

not

"its SPIDERMAN! FIGHTING WITH HIS WIFE!"

no one cares about relationships. they want superheroes and read comics. If they want fake relationships they would watch reality shows.
And you obviously never read the comics when he was married compared to the comics now that he's single. He has more girl drama, and personal crisis now that he's back to being the super cool bachelor he never was.

Their relationship ended up working out well because writers gave MJ a personality outside of "Hi. I'm Spider-Man's woman!" She did her own thing and wasn't always getting kidnapped, or sneaking her way into danger (looking at you, Lois Lane). Parker had just as many adventures married, that he did single -or otherwise. The difference? He had his own place, and didn't have to make BS excuses as to why he couldn't go out to dinner. Now he's just a freeloading douchebag.
 

Johann Goethe

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Nov 28, 2009
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Ultratwinkie said:
right because spiderman fighting criminals is much more boring than spiderman talking with his wife. i forgot this was TMZ, and not the spiderman comic. /sarcasm.

"its SPIDERMAN! FIGHTING CRIME!"

not

"its SPIDERMAN! FIGHTING WITH HIS WIFE!"

no one cares about relationships. they want superheroes and read comics. If they want fake relationships they would watch reality shows.
Yeah, man! Love is for losers! It's not like you can get meaningful character development out of relationships, and the trials and tribulations that come with them! Comics should just be wall-to-wall fighting with none of that girly "plot" or "characters" slowing it down!
 

powergamer101

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Nov 9, 2009
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We forget so easily that what also came with that deal is that Spidey is back to his web-bands as opposed to his naturally made webbing. Not only this, but we probably have to discount the extra strength (literally) that Spiderman had obtained during his marriage with MJ, so he's actually "powered-down" in physical strength. Spiderman was never meant to be the strongest superhero, but it really hurts to see my favorite superhero drop in strength when everyone else is just getting further ahead.
 

MovieBob

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Phantom64 said:
Joe Quesada just needs to fucking die.

I liked Peter and MJ married, it added some maturity to him. But according to Marvel a man with a healthy marriage isn't relatable to kids so they decided to do a major asspull and make him a 30something bachelour who's still shacking up with several minor characters. Hey Quesada, why don't you listen to the fans when they say SPIDER-MAN.IS.NOT.FUCKING.BATMAN.

He is a Goddamn role model and what are you telling the readers with this bullshit? "marrigage is bad, be single and have many half-assed relationships!" or "Screw accepting death, make a deal with the fucking devil to bring them back to life!"

Quesada needs to go if Marvel hopes to get ANY credibility back in its name.
Eh... I dunno.

The thing is, I think the elephant in the room is that for all the effort that's gone into making them "deeper," a lot of these comic characters aren't actually "complex" in the sense that they can survive a lot of "bending." SOME of them can - Superman works as an adult, a teenager or an old man, for example. But most of them can't. Batman (Bruce Wayne version, anyway) more or less NEEDS to be an adult whose already been Batman for awhile to work in the long-term, and to an only-slightly lesser extent he'll eventually NEED a Robin, an Alfred and a Comissioner Gordon.

Looking at the whole existance of the character, broadly, I think Spider-Man is in that 2nd category. His "thing" - skinny guy in brightly-colored full-body tights swinging around in broad daylight (partially) for kicks and doing his stand-up schtick while knocking around muggers - doesn't seem to work all that well outside the "confines" of a charater whose fairly young and not terribly "attached" to very much. It's a visual/textual synchronicity issue: He has no "headquarters," carries all his gear with him, etc - he's the unready-college-kid-backpacking-across-Europe-for-a-semester of superheroes. He doesn't "work" as, say, an old man (they tried, it was awful) unless you change everything else about him, and he doesn't "work" as a guy with a conventional family waiting at home for him (which he'd need a MUCH less superhero-friendly day job to provide for.)

We know why Batman is up on a roof at 2:00am - he's a depressed, possibly-insane self-hating loner and this is how he avoids dealing with it. Why is Spider-Man spending all afternoon swinging around Manhattan waiting to happen-upo that week's adventure when his inexplicable super-model wife is waiting at home? Peter Parker: Middle-aged guy watching Idol with the wife and kids, only ever putting on his uniform and heading out when he happens to hear about a crime on TV? That's just "not" Spider-Man. Peter Parker: Guy who's happily married but for some reason spends 90% of his day apart from his family looking for superhero stuff to do? ALSO not really Spider-Man. This is why you don't make huge changes to a character as a publicity stunt.

What strikes me as ironic is, after all the One More Day nonsense (FWIW, to the extent that you can "get past" OMD I think the Brand New Day stories have averaged-out pretty good, "New Ways to Die" being a high-point) when they finally went and explained "the rest of it" the big "extra reveal" was:
MJ opted-out of a chance for them to stay together even after they erased the world's memory of his identity because she just couldn't "do" the whole thing anymore.

Which would've been the BEST WAY to get them unmarried to begin with. But THAT solution can't be turned into a five-issue "event" to drive up sales and whip the fanboy press into a news-friendly coniption fit so... obviously couldn't do it ;)
 

Johann Goethe

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Ultratwinkie said:
well fake love is. if you're going to be adult do it for spiderman's sake. Don't try to put in utter "i love you" tripe to try to draw in the "mature" crowd. maturity for maturity sake does not stand. relationships =/= maturity. Even douchey 12 year old XBL players have girlfriends but are they mature? meaningful character development? Next you're gonna say Leisure Suit Larry is the most developed and mature character than all of the main characters in the gaming industry.

