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Post by The Cheat on Dec 18, 2020 14:12:03 GMT -5
As long as it's not to the exclusion of other types of stories, then yes, definitely. At the time there was plenty of other Spider-Man titles to pick up if you didn't like the tone of adjectiveless.
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Post by Deleted on Dec 18, 2020 14:23:15 GMT -5
Not to mention The Punisher first appeared in Spidey 129....add that to some of the most violent Marvel characters being affiliated with webhead.
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Post by Deleted on Dec 18, 2020 14:24:36 GMT -5
I’ve been reading some early 90s Spider-Man recently. Via eBay, I bought The Complete Spider-Man (many, many issues). Each monthly issue reprinted the 4 core Spidey titles.
And they all seem dark, whether it be the “Return of the Sinister Six” arc or anything else. Other stories I am reading include Puma wishing to battle Spidey to the death, Aunt May’s partner, Nathan, close to death, people dying left right and centre, Mary Jane being stalked due to her acting job, etc, etc.
McFarlane’s is the darkest of the lot, but when I hear people criticising his dark stuff, well it’s not like the other stuff was light.
(The letters pages in The Complete Spider-Man seem about 80% in favour of McFarlane, 20% against. Comparisons to Judge Dredd and Batman keep coming up)
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Post by berkley on Dec 18, 2020 15:11:04 GMT -5
The whole symbiote thing happened long after I stopped following Marvel comics so I have no nostalgia or feeling of any kind for it based on a reading experience. The concept itself, as far as I understand it, isn't one I find appealing or interesting so an entire MU "event" built on it is a complete non-starter for me.
I have the impression they're running out of ideas for these things and are at the point where they're really starting to scrape the bottom of the barrel.
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Post by Deleted on Dec 18, 2020 15:50:13 GMT -5
The whole symbiote thing happened long after I stopped following Marvel comics so I have no nostalgia or feeling of any kind for it based on a reading experience. The concept itself, as far as I understand it, isn't one I find appealing or interesting so an entire MU "event" built on it is a complete non-starter for me. I have the impression they're running out of ideas for these things and are at the point where they're really starting to scrape the bottom of the barrel. I understand there’ll be repetition after many decades of Spidey action. I get that they’ll repeat themselves. But I just wish less could be more. If it was a 3-issue or 4-issue arc about the symbiotes, I might be interested; but I’m not interested in multi-issue ‘events’ with lots of tie-in issues. I get that that is what sells - and the masses will lap it up - but it’s not for me. Just imagine what the Galactus Trlilogy would be like if it was being published for the first time today. 12 issues or more. Lots of tie-ins, even when it’s not appropriate (does a street level anti-hero like Venom really need to tie into the likes of, say, “War of the Realms”?). Today, the Galactus Trilogy would involve everyone from Daredevil to Luke Cage while the main story would run for all eternity.
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Post by tarkintino on Dec 18, 2020 16:05:45 GMT -5
Less is never more with Marvel. I suspect that if Secret Wars was published today, it’d be 24 issues long - and with 30,000 tie-in issues. Wait...you mean the House of Opportunists didn't do that?
OP: Spider-Man's nature is that of a person born of darkness (the reason he made his decision about power & responsibility), and constantly faced double-barrelled threats to his personal and "professional" life that no teenager / young adult (in a normal world) would under any circumstances. That's Spider-Man's world, which is why its no shock that the greatest Spider-Man stories ranged from grim, to dark and tragic. For that to be the weight Parker/Spider-Man carries on his shoulders while still growing into manhood made him appealing in ways not matched by more experienced (and older) superheroes; he was learning along the way, with no mentoring or being part of a group, yet he lived the drama of several people all at the same time.
Spider-Man being some jovial quip-machine (as too many cartoons, live action adaptations and articles about the comic have presented him) missed the point: Parker was more sardonic than a jokester, a reaction to the idea that he was a young man dealing with a world of evil most adults would avoid like the plague. When it threaded its way into his personal life, the comic never worked better, particularly when truly good people were endangered (Aunt May) or could not escape the deadly "curse" of Spider-Man (the Stacys). The running plot of truly good people--a light in Parker's life--mercilessly snuffed out due to his own existence (which he never denied) is the character at his finest. Sure, some Spider-Man stories have lighter moments, but those are and should be rare, instead of the opposite, which leads to the kind of Spider-Man characterization seen on Spider-Man and his Amazing Friends.
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Post by Duragizer on Dec 18, 2020 18:30:00 GMT -5
It looks to me like they overdosed on both Venom and Carnage for quite awhile. I still like Venom. He's basically Bizarro Spider-Man; I don't take him seriously at all. Carnage, though ... yeah. A nihilist serial killer is someone I want dead after their third or fourth appearance.
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Post by beccabear67 on Dec 18, 2020 19:13:38 GMT -5
It looks to me like they overdosed on both Venom and Carnage for quite awhile. I still like Venom. He's basically Bizarro Spider-Man; I don't take him seriously at all. It did make for an interesting early Spider-Girl issue... but that's a single issue.
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Post by zaku on Dec 19, 2020 4:28:19 GMT -5
There wasn't a period in the 80s where Spidey's stories were a little darker than the usual (black costume period)? I remember him dealing with drug dealers and IRA terrorists.
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