House to Astonish Episode 134
Paul and I are back after a slightly unusually long break, with a massive run-through of the All-New All-Different Marvel books, the announcements out of Image Expo, DC’s Convergence tie-in launches, Vertigo’s new slate, IDW’s surprising licensed launches and the return of Tokypop. We’ve also got reviews of Archie, The Spire and Dungeon Fun, and the Official Handbook of the Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe is lovely jubbly. All this plus Little Nico in Slumberland, Belfast’s most bangin’ DJ and the gentle caress of a brick to the face.
The podcast is here, or here on Mixcloud, or available via the embedded player below. Let us know what you think, in the comments below, on Twitter, via email or on our Facebook fan page. Don’t forget that you can also deck yourself out in one of our natty t-shirts by visiting our Redbubble store and, like, buying one. They’re all the rage in Paris, I expect.
And they basically *did* the story where Doc Ock drove Mary Jane away early in the Superior Spider-Man run. On the one hand, in that particular case, I can see where Peter being married at the time would have created bigger problems in that it would have made Otto seem like even a bigger jerk, whether he stayed married to MJ and kept deceiving her, or broke up the marriage. On the other hand, this is a story that started when a supervillain murdered a man and stole his life, so the jerk part was pretty well established already.
“I’ve yet to hear anyone make a good argument for why the marriage was bad for the character”
I don’t think it was “bad”, per se. After all, a whole generation of readers grew up on a married Spider-Man and it irked me whenever Joe Q or someone else would bring up “relatability” as being the problem. I grew up in the ’70s and ’80s. As a kid, I couldn’t directly relate to Peter’s college/dating woes. It didn’t matter. You can still have empathy for someone even if you can’t relate to their circumstances.
But the marriage set-up *was* creatively limiting. Not because married couples can’t make for interesting fiction, but because with Spider-Man, there are too many marriage-related story paths that you just can’t travel down that you can with other married couples in other realms of fiction. You can’t do infidelity. You can’t do domestic violence. And because Marvel/Disney, in the interest of keeping Peter eternally youthful, don’t want the character to be labelled as “divorcee”, “widower”, or even “parent”, you can’t even reasonably threaten/tease any of these and the marriage itself can never be on the line.
What do you do with that? Come to think of it, what *did* they do with it? Can anybody here identify any story written during the Peter/MJ married years that: a) absolutely relied on Peter Parker being married (something that couldn’t have worked if MJ were simply his girlfriend, and b) is widely-regarded as one of the greatest Spider-Man stories of all-time?
But why would Spidey *need* to do stories about infidelity, domestic violence, or parenting? The core of the character is that he’s a young hero trying to balance the responsibility of being a superhero with the responsibilities of, well, being a real person. You could already to stories about him trying to balance dating MJ with stopping the Green Goblin. Does it really make a difference if stopping a bank robbery makes him miss his anniversary instead?
@Taibak – I certainly wasn’t suggesting that Marvel *should* have done domestic abuse or infidelity stories with a married Spider-Man.
My point was that if traditional avenues of storytelling when it comes to married couples in dramatic fiction are closed off to Peter Parker, then what’s the point in even going there? There’s only two settings: marital bliss (not dramatic) or maritial difficulties (that cannot lead to anything but Peter and MJ inevitably making up). There’s nothing to work with. So why put him there?
You asked what difference it makes? He can break up with a girlfriend or a girlfriend can break up with him. In a dating situation, the relationship can legitimately be at stake. In a marriage situation, it can’t. It’s the difference between genuine dramatic tension and none whatsoever. Pretty big difference.
Another problem with aging him too much is it changes the wisecracking aspect of the character. It’s fun to have a teen buck authority, but when grown man does it he looks like he’s trapped in his adolescence. It’s fine for Deadpool, because he’s crazy. Peter Parker, on the other hand, can come off a stunted. Witch is fine, if that’s what your going for in a tv show like Psych, but doesn’t really serve a character like Spider-Man.
Oh, auto correct…. you complete me…
“What do you do with that? Come to think of it, what *did* they do with it? Can anybody here identify any story written during the Peter/MJ married years that: a) absolutely relied on Peter Parker being married (something that couldn’t have worked if MJ were simply his girlfriend, and b) is widely-regarded as one of the greatest Spider-Man stories of all-time?”
Was Peter married during Kraven’s Last Hunt? If so, I suppose that meets b) and maybe a).
That said, I’ve never actually seen anybody say why they liked married-Spidey. People seem to want the marriage back, but never seem to provide a compelling reason why. Most of what I remember was bimbo-MJ (drawn by Larsen) angsting at home alone, taking up smoking, getting kidnapped by Venom, finding emotional support from a fellow actor, etc. It was soap opera stuff that was bad even by comic book standards.
Yes, OMD was stupid and terrible, but it was 4 issues of ripping off the band-aid, followed by years of (IMHO) the best Spidey stories since the 80s. One more terrible Spidey story was worth it to get the fun stuff that’s come since.
“My point was that if traditional avenues of storytelling when it comes to married couples in dramatic fiction are closed off to Peter Parker, then what’s the point in even going there?”
It’s a very simple point – it makes sense for the character. Peter loves MJ, so he marries her.
If MJ not legitimately being at risk is because they wouldn’t want Peter as a widower, then that’s Marvel’s fault for making it known how desperate they are to keep Peter young. And…Gwen died (so did MJ, for a short while).
He can break up with a girlfriend? He can separate from his wife (and did, didn’t he?).
Which of the recent years’ stories couldn’t have been done with the marriage, with some minor alterations?
Again, I find it easy to dismiss the ‘problems’ of a married Peter. And the main reason I argue for the marriage is simply that he got married, and it made sense, where undoing it didn’t. Whereas it seems to me like you really have to work to make a case against the marriage.
“It’s a very simple point – it makes sense for the character. Peter loves MJ, so he marries her.”
No argument there. That is a very simple point. It blithely ignores the fact that Peter Parker is not just a character. He’s a valuable piece of intellectual property created before most of us here (I assume) were born, and is meant to outlive us all in ongoing, dramatic, serialized form. There’s publishing strategy to consider and “His getting marrmade sense” doesn’t even acknowlege that there’s a publishing strategy at all.
So, keeping in mind that Peter isn’t a real guy and keeping in mind that Spider-Man is an ongoing serial about power and responsibility and the burden that comes with being compelled to wield great responsibly, and keeping in mind that resultingly, Peter’s compulsion to use his powers responsibly should always inevitably work to his own personal detriment because that is both the formula and the *point*, and keeping in mind that Peter’s previous marriage to Mary Jane, besides blocking off an endless stream of romantic subplot possibilities also undermined the traditional and proven formula by positioning Peter in a cushy (in a fan wish-fulfillment dreamwife-fantasy sort of way) but creatively desolate status quo where, no matter how shitty his day was, Peter always got to go home to his fantastic, gorgeous, understanding model wife who shared his burden with him thereby largely eliminating the whole “Poor Peter! His personal life is an absolute trainwreck, but by God, it’s entertaining and I can’t look away!” aspect that served the character and his fans perfectly well for the twenty-some-odd years preceding the marriage…. keeping all of this in mind, finish the following sentence:
“In the interest of keeping the character of Peter Parker/Spider-Man as youthful, vital and entertaining as can be for decades to come and in the interest of providing his writers with the most creatively fertile ground that they can work with, I feel the most optimal presentation of the character is for him to be eternally locked in marriage because…?”
And no, “it makes sense” will not do, because it really doesn’t.
“That said, I’ve never actually seen anybody say why they liked married-Spidey”
I can’t say how “compelling” it’ll be for you, but, simply put, I liked the way the characters played off of each other when handled properly. The interactions with MJ, who knew what Peter was off doing, were more interesting to me than the “she’s pissed, but how can I tell her that I missed her birthday because I was off fighting Doctor Octopus?” stuff. (Nothing wrong with the latter – that was fun, too – but I simply preferred the former.)
I also liked how it reinforced the notion of Spider-Man as a “realistic” super-hero. When I first started reading the books, Marvel Tales was reprinting the Lee/Ditko issues, which made for a nice contrast with what Roger Stern and Bill Mantlo were doing in the present day books. Here he’s in high school pining over Betty; there he’s in college wondering how he’ll cover the Black Cat’s hospital bills and has settled into a nice friendship with Betty. So, to my mind, Peter was an ever evolving character. I was all for seeing that continue. (Very disappointing to me when they killed off Baby May…)
Liked the Spider-Man aspects of BND (and it was so nice to see subplots back again), but the Peter Parker stuff did nothing for me. Frankly, as often as not, I think the BND stories would have been better had MJ still been in the picture.
And yes, Kraven’s Last Hunt was right after the marriage. But to be fair to the married Spider-Man fans, how many of the “greatest Spider-Man stories” absolutely needed him to be single? The origin story, sure, but something like Nothing Can Stop the Juggernaut would have worked just as well either way.
(Although I hate coming across as an absolutist about it. Part of the appeal of Spider-Man as a married character is the 26 years worth of stories beforehand with him as a single one. Wouldn’t want to lose either period.)
“In the interest of keeping the character of Peter Parker/Spider-Man as youthful, vital and entertaining as can be for decades to come and in the interest of providing his writers with the most creatively fertile ground that they can work with, I feel the most optimal presentation of the character is for him to be eternally locked in marriage because Mary Jane is by far the most popular love interest the character has ever had; teenagers hitting puberty get to have someone to ogle; her presence allows for creative synergy with the Sam Raimi movie trilogy which made billions and served as the first exposure to the character for many (and the 90s cartoon, which was also a key entry point); unmarried super-heroes are a dime a dozen and the “Peter Parker” model has been aped to death, so having him married serves to keep him out of the herd; the youngest readers don’t really care about the Peter Parker stuff anyway and just want to get to the fun (i.e. superhero) parts; the relationship widens the number relatable aspects and lets us speak to everyone from young kids to old married guys; and we can always do an “Ultimate Spider-Man” or “Spidey” comic and thus have our cake and eat it, too.”
“… the youngest readers don’t really care about the Peter Parker stuff anyway…”
They don’t? I did. I was seven when I started reading Spider-Man. He’d just lost Gwen Stacy. I remember feeling sad for him.
“…the relationship widens the number relatable aspects and lets us speak to everyone from young kids…”
The young kids who don’t care about the Peter Parker stuff according to you? Those young kids?
It makes sense that he’s retire and move to Florida at some point too. It doesn’t make it a viable direction for a franchise character who has to carry on in perpetuity.
Anyway…. Ant Man is pretty good.
I think what gets the youngest butts into the seats is Spider-Man, not Peter Parker. You can enjoy or not enjoy the Peter Parker stuff on its merits, but in many ways it’s just filling pages until you get to the fun stuff (never saw kids reading Spider-Man comics and going off to pretend to pay their landlady…). It’s as you get older that you start relating to the Peter Parker elements, too. That’s the whole thing about an “all ages title.” You can come in to the same story at different points in your life and see different merits in it.
“It makes sense that he’s retire and move to Florida at some point too. It doesn’t make it a viable direction for a franchise character who has to carry on in perpetuity”
Hardly the same thing. Married Spider-Man was still Spider-Man (and carried four monthlies for quite some time – for a non-viable direction they sure managed to find SOMETHING to work with!). Retired Spider-Man isn’t exactly doing much of anything.
Sorry, not planning on seeing Ant Man until tomorrow…
“Retired Spider-Man isn’t exactly doing much of anything.”
You only think that because you never visit. You don’t call. Kids today.
“I think what gets the youngest butts into the seats is Spider-Man, not Peter Parker.”
Agreed.
“You can enjoy or not enjoy the Peter Parker stuff on its merits, but in many ways it’s just filling pages until you get to the fun stuff”
Sure. It’s like the parts of a porno that most people skip over (Although, admittedly I don’t. I need the build-up.)
“It’s as you get older that you start relating to the Peter Parker elements, too. That’s the whole thing about an “all ages title.” You can come in to the same story at different points in your life and see different merits in it.”
How does any of this mean he’s better off being married? Because what you’re saying is true of Spider-Man stories whether he’s married or not. The whole Gwen Stacy relationship read differently to me as an adult than it did when I read it as a child (she was already dead, but the back issues were cheap then).
And quite how you’ve arrived at the conclusion that his being married somehow widens his relatability as opposed to narrowing it is beyond me. *Everyone* can relate to being single. I’m married now but that doesn’t mean I can no longer relate to a single Peter Parker. I still remember being single. How could I possibly forget the last time I was happy?
I don’t need Peter Parker to walk the same paths of life along with me. I just need him to entertain me.
“(Although, admittedly I don’t. I need the build-up.)”
Yeah, same here.
“How does any of this mean he’s better off being married?”
Acknowledging up front that this is all water under the bridge because the damage was done years ago and whatever will be will be…
I think the optimal presentation for the character is one that reinforces the illusion he’s a character/person and not “a valuable piece of intellectual property.” So the “deciding vote” that he was better off being married (at the time of the split – not saying he should have been created that way) is that he was married. If you want to argue that he never should have been in the first place, fine, but personally I think they were starting to run out of variations for splitting him up and types of girls for him to be with.
They’d done Spider-Man driving a girl away from Peter Parker, Peter Parker driving a girl away from Spider-Man, dead girlfriend, false starts, love triangles, etc. And getting the audience to connect with a new love interest is no easy task – Peter and MJ seemed far more enamored with Carlie Cooper than most fans I’ve seen. Which eventually leads to cycling through the same characters which means you need to come with increasingly artificial contrivances for splitting them up “because that’s how things should be” and we’re at Spider-Man being a “valuable piece of intellectual property”.
“And quite how you’ve arrived at the conclusion that his being married somehow widens his relatability as opposed to narrowing it is beyond me.”
Because the more universal aspects are still intact – the feeling of being pulled in different directions, always feeling like you’re not doing enough for those you love, trying to do the right thing and it not quite working out, doing what’s right vs. what you want to do, etc. Spider-Man’s always been a weird combination of “wow, glad my day wasn’t as bad as his” and wish fulfillment (marriage aside, he still had plenty of chances to sleep with MJ + steaming up the roofs with the Black Cat – and, of course, the whole Spider-Man thing) anyway. So some stuff you relate to because that’s how things are and some stuff you relate to because that’s how you hope things will be one day.
“I don’t need Peter Parker to walk the same paths of life along with me. I just need him to entertain me.”
Sure. The problem I have is the going in position that he’s inherently less entertaining married. There are stories that are or would have been enhanced by him being single. There are stories that are or would have been enhanced by him being married. And in most cases it doesn’t really make a difference. Although I hate playing that game. I’m not arguing that Peter should have been created married, married off sooner or anything like that. I’m just trying to say they weren’t wrong to make the creative decisions they made when they made them. Until they started trying to “fix him” with clone swaps, undead Aunts and arch-enemies, and the like. YMMV, of course.
What if the problem wasn’t the marriage – what if the problem was making MJ a supermodel? Maybe Sam Raimi got it right by keeping her as a struggling actress.
@Taibak – Well, her being a supermodel didn’t exactly help matters, but ultimately it’s just Peter being locked into any relationship that I and I think most other marriage-detractors had the problem with.
And I liked Raimi’s MJ but my attitude towards films are different anyway. When you’re dealing with actors who age in real time, it’s probably better for the films if personal lives progress along naturally until it’s time to reboot with younger actors.
@Dave Phelps – Okay, firstly could you clear something up for me, Dave? I see posts in this thread by “Dave” and by “Dave Phelps.” Are you the same guy? Because it always irritates me whenever I don’t know how many Daves I’m dealing with.
Moving on…
“If you want to argue that he never should have been in the first place, fine, but personally I think they were starting to run out of variations for splitting him up and types of girls for him to be with.”
Hmm. I can’t tell if you’re trying to assert that this was a reason they married him off. In any event, it wasn’t. Stan Lee wanted to marry Peter and MJ in his (godawful) newspaper strip where they had been an established couple for years. Shooter decided the comic and the strip should coordinate the event– despite the fact that MJ had just barely returned to Peter’s life in the comic and wasn’t exactly keen on him being Spider-Man.
Now, I can’t quite vouch for the accuracy of the details because Shooter has a tendancy to, flat out lie in interviews and I must have heard about six different versions of his own version of these events (including one where he was against it).
Whatever. Anyway I was a regular reader at the time and boy did it come out of left field. DeFalco got booted. Michelinie came in after DeFalco and suddenly MJ has a complete attitude shift towards Peter’s alter-ego.
It was all really organic. And by that, I mean the opposite of organic.
Anyway, nobody involved ever cited “lack of ideas for dating subplots” as a reason to marry Peter off. And if a writer is actually struggling with that then god help him when faced with “What should Peter and MJ bicker about now?”
I’ll have to come back to your other points later. My wife just noticed me relaxing.
“creatively desolate status quo where, no matter how shitty his day was, Peter always got to go home to his fantastic, gorgeous, understanding model wife who shared his burden with him”
The word “wife” isn’t the issue there. Replace it with “girlfriend” and you have almost the same situation.
Woe is Peter, his life is terrible. He’s dating a fantastic, gorgeous, understanding model. No matter how he screws up, she ultimately stands by him.
For that, the problem wasn’t the marriage, it was Mary Jane.
Not that writers wouldn’t have eventually probably have put any other long-running romantic interest into a similar situation. Comic book writers honestly aren’t that imaginative at times. Keep any female character around long enough, and the artists will eventually turn her into a supermodel. The writer keeping the character around for years means that they pretty much have to end up being understanding and forgiving. (The alternative is the hero grovels and begs to maintain a non-working relationship with an unforgiving non-understanding partner, which is no story improvement.)
Not that a revolving door for love interests would be much better, when covering decades of storytelling.
“@Dave Phelps – Okay, firstly could you clear something up for me, Dave? I see posts in this thread by “Dave” and by “Dave Phelps.” Are you the same guy? Because it always irritates me whenever I don’t know how many Daves I’m dealing with.”
“Dave” is a different guy. I gave up on fake and abridged names for message board posts back in the late 90s.
“Hmm. I can’t tell if you’re trying to assert that this was a reason they married him off.”
No. I know the official tale and whatever the true reasons are, it boils down to someone thought it was a good idea at the time. Just saying why I didn’t think it was such a bad idea as others.
“despite the fact that MJ had just barely returned to Peter’s life in the comic”
“Just barely?” She’d been back just over four years (returned in #242, proposal in #290) by that point. She revealed she knew his secret id in #257, told him all about her life in #259, asked him to tell her about his life in #275, pretty much settled into the confidant role and they were closer than ever. (And in #284 (give or take an issue) Peter found himself wondering if MJ ever spent time at her own place so clearly there were frequent interactions in between. Just don’t have time (or inclination) to count her appearances.) There were definite romantic inklings in there as well, although MJ wasn’t sure about the whole Spider-Man thing. She understood it, but wasn’t sure if she could handle it. That’s what the whole story in #290-292 was about. (With the annual there to resolve last minute doubts from both parties.)
#290 accelerated the process, but both DeFalco and Frenz have said that they were positioning the two for a romance that would lead them to the altar by #300. In their version something would have happened (MJ’s sister having a crisis of some sort, IIRC) and MJ would have jilted him, true, but the point is that the two were being set up for romance and the wedding wasn’t quite out of left field as some detractors might portray it. Quick, sure, but if you look at most super-hero weddings, that’s almost par for the course (see Bruce Banner, Hawkeye, Aquaman, Elasti-Girl from the Doom Patrol, etc.).
“Just saying why I didn’t think it was such a bad idea as others.”
No, what you said was…
“I think they were starting to run out of variations for splitting him up and types of girls for him to be with.”
Firstly, assuming you’re not a writer, then new ideas you can’t conceive of yourself is by no means an indication that the well we’re talking about is dry. You’re not Grant Morrison. Now, if Grant Morrison were to say, “Hey, there’s no more new ideas in here!” then I’d be inclined to believe him. Or possibly I’d ask him to take some drugs and then get back to me in a few hours.
Secondly, that was never cited as being an issue by anyone involved at the time and I’ve never heard of any Spider-Man writer citing this as being a creative hurdle at any point throughout Spider-Man’s existence. Conversely, I’ve seen a lot of writers point out how they felt the marriage status quo was creatively restrictive and just a bad idea all around. Writers. People with experience at this sort of thing.
Jerry Ray was dead on with his post about how the pro-marriage camp love to point to the quality of OMD as evidence that the marriage should never have been tampered with. Yeah, it was a crummy story, but it’s a story that’s several years over and it succeeded in what it was intended to do. Who cares if it sucked? Burning my house to the ground and then rebuilding it from scratch might be a monumentally stupid means of ridding my home of termites, but hey, the termites are gone at least. No point in dwelling on the methodology by this point.
Besides which, even if OMD were remotely good, the pro-marriage camp would have hated it *anyway* because of the end result. Right?
Anyway, I’m getting a bit bored of this. I can also see why you say you’ve never read a good case against the marriage. Plenty of people including professional writers have articulated their own indictments of the marriage set-up much more succinctly and eloquently than I have here. If those don’t move you then plainly you will not be moved.
“No, what you said was…”
Yes, in order to explain why I personally didn’t think the marriage was such a bad idea. If my phrasing made you think I was attempting to assign motives to those who did the job, it wasn’t my intention.
“If those don’t move you then plainly you will not be moved.”
It’s not that I “will not” be moved. I’d LOVE to be moved. I miss my 2-3 times monthly Spider-Man fix.
But creatively, I’m just not seeing the wonderment I’d been denied by the marriage (for one reason or another I own and have read everything from #546 up until the end of Superior Spider-Man). In fact, rather than feeling like a vital intangible element has (finally) been restored, I feel like one has been removed.
Beyond that, there’s no real empirical evidence to support the notion that the marriage was inherently a bad idea. Readers didn’t leave in droves when it happened and didn’t return in droves when it was undone. (“Movies and cartoons don’t do it” doesn’t work for me as an argument because I DO agree high school age single Peter is the ideal starting point and the cartoons and movies never last long enough to reach the point where marriage would fit.)
So all I have left to work with are arguments based on the personal preferences of others, which so far haven’t proven compelling enough to convince me that so many stories I enjoyed reading over the years should have never been published (at least not in the form they were) in the first place.
So, anyway, nice “talking” to you.
“So all I have left to work with are arguments based on the personal preferences of others…”
No, Dave. My position has nothing to do with my personal preference. Unlike you, I’m coming at this objectively, with a view to what I legitimately feel is best for a character that needs to hover around a certain point in his life indefinitely.
Your position is based purely on your own personal preferences, and it shows. A lot of rationalizations and lamentation over the fact
that your era of married Spidey is over, and how the book just isn’t doing it for you anymore, and how you wish they went through with Baby May, and me, me, me, me, my Spider-Man! MINE! GIVE HIM BACK TO MEEEEEEEE!!
Hell, I got “my” Spider-Man back and do you know what? Too late. Don’t care. Not interested anymore. Good idea, but nahhh. Not coming back. Haven’t even read OMD (just heard it was crap) and i haven’t read a single post-OMD comic. I can’t even remember what the last Spider-Man comic I read was. I think it might have been the 9/11 tribute issue I picked up out of curiousity. Christ. That was a long time ago.
My personal preference? If I could have Spider-Man my way? If I was his only reader? He would age. His story would have a beginning, middle and an end. That’s what I would want if I were actually still reading a Spider-Man series and could dictate the general approach.
And believe it or not, that could even include a marriage (though it wouldn’t necessarily need to). At least on my terms, the marriage could conceivably end in divorce or the death of the wife. Just another domino Peter manages to set-up that could potentially get knocked down. At least a writer could generate genuine dramatic tension out of a marital spat with me having no idea what the consequences could be, if any. She could leave him for all I’d know.
That would be my ideal. A “Life of Spider-Man” type of series spanning his entire career. That’s the only type of Spider-Man series that I would be remotely interested in reading these days.
“Remotely” being the key word. As much as this would be my ideal, I had my fill of Spider-Man quite some time ago. This would have to be a really good read.
However, my not giving a shit what they do with Spider-Man in the present because I’m no longer invested means I can look at what they do from a detached standpoint and say “Good decision” or “Bad decision” based on what I believe will work for *them* (Marvel). I’m not looking at it through the eyes of some still-demoralized reader who really needs to just get over it.
We can’t blame Jamie for this one!
“My position has nothing to do with my personal preference. Unlike you, I’m coming at this objectively, with a view to what I legitimately feel is best for a character that needs to hover around a certain point in his life indefinitely”
Hey, I’m as objective as the next guy. I’ll admit some whining snuck in here and there, but if I was seeing high sales, universal acclaim, etc. for the new/old direction then hey, my point of view is objectively wrong, so be it. If someone could show me how Spider-Man as a series requires Peter to be able to bang someone new every few years to stay creatively vital rather than taking it as a given and proclaiming that I and those who share my point of view are whiny self-entitled idiots who refuse to accept what is best for the character for feeling otherwise, then great.
But I legitimately feel what is best for the character is that he DOESN’T “hover around a certain point in his life indefinitely.” From what I can see, the character’s success wasn’t based on him being a high school kid. It’s that he started as a high school kid and moved on and developed from there (albeit really slowly after the first year or three).
Peter’s “state of grace” (i.e. the key that keeps a series going indefinitely) is built upon him being pulled in multiple directions simultaneously, maintaining a foothold in mundane concerns (bills, laundry, etc.), the ongoing conflict over what he wants to do vs. what he feels he has to do, having honest to god ups and downs, etc. Maintaining that framework gives you a ton of wiggle room. No sense in imposing artificial boundaries if you don’t need to.
Okay, I’m done. Last word’s yours if you want it.
Sorry, one more final thought to get away from the various should’vewould’vecould’ves that have popped up in the multiple fronts of this debate.
IMO, Peter Parker works best when there’s the illusion that we’re observers of his life rather than simply watching a valuable piece of intellectual property being run through the formula.
Anything that sustains that illusion (Break-ups, marriages (and, yes, divorces), job changes, etc.), regardless of whether or not I would have advocated for it before it happened*, I’ll generally support. (Exceptions to every rule, of course.)
Anything that busts the illusion (clone swaps, reality alterations), I’ll be against because the very act of busting the illusion means the “fixes” are far worse than the “problems” they were supposed to address.
All that said, the window for undoing the Mephisto revision is long since closed. Whatever path the character’s on now, it needs to be stuck to.
(*Which I wouldn’t have. I’ve never been the type to say stuff like “this dating stuff is getting boring; he should get married already.” If I’m bored, it’s time for me to move on, not the series.)
Dave that’s just “Dave” here – as I said before, there’s no lack of objectivity. I already said I think of all the Spidey I’ve ever read it’d be around 50/50 for married/unmarried, and I think the last few years have been good – much better than the JMS era – but I think they’d have been the same without OMD having happened.
Maybe if all these writers’ opinions included Slott pointing out which of his stories just couldn’t have happened with a married Peter I’d have to concede that there is a legitimate argument against a married Spidey. So far the only one here is that Spider-man isn’t (just) a character, but an intellectual property who needs a publishing strategy – but that’s more about marketing and business than stories.
HR really lost me with that last post – the one that complained about objectivity then became a somewhat personal attack on whiny readers, while also acknowledging not being able to attest to whether or not any of the post-marriage stories needed a single Peter Parker. I don’t know where all that ‘Give him back to meee!’ stuff came from.
Once more – I have no personal preference, other than preferrring that a character behaves like a character, and not a device that needs fixing (despite no solid evidence that it’s broken).
I also find it hard to believe you can say Pete marrying MJ doesn’t make sense, but if you mean the IP and not the character, OK – that’s clearly not what I meant.
I know what you meant, Dave, but you can’t approach Spider-Man as a character without taking the ongoing IP aspect into consideration. They are *not* two completely unrelated things.
With regards to Archie, as someone born in the 1980s, I think one would encounter Archie digests mostly on line at the grocery store or in the pharmacy, or even at a newsstand, but not in a comic book store. Maybe it was also a comic strip on Sundays? I can’t really recall, but I feel like I must have read at least one story at some point or another. My girlfriend, on the other hand, read tons of Archie comics as a kid, but never read any other comics and doesn’t read comics as an adult. I suspect that the relaunch is trying to tap into the growing market of female readers. My gf has really loved Saga, which I’ve given to her, and might be open to reading an Archie book done by Fiona Staples. Will be interesting to see how the book does. (Well, I suspect)
Aside from “Sugar, Sugar” a few other more recent pop cultural references come to mind:
Archie subtext scene from Chasing Amy: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q7jbDprab-4
and Brubaker and Philips’ Last of the Innocent Archie noir pastiche