You don't need relationships in order to have meaningful character development. Hell in some cases relationships stop character development.
Leisure Suit Larry? Really? You're going to use that amoral waste of time as an argument for your point? The whole point of the series is to move your unlikeable prick of a character into a conga line of one-night stands. Those are definitely not long-term, romantic relationships, and strong characters was definitely not the purpose for what is, essentially, an interactive wankathon.

Romance was a recurring element in Spider-Man going back to the 60's anyway, and the wedding itself provided character development. Mary Jane was flighty and insecure, afraid of staying in relationships too long for fear of showing her true self. Peter was scared of putting trust in anyone for fear of his enemies hurting them (hell, he even has nightmares about this on the eve of his wedding) and needed someone who would stand by him. A spouse fitted them both pretty well.

You can get character development out of a divorce. But having one of your most moral-driven superheroes toss away a relationship just to save the life of a woman who didn't want to be saved is not the best way of going about it.
 

goliath6711

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I guess I should throw my two cents in.

I only read the last part of One More Day, but it encapsulated everything that turned me off to the Spider-man comics. They erased the marriage. It didn't matter how they did it, they got rid of the one person that actually made for an interesting dynamic. Regardless of what uninformed loners think about Mary Jane, she was loyal to Peter to the end. After all the crap that they've been through, she could have (and temporarily did) leave him. But she always came back because they knew that despite their differences and whatever was thrown at them, they would always be there to support each other. It's really very inspiring to see such a truly devoted couple. So let's just erase all of that. Pile on the fact that the reason this is occurring to save Aunt May, who just told Peter that she is ready to move on, and it makes the whole "Deal with the Devil" thing seem like an afterthought.


malestrithe said:
I do not hate One More Day for existing. It was a massive retcon that probably was long overdue. I do not have the serious case of nostalgia goggles.

All it did was reaffirm one thing that I've always suspected about Spiderman. He can give lessons about being emo to even the most harcore goth out there. He was happily married for 20 years, but he still managed to find something wrong with that. He has done great good in his life, but he focuses on the tragic events of his life more often than the good. He chose his almost 100 year old aunt over his marriage. Those actions are the definition of emo.

Then again, knowing internet fans, if Aunt May did die, there would be an equally mountainous amount of letters and complaints telling the writers, how dare they mess with our fanboy nostalgia.
The sad thing is I believe that to be absolutely true. However they would be much easier to brush off by saying, "Look at her. How long did you really expect her to go on?"

What if whoever is in charge of DC Comics decided, "You know what? Superman was a way better comic when he wasn't married to Lois Lane. So let's revert her back to the idiot that had no idea that the guy she had been working side by side with for years and the superhero she was in love with might actually be the same person." Would you be able to take that seriously?
 

Negatempest

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Wait a second here. Disregard the many attempted plans to be rid of the marriage, the deal with a devil, and the whole reboot thing. Did Marvel really drop the chance of making Peter Parker a father? Think about it very carefully, we could have seen a well respected comic book hero not only become (possibly) a doting father, but one who understands the heavy responsibilities of parenthood? I am already imagining spider-man trying to stop a bank robbery and on his way back he forgets about buying baby formula. I am seeing mature arguments between MJ and Peter over salaries, bills and spending money while trying to keep their child safe and well fed. The complex possibilities that could have pushed the image of Spider-man far beyond its' current form. All dashed because someone wants to keep Spider-man in the past? For shame.
 

The Deadpool

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What bothers me is the logic that the BND Peter Parker, the down on his luck, having girl issues while being hounded by a dozen impossibly hot women, is more relatable... It's just wish fulfillment crap and I, for one, can't stand it...
 

NKnight

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Jul 31, 2010
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lol comic book writers should get some tips from mangá ones. They might teach them a thing or two about writing compeling stories... well, most of them at least.
 

DAJ_

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Apr 4, 2010
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Wow, an instance where the "It was all a dream" cop out would actually be the more acceptable scenario...
 

Gindil

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1) I hate Joe Quesada. PERIOD
2) Not going to go through 40-50 years of backstory to understand characters
3) None of the adventures of Spiderman, Xmen, Wolverine, or Marvel or DC have ended

4) The above reasons are why I prefer manga. There's a beginning, middle, and end.
 

SamElliot'sMustache

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MovieBob said:
Why is Spider-Man spending all afternoon swinging around Manhattan waiting to happen-upo that week's adventure when his inexplicable super-model wife is waiting at home?
Uh, does the phrase "with great power comes great responsibility" ring a bell? The whole core theme that's run through the Spider-Man comics since...ever (the idea that if you have the ability to do good, you should be able to)? The entire history of the book, before Quesada came along with his Mid-Life Crisis on Infinite Earths, has been about Peter Parker growing up, and how life got more and more complicated for him as he went. Maybe he hasn't been growing up fast, but he had been growing up, so it kind of made sense for him to get married eventually, and even get a more regular job (he got a staff job at the Bugle, then became a part-time teacher). If anything, I'd say Spider-Man is a character that has a great deal of narrative flexibility